Better late than never

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sorry, to be gone so long.  Life happened.  Not much has changed here on the farm but I thought I would let everyone know we are still around. 

 

 

I had some success with my tomatoes until the hornworms and drought hit.  By the time, I figured out that hornworms were eating my tomatoes, they were almost too far gone to come back.  We picked them off by hand and sprinkled Sevin dust around.  I know that is a dreaded pesticide but I was a little desperate to save my tomatoes.

 

 

This season we had planted three different types of tomatoes.  Cherokee purples, Rutgers, and Red beefsteak.  For flavor, I must say that I liked the Cherokee purples the best.  For durability and continued output, the Rutgers did great but the tomatoes got smaller and smaller as the season went on.  I have a feeling the drought may have been the reason though.  I do not think I will try the Beefsteak tomatoes again. I had only three of those but they did very little and the tomatoes that I did get had no flavor.

 

I got one very small cabbage from my nine cabbage plants.  The flea beetles got the rest along with my Brussels sprouts. There was nothing but skeletons left no matter what I did to try to save them. My broccoli gave me several small heads that I was able to put in the freezer.  I got three quart bags out of all nine plants. 

 

This was a good experiment to see what I could do.  I know what I can plant but that I need to amend my soil in all of the boxes and tires.  I will need to add some sand and composted manure to all my raised beds.  All of the beds have settled down and now the soil in them are about 4 -5 inches below the edge of the boxes.

 

Here are pictures of the boxes as they are now, getting ready to add the amendments and let them sit over the winter.

 

 

Along with working on the raised bed garden, we are about to finally start our chicken coop.  Some friends gave us an old metal storage building.  We were also given an old metal chicken nesting box that has 14 nest boxes in it.  All we had to do is clean it up and put new bottoms and landing bars on the front of it.

 

 

The Blacksmith has already put new roosting bars and a new bottom in the bottom boxes.  He still needs to put the individual bottoms in the top boxes.  These will be a little more tedious to do.  Each will have to be measured and cut individually.  We will mount this nesting box inside the metal building. 

 

First, before all that we are going to build a small raised deck to lift the building up off the ground about two feet.  We also located a gentlemen that recycles metal and has used metal fence posts for sale.  We bought our first bundle of those to fence our chicken yard in with.  Once we have everything together, I will post again to give an update on completion.

 

 

 

But, while we are getting the materials together to do all that we plan, I am enjoying our fall weather and the beauty of God's handiwork.

 

 

Successes and Failures

The Krooked Pine Farm has had to take a little bit of a back seat to training for a new job and sickness.
 

The Blacksmith has had two bouts of pancreatitis for which one of he had to be admitted to the hospital and another incident of an abscess that tried to cause sepsis that also called for another admission to the hospital. 

The Blacksmith is well on his way to good health.  He has more doctor visits to do, but seems to be doing much better. 

 

Now, on to the Krooked Pine.  When I last left you, we had started making fence posts and raised garden beds.  We did not get very far with the fence posts when the Blacksmith got sick.  We did get the beds finished  before that though and I had planted numerous peat pots of tomato seeds and cabbage family seeds.   I have not been able to figure out what I did wrong with them but after they all reached about 2 to 3 inches in height, they all died.  I do not know if I was supposed to transplant them at that stage or what but they all died.  I watered them all as the directions on the peat pots advised but alas, a seeding green thumb, I do not have.

 

Those are the failures so far.  Now, on to the successes we have had.  As I said, we got the raised garden beds in place and filled.  When the seedlings all died, I went ahead and bought broccoli, Brussels sprout, and cabbage transplants.  Those were transplanted into the smaller of the two wooden beds.

 

 This was a few days after planting.  In this bed, I have nine broccoli plants at the far end, nine Brussels sprouts in the middle, and nine cabbage plants on this end. At the far end, next to the bed wall, I planted some icicle radish seeds.  Along the wall, to the right of the transplants, I have planted two different kinds of carrots. 

