tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53434180394224545772024-03-13T05:10:36.276-04:00Hillside HomesteadTwo city kids on our path to eating compassionately, from kit to kitchen.
Updates Tuesday and ThursdayCouretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.comBlogger450125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-57464211589299696782016-08-10T09:57:00.002-04:002016-08-10T09:58:44.235-04:00Some success in the garden.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Apologies for the photo quality, not only was it raining today which makes the lighting a little iffy to begin with, I don't have a machine that I can edit photos on right now. Even without edited photos I'm glad to be able to share that our remaining squash plant seems to be doing well. As you can see from the plethora of blossoms it is adding fruit constantly. Not having a trellis isn't seeming to hurt it at all. I'm looking forward to being able to cut summer squash and steam it.</div>
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Our tomatoes have also set fruit, and seem to be doing fairly well. Some of the fruit appears a bit crowded as you can see here, though it seems to be growing fine. From how close the fruit is set these are probably sungold tomatoes since I think that's the only kind of cherry tomato I planted this year. The tomato plants are very stunted this year compared to the past, and we didn't even plant them late. They just haven't been doing well. Some of that is probably us having not used the bunny fertilizer we've used so liberally in the past, some of it is probably the very strange weather we've been getting with cold nights, and scorching dry periods.<br />
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Given the attention we've been able to give the garden at all this year I think it actually speaks very well to the benefits of mulch. If we'd given as little attention and watering to our plants in the past they'd probably be dead by now. With mulch they seem to be able to retain moisture well, and stay hydrated which has prevented the tomato plants from having strange split tomatoes, or just turning yellow and drooping after a week of no rain and hot sun. When we garden in the future I intend to make sure we mulch our garden beds, because the cost seems to be well worth it!<br />
<br />Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-51375803673113913092016-08-03T10:19:00.002-04:002016-08-03T10:20:54.487-04:00Garlic scapes, and chicken intrusions.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I'm sorry for not having a post up yesterday, with trying to get everything done, I've been running out of time and brain power. This is especially true as we've started packing up the Critter's things and he's getting upset and concerned about why his things are going away. That's led to evenings being a lot more challenging for us, and less sleep. Either way, while we have gotten rid of a lot of the homesteading things with the rabbits and being down to two chickens, there are still things left to do.<br />
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First of all, as you can see the garlic is doing very well. I went through and cut all of the scapes, and have put them in a vase. From the experience of a few seed savers this should give them enough energy to get through flowering. Over the next couple weeks I'm going to be keeping a close eye on them so I can pull the bulbules out and try to give the flowers room so we can save actual seed from them. It's one of those things that I really don't want to let go of since it's been a goal for some time now.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjsvW5_puO3g3FUOvXoOdletjOIctnPf7-mAfY53ehWHesitt0K1A6FMYSdFvyMckHELHfo5Yq4KP8ejD6c2z4-ZJ3zZIvyH_7tuIX66RSfsGIbuvNbj_AlXUo1Rzgr26KZtFoBGYeY3Sf/s1600/Window-Chicken.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="298" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjsvW5_puO3g3FUOvXoOdletjOIctnPf7-mAfY53ehWHesitt0K1A6FMYSdFvyMckHELHfo5Yq4KP8ejD6c2z4-ZJ3zZIvyH_7tuIX66RSfsGIbuvNbj_AlXUo1Rzgr26KZtFoBGYeY3Sf/s400/Window-Chicken.gif" width="400" /></a>Another thing that's going on is that the chickens are still very much around, and our red girl has survived and is thriving despite the attack from what I assume was a hawk. Unfortunately her desire to stay close to the house lately has led to some interesting behaviors. Including staring in the dining room window during dinner. The other thing that happens with this has become particularly relevant to my sleep. She's been perching there during the night, and as dawn approaches she starts shifting, and the bush taps the window. That wakes the dog up, who given the events of a couple weeks ago, thinks that the bear is back and wakes up barking. The barking wakes me up, and because you can't assume a false alarm I bounce up, run down stairs, and check for intruders. This of course cuts my sleep short when he does this 3 or 4 times from 4 - 6:30 AM.<br />
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Something we haven't discussed a lot in our homesteading talking is dogs and dog training. Dogs are an integral part of homesteading in my mind, and good training is an important part of that. We aren't expert dog trainers is why I haven't talked a lot about training. I would say though if you intend to do homesteading in the future, bone up on your dog training, and get good at it so you aren't looking for the best way to train this kind of false alarm behavior out, without eliminating the alerting behavior we do want!<br />
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Finally, we really appreciate all of the help we got on the <a href="http://gofundme.com/hillsidehomestead" target="_blank">GoFundMe</a>, The push with the doubling met the goal, and it has helped a good bit. We're still struggling but it has made a huge difference for us, and thank you to everyone who has helped.Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-77566535424686124092016-07-29T10:01:00.000-04:002016-07-29T10:01:50.033-04:00Events, rain, and chickens.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The rain finally came as it always done, and I swear the plants have perked up overnight. That's probably hyperbole, but it definitely feels like it even if it is a psychological thing.<br />
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Before I get back to that and focus on the homestead for the rest of the post, I'm going to touch on a couple things. First things first. The Lady of the House is having an art show near us, so <a href="https://www.facebook.com/events/1074049069326977/" target="_blank">if you're in our area and come we'd love to see you</a>.<br />
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The other thing is, we're getting so close to the line where we can put the down payment on the furnace, and we're getting close to the end of the donation matching period on our <a href="http://gofundme.com/hillsidehomestead" target="_blank">GoFundMe</a>. If you have been thinking of donating, now would be a great time.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbMPFNV3u9r0pC2PRTfBZMGBWRdkprYDfy_watMDBs7DkDIS4V8HDAVSRWlWsXPYwcOTS9SF6U521-fIuuz7DwiSpCk_iV8dvflSZXIieGv0LHLyUdDuBV6VRuyc-R4ByY6gobFNOFz70i/s1600/Squash-Blossom.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbMPFNV3u9r0pC2PRTfBZMGBWRdkprYDfy_watMDBs7DkDIS4V8HDAVSRWlWsXPYwcOTS9SF6U521-fIuuz7DwiSpCk_iV8dvflSZXIieGv0LHLyUdDuBV6VRuyc-R4ByY6gobFNOFz70i/s400/Squash-Blossom.gif" width="400" /></a>So, back into the garden from everything else going on. Most of our squash plants aren't doing well. I accidentally mowed over one with the weed eater while making the yard look more suburban than it had, and killed the most healthy one very thoroughly. Of the remaining plants, the one <b>Left</b> is the only one that looks even vaguely like it's going to be able to produce. That said, it already has a couple squash set, and is popping more flowers out constantly which is a great thing to see. The others, well, they're getting flowers, but their leaves aren't doing well so I don't expect much from them in terms of production.</div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXVeph7Zq5Gp4vbiS-oZXVXPLsoIjtNmP5NnIivzPAz6MOt_GEFSh30XEJVKTlV9nXIDIVL07a7vtB8yZoY3AytYF8vthyPRxvasdK_bcz7aO9Npbq8RSoPDz0S3F_wm8Trvv_kGPtNjZX/s1600/Surviving-Chicken.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXVeph7Zq5Gp4vbiS-oZXVXPLsoIjtNmP5NnIivzPAz6MOt_GEFSh30XEJVKTlV9nXIDIVL07a7vtB8yZoY3AytYF8vthyPRxvasdK_bcz7aO9Npbq8RSoPDz0S3F_wm8Trvv_kGPtNjZX/s400/Surviving-Chicken.gif" width="400" /></a>On the chicken front, our chickens have been declining to go into the coop lately which has been inconvenient, and we've lost a couple of them I suspect due in no small part to them not being safe at night. This morning I came out, and found our red hen looking unfortunate with only one tail feather. I'm guessing a hawk hit her, but it could be something else. I have a photo of the wound below, though it was hard to get a good shot with my cell phone with one hand, while holding her.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjB372Cyvb8IDgm_GrfmObF0Sh2b3WEcoaXuG8-AkYDhmMrNdjcn3TCEzeZTcvHUmDdxKrwV-gqugrDRHKhMeHW1QJc1PX6QV3avY9urEcor3mcKwt6j60vhg4hO4kUFmEUbBpnYBCQhvOk/s1600/Wounded-Chicken.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjB372Cyvb8IDgm_GrfmObF0Sh2b3WEcoaXuG8-AkYDhmMrNdjcn3TCEzeZTcvHUmDdxKrwV-gqugrDRHKhMeHW1QJc1PX6QV3avY9urEcor3mcKwt6j60vhg4hO4kUFmEUbBpnYBCQhvOk/s400/Wounded-Chicken.gif" width="400" /></a>I know it's hard to see, but it was still bleeding when we found her. With poultry bleeding is a big deal, since they don't have a lot of blood they can afford to lose. Because of that I was holding on tight and the Lady of the House was getting the corn starch. Fortunately she seems to be fine, and I was going to be putting her into the chicken coop for the day, and trying to shoo her surviving friend in. The problem is, when she saw me going there she kicked free and was VERY offended. If she's that strong, we'll let her be out with her friend. My main disappointment today is that I failed to have the Lady of the House get a photo of me wearing a lot of the corn starch after she kicked free. Just imagine most of that excessive amount of corn starch all over me. It was pretty funny looking. Here's hoping that she does fine, and that we can get her and her friend to the Lady of the House's father's house this weekend.<br />
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Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-82280130974051253082016-07-26T10:10:00.000-04:002016-07-26T10:10:01.562-04:00Sending on the coop.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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One of the hard things about getting the house ready is how much we'd done to make it ours. Some of that is the chicken coops. Unfortunately when the chickens are gone I'm going to have to just disassemble the big coop in the back. Fortunately, the Lady of the House's father wants to get into chickens so I was able to offload the smaller red coop we used for so long back to him. He actually found that coop for us for free, and hauled it up in the first place. He came up on Saturday, and the two of us moved the coop onto the trailer he brought, took down the chicken run, and packed it up into his trailer. Once that was done we loaded up a lot of the Critters toys, and the electric fencing for the chickens and sent it off to his house. Once that's set up we're going to bring the chickens to his place to watch over until we have a place we can have chickens again.<br />
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On the subject of the <a href="http://gofundme.com/hillsidehomestead" target="_blank">GoFundMe</a>, we are doing well, and with the donation matching we're getting close to the $5,500 point where we need to be to get the heat and hot water installation begun. Any help you can give before the 1st while the donation matching is still going on would be greatly appreciated. All of the help and sharing we've gotten has been amazing to us. Thank you all.<br />
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On the farm side of things, we still desperately need rain.<br />
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Yet another week of promises of rain, and strange weather. The ground is still parched and dry, which is getting unfortunate for the ground. On the up side, it's great for the garlic which should be coming out of the ground shortly. On the down side, on days like today where it's going to be very windy farmers with dry fields are going to lose a lot of topsoil. We are fortunate in that we have mulch on most of our garden beds, and in the fact that we have a lot of wind break cover from living in a clearing in the woods. Without the benefits of being sheltered by the trees around us we'd need to make absolutely sure before we left today that we soaked any loose dirt like on the garlic bed. I didn't do so this morning because the garlic should be dry when it is harvested, and if we're going to be doing that soon, may as well let them stay dry. Once we pull the garlic up that bed is going to probably become leafy greens, and flowers to make things look nice. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlhTJXZ4XTeyANq_TO9lX1Pj54B52DzB7w0TvDi_OA3HHaZi_9tMDZ_Y-Y43nIjhk9EVO3bIT7N8d9yVtUBahXOs7_KrligIXQtEXbAogRYWBhtq55fm87BUrFXXnysghYlmpQQKc8JYdd/s1600/Wood-pile.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="232" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlhTJXZ4XTeyANq_TO9lX1Pj54B52DzB7w0TvDi_OA3HHaZi_9tMDZ_Y-Y43nIjhk9EVO3bIT7N8d9yVtUBahXOs7_KrligIXQtEXbAogRYWBhtq55fm87BUrFXXnysghYlmpQQKc8JYdd/s400/Wood-pile.gif" width="400" /></a></div>
