July 16-17, 2011

Our tomatoes are being attacked by Hornworms.  We are only at the farm on the weekends and hornworms need to be taken care of daily.  We must have picked off over 100 hornworms this weekend, between 2 adults and one labradoodle..... yes, labradoodle.  My wonderful Nugget has watched us take the hornworms (large green caterpillars) off the tomato plants and he now sniffs them out and snatches them off with his teeth. He does a great job too and finds the ones on the lower part of the plant.  But you have to watch him because he also likes to eat the ripe cherry tomatoes.  We are hoping the special wasp shows up that lays eggs on the hornworms.  Once the eggs are laid, then in less than a week, the worms are gone.  Nature is it's own insect repellent sometimes.

Well, the heat has not diminished so we try to limit our workload outside and drink plenty of water.  Every once in a while Nugget will dash from the field and heads to the pond to cool off.... he swims around and then comes back to the field, wet but refreshed.  Smart dog.  

We are still waiting for the well. Suppose to come back out this week and drill deeper.  All we can do is wait.  We have been bringing gallons and gallons of fresh water with us every weekend so we can cook and drink but that is getting old.  

We harvested the potatoes (red & white) and the remaining onions.  The onions are drying out at the farm and then will be stored in a cool, dry place like the potatoes so we can keep them as long as possible.  

My sunflowers have all bloomed and look great.  The cabbage is growing nicely too.  The okra is taking off despite the weeds.  

We had our monthly meeting with friends Sunday at the Bolivar Nursery.  Once again, good food and good conversation.  Michele, the owner of the nursery discussed herbs and the various medicinal properties they have.  

On a totally non-farm related matter - we saw the final Harry Potter movie over the weekend too....it was awesome!

July 9-10 2011

 

Last week Alex and I went to Maryland to visit family and Cris stayed on the farm the whole week with the 2 dogs and cat.  Kitty took a couple days to adjust to his surroundings but is fine now.  He is not allowed outside though, not until he is used to the area. 

We put our Memphis house on the market and had a couple people look at the house.  It is not the best time to sell a house but hopefully we will find the right buyer and the right price.  The house has never been so clean….even Alex is keeping his room clean, but that could be the $20 he gets for keeping his bed made and floor clear of clothes etc…

The well is not installed yet.  We ended up changing well companies because the other kept giving us the run around… it was always, “next week”.  The new company (which came with recommendations from friends) drilled yesterday and hit sand around 50 ft. which is good.  They went to 95 ft. and stopped.  Tuesday another person comes out with a pump to see how the water flow is from 95 ft.  If it is good, then they install the pump and holding tank…..if not, they dig some more.  When the well is ready to be hooked up to the house, we get the electrician to run the electric and then FINALLY, we will have a well. (update - well is not deep enough so they are coming out again to drill....no well yet!)

Two weeks ago we had friends over to make shitake mushroom logs.  Cris hooked up a barrel of water to the house so we could at least use the bathroom.  That was handy and appreciated by all.  The mushroom plugging went great despite the heat.  Afterwards we all went inside to the air conditioning to have a wonderful meal and conversation.  Cris made two different mushroom dishes and others brought dishes from items out of their gardens. 

I thought it was hot two weeks ago, that was until we hit this weekend….. The heat and humidity are horrible.  We are not getting as much done as we had hoped for fear of heat exhaustion.  This morning we weeded the cabbage and ended up a drenched mess.  This evening we hope to start weeding the okra plants.  Last week while Alex and I were in Maryland, Cris weeded the 500 strawberry plants and then covered them with weed block…. That took him 3 days because of the heat and humidity. 

We are thankful that it has rained…not like last year  when it was so dry.  I think that is why the weeds are so bad this year….not really weeds but just grass.  Our cows will have some wonderful grass to eat because it grows like crazy. 

Since we are limited to what we can do outside, we “went to town” to pick up materials to make a solar clothes dryer (clothes line) and we installed that today.  I plan to buy a used washer when the well is ready and will only wash on sunny days so I can use the clothes line.  We will see how long that lasts before I beg for a dyer.

We are also pricing the sheeting that goes on the bottom of the trailer.  As soon as the well is installed, we hope to get the heat pump and then we can put the sheeting up…that will keep the dogs out from under the trailer. They love hunting for frogs.

Cris has been mushroom hunting around the property and has found chanterelles, which are in season right now.  They are all over the place.  Our dinner tonight will consists chanterelles freshly picked, and freshly picked cucumbers, lettuce, peppers, tomatoes and onions. 

