i hope it goes very well for you, do you have a large network of bean friends down there? i know of a few but i'm not in contact with them regularly. i can talk about beans way too much... hahaha...
i did get my car sold. that's a big weight off my mind/shoulders. it was going to need so much more $ and the mice were a constant battle. for how little i was driving it it was time to say goodbye (after 21yrs). i do miss driving it as it was fun but i don't miss the rest of it... at last able to get more done outside now that the rains have let up enough to let me get some gardens turned. 25cm of rains in a few short weeks on this clay and it keeps the gardens a mess to work in. we always keep extra pairs of garden shoes handy so we can do what we need to do but it's much better if the ground can dry out a bit before we really do much else... right now in the NE garden it is a large garden i was hoping to plant this past season with beans and other veggies, but due to injuries i could only plant a small part of it. the rest was left fallow (and is being mowed) and was taken over by hard woody stemmed weeds (Polygonum persicaria) that are very hard to scrape with a scuffle hoe (my favorite method for surface prep because it doesn't disturb the soil much at all). unfortunately the scuffle hoe can't slice through them and so it comes down to just turning it with a shovel. the weeds, stems, etc. will be worm food for the next 7 months and i can scrape it quickly early in the spring to keep any new sprouts from getting too woody too fast. i'd love to plant the whole area with winter rye or winter wheat but Mom won't do it so i have to take the OM i can get. i can dig back there all fall and next year at the rate i'm going, but the main point now is to get just the weeds with seeds forming on them turned under - i can finish that today. then i need to shift to my other large garden where it is overtaken with oxalis to start getting all that turned under. i need to keep the billions of seeds from blowing or being washed or moved by the winds/rains/animals. it's much easier going in there as it is topsoil and plenty of OM. i have to get some strawberries transplanted again in there (the deer keep eating them). my October project for that garden is a good fence around it. as much as i don't want to disturb the soils in the gardens digging is good exercise and i do need to recover and heal up and strengthen from injuries this season. the established gardens inside the fenced areas are already pretty well kept up and not much needs to be done to those other than burying any garden debris which doesn't disturb much of the garden (as i'm having to do in the above mentioned areas - those are much wilder and full of weeds in comparison). bean season is coming to an end, we've had so much rain for so long i was harvesting pods that were almost ready and very soggy so i could dry them inside. many beans sprouting in pods and others rotting/fungi so those end up as worm food. still some yet to finish (the frosts will likely be here at some point in the next few weeks) and i hope they'll have something in the pods. they're sure growing heavy on the fence i may have to prop it up against any winds. even with all the rains it has been a better bean year than last so i guess it's ok even if i have to scramble a bit to get things dried and/or shelled to prevent them being lost. we have a nice weather forecast for the next week, i'll be ramping up my fall schedule as much as i can get done before the real cold weather returns. plenty of minor projects to get ready for winter, plugging up gaps that mice or bugs are using...
Have you ever thought of putting one of those chicken tractors on your really big gardens? They LOVE!!! oxalis.
i have no desire to keep animals here other than the worms. it's been raining so much the past few weeks i've had three days to work outside and about 20cm of rain which is on top of what we had about a month ago which was plenty. i have a few last bean plants trying to finish up that aren't doing much due to lack of sunshine. tons of other work to do not getting done. fence waiting to be put up. etc. in the meantime with all this indoors being cooped up i've been writing a program. more accurately, i'm taking an old program written in C and adapting it for Python. since my new computer is interesting enough graphically i have a bit more of a reason to learn something new for a change. so that's been keeping me busy and my brain working. beans are drying out in here, all shelled so i just wait a bit for them to finish drying before doing the final sorting (mid-winter project ).
