How Does Your Garden Grow? July 1st

July 1st: We have been short on rain lately, but the garden is coming along alright.  Thing have been busy so I haven't gotten all of what I had hoped planted, but I have gotten the most important things in.

I realize that it is a little hard to read the words on my drawing.  Here's what's in each quadrant.

Quadrant 1: Peas, cucumber, dill, green beans, yellow wax beans, cauliflower, broccoli, cantaloupe,

Quadrant 2: Sweet peppers, green bell peppers, banana peppers, zucchini, summer squash, acorn squash, carrots, onions, lettuce, spinach, slicing and cherry tomatoes, Roma tomatoes, San Marzano tomatoes, onions and carrots

Quadrant 3: Corn with beans

Quadrant 4: Potatoes, sweet potatoes, beans, watermelon.

** Click on photos to see them enlarged and scroll through backwards to watch progression **

Full View

BUMMER!   Forgot to take a picture

July 1st: Enjoyed some more strawberries, kids' flowers coming up nicely - my flower plots planted

June 1st: Enjoyed a few strawberries from new transplants. Kids each planted a plot of flower seeds opposite strawberries.  Needint to plant my flower plots. Excited to see experimental direct seeded asparagus up and joining asparagus transplants started indoor from seed.

Quadrant 1

July 1st: harvesting and canning green beans and broccoli, enjoying the first of my late planted peas, cauliflower planted

June 1st: needing to plant herbs, lettuce behind peas, and eventually fall broccoli and cauliflower

Quadrant 2

July 1st - harvesting some carrots and lettuce, onions and carrots planted between tomato plants - needing to plant acorn squash and basil. needing to support tomatoes

June 1st: harvesting lettuce and baby carrots - needing to plant acorn squash and basil

Quadrant 3

July 1st - sunflowers and all corn planted - planted pumpkins and gourds elsewhere on farm

June 1st : needing to plant 3 rows of late sweet corn, sunflowers, pumpkins, and gourds

Quadrant 4

July 1st: all plants planted. volunteer watermelon came up were beans were going so didn't plant beans (will try fall beans in place of potatoes)

June 1st - needing to plant 3rd row of sweet potato slips, watermelon and beans

Blueberries and Vines

July1st: enjoyed many blueberries form smaller bushes, planted second row of blueberries - needing to move grapes over a few feet to the right, plant another planting of sunflowers, and mulch

June 1st: nibbled on some unripe, but nicely tart, blueberries - needing lots of work and planting yet!

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De-Beeing our New Shed

Earlier this spring we brought in a new building to our farm. We are going to fix it up and put it to use soon - but first we had to get out the bees!  Our friend who keeps some hives on our farm helped us with this, and he got a new hive.

 

The tiny opening where they were going in 

Setting up the "Bee Vac"

 

Getting some of the bees from the outside first

 

Time to move inside.  There entrance was right under where the sunlight was coming in.

 

Corner board removed.  Except those aren't honey bees, but bumble bees!

 

Removing the bumble bees

 

There are the honey bees!

 

A peek inside

 

A better peek inside 

 

Collecting the bees

 

A shot downward after many bees had been captured

     

  

Bees in their box, ready to be relocated.

I had to leave for the last part, but the comb was removed - the honey was not dry enough to be used so it will be given to the bees who will take it into their new hive.  And now our building is ready to be worked on!

How Does Your Garden Grow? - June 1st

I thought it would be fun to do a little photo journal of my garden this year. This is the first year I have really had it set up how I want.  We've been slowly tilling up new land, running hogs in it for fertilization, and battling the joys of starting a new garden. (Weeds, grass, soil quality, etc.) There's a little more work that needs to be done - putting a border and rock down at the hydrant, tilling up the berry/grape end (not shown in the drawing) and fencing it in. (We will be using field fence and will be including the orchard in the fence, which is directly behind the garden - this is as much to keep our livestock out!)

I have decided to garden with quadrant gardening.  I will be rotating the 4 sections of my vegetable garden each year (moving 1 section to the right) to help control disease and nutrient loss.  I used some resources to piece together my quadrants.  It isn't exactly what was recommend, but it is what works for the types and amounts of plants I grow.  I also have some permanent and semi-permanent beds.  On the back, north side of the garden, is my asparagus.  In the front I have a strawberry patch and cut flower patch.  I will rotate the strawberries and flowers every 3 years for the benefit of the strawberries.  And then directly behind the strawberries and cut flowers is a permanent border with rhubarb.

Click to Enlarge

I realize that it is a little hard to read the words on my drawing.  Here's what's in each quadrant.

Quadrant 1: Peas, cucumber, dill, green beans, yellow wax beans, cauliflower, broccoli, cantaloupe, herbs

Quadrant 2: Sweet peppers, green bell peppers, banana peppers, zucchini, summer squash, acorn squash, carrots, onions, lettuce, spinach, slicing and cherry tomatoes, Roma tomatoes, San Marzano tomatoes, onions and carrots, basil

Quadrant 3: Corn with beans, pumpkins, gourds

Quadrant 4: Potatoes, sweet potatoes, beans, watermelon.

