Author: Cabincrafted1

Farm and Market Day

Saturday mornings are Farmer’s Market day and with family coming for a week and a half, we wanted to get some meat in the freezer for them and winter and stock up on veggies, cheese, eggs, and fresh pasta for our week. We are now getting two pullet eggs a day and have a great vegetable garden, but there are some things I don’t grow, but like or that just aren’t producing yet. Today was a great market, live music and an art show in the street of the market block. We left early enough to get pancakes and bacon for breakfast before shopping and arrived home early enough to start the farm work.

One of my projects for the day was to reconfigure the chicken run to incorporate a peach tree for shade and to leave space for a Purple Beautyberry bush that I purchased a few days ago, also for shade. The latest round of storms that we have had during the heat wave this week have uncharacteristically moved from east to west and the east window of the coop is a drop down flap with no overhang. This has caused the inside of the coop and perches to get wet. Another idea that I had was to create a sheltered area on the east side of the coop, also for shade and to hopefully provide shelter for that window and allow me to put their food outside the coop. While I was moving fence and trying to figure out how to make the shelter, I watched my largest Buff Orpington, who was purchased as a pullet, attempt to mount one of the Red Rocks that are the only egg layers so far. So we now know that the beauty below is a he, not a she…

He can’t stay in the coop and run if he is going to be aggressive, so he is either going to have to go to freezer camp or be rehomed.
The coop has been scrubbed out with a vinegar/orange/mint cleaner and new hay put inside. The old hay has been removed to the run to help reduce the mud during the afternoon showers. By reducing the width of the run to 8 or 9 feet and lengthening it to about 20 feet, I was able to erect a 6 X 8 tarp over hooped flexible poles and stapling it to the upper edge of the coop, there is now a 4 foot wide X 8 foot long shaded run that houses a small shallow pool of water and their food. The plastic poultry net is stapled to the upper edge of the coop and tied to the fence to drape over the peach tree and protect the rest of the run from the hawks.

Until I can get our eldest back here to help me build a lean to using the roofing metal left over from building the house, hopefully it will work for us.
And this was our afternoon visitor.

July 20, 2013
A Week on the Farm – July 18, 2013

Harvest

Hiding from the heat

Laying eggs (finally)

Seed starting for fall garden

Lovin’ life on the farm!

July 18, 2013
We Are Melting

Last evening brought rainbows and lightening simultaneously. Wind and hail. When the storm subsided, it still wasn’t quite dark, but the chickens were all huddled together on the perches in the coop. The storm cooled the evening at least 30 degrees from yesterday’s high of 95f. Today is another mid 90s day and with the humidity, I feel like I’m back on the coast. This is not mountain-like.

The morning is already hot and humid, a heavy haze hanging over the ridges to the north and south of us.

The hens gathered early for some morning treats, but will soon disappear under the coop in the shade.

I’m trying to figure out how to give them more shade and a place to put their food and water outside in the shade. The coop is well ventilated, and the roof is insulated, but it is still hot when the air temperatures are in the 90s.

Today we are going to venture to the garden center to see what they have in vegetable starts and seeds to begin thinking about what to put in the beds that are empty from harvesting onions, garlic and peas. I continue marveling at being able to walk to the garden and pick vegetables for our dinners and having enough to put away for the winter. Our city gardens were for fun, a few small boxes with tomatoes, peppers, maybe a cucumber or two and a handful of beans. Last night again, our dinner was entirely from our garden and the farmer’s market. Live locally and eat locally.

Life is good.

July 17, 2013
Monday Heat Wave

After a solid month of daily rain, often heavy enough for flooding of the creeks, the sky is clear and the temperatures are soaring. The forecasters are predicting a heat wave. According to them, that is a string of 3 or more days of temperatures at 90f and above. Today is predicted for 91, tomorrow 95. They are right on so far, it is 3 p.m. and it is 92f. The entire week until Saturday is predicted to exceed 90.

This is just as my young hens are just beginning to lay. Today, I got my fourth pullet egg, they are so small that it will take to two to equal a large egg. The heat may slow down the laying process, just as it started. Most of the girls are hiding out under the coop in the cooler bare earth.

But one is sunbathing.

The rain has caused the weeds to flourish in the garden. Eldest son and I made a big dent in the weeds in the beds, but left the aisles due to lack of time. I will not use RoundUp or its generic equivalents, so this morning, I mixed up a gallon of vinegar with Epsom salt and dish soap and attacked the aisles that I had weed wacked late yesterday. A few minutes ago, I went out to see if it had done anything and was amazed by the success.

In the cool of tomorrow morning, when I go out to let the chickens out, I will add a thick layer of straw to the aisles in hopes of keeping the weeds down.
I’m glad I got it done this morning as hubby and I both had visits with the orthopedic specialist, hubby for his knee, me for osteoarthritis in my hand and trigger finger in my ring fingers. He was released to continue to rebuild his strength and do whatever he is comfortable doing. My wrist is doing better since the appointment was scheduled and so that problem has been tabled for now, except to leave with a splint/brace to wear when gardening, knitting, or spinning. The right ring finger received another cortisone injection. Normally, injections don’t bother me. I have had cortisone injections in my wrist, my shoulder and previously in my ring fingers, but that is the most painful injection possible, it totally takes my breath away. Now I sit holding ice and hoping it is less bothersome tomorrow.

