Keeping the Cabbage Moths Away UPDATE 4 JULY

Don't you just hate it when you go out to check on the garden and find your lovely cabbages have huge bits missing and holes everywhere?  The most pesky insects in my garden are cabbage moths and Japanese beetles.  Last year those beetles decimated my Kentucky Wonder patch, and the moths caterpillars nearly did the same to my cabbages.

Last year I found a way to take care of the cabbage issue in time to save my small crop.  I removed every caterpillar I could find and then sprinkled the cabbages with baking soda!  End of problem.

This year I am trying to avoid the problem altogether.  I started seeing those annoying white moths almost as soon as I put the seedlings out into the garden, so I needed to act quickly.

I had been saving one gallon sized plastic water jugs with the intention of using them as mini-greenhouses for started seedlings early.  Instead, I removed the bottoms and set each one over each cabbage plant, mounded a bit of compost around the lower 2-3 inches to help secure them in place and hoped for the best.

Yesterday while I out there weeding, two cabbage moths came exploring looking for a place to create their havoc.  They fluttered around each of the raised beds, and when they reached the cabbage bed they fluttered around the plastic jugs, but never got any closer to the cabbages.  It appears it may work.  Once the plants are too large for the jugs, I will have to find another protector for them, however.

I have pvc hoops for the raised beds, but I am trying to not use them this time around as they get in the way when I am weeding or planting or harvesting.  There are a few ideas developing and I'll let you know if anything works out.

For the Japanese Beetle, which began attacking the yellow beans as soon as they were transplanted, that problem has been resolved, at least for now.  I found a Japanese Beetle Trap at the Dollar Store and I really didn't expect it to work.... but it has been working perfectly, for the three weeks that it has been out in the yard has been steadily attracting and collecting these pests.


So I think I will plant green beans again this year after all.

UPDATE: JULY 4
The Bag-a-Bug is working!  It has been attracting and trapping the Japanese Beetles and the bean plants have remained untouched since the first bug I found during the transplanting of the seedlings into the garden.  Well worth money.

Also, the plastic water jugs covering the cabbages have also done their job and the cabbages are getting almost too large to remain covered much longer.  I am working on making another covering for them since the pesky cabbage moths are still trying to find the cabbages.

The Meat Chicks Have Arrived

Twenty five  day old meat chicks were delivered this morning!  Don't you just love the sound and feel of these little fluffs of down?

We are trying a different bird this year since the 3-4 lb birds we had been raising are too small for us,  It isn't cost efficient for us to raise birds that will only feed 2-3 people one meal.

The Cross Cornish will grow to about 9-9 1/2 lbs in less than 12 weeks. Now that's a meal and more. That's a chicken dinner every two weeks, but then I can get several meals from each chicken plus quarts of stock from their leftovers and bones.

They are brooding in the hen house until their have their feathers, then they will be moved out to the
chicken tractor and allowed to forage all the insects they can find.

We purchased the chicks from eFowl.com.  They had a sale and by buying 25 chicks shipping was free.  So it came to about $2.35 per chick,  They were shipped via Delta Air and arrived one day after shipping.  The packing list states :  Hatched: 2016-06-22  06:00

They will use up about $10 worth of chick feed then they will forage and have a bit of corn and hen feed now and then.

We will let them grow to 9 pounds.  Cost will be about  $2.50 per chicken @ 9 lbs =  $.27 per pound

Now that's "Good Eats!" to quote Alton Brown....

Limited Space in Your Garden? What Should You Grow?

   It seems that each spring the same question arises.  What shall I plant?  With garden space limited it is important to carefully select what should go into it so as to make the best use of every square foot.

The best way I have found for making this decision is to look at the foods you eat regularly.  Do  you eat plenty of pasta, pizza, salsas, etc?  Then focusing on raising plenty of tomatoes, peppers and onions would be a good start.

Or are you crazy for salads?  Start your garden with lettuces, cucumbers, radishes, and all those other good veggies that make great salads.

Simply grow more of what you eat most often.

Vegetables such as lettuces and spinach prefer a cooler temperature so plant them early in the season and plan to replace them with another vegetable which prefer the warmer, summer temperatures, such as green and yellow beans.  Vining varieties take up little space if trained on a trellis or fence and are heavy produces.

Cucumbers will grow well either on a trellis or left to roam freely on the ground.  Raising two varieties, one for slicing into salads and another for pickles, will provide all you need for the coming year.

