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The show about Dick sometimes comes on PBS - it is awesome! A man of all trades, that fellow was
Amazing how animals can prune for us, and it is actually to our benefit! We had the same with 2 apple trees this year that got pruned by deer. We didn't get any fruit, but wow, new branch buds are forming and more leaves than before.
We actually left our Asparagus one extra year before eating and that made a huge difference in the yield we are able to get. It was hard to delay the eating, but now of course we are glad we did that.
It's not too cold here yet, this morning in PR it is 19C (about 62F). Now that we are on the Coast, we will likely have milder winter weather, with a lot more rain than snow.
Thanks Chris, we moved here in 2006. Huge help that we cashed out on waterfront property and were able to get this place and not have a mortgage.
Put us ahead probably 10 years at least...and we have never regretted making the move.
When he was carrying on about that girl, I wondered if he was attracted to her and....you know that saying "I think he doth protest too much"....
Overall a good show last nite, I'm looking forward to next week
He's always on the ball lol!
Really? I didn't realize it started this week, I'm glad I read your post.
Jim, we are up in Prince Rupert for a few months. The guys went on a fishing charter yesterday - brought home 13 salmon and about 14 crab.
Fantastic dinner last nite!!
We brought the canner so we can bring some salmon home with us
If I Have it right, I think in Winter, they still have to bucket water into a big tank they put in their basement. This is in order to use the handpump at the sink.
It'sa blessing for you to have nice clean snow that u can melt!
My friend here stopped growing beans outside when she lost them to a frost at the end of July. I know what u mean about having to move the seedlings around all the time. Major PITA, but well worth it in the end.
Yes no doubt that would be very painful! I hope it will be OK.
Great! Growing what does well naturally is by far the best way to go. It makes things so much easier.
If I had realized how difficult it would be to grow warm weather crops, I would have held out and moved to a different area. But hubby says he will enlarge the greenhouse for me. At least then I could plant more corn and tomatoes. Peppers did great in there this year.
Wow, 5000 feet, that is pretty high. Of course your temps are much better than ours.
We are at 2800 feet elevation, with temperature extremes easily from 5C to 35C from night to day.
Makes for crazy gardening, for sure
We have friends in our Valley who live off grid. They do have a hand pump at the kitchen sink. But it's Outhouse for them too and in order to bathe, they built a little bathhouse, with a fire underneath a drum - like an oil drum. It's pretty cool and they very much enjoy their life.
And having no bills helps too of course!
We are in Zone 3 here in South Central BC. Root crops grow fantastic here, cabbage too.
People who don't know any better than to leave food out for wildlife are candidates for Darwin awards, lol. Esepcially if they keep doing it after it has been explained to them how stupid that is.
The other night, we had a buck and a doe in the driveway where we are staying in Prince Rupert. Ten minutes earlier, we had seen 2 does in the backyard. This place is overrun with them and of course you can't shoot them in town.
But then, who would want to? They are VERY small deer here - still, wildlife in towns can lead to huge problems, as u know
good on you for putting in a garden this year. It takes a couple years to really figure out what works for you and how much to grow.
I hope your tomatoes get to ripen on the vine. They don't like frost at all, so if that threatens, you may want to pick them green. Let them ripen indoors or even make fried green tomatoes or mincemeat from them.
Or you could throw a sheet over them in late afternoon (while there is still some warmth outside) and leave it there for the night. Once the temperature heats up a bit in the morning, just pull the sheet off.
Have fun in your garden!
You can easily train chickens to go home at night. Most of them do anyway as dusk falls.
When u first bring your chickens home, lock them in the coop for 24 hours and don't let them out. Then, allow them to just go in their chicken run. They should be able to access both the run and the coop at this point.
Don't let them out of their run for a week. Just the chicken coop and run.
This teaches them where their home is. As dusk falls, they should go back in the coop on their own. If they are still hanging out in the run, go in the chicken coop and call them, while shaking a little bucket of grains. They'll come in, then throw them down a bit of food, so it is like positive reinforcement.
After a week or so, let them out of the run to free range. We do this in mid-afternoon, so that they have already laid their daily egg.
Before dusk, if they are still out galivanting around, grab your little bucket of scratch and give a shake, while calling for them.
Chickens are creatures of habit, so give this a try and you can easily train them.
