Hey Man, Thanks (Gardern Reflections 2009)

All that's left to do is the crying. Well no, not really. The tomato teepees need to come down and be stored for next year. The nasturtiums can be pulled and dried for the rabbits and the rest of the carrots need to come out. There's no crying to be done this year. To tell you the truth, I am left with a sense of amazement, it's been one heck of a harvest.

Almost everything did well. I pretty much kept with the same companion planting I did last year. I had most of the onions growing in the annex and got 2 half feed bags of great onions from two packages. I might buy 3 packs next year.

I did over-plant terribly this year. I did that the first year and then I smartened up. This year, there were a couple of issues that led me to over-plant. I was using my own saved pumpkin seeds for the first time and I was a little unsure if they'd work so I planted a bit more than usual. I ended up with 80 some pumpkins. That's a lot of pumpkins considering last year I thought 40 was too many. I won't plant the cucumbers near the pumpkins again though. The pumpkins did overtake them a bit. I have also found out that planting plants of the same family close together does attract more of the harmful bugs. Planting crops farther away from each other means more travel time for the bugs and they can't get as established and do as much damage. I didn't have much of a problem with bugs this year because I brought Mandellas out to the garden whenever I was weeding and she had a wonderful time eating earwigs, (her favorite) cucumber beetles and anything else she could get her little hooked beak around. She was terrific bug control and great company in the garden.

I didn't really over plant the tomatoes per se. I did the cold frame experiment and bought a couple of flats of tomatoes just in case. All did very well and, ta-dah! - 9 boxes of tomatoes. I'm not thinking I'm going to run out of canned tomatoes this year.

I did have a part of the garden not do well at all so I replanted the beans and carrots in the new lasagna garden where they did very, very well. Hopefully letting that part of the garden go fallow after dumping a lot of compost and rabbit manure on it will help for the next season.

The three sisters did well. The corn was from my own seed. Now that was pretty easy to save, all I did was dry out a cob of corn. I ended up planting way to much, again, because I wasn't sure that it would work. Happily, a friend of mine was having terrible luck with her corn and I was able to give her all my extra plants. They transplanted well and she had a good crop of corn as well. I have found letting the corn get to 4 - 6 inches high before planting the snowpeas a good idea. That way the fast growing snowpeas don't over-run the corn which grows much slower at the start.

I planted some organic lettuce mix and beets this year, courtesy of my mom (Eileen) who sent me some seeds, they did beautifully as did the chard. I think I will plant more packs of lettuce next year. I planted 6 packs but with the rabbits, us and all our visitors, I kept running out. I think I might go up to 10 packs next year. I'm the only one in the family who eats beets so a pack is more than enough. The rabbits love it too and I have found if I leave a few beets hanging around, I can harvest the leaves for the bunnies right up to almost snow cover.

The herbs, mainly dill and basil seem to like the lasagna garden better. The dill did very well there. The basil, planted with the tomatoes in the main garden, was average. Last year when I grew it in the lasanga garden, it was exceptional.

As far as my new projects went, one, the tomato cold frame, was very successful and the other, the potato tire growing scheme was an utter failure. I'm hoping to expand on the cold frame idea I used for the tomatoes. And I'm not ready to give up on the potato project completely, think next year I'll tweak it a bit and see what happens. I think that's the best part of garden, the plans, the hopes, the sense of accomplishment sprout right along with the seeds.

Chicken Update

Today I gave the chickens the insides of the pumpkins I baked for freezing. Of course, there's always one in the crowd more interested in the empty container than in the seeds. I guess she's just making sure I didn't leave any in there, she probably figures you never can tell with humans.

A hen Doin' Her Job

This year, we decided to keep more hens over the winter. The demand for our eggs has increased to the point where sometimes we don't have eggs for ourselves. That kind of defeats the whole reason of chickens in the first place. We're hoping by having 17 hens instead of 10 will meet all our needs. I'm also thinking the more warm bodies in the coop the warmer it will be this winter. Personally, I really think we need a four legged animal in there to use as a walking furnace. A friend of mine has a goat and her barn stays a lot warmer than my coop. I'm leaning towards a donkey. Always wanted a donkey. Don isn't too sure about a donkey, may-be he figures he gets enough braying as is. (Now there's a question best left unasked!)

I'm hoping the increased number of hens will keep the two roosters living in relative harmony. So far it's been working. Last year, I ended up separating the roos because one was being harried to death. This year I kept two new roos and they are getting along better. Each have their own harem of hens and as long as the second rooster, Chandler, doesn't start courting one of Captain Morgans' ladies, they co-exist pretty well. They don't ever fight, Chandler knows he's second fiddle and seems to be fine with that arrangement. He doesn't crow and he always gives way to Captain Morgan. I think because there's more hens, they can easily share without any conflicts. The real test will be when they are cooped up together days on end during a winter storm or cold snap.

Captain Morgan (front) and Chandler (back) Ignoring Each Other Peacefully.

We're thinking next spring of getting a few more layers, hopefully Americaunas, like Leah; green eggs are cool. I might look into getting a few meat birds to raise over the summer as well. I really like my dual purpose chickens but it takes two birds to feed us, it might be nice to have a few of the bigger variety. While we might expand our variety, we will keep mainly to our heritage breeds. They don't have the problems the modern breeds have. Modern meat birds, because they're so heavy tend to go lame easily. Modern egg layers won't go broody; that trait is pretty much bred right out of them. That means they won't sit on a nest to incubate and raise chicks. I certainly prefer broody hens to incubators and brooders. What ever we do, as long as I can go into the coop and thrill to a nest full of eggs, I'll be happy.