The other thing that got done this weekend is breaking down the pallets around the property that I'd been saving for use, or using for one thing or another. I am somewhat impressed with just how much of a pile a bunch of broken up pallets make. We're going to have a lot of wood to burn in our next couple bonfires as we do the final preparation to get the house on the market. Pallet wood burns fast, but it'll cook food just fine!Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-24473763550185874022016-07-22T09:49:00.001-04:002016-07-22T09:49:54.113-04:00Short grass problems.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMJ4T1r1Pv_I7wiaY7cc6XcesiwQnx68O3iaAgvEPZXWss5WGLqkRlnTzwk7KxcG84Kcw_NavzV9qWkzut8aJZH1GlXf0QdqQkczlfY2Mcbfh_S4m3xlyEZdpdJM8LZivcB83XhePymqcq/s1600/Backyard.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMJ4T1r1Pv_I7wiaY7cc6XcesiwQnx68O3iaAgvEPZXWss5WGLqkRlnTzwk7KxcG84Kcw_NavzV9qWkzut8aJZH1GlXf0QdqQkczlfY2Mcbfh_S4m3xlyEZdpdJM8LZivcB83XhePymqcq/s640/Backyard.gif" width="640" /></a></div>
One of the not entirely unexpected consequences of mowing the lawn short relative to our wild grass and perennial woods clearing. With the drought we've been seeing this summer, despite our nice moist climate relative to the valley, after mowing the lawn regularly we're seeing a lot of sad and browning grass. It's not the vibrant greens that I'm used to seeing our lawn, but it is starting to look more like a normal lawn. With a bit of rain it'll look fine. <br />
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On the <a href="http://gofundme.com/hillsidehomestead" target="_blank">GoFundMe</a> front we are closing in on enough to put the %50 down payment on the furnace. Right now with the donation matching my father is offering we could reach that goal very quickly. We hope to reach it before August 1st so we can get the house on the market with a firm date of installation for the furnace. Thank you all for listening, sharing, and donating. Our community has been such a huge help to us.<br /><br />Now on to the rest of the gardening situation.<br />
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One of the consequences if the light rain and our insufficient weeding is that the garden isn't doing particularly well. The plants haven't died, but they aren't growing large. A trio of tomato plants, and a few pepper plants are of a normal size, but most of them are still very small. That said, the peppers seem to be setting fruit and while we may not have the biggest plants, as long as the dry streak doesn't continue for too much longer we should still have peppers, and some tomatoes at least. We should probably be watering more than we have been, and that's something we can pick up on now that it's hot enough that the peppers are getting their ideal temperatures.<br />
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What has been doing very well is the garlic. We're coming up on the point we can harvest the garlic, and we have already been eating the garlic scapes. We aren't going to eat all of them because, again, this year I want to try to get garlic seeds instead of solely cloning the garlic we have. We'll see how well that goes. I'm going to early next week be cutting all of the scapes we have that are un-eaten by that point, and putting them in water to see if we can get them to flower. The thing I need to remember to do this year is, as they open gently with tweezers pull out all of the bulbules so they don't crowd out the flowers preventing seeds. That's what I forgot to do last year. As I do that I'm going to try to get photos because it's apparently a fairly involved process.Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-44709252685397348392016-07-19T10:06:00.002-04:002016-07-19T15:21:59.326-04:00A Bear Visit<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_fqX7YLM6eLhTuxGZo0h1T0gcoK2rqlR5jZD-X4WCZrzz1AGG7bCVBQuM9gXfmyKbHpjgQEG7WODx-ptNDmwazBHGOpp79tQMqG3hAUG-KMpKMvIKQndXONPXt_Zd8SiK1uS8oRaojsl6/s1600/Bear-on-Porch.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_fqX7YLM6eLhTuxGZo0h1T0gcoK2rqlR5jZD-X4WCZrzz1AGG7bCVBQuM9gXfmyKbHpjgQEG7WODx-ptNDmwazBHGOpp79tQMqG3hAUG-KMpKMvIKQndXONPXt_Zd8SiK1uS8oRaojsl6/s640/Bear-on-Porch.gif" width="640" /></a></div>
The Lady of the House had a very interesting experience while I was at work yesterday with a visiting bear. When I say visiting, I mean opening the trash can, and trying to get what little food there is in our trash.<br />
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Before I get to that I'm going to touch on our <a href="http://gofundme.com/hillsidehomestead" target="_blank">GoFundMe</a>. We finally have a solid estimate on the furnace replacement. It is going to come to $10,550, and we have to pay half up front for them to get started. To help us out my father is offering donation matching dollar for dollar. Right now if you can help, your donation will count double.<br />
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That out there, let's get back to the bear, and the Lady of the House.<br />
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For those of you who know bears, this is a very small bear, probably a yearling. It also looks very much malnourished. Probably due to the need for food, this bear was a bit daring. The Lady of the House shouted and growled which got it moving away initially.<br />
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Unfortunately it promptly came back around. Usually this is behavior of a Very human habituated bear, though in this case I could very easily see this being a bear that is so hungry that it is more difficult to deter. It probably really needs the food. Because of that situation it needed to be scared and scared badly.<br />
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Obviously one still has to be careful, even a bear this small could do a lot of damage if provoked, though it is unlikely to. Black bears tend to prefer to avoid confrontation. This one was no different. When the Lady of the House pushed to try to drive it off, it promptly moved out of range from her. Again though, instead of running the way a bear usually would when confronted by a lot of noise, and a big predator, it just went to the woods line.<br />
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Important to know, humans are big predators to most animals. Many predators even recognize humans as large and dangerous though we are fairly squishy because we are tall, and have forward facing eyes.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1X1rJxUkWPk4a8jOWg6QJJKPa2qGyK_29QAJveCtFrvc2fGDyyIENCCB6nrS8KDbRl46jfw7je2rB2SApzjEGDHdLSeFyqioNpQrpfduJMIy41duXX-lKPsCwqRz8HhsosShHS6S-Xpit/s1600/Doesn%2527t-want-to-leave.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1X1rJxUkWPk4a8jOWg6QJJKPa2qGyK_29QAJveCtFrvc2fGDyyIENCCB6nrS8KDbRl46jfw7je2rB2SApzjEGDHdLSeFyqioNpQrpfduJMIy41duXX-lKPsCwqRz8HhsosShHS6S-Xpit/s640/Doesn%2527t-want-to-leave.gif" width="640" /></a><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiz00oONqRGR0axA9GbqMQBbefbUlgsjr9oKLiMGhxrsvIC8uJE-nCGRk1IuyP7Zp8CJ2OOtVlPJHmrFTVRpQnpvzaB4eIJWFhmUgZcZgEgiV6oe1UdCYPx5g4U0Re7-uO2WbN_35jBBT9D/s1600/Sitting.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiz00oONqRGR0axA9GbqMQBbefbUlgsjr9oKLiMGhxrsvIC8uJE-nCGRk1IuyP7Zp8CJ2OOtVlPJHmrFTVRpQnpvzaB4eIJWFhmUgZcZgEgiV6oe1UdCYPx5g4U0Re7-uO2WbN_35jBBT9D/s400/Sitting.gif" width="266" /></a>Once at the woods line, instead of continuing to move off, it just, as you can see, sat down almost like a dog. His canniness with humans was concerning, because it would indicate that he just isn't scared of people at all. That would mean that this bear is likely to come back and be a problem over and over. The cure for something like that is a real scare. The trick of course is how to really scare such a bear.<br />
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The Lady of the House tried doing a false charge or two, which often does scare off a bear as they tend to not want to be aggressively approached. This sort of bear while problematic isn't a threat to human life yet. The problem with a bear like this not getting scared badly is that it in the future will be a problem and have trouble co-existing with humans. The problem here is, it's reaction to the false charges and more yelling and noise making was just to circle the property, going to the fire pit area.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOhKAq-dNYCJaWebnSEuDOaj2Roj1o68zkQW653tyJU9LTeHIDNsduDh23uYFUwMcFxcpgsOOmDAzONURWgAsrWVRm3jMeT28KvDlFIb8My7NkSUnIQN-wLmPfx8i15h-Dn_yJQJUmkpYt/s1600/Not-quite-gone-yet.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOhKAq-dNYCJaWebnSEuDOaj2Roj1o68zkQW653tyJU9LTeHIDNsduDh23uYFUwMcFxcpgsOOmDAzONURWgAsrWVRm3jMeT28KvDlFIb8My7NkSUnIQN-wLmPfx8i15h-Dn_yJQJUmkpYt/s400/Not-quite-gone-yet.gif" width="400" /></a>This incident made us Very happy to have a dog, because our final tool for bear scaring since I don't yet have pepper rounds for the shotgun is the dog. You know what, the dog is Very effective, and really enjoys this part of his job around the house. A good side benefit, the dog gets some much needed exercise. We don't go to the dog as a good option because 1: he could hurt the bear, and 2: the bear could hurt him. Once we get the bear starting to move away, letting the dog go after the bear and scare it into a tree is a good way to cement that this area isn't a good place to be. This bear behaved oddly again, usually the bear goes up a tree quickly, this time the dog chased the bear for some distance before coming back tired and happy. We hope that did enough to scare the bear off permanently, hopefully from all humans, not just us.<br /><br />Edited to add: The Lady of The House gives this note: Just for the record, I would never have released the dog if I thought that either would get hurt, I couldn't leave the area because my son was still napping. Animal does not come when called, and I know my dog Very well. He is all bark, and has a very good recall. Never assume your dog would do the same.<br />
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TLDR: Call animal control if it is at all an option.Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-91194782015025073242016-07-12T11:13:00.000-04:002016-07-12T11:14:08.113-04:00Quick Hit: The last rabbit kill.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Forgot to get the photos for today, so instead I'm just going to do a quick post, after all, this particular post doesn't really need any new photos. Last night I did the last butchering of rabbits that's going to take place here on the homestead. It was a killing that needed to happen, but I still am glad that it's the last one unless I'm going to be teaching people.<br />
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Herbie was the last rabbit on the homestead because he wasn't a rabbit we could let move on to another home. We'd tried to give him almost 6 months to recover from the back leg problems he was having, but he never did recover. It seems he may have injured his spine while playing and jumping around in the hutch, and just never was able to move properly after. It's a thing I've been putting off hoping he'd magically get better and we'd be able to pass him on, but it just wasn't happening.<br />
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Physically, skill wise, it was one of the easier killings I've done. Both of us were calm, and the physical process went perfectly. On an emotional level, it just confirmed that we made the right choice not to do rabbits anymore even if we were going to be able to stay in the homestead. The question now is, how do I continue to eat ethical meat, and stay healthy? Mostly, by eating less meat, and only buying from ethical sources.<br />
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But to be honest while we're in the process of selling the house and under financial duress, we're probably going to have to compromise and just eat what we can afford, while eating as little meat as we practically can.<br />
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<a href="http://gofundme.com/hillsidehomestead" target="_blank">Go Fund Me</a>Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-15924834489576140922016-07-08T09:21:00.000-04:002016-07-08T09:24:31.754-04:00The conundrum of chickens.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Obviously I'm using old photos today given that this shows Boris and our old girls, but I wanted to talk about chickens, and letting them express their chickenness. There's a balance to be had as long as you don't have infinite money with chickens. It's the balance of safety versus comfort/freedom that comes up in many ways.<br />
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Financially we're sort of on the extreme end of this since we basically have been working with what we can get our hands on instead of what we want to buy. The electronetting is kind of an exception, and is a great deterrent for terrestrial predators. That obviously doesn't help with aerial predators as we saw from Boris's end. Now how we've combated aerial predators is either the orange construction netting over the little fenced in yard area, or giving them a lot of tall grass for cover. The down side to keeping in the little run is, they definitely don't have enough room. By technical standards they do have more than enough room per chicken given the number of chickens we kept in that coop. The official standards are 4 ft/chicken inside and 10 ft/chicken out in the run. The run is 120 sq ft, and the coop 24 sq ft. We had 6 chickens, so technically that should be completely fine.<br />