Have fun with your chickens, the 1st year, I started with 4, by the next year, I was up to 15. I'd discovered I LOVED having hens, lol!
If you want more chicken information, please feel free to come over to our website:
http://www.countrylivinginacariboovalley.com/
Click on Raising Chickens, you will see it about halfway down the page in one of the sidebars.
PS Coops properly managed should equal no smell at all.
Hi Koog, nice to see you on this board. Chicken tractors are actually a great way to both feed your chickens and keep the grass short. They also fertilize your lawn at the same time.
Google Joel Salatin and his mobile chicken houses for more info.
But, moving a chicken house once a day doesn't = $8.00 a dozen, in my book
Nice to have you here, b4atf! Are you in the forest in MN? A little property?
I look forward to your posts,
Annie
I have read many stories, your grandparents included, that say those who were able to have fairly large gardens and a roof over their heads, were able to get thru the GD fairly unscathed.
People need to learn that you don't need a large farm to be able to provide your family with most of a years food.
What can be done in city backyards can be quite astounding..but you already know that!
Fantastic plan, I hope it all comes to fruition for your family!
Feed seems to be a lot more expensive for you than it is here, although lay pellets for the hens is about $11.50 now for 50 lbs.
Love the way you are growing your own chicken feed - I sure wish we could grow corn and sunflowers on a largge scale. Our elevation is too high. The temperatures are too extreme from night to day
Thanks Chris. We spend a lot of time working on the property - now we are trying to think ahead and make things easier for ourselves as we get older.
What a beautiful view Chris....what is the elevation where you are?
Gleaning free food that would otherwise go to waste is becoming more common. As long as people get permission from the land owner, there is no downside to this.
In BC, there is a pretty large bear population. Residents are encouraged and politely forced (or shamed) into picking the fruit off their trees. If they don't, the bears keep coming back to eat the fallen fruit. Leads to big problems.
You must have lots of bears where you live too, I woud think.
Quite a few cities use some of their unused space by having community gardens. People can plant a small plot there and they have to look after it themselves.
What do you do with all your zuccini? Do you freeze some or try and eat it all fresh?
This year, 4 of 6 Zuccini plants survived here. Wayyy too many plants for us. But we usually put in a full row, because the pigs love it and we didn't do pigs this year. Our hens will eat it, but the pigs enjoyed them a lot more.
lol! From the expression on his face, perhaps too much vinegar??
Excellent! Another town realizing that backyard chickens are a GOOD thing
Awesome pictures Eddie! Improvements are added every year, good for you....Your Asparagus will look a lot better next year,it takes them awhile to settle in.
How old were the Asparagus crowns you planted?
I sell my eggs for $3.00 a dozen, the price could be going up a bit soon though.
$8.00 a dozen is ridiculous imo - what is that fellow doing to justify that price? Moving a chicken tractor once a day? I should go back and read the post again, I may have missed something. Maybe he pets them all to sleep at night....
We have people here who sell their eggs for $2.50 a dozen. Why? Just to undercut the others who sell eggs at a more realistic price of $3.00. And the folks who sell at $3.00 a dozen do sell out, I know I cannot supply enough eggs for the demand.
Then the people who sell for $2.50 say, a person just can't break even financially with chickens. Hogwash.
I still think the #1 producer on a small farm or a city backyard are chickens. You CAN actually make money if you do it right.
Chickens don't need a fancy schmancy building lined with $8.00 a bale hay on the floor.
I wrote a post about how to use chickens to start providing for your family. How to take the leftover $$ and put it back into your self sufficiency plans.
Here's a link in case anyone wants to read it...
http://www.countrylivinginacariboovalley.com/how-to-get-started-on-the-path-to-providing-for-your-family-2/
Imo, there is nothing wrong with trying to make money as a small farmer. I think farmers are some of the most under appreciated people in the world.
I just don't think producers need to be gouging customers who want to eat more healthy, that tends to piss me off, lol.
OK I will get off my soapbox, haha!
In other news, we are relocating this coming week. By Wednesday we will be way up North in Prince Rupert for about 5 months, as husband has a great job opportunity there. Should be interesting, if I survive the pace of this last week at home.
Right now, I am trying frantically to empty gardens, do more canning and wrap everything up around here for the year, all on 2 weeks notice.
Friends will keep an eye on our home here and I will greatly miss my Valley's Fall colours.
