Well, its Garden Monday, but the truth is, I am waiting for rain, but there has been a few things, I was able to collect and put away pint jar of radish seeds for sprouting in winter time, it should have been a quart jar but the little yard lamb seem to like them and as they were in the horse trough there were not behind the garden fence, so little I could do about it.
I have started getting fresh tomato’s this past week, along with green beans, radishes, onions, horseradish greens and green peppers, I am pretty sure if I dug, we would be able to get fresh new potatos, DH put down another couple hundred pds of mulch in the garden and taking things from our normal 2 to 4 inches of mulch to 4 to 6 inches of mulch seems to help perk the plants up.
I do have lots and lots of mints thriving in this heat..so I am wild crafting and drying mints.. Got another small bowl of mixed berries this past week, a few more currents, gooseberries and mulberries came in..
I am just amazed at the amount of wild parsnip that is thriving this year, we always have some (which we battle as its one of the few things DH reacts to if he gets swiped by it) but this is crazy, one of the land owners down the way (a couple farms over) used to have race horses and he has clearly gotten out of it, and is letting that feild be fallow and its currently a field of wild parsnip!, I really! really hope he takes the time to cut it down at the very least and to be honest, he needs to consider turning it and reseeding it, otherwise its just going to stay taken over!
On the flip side, we got the second side of the little barn all guttered off and more water barrels set up so that we can collect an extra 300 gallons from that side of the barn if it would ever just give us a really good rain! something we have talked about for years but never needed to do because for the past because what we had gave us more then enough water.
The price of critter feed has already gone up, a bag of starter that we got two months ago was 13 and where we in for a “what” when the same bag, make and model and the same store was up to 17 when we went back for one this weekend.. Now that is one heavy jump in a very short time and this years crops are not even in yet..hmmm
I read that 28 states in the US have declared themselves in a state of drought and that there will be minor to major crop failures in all the states listed, I tried to figure out if we have anything like that in canada at the moment but so far I could not find anything on it.
Have a great monday!
Just another Day on the Farm 
I know that our farmers are now saying we’re at a “critical stage” regarding rain. If we don’t get some soon, the corn isn’t going to have ears. Very few of the farmers can irrigate well enough to combat this, especially when they have acres and acres. I guess it says a lot when a bunch of Mennonites (not known for being boisterous!) all start cheering and running to the door when someone says “It’s raining!” just after church yesterday! It rained lightly for a few hours, but not a fraction of what’s needed.
I’m sourcing my veggies from other places – L says she’ll have plenty of tomatoes, but mostly she’s managing to grow just enough for her own family. I know she relies on the produce money, so this has got to be rough. I’ve also heard farmers predicting a “hungry year”, which is one reason the smaller farmers aren’t selling – they’re putting up everything they can manage to grow.
Oh, and I was told that everything is producing 2-3 weeks ahead of schedule because of the heat, which is something to keep in mind. And a friend at church remarked that the farmers have already done a second cutting of hay, which is wonderful … but a bit odd, they said, considering the dryness.
Morning Doomer,
We watching the radar that showed light rains move by us all day yesterday, we could even see it in the distance but not a drop hit my farm, so I will be dancing and whooping myself when that rain comes here to!
I hear you on the ready sooner, I was at a friends on sat for her little ones b-day party and I would swear that her apples are ready and starting to drop, I have a invite to come over and take as many as I would like and I will be swinging over on tuesday and getting any that are ready and then depending again on the weekend, that would put them weeks ahead of normal.
I have to agree that it could be a “hungry” or “lean year” but I am looking at it in a combo of ways, first, I do have some crops holding and doing ok, second I do have a overflow of meat (high calorie) and the truth is, it would not hurt us to cut the number of daily calries consumed.
One thing to remember though girls; remember what happened last year when we had an absolutely amazing September and October? So chin up, all is not necessarily lost (for the gardens, at least: )
O, I hear you Deb, I have major! plans to alot of short term planting crops end of aug(or a touch early depending on heat/rain) and will be using every trick in the book to extend the season’s to get those cooler shorter crops in and then out into the house in time before the first major steady frosts, I am planning on using the greenhouse’s as well.
Agriculture Canada does a “drought watch”, where you can look at precipitation levels over a variety of time periods. For Southern Ontario, we are at <40% of normal for the past 30 days, and at 40-60% for the growing season. We got rain yesterday, but it amounted to less than a quarter inch – no where near what we need. I checked the garden soil yesterday afternoon, and it was bone dry again. The heat lovers like tomatoes and peppers are doing great, my garlic and onions are doing well, but it's a wash this year for "cool" crops. The local farmers are predicting a complete failure of the corn crop – on top of the 80-100% loss in tender fruit, it is NOT going to be a good year 😦
Thanks I will dig that up and bookmark it, they say in our area we would need a 100 ml of rain to get back to where we should be at this time of the year, I am on a rain watch for tomorrow with a 70 percent change, and boy do I hope it arrives.. I hear you on the corn, if they don’t get rain here soon, there will be no cobs..
We were blessed with a really nice long soaking rain last night….been too long. We have tons of wildparsnip too…and tons of rabbits… they got to the bean row, little thieves. Hope some rain comes your way.
*anna
That is wonderful news for you, I am so glad you got rain, it was very needed.. yes that wild parship is really liking this strange weather we are having and doing well, I know you can eat the roots but I have never done so as I don’t want to risk it with DH.. interesting about the rabbits, I have not seen any locally that are wild and I normally do, but not this year..
Hey FarmGal, We finally got an hour’s worth of showers yesterday (not nearly enough) and they’re talking about more tomorrow…
We went to our annual Beekeepers’ Summer Picnic/Meeting yesterday and I SWEAR you could see that the corn had shot up by inches after the rain: like showing tassel that was definitely not visible when we passed by the first time… Amazing!!
Your apple mint is a beautiful plant; so soft and fuzzy allover, with such a lovely scent and flavour!
Glad you’re loving the day lily – they at least seem to be thriving in this heat! Everything else is growing like mad; so long as I keep the water coming. Thinking that extra couple of inches of mulch is an excellent idea.
Wishing you hours of slow, steady rain… D.
Thanks for the update Deb, so glad the plants are doing well, I do love that applemint, and I have given it away lots so far nothing but rave reviews back on it. Hope you had a great time at the Beekeepers meet, so how is the summer/heat, lack of rain effecting the provinces beekeepers and there little charges?
In parts of the prairie provinces we had so much moisture this spring many of the crops couldn’t get planted…. and still the rain continues.
I keep hearing about that lovely rain from my mom, she likes to tease me.. Its cool rain, its farmers rained all day, all the windows are open and I am smelling that fresh light rain smell.. Bla!
Grin 🙂 I do hear you though, there was a huge flood out at my dad’s again this year, thankfully the ditch we had done the year before did its job but it was full and the amount of rain he got in such a short time is amazing.