I think they grew a little bit. 

The radishes are doing great.

They are little hard to see but the carrots are coming up.  I think I planted the seeds a little too deep but they are on their way.

As you can see, we had to put bird netting up with pvc to keep our cat, Tootie, from visiting the bed.  These supports were so easy.  We just slid them down inside the bed and let the soil support them Then using roofing tacks wrapped the bird netting over the bed and secured it.  The rain can still get to the plants.  These supports also came in handy when we had a threat of a freeze.  We just pulled a tarp over the bed and secured it to keep it from blowing away.  No losses.

Now, on to the tire beds.

In this bed is a one hundred bulb set of sweet, yellow onions.  I think at least ninety nine of them have sprouted.  Yeah!

 

This is also our first try at potatoes.  We put out one set of Kennebec potatoes.  This is what we have so far. 

So, while we are growing what we have planted so far, getting over sickness, and learning a new job,
we are enjoying the gifts of God with this beautiful spring. 

 

The view of this great Dogwood out my front door is magnificent.

 

I do not know what this is but I thought is was pretty in my side yard.  There are numerous clumps of it there. 

 

Our red oaks are budding out.

 These last two need no description.

Hope you enjoyed this update.  Enjoy spring, it is so fleeting. 

Thank you, Lord, for your miracle of life and the beauty that you allow to surround us.
 

 

Free, Free, Free. Yay!

 

 

This interruption of fence post cutting and scraping is brought to you by free lumber for raised garden beds and BIG tires for garden beds.  Yay!

 

I was beginning to think we would not have our other beds ready once it was time to plant our seedlings.

 

 

 

We got several very thick boards that will work to create a twelve foot long by four foot wide garden bed.  And with the four big tires, that will give us four more smaller beds.  Even though it was getting dark by the time we got it all loaded and to the house, Mr Blacksmith was ready to get started on the long bed.

 

 

 

 

We got the two long sides completed, before it got too dark to work.  Tomorrow, we will complete the end caps and set it in place.

 

 

 

So glad the wood came up finally.  Even though it is still about 4 weeks before we really start planting, it will be nice to know we will not be running around like a chicken with its head cut off looking for material for beds.   I will post an update and show the bed completed along with the tires in place.  But for now,

 time to get ready for bed.

 

 

 



Posting for a Fellow Blogger, "5 Acres and A Dream"

A subscriber and fellow blogger that I have followed for a while has written a book about her and her husband's journey to be self-reliant and homesteaders.  She has now sold over 500 copies of her new book which I think is just great.   Lady Leigh is now holding a contest to give away a copy of her book and I am entering to win a copy so I have more information to fall back on in our journey to our own homestead and our own attempt at self-reliance.  So, for Lady Leigh here is the link to her posting and her blog:

     http://www.5acresandadream.com/2014/03/giveaway-celebrating-over-500-copies.html

 

 

Lady Leigh, here is to continued success for your book and your blog.

 

And if there is anyone else out there that finds my blog of any interest, please, feel free to subscribe.

 

It's free.

 

Thanks

 

Lady Hawke

Fence posts, How to Afford Them

 

We have had a little bit of a dilemma in trying to decide how to provide the fence post for a goat area.  When we priced them at the local feed and seed and Tractor Supply and Home Depot, we found that for the number of posts that we need, we just cannot afford them. 

 

So, we looked back on how the pioneers did their fence posts.  We want to be more self-reliant and not have to depend on the store for everything we need.  We looked around our land and saw that we have so many pine trees that are just the right diameter for fence posts.  Mr. Blacksmith and I both came to the same conclusion.  Why not use the wood we have?  We had already decided to clear an area behind the shed to plant our small orchard of fruit trees.  The pines had to go anyway, so why not? 