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In our experience though we've seen that chickens need more space than that to really go and do chicken things. I'm sure that chickens can be healthy in smaller spaces, but as I've gotten to know them I think that a lot of space is important. Electronetting and having the ability to move them around and let them meander through new places regularly is great. The trade off there is, there is no real way to protect them from aerial predators other than some portable shelter, hope, and presence of something that bothers hawks. In the end my experience with chickens so far tells me, having them out, roaming around, and being chickens is worth losing one from time to time. It's when you lose all of them to a fox that it's a problem. With that in mind, until we get an aerial predator that gets everyone in one go, our focus is happy chickens with protection from terrestrial threats.<br />
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As a last note, right now our <a href="http://gofundme.com/hillsidehomestead" target="_blank">Go Fund Me</a> has stalled out a bit. We're moving along, and working on getting things fixed up as we go. Any help is greatly appreciated.Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-31156024369692624492016-07-05T09:55:00.000-04:002016-07-05T09:55:04.008-04:00Moving rabbits and hutches.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I hope everyone had a good 4th of July. If you're in the USA I hope you enjoyed your Independence Day however you chose to celebrate it, and that your livestock, and the humans in your life weren't disturbed by the fireworks. For the most part we weathered the fireworks just fine, but last night it seems that Boris didn't make it back into the coop, and I wasn't able to find him this morning. Last night was a bad night to be out between the thunder storm, and the fireworks.<br />
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Otherwise this was a very good and productive weekend, though we also spent time getting to be sociable and relax which is important in the midst of stressful weeks.<br />
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Most of the hutches are gone, and almost all of the rabbits are gone with all but Dawn and her daughter, and Herbie being gone by the end of the day today. As you can see we have a lot of cleaning up to do after the hutch removal because there's a lot of manure under where they were. The good side is the manure is going to go right on the garden and hopefully help out our poor peppers and tomatoes which are suffering for the cold nights. The peppers and tomatoes are growing, but not much and we really need them to go faster, or just hope that we don't get our normal September frosts because otherwise we aren't getting much in the way of peppers and tomatoes! Either way, we're letting them do their thing, and hope the manure will help.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBaXGNbGA9Vw_JTz-BIJKQxKcTeYfy8UBYfn3qUL5Ol5sZgTwTLKllTWPBSf8S15xd0-Gc-YmON8Jskqi22XNA8mCXLS7raJfMap-GaAESXITIrHs0uLH-PlUeMBWCVRNlV_YSc7ou6W5o/s1600/Hutches-in-the-woods-gone.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBaXGNbGA9Vw_JTz-BIJKQxKcTeYfy8UBYfn3qUL5Ol5sZgTwTLKllTWPBSf8S15xd0-Gc-YmON8Jskqi22XNA8mCXLS7raJfMap-GaAESXITIrHs0uLH-PlUeMBWCVRNlV_YSc7ou6W5o/s400/Hutches-in-the-woods-gone.gif" width="400" /></a>It is weird to me to not see the hutches in the woods, and it was a bit hard for me to pick up and move the rabbits and the hutches that have been such a part of our home and identity for the past five years. I'm really glad they've gone to good homes where they will be used and be treated well. I actually loved seeing the set up that most of the hutches went to where they're going to be in a garden with chickens right around in the same area. It's been a hard decision to get out of rabbits, and we know it's the right one. Doing the work of actually doing so was difficult. To be fair, it was partially difficult due to the weight of the hutches, but that's a different story.<br />
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To move the big hutch from the woods that had never been moved we removed the doors, and the sides to lighten it up, and that did help a lot. With six people we moved it over about 100 yards in around 5 minutes. Once we got it to the location it is going to be staying in that was a bit harder since we only had five people, and lost one of our strongest, but we managed to get the hutches into place.<br />
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I love seeing a bunch of people come together to get things like this done, and get it done well. The folks who are taking in the rabbits seem to be thrilled, and the rabbits will do well in their new home. Now, focus shift to the garden, and preparing the house.Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-46370372428733350642016-07-01T12:33:00.001-04:002016-07-01T12:33:19.913-04:00Luna moths, leaving rabbits.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJYFtNJxh2A7JsS2W1e5p8JS8vfZEO9p8cJ-I4fV_YmN_94deRv2Aj_hYPIOEFLasfp-_20E3TYx9IL_XdADvPjKlWlv-LMOXZDPZnjyhhlELX12a3W8ar-p0VEI6s1V3g-l6oD-3GzWcr/s1600/Luna-Moth.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="504" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJYFtNJxh2A7JsS2W1e5p8JS8vfZEO9p8cJ-I4fV_YmN_94deRv2Aj_hYPIOEFLasfp-_20E3TYx9IL_XdADvPjKlWlv-LMOXZDPZnjyhhlELX12a3W8ar-p0VEI6s1V3g-l6oD-3GzWcr/s640/Luna-Moth.gif" width="640" /></a></div>
I'm always glad to see the arrival of our first Luna Moths, they are a beautiful if fragile species with a short visiting time. To me they have a lot of the charm of fireflies except during the day instead of dusk and night. They are also incredibly sensitive to pesticides so they only survive in areas without any real pesticide use. To me they are a sign of living in a healthy environment.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFHnoFoLX_O15vLm4W-cYIerUgz47yISBPx4LN6QGIElVV-4YEqcVil61palESdJ1P949XLYyx1z6vZuLNEVPregkgtgLNnQOOrLIWzHJwRQ0eCNhWU2zheMTJyAfQEwBRgMzWDXaaLSf4/s1600/Hutch-Gone.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFHnoFoLX_O15vLm4W-cYIerUgz47yISBPx4LN6QGIElVV-4YEqcVil61palESdJ1P949XLYyx1z6vZuLNEVPregkgtgLNnQOOrLIWzHJwRQ0eCNhWU2zheMTJyAfQEwBRgMzWDXaaLSf4/s400/Hutch-Gone.gif" width="400" /></a>In the realm of rabbits we're moving quickly in getting them moved out. So far Dorado and Starry Night have moved out, and are at their new homes. One of the new homes is taking hutches with rabbits, so one of the hutches is already gone with more soon to be gone tonight, and this weekend. If scheduling goes as expected we won't have rabbits on the property by July 4th. The sooner we can get the hutches out of here the better of course, that way we can start cleaning up the areas they were, and making things look more "normal" than homestead in the woods.<br />
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I will say it definitely threw me off this morning to see the hutch next to the wood pile just, gone. Of course, that one's in the driveway waiting for another truck run since getting the first hutch out of the woods took a long time and a lot of work. I'm definitely getting a feel for just how much more solid my hutches are than most. For where we are that's been a good thing, but since I mostly built them in place I haven't experienced the joys of heaving them around more than few feet at a time. The hutches aren't That heavy, the problem with moving them is that at over 6' tall they're very top heavy and are easy to lose control over. We didn't drop a hutch, but it took 3 of us almost 20 minutes to get it out of the woods and onto a pickup truck. Sunday we're looking forward to having more help from stronger folks!<br />
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The <a href="https://www.gofundme.com/hillsidehomestead">Go Fund Me</a> has paused for the moment, but the other forms of help have been continuing to come in. Selling off the rabbits and the hutches is bringing in some money. Along with that we're selling the viable materials from when I did the work disassembling a friend's barn which is making a little more. Step by step with help from friends, and community we're getting things normalized and hope to work this out so when we move, we'll be able to continue at least limited homesteading.<br />
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Thank you all for your kindness, generosity, and the continued support from the patreon supporters.Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-81941844899070105872016-06-28T10:51:00.002-04:002016-06-28T10:51:56.659-04:00Welcome rain, warm nights.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0HGKcxvaar2_AgDnxXslrnTasA9qu1QP7XOFZ-1pdiD38AlriQSN1MMDmLGeeZ3rSwAFR_xGfpK8CtWOg4WvVHRZ9PKez5nBbCVYmKdnsfhKDvRsjdZJFdGSbQAxP_AUJ_frq7BL7zS4r/s1600/Chickens-in-the-Grass.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0HGKcxvaar2_AgDnxXslrnTasA9qu1QP7XOFZ-1pdiD38AlriQSN1MMDmLGeeZ3rSwAFR_xGfpK8CtWOg4WvVHRZ9PKez5nBbCVYmKdnsfhKDvRsjdZJFdGSbQAxP_AUJ_frq7BL7zS4r/s640/Chickens-in-the-Grass.gif" width="640" /></a></div>
Despite the challenges right now we're moving along with life as we address them. Lately our predator concern has come from the hawks that are out a lot lately. The electronet doesn't help with that, but the chickens have been sticking to the tall grass and weeds to hide from the aerial threats. I'm always glad to see animals doing the smart thing to stay alive when I can't be there to preserve them 24/7/365 since I'm at work during the day.<br />
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On the funding side of things, the furnace situation is rough, but the <a href="https://www.gofundme.com/hillsidehomestead">go fund me</a> has been incredibly helpful, and people have been generous, kind, and helpful with money, advice, and love. Our strength and wealth is in our community and friends, and this has really highlighted that.<br />
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Another concern lately has been the absence of rain, which has come to an end today. A good day of general rain fall will do our plants a lot of good, as you can see below the tomatoes haven't been growing fast, and nor have the peppers. The garlic has been doing very well no matter what the weather, and the scapes are starting to look great. I'm trying to decide if I'm going to try for getting the garlic flowering, and harvest seeds this year, or just go for eating the scapes which are delicious, and easy to cook with. I'm probably going to be doing some of each honestly because the idea of having actual garlic seeds is very appealing to me.<br />
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A thing we've been forgetting to do lately is water the garden. We don't water often normally but with the distractions in life we just haven't been doing it. I think that the mulch has helped keep almost all of the plants alive which is impressive given the level of care we've given them which has been nearly nothing for the past two weeks. We're getting our minds back into the swing of things, and are going to be doing weeding as soon as we have a couple minutes to rub together without rain, and with sunlight to do the weeding in. I can't really imagine that weeding at night would be a wise idea with my level of skill at plant identification! I'd end up pulling out the tomatoes, and leaving the plantain. I'd say the rabbits will be happy, but they won't be around by the end of this <br />
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coming weekend. That's not to say that all of them are going to be butchered for meat. We're selling our stock off to a couple different locals who want to get started with rabbits. We're selling off many of the hutches as well, and the ones that don't go soon I'm going to be putting up on various "sell this thing" sites because while I'm not perfect, these hutches are still in great shape after a few years, though they could use a coat of paint. Getting rid of the rabbits to folks that are looking to get into them makes us feel better that they will be used for their purpose, and is another step towards getting financially out of the mess we're in. Every dollar counts, especially when it's a dollar earned, and a dollar not spent on feed all at once.<br />
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We are going to be holding onto the chickens to the bitter end in hopes that we'll be able to keep them when we move. As always, we'll keep you updated, and intend to make sure, where ever we land we can at least try to keep the mindset of working towards sustainable community living.Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-30475977988737223222016-06-24T09:59:00.000-04:002016-06-24T09:59:13.553-04:00The time has come.<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCTBruxxlkEHZDO1fyercGG7c_2kFcqG6UJ3H5UUZesofIVENXN_IAOIE8guS_mjr2OKvt35Qval5DfogXAiFZpsR0uNraiWdfDf848vz4THu0GMqo_wuEkipbvyx0wRp1Y1ZSrNS3OBYx/s1600/Home-in-the-sun.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCTBruxxlkEHZDO1fyercGG7c_2kFcqG6UJ3H5UUZesofIVENXN_IAOIE8guS_mjr2OKvt35Qval5DfogXAiFZpsR0uNraiWdfDf848vz4THu0GMqo_wuEkipbvyx0wRp1Y1ZSrNS3OBYx/s640/Home-in-the-sun.gif" width="640" /></a>In short order after Tuesday's post, things have changed again. Our furnace failed spectacularly. While we've always wanted a hot tub, 5" of boiling water in the basement was not quite what we'd wanted. With the results of that, and everything else going on, we've shifted from "We need to fix up the house, and sell but we'll keep it private for now" to "ASAP."<br />
