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Farm Update - October 2011

I know its not quite October yet, but I have some special plans for October, so there will be no time for updates!

I suppose its natural that spring would be a busy month, but it seems like I've got so much to write this time!  Unfortunately we have had no rain in September (so far!), but there must be enough moisture in the soil as the grass is getting greener.  

I have finally harvested broccoli and we'll just keep taking small florets from this one

The frost damaged Poor Mans Bean has recovered and is thriving,
soon to take over my garden fence once again!

I returned from a trip to the parents-in-law with a stash of tomato seedlings
and a couple of basil plants that just self-seed in their garden.

Herbs in pot (escape risks - mint and oregano, and thyme)

Rosemary, sage, capsicum (survived the frost) and pathetic looking lettuce.

Aloe plants that used to live in a small pot, time to plant out,
and part of another experiment with fermented aloe....

Plenty of silver beet and mustard greens!

The bandicoot has been back digging holes...

This is a bandicoot (not my bandicoot, I haven't been able to catch him yet!)
Comfrey has also recovered and I have plenty for
compost and feeding to the cow.

looking across the garden

beans - I tried sprouting them in toilet rolls, so far so good

peas - still not happy, only getting 2-3 a day :(

lavender and trying to revive the paw paw plants

arrow root flowers, so pretty!

Tomato and zuchini seedlings nearly ready to plant
(plus some eggplant that didn't sprout yet, any tips?  might just be old seed)

finally planted the seed potatoes, hope its not too late in the season

Mollie is getting HUGE and could be weaned but we like having
the option of not milking some mornings and letting her have it all


We currently have more green grass in the house yard than any other paddock, so Bella have been allowed limited time in the house yard each afternoon (we have learnt from experience that they are fine for a short time, but when they have eaten their fill they will start to be naughty and tip things over....)

Not enough milk for hard cheese, but still making
cream cheese, yum.....

......and kefir (see the "grains" on the spoon? we feed the curd to
the dogs and drink the whey ourselves).


We've got the incubator running again (48 eggs!),
and I sold 5 cartons at work this week!

The roosters posed for a photo -  Randy the Rhode Is Red......

....and Ivan the White Leghorn, check out those beautiful tails!


The dogs are now great mates after only knowing each other for a few months


BEFORE: my husband has built a steel rack to tidy up all our scrap metal....

AFTER: that's better!

We finally got around to tanning the hide from Bruce, more on that one later.....

Comments

  1. You have been busy.
    I have been growing Arrowroot for many years here and never had it flower so you must be doing something right.
    The peas are unhappy because they don't like to grow anywhere near members of the onion family, I try and keep about 1 metre between peas and onions.
    Potatoes I only just put mine in about a week ago as I didn't want too much growth on them in case of a late frost.

    ReplyDelete
  2. My goodness! How do you get so much done? You've got so many things growing in your garden, plus all the livestock to look after.

    Reminder to myself: get comfrey and aloe vera. I want to try making your comfrey potion. And aloe vera is great for baby's skin apparently.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Thanks Judi, good to see that I wasn't too late with the potatoes!

    Hi Emma, Thanks for the comment, if you know someone who is growing aloe vera and/or comfrey you should be able to split off a pup of aloe (the babies that grow around the base of the main plant) and split off some comfrey by root division. Would give you some of my own if I could! Also with the aloe, I didn’t realise, but a naturopath explained to me that you need to use the juice, not the gel, you’re supposed to cut out the flesh, rinse off the gel and then juice it, check it out on the net, just wanted to tell you as the gel is actually quite irritating, so you could do some damage if you don’t realise the difference (which I didn’t until I was told).

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hi Liz
    Regarding your Eggplant seedling problem - don't give up on them yet. This year for us, we have had seeds take up to a month longer than we would have expected to shoot. I'm not sure but I think it is because we have quite a bit of moisture in the soil from the earlier rain and maybe the soil is taking longer to warm up??? We had all but given up on cucumber seed and actually raised seedlings in a greenhouse. After planting the seedlings the dormant seeds came up also - double crop of cucumber this year :). Your garden and animals look awesome. Hope you and Pete are well.

    ReplyDelete

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