The potatoes and remaining onions are ready to be dug up but the ground is too wet so that will have to wait.  We did some more tomato staking (the tomatoes we planted outside, not in the greenhouse), weeding and then called it a day at 6pm…. Just too hot for man and beast. 

Our farm home is currently a mish mash of furniture and boxes and there is NO method to our madness, as they say.  We are slowly moving items out to the farm but some items have to stay at the Memphis house since it is for sale and we want to make it look nice for potential buyers. We will not have the storage space we have in Memphis so we are coming up with ideas to create storage.  Our project list just keeps growing. Luckily, my daughter Lindsay has moved into a townhome and needs furniture...I am glad I can pass some of my mother's furniture onto her granddaughter.   

Weekend of June 18-19, 2011

We went to our friend’s farm today to pick out some more cows.  When we do live on the farm full time and have the fencing up, we will have four beautiful Scottish Highlands; Hyacinth, Henrietta (Hyacinth’s cousin, their moms are sisters), Mindy and another one that is a blonde beauty; forgot her name. 

Today we harvested the wheat.  Cris used the scythe to cut the wheat, then we gathered it onto the trailer and used the wood chipper with the medium size blade and shredded the wheat.  This took the wheat kernels off the stalk.  We then set up a fan next to a large container.  We picked up the pile of kernels and shredded wheat by the handfuls and let it drop next to the fan.  The kernels were heavy enough to drop into the container, yet the shredded wheat stalks flew away.  It worked great but we will have to run through this procedure a couple more times to get all the shredded stalks removed.  The wheat berries will keep forever in a tightly sealed container; you just grind the wheat as needed and the use that wheat flour within 2 weeks.  The wheat was grown on 1/20 of an acre.  I am not sure how many pounds of wheat berries we will end up with but we think it should be enough for a year. Kitchen Aid makes an attachment to grind wheat so that is handy.

The well has yet to be installed, which is very aggravating.  We have been told the last three weeks that it will be "next week”.  We are having people over to the farm to make mushroom logs on the 25^th and I was sure hoping to have running water.  We shall see. 

The English Peas are finished for the season, they turned out great and we plan to grow a lot more next year so we can freeze them.  They are not something I want to sell at the farmer’s market though unless we get a pea sheller.  I don’t mind shelling peas while watching tv for our own enjoyment but it would be a lot of shelling by hand to have enough to sell at the market.

The shade cloth we put on the hoop house works great….. Too great I am afraid… we may have to remove it so the tomatoes can get more sun.  It does cut down on the temperature in the hoop house though.  Some of the tomato plants are taller than me and green tomatoes are starting to grow.  The peppers are plentiful as well. 

Weeding is a big issue with the farm.  We did not put any weed block (liner) down this year and that was a mistake.  Who wants to spend time weeding in 95 degree weather….not me!  Nothing gets planted without weed block ever again. 

TEDDY VS THE SNAKES -  last week (June 11th) Teddy came up to us acting funny….. Cris went to look at his face and Teddy cried in pain.  He apparently went after another snake and this time he got bit.  We gave him some Benedryl and off to the vet we went.  The vet gave him a steroid shot to help with the swelling.  He got bit but a rather large snake from the size of the bite. We were never able to locate the snake that bit him so I guess it got away.

Farmisms.....

A few little Farmism's from Sandy:

Living in the country, the phrase, “Let’s run to town to pick up beer (or milk or a tractor part or gas for the mower) gets me super excited.  I just love “going to town”.  Of course, I usually sit in the truck and wait for Cris to get whatever he went to town for but I love it. I sometimes end up with a Dr. Pepper and a Good Humor Strawberry Shortcake ice cream.

Give me a tractor or riding lawn mower with a full take of gas and I could mow all day long.  I just love the feeling of accomplishment….. It is immediate gratification….you mow a strip and right away it looks better.  I feel that way about vacuuming too.  Just ask Cris about my fascination with vacuums, brooms and mops. 

The difference between 95 degrees and 85 degrees is night and day.  I learned that a couple weeks ago after we had a brief drizzle at the farm…. The temp turned from 95 to 85, humidity was lower and it was heaven. 

Two people working together make the chores easier to handle.  (duh!)

Just because the Great Pyrenees your friend owns had 6 of the most adorable puppies you have ever seen, that does NOT mean we can have one.  They are livestock guard dogs and we don’t have livestock yet. 

It is OK to name the female cows but not the male cows.  The female cows stay on the farm to have babies and the male cows end up on the dinner plate.