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Where does that leave the blog? Well, sale in our area usually involves 2 years on the market once we get the repairs complete. I see no reason to not keep up what we're doing with this as we move along and keep doing what we're doing. I intend to keep going with the blog, and keep on keeping on for now. I will keep updating folks both on the homestead side of things, and will let folks know if the blog is likely to close or take a break for a while.<br />
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For now, I'm going to post the information from our <a href="http://gofundme.com/hillsidehomestead">Go Fund Me</a>. If anyone's looking to buy a house in the hills of MA, or pay for all of our repairs let us know! We love the house, it's a great house in good condition other than a couple repairs. The real reason we have to move comes down to, our financial situation isn't improving, and hasn't improved for years. Without our finances improving, we end up with our one car dragging the Critter around for hours a day which isn't ok. So, it's time to change.<br />
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I figure, closing on a rainbow seems appropriate. If you're interested in the <a href="http://gofundme.com/hillsidehomestead">Go Fund Me</a> you can go to the link, or I'm including the text below.<br />
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As some of you may know, we have reached a challenging point in home-ownership. We had planned to keep it private, but we had already decided to move after the latest in several major expenses when the well suffered damage due to the previous home-owner's "DIY tendencies." We simply cannot keep up with the expenses, even with insurance. We LOVE this house, but the distance and issues have made this a completely untenable situation.<br />
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We have long spent our emergency funds and ability to take loans/credit cards. Those who have been to our house know that we hadn't even had a chance to repair the damage from the first plumbing issue (affectionately known as the "Speed Bump") where the improperly installed dishwasher dripped through to the basement.<br />
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We just had our oil furnace completely give up the ghost. Our insurance is probably helping to cover much of the water damage caused by 4+ inches of hot water, but not the new boiler which is the priciest part. While having a hot tub is something we wanted, in the basement by surprise wasn't really what we were hoping for. No one was hurt and there wasn't a fire though, which is lucky.<br />
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For the destroyed oil furnace, while we may qualify for fuel assistance to get a new burner through Massachusetts grant programs, they are out of money at this time, and may not be able to start qualifying us until November. We are looking to see if an exception can be made but the process is slow and unclear. We also are out of hot water and heat until it is replaced (though the water otherwise works fine thanks to that last repair...thank god!)<br />
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We would normally never resort to such a thing, but times are bad. We were trying to save for the new roof, or the painting that the house badly needs to be lived in long term, much less resold, but things kept coming up.<br />
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If left in this state, things are only going to get worse.<br />
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We are asking for help with covering some of the expenses because we are out of options. We are going to continue to try to pursue grants and things of that nature, but realistically much of it will need to be out-of-pocket. There are some things on our list that are musts, and some that are maybes.<br />
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Houses don't sell well in our area, so it's necessary that it's at absoluty move-in ready and passes inspection to sell in any length of time.<br />
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To start with the money would be used for:<br />
Paying the well repair company<br />
The installation and cost of the new furnace<br />
Repairing the floor damage caused by the first leaks<br />
Wiring the bathroom light<br />
Fixing the wiring in the upstairs room<br />
Painting the house<br />
etc.<br />
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Some of it will also go towards paying the taxes on the funds.<br />
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For those who own a home, you'll probably notice that our list is long for 10K. If the money goes over, the money would still be used towards getting the house in livable, then sellable condition. If it's under, we will handle things in dire need first.<br />
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Of course we prefer not to just be handed money. Michelle also has an etsy store, and sells art. We are happy to go that route as well. She cannot take on many detailed commissions because we currently rely on the regular income from that time spent making gryphs so couldn't realistically give a reasonable deadline since it couldn't be prioritized. Smaller projects might be a go, such as pet portraits. She'd be happy to discuss work that is already created though, or custom size prints, etc.<br />
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If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact us. Any help right now would be invaluable, thank you for your time, anything you can give, and anywhere you can share this. If you'd like to contact us directly with support rather than through here, you can contact me at coureton@gmail.com.<br />
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Thank you.<br />
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Coureton, Michelle aka. The Lady of the House, and Gabriel aka. The Critter.<br />
<br />Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-43205837560750143652016-06-21T15:49:00.004-04:002016-06-21T15:49:40.923-04:00Quick Hit: Quitting Rabbits.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The Summer Solstice has come, and it is a time of changes. This is the best time of year in Cummington, and when we most love where we live and homesteading. Given that, I feel that it is also an ideal time to make decisions about things that are tough to decide because we aren't tainted by the fact that winter is rough.<br />
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We've decided it's time to move away from raising rabbits for meat. The primary reason to move away from it is, I am getting to the point I just can't really take doing the killing. It's too stressful to me to regularly be giving the rabbits the care I feel the deserve on an ethical level, and also be able to kill them. Part of it is the frequency it has to be done, but part of it is, I just think I'm not cut out for doing it since I don't literally HAVE to to survive. There are other choices we can make to have ethical food, and we're just going to have to do those instead.<br />
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I'm a little disappointed that we aren't going to be able to continue doing rabbits, but there is more than enough in the way of other things to do.<br />
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For now we're going to start de-acquisitoning our herd and getting rid of the hutches, because the rabbits and hutches both are in good shape.Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-37800816011015616142016-06-17T12:52:00.000-04:002016-06-17T12:52:52.482-04:00Wait, it's Friday?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I seem to have gotten confused on days, and ended up not making a post yesterday! I apologize for my oversight. The new chickens that our friend was kind enough to de-acquisition to us have settled in for a couple weeks, and we're starting to get them used to being outside. I need to do a little more mowing and weeding before putting the electronetting up is going to be useful and successful, so right now they're only out when we are outside with them. The Critter really enjoys being outside with the flock, though they break way before him like he's a large ship with a really unfortunate bow wave! He hasn't yet trained these girls that he's safe enough to be around to be able to pet them.<a name='more'></a></div>
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He is however very excited that one of the Australorps is curious enough about him to come very close. She actually is kind of funny because she doesn't seem to have a voice. She comes up and and very insistently opens her beak and makes quiet hisses of air, but no sound comes out of her beak. I haven't spent a full day watching her, but I have yet to hear sounds come out of her, unlike the rest of the new hens. Over all we're very happy that they've settled in so fast, and that they are laying plenty of eggs. We're hoping to encourage one of them to go broody so we can get our hands on known fertilized eggs to mix in with the ones they lay. We're not sure that Boris is still able to do the breeding duties of a rooster, but this time that's ok. The hens do follow his lead, and though he is slow stick relatively close to him. We think he may have reached the limit of his recovery, you'll notice in the photos <b>Above</b> that while he has moved between the two photos about two minutes apart, he hasn't moved a whole lot. He seems to be eating well though, and does get around. The hens went back into the coop at his urging when it was dusk, and that's exactly what we want to see.<br />
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I'd mentioned that the grass needed more mowing, and more weeding needed to be done before the electronetting will be useful. Here's the thing about electronetting. It is very effective at what it does, which is put electric current into anything that touches it. The consequence of this is, if it isn't an insulated post, it is going to act as a ground and rob the fence of effectiveness. Each long bit of grass, weed, and stick touching the fence is going to reduce its effectiveness. With electric fencing you never want any animal to encounter the electronetting at less than full effectiveness. One of the things with training any animal is consistency. With electric fence of all kinds the electricity isn't actually enough to stop an animal. The expectation of pain and it not being worth it to cross the fence is what you're going for. You want the suggestion that it's not worth it, with the disincentive of the pain from the shock to make animals not even test the fence. That's why constant maintenance and testing of the electric fence is so important once it's installed.<br />
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Once you've been inconsistent once it is much harder to teach animals to stay away from the fence long term.Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-90285618825833256612016-06-14T09:42:00.000-04:002016-06-14T09:42:09.734-04:00Two Years, and healthy greens.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhk7fg8aV0oOXCdREsbT9DmmVeBnN2Uuh_tqhro6E25NcsjJaGmVKrYfUa3S3IMYdVhqWuBOJEeC-mUHOfHtpfzpZTXZaSDkEZqb7_p4jaT8oJ_gnaY7aN73gBgSCITZmIuO04tPmuYetx5/s1600/Herb-Garden.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhk7fg8aV0oOXCdREsbT9DmmVeBnN2Uuh_tqhro6E25NcsjJaGmVKrYfUa3S3IMYdVhqWuBOJEeC-mUHOfHtpfzpZTXZaSDkEZqb7_p4jaT8oJ_gnaY7aN73gBgSCITZmIuO04tPmuYetx5/s640/Herb-Garden.gif" width="640" /></a></div>
First things first, today is the second anniversary of our wedding. It's been a tough couple years, but our partnership is only stronger than it began, and I'm glad for it. Something that may not come across all the time is just how much the Lady of the House does for the homestead, and in terms of thinking and planning. Her beautiful work on her herb garden has done a lot for the beauty of our house, and in terms of what we will have available for cooking.<br />
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Really though, I feel fortunate to be with her as whether homesteading or otherwise, she enriches every aspect of my life.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLQUfUA4jAb0x1o5H4i1C2jKWbF9o9RqGOIC24WTe3HkWJA2WRjQicrHgpVMFLoJ02Gk9OEwAEpvx3aRLLTb9YfTB55AH3DN7SIWGJStK8wyI7AGmsZXDyNPtldWm957Y2qdFy2WlUd8YE/s1600/Mowed-Lawn.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLQUfUA4jAb0x1o5H4i1C2jKWbF9o9RqGOIC24WTe3HkWJA2WRjQicrHgpVMFLoJ02Gk9OEwAEpvx3aRLLTb9YfTB55AH3DN7SIWGJStK8wyI7AGmsZXDyNPtldWm957Y2qdFy2WlUd8YE/s400/Mowed-Lawn.gif" width="400" /></a>On to the rest of the homestead, and day to day things. The weather has been so crazy this year I actually couldn't keep up with using the sickle and feeding the rabbits. This year I mowed the lawn. I'm not against a mowed lawn, it's just that with rabbits I like supplementing their food with grass and edible weeds as much as possible, it helps our feed bill and their gut health both. That said, the Lady of the House and I found that having a mowed lawn really is more appealing, and with the Critter roving around more we're probably going to be keeping the grass cut short regularly, and just cutting for the rabbits from further out. Shorter grass is a bit safer when having small people around, especially in relation to the fact that there are ticks, and we want to avoid having the Critter get Lyme disease if at all possible.<br />