 

Well, we had the drawknife, we just need a log dog to hold the logs to strip the bark off.   We love to watch a Youtube video blogger called "Wranglerstar."   By learning from his tutorial, Mr Blacksmith learned to build our own log dog from scrap pallet wood.  So other than the screws to put it together it did not cost anything.

 

 

This was our first log to work on so we still needed to make some modifications.  The tall uprights had to be trimmed down a little.  But here are a few pictures of Mr. Blacksmith in action stripping the posts.

 

 

 

 

This is the area that we are going to clear for our fruit trees. 

Goodbye pine trees, hello fence posts, hello soon-to-plant fruit trees.

 

 

 

After they are stripped, we are going to coat them in a wood preservative of which  we are still researching.   One down, many more to go.

 

 

Shared with: Down Home Blog Hop~ Number 78 + Homemade Body Butter

 

Spring Fever, Getting Ready for Warm Weather.

 

 

As those of you who follow me know, we are starting our first garden this year.  Having been over the road truck drivers, time never allowed us to plant a garden, tend to it, and harvest anything that might have grown in it.

 

So, I am going to share with you my journey of trying to grow seedlings for transplanting in our garden.  If you see anything that I might try to do different that will work better, please, leave me a comment.  I will try my best to follow your advise.

 

I follow Jackie Clay of "Ask Jackie" of the Backwoods Home Magazine.  I noticed that she uses the Jiffy Peat Pots.  So, I thought if they are good enough for her, I will try them and see how it goes.  I went down to the local feed and seed store and got three trays.

 

My first set of seeds that I planted are 6 different kinds of tomatoes.  I followed all the directions on the packaging and this is the result.

 

 

Just about every seed that I planted came up.  Being, that so far I am having some success, I will show you what I did. 

 

First, you start with a tray of peat pots.  Now, just so you know, I do not receive any money for endorsing any products that appear in my blog.  At least, not yet.  And if and when I do, I will let you  know.  Now.

 

 

The directions say that if you want to hydrate the whole tray to add ten and a half cups of water to the tray.  This will cover the peat pots by about an inch and a half to two inches. 

 

 

 

After adding the water, you wait.  As you wait, you may see a few air bubbles come up out of the peat pots and see the water level go down.  But unless you like to watch paint dry, I would get some other chores done.  Give the tray about 30 minutes of sitting time and when you get back you will have this.

 

 

Now is when your fingers will get just a little dirty.  I found that you need some small tools for opening the peat and then, pushing the seeds down in the peat and then covering them up.  These are what I used. 

 

 

The fork, I used for picking up the netting on each pot to help open it up.  The fine point Sharpie, was used to mark what kind of seeds were being planted on each of the plastic plant markers.  The toothpicks were used to fluff the peat, push the seed down into the peat, and then firm up the peat on top of the seeds.  The plate has a special purpose, also, I will explain. 

 

Before opening each pot to plant the seeds, you have to be able to handle the seeds.  I use the paper plate for this.  Each pouch of seeds is poured out into the plate.  Then you can get to each seed.

 

 

After I was finished with each type of seed, I used a funnel placed in the neck of the pouch and poured the leftover seeds back in its proper pouch.  I made sure to only work with one type of seed at a time.

 

 

 

In each pot, I opened the netting that holds each peat pot.  I tried to place 3 seeds in each pot.  Using the toothpick I pushed each seed down into the peat.  I tried to just push it down far enough that I could not see it anymore, about one fourth of an inch.  Then, using the toothpick, I firmed up the peat and covered each seed.

 

 As I finished with each type of seed, I need to mark what each pot contained.  Each tray held 72 peat pots.  So, I used 12 pots per type of plant.  This tray contained 3 different kinds of cabbage, 1 type of broccoli, 1 type of cauliflower, and 1 type of brussel sprouts.  These are all part of the cabbage family.  With all the differences, I need to know what was in each pot.  I used an old plastic mini-blind that was no longer serviceable for a window.  Mr. Blacksmith took it apart for me and cut each slat into smaller useable pieces.  For every 12 pots, I made a marker.  Each one was about three and a half to 4 inches long.  I wrote on each one what kind of seed was planted in those pots.

