Update garden and new little chicks

So yesterday we got the new hens... well iddy biddy hens they are....

not even sure you can see them too well but the bigger white birds where the iddy biddy ones from the last post.  The Rhode Island Red hens are about the same size here as the meat birds were when we got them.  It is easy to see how fast they grow. 

We have had soo much rain the past week that the garden hasn't done a lot of growing.  We need more sun.  Today is nice and the next couple.  The next update will probably show more progress.

from front to back - pak choy, radishes, jacob cattle bean, kale, peas, rhubarb,and behind that are some winter squash



front to back - winter squash, to left jacob cattle to right cherry tomato (had a little space to stick in a few more items)
behind that more pak choy and the strawberry patch behind that is the slope where cucumbers, summer squash, beets and more radishes live, then along the fence at the bottom of the hill are some sunflowers. 



in the foreground is the herb garden - camomile, basil, oregano, caraway, wormwood, rue, more basil, lavendar and various sorts of wildflowers - not blooming yet
behind the herb garden to the left are carrots, chard, parsnips, our blueberry bushes, then corn
and behind them the pole beans.

My grandson will be here next week, so maybe we'll work on a little weeding expecially in the perennial bed and then I'll post some pictures of flowers.  The peonies are blooming and iris and columbine too.  I'm just too ashamed on the condition of the beds to post pictures just yet.  I went down on Tuesday and did a little work, but they're in bad shape because of neglect.  The flowers bloom reqardless of my lack of attention, but they look a lot prettier if I spend some time there weeding and fussing over them.

I'll write more later.

Have a wonderful weekend!

Lil chicks

This was last week... they've tripled in size since then.  Time for a new picture.  These are the meat birds.  It's have to believe that in September they will dress out at 11-12 lbs.  They just grow incredibly fast.

The Garden continued

We has a little excitement in the chicken coop today.  Mr. D went into the coop to collect eggs.  I was in the garden not far away and soon I heard him yelling for me to come.  I came as quick as I could and he had a board across a metal trash barrel.  He told me to go get a lid big enough to cover the can.  We have lots of barrels, so I ran and grabbed one quickly.  Inside the can was a fox.  Apparently Mr. D had caught him in the act of terrorizing our hens.  He had killed 3 and was looking for more.  Well in my opinion once they get the taste for chicken there's no coop safe from that fox so we did the only thing we could and that was his demise.  It's a sad thing for the fox, but happy for the hens who will not worry about him again.  I don't think he was very healthy anyway.  It looked to me like he was suffering from mange and had quite a few ticks.  I took pictures of him, but didn't want to post any here.  There are many out there who are not happy that you have to kill any animal, but farmers know there are some limits.

The garden is doing much better after the recent rain.  Strawberries got a little too much water just when the berries were developing, but we picked all the red ones we could find and hope the rain will ease up now and the rest will be good too.  They sure are yummy.  We don't grow enough to save them up, but we enjoy them right away.  I had mine with some yogurt.  Yum, Yum. When Brandon come next week maybe we'll have enough to make some shortcake or have some over ice cream.

Here what the garden looked like this morning:

Amazing what a little rain will do.  Notice the cover over the strawberries.  If we didn't do this the Cedar Waxwings would be all over them.  Sorry the pics are so blurry.

This is only about 1/4 of the garden.  The corn is also up and the squash, cucumbers, tomatoes etc are all doing well.  I'll take some better pictures next time. 

Hope your gardens are all doing well this year.

The garden is in and started - From last week....

I wrote this last week, but of course did not get it edited and posted.  So here we go...

Progress on the garden...

On May 28 we tilled the garden.  For two days before that we hauled in a couple loads of manure and put in all the compost and chicken manure from last year.  This makes the soil rich and dark and great for growing veggies.  We also get plenty of weeds, but the soil is soft, so pulling weeds isn't a huge issue. 

We planned out all the spots for the veggie seeds we had... here's our list from earlier...


Miragreen - peas
Gotta Have - It corn
Ozark Beauty - strawberries
Gentry Hybrid - summer squash
French Breakfast - radishes
Macintosh apple tree
Herbs ...
Sage
Dill
Basil
Thyme
Marjoram
Jacob Cattle - beans
Romano - pole beans
Straight Eight - cucumbers
Burgess Buttercup - winter squash
lots of winter squash seeds, lettuce, carrot, pak choy seeds left
Ruth Bible beans

Some were ordered, some were saved from last year....

We planted some other things too...
Lavender
Several different types of Basil to see which we like the best.
Pak Choy (free seed)
Kale  (green -eating and also flowering)
Beets
Carrots (from some free seed that were given to us)
Lettace (free seed)
Since we pull the last of the Parsnips we planted some of those, but we won't be harvesting them for a couple years.
We planted three variety of winter squash that we especially liked from last year all from saved seeds.  The planted we started early are doing well.

I also planted some flowers in pots for sunny areas.  I can't see paying such high prices for flowers.  Some of these that I planted are prennial, so they will be back next year too, some are annuals which will only be around this year because we have not space to keep them indoors.