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Other things that happened this weekend other than having a relaxing bonfire day with folks was getting squash in the ground. The Lady of the House purchased starts from Crabapple Farm, and this weekend I cleared out a couple of beds, planted the squash, and moved the squash trellises over to where the squash have been planted. We've mostly stopped doing squash starts and instead buy them. Squash don't really like being transplanted very much, and can be very sensitive to environment changes from being grown indoors under lights and then moved outside, even with hardening. Crabapple Farm starts their squash in greenhouses which gives them a lot less of a shock when moving outside, and their starts have never been problematic for us, and ease of growing is nice.<br />
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Obviously starting seeds inside is great for things that we have space for and really want to do a lot of like peppers, tomatoes, and the like. Things like squash that are a little more sensitive buying from a professional is a great option. Cost wise we got 6 starts for $15. Given the prices of squash if we get 15 squash we're doing fine, and since we're likely to get many more than that I think we're going to more than get our moneys worth on it. Even with the work of maintaining the squash. The one thing we didn't do that I wish I'd remembered to do before planting the squash was do a trap crop to burn and kill off the squash beetles. Maybe we can train the Critter to pick the squash beetles off. That's probably a next year thing.Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-9939707028373985612016-06-09T10:19:00.000-04:002016-06-09T11:44:02.795-04:00Wind, power, and wood oven class.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Another long night of heavy winds which seems to be more and more common. We get a lot of good cover from our trees, but that doesn't protect power lines elsewhere. We lost power for around eight hours last night which is very inconvenient. Fortunately other than needing to throw out most of what is in the fridge, it's just that, an inconvenience. Sadly part of that inconvenience is not having our white noise machine that helps the kid sleep, so we had a long night.<br />
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Before that though, I went to an interesting class last night at the <a href="http://rivervalleymarket.coop/">River Valley Market Co-Op</a> that I'd intended to talk about today, so that's going to be below the cut.<br />
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The class I went to last night was on building earthen ovens, which is something that has sounded interesting to me for some time. The class was thorough, interesting, and had all of the information I needed to do decision making on building an earthen oven, and probably enough to figure out how to do it myself with a little bit of online research and experimentation added in. Before I get into the details though I'm going to credit the class properly<br />
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<b>Earthen ovens in your backyard</b><br />
Presented by <a href="http://broadfork.coop/">Broadfork Permaculture</a> and <a href="http://earthenovens.com/">Ashley Schenk</a><br />
Recommended other resources: <a href="http://firespeaking.com/">firespeaking.com</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Build-Your-Own-Earth-Oven/dp/096798467X">Build your own earth oven</a> by Kiko Denzer<br />
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Ashley Schenk was the gentleman teaching the class, and he is knowledgeable and experienced. If one were to want to build an earthen oven I'd recommend a class with him, or hiring him to lead your work crew since that's something he provides as a service. I was frankly impressed with how well he knew the subject and how he handled a class of people who kept asking questions instead of letting him get to the material.<br />
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Let's get down to it.<br />
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Bottom Line Up Front: This is a really cool idea that isn't going to be realistic for us because of the combination of cost, relation to our weather, and specific time frame time investment. Something similar that allows for a different building method would be ideal, and I'm going to be looking into other options.<br />
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<b>The process</b><br />
Location: You need to choose the location for this oven carefully because of a number of factors. First and foremost, you aren't going to be able to move this oven. Even beyond the built onto a concrete pad problem it's going to weigh in around a ton or more. Factors that are important:<br />
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<ul>
<li>Fire will burn more easily with the door facing away from the wind</li>
<li>You need a safe distance from flammables (10+ feet)</li>
<li>You need a good amount of room to work at and around the oven since you will be cooking multiple things with it at a time</li>
<li>Access to water for cooking and safety</li>
<li>Access to fuel</li>
<li>Access to the kitchen</li>
</ul>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This is one place I might put one of these ovens.</td></tr>
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Size: How big do you want this oven? Is it going to be for a single family use with some parties? Is it going to be for a community, or a village? This is going to affect cost, time, and skill. It will also heavily affect the fuel cost for firing the oven which I'll get into more later. Kiko Denzer's book has a great chart of oven materials to help make this decision as well.<br />
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Foundation: This is to provide both a stable base, as well as provide drainage away from the oven. The information he gave sounded very similar to a french drain, and I'd probably do an actual french drain for increased drainage given our area. The foundation recommended is a 6" - 12" concrete pad "floating" on a gravel and fill base. The gravel should be going down around 12" - 24". This is one of those things that is going to depend on your environment, where we are with deep frost heaves, 24" + would be wise.<br />
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Work time for the foundation is approximately 1 full work day with 2 - 4 people digging, packing gravel, tamping, framing, and pouring the concrete pad.<br />
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Wait for at least a week maybe two for the pad to cure properly.<br />
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The Base: The base brings the oven up to a good workable height that is going to depend on the person. Essentially counter top height so it's easy to work with. This can be built with any number of materials and in many styles. It can be built with a hollow base if you have a good solid foundation for the oven itself, or more likely closed and filled with rubble and clean fill. This needs to be built perfectly level and stable because it is going to be supporting the oven itself, and any imperfection at this point will affect the quality and stability of the oven itself.<br />
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This is also when you'd build in extra shelf area, or grilling areas on the sides of the oven. Good ideas I've seen are shelves off to the side to place baking materials.<br />
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Bottom Insulation Layer: This is to keep the heat in because otherwise the base would just suck the heat out of the thermal mass that provides the primary cooking heat. It forms a firm lip around the circumference of the foundation of the oven. The material of this is clay slip which is one part clay and one part water mixed to a smoothie thickness. Once you have that mixed you add in perlite or vermiculite for further insulation. He warned, be careful to not breathe in clay dust.<br />
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This takes about another day or more depending on how many people you have helping, and your skill with masonry.<br />
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Sand Layer: Much like building a patio you then put in a layer of fine sand, and level it perfectly.<br />
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Hearth: This is the base of the cooking area. You can use a variety of materials for this ranging from slabs of soap stone to heavy duty fire brick. Again, the thicker your hearth, the higher the heating cost, and starting time, but the longer you can cook. He recommends for residential uses having the hearth be 2" fire brick because it is a good balance of charging and discharging.<br />
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When placing the bricks instead of placing on the sand and sliding, put the brick butted up to the one next to it and slide it down, you don't want sand working even a little bit between the bricks as they have to be perfectly butted to each other.<br />
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Door Arch: You are going to want to build the door arch now if you're going to be using brick so it can be meshed with the next insulation layer. Fire Brick is recommended for this because it is more resilient to dings than clay. You are going to be dinging the door arch because it's regularly interacted with using tools. This is a specialist thing I'd look up since my notes on it are Long.<br />
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Shaping the baking space: Mark a circle on the hearth to denote the interior space of your baking area. You then use damp sand to build the form of the interior. The baking space is going to be a parabolic shape, and to build this you use a cardboard or plywood form to increase the accuracy. Once you have built this you are going to layer two layers of wet news paper over it to make removing the sand without damaging the next layer easy. When working with the sand having one person with a spray bottle keeping the sand damp as their whole job is recommended.<br />
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Inner Thermal Battery Layer: This layer fills the same niche as the hearth in terms of acting to retain the heat for cooking, and protect the rest of the structure from thermal damage. This is built of one part clay, and 2 - 3 parts coarse sand. The clay should be a pudding consistency before you mix the sand. This is hard work to mix, and must be mixed thoroughly to build with. This should be applied in a 2" - 4" thick layer similar to the hearth. It should be of even thickness top to bottom, and packed in firmly to eliminate any air bubbles.<br />
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Top Insulation Layer: Mix clay slip similar to the bottom insulation layer, then mix in straw. This will be the insulation layer similar to what kept all of the heat from going into the base except to keep the heat from going out into the air. This doesn't need a lot of clay, the clay is just a binder for the straw in this case. This will be applied in a 4" - 10" layer. He recommends 4" - 6" that seems to be optimal for his experience. Start from the bottom, build a ring layer and pack down, build the next ring, and so on. This helps prevent slumping and uneven thickness. When it does slump cut from the bottom and move the material up.<br />
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Plaster:<br />
Coarse layer: Mix one part clay slip and one part sand and apply in a rough coat for the first part of weather protection.<br />
Fine layer: Use ideally lime sand plaster and apply a smooth finish coat to the outside for weather protection.<br />
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Clearing: Once all of that is done which should be a day of work with significant manpower help you carefully clear the sand out stopping at the damp news paper.<br />
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Firing: Once the sand is out start by lighting a small fire, and then over the next 4 - 5 days lighting slightly larger fires each day to dry the interior of the oven space. On the fifth day light a full fire to properly fire the clay that forms the oven.<br />
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Roof: In this climate it is recommended to build a shed roof over this oven to keep the earth work from getting battered by rain and snow which will preserve the life span. When building this insure you don't have wood over the thermal plume from the oven because the temperature of air coming out of the mouth of the oven will be 600 - 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit.<br />