What type of seed or seedlings to buy?  Hybrids are raised to be disease resistant, to grow to special requirements such as colors and sizes.  However, their seeds don't reproduce when planted.

For best flavor and to be able to save the seeds for next year, I recommend getting Heirloom seeds/plants and in order to be assured they are chemical free, also grow Organic.

The Heirloom/Organic seeds/seedlings will feed your family this year, and every year with the healthiest and best tasting vegetables possible.

Have fun planning your new garden!

New Life at Henny Penny!

There's new life at Henny Penny Farm and we are so excited.  The baby ducks are already 1 month old and are beginning to get their feathers.  Papa Duck is still kept away from the family because he is always trying to hurt them.  He paces back and forth outside their fence all day, it's obvious he wants another date with Mama Duck.


At the opposite end of the farmyard, tucked safely away in the maternity ward at the hen house is our Mama Hen peacefully brooding on her nest.  We have no idea how many eggs she has hidden beneath her feathers, but at least two of them are being squeezed out.
She has been on the nest for about 1 1/2 weeks, and receiving room service for her food and water, and cleaning out her  "dirty business".   This is the first time since we have been raising chickens that we have one who actually stays on her nest.

The chicklets will all be hybrids since we have one rooster who is a White Sex Link, and several breeds of hens.

After we move to the new farm we hope to raise heritage breeds of chickens and turkeys.

There is even new life in the garden, at last.  The transplants have been taking hold of their new beds and the pepper plants already have tiny green bells on them.

The yellow beans are flowering and so far I have been able to keep the Japanese beetles at bay.  The vining peas have had a tough start.  The thrived initially, when transplanted, but after a couple of days one of the chickens got into the garden and scratched them all out of the ground!  She was invited to dinner the following day.

The peas were re-planted, and though they are still struggling, they may recover.  Fingers crossed.

Sixteen tomato plants have been successfully transplanted, and there are another 2 dozen left to plant.

Once more I am trying to grow onions.  The seeds I planted in March failed to grow more than a couple of inches before they died.  This time I purchased a couple of flats of seedlings and have filled one of the raised beds with them.  Once again, fingers crossed.  I am determined to grow onions.

Still more to plant this week, then it will be only weeding and feeding until the harvest.

Our next trip to the new farm is scheduled for week of July 1.  We should know by that time if we will have our permits for building and for the electric power to be connected.

Another Week Closer to the Goal

It's hard to believe how quickly the weeks are passing and we have been  already completed our fourth trip to the farm.  We are another month nearer to attaining our dream of living at the farm.

Towards that end we have begun making the change of address a reality and have put up the mailbox and visited the DMV to get the information regarding transferring our driving licenses and vehicle registrations.

The DMV was a nice surprise.  Upon arriving we thought perhaps it was closed because there were only two or three vehicles in the lot, but it was open for business.  Inside it resembled other DMV offices we have been in, but without the crowd.  There were three people working behind the counter, and only three two people there to do business, in addition to us.  It took less than  five minutes waiting before we were helped by the nicest person we have ever met behind a registry counter.  She was pleasant, polite and extremely helpful.  Amazing!  We had all the documents necessary except birth certificates for the licenses and the title for the car.  So, we will complete this process next time.

hoisting fram

We finally had a scheduled appointment for the EH agent to come to the farm to confirm the septic system and a well.  He didn't care what condition the well is in, as long as there is a well.  On the other hand the waste system is his primary concern.  If there is no approved method of "waste" removal then there are no permits issued.

So we constructed a frame using our 4x4 fence posts and some scrap

raising the concrete cover

lumber to form a sort of A frame from which to suspend the block and tackle for raising the concrete lid covering the "septic tank" and exposing it for inspection.  This block was much heavier than the concrete calculator estimated.  Yes, there is actually an on-line calculator which figures how much a block of concrete weighs based on its dimensions. This one should have weighed about 200 pounds.

The block and tackle was supposed to easily raise up to 1000 lbs.
Well, as you can see, it didn't and we needed to use another 4x4 as a lever to help raise it about 4" at a time from each end.  We raised it until we could clearly see what we had been guessing as to what would be beneath.  No septic tank, steel or concrete, just a dug out hole in the ground.  Probably the pit under an old out-house was our best guess, even the EH agent agreed as he grinned, peering into the pit, and basically saying "this won't do".  We knew that as soon as we had opened it.

