Oink Oink Oink

Well, the Hobby Farm is working it's way up to REAL Hobby Farm status. That's right, there are two new members of our family.






Hamhuis and Schweinsteiger


Of course, we are going to eat these members of our family, which you are not allowed to do with any human members, and society frowns upon dogs and cats as well, but that's a whole different blog.

The two new pigs gained their names from the newest Canucks defenseman, Dan Hamhuis, and German midfielder Bastian Schweinsteiger, man of the match vs Argentina. I don't love or hate the German team, but this name fits perfectly, and Schweinsteiger is also considered the "Rockstar" of the German team. He loves the media, note the smile on his little pig face, and see the confidence in his little pig eyes.


The Hamhuis hotel.






More pics of the pigs, along with our piglets coming soon!

Zucchini!

Another warm weather crop is zucchini.



I planted these guys ages ago, and they have just kept getting bigger. Slowly at first, then much quicker lately. They are ready to go outside, but it has been cold this week, so I have kept them in.

Hopefully they can withstand the change when they do go outside.

More tomatoes

My largest tomato plant got so big it needed to be staked, even though the variety isn't supposed to need staking!

They have been kind of stagnant because of the cold weather and general lack of sunshine, but as soon as it got sunny today, the plant exploded!




In this photo there are several tomatoes planted at different times, and there are also several pepper plants.

This weekend should be great since the weather is supposed to warm up.

It was like a Thanksgiving feast!!!

Well, that's exaggeration. Gross hyperbole if you will.

Anyways, I picked and ate two radishes.




I left some dirt on them so you know they aren't fakes.
I don't like radishes, and they were very small.

I know they were premature, but considering the high likelihood that my dogs will soon ruin them, and considering also that I really have been working hard on this garden with very limited success, I needed to pick and eat something.

Radishes were ready, radishes got eaten. Yum.

Cabbage, Dogs - Dogs, Cabbage

You can probably guess from the title.

Of course the dogs ate all my cabbage plants.








Rest in Peace little Cabbage.



This is very frustrating, as cabbage was one of the few thriving crops so far. At least they left me one plant, and I have more inside as seedlings. I should still be able to get some cabbage.

Knee-High by the first of July

That's what they say about corn.

Corn wants full sun and doesn't require much love.

For a long harvest, you can plant early and late harvesting corn at the same time. Also you must do succession planting to ensure success! Plant new plants every two weeks for a month or so, that way you will have plants maturing every two weeks in the summer.

As I said earlier, I plant radishes in between, because corn takes a long time and radishes will come up well before they are in the way of the corn.

Tomatoes

Tomatoes do well with warm temperatures, lots of water and lots of fertilizer.

I grew these Roma Tomatoes from seed and seem to have some plants doing very well.


This guy is the ass-kicker of the bunch.

Since tomatoes like warmth and sunlight, a great place to put them is near a south-facing window, especially in the early season, before they are ready to go outside.



These plants are at the sliding glass door in our bedroom. They don't do much for sexytime atmosphere, but since Jen has been keeping chicks in our living room, I feel this isn't too big a deal.

The milk jugs give each tomato plant it's own little hothouse. Keeps the soil warm so the plants do well.

WTF is a Gingko?

This is my Gingko. Apparently these are good.

Let us talk Lettuce

What you are looking at here is a fine Romaine specimen. Commonly used in caesar salad, this lettuce is very high in nutrients.

There are also iceberg and mesculin lettuces, but the romaine seem to be doing the best.

Cabbage Patch

Cabbage Soup. Cabbage Salad, Cabbage Rolls..... I hope you guys like Cabbage.

The dogs have ravaged the Cabbage plants a bit, but I still think this will be one of my successes.

Radishes

So I said earlier that there would definitely be vegetables on my table this year.

It appears radishes will be the first. I'm guessing another week or so until I can pull the first of the bunch.





That's right, a row of thriving radishes!
(Carrots are beside although barely visible. Carrots take much longer, so plant them with radishes so you know where the row of carrots is!)





