It’s the holiday Monday of the May Long Weekend here.
If we were still in the city, I’d be planting my tomato plants today.
Of course, this spring has been odd, and we’re not in the city and I ain’t risking my tomatoes yet. Over the next 2 weeks I’ll work on hardening them off, so they go out first weekend (or so) of June.
Still tons of garden work being done this weekend tho…
We’ve, surprisingly, had sunny days and very little rain this weekend.
So, brooders got cleaned out from last year’s last birds.
I had 10 turkeys hatch (with 3 more pipped, but I think I have to help them out of their shells after coffee) and moved to a freshly cleaned out and bedded brooder.
We worked on cleaning up the yard…winter was a tough bitch this round and I’m not proud that there was waaaaay more garbage ’round the Farm yard than normal.
😥
So we made a dump trip with the truck well loaded down.
Rotting pumpkin bits (that the dog spread all over the damn place in her winter fun) got forked up and put into the compost piles.
I broke down more of those food waster recovery program boxes for garden expansion, and laid a ton of them out to be covered by the straw/manure bedding from the brooders.
And we had a bonfire.
A very big bonfire.
😀
While Hubby built the fire, I worked on this:
I’m working on covering the weeds in the tomato patch with deep straw mulch, to smother them out.
I should have cut them down first, but meh…it’ll be fine.
We do still have 1 full round straw bale, but, I don’t want to open it if I don’t have to.
It will hold over to the Fall when we start giving the Merry Mares straw bales to pick though and lay in, so if I don’t need it in the garden, that saves me money later.
So I use a garbage can and haul bin after bin after bin of straw from the current bale that the Mares have been using for bedding (and crapping in). Little more work, but saves me $$$, and free fertilizer. Because peed in straw is *excellent* mulch for tomatoes, dontcha know! 😂😂😂
And, not gonna lie, I get a bit of a giggle out of the folks who pay outlandish prices for “clean” bags of straw to mulch their gardens, as if that’s going to stop weeds.
😂😂😂
Weeds are gonna happen, we just have to get them before they get out of hand, and I’m not paying $18 for bags equivalent to a 45lb small square when my big rounds cost me $40 last year (and that was spendy due to drought, I normally pay $25 for a round of straw) and will go much, much farther.
So that’s gonna be my summer…hauling straw to mulch as the plants come up.
Eh, it worked amazingly last year and hauling 2-3 bins and spreading it a day takes very little time.
It just becomes part of the daily routine.
And that garden expansion strip out front of the house?
Potatoes this year.
With the unexpected expenses that hit us (between the septic pump and the truck going over the $1500 expected cost), I’m not 100% sure I’ll have the $$$ for top soil to add to the lasagna pile to plant tomatoes in.
So, Ruth Stout style potato patch it is.
And then, by next year, tomatoes and peppers will be able to go in there, easy peasy.
🙂
So there ya go…we busy.
In 8 days I have turkeys, ducks, chicks, and goose babies coming.
So we’re gonna get more busy.
But that’s okay.
We’ll plant the garden, grow the foods, preserve the foods and get ready because…
Winter is coming.
Midnight Calico Farm 