I have almost all of the above planted. I got things in a little later than hoped, but it's much earlier than I have been able to other years. I'm also excited that this year I was able to start all of my plants from seed, either inside or in the garden, except my hot peppers.  I only wanted 1 or 2 of each variety so it just worked better to buy those.

So with all of that said . . . here's how my garden grows in June. :)

Full View: Enjoyed a few strawberries from new transplants. Excited to see experimental direct seeded asparagus up and joining asparagus transplants started indoor from seed.

Quadrant 1: needing to plant herbs, lettuce behind peas, and eventually fall broccoli and cauliflower

Quadrant 2 : harvesting lettuce and baby carrots - needing to plant acorn squash and basil

Quadrant 3 - needing to plant 3 rows of late sweet corn, sunflowers, pumpkins, and gourds

Quadrant 4 - needing to plant 3rd row of sweet potato slips, watermelon and beans

Blueberries and Vines: nibbled on some unripe, but nicely tart, blueberries - needing lots of work and planting yet!

The 3rd Building on CGF Arrives!

As many of our blog followers might know, we purchased our farm about 4 years ago with absolutely nothing on it except trees, grasses, and massive ant hills. We have come along way since we first broke ground here, but we still have quite a bit of set up to do! 

One of the things that we are much in need of is more structures.  We have our house and our open face shed that we built, but that is it.  With all of our different livestock, we really would like more buildings.


About 1/2 mile away, on the top of the hill on an old farmstead, we saw this old 12 x 20 grain building.  We contacted the owners of the land, met with them and enjoyed hearing the history of the farmstead, and we were given permission to purchase and move the building.

Since it was built with 3 skids, which had been resting on concrete, it would have been a simple-ish task to move it to our property after a good snow, pulling it behind our tractor. But alas, we didn't have much snow this winter and it is now almost May.  So we did the next best thing. Ethan got ahold of his cousin, who also farms and can do about anything - and who has a grate trailer and an assortment of tractors, and requested some help.

I trailed behind with the camera to capture the process.  Here's my best attempt.
*You can click on the photos to enlarge them.


Ethan and Verne hooked up the front corners of the building with chains to the loaders of 2 4020 tractors.  They then lifted up the front of the building.


Verne backed the trailer under the building. (The trailer had some steel extensions on the bed so the skids would have support on them.)

Next, the building was hooked up to the winch.  This would have easily pulled the building up onto the trailer . . . except the winch wasn't getting power from the batteries or something.  I didn't ask!



So plan B - Pull both tractors parallel to the trailer, hook them up again to the corners of the building, and back the tractors up to pull the building onto the trailer.


 Now, the large, heavy building somewhat was on pivot point being pulled on different corners by 2 tractors.  All I will say is that it is a bit tricky to reverse at the same rate with 2 different tractors, and I was glad with the building was on the trailer and sitting still!


After the building was on the trailer, I had to take off to town with our kiddos for our home school coop.


Ethan said that they then chained the building to the trailer and headed down the road.


The 1/2 mile drive was uneventful, and they pulled up into our pasture behind the house.


Unloading the building seemed to be a bit easier, although pulling the building off with the tractor didn't seem to be the best way to go power wise.  They kept the tractor chained up, though, and just pulled the trailer ahead. The weight of the tractor seemed to do the trick as the trailer pulled ahead, and the building slid off the back.  Just before the last part of the building came off the trailer, they once again hooked the building up to both tractor loaders to hold it in the air while they finished pulling the trailer out, and then they gently lowered the end of the building to the ground.

So now we have another building here!  We have a bit of work to do before we use it though.  First off - we discovered that it came with honey bees in the walls! Thankfully we have a bee keeping friend who is excited to capture the colony for a hive.  We then need will need to reside it to keep it tight.  We need to make it predator safe since we plan on brooding some chicks in one of half of it. (There is a full wall in the middle, dividing the building in half.)  And lastly, before we pull it to its permanent location, we want to put some lengths of cement down to help it be level and stay off of the ground.  Since we will be putting a bit of work and some money into it, we want it to last a long time! 

So there you have it!  Hopefully I can get some pictures and posts of the bee extraction and fixing up of it. I'm sure excited to put it to use though!

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Asparagus and Fruit!

If you know Ethan and myself well, you will know that he is the meat guy and I am the fruit and vegetable gal.  Ethan would be perfectly happy to only eat meat - and never fruits or vegetables.  And although I do enjoy smaller portions of good meat, I would be perfectly happy to live off of fruits and vegetables.

Our farm is definitely a meat farm.  There's no getting around that.  But, I would love to take my love for fruits and vegetables - eating, growing, and preserving them, and add a little bit to the farm as well. Since these things aren't the main focus of the farm (read - our money and time need to go into the meat aspect of the farm right now), the fruits and veggies are going to need to be added slowly.  This year I've made some steps ahead though!

