June Food.

We're more than halfway through June and we haven't bought, and wont buy, any real food from any shop.  I wont tell you about the hot chips and the lollies from last week... but if I am talking real food, like fruit, veg, meat...then maybe I can mention the hot chips and lollies...but as I am suposed to be eating healthy and getting fitter I want mention them...

We have a full freezer crammed fuller with assorted fish thanks to a fishing trip to Shark Bay that the husband and son are not long back from.  Salt and Pepper Squid for tea tonight if I can sweettalk the man into cooking it.  The fridge is full of eggs and vegie soup.  The table is covered in oranges and lemons...and apples.  There is a basket of apples out the front and the back yard is covered in chokos that were blown off in last weeks storm and for some reason are still there.  I will pick them up before I mow though as they are too big and too many to get chopped up properly.   I have 5 whole pumpkins left and they too are on the table on the front verandah.  The chilli bushes are chockers but there is no room in any freezer to put them.  I will have to cook them up and make more chutney or jam...but I am away again from tomorrow...Or this afternoon, not decided yet.

There are at least 6 roosters that need doing...NO idea where we will put them all.  But they NEED doing as they are so loud and there are so many.

I was going to have eggs for breakfast but there are a few manky, small bananas that need using so will have a milkshake instead and an egg later on.  I will put some apple in the woodstove oven later and see how they dry in there...because there is no room to freeze any cooked and there are too many to eat.  They wont keep as they are bruised and marked from being blown off.  In last weeks storm. 

This growing your own food is great, I love it.  But it is so much more work than driving to the shop and buying what you want as you need it.  Our way takes time and planning so not too much is wasted.  I will collect a bag of assorted stuff to give away today and I will try and sort as much as the other stuff before I leave here for the week.  Best be off and adoing.

December Update.

Not a lot happened here this month.  We are stilll mostly eating out of the garden but that is more due to the fact that we've not been eating enough fresh stuff this month I think.

I have not had any success with lettuce so far.  And the new lot of seeds and seedlings I put in a couple of weeks ago were scratched up and eaten by some escapee chooks.  So, sad to say I bought a lettuce.  And a 5kilo bag of carrots.  I know...Bad Barb.  I have more lettuce seeds to go in this weekend but not looking forward to telling daughter that the ??? (some special seed) seedlings that she gave me got eaten.  As did all the new silverbeet seedlings and the spinach that was just coming up from dropped seeds.  I have a couple of bigger plants that survived the scratching so still have something green.  And they got a few ripe tomatoes too.  Scratched up some of the garlic but I need to get that up and out anyway so no big deal wih that.

We can pick and eat tomatoes, capsicum, chillies, sweet potato, carrots, few different beans, silverbeet, onion, choco, cucumbers.
There are a few potatoes but not enough so I bought a bag to plant.
I'm not going to get any zuchinnis as the 2 seedlings that I was given turned out to be butternuts.  Oh well, they are doing great and the husband likes them better anyway. 
The garlic needs pulling but it wasn't a great lot this year.  It is kinda small.but there is enough for what I need
I have been given 4 cloves of a purple garlic so will get that going when it is time.

December was Apricot month.  We had so many and I have some in the freezer but sadly, they are finished now.
The grapes are starting to ripen and we are eating a handful or so at a time.  Wont be long before we have heaps as we have different sorts that ripen different times.  I'm hoping to successfully dry more this year so I wont need to buy sultanas.  Bleedin' chooks are jumping up onto the top of the fence and pinching too many though. 
Getting plenty of strawberries.  Still have oranges on one tree.  Pepinos are ripe.

I am down to a dozen eggs in the fridge so looking forward to being able to collect and eat the eggs again.  It's nearly a month since they were treated for Scaley Leg with the potion from the vet.  I had been told by some people to leave them for 2 weeks others said 3.  I'm going with 4 to make myself feel better about it all.