I'm way behind on reading this board's posts, but I'll be able to catch up after we get up there. Hope everyone is doing great and your gardens are giving you fantastic Harvests!
Wow, those look beautiful! Fantastic harvest!!
Yes they are definitely a problem in suburbia. This year there have been 2 or 3 items on the news where a doe attacked a woman walking with her dog.
In the other incident, a doe litterally tried to tear a dog to shreds. Both times, there were fawns so Mama may have been trying to protect the babes.
I'm wondering if the 8 foot fence was a straight fence or if it had additional wire slanted out at the top?
If you need to improve your fencing or put new fencing up, the general rule I have heard and seen with deer (the most common menace) is to
either do an 8 foot high fence or do a 6 foot fence with another piece on top of it, slanted outward for 2 feet.
Deer can jump high OR they can jump wide, they cannot do both at the same time.
I'd rather have a dog...cheaper and you can cuddle better with a dog than a fence :)
Thanks Eddie, I'm glad you are still enjoying our pictures and the web site. We're planning to do Calendars again, but I need to get out and take more pictures.
I tried corn outside this year as an experiment - it didn't turn out well, mostly because of the cool wet Spring. Even the corn in the Greenhouse suffered.
Our problem with growing corn is that our temperatures are extreme. We can change 25 degrees Celsius easily each day. We have hot days and cool nights, which corn does not like. So the corn had a double whammy this year. If we lived on the Coast, we could grow corn much easier, altho they have had troubles this year too.
Garlic grows very well here. I just started a series of posts about Growing Garlic over on the website, if you want to take a look.
There is no downside to Garlic - easy to grow and very very good for you. You can grow a lot of heads in a large pot if needed.
Have fun in your garden, you have been working hard and it shows.The bonus is having great neighbours like you do! I'm looking forward to seeing more pictures
I didn't remember that it came from you. When I read it, it struck a chord. It's a great saying
At least the bears are waking your ole fellow up! I'm not sure I could say the same of ours.
But they become members of the family, and this guy has sure earned his keep and so he can while away the hours on the porch. We're trying to get more travelling done before we get the 2nd dog.
I think it needs to happen next Spring. While our dog can still do some of the training. We'll be looking for another Wolf/Malamute - they are a fantastic family dog which also protects the barnyard.
Well said....when I read it, I thought of that quote from Alton Brown. I have it as a header over on my Journey to Homesteading forum:
"We are fat and sick and dying because we have handed a basic, fundamental and intimate function of life over to corporations. We choose to value our nourishment so little that we entrust it to strangers. This is insanity. Feed yourselves. Feed your loved ones. And for God's sake feed your children." — Alton Brown
(Updated to add: I think I got that quote from someone off this board, lol!)
Hi moxa, thanks! It takes a lot of work, but to eat our own food most of the year makes it very worthwhile.
Unfortunately, the native soil here is clay, horrible clay. We use Buckwheat and Fall Rye, along with as much horse manure we can get our shovels in. They all combine, along with leaves, etc. to make great airy and light soil when mixed with the native soil.
Do you have a garden planted this year?
Thanks excel. For the first time in 6 years, we have deer in the garden. Our dog has always kept them out.
Unfortunately he is now getting a bit hard of hearing and enjoys sleeping at night, rather than guarding the perimeter fencing as he is supposed to.
Think we will need another dog by next Spring. Love puppies, but hate the training lol.
We have 2 fences. The perimeter fence is 4 feet high. This gives our dog about 2 acres of room to run.
Then the 4 main Gardens are individually fenced, again only 4 feet high. Basically up to now, the only things the fences were keeping out is the chickens!
Now tho it's another story.
Thanks Chris....ours is a work in progress too, but I think most homesteads are.
Please post a few of your pics, I would love to see them!
Here are some pictures of our Garden this year...
Above is the Main Garden - this year we are growing cabbages, Brussel Sprouts, 2 kinds of Peas, Lettuce, Beets, 2 kinds of Chard, Turnips, Potatoes, Green Beans, Carrots (terrible germination this year), and lots of Onions
Here are the Berry Beds:
Strawberries (3 beds) then on the other side of the pathway is the Garlic (around 400 head) and the Raspberries. Also 2 Highbush Cranberries in that bed, but I want to move them this Fall. Gotta make room for even more Garlic and more Raspberries!