The Insanity of Spring

April 2018 Blizzard coated the windows in ice.

I was reminded by a good friend that I haven't been around for a while.  I was actually aware of the fact, I just simply haven't had the time to sit down and write.  Luckily for me, and you, we had a blizzard yesterday. 
Yes, that's right, April 14th and instead of planting cool season veggies in the garden, I'm huddled inside avoiding a day where the high was only 30 degrees.

3 bin composter, 4x15 feet, large enough for the tractor
bucket to mix and move the materials

The past two months of internet silence has flown by.  I have been doing the work of three people for weeks.  Every moment that was nice enough to be outside, I was outside working on the acreage projects that need to be accomplished to bring home the two mini donkeys I bought in January.  On miserable days, I was inside catching up on all the small projects that pertain to the barn or to the ever growing list of household chores.

I removed the concrete curbing and stones around the well head,
Added compost and soil and planted 800 sq ft with wildflowers
in a new pollinator garden.  It will be allowed to go wild and self seed.

Ducks at the annual Saline Center Auction.

I built a slow feed hay feeder for the donkeys.

The cedar tree seedlings
have to be tackled every Spring
when they are orange and
easiest to spot in the pasture. I still have
3 acres to go.

The 'to do' list is endless.  Worse than the Great List, are the endless hidden little things that should have been on the list, but never seemed to make it ON to the list.  And the amount of time all the little projects take was shocking.

Fresh yeast doughnuts.

I finished the interior of the stock barn with kick panels, gravel, sand, and crushed limestone. It took 5
gallons of paint to cover the whole area.  Lights have been installed and run off of a portable power supply.
I built and painted two large wind break panels for the paddock and painted the wood fence in the paddock, and installed
an owl nesting box. (Thanks Doc for holding that ladder.)

But here we are, the middle of April, and I am waiting on the frames for the stall walls, and need to string the pasture fence.  The rubber mats need to be slapped on the floors, and the wood installed into the stall frames, and all the little things need moved into the stock barn, but that's it.  Can you believe it?  The frames are late to arrive, so that is holding me up.  Instructions for the fences should come tomorrow, so that looks like that's where I'm heading next.

Ellie being Ellie.

Last week, being that I was in a barn project holding pattern, I decided that it was the week that I was going to tackle the garden.

Those that have been following along for a while are saying, 'Wait! What garden? We thought the lovely, lush, productive garden was bulldozed and now resting peacefully under the new barn.  OMG! Is it a zombie garden?  Do you have to lop off the cabbage heads to kill a zombie garden?  CAN you kill a zombie garden?'

It's OK dear followers.  Zombie vegetables will not be taking over the central US.  The old garden, is still deep under the new barn.  You will recall that the new barn was finished this time last year, but I just didn't have the brain power, time, or physical motivation to plan, locate and build up a new garden after the barn was completed in time for planting.  So I resorted to container gardening for the summer.

What a disaster.  Big money on good containers, quality container mix, and plants, and I think we managed a dozen cherry tomatoes, one horn worm, and three containers of plants that did nothing before they died.

As winter projects started eating my soul, each walk to and from the stock barn I would survey locations and dream of my rich green garden again.  I really enjoyed the deep mulch method of the old garden.  It worked remarkably well the first year, and fairly well the second year. (The second year was my mistake.  I pulled out all the frames, which had exposed soil and piled the hay on 12 inches deep to over winter. The seedy hay found the dirt and weeds went wild and rooted deep.)  The method was sound, in practice, I screwed up.  But all-in-all it was fabulous.  The whole garden was essentially an active compost pile, making new soil for future years, and the depth of the mulch discouraged weeds.  Even those that took root, weren't rooted into anything but hay, and pulled out easily.  You did have to keep up with it, every square foot of it.

April is burning season.

So while I liked the old method, if I was starting from scratch (AGAIN), I was going to improve upon what I had learned.  I kid you not, this is when a blog I follow had a book published.  (Old World Garden)  WHAT TIMING!  I was looking at an incoming snow storm, and Amazon Prime could have it at my door in two days, perfect for weekend reading, pondering, and if I liked it, planning.  Now I have no affiliation with OWGarden, nor do I make any money from you buying the book, Raised Row Gardening ,or am I compensated in any way.  I'm just letting you know where I drew my inspiration.  (By the way, try their recipe for Beef and Noodles! It's how I found them to start with.)

The book is laid out in chronological order and is very clear and easy to understand.  The authors not only take you through the process, but inform you on why the process works.  They then go a step further and give you a clear list of companion plantings, composting tips, material selections, and instead of just taking you from planning to harvest, they wrap you clear around to winterizing, planning and planting for the next Spring, so you aren't left wondering if you are doing the whole process correctly.  This is, after all, a perpetual garden.