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Door: You need two doors for this oven. First is a metal firing door that has an air inlet at the bottom, and an air outlet at the top. Second is a hardwood baking door that fits tightly and keeps the heat in the oven with no air outlet because when you are cooking and baking there won't be a fire inside.<br />
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Cooking and Baking:<br />
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<ul>
<li>Build a large fire in the oven and burn for 1 - 3 hours</li>
<li>Remove ashes and coal</li>
<li>Bake pizza or other high temperature foods first</li>
<li>Plan to bake many dishes throughout the day, as the temperature of the oven slowly cools.</li>
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Maintenance: You are going to have to re plaster every 2 - 4 years, and every so often depending on the oven and environment you will have to take the entire oven off the hearth, and rebuild the earth outer work.</div>
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As you can see this is a work intensive building process that will require a lot of people, and isn't going to be anything like free. If you can find clay for low cost which I'm assured is possible that will help. Using recycled materials from other projects or other places would also help.</div>
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All in all this sounds like a great baking oven that does what I want it to, but I need something I work on building a bit every day. If at some point in the future I have much greater leisure than I do today this is something I'd love to do. I'm hoping that at some point I'll be able to help someone else build one so I can watch this process and learn. If you want to know more about how to do this, or have time to do so, use the resources I listed, there's a lot from my class notes I couldn't put in, and I didn't even take notes on everything! Sounds like a very fun process with a great result.</div>
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Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-61939698556591709522016-06-07T10:29:00.000-04:002016-06-07T10:29:04.749-04:00Perfect weather for greens.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZIG-kfobcBPxi6N7TRuFLGI06yR9yxjTcpo6OkropELdkRHz6m1PhOBT6cpdigsYCP-ZSTL4gp8unJrvG5C65_ajWObDTIZU7m6vPabqyHQu7fDEXbwUTQZNtkQz3nHQ1OJ4_cw1RKVi4/s1600/Garlic.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZIG-kfobcBPxi6N7TRuFLGI06yR9yxjTcpo6OkropELdkRHz6m1PhOBT6cpdigsYCP-ZSTL4gp8unJrvG5C65_ajWObDTIZU7m6vPabqyHQu7fDEXbwUTQZNtkQz3nHQ1OJ4_cw1RKVi4/s640/Garlic.gif" width="640" /></a></div>
The grass is getting out of control with the nearly every other or every third day rain we've been having followed by hot sunny days. I'm going to actually have to mow the law instead of using a sickle and feeding it to the rabbits. Just too much greenery! Not a thing I thought I'd be saying, but there it is. We've been trying to keep on top of the weeding. In the bare beds I haven't mulched yet that's tough, though the garlic is going gang busters as you can see.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9BKoxie42Xpf2IKhdWj8TomobKQFV6cOH5KOeVyhZvGA93W45s94DiheKuoA0ipJai-EtBzP0xm4CoiOPjRZOhJY4aMPeeGrbbUBGIsuCdGS6c_qM3NDiHH0Jv1kdPfMxjM0ycbBTM8mP/s1600/Pepper-in-Mulch.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9BKoxie42Xpf2IKhdWj8TomobKQFV6cOH5KOeVyhZvGA93W45s94DiheKuoA0ipJai-EtBzP0xm4CoiOPjRZOhJY4aMPeeGrbbUBGIsuCdGS6c_qM3NDiHH0Jv1kdPfMxjM0ycbBTM8mP/s400/Pepper-in-Mulch.gif" width="400" /></a>The peppers in the weeded beds are doing very well. There isn't as you can see a lot of weeding to do in the mulched bed. This bed hasn't been weeded since we put the mulch in a little while back. I'm very happy with the mulch so far. That said, we have found a few spots that haven't been quite properly mulched and they are showing up quite clearly. As you can see <b>Below</b> there is a pepper plant being overwhelmed by grass and other weeds around it.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgpCkQ6m5x2XB5oHziSQVFwQkUfPak4f2vi_H0fWyoX1MXt3ryjsDdr9fGbr7KsMCVbvZ7akaRTwubs5HhXQ2h-qnxOBdEfgqdEzSp_znt449avV2vECZSthOsq1deL1F3v7eFI6L96W30/s1600/Weeds-and-peppers.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgpCkQ6m5x2XB5oHziSQVFwQkUfPak4f2vi_H0fWyoX1MXt3ryjsDdr9fGbr7KsMCVbvZ7akaRTwubs5HhXQ2h-qnxOBdEfgqdEzSp_znt449avV2vECZSthOsq1deL1F3v7eFI6L96W30/s400/Weeds-and-peppers.gif" width="400" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiq_7kJVoHuKZ_Eeha5CW4Nrd_XjhUC1WCgCjtLf75yTRaTvY2Gzs_pi2on77eiNKNc1t0aUWT7f-duEFCLKA0FcmuXOjW0uyKgSFAZRF3x7E8-iPIPrvfPXSQXpLF75ZhNzye5A3SO9QJP/s1600/Weeded-Pepper.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiq_7kJVoHuKZ_Eeha5CW4Nrd_XjhUC1WCgCjtLf75yTRaTvY2Gzs_pi2on77eiNKNc1t0aUWT7f-duEFCLKA0FcmuXOjW0uyKgSFAZRF3x7E8-iPIPrvfPXSQXpLF75ZhNzye5A3SO9QJP/s400/Weeded-Pepper.gif" width="400" /></a><b>Below Right</b> you can see the quick 30 second weeding around the area, and re covering with mulch. It's going to need some more detail care, but that gives the pepper plant more light with a very quick weeding. The mulch has made a huge difference, and having the bark mulch instead of the hay mulch has also led to a lot fewer random grasses sprouting which is the problem with using the waste hay mulch, it has other seeds floating around in it. Cost wise we'd be happier not having to do bark mulch or just using the left over bark from the bucking and splitting of firewood, and in the future I'm going to be trying to preserve bark for that purpose, but for now it's exactly what we need. The other advantage of doing it this way is that it is a more consistent look which is actually something that's nice. Our garden has been the "homesteaders hacked it out of the hillside however they could" for some time now. I'm really enjoying trying to make things look a little better and more unified as much as we can. We aren't looking for perfection obviously, but we'd rather not look like we're just desperately scratching out a living on the side of a hill, however true that appearance may be. Having a pleasant looking environment is positive for the psychological health of everyone who lives in it.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjMNKNW2t-OMu66rgCcetr4hgPMIm4PBFyNu4I6GqrsY75HG5DwbiQx3KERa7Hg5VXhajxTqstD2doEGjmlCcRScjGk-DEUF6zv2s1s0EYOvbc9xmI4b0AeWIu0WGWix20MJXAWq1213UM/s1600/Mustard-Greens.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjMNKNW2t-OMu66rgCcetr4hgPMIm4PBFyNu4I6GqrsY75HG5DwbiQx3KERa7Hg5VXhajxTqstD2doEGjmlCcRScjGk-DEUF6zv2s1s0EYOvbc9xmI4b0AeWIu0WGWix20MJXAWq1213UM/s400/Mustard-Greens.gif" width="400" /></a></div>
Something we did this weekend in a break in the rain is thin out the mustard greens. Can you tell? Yeah, we can't either. We cut, pulled roots from, blanched, and stored about 6 big bowls of the mustard greens, and we have far more than that left. As we have an hour here or there we're going to try to cut and blanch a bunch of the mustard greens in dinner sized servings so we can have those later when they aren't growing. It's impressive just how easy blanching and storing mustard greens actually is, and when our kitchen is a little less messy I'm going to get photos of doing so and post a walk through on how it goes. That will also let us show off the beautiful purple color of the water you get when blanching the red mustard greens.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcLOjMejE3Gs0pOI6J9rDqZj1FHbmaVJTJ3MJJeD4xQisJaMjiiLsvmzromeWTZUoOWRbUZ7gxTrx9DrO524CcaTdcNfQ2Ob5CXF9yDKQ5AMeVt8G1ne-4GMu1SH3l-8R1gbWqqp8MsPfh/s1600/Thistle.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcLOjMejE3Gs0pOI6J9rDqZj1FHbmaVJTJ3MJJeD4xQisJaMjiiLsvmzromeWTZUoOWRbUZ7gxTrx9DrO524CcaTdcNfQ2Ob5CXF9yDKQ5AMeVt8G1ne-4GMu1SH3l-8R1gbWqqp8MsPfh/s400/Thistle.gif" width="400" /></a>A last photo in the, weeds are going crazy category, this is a weed on the hugulkulture bed, and it is about 4.5 feet tall! That is a thistle plant, and I think it's still early enough for us to eat the weeds as long as we handle it with care. We haven't eaten thistle before but I'm curious how it is going to taste. When we do cut it down and eat it we'll post and let everyone know how it goes. If it beats me and wins the fight, the Lady of the House will post about the results! Seriously though, that's a big thistle plant and I'm going to have gloves and long sleeves when I'm harvesting it.Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-32820925690814214332016-06-02T09:55:00.000-04:002016-06-02T09:55:30.474-04:00Chickens, and mulched terraces.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgE9Yoeg-aId-T-Na3pBTZNjAJQlx3qPx1sHk9_xlu6S1mNp-Ni6CYkr2YidRb5OWxoHIyQp48xMKGhqD8HdXaElRV1ZFkC-QP5EW1S64Egb0aNNEGgG0Z6ByVtxb0LpyAIVu7gie-km3hc/s1600/Back-Yard.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgE9Yoeg-aId-T-Na3pBTZNjAJQlx3qPx1sHk9_xlu6S1mNp-Ni6CYkr2YidRb5OWxoHIyQp48xMKGhqD8HdXaElRV1ZFkC-QP5EW1S64Egb0aNNEGgG0Z6ByVtxb0LpyAIVu7gie-km3hc/s640/Back-Yard.gif" width="640" /></a></div>
Of all the things we got done this weekend despite the rain, mowing the lawn wasn't one of them, though the rain was why it didn't get done. The rain also made the necessity of doing it all the greater. It's amazing just how fast our grass grows. That said, while I covered most of what went on I missed a few things, and didn't get all of the photos I wanted to share for Tuesday.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnShxjfy6iapXTwhaj7sc3qi766L9ZoszxHljMro0fp19ct_6-sWItA5n_Abbh6dMWcYkKPL5e301ie51ejCPUcWiOaCNJrtnPgjF9WcQqN1RG-vxfaZU4wt8FyVSv_Hvj2fSoty0E2ws4/s1600/Chickens.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnShxjfy6iapXTwhaj7sc3qi766L9ZoszxHljMro0fp19ct_6-sWItA5n_Abbh6dMWcYkKPL5e301ie51ejCPUcWiOaCNJrtnPgjF9WcQqN1RG-vxfaZU4wt8FyVSv_Hvj2fSoty0E2ws4/s400/Chickens.gif" width="400" /></a>Pardon the blur, with the lighting available I couldn't get a photo of all of the hens in one shot without blurs. These things happen, but the important thing is that we have new hens. Our good friend Michelle Chandler has a substantial flock of hens, and she had some she was willing to part with as they're older, and she's very kind. We brought them home Saturday after picking up some new to us furniture so we now have a couch instead of just chairs in the living room. Boris seems to be happy with his new flock, though he's still stumbling around. I wasn't able to get a good photo of him with them because of the limited angle.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5MgAeokDrBMym1ygY6DvTM-BUkIzLLCwEYDQOcbFsV2Sa2tJ4OaJyvBdyE6DM-_OuiKyUXkVrClq-HUKzOH34oTpf0_5ntee9Gqx_qis9xmzYo2Yj3k1jm-k_AUR7AiclbFmh1PnAZwDC/s1600/Egg.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5MgAeokDrBMym1ygY6DvTM-BUkIzLLCwEYDQOcbFsV2Sa2tJ4OaJyvBdyE6DM-_OuiKyUXkVrClq-HUKzOH34oTpf0_5ntee9Gqx_qis9xmzYo2Yj3k1jm-k_AUR7AiclbFmh1PnAZwDC/s400/Egg.gif" width="400" /></a>One of the really nice things about getting good hens that are already laying is that they're laying. They have gotten comfortable very quickly here to the point that they're laying eggs. One of the reasons Michelle Chandler was willing to part with these hens is a few of them were broody. We're hoping that Boris still has the capacity to breed his hens, though it's not certain given how hard he's still limping around. With his balance I can't really imagine he'd do very well at mounting hens. If not when one of the hens goes broody again we'll have to get some fertilized eggs from friends, and raise a whole bunch of new chicks to fill out this larger coop. I'm also going to have to make sure that I fill in the chinks in the walls so there aren't drafts at the level that the chickens are living during the winter. Ventilation is certainly important, but you can't just have drafts once the hard weather comes.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPu7Z-5cXE3As8e2MNFwd43D9T4OpmPSl7rPHChF6uLknOR1C1vRXTIQD6ikKK1YXmnikbPfbffQthgbfdLowe_98juIWh1bmlD21s2EUH2E2yq8b7KUKAcKb9ZICaI7zs1OYSV8z6ejZb/s1600/Mulched-Bed-Weeds.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPu7Z-5cXE3As8e2MNFwd43D9T4OpmPSl7rPHChF6uLknOR1C1vRXTIQD6ikKK1YXmnikbPfbffQthgbfdLowe_98juIWh1bmlD21s2EUH2E2yq8b7KUKAcKb9ZICaI7zs1OYSV8z6ejZb/s400/Mulched-Bed-Weeds.gif" width="400" /></a>I'd promised you photos of some mulched beds, and here is one. We didn't quite get the mulch down properly yet as there's some weeds managing to poke through, but we're going to aggressively weed these beds to avoid anything taking over. You can see a few Popsicle sticks next to pepper plants in this photo. There are peppers every 18 inches across the top and bottom of the bed, the rest of the random greens are going to go when we have a few minutes here and there. Basically every time I walk by I reach in and pull up a few weeds. I'm trying to have the you can pause for 90 seconds to weed every pass mentality so we don't fall behind. <br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQFaZbqGTcg9gEjI68SClolwK1T3c7F9axbKcV6GLgPINwCBFuDR819KL-b_kfNgj_q4AJ64fOhGw2gaCyFM6HT3p5Pgk9y5g1vXvRLdKFokg8FSi65CZf49JaeHuwJZi_K1yQb1t6ci5G/s1600/Steps.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQFaZbqGTcg9gEjI68SClolwK1T3c7F9axbKcV6GLgPINwCBFuDR819KL-b_kfNgj_q4AJ64fOhGw2gaCyFM6HT3p5Pgk9y5g1vXvRLdKFokg8FSi65CZf49JaeHuwJZi_K1yQb1t6ci5G/s400/Steps.gif" width="400" /></a>Here is the fully carved out terracing out of the front beds. So far we have I think 20 tomato plants, and around 36 pepper plants in these beds. There is also garlic up in the top bed, and over to the right this weekend we're going to be putting in beans and other staple crops as we see fit. I'm also thinking about expanding out these terraced beds to the left (south) side of this shot since they work very well getting over 6 hours of sun per day. Next step, thoroughly weed out the asparagus bed, and finish mulching the top bed, and cut most of the mustard greens to saute and freeze, and get plants in the diminished hugulkulture bed, and put more manure on that bed, and . . .<br />