 

 

 After this, I put the clear plastic lid on to create a greenhouse effect and put the entire tray in my guest bathroom which somehow is the warmest room in our home.  I put the tray on top of a heating pad that has a timer on it and set it to the next to the lowest setting so I would not cook my seeds.   Oh yeah, I made sure to leave the light on in there.  

 

After this is the waiting game.   Hopefully, if I have done everything right, I will have some cabbage family plants in a few days.  According to everything I have read, I can put these out in the garden bed approximately 3 weeks before our last average frost date.  If there is a threat of frost after that I will cover them up with blankets or plastic.  

 

Thanks for reading.  Hope that what I am doing will help someone else.  

Like I said before, this is our first garden.  Don't take what I do as gospel.  I am learning, too.  If you are more experienced and know something that will help, I am all ears.  Thanks for stopping by.

 

 

Shared with: Down Home Blog Hop~ Number 78 + Homemade Body Butter

 

 

 

Winter Storm Warning

 

Well, here we go again.  The weather service is predicting that we are going to get a 'dusting' of snow.  

 

But with this prediction, we have a little bit of a different situation here at the Krooked Pine Farm.  After five months of looking for employment, I am now working for a 911 center nearby.  My first day was yesterday.  For the next 6 months, I will be on probation and in training.   So with this weather prediction, we three trainees were sent home as we were really useless in answering phones and sending calls for assistance to the people in the communities. 

 

It seems that the weather service kind of underestimated the speed at which this storm was going to come in.  I was still at work when the Blacksmith posted these pictures to let me know how bad it was already at home. 

 

 

For those of you that look at this and think, "that's nothing."  You are right, for an area that has the infrastructure to take care of it.  We live in the south in Georgia.  Due to this rarely happening, Georgia does not budget for such happenings.   This is what the weather service expected.  This is a dusting.  This, most anybody could handle.  But it did not stop at this. 

When I got home, this is what it had become.

 

 

A little while later, we had this.

 

 

A short time after this, we had this.

 

 

And finally, after the snow stopped, we had this.

 

 

Even this, for people who live in areas that get snow all winter long, is nothing.  But in the south, this is a disaster.   The grocery stores are stripped bare of any kind of bread or milk.  These are the first things to go. 

 

The Blacksmith and I are well set to weather most any storm.  We have two, four wheel drive vehicles.  We have food stocked including bread and milk.  But this time, we realized that we were very low on propane gas for our back up heat supply.  Our home is, unfortunately, total electric.  If the power goes out we are without heat.  So we have a old propane heater that will heat our entire home, if needed.  Thankfully, the propane gas company is just down the road about six miles. 

 

This is what we saw in route.

 

 

Turns out, we were not the only ones getting propane.

 

 

So, we got our tanks filled.

 

 

For somebody from, say, Michigan or Wyoming or Montana, they would laugh at how we react to something as simple as three inches of snow.  I, also, think it is kinda funny, as I have driven an eighteen wheeler in much worse weather than this.  But, the roads that I drove on had snow plows and road sanders or salters.  In the south, we are lucky to have a dump truck throw out a little sand on the bridges here or there.  Some cities have a road scraper go through town to move the worst of the snow off of main street and some of the other major arteries so the ambulances and fire trucks can move around town.  

 

So, please, don't laugh at us too hard.  We are just not used to this kind of weather.  If you look at my earlier posts, you will see one of the last snow storms we had.  That was back before we had even moved our home onto our land.  The Year so Far in Pictures

 

So, for those of you in the south, be careful and try to stay home.  For those of you elsewhere, be thankful you have the infrastructure to help deal with these little 'dustings'.  Stay warm.

 

 

Shared with:  Down Home Blog Hop