Along with my orchard, I finally got a nice row of black raspberries to winter over from moving starts up from the woods.  My brother dug up a rhubarb plant he didn't want from his new house - I divided around 60 roots from this plant!  I am also receiving some additional strawberry plants from my mom and everbearing red raspberries from a family friend.

I've had my eye on some asparagus in the ditches that I would have liked to move, but from what I have read, it is very hard to move.  Since I don't have a lot of time to spend trying to transplant something that might not take and not a lot of money to buy crowns for the size of patch I would like, I decided to give seeds a try.

So I purchased about $5 worth of seeds, made homemade planting pots out of newspaper and filled them with our very own compost, read the planting instructions, and planted the seeds.  (I tried half in my planting pots and half outside just to experiment. I haven't disturbed the mulch outside where I planted the ones outside, but my inside ones are growing!

I'm excited to see what will happen with these 200 seeds I planted, and I hope to have a nice asparagus patch down the road!

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Rabbits are Joining our Farm!

Our 7 yr old son, Caleb, has had a project going for the last few years making potholders and selling them to earn money for Gospel for Asia, along with managing and keeping a blog for it - Five Loaves Two Fish.  Well, now that he is close to turning eight and his sister is 6, it is time to pass the potholder creating to her. He wanted to find something else to take the place of his potholder business, and while reading You Can Farm by Joel Salatin, he discovered that Daniel, Mr. Salatin's son, began raising rabbits when he was 7.

Caleb decided that he would like to try to raise rabbits too, so for Christmas we bought him the book Story's Guide to Raising Rabbits, by Bob Bennett (There are a couple pages in this book that might be TMI for young kids, by the way - they can easily be removed though.) Since then, he has been reading, studying it, and taking notes over it, and this weekend he got his first rabbit. :)

On Saturday, Ethan and Caleb purchased the materials and built a movable, pastured rabbit hutch. Ethan didn't really have a design to work with, but did combine a few designs he came across and has heard about.  Each breeding doe will have a hutch like the one above, which will be her permanent home that moves across the pasture. When her babies are old enough to be weaned, they will be moved to a grower pen - yet to be built.

Here is another picture of the hutch while it was being constructed.  You can see the slats that allow the rabbit to graze and that the top slants a bit to allow rain to drain off.

This is the nesting area (minus the next box), and Caleb's first doe.  This is a Champagne d'Argent rabbit, a heritage breed rabbit.  We are also looking at getting some Creme d'Argent rabbits, which are just a color variation of the d'Argent rabbits.

Caleb is quite excited to finally have his rabbit, and is looking forward to getting a couple more bucks and does.  Along with learning to care for his rabbits, Caleb will also be keeping breeding records for his rabbits, learning to keep track of finances through Quick Books (along with learning about getting a loan from his parents - and paying back that loan!), and various other things that go along with running a business.  Caleb will also be putting a percentage of the money he earns into long term savings, offering (he wants to continue his Gospel for Asia projects), and spending - investing in his business or using it for getting something fun.  He is quite excited about raising rabbits, and it is a great opportunity for learning quite a bit!

Helpful links we used:
http://polyfaceapprentice.blogspot.com/2009/02/hare-pen.html#links
http://livingthefrugallife.blogspot.com/2009/03/meat-rabbits-on-pasture.html

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Our Newest Farm Babies

I realize that I don't post much to my blog anymore. Life is still quite full with keeping the farm and farm business going, picking up and delivering meat, Ethan still working 40 hours in town, and still homeschooling our children - now ages 7, 6, 3, and 13 months.  I just couldn't help but put up some pictures of the little babies that have arrived on our farm the last few weeks though. 

First a background story: This summer this momma pig surprised us by making a nest against a log out of gathered, fresh twigs. She had her baby pigs right out in the open woods, and they did wonderful!  This is what pigs were created to do!

This same momma pig just had another litter of piggies a few weeks ago.  She had 10 - all 10 survived and are doing great.  No farrowing crates needed for our smart momma pigs! (We don't own any by the way - the dumb mommas go elsewhere.) As you can see, half of her piggies look like her and half like their 100% purebred heritage Hereford daddy.

This is the first of our little lambs, born a week ago.  It is a Katahdin hair sheep and is doing wonderfully.

Just yesterday, we had a little calf born.  Our heritage Dexter momma did a great job cleaning him up, drying him off, and getting him nursing.  A must when born in the snow.

I would love to show you some new chicks, but as you can see by the snow - it's not quite time.  These are the eggs gathered from this morning.  I've been dreaming about hatching some out in an incubator for some more layers to be ready this summer, but we will have to wait until the weather warms and hens go clucky. (Unless anyone in the area has an incubator they are no longer in need of.)

So there you have it - the newest additions to Crooked Gap Farm.

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