So now the problem is this.  The ground in the area of the house won't perc.  The areas that will perc are too far from the house.  We must find an acceptable alternative or move the house, or build new in a different location.

Using an alternative is the most cost effective way to proceed.  We have found commodes which do not use water, and are not composting.  These commodes are a sort of ventilated dehydrator for the waste.  The solid waste matter is dehydrated and once the moisture has been removed, is ready for the compost pile.  The unit is ventilated, has a built in diverter for waste water, and the small fan and heat system uses a very small amount of power, either AC or DC.  It is also very affordable.  I'll tell you more about this product when, and if, our plan is approved.

For the gray water EH is in favor of a leaching field rather than a holding take or filters.  He has agreed to issue a special permit once the building inspector approves the plan.  So, now we wait, again.

The work on the goat yard was slow going because the ground was still very wet from all the recent rain.  It was a few days before Nick could get back to work on it.

We enlarged the original plan for the area so the final side of the yard must wait until the next trip for its completion.

We decided to add one 8' foot gate which would allow for a tractor to enter the yard when necessary, and also a 4' gate on the far side of the yard in order to move the goats from their yard to the pasture more easily.  The entire pasture will, eventually, be fenced to help keep predators out and the livestock in.

While waiting for the ground to dry off, Nick was able to work indoors stripping the walls that
enclose the front farmer's porch.  It was great to find it had been framed using pressure treated 2x4's because we can re-use these to frame the back "porch" area.  We will be enclosing that back open and adding lots of windows.  In time it will become a part of the kitchen.

The front porch will be opened up and new columns installed.  We don't know what lies beneath the stick on vinyl floor tiles, but we doubt it will be nice wooden floor-boards.

Whatever is there will most likely need to be replaced.

I can already see the porch completed, at least in my mind's eye.  A lovely wide and deep porch, with four solid columns and a painted floor.  There will be a couple of rocking chairs and a table for holding glasses of lemonade during the summer.  Perhaps a few hanging baskets filled with colorful flowers and greens.  A welcome mat at the screened front door and perhaps a friendly greeting painted onto a weathered board and hung on the wall.

Now, back to reality.  At the back of the house is what we have been calling the "back porch", but it
never was a porch.  Originally it was the kitchen and one of the old chimneys still stands just outside the south wall, obstructing the view to the back yard.

Early one morning, while I was still asleep, Nick went to work on the old chimney to take it down before I awoke.

What a great surprise was waiting for me that morning as I walked to the porch to prepare breakfast and saw the unbroken view to the back yard!

The block chimney is still on the ground, but it will be gone soon.  We will find a new use for them somewhere.

One day those posts will be gone and a wall of beautiful windows will be there to provide us with days filled with sunlight and a beautiful unobstructed view of the farm.  This room will become an eating area for the kitchen as well as sitting room for relaxing at the end of the day.

From this room we will have a clear view of the gardens to the left, patio straight ahead, and livestock to the right.

I have been eager to start the garden in some manner.  Not having a tractor or roto tiller doesn't make starting the garden an easy task.  At this time I also don't have the lumber to build raised beds so I need to find another way and hope it will work.

While visiting the post office Nick noticed across the road, beyond the dumpsters which are where town residents bring their household trash, were piles of wood chips in varying stages of decomposing.  A gold mine for us, free for the taking.

So we lined the back of our suv with a tarp and shoveled into it a good sized load to take back to the garden.

Using the tarp helped to keep the cargo area of the car cleaner, but it also was a great help to emptying the load onto the ground.  Nick

backed the car near to the row of hay I had spread for the first garden row/raised bed.  Then we each took a corner of the tarp which was furthest inside the car and pulled, thus sort of rolling the wood chips forward until they spilled out of from the hatch onto the hay.

There isn't much to show right now, just a bit of hay spread onto the ground and covered in wood chips.  But maybe by the end of the summer there will be something worth showing to you.  For now,  a small portion of this first row is being used as a holding nursery for the daylilies we bought and will use somewhere on the farm one day.

Nick found a source for wood pallets, all we want free for the asking.  We chose these blue pallets to
build the goats shelter during the next trip.  There are also red pallets and natural ones too.

As you can see in this photo, we have done a lots of clearing around the little barn.

Remember how it was at the start
of our journey?  One of these days we will get back to working on it.