Saturday Farm Journal :: Green Tomato Relish

The batteries in the camera died right before I could show you the two gallons of relish I made Friday night. All the green tomatoes are from our garden. The peppers in the photo are from our garden, but the onion is from the store. I ended up purchasing onions and peppers from the store, but maybe the last batch of relish will have some from our garden. The story is the same with the garden, many weeds, few things to report. We are fairly certain we are not going to get the 5lbs of seed potatoes back in produce. We are hoping to break even. The good news is that the ducks are now taking care of the potato bugs for us, check out  this post for the all the waddling fun!

The tomatoes are doing awesome, regardless of their floppy, bushy state. Jason did manage to stake a few. He tossed some branches into the horses paddock, which is beside the garden, believing that the horse didn't like tomatoes. Wrong! The next day the horse helped himself to some plants and ruined some tomatoes! Gah! Luckily, there are tons of tomatoes so the horse can have a few.

Mom did manage to weed one row of potatoes in the last week. We have picked green beans twice, but haven't been able to put any up for winter because we're eating them. We have stored up four gallons of blueberries in the freezer. My sister in law picked about a gallon of blueberries yesterday and we have probably have eaten a gallon. That's six gallons of blueberries from three bushes! God is good! 

Last weeks list:

• weed: cabbage and tomatoes
• stake tomatoes
• pick tomatoes
• make relish
• pick blueberries

This weeks list:

• pick blueberries
• pick green beans
• weed something
• stake tomatoes

Adventuring

A few years ago my sister had two ducks, one named Snow. The bigger one (not Snow) would lead that foolish duck all over the yard, down the street, across the road, and into the trailer park; waddling and quacking as they went. We'd look out our window and sure enough there would be Snow dutifully following her leader across the neighbors yard, across the street, and back into our dooryard. Eventually the big duck was eaten by some wild thing and a few years later, Snow as well. My Dad did not wish to repeat our mistakes and so a plan was carried out to keep the ducks on our property. 

We fenced in a small area by the duck's house near the shallow end of the pond. The goal: ducks in the pond or in the fence; not in the yard, garden, or trailer park. For the first few weeks they refused to leave the fenced in area. Then last week the littles plopped down into the water and a day or two later the big ducks jumped down in too.

Today Mom was in the garden weeding the potatoes and I was in the daycare yard with the kiddos. I could hear the little ducks making all sorts of racket, but I ignored them, because ducks make noise. Then I noticed that they sounded louder than usual. They didn't sound like they were in the pond any more. In fact they sounded like they were out of the pond.

I stood up from where I was watching the kids and walked to the white fence that marked the end of daycare and the beginning of farm. The big ducks were very loud and making a noise that sounded like "come back here" to the little ducks. As I got to the fence I saw seven gray and white ducks happily wandering around nibbling at the grass.

Mom said to me from the row of potatoes, "I think the big ducks are calling the little ones back."

We watch the little ducks for a time. They circled back and headed back into the pond. I walked back to my spot on the swing, but not for long. About three minutes later I heard the ducks making a racket again and so I rose to my feet to take a peek. Sure enough the little ducks were out again foraging, and the big ones were calling them back. After a few minutes the little ducks obligingly went back into the pond.

I returned to my spot in the daycare yard, and picked up my knitting. Not even five minutes later I hear my Mom bellow, "Delia!" I come trotting over, camera in hand.

All eleven ducks were out of the pond and walking through the garden! They waddled over to the chickens nibbling and munching on tasty bits. I was able to snap a few close ups, previously they ran from me, so that you can see the beautiful coloring of our seven "little ducks'.

The question now remains: will they end up in the road?

Bunny Visitor

On a warm, sunny day in July, a little bunny stopped by the farm. "Hello," she said, "I'm Gwendolyn the Grey Bunny. I am looking for a forever home, I think this might be the place."

"We'd love it if you would stay," we replied, "come on over to the farm and take a look around."

"This is our pear tree we like to climb, what do you think?"

The little grey bunny climbed up, up, up in the tree to admire the tasty fruit. "The pears do look yummy, but I think I'm stuck!" Brushing the bark off her pretty dress the bunny said, "I don't think climbing pear trees are for me, what else can we do?"

"Are you hungry? Do you like to pick blueberries?"

"I am hungry." she agreed rubbing her little belly. "I'll try picking some berries." The little bunny climbed up to the top of the fence to reach the yummy berries. After a few minutes in the hot sun she said, "I don't like the hot sun and the berries might stain my dress, is there something else we can do?"

"We can feed the chickens. Do you like chickens?"

The little bunny walked over to the chicken yard, but refused to climb in. "They are very big and scary looking for a bunny of my size. I think I'd like to just watch the chickens, is there something else we could do?"

"I'm sorry Gwendolyn, but on the farm we play and work. We get hot, messy, sticky, and do things that are scary at first. Maybe this isn't the place for you."

The little bunny cried, "But I am so lonely, I don't want to keep looking for a forever home."