Son has brought out a few packs of meat throughout the month..  It's been on it's use by date but I cook it up that night and we haven't died from it yet.  He's also potted me a few rabbits so more free food there. I crumb it with breadcrumbs from the 15kilo bag he brought out.  It was the wrong size/texture for what his work needed, there was a small hole in the bag, it was going to be binned...I will mix it with bran for a better crumb but don't tell anyone.  People here say they don't like bran...Little do they know...

There have been no roosters to eat but I have 17 chickens of various ages so am bound to get a few from them.  More chickens are due to hatch this weekend so in a few months there should be rooster meat..

Hubby has agreed to a BIG challenge for next year.  It's not really decided how it will go yet, details will be coming soon but it has me a bit worried.  It will definitely be a challenge.  I'm not working next year though so I will have plenty of time to get it sorted and no excuses.

No Excuses This Week.

I've had a few days away and in the leadup to *My Adventure*  I was spending more time on getting the van packed and ready than out in the backyard but I have no plans to go off anywhere again for a few weeks so should have plenty of time to get the gardens sorted.

I missed buying seedlings last week so might have to make a special trip somewhere to get some but this week I will get some seeds in as well.  I am home for the next 2 weeks so really have no excuses.

And as per usual the grass needs mowing again. 

One chook pen is in real need of a decent cleanout and I have decided to put the chooks that I want to keep all together in the orchard pen and get rid of the others.  I need to fix the fence first though or they'll be able to get out. 
I will choose which of the Mixed breed chooks are staying today and put them in the front orchard pen.  After I fix the fence.  My concern is that they are a lot smaller than the AussieRocks that I will put them with but the AR are a friendly bird so shouldn;t cause to many dramas.

So much to do so better make a start.

Chooks Make Mulch.

I have been mowing and that means that I need to rake out the chicken yards of the old clippings and put them on the gardens and put the fresh clippings in the pens for the chooks to do their work on.   

It's never just one easy job here.

But these poor deprived chooks...They have a huge area with fresh green grass but they need to hang around me and get in the way.  Like the old stuff is better than the fresh, still growing stuff.  Stupid chooks.  They come running and get in the way, peck at my shoes and fingers as I am trying to put the old stuff into the bags...

"Why go out there when she will bring it to us in here"

 

"Good, already chopped into little pieces for us."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The chooks in this pen are Australorp-Plymouth Rock cross.  I call them AussieRocks.  Some are black some are more PR colour, some a a smokey colour.  I like them.

Another One Bites The Dust

Month that is.  Two down already.  And I have done hardly anything in the garden.
I have lots of excuses but no real reason.  Just slack!
We still haven't bought any vegetables so far this year but I think that I will end up buying some carrots sometime during March.

Lots has gone wrong, some preventable, some not.
A lot of the viney stuff developed Powdery Mildew so that was disappointing.
We only ended up getting a few Rockmelons and they weren't the best.
We picked some Butternuts and have another 6 or so out there but that vine is on it's last legs. I should pull it up but I'm hoping it will get the last few fruit a bit riper.
I was very sorry with the way the cucumbers performed.  There were nowhere near enough to preserve.  I have 2 plants out there in a different part of the garden that are looking OK but still not a lot of fruit on them.
Tomatoes all died off.  The few that have come up in a different area now have flowers but I'm not sure how they will go.  I should have transplanted them out into a bigger area but the couple that I did died.  I'm blaming the heat and not enough care for that.

The small chooks kept getting out so most of the lettuce are gone.  I put the chook away, fix where I think it is getting out from but it gets out again.  I fix another spot, out it gets.  I'm not planting anything more until I am sure I have fixed the right spot!  They also scratched up most of the Strawberries, young onions, silverbeet...

We've had the worst bout of Fruitfly here than I can remember.  We lost all the Peaches and I now have them in the Strawberry Guavas.  I will pick all the fruit over this week and bag it or drown it in a bucket of water.  We have never had them in these trees before.  Bleedin' chooks are supposed to clean them up but that's not   happening.  We have traps set out in the trees (not the Guavas) and caught heaps but the numbers of them are too high to control. 

