We have been blessed to share our lives with this land we call ours for nine years today… here is to many, many more!
Got Milk, Girl does..
Got Milk, Girl does.. I was doing my check, afternoon feeding and as she was up this time, I did my touch, check, her bag is even bigger and fuller then before, and I did my regular teat milk motion(its a practise thing I have been doing since she was a young calf) and out comes milk on the first try.. I stopped right there, and gently touched the other three teats and didn’t milk them..
So if she has milk, how far can the calf be behind
At this point, I will take dibs on when this calf is coming!
Posted in Life moves on daily
9 Comments
Sunflower Report 1- May
Well, for those of you who are new to the blog, please check out my first post on the grand 2013 Sunflower plan 🙂
So its grown a bit, I have confirmed with Farmer R that he has no issues with me growing Sunflowers on my buffer zone, and that it will not effect his crops, he was also kind enough to give me a timing on the two times he will be spraying so that I could plan my planting around it.
So there has been a slight modification on the plans themselves, in that I am going to be growing different kinds of sunflowers, one side is going into Mammoth Russian, these suckers can grow 8 to 10 feet tall and produce heads as big an heavy as 5 pds each..
If you think these look like something you know, that is because this is the kind of sunflower seed used to make spits from..
The second row is going to be grown as black oil seeds, most folks know these as the smaller solid black sunflower seeds you buy to put in your bird feeders, they only grow 3 to 4 feet high and they max out at around 2 pds per head, they have a much! higher fat content then the Russians do a above..
The third and shortest fenceline is growing sunflowers that are for cutting, they are pollenless and are meant for the table, you have no doubt seen them at the florist or peeking out at you with its bright sunshine face in the buckets at the farmers markets.
In my food forest garden, I am putting in smaller multi-colored and flowering sunflowers, they can make small heads but they are mainly there to help feed the pollinators and to work the soil.
Posted in Food Forest, gardens
Tagged sunflowers, sunflowers for animal fodder, sunflowers for bedding for animlas
1 Comment
Pin Cherry(nope) Wild Plum (YES!)
Ok, on the past weekend, we passed a large bush that was in full flower, the flowers out, but the leaves still in bud and we snagged three nice branches and then snagged some fresh willow branches and into wet paper towel and a baggy till they got home and I am working on rooting them out.. well the willow will root for sure, we will see about the bush..
I can clearly tell that its a fruiting bush and I figured that it would be fairly easy to dig out what kind in my different books but I in fact a little huh.. it fits a couple different ones but its not quite right on any of them and there is no chance that I am going to head out that far way on the other side of the city later this season to figure it out.. I can of course hope that it will in fact grow and find out that way but I figured it would not hurt to ask if any of you can take one look and tell what it is..
I have it narrowed down to the red cherries prunus spp family.. but the leaves should have been out before the flowers.. the flowers remind me of Saskatoon but the leaves are wrong from what I know.
Put the photos out on my wild edibles group and they came back with service berry (and its not that, I know my saskatoons) or wild plum.. well dang, compared it to my own current in full bloom plum tree’s and its a perfect match, now I hope more then ever that one or all of them will root out.. three wild plum bushes to be added to the food forest sounds just perfect to me!
Posted in Life moves on daily
5 Comments
Asparagus are starting to come up now..
while we are planting last night dh pointed out something that I had in fact missed… there in their bed where asparagus standing proud and tall, with more spearing shooting up from the rich dark soil… I think for the first few ones ready, I am going to use them in a lovely fritta.
A lovely Visit with Callie K and pretty flowers
I braved the downtown of the big city to get to have a picnic shared lunch with Callie and a short but lovely walk, my foot is still quite sore from the double nail step down last week.
When I asked if she was good with being in the picture, she sais yes, so I hope I got that right that that I could use it.. if not, let me know and I will remove it and move to just the lunch photo only..
Boom, Boom, Out Go the Lights: Writing during Emergencies
Love this writeup from DH, check it out, way to funny, my man has a great sense of humor.. 🙂
Posted in Life moves on daily
2 Comments
The Fruit Trees and Flowering Bushes are starting! But Where are the Bee’s!
Just a few of my flowering fruit tree’s are fully out, there is pears, and the plums in a full swing, the haskups are putting out a few (not bad considering they only got planted last year) and many many more are like the apples tree buds photo.. getting there.. but while I did see ants, and bettles I didn’t see a single bee on any of these tree’s or flowers.. I put the blame on having that dang GMO corn fill the fields around me last year..
We will have to get our little paint brushes and make sure our fruit tree’s get good movement of pollen to increase our possible end production. I might also pop into my closest bee keeper and see if there is any chance at all that he might be willing to put a hive on my place for the year..
Posted in gardens
Tagged First Fruiting trees of spring, Fruit Trees, Where are the bees, Wild violets
7 Comments
Fly control.. homemade bug spray mix..
Well, there a number of things that are in play to help control the flies, there are the ducks and chickens having access to the compost piles and the dung dropping from the larger critters.
There is a natural mix that goes into both the cow and horses feed to help control this as well..
But none the less, the bottom line is that they need to be sprayed down once or twice a day to help with the flies and bugs and to have fly masks..
I very much liked the mix we used last year and so while I am tweeking it a bit this spring, it will be my man go to mix.. its 1/3rd avon skin so soft, 1/3rd vinager and 1/3rd water, my extra’s this year is I am adding in ten drops of lemongrass oil and ten drops of Tea Tree oil to the mix.. pour together.. shake well before using and avoid the eyes, I just cup over them when spraying for the cow and I spray my hand and wipe when it comes to Brandy’s ear’s and face, I am careful around the nose as well..
I am also thinking about maybe? trimming down Brandy’s feathers, I have heard that its a good idea, we will see..
Just another Day on the Farm 