With out even pausing to think we replied, "Oh, sweet little bunny, you can stay with us until we can find you a home! You can live in our home and we will care for you. We promise to find you a forever home one day!"

The little bunny wiped her tears away, "You'll let me stay?"

"Yes!"

And so, the little bunny found a cozy place to sit in Delia's knitting basket to sit, wait, and dream of her forever home.

~Delia  @ www.deliasknittedthings.blogspot.com

Saturday Farm Journal

On Thursday, with the help of the son of a farmer from church, the broilers were slaughtered, processed, and placed in the freezer. The whole chickens varied in estimated weight from 5-7lbs. We decided to go ahead and stop growing them at 8weeks because the largest broiler died one evening and another good sized one became lame. We ended up with eleven chickens in the freezer for a total of (averaged and estimated) 55lbs of chicken. Not too bad for our first time. Next year we will be doing more, and possibly getting a few turkeys too.

The ducks have been moved to their permanent home. All eleven of them. At first we kept the two batches apart with fences until they were accustomed to each other. Now they get along just fine with only a little bit of dominating pinches now and again. 

We have been eating a lot of blueberries. Every two days we spend two hours picking everything that is tinged red. Once inside they are all blue within a few days and then we freeze them in gallon sized bags. I have already made Upside-down Blueberry Cake and will be making it again tonight to take to a family gathering. I will be sure to take a few photographs and put the recipe up on our other blog after this week-end.

The garden is doing great. Mom has been spending a lot of time each evening weeding, when she isn't picking blueberries. This past week she weeded some tomatoes and potatoes and Dad hilled them. I weeded some tomatoes and peppers, and staked a few tomato plants. We ate green beans out of the garden on Wednesday, they were so yummy. Next week I will be making Green Tomato Relish, since we ate up the last jar a month ago.

Last weeks lists:

• weed: cabbage and tomatoes
• water if it doesn't rain
• continue to watch for bugs
• replant cucumbers
• move layers outside and Peking ducks to house

Next weeks list:

• weed: cabbage and tomatoes
• stake tomatoes
• pick tomatoes
• make relish
• pick blueberries

Layer Update

In the morning or evening when someone would go down to tend to the chickens there seemed to always be one or more layer where she didn't belong. One day when I went down there were four layers roosting on the fence that kept the three species apart, two in with the ducklings, and three in with the broilers. It was apparent that the layers had outgrown their fence.

Yesterday we moved them outside. They still aren't in their permanent home, for the time being they are in the pen that the ducks were in. There is a "plan" for their future home. I don't quite understand it yet but it has something to do with rotating the pasture they are in so that they will always have some place that has food and bugs. We can't free range them for fear of them pecking at the tomatoes, getting eaten by the neighbor dog, or visiting the daycare. 

They respond to my (Delia's) voice. I had this fear of chickens before we brought these homes. I had this image of putting my hand under a chicken to pull out an egg and getting pecked to death. I had a goal that the chickens and I would be friends. Nearly everyday when they were just wee chicks I'd go out there and talk to them and hold them. Now when I go out to see them they come running! They allow me to pick them up and will sit on my hand looking like the king of the mountain. 

  

We think that Fluffernutter might be a rooster. What do you think? 

Piglet has grown and we can no longer  pick her out of the crowd.

Twig is growing and her funky feet don't seem to be an issue, but she can't quite scratch in the ground so we will need to keep some dirt around for her.

Saturday Journal

The gardens are doing awesome. This is the best year that any of us have had in recent years. We have been weeding, tending, hoeing, hilling, watching, picking, and dancing a little dance of joy. Some of the squashes look a little on the small side, but I think they'll rally. Mom realized that she's been drowning the cucumbers on a regular basis and has moved the duck pool so that she'll stop doing that.

We have eaten peas twice now and it looks like we'll be able to eat them at least one more time before I have to pull them up. The blueberries are turning blue and we've eaten a few. Looks like our mornings and evenings will be spent picking them soon! Yum! There are small tomatoes, peppers, beans, and Brussels Sprouts; the top of the onions, carrots, beets, and turnips are looking great and so we are optimistic about a bountiful harvest. I'm not sure how the cabbage is doing, some of it is big, but I don't see anything forming in the middle. The Brussels Spouts have - ahem - sprouted but in this heat I don't think they'll do much.

The broilers are getting huge! We really hoped to do some swapping around this week but we ran out of roofing material for the duck house. Dad and Jason have Monday and Tuesday off so just maybe we'll get some of our birds swapped around. Our total bird count is 38: 15 layers, 12 broilers, 7 mystery mallard layers, and 4 Pekings. Three of the mystery mallards are going to a friends house, we are just raising them for her for a short time. The winter count of birds ought to be 21, maybe a few less if we decide to eat all the Pekings.

How is your garden doing? Feel free to leave a link to your blog!

Last weeks list:

• weed
• watch for bugs
• weed
• water when needed
• weed
• move layers to a tractor outside

This weeks lists:

• weed: cabbage and tomatoes
• water if it doesn't rain
• continue to watch for bugs
• replant cucumbers
• move layers outside and Peking ducks to house