Nothing purking yet... was very dry for a couple weeks....

to be continued.

Getting ready to plant

We've been busy getting all ready for planting day on Monday.  Hoping for at least a bit of dry weather on that day and the day before.  The weatherman has been saying thunderstorms, but we are hoping they will miss us.   The dump truck had to be registered to the tune of $180... then there is some repair before it is inspected but we have till June 10 to do that.  We'll haul in 2-3 loads of manure because it is the best stuff to grow in... weeds galore, but we just feed those to the birds.  The chickens have been let loose in the garden this spring so not only have they had lots of green stuff to eat, we have gotten rid of quite a few of those pesky weeds and added a little fertilizer too. 

I planted the window boxes this week and a couple of potted plants for the end of the driveway.  The grass needs to be mowed and I probably can get to that tonight if it's not raining. 

Monday is planting day.  We have a map worked up and ready and the tiller is ready to roar.  I hope we will be able to post some pictures here on Tuesday. 

We are planting Romano Beans, Ruth Bible Beans and Jacob Cattle Beans, cucumbers
Lutz Winter Keeper Beets.  I bought 6 Roma Tomatoes and 6 Jet Star
We have Peas of a couple varieties, Zucchini, and as usual lots of winter squash from saved seeds, We bought corn seeds and I always plant sunflowers.   This year we dug up the last of the parsnips, so I purchased some more seed though that won't be harvested for another couple years.  If our growing season we just a little longer we could have a new crop each spring, but I let the last ones grow two years and they were just right.

Some of the herbs came back, but I started some others in the little greenhouse.

Here's some of my spring blooms in the garden this year.

pink barrenwort

lupines - no flower spikes yet

double daffodils - nearly all gone by today

not sure of the name, Mr. D bought these for me the first year here
I really like the little (cornflower) blue blossoms.

more little daffodils... light colored ones have multiple blossoms
on each stem

doesn't look very big, but was quite a job to get sod and rocks
out of this bed... day lilies and iris planted here... very wet!

That's what's happening at our place so far.  Lots more to do though, so more pictures later.

Rain, Rain, go away....

don't know what it says on this clip art, but liked this little rainy-day picture

I wanted to get down to the end of the driveway to take some pictures of the flower beds, but twice now I get 1/2 way down the driveway with my camera and it begins to pour.  The poor daffodils are all bowed down in the wet.  I did notice the bleeding hearts have come back from last year and they are blooming.  Also I noticed some slugs on different things... gotta get those egg shells down PRONTO.

I will get some pictures on here as soon as I can.  Mr. D was out weeding the veggie garden and I cut some rhubarb to sell along with our eggs.  We have two rows of rhubarb and it's usually the first crop to come up.  We got a little asparagus last night too.  Yum. 

I want to send you to one of my favorite blogs...  Across My Kitchen Table  my friend Mrs. T has some great comments about springtime there.  She is also a wonderful "cooker" and baker and likes to share her recipes.  We have enjoyed her cooking at church dinners and special occasions.  We have twice been to their home for Thanksgiving which have been wonderful times of fellowship, fun and of course delicious food.

We have known each other for quite some time, but have only become true friends in the past few years.  I have great respect for Mr. and Mrs. T and am glad to call them friends and of course we are family... in the Lord which makes it even more special.

Hope you enjoy her blog as much as I do!

Finally a little spring

We've had some beautiful spring weather the last few days.  Yesterday and today is wet and will probably be wet the rest of this week, but last week was so nice and warm with many sunny days.  It makes the wet days tolerable.  I noticed that the new little apple trees are beginning to leaf out finally.  I was afraid for them after such a hard winter, but they are coming along.

The day before Mother's Day, our local fire dept auxillary had its annual plant sale.  We bought some wet-loving plants to put in down at then end of the driveway.  It is always wet there, but the water seems to flow right through and in the dryer season will be dry, so we picked up some more day lilies...

These are "Kwanzaa Double Day lilies.  They will probably not bloom this year... or maybe they will.  The other day lilies that we had there already have bloomed very well for the past few years.  We also got some iris...

The Siberian Iris

larger Purple Iris...

and we also transplanted our German Bearded Iris which had multiplied well, but did not do well where we had it planted because of slug attacks.

These should look pretty all together there.  It will be nice if they all fill in that wet spot.  Mr. D also went back on that Monday and asked if they had any left-over plants.  He wanted to get me another Peony.  So the lady who helps run the plant sale went to her own garden and gave him a little Rose Peony...

Of course none of these pictures are my flowers... mine look more like orphan green stems and leaves right now, but we are hopeful that they will fill in and look nice next year. 

Mr. D was able to use the Blazer to pull out all the small trees that were growing on the road-side of the rock wall over to the neighbors driveway, so now our driveway entrance looks more manicured.  I'll take some pictures when the sun comes back out so you can see the progress.

I just love to get my hands into the dirt.  Thank the Lord we have summer... makes all the long winter tolerable.

Hope you are all having a good week.