Pipes, Pens, and Pruning

Ok first of all, apologies to Rick C. This image was supposed to appear in the last post, with fulsome admiration for his ditch digging and plumbing prowess. He hand-spaded the run to this standpipe, put in all the plumbing, and got rid of an annoying hose running across the pasture. So thanks Rick, and sorry for the omission.

Ok now that I'm done groveling.... Rick J worked on getting the pen glued together.

The potatoes are sprouting nicely. It's not quite time to bury them up with straw, but soon we will.

And the grapes are showing nice growth, all along the top of the fenceline, as planned. My pruning was amaturish, and probably not thorough enough, but it definitely helped.

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Weather Note

The weather is still damp and cloudy, and Buddy saw hail early in the week. So it remains perfect weather for the peas and lettuces in the garden. But the long term forcast was showing a big increase in nighttime temperatures, which are a key indicator. The nightly low went from 43 to 53 in a few days. Soon it will be warm enough for the first of the summer crops. In the meantime, we have a garden full of lettuces and peas, so we'll be eating well.

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Yesterday Rene and Cooper came over. Here he admires the huge carrot Rick pulled. These are carrots we planted last fall, and I was surprised how large they got. We'll have to do carrots again, but seed much more thickly, like we did in the small raised bed.

Rene and Rick work on zip-tying the pen.

While Buddy supervises.

Rick and Catherine work on the orange tree. Because it's budding out so much now, we want to direct all that lovely growth where we want it, rather than wasting it on pieces that have to come out.

Cooper was quite intrigued by the chickens, but he calmed down after a while. Here he is supervising.

Rick and Rene put the new pen up to the main coop to see how it fits. It's... pretty close lol. I really don't think we need to worry too much. Pretty soon the chickens will be eager to hop in there, as they'll know it means fresh food is coming.

And hmmm... what did I do? Well besides drink beer and take pix? I ordered all the summer vege seeds! So I spent the afternoon pasting images and descriptions in our lovely farm scrapbook.

I figure there's no point in growing the same varieties you'll see in the Farmers' Market, so I got all unusual and extra delicious varieties.