It is based on the same compost in place system as my previous garden, but it has dedicated maintained growing areas, and dedicated heavily mulched walking areas.  The benefit to this is that you are severely limited the areas exposed to even possible weeds, and those areas, being mulched as well, will also limit the number and tenacity of the weeds.  All of that reduces the amount of maintenance time spent in the garden.  BONUS!

The flat enough area between the orchard and the workshop.

I read the book.  Ideas started swirling about my head.  I found a level-ish spot in the yard and I dug out the project book and started planning out my rows.  I remembered I had 104 feet of portable, electric poultry fencing that I ordered a couple of years ago from Premier1 fencing, and never put into use.  So easy decision on the size of the garden 25x25 feet.

Now here's the only place I deviated from the book.  It calls for placing the working/growing rows out first, with layers of straw and then soil.  Then filling in the surrounding area with a thick layer of mulch material for the walking zones.

I was starting from scratch and the ground was still mostly dry, so the opportunity for the dump truck hauling 16 cubic yards of mulch to back up to the actual garden location was not to be passed up.

Quite the heap of mulch.  To be matched a week later by
a heap of soil. (most of which was used to re-grade areas
around the lawn.)

  My mulch/dirt guy thought I was nuts, but I'm a regular customer, and I'm used to his "she's nuts" smile.  He was interested in the process and promised to come back in the summer to see the progress.  The hens were quite interested in the massive pile of hardwood mulch, but there really wasn't anything in there for them and they quickly lost interest.

Inspection crew hoping for a new hunting ground.

The tractor made quick work of the pile, pushing it to the pre-measured, painted lines in the lawn, and leveling it.

I pushed the mulch out another 4 feet on a side so that I could place the electric fence into mulch and wouldn't have to mow against the fence, and the mulch would inhibit weed and grass growth along the fence.

I only used weed control fabric under the mulch which is outside
of the electric fence.  5 inches of mulch IN the garden
will keep any of the sad lawn that wasn't really there to start
with from growing up through.

I then installed the fence.  It was here that we found the fence was not 100 feet, but 102, and the gate added another 4.  So the finished size ended up being 25 x 28 feet, which allowed me to add a LONG wide row at one end for sorghum, sweet and decorative corn.

I mapped out my growing rows and removed the mulch from these areas and moved it to around the electric net.

All the mulch removed from the growing areas.  I forgot to take photos
of the next step, which was a central mound of compostable
material, in this case, straw.

I then followed the instructions in the book to build my straw mounds and then good , pulverized garden soil, and then I augmented that with pure compost soil.  I will add more compost to each planting hold when it comes time to plant and then top mulch with straw.

Straw covered with pulverized garden soil and settled. Note the
start of the potato towers in the back left.

I added heavy duty support posts and will add tomato posts and support frames a little closer to June 1st, the earliest I will plant them.

Herb seeds started, potato starts drying, onions and garlic waiting
for Tuesday or Wednesday.

Compost soil added to the garden soil.  Large support posts installed and
potato towers started. (We are two weeks behind on potato season here.)

The two towers are for potatoes.  I accidentally came across an old archived blog post on building them, and am going to give them a try.  They are supposed to cut down on weekly soil mounding and increase the planting to harvest ratio.  We shall see.

Cedar Creek Pottery  A hidden GEM!

So there you have it.  I will share all the other build projects, trips, mis-adventures, and baking

Built two lids for the wine barrels and hooked up the rain/downspout
diverters.  They work great.  It doesn't take much rain to fill a 50 gallon
barrel.  Also hooked up a runoff from the barn to the stock tank, and ran
an overflow pipe down into the pasture.

adventures teased in above photos in future posts, but I wanted to get the garden post out there for anyone else out there figuring out what they're going to do this year.  The great thing about this method is that you can start small and try it out and build on to your plan as the years/ needs/ budget allows.

Chicken Update-

The two speckled Icelandic cockerels have gone to live about an hour away.  I simply did not have room for 4 boys.

Extra eggs?  Deviled eggs!

Delmar, Astrid, and Freya have all joined the ranks of regular layers. Their eggs are barely champagne pink, almost white and still small.

Our remaining Icelandic boy, Ari, is turning out to be a kicker.  It remains to be seen if he is staying.  I will not tolerate being stalked and flogged by a rooster.

Egg laying was going gang busters until Easter, when the Broody Prison Opened, and has had a revolving door ever since- Daisy, Violet, Princess, Ellie, Flora, Donder have all been inmates, so far.