Spring is here! Let the work begin...
Spring is upon us! This last week we have seen temps at 80 and plenty of sunshine. Time to get those gardens in and start using muscles we forgot we had.
Lots of babies here at the farmstead. 14 American Guinea hog piglets and 7 baby goats. 21 Dominique eggs in the incubator have started hatching today. All make the hard work of winter worth it and remind me exactly why I put in the hours.
Potatoes, peas, carrots, spinach and lettuce are all planted and I've enjoyed one meal of the lettuce already. More will be ready this weekend. Fresh salads await! By next weekend I'm planning on having the tomatoes in and getting some herbs transplanted.
I purchased 50 bareroot strawberry plants and to be honest I'm pretty disappointed. Less than 1/2 are showing any life. So I guess I'll be on the lookout for more established plants. The elderberry I transplanted last fall looks great, so there should be plenty for me and the chickens to share.
So in short, there's plenty of work to be done but plenty of promise too! The opportunity for good nutritious meals await, I just have to put in the effort to make it happen.
Two batches of fresh soap are currently aging and will soon be read to wrap up and use or sell. Old fashion lye soap and honey oatmeal. Both made with lard from the Guinea hogs. Both made with ingredients we can actually pronounce. The way our grandmothers would have made it!
A few big projects here to get wrapped up in the next month before the summer work begins. I plan on finishing up the split rail fence, get the last of the landscape cloth down and get rock laid. Then I'm putting a new fence up around the garden. I've got to make it more chicken proof if I want to allow them free range and still have a garden. No one ever talks about how destructive a 5# hen can actually be but they will destroy an hour's worth of work in 5 mins. They are driving me nuts in my raised beds! I have everything planted covered with screens right now to keep them out. Ugh!
This weekend I'll till up the corn patch one last time in prep for the corn and sorghum in a couple weeks. A neighbor has graciously offered to let me plant an acre of heirloom corn. He's doing the tilling, I bought the seed and we split the cost of the lime. I settled on Boone County White dent corn since I couldn't get enough Bloody Butcher seed at a decent price. The cost of heirloom corn seed is nuts! Funny how it's cheaper to eat GMO products than healthy ones isn't it? This additional acreage should with luck, provide me with enough corn for the year. Pray the deer stay out of it!
Soon as I can move the sow out of the winter lot, I'll till that up too and get it planted. Clover, squash, pumpkins, turnips and more for livestock feed is slated for that area. The road to self-sufficiency is never paved, but the peace of mind that comes with it makes the journey worthwhile.
Join me! Get outside, get a garden planted, built a chicken coop, taste how delicious self-sufficiency can be.
