Happy Harvest Blog
Rain Washing
I set all my houseplants out on the “patio” in the rain for a good washing. They are dusty and due for a spring cleaning.
And then there’s my Big Mama Aloe. I didn’t know that an aloe could get so large. I don’t even remember where I got her as a baby, just that she was an unremarkable size, and she’s grown to resemble a pineapple plant.
My scarcity mindset expresses itself in mulch
Last month when All This was bearing down on us, and seeing that isolation was coming – the thing that made me anxious? I don’t have enough mulch!! I went out of my way to panic-buy a load of hay, and obsessively made trips to the sawmill to bag wood shavings (the best free resource!), especially happy that I can get in and out with my little car stuffed with wood shavings without contacting anyone at all.
The tulips are up!
So exciting to have tulips again! I haven’t had since I lived in B.C, and my mom sent me a big box of bulbs last fall. Yesterday they appeared and now they are poking their spear-like rolled leaves above the ground. Different tulips, different coloured leaves. I planted them by colour scheme, but I don”t remember which colours where, so it will be a surprise. I did wonder if the chickens would cause problems.
Sow it begins
This is the beginning of the growing year. Then there will be two trays, then five, and eight...Soon every windowsill is be filled, and the shelves will come out until all the available glass real estate in the house is occupied by trays in early April. I have calculated the current maximum seed tray load of the house is 14, unless I evict the aloes from the other picture window, and then I could bump it up again. I hope it doesn't come to that. I need some limits.
First Frost
Got a serious frost last night, and a warning frost the night before.There was ice crusted on the water in the stock tank, and the sweet potato vines were finished off. The squashes themselves took damage, which is very disappointing. Not the worst thing to have to can pumpkin, but I like to have squashes and pumpkins throughout the winter for the chickens. Bummer!Also today; world climate strike. I hope the message is deafening because the increased storms and fluctuating temperatures and melting ice caps haven't been loud enough, apparently.
Tomato canning
A lovely pile of a wide range of tomato varieties. I have late blight now in the greenhouse (what the? It's not damp), so the harvest may turn out to be smaller this year than usual, but any reduction isn't showing yet. Three bread bowls of tomatoes today is the second haul harvested, and now the cauldrons boil and bubble.
A conjoined cucumber
I got a fused cuke. That’s never happened before. Of course, I didn’t think to take a picture before giving it to the hens. Inside, two seed cavities. It’s like a double yolk egg, only a cucumber.
The most beautiful time of year.
The apple tree blooms are past now (they were prodigious, and they was no terrible frost this year, so we have reason to expect plenty of apples!), but the hawthorn stays white a little later. This scrappy placeholder hawthorn tree by the house I allowed to live (until I replace it with a fruit tree), is happy to be becoming quite attractive. I've got my decorative birdhouses back out too.
Tomatoes in
It’s that time of year. The tomatoes are installed in the greenhouse (today), and now I have to scrupulously keep the chickens out (lest this happens again), let the guineas in at night but not so soon that there are marauding chickens still about, keep an eye on closed/open doors for air and heat circulation, and watch the forecast like a hawk for frost temperature dips. It’s a nervous time, while the tomatoes are still baby plants. I swear planting is getting faster and more efficient every year though.
tap tap tap
The sap is running! Last year we were largely robbed of the sugar season when winter ended a month early (just kidding! Catastrophic frost in June!). I completely failed to get taps in the trees on time last year. This year, the sugar season is right on time, precisely timing the sugar moon. I've got one tree tapped, the sap is flowing, and I'm even boiling it down!
sprouts!
The year's first shoots are always exciting. Reliable, pedestrian kale races out of the gate, germinating in three days and fully unfolding cotyledons in <24 hours (pictured at two days old). More exciting is licorice: Before too long every windowsill will be full of seedling flats, and I'll be grumbling at how fast the tyrannical little shoots are pressuring me to pot them up. I flaked all of February, the early planting, but I'm back on track now with my planting schedule (easier every year as most things are just a straight copy of last year's schedule).
Garlic and grass
Planted the garlic today. On paper that’s half a month late, but by the weather, it’s just the right time. The beds covered with hay look exactly the same after planting as before. So many worms under the mulch! I started some wheatgrass for the guineas. I couldn’t remember if wheatgrass required soil or not, and I’m still not sure, so I’ll start trying it soil free. I will also find out soon how many days it takes to become edible, and cycle trays through the windowsills.
Boil 'em mash 'em stick 'em in a stew
I looked at the forecast and figured it was the last minute for getting the potatoes out of the ground. It wasn't. They were plenty well tucked in and could have withstood much colder temps. But they're out now. First I take the blanket off. Dig the potatoes...Oh look, I got a heart potato! That wasn't staged. It really turned over the first forkful. I got two heart potatoes today. Somebody's been here first.
pasture pigs
The wild birds are well fed. They've been cleaning out my crop of sunflowers. From full to this, all in four days. I grew them for them, but I hoped to ration them out a little better, and for my chickens to get some. Makes me want to grow a field of them, but then the ravens will come and really clean them out. The pigs are moved again, now in the "pasture", which is much easier to move the fence through. Of course, they are hiding.
Tonello beans
SO pretty! And very far from cured, some. But very pretty purple when mature.
Double trouble
Occupied. They were just hanging out, prepared to stay for the long haul. This is not a problem I was expecting to have: The squashes swarmed the fence, and the frost revealed the bounty. Stuck to the fence. The frost wiped out the morning glories, too, and the zinnias. Inky and Velvet are so beautiful (and so sweet). Inky still insists (very, very determined) on going to bed in the tree, but she might give a little chicken hug (neck snuggle) when you move her.
Mr Tomato Head
Look at that tomato. Eggs (normal and Silkie) are there for size context. It's very large. A Persimmon. They are so good. The surprise of the year. I was expecting a normal-large tomato, not one tomato the size of a loaf of bread! Meaty, and delicious. When the hens get a bucket of scraps, they pick out the orange persimmon bits first. In the tomato fermenting pots, the process is rolling right along. Look at that scum of mold - perfect. Outside, the morning glories have come, vining up with the volunteer tomatoes.
Tomato seeds
Pretty colours! I set up to save seeds from most of the tomato varieties I grew this year. They've each got annotation on size, flavour, and vine behavior ("disobedient", "excessive suckers")Each tub has the ripest, spoiled on the vine where possible fruits, and they're going to rot down into a soupy mess with a scum of mold on top, yay. I may not keep them in the house for that. Last time I was ferment-saving seeds I forgot about them in the camper and they were perfect.
I forgot, harvest starts at the beginning of August
Had a very promising canteloupe, despite the vine leaves being all weird like they're blighted. But then I opened it, and it was green, green, green. Pretty, though. Pigs and hens enjoyed it. There are a couple of little watermelons coming. The tomatoes have hit stride, so there are 1-2 gallons ripening every day. I'm so not ready to start canning already. Too soon. I wondered if I'd get any of these. Exactly what the song sparrow couple in the next shrub was also thinking, watching me pick.
Bugs, good and evil
I think I have a squash bug problem: I dispersed them with soapy water, but they have the military might. There are honey and bumblebees rolling around together in the funnels of the squash blooms. It's true what they say about bees loving Echinacea (coneflower). I've found them NOT easy to grow, though, so I'm very pleased to have some mature, and even better, for them to be established in a perfect place in the garden
Instagram.
I may not make a blog post every day, but at least I Insta.
Bite size.