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I think we may have a lot to do on our hands!Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-82454850804869483542016-05-31T09:25:00.001-04:002016-05-31T09:25:56.251-04:00Mass weeding.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9G4FjCoyOipo-6oTrIgIZCZ2nwcUJZ9vgxnUqBYR_xHdUuG1lFx5t43gypKlfboL7U_Brh2MDonDAE90dveKHUJDlp-AJS2pF6JCYX4_3dMSYbUnBeqS5UCEULQrB02xF2w8ugmlpB6OA/s1600/IMG_0339.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9G4FjCoyOipo-6oTrIgIZCZ2nwcUJZ9vgxnUqBYR_xHdUuG1lFx5t43gypKlfboL7U_Brh2MDonDAE90dveKHUJDlp-AJS2pF6JCYX4_3dMSYbUnBeqS5UCEULQrB02xF2w8ugmlpB6OA/s640/IMG_0339.jpg" width="640" /></a>One of the fun things about a sudden change from normal cool spring to super hot is the explosion of life. That also means an explosion of weeds. In this photo you can see a profusion of god knows what in with our garlic. The quantity of weeding that we had to do was a little intimidating, fortunately it wasn't just the Lady of the House and I working on it. It also led to us doing some calculations and making some new decisions about our gardens.<br />
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Here is the Critter providing "expert" help to our housemate Lucas as they were doing weeding together. You can see just how much weeding did get done, though I didn't remember to get an overall shot of the weeded gardens. Thankfully the Critter is mostly good about not pulling up or standing on the things we don't want him standing on. As he gets more confidence and capacity than he currently has I'm sure we're going to have to keep a close eye on him as we do future weeding. The other thing I want to note is just how helpful it is to have a third pair of hands. Especially with a toddler around. Lucas made a lot more work possible both with the work he did, and the attention he allowed us to divide by helping keep an eye on the kid. Community helps with child rearing, and homesteading.<br />
We're hoping to have a lot less in the way of future weeding to do though because we've decided to make a big change. We're going to start using mulch, and not just waste straw and hay mulch from the rabbits. We're starting to use bark mulch. Part of this comes from the fact that hay was so hard to get ahold of lately we were very actively avoiding wasting it and having much waste so we don't have much to put down. The other part comes from the fact we actually for once have the money to spend $50 on our garden. For scale, that one expense is what we've spent on our garden in the previous three years. We haven't gotten the garden beds mulched up yet, but as soon as we do I'll have photos of that for you. As a nice side effect it should be much nicer looking.<br />
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On a complete digression from the weeding and gardening, we have a new and more thorough appreciation and awareness of the bug around our homestead. The Critter notices so many small things and loves looking at and interacting with the bugs of one sort and another around our garden. While we tend to be aware of pests around the garden, I think that with a small person around we're going to be likely to see a lot more of the small things that are closer to his level. We'll be back on Thursday with photos of mulched garden beds and a run down of what we got in the ground over the long weekend.<br />
<br />Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-64003612553676286522016-05-26T09:40:00.000-04:002016-05-26T09:48:24.047-04:00Greening, and resorting to Roundup.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Well, being sick or exhausted for a couple weeks we've missed the easy time to really do ground clearing, now we have a thoroughly greened area. We went from just go yank it up to, I suggest power tools. Given that this slope is a if we have time area, not a focus area I have a sneaking suspicion it isn't going to be gotten to this summer. Ahh well. That said, none of what's over there is something that has to die right now, the only weed we have around that needed to die right now was in our front garden bed, so we did something about it.</div>
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The Lady of the House did a great job of working on the front of house garden bed. Sadly I'm the one that got the photos, and this is the only one that kind of came out. She put in the herbs that we picked up from the seedling swap, and mulched the bed thoroughly. Of course, before she did that I went in to deal with our hated foe, the Snowcap. The weed that we've spent hours over 4 years, and a lot of hours of our work and friends work trying to kill. After all that time we finally gave up, and I went to a tool I thought I'd never use. Yep, Roundup. </div>
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Obviously we're cautious about Roundup, it's a chemical that's a focus of a lot of concern right now. I could go through and pull up articles on it that show that it's both safe, and unsafe. I'm going to be blunt, I don't want to use any chemical pesticide, herbicide, or anything of that nature on our property that aren't entirely necessary. </div>
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By this point, I'm fairly certain there isn't anything that we are able to do to the Snowcap that is going to kill it that doesn't involve herbicides. We've tried digging up damn near 2 feet down and ripping out every last bit of root we could find, and the stuff still comes back. We've tried pulling up every green bit possible, still it comes back. Well, I can say that isn't going to happen this time.<br />
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First things first. We treat Roundup as very dangerous, but with an understanding of how to use and protect ourselves from chemical poisons. Remember, the Lady of the House and I have both worked in labs with chemicals and solutions that are a lot worse than this one. One of the nice things about Roundup is that it comes in a variety of forms, so we chose one that is a foam which limits over spray, and particulate floating around. It also highlights very clearly where it is. Also, using it outside in low wind conditions strongly limits its spread. One of the things about Roundup is that it is very lethal to plants, if it touches the leaves of a plant, that plant is going to die. I'm going to say, I was actually very pleased how easy it was to use Roundup safely in terms of my health, and it was interesting to learn about proper usage of it. For instance, you want to make sure that it isn't going to rain within 30 minutes because that could spread the chemical to places you don't want, and you want the wind is as close to still as possible.<br />
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And it (mostly) works. We're going to have to do reapplication to finish off the Snowcap. It's so hearty that Roundup isn't doing a one shot kill on it. Even when I literally soaked this pile of it that doesn't have anywhere to root. I don't know what this stuff is, but if it was edible it would be amazing. Given that it's just a problem, well, it was time we couldn't fight this fight anymore.<br />
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So in the end, why did we use Roundup when we do have concerns about it?<br />
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At a certain point you have encountered an obstacle that with hand tools, and the time and energy you have you can't overcome. At that point you use different tools, tools that will be effective with the time, skill, and energy you have. In the case of weeds this pernicious, that's Roundup or other similar chemicals. I'm uncomfortable having to use it, and this isn't ever going to be a regular weed killer on our property, but in this case, it became our last resort.<br />
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On an ethical level I'm uncomfortable giving Monsanto any money at all given their behaviors, but there isn't a company that produces herbicides that I want to give money to, and I know Roundup works very well. I can't let this invasive species expand out of the garden and into the yards and the woods and where ever else. I also can't spend all spring, summer, and fall exclusively trying to fight this thing. Can't say if it was the best decision, but it is the one I felt we had to make given our situation.Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-79703832541803347792016-05-24T09:22:00.002-04:002016-05-24T09:22:43.435-04:00Quick Hit: House plants and recovery time.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1quoCBoLLKyXKoBYWfbnCe6EHH5goDIy6blwaj6NWzmdwdzkPMBc6xPxIbaYGxVVa2W8mLz3us-BNwYAGQTSy2m7CDLf2u1LTzxuh1JQzgIWnG3P6C6uP_GTNftwCkydblwTiINM0Ui9x/s1600/artsypost.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="198" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1quoCBoLLKyXKoBYWfbnCe6EHH5goDIy6blwaj6NWzmdwdzkPMBc6xPxIbaYGxVVa2W8mLz3us-BNwYAGQTSy2m7CDLf2u1LTzxuh1JQzgIWnG3P6C6uP_GTNftwCkydblwTiINM0Ui9x/s640/artsypost.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6uHfG3T63puJOb0VzjspqyLgBN-JtR2ppqAidVKzFQrDaEBXodsw_y0l1cC2Y5V24n7FLN79Sxduuktlqqv1FwyuzCS0XonkgRtcBaijfo8-Xjpxq0D86CyRMX4jXtaZq8KNtc5z-_6bb/s1600/IMG_0086post.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="263" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6uHfG3T63puJOb0VzjspqyLgBN-JtR2ppqAidVKzFQrDaEBXodsw_y0l1cC2Y5V24n7FLN79Sxduuktlqqv1FwyuzCS0XonkgRtcBaijfo8-Xjpxq0D86CyRMX4jXtaZq8KNtc5z-_6bb/s400/IMG_0086post.jpg" width="400" /></a>Again, the whole household has been sick basically all weekend. It's a really inconvenient time to be sick, but there it is. On the up side we're going to have a 3 day weekend to work on the homestead with next weekend, so hopefully we'll be well for that. Mostly what we did when one of us wasn't experiencing the joys of gastrointestinal distress was try to get outside and do things that weren't too physically strenuous. Fortunately the Critter's all about going outside and enjoying things even when he is just getting over being sick. It turns out he's also really good at spotting wildlife, and seeing any sort of shift in his environment that would indicate something is there. For an 18 month old he's also super patient waiting for things to come out of hiding. Of course, that means about 2 minutes, but that's a long time for a toddler!<br />
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What we did get done this weekend, and by we I mean the Lady of the House, is getting some house plants set up. As we move the seedlings outside, the Lady of the House really wants to have some living plants inside for a number of reasons. One is the relatively inexpensive decor, and another is the benefits to the interior atmosphere. Here's the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_Clean_Air_Study">wiki that includes the chart</a> from the findings from the NASA experiment. One of the plants we set up is Aloe Vera which in addition to being pleasant to look at has medicinal benefits. We're thinking about what other house plants we could have that would be pretty, have medicinal benefits, and only be minimally toxic to both toddlers and cats, since our cat REALLY likes eating plants.<br />
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Sorry for the short post, we have other things going on to talk about, so I'll have a more substantial post Thursday!<br />
<br />Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-33608694844945648022016-05-19T10:42:00.003-04:002016-05-19T10:42:46.360-04:00Weeds and Boris.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The good news is Boris is doing very well, he's about fully healed at this point and only occasionally stumbles. The bad news is, he's the only chicken we have left. Between sickness, fatigue, etc, etc, we didn't get the electric fence up yet, and what was probably a fox again came and took all of our laying hens leaving Boris uninjured, but panicked. The Lady of the House found him panting and hiding in the shadow of the house, he's not well enough to fight a fox again, though the fact that the fox left him indicates that most likely it's the same fox that didn't want to tangle again, and left him alone. I feel really crappy about myself because I let the fact that I've been very tired lately get in the way of setting up the electronetting, and lost 4 hens because of it. The first one, happens. The other four are entirely because I didn't do my job. We're fortunate to be in a situation where we will be able to get more laying hens that are being de-acquisitioned from a friend's flock. Before we do so though, I'm getting that fence installed and running because I don't want to do this again. On the up side though, the world is turning green.<br />