Of the dozens (hundreds?) of Sunflower seeds that I planted I have 1 plant.  It is multiflowered but still only the 1 plant.  How sad is that! lol.

I have at least 4 roosters in the young AussieRocks.  Hubby is waiting for a cool day when he is home to do them so not this week.  One of them is getting quite loud!

And bloody Roosters!!  I have lost the Australorp rooster, a parent to these young ones.  Looks like it could have been a rooster fight but because these 2 roosters grew up together and have been together forever I thought they would be all right.  Stupid me, now I only have the Plymouth Rock as a breeder.  He is big and beautiful but not pure so none of these AR chooks can be called pure.  I knew they wouldn't be but I like them, they look much better running around the orchard than the common old brown things.

Lawns are ten foot high again...OK, maybe not 10 foot but pretty damn long.  Because I am riding the pushbike more I am unable to mow as well.
http://fitterbyfriday.blogspot.com/2011/02/another-long-ride.html   Biking is more fun but I really do need to mow.  Maybe this week will see a bit done.

I am hoping for some cooler weather so I can get outside and catch up with everything but might need to wait a couple more weeks.  The heat wipes me out and I don't like being out there after 9ish and I am too sore lately to do anything much in the evening.  Come on the cool weather I say.

Hopefully March will see more getting done.  I do have high hopes that it will but am unsure whether I am as enthused as I was.

I think I need to start listing things again.  That usually helps.  Might even put them up on here...

Mulchnchooks.

We've got a week of HOT days coming this week so today I need to change the new chickens over from their little pen into the big netted pen.  Which means that I have to decide where to put the big chickens...I will take out the oldest chickens that are now chooks and either put them with the Isas or try and catch them and put them in with the mixed Breed chooks which is where the parents are.  Putting them with the Isas is easier...and they don't fight, they have been together before...Decided.  The bigger chickens are my AussieRocks and though they are getting big I still don't want them in an unnetted pen.  I can shift them into the old Isa pen and then the new chickens can have their pen...Decided.
I need to put up another piece of shadecloth to give more shade to the small pen where I have a chook sitting.  She is due tonight/tomorrow.  I will also need to get the sprinklers in the right spots as I will not be home for 2 days this week but Hubby will.  He will turn them on for me to cool them all down but as he has to leave sometime those days for work it needs to be easy for him.  So the chooks will be sorted.

The gardens still need more mulch on them.  That seems to be an ongoing job.  I rake out the old stuff from the pens, put it on the gardens,  mow the grass and give that to the chooks to scratch over.  The next week the grass needs mowing again so I need to rake up a pen... so I'm not raking out every pen every week but each pen is probably done a couple of times a month.  I have 3 main pens and the 2 big netted pens used for the chickens so it does take me awhile.

I haven't put shade up over the lettuce bed yet so must get that done.  Hubby is helping L and M shift today so he won't be helping me much.  I might go and *help* as well so that will limit my time here.

And yet it is already after 6 and I am still here...Better go, I have another blog to update!!

Disregard all of the above as it is now 3.30 and I am not long home.  and this morning the computer froze so nothing could be done then either.  I am out tomorrow morning, all day Tuesday, all day Thursday...Something might get done this evening when it is cooler...

Busy Morning. Or So It seemed.

I've had a busy morning outside but no mowing or mulching was done.

I did pull out some more moth-eaten cabbages and I now have 6 of them soaking in salted water to try and get the caterpillars out of them.  If it doesn't get them to come out then it might kill them.  I'd rather eat a dead, salted caterpillar than a live one but maybe that's just me.  Not sure how I will use them.  More coleslaw. Maybe cook some up with onion, zuchinni and whatever else I can dig up and some rooster and freeze.  Dunno.

Raked out a bit of one chookpen.

Searched for and found the sprinklers and set them up in the chookpens to cool them down.

Most of the washing is done and dry but awaiting the fold and put away bit.

