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Saturday, April 16, 2011

Gathering supplies to build an ark

Or at least we need to be gathering stuff to build an ark. We have had so much rain here. We cant seem to get much planting done at one time. We kinda try to catch a dry spell for a couple days and rush and plant what needs to be that day. It is time to plant field corn and we have water standing in the fields. We usually try to plant out corn and beans in the garden in mid April as well as most of the other seeds that are direct seeded. Tomatoes and don't get put out in the garden till after the first of may to avoid frost. The past few days and nights have been rather cool here and that is not doing any good what so ever for the seedlings in the greenhouse. It don't hurt em they just don't grow too well. In farming it is always a battle with the weather.
I went to my doc appointment last week on Thursday, got my meds refilled and  the doc seems to think I am doing OK. Although he did bring up the subject of Lupus. But the meds I am taking treat that as well. Then we went on the the farm equipment dealer to look at new tractors. Rodger had decided to try to buy us a small tractor with the bucket on the front an a rear discharge mower. We so desperately need a tractor and bucket here on the farm. We are always needing to dig or move something or scrape and level something and it is just too much work for a shovel. We really need the mower to keep the orchard mowed and be better able to take care of our fruit trees. We did end up buying one although we probably wont get it here on the farm till next week. The dealer had just gotten them in and the tractors are still in the crates and not put together. So he said he would get one put together for us and we should have it delivered next week. I can keep it busy for weeks just getting thing done in the yard here. I need a couple more beds built fer herbs and berries and some other landscaping projects. When the toy is delivered I will post some pics of it on here.
So far the chicks are growing and doing really good. Those lil fellers seem to just grow over night. I plan to have them butchered by about the 3rd week of May. There is only 25 so it wont be a big job for the 3 of us to get done in one day. 
I have lost my window of opportunity to mulch my herb bed and asparagus bed. The plants are already up and about a foot tall in both bed and would be really hard to get mulch in there without killing some of the plants. That is unless I can get my hands on some wood chips to mulch with and wood chips don't get on the leaves and pull the plants over like straw does. I hope I can find wood chips on our road like before from the tree trimming companies. The wood chips make great mulch for strawberries as well. I have enough old straw to mulch in the raspberries that we got planted last week. We just want to have the ground dry enough to plow them out one time before we mulch to smooth and level the soil in the rows. So we wait for drier weather.
Till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

We have so much mud from all the rain we are no where near planting. I'm envious of you and your new tractor. It's on our "wish" list. Sounds like you'll keep it busy for quite awhile.

The Apple Pie Gal said...

By golly, tractors really are "going around". Well I hope you get yours and then cut loose on all those things you want to do! I know I will! (as soon as I get home that is)

This has been a strange spring so far for everyone. Bummer!