July 15, 2013
Monday Heat Wave

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July 15, 2013
Sunday Thankfulness – July 14, 2013

Hubby seems to be on the mend, both his knee and his broken toe are healing and he can again walk around without discomfort. If we can get the Ranger beast to get in his car and not be aggressive toward other dogs, we can again go walking.

The bounty from our garden is beginning to fill our freezer and pantry for the winter. The freezer contains the peas from the spring planting and will be supplemented with a fall planting next month, though it is never as good. We have greens for us and for the chickens, the bush beans just beginning to develop, we will have our first picking of them tonight. Cucumbers are forming, so there will be salads and pickles. The garlic yield was 91 heads, curing in the garage.

and a supply of potato onions curing in the root cellar.

The young hens are beginning to lay so soon we will have a supply of fresh eggs.

So far there have only been three, but the girls are only 16 to 18 weeks old, so it is a start.

Life is good here in the mountains and I love our home and the area.

July 14, 2013
Sunday Thankfulness – July 14, 2013

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Due to my increased frustration with Blogger, my blog will now be found at the above link.

July 14, 2013
A Week on the Farm – July 12, 2013

     This week has had family visiting, as eldest son was here until Sunday and eldest grandson stayed on until yesterday. It has rained nearly every day, but we did get one good day to take grandson to the local public pool for a swim. He is so much more adventuresome than last summer. He must have gone down the tallest tube slide a couple dozen times and by the time we left, his eyes were so bloodshot, he complained all through dinner.

     The week has been an adjustment for the hens, as we harvested 3 of the young hens last week and added 3 that had previously been separated as culls and put in a different pen. They seem to be working out their new pecking order and will actually all gather if I throw out scratch over a broad enough area.

     It has been too rainy for much gardening, a bit of weeding or harvesting when the opportunity presents and enjoying the cabbage, kale and peas that have matured. So far that and an occasional pepper are all we are getting. The winter squash and one of the pumpkins have all wilted, either root rot or squash borers. I don’t know if there is enough time to plant more before the season here in the mountains ends.
     Yesterday I drove grandson home to Northern Virginia in time for his weekly guitar lesson, spent the night with them. There has been a lot of road time the past two weeks. We are home now for a month before it starts again, but during that month, we will have our daughter and her family here for a bit more than a week visiting and getting more grandkid time.

July 12, 2013
Another busy day

     Today was the last full day that eldest son was here to help with work. We started off early enough to get breakfast in town and make our weekly Farmer’s Market run, and for a change, we were early enough to actually score some real goodies, fresh corn, raspberries (Yummy), new Yukon
Gold potatoes, cheese, eggs (the girls aren’t producing with any regularity yet), some meat for the winter freezer.
     Our afternoon was spent making modifications to the Chicken ark/tractor. After using it for 5 weeks, I realized that the walkboard was too wide and hung down beside the feeder and over the waterer. I’ll just say that chickens are nasty birds, so we moved the walkboard across the width at the end with the perches, added one additional perch and put hefty eye screws in the peak to hang the food and water so that the chickens will have room on both sides of the feeder and waterer and more ground space to move around in. We also added a door on one end that will allow me to more easily return escapees to the run and to let them out for some free range time so that they aren’t so crowded as they get large.

     After a dinner of Farmer’s Market and garden goodies, the garden became the focus of the rest of the days labor. It is now about half weeded again, plus harvested another quart plus of fresh peas, two grocery sacks of kale, two cabbages (the others were so shaded by the kale they need more growing time), and a couple dozen potato (or cluster) onions. The onions are curing, the cabbages are stored, the peas are shelled and most frozen for winter meals, a meal’s worth saved out for tomorrow’s dinner and I started on freezing the kale, but ran out of vac/seal bags material, so the rest will have to wait until tomorrow. It is great to be filling the freezer again with garden veggies, chicken that we raised and beef and pork from the Farmer’s Market. The wild blackberries will be ripening soon, the wild raspberries sooner and there are a couple of pints of blueberries on my young bushes. Some of the berries will be made into jams and some frozen for muffins and smoothies.

July 6, 2013
A Week on the farm- July 5, 2013

Half of this past week was spent on the road and helping with childcare in Northern Virginia and during the whole week, we have had rain and more rain and more rain. Our creek and run off creek are flowing so hard they have filled the bottom of the sinkhole and are running down the old creek bed that only sees water about once a year, some years it remains dry.
The rain has the garden growing vigorously, but it the paths and berry beds are quickly being overtaken by weeds.

The sunflowers are nearly as tall as I am.

The chicken ark in the background is now empty and will remain so until the fall order of meat chickens arrives for our eldest son and his family, though they will spend the first five weeks they are here in the brooder in the garage.

The week brought our first eggs. We know they were layed by the Rock Red cross pullets because they were found in the chicken ark and the one Rock Red we harvested was full of developing eggs. Because of that, she was the first we harvested, we moved the other three to the hen house and three of the other pullets were harvested instead. None of them showed any signs of being ready to lay, so we will have to be content with two or three eggs every couple of day for a few more weeks.

The rain has also provided a spot of color in the flower bed along with many weeds seen under the flowers. If we don’t mold, wet rot, or float away, there will be some days of weeding in my future.
Life is good on the farm.

July 5, 2013