Cabbage free garden beds have had the soil loosened and wettasoiled.  I need to decide what I am putting in them and then get them manured and mulched ready for when I buy more seedlings.

Caught and crated some roosters.

Not a lot when you read it like that but it seemed to take me all morning.  I will start on the mowing this evening but in the meantime I have what looks like a good book to get stuck into.

Hubby culled 6 roosters and they are in the fridge awaiting the frypan.  That should make for quieter morniings.

Chooks and Gardens Survived Without Me. (might go away more often now)

After being away for near on 6 days we arrived home just before 5pm yesterday.  First thing I did was go check on the chickens and I am glad to say that they are all still there and looking none the worse for being fed and watered by someone other than me.  Thankyou to T&J and L for coming out and looking after things for me while I was away. 
The gardens also look like they have been well looked after and so far I can't find anything dead or missing.  Maybe I should get someone else to do the gardens more often!

The grass  must have loved my being away as it is about 8inches longer than when we left so getting that back down will be my main job for the next few days.  We are expecting some warm weather here over the next few days so I will need to get started early before it warms up too much but everything will need more mulch as well and that is also a big job for me.

So...I need to finish raking out the chookpens, mow grass and throw the fresh clippings in to the chooks, put the old clippings from pens on the gardens...All that, and updating my other blog, should keep me off the streets for awhile. 

Coffees finished so better get started.  Afterall, it's already after 5.

Damaged Trees

I have a few Strawberry Guava trees in some of the chookpens.  They were bought for $2 each as small seedlings a few years ago.  They've been growing well but Hubby cut them down a couple of months ago as they were getting too high for the netting over the pens.  They were reshooting and looking good.  Except the one in the pen where I have the older chickens. 

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I thought that the wind had broken the top branches but I was out there this evening, later than usual and I saw the real branch breakers.

The *chickens* are roosting in this tree and as they are now just about fully grown, and there are 11 of them, the poor tree is breaking under the strain.

Once the 5 roosters are gone and the females are added in with the Mixed Breed chooks  I will cut off the broken bits and give the tree a chance to regrow.  If I'm going to leave the chickens in this pen for so long then I may need to get some proper roosts built.  Maybe it's time to play the nice wifey again.

It's Raining, It's Pouring...

Probably a bit of snoring been going on as well but not much has been done outside in the gardens the last few days.  Everything is wet and soggy and the poor chooks have had to learn how to swim.

I'm thankful that Hubby got most of the mowing done for me.  He has also pruned and mulched all that needed pruning and mulching.  Seems there are some benefits to having him home longer than usual.  (Hi Hon!)   Everything is looking bare, mainly due to all the leaves dropping but also because most of the branches are gone.  They will grow back though, bigger, better, faster...OK, maybe not faster.

The sun is up today so if it stays dry I need to get some more hay into the chook sheds to keep them warm.  Well, I need to do this regardless but if it stays dry it is more likely to get done.

No snails were found on the last couple of mornings *snail patrol*  I think if they were around then they would have been out and about the last few days so numbers there are way down.  Wish I could say the same for the Slaters.  Hubby wants to put barrel loads of Slater poison down...I argue about it but then whinge about the bloody things eating everything.  I am very tempted to use the poison but...It's poison!

I have another 10, yes 10, chickens, hatched a few days ago.  As if I needed more chickens.  But she was secretly sitting  and when we found her I didn't know how long for so *had to* let her go.  There are a few roosters needing to be culled so that will kinda even things out. 

Hmmm, I thought that it was going to be a nice dry day but it has come over all dark.  Doesn't look too nice out there anymore so I better make a move while I can.

Who Let The Chooks Out?

Somebody is in trouble! They let the IB's into an area they are not suposed to be and they, the chooks, ate all the zucchini I was planning on using in a quiche.

Now I am not saying it was me but nobody else does any work in this area so I guess we all know who it was. Bugga! Hard to whinge when it was my own fault.