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The increasing vibrancy of the world encourages me to think that we've actually seen the last of the really cold weather. I'm still not going to be risking planting earlier than our 90% last frost date of June 4th because there's no point in taking a risk at this point. Everything is going great tuns though having grown visibly since Tuesday. The apple tree that survived the winter is looking great, and is actually starting to look like a tree. We're not going to be pruning it this winter at all because right now we just want it getting as much sunlight on the leaves as possible. This year again we're going to be trying to get a bunch of clearance fruit trees as the planting season for most of the area ends, and get them in the ground. For how much we spent for the 4 fruit trees of which only this one survived, we could have purchased half of a fruit tree at normal prices, so it's working out so far despite the poor survival rate. That's something we're going to have to do soon given the weather lately. We'll see what happens. Worse comes to worse we won't put more in the ground right now and put them in just before fall. I'm also starting to look into learning how to prune trees since we're going to have to be able to prune our own trees. I think it's really exciting to see our first fruit tree starting to look good. That's one of the long term investments like asparagus that can be a really tough up front cost for folks like us that are living on the edge of making enough to get by on. In a couple years it's going to be worth while.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoQfrOXmzER5nfBdOZhtuybex6w8yvd_cVRY49WklZlU94t3oTyuVa15X1IzqiaBCt8TEMxJokoc40OUBcxmh9vWLFk-yV7OjMYVZYDTnQyvAk5YWofDq2eIgvnCIl1UX_LatpWVPU0TVE/s1600/Weeding-time%2521.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoQfrOXmzER5nfBdOZhtuybex6w8yvd_cVRY49WklZlU94t3oTyuVa15X1IzqiaBCt8TEMxJokoc40OUBcxmh9vWLFk-yV7OjMYVZYDTnQyvAk5YWofDq2eIgvnCIl1UX_LatpWVPU0TVE/s400/Weeding-time%2521.gif" width="400" /></a></div>
Weeding is going to be a big chore this year, I hope we can start teaching the Critter to weed. If nothing else we can spend time outside with him while weeding, and I'm sure he'll start pulling things up either way. The question of course will be whether or not he learns to pull up the right things quickly or if we have a lot of immature plants pulled out of the ground. Either way, that's how a kid learns, experience. Really though I'm not expecting much out of his weeding prowess, he's 18 months old. I just hope that I can impart a joy in gardening to him that it took me a long time of my adult life to start getting. Even if I can't he's going to know much more about where his food comes from than I did for a long time.Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-10272819506937557372016-05-17T10:47:00.001-04:002016-05-17T10:47:31.456-04:00Seedlings, and seasonal confusion.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzdimLtQ53XTq7AzEbWKPo6H_IMPNyOpifLhlxYJcn-nUcCe2OAGHw0cJ6sy26-pq2OMBPcIDbuNcFg8ZBpFS5ciwCaceHYIIHdycUHFQp0Q-Z5KTUnhG_lasuaehQGTFN7IQB8DCeSjDh/s1600/Seedlings.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="338" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzdimLtQ53XTq7AzEbWKPo6H_IMPNyOpifLhlxYJcn-nUcCe2OAGHw0cJ6sy26-pq2OMBPcIDbuNcFg8ZBpFS5ciwCaceHYIIHdycUHFQp0Q-Z5KTUnhG_lasuaehQGTFN7IQB8DCeSjDh/s640/Seedlings.gif" width="640" /></a></div>
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Despite the very strange weather that continues to be very unpredictable, and perhaps because of it, seedlings are our focus right now. This weekend was the seedling swap, so you may notice that a lot of our seedlings are gone because we gave them away at the seedling swap this weekend. I'm always happy to be able to share the wealth with seedlings, especially given that it isn't like we came home empty handed. You can see some of the more sensitive seedlings still inside in this photo, but we also came home with a basically full herb garden.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhabxdltFYiturG0ExoosqSY5sMMzjOSc4yJqxV2GyPnWMLRrMEDDeWwSjZPvvRHJQhu2Vf2OOwNVGmkzG-g-MG172e2T8PJDsXiE84iXGz2la-rCEqHrGYtPpjpZvclTAqoAOWlOsaLjtd/s1600/Chives.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhabxdltFYiturG0ExoosqSY5sMMzjOSc4yJqxV2GyPnWMLRrMEDDeWwSjZPvvRHJQhu2Vf2OOwNVGmkzG-g-MG172e2T8PJDsXiE84iXGz2la-rCEqHrGYtPpjpZvclTAqoAOWlOsaLjtd/s400/Chives.gif" width="400" /></a>In a further attempt to eradicate our long term foe, the whitecap we put the herb garden that we got in that garden bed. The whitecap is doing just fine BTW, so we're going to be trying thick mulching, and are going to be resorting to some kind of herbicide to keep it from escaping between the stones of the path to the yard. We're in this case probably going to have to use commercial non selective herbicide. One of the interesting things about herbicides versus natural methods of killing something this nasty is the time that it continues killing everything. If you do a salt and vinegar mixture it's going to be in the soil for a long time and require modifying the soil to get the fertility back. Things like Roundup are going to kill what you spray them on, absorb through the leaves, and be safe once they're dry, no longer killing just due to being in the soil. In general I'm very hesitant to use herbicides, but in this case it may be the best option.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg81dIXUUcH2wvZ9oOV4gSwrJelHb2BbsbpBMh52gbFiAZ7zB5O9wGoCEacQx1k9pFNLOlAuX0VntVqIp2ZonBMsNMmWcuXL5IWNfckeFDP9_7es-rziA1yR6max1HWvLc1xOhWwAduh3e6/s1600/Chocolate-Mint.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg81dIXUUcH2wvZ9oOV4gSwrJelHb2BbsbpBMh52gbFiAZ7zB5O9wGoCEacQx1k9pFNLOlAuX0VntVqIp2ZonBMsNMmWcuXL5IWNfckeFDP9_7es-rziA1yR6max1HWvLc1xOhWwAduh3e6/s400/Chocolate-Mint.gif" width="400" /></a>I'm really looking forward to having a good herb garden out front though, I like having fresh herbs in our food, though I've gotten fairly used to the dried variety! One of the things we have from last year's seedling swap is chocolate mint. It was planted in direct competition to our whitecap problem, and so far seems to be doing very well! Mint of course is a very hearty plant that is able to survive in just about any environment. Chocolate mint is tough enough to over winter without us having remembered to mulch despite this past winter having very little snow and a lot of cold. This is a plant we're going to have to make sure to eat so it doesn't overtake our garden and become a problem plant as mint can.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhojoR-ojH-69pKx60jAcdLGGC-am9Q_5lsM-8VfjYb20a5l83kgwaGIadqeLvnjN5BmcqNPw0szeE2m9EDB1oUZFmrCFJ-eYKWD7BvRFIBlx7B9CLAtQihZPdMASW6MAErrq8BiK9fv8kn/s1600/Volunteers.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhojoR-ojH-69pKx60jAcdLGGC-am9Q_5lsM-8VfjYb20a5l83kgwaGIadqeLvnjN5BmcqNPw0szeE2m9EDB1oUZFmrCFJ-eYKWD7BvRFIBlx7B9CLAtQihZPdMASW6MAErrq8BiK9fv8kn/s400/Volunteers.gif" width="400" /></a>Speaking of getting out of control, our volunteer self seeded mustard greens are doing better than just very well. They're completely covering the front garden bed, and they've even ended up in the back yard, and I'm not sure how! I'm assuming that birds ate the seeds from the one we let go to seed last year, and pooped elsewhere in the yard. The upshot of this is that we really need to start eating salad. A lot of salad. That isn't particularly a hardship, but it is kind of funny to see it expanding up the slope and just taking over everything. Even if we want to keep a bunch of it, it's time to do some major thinning or it is going to choke itself out just due to how much there is in one place. I think at this point we're late to get the cool weather plants in the ground, but given the strange weather I'm still going to do it. I'd have said we were going to probably be safe from frost for the next couple weeks, but I'm just going to wait on the 4th of June.</div>
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After all, it snowed (a little bit) Sunday night, and we had a light frost last night.</div>
Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-1740435884685267072016-05-12T09:54:00.000-04:002016-05-12T09:54:02.969-04:00Growing and recovering.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_AWBdki6kVBckyiu53a_IZUs-ra8HA67DPtowyHF3famv1iDIi0qJeS0ZnnG-x-fBpSp0UPXoUuiADpMk4oH3SyKCOO1b6CwYyYEldjeo4cCdrznHvQkciJfQ4fEgeMRydlgytazhCYIO/s1600/Asparagus.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_AWBdki6kVBckyiu53a_IZUs-ra8HA67DPtowyHF3famv1iDIi0qJeS0ZnnG-x-fBpSp0UPXoUuiADpMk4oH3SyKCOO1b6CwYyYEldjeo4cCdrznHvQkciJfQ4fEgeMRydlgytazhCYIO/s640/Asparagus.gif" width="640" /></a></div>
One of the particularly unfair parts of parenting is something called sleep regression. It's when your kid (who never really slept well) stops wanting to sleep at all. The result of this is that I've been living in a fog for a few days. That has impeded us doing much of anything because between trying to get the kid to sleep, and day to day work nothing is getting done. That said! There are things happening. For one, the asparagus is doing very well. Most of the asparagus has come up and is doing well. To fill out the asparagus patch we've been advised to take the red berries they will sprout later and plant them to thicken the bed, which I look forward to doing. There is a lot that's going on though, especially with the weather as warm as it is, though we're still getting frosts at night not infrequently.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZQOMhLhgRYOnxyqov8FFKtsAzRZY2ku21EryBad4Re1ON-fp-NzQlGY0amV-uZXHMPWOm1eLyO33UC6X_pPuHvN5PNW-3qihHqgpn9CuMrWxQEDy5gI5CbjKtTIPZshPFmwVjrA2eyMZf/s1600/Plants-Outside.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZQOMhLhgRYOnxyqov8FFKtsAzRZY2ku21EryBad4Re1ON-fp-NzQlGY0amV-uZXHMPWOm1eLyO33UC6X_pPuHvN5PNW-3qihHqgpn9CuMrWxQEDy5gI5CbjKtTIPZshPFmwVjrA2eyMZf/s400/Plants-Outside.gif" width="400" /></a>One of the big things I'm excited about is that the seedling swap for the Hilltown Seed Saving Network is this Saturday at the town hall where we live. It's always a great time for swapping plants, and chatting with good folks. We learn a lot while we're there and have a good time. This year we are going to again have a lot of tomatoes and peppers to trade, and are hoping to pick up summer and winter squash though they don't transplant very well. We're starting to get our seedlings used to being outside by giving them an hour outside today, 2 - 3 hours tomorrow, and then they'll be outside at least 4 hours on Saturday. One of the things we've done in the past is have our seedlings far too big by the time we go to the seedling swap, this year it may be the opposite, we did start our seedlings a bit late which happens. For the most part our seedlings are doing well except in areas that got bad watering which is my fault. I'm going to be in the future making sure to rotate the seedling tray to avoid the kinds of problems with dry spots in the future. A properly leveled area is important for the bottom watering we do, and we didn't do that well enough this year. Things to try for the future.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2oHlAn6BkjTtB1kCJvjQoYZINOiWy-JXVBD8HYe0DM3-roAxMGWLFhx2cpvZvILW1ksOgoZpfGPCIaDoZtTN2x7UuCWivlhVh90VQbIRdll3M5Cc4TpRLfJOd9v3_VjABeeeGpMbesH7u/s1600/Boris.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2oHlAn6BkjTtB1kCJvjQoYZINOiWy-JXVBD8HYe0DM3-roAxMGWLFhx2cpvZvILW1ksOgoZpfGPCIaDoZtTN2x7UuCWivlhVh90VQbIRdll3M5Cc4TpRLfJOd9v3_VjABeeeGpMbesH7u/s400/Boris.gif" width="400" /></a></div>
Also figured I'd give folks a photo of Boris to show you how well he's doing. He's still not thrilled about how things are going, and is still moving slowly, but he's up on his feet and walking around normally for the most part. Sometimes he tumbles, and if he gets up the hill and gets too tired to continue he'll roll down the hill, which is kind of funny for such a normally dignified rooster. For %100 recovery we'll see if it's possible, but he's more recovered than we had really expected. We're not sure if he's breeding his hens at this point, so we're going to have to see him mounting one to know if he can do that part of the job. It is impressive though to see him bounce back though, and he's now well enough that I'm not checking on him multiple times per day.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyIuRSXOyx5GgRH9jrYwx3sc0uTO9DYwQXWPCQ9fzNFHHZs6wGB64BpgFh9nNtNyKk2Rr4zZnIAgXofwHW-UJSbPQyoiRpz4R8SzGxTP5zTclZgYBc976EX7LjpNrGSNc-Tv_TLP6cKX47/s1600/Rico.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyIuRSXOyx5GgRH9jrYwx3sc0uTO9DYwQXWPCQ9fzNFHHZs6wGB64BpgFh9nNtNyKk2Rr4zZnIAgXofwHW-UJSbPQyoiRpz4R8SzGxTP5zTclZgYBc976EX7LjpNrGSNc-Tv_TLP6cKX47/s400/Rico.gif" width="400" /></a>Boris isn't our only convalescent right now of course. Rico is healing up very well, and thinks he's fully healed enough that we should let him go running around. Of course, the fact that he still has staples in makes him running around forbidden. Good luck explaining to a high energy dog that he can't run around. Tomorrow we're going to be bringing him to the vet to get his staples out and get checked to see how well he's healed up. He's still limping a bit from time to time, but I'm not certain that's entirely injury related given that I've limped around a lot after recovering from injuries. I just know he's going to be happy to be able to run full tilt again, though we're going to be more careful about letting him out without seeing what's out there first!Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5343418039422454577.post-71538082963710577652016-05-10T08:46:00.000-04:002016-05-10T08:46:05.370-04:00Posting tomorrowThis weekend we were busy enough that I don't have a post for today, I'll try to have one tomorrow.Couretonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07345010106705079453noreply@blogger.com0