The Weekly Digs #121
I did a little less in the garden this week because we had family in town. My Dad came for a visit. He is a photographer and took our family pictures and some farm pictures.
In addition to that, one morning my Dad and I weeded an entire strawberry row and cut off all the runners. It was hot and humid out but nice to get it done! My Dad and I had a nice talk while we worked.
This post contains affiliate links. Here is the full disclosure.
House Progress
I have to put this first because it’s exciting! We finally passed the certificate of occupancy and are legally in our house. I can’t wait to get more settled and moved in! I’ll share some pictures soon.
Chickens and Turkeys
I don’t know what happened this week but all of a sudden the chickens and turkeys decided to run amuck! Each day the kids would put them in the fence and then they would figure out a way to get out.
For the past few weeks, we let our new chicks use the portable electric fencing and they can slip right through the holes. That also meant our older chickens didn’t have a fence. The chickens, both large and small, were all running about the garden and doing great eating bugs. But then I realized how much damage they were doing to my tomatoes and said, no more. Actually it was more like, “Aghhhh chickens!!!!!”, with me chasing them around.
Certain times of year the chickens can do a lot of good without damaging much, but when they stick around for too long they eventually wear out their welcome.
We moved them and their coop and electric fencing out of the garden. The turkeys were also escaping fencing everyday and from what I’ve heard they only fly more once they get older. We invested in a run for the turkeys that we plan on modifying and putting wheels on so we can move it around the pasture.
In the Garden
The kids helped me harvest the Yukon Gem potatoes that were ready. Six plants pulled out and we filled a 2 gallon bucket. I didn’t get a chance to weigh it before we cooked some of them up for lunch. We were too hungry!
This is the time for planting fall crops. It always catches me a bit off guard. I got started transplanting my cabbages to a row but still need to do a lot of other crops like carrots, celery, greens, turnips, and radishes.
- Harvesting the first of the tomatoes!! Plus summer squash, carrots, cucumbers, arugula, kale, potatoes, and herbs
- Planted another succession of cucumbers. Chicago pickling and Nastu Fushnari.
- The goldilocks beans that I planted last week popped up.
- Butternut squash are growing big!
- Planted muskmelons
- Weeded so much.
