Today has turned out to be absolutely gorgeous!

We dipped to 10C/50F during the night, and as I write this at almost 3:30 pm, we’re at 17C/63F, and I’m absolutely loving it!

I took advantage of the temperatures to work on a job that I was avoiding during the hot days. Mowing in the outer yard, with the push mower.

I had a specific purpose for this. When it was cut before, the riding mower was at its highest setting. I’ve lowered the push mower, while also using the bag to collect the clippings. In this area, that would be a mix of old, dried thatch from last year, and fresh growth. I had the wagon handy, as it holds a lot more clippings that the wheelbarrow, to empty the bag into until the load could be hauled off to the garden.

This is as far as I got before filling the wagon for the first time. About two and a quarter passes. It takes about five bags to fill the wagon. In the drier area with the deepest thatch from last year – including the portions we were able to mow and rake up last time – I was emptying the bag ever few feet. I’d say doing this narrow strip took me at least 15 minutes. Then, when I filled the wagon, I started mulching around the transplanted squash right away, which probably took another 15 minutes before I brought the empty wagon back and took this photo.

This is how far I got before stopping for lunch.

By this point, I was able to mulch all the squash mounds, including the ones that were direct sown with summer squash, all the grow bags with peppers and onions, and even low raised beds, around turnips, beets and carrots. I’ve removed the boards that were placed to protect the tomatoes from the wind, which opened up space that needed to be mulched.

That done, I started dumping loads onto the black tarp that has been so handy. We use to to cover areas to start killing off grass and weeds, to hold sifted garden soil until it can be returned to the beds, and now to hold grass clippings for later mulching.

I’m going to continue to focus on using the push mower in this area. Everything else can be done with the riding mower that my brother and his wife left for us to use.

He’s done a lot on the riding mower they took back with them. The drive chain turned out to be stretched, and that’s why it kept falling off. He replaced that – but even the new chain needed to have a link removed for it to work. He replaced the seat, which I didn’t even think needed replacing. The belt for the mowing blade had fallen off at some point. It may need a new battery, and at least one of the tires will need replacing, as the rubber was showing huge cracks. We’re all amazed it held air long enough for my brother to get the mower onto his trailer!

It turned out to need a whole lot more work than expected! He keeps finding more and more things that need to be fixed.

I so appreciate that they left one of their riding mowers behind for us to use while he works on it. It will save us a lot of time, that’s for sure.

For now, though, I’m going to continue to use the push mower and slowly reclaim the super long grass that we never got to cut, or even scythe, last year. This will give me huge amounts of wonderful clippings to use in the garden!

Meanwhile, one of my daughters have been supervising the cats in my office/bedroom. At about 3am, I was awaked by strange kitten noises and discovered Decimus had already moved two of her babies out of the cat cage. I found her peeking at me from one of the cat cave the Cat Lady gave us, so I quickly moved the last two babies over for her. Marlee has been snarling and growling at her most of the night, too. Every now and then, Decimus will leave her sleeping babies and go around the room, getting into things. I’ve learned that this is her looking for a place to poop or pee. For some reason, after the litter boxes where cleaned (with the litter pellets, we just need to empty the bins completely, every few days), she stopped using it – which got very messy! I managed to distract her away from her searching, and she finally ended up using one of the litter boxes. I get the impression eliminating isn’t very comfortable for her, yet. It’s been less than a week since she gave birth, after all.

She’s not the only one moving her babies. After using a load of grass clippings as mulch and starting to head back, I spotted Brussel, crossing the grass in the main garden area. There was something with her! It turned out to be a black and white kitten. It’s not as big as the first litter of kittens we started seeing in the yard, but pretty close! Based on where I’ve been seeing her, I think she had her kittens at the empty farm across the road, and she is now bringing them closer to the house – and kibble! I have no idea how many she has. I’m just assuming she had more than one.

Well, time to head back out and see how much more progress I can get on that super tall, thick grass!

The Re-Farmer