These ones are planted in between corn stalks. It's a wise use of space to plant radishes around longer maturing crops such as corn, zucchini or pumpkins. These plants will eventually grow large and need space, but since radishes mature quickly, they will be harvested before the corn stalks are ready. (Note the wire mesh over top to keep the stupid dogs out)












Closeup! One of my other hobbies is photography!

Bok Bok Bok part 2

Now that Jen seems to have got the chicken situation on a steady and positive path, she has set her sights a little higher. Sometime, somewhere, she heard about silkie chickens.

Now, most of you probably aren't familiar with silkies, but they are very strange looking, cute, white, furry chickens. Pretty much these birds are just pets, we want some cute, weird things to point at when people come over. Either way, I'm glad Jen got her chickens!


If you ask me, they look like mythical creatures out of Dr. Seuss books. Reminds me of the story, "If I ran the Zoo"

Separated at birth???

Bok Bok Bok part 1

After months of settling in and learning about our new environment, along with lots of web and literature research, we decided that chickens were the first livestock that we should add to the Kapty Hobby Farm. On our property there was an existing chicken coop, which was very well built. Seemed like it should be fairly easy - get some chickens off craigslist, feed them, water them, and then start eating eggs. We got some regular brown chickens that looked just like this photo.



Morgan exclaims, "There's chickens in there!!!"


Long story short, the chickens were too old, not very healthy so we got rid of them, again on craigslist. A nice lady came in and took them to her petting zoo where they would live as punching bags for the children in our town.


The best reason to get chickens: The beautiful smiles on our kids faces!


Now we've got a better idea. We got some new chicks, so they will be raised in our environment and presumably be happy, healthy and productive egg layers. It might slow down the egg production temporarily, but we weren't getting many eggs anyway, and this is a good long term solution. Nice work Jen!



The chicks are very cute and they are barred-rock chickens. The biggest difference is that they are grey instead of brown. Apparently they are a good mix between egg layers and meat birds...yummmm.

Dog Day Afternoon :(

Lucy, the main culprit....






The sun was shining brightly, I was on my way home from work, thinking I would check the garden when I got home.

I drove down the long driveway, which was bursting with life on this hot, bright day. This could only be good for the veggies.

As I neared the house, Lucy, the crazy dog, went into a frenzied tirade, running, jumping, darting this way and that. It is these quick movements that dig deep holes in my tilled soil. This day, however, was not her day.

Zoe, the older, lazy dog slowly raised her head as she lay sunning herself, perhaps disappointed I interrupted her nap, perhaps happy to see me home. Normally, I would assume she was happy to see me and give her a scratch behind the ears. Not this time.



In fact, I sort of wanted to smack her behind the ears, as she lay sunning herself right in my garden, on top of the cabbage and broccoli.

So the dogs are an ongoing issue.

My Stupid Dogs Trampled Everything

Yes, it's true. I worked hard growing seedlings indoors, and the time was right to put them in the garden. I did what any noob gardener would do - prepared the soil, had my seedlings ready, used books and internet info to think of all the best things I could do.

I spent several hours on a glorious Sunday transplanting lettuce, cabbage, cauliflower and broccoli. Evenly spaced, properly distributed.

Two days later I went out to check the plants. Immediately after I stepped outside, the rain broke from the skies. I had no jacket and got very wet. Didn't really matter I thought, I'm a gardener and I have to check my plants.As I stepped onto my well-placed, decorative stepping stones, the rain switched to hail. No worries, it would only take a minute to look at my veggies.

Turns out the dog, or dogs, but I think it was one more than the other.... had trampled all through everything. I spent a solid 20 minutes trying to reposition and replant my broken, vulnerable vegetable seedlings. I knew inside that I was only delaying the inevitable. The plants are going to die. Weeks and months of easy work down the drain.

I still have a few seedlings left, and some seeds. Tomatoes inside seem okay. All is not lost. Disheartened? Yes. Determined? Yes.

There will be vegetables on my plate this season.