You are so missing out on funny stuff with not having chooks!! and they eat your weeds, thanking you for them....they arent too much work- hardly any, well so long as they dont get into your prized possessions, plantwise.
some new pictures from the website : working on the strawberry patch inside the fence. raising the lower part up and lowering the hill down so it will be level and easier to pick strawberries. digging up the stuff under there that i buried a few years ago. in other words, just having fun digging in the dirt. i went out yesterday to just bury the bean plants that were done and to do a little weeding, but while i was there i thought i'd see what i could get done. about half way. i hope i can finish the rest today, but may have to take it easier. my leg is a bit mad at me... way too much rains the past 6 weeks, two days ago we even had rain/snow for a while. already some hard frosts have come through shutting down all the bean plants that were still trying to make seeds. with my gimpy leg and arm i'm gradually getting gardens put up for the winter and taking a bit more time than usual, but i will keep going as long as the ground doesn't freeze and i can get out to do it. gardening is my favorite form of exercise and i sure need it. about another week and a half and i should be done with the fenced gardens and ready to do other gardens outside the fence. including putting up a fence around another garden... as usual always more projects than i will likely get done. cheers until next time...
yah! some animal actually pried it out of there (probably a deer) a few weeks after i took that picture. as for Z, i love the implied history in that one rock, all that geological time... that picture did turn out well.
yay! bean sorting season! my favorite time of the year. sorta (bad pun? )... here is a cross from this season. i'm calling it Lemon Slice as usual the full resolution image is linked to in the bean page... in other news we've already had our first snow. a bit earlier than i'd like as i was still hoping to get some gardens cleaned up before winter set in. so now i'm hoping for a weather relapse to some warm enough temperatures, but hard to say what will happen...
yes, i haven't grown enough to cook up yet. i'd guess they are going to be similar in flavor and texture to the tan goats eye beans i've been growing.
it has been a while. not too much new going on lately it being the middle of winter and all that. i did some bean sorting and took a few pictures of some and this cross in particular is interesting because of the unique splotchy patterns it makes. this bean is called Yed because of the yellow and red markings. in other news, starting to strengthen my leg back up now that it has mostly recovered from the tendon pull. getting ready for spring. snow storm today, but it looks pretty out there...
yes, Bill, we're having some pretty low wind chills this week from the arctic blast. when there was more sea ice up north the cold air would be up further. now it is more open sea and that means more heat in the air up there but not over the neighboring land masses so the cold air shifts south. at least that is how i see it playing out. this coming weekend we are due to get back up into the 40s for a few days. it goes from a high on Friday of 5F to 39F on Saturday. we've already had some days this past week where the high was -5F for the day. not as bad as the upper plains states, but plenty cold enough for me. the thing right now is the temperature is about 7F with 80% humidity. that goes right through you. gusts of wind up to 20MPH so not too bad out there, but i don't want to go outside to shovel until tomorrow sometime...
@9anda1f i see you might be getting some rain there! warm today, i just got out and scraped back the last of the snow from along the edges of the driveway so it can all melt off and clear up the remaining bits of ice.
Rain is turning to snow as we're getting our turn at low temperatures for the next 10 days or so. Not going to see temperatures above freezing for the remainder of the forecast period. Hopefully winter's last gasp.
where you are at all moisture is great news. i hope you get plenty. do you measure your ground water level like in the well? or do you have to bring in water to fill a cistern for use? we have a well. pretty deep. never measured the depth of the water table there or in the ground in general since we have two large drainage ditches flowing through the property and a lot of springs in the ground whenever i dig down very deep.
Actually I haven't had the well level measured but we haven't had any issues, although I'm very easy on the well. It's 320 feet deep in a 4 inch casing (old). I have one 10,000 gallon in-ground cistern and multiple 1650 gallon tanks that are filled from roof catchments, but I could easily double my tankage with all the roofs here (there are some 13 buildings and two of us to care for/fill them up with stuff. Of such storage riches, hoarders are born! = )
for those who may be wondering... i haven't been posting much here recently because PRI staff or agents of them undid the work i'd done to fix what they'd changed plus they wiped out a lot of recent posts which i'd spent a lot of time writing. they also took out a lot of newer posters that were finally showing up and providing content again. this kind of lack of care just irked me rather badly and i've had a very difficult time wanting to put much efforts into writing here again. as they say, "I've moved on..." i'm on haitus until next winter. perhaps PRI staff can go back and fix their mess they've made, but i doubt they will. if you see much of me it won't be until i can get back when things calm down and i've cooled off. in the meantime i have the greatest respect and care for some of you i've come to know and @9anda1f our esteemed moderator. peace and love to all of you who happen to see this.