This little guy is getting a little more socialized!
He was on the rail and did start to move away as I got closer, but the other end is covered in rose bush, slowing him down. That allowed me to pick him up and cuddle him a bit. When I put him back on the rail, he stayed and let me take his picture a few times.
I just about squee’d out loud when I uploaded the pictures and saw this.
I got a tongue blehp!!!
*melt*
The Re-Farmer
Today, I decided to go to Superstore instead of to Costco again, as there were a couple of things on my list I either didn’t see at Costco, or what I did see wasn’t in good shape. Plus, I had a hankering for Superstore’s torpedo buns! 😂
I passed on the photo of the fallen tree to my brother and his wife to let them know about it, and ended up arranging to meet with my SIL for lunch. We had a fantastic visit! After we parted ways, I decided to take advantage of the location and made a quick run through the Home Depot that was next door to the Superstore. I found the plastic conduit pipes I want to use to bury and protect the hose we want to run to the garden tap, which gave me an idea of how much we can expect to spend. While looking for something else, I found short lengths of rebar with a protective coating for under $3 each, so I got 10 of them. I think I need only eight. We found the parts and pieces for a car port in the barn, but if we want to set it up, we need to secure it to the ground somehow. These rebar pieces can be pounded into the ground, and the supports should fit right over them.
I hope.
If it doesn’t work, I can find many other uses for them!
Then it was off to the Superstore. This is was $224.45, after taxes, looks like.
I won’t list the prices for everything on there, but this is what I got.
At my husband’s request, I got nacho fixings – olives, chips and mozzarella cheese. He also requested canned beans as a quick heat and eat. There was a sale on one brand, with a limit of 4 of each type, so I got two flavours. Eight cans at $1.50 each. I had intended to buy a case, but a case of 9 cans was almost $16.
I stocked up on distilled water for my husband’s CPAP humidifier; the cost/4L jug was about half what they cost locally. There’s a 20 pound bag of “almost perfect” potatoes for $11, and a large package of house brand paper towels. I got another case of Coke Zero, even though I got one at the recent Costco trip. This one it to tuck away for later. There’s a couple of boxes of tea; Maple Rooibos and Vanilla Earl Grey. There’s a bag of Basmati rice that I hope is good. I couldn’t find it at Costco, and this is a different brand. We have not had much luck trying different brands! I also stocked up some more on Beaver Buzz energy drinks for my older daughter and I. The citrus flavour was on sale, but I also got root beer and saskatoon flavours. There’s a 2 pound clamshell of blueberries. Regular price was $6.99, but there was a sale at $3.20, with a limit of 1. For fruit, I also got a couple of bunches of bananas, as they were only 35¢ each, instead of the usual 79¢ or more.
There’s a couple of jars of mayonnaise, a loaf of French bread, 4 packages of 12 hamburger buns and a sourdough loaf. I also picked up some fresh Fettuccini noodles, to make the original Fettuccini Alfredo I’ve been wanting to try. I would make the pasta ourselves, but no one wants to do that in this heat.
Last of all, I got cold bottles of water and Coke Zero for the drive home. I ended up only drinking the water, so I’ve got a Coke for later.
All of that, before taxes, came to $216.38 The one thing on my list that I did not get was cat kibble. For that, I will make a trip to Costco. Their cheap dry cat food is too cheap – not even the outside cats want to eat it – but the other large bags cost more than Costco by quite a bit. We’re okay for cat food supply right now, but the difference in price is worth the extra trip to the city.
The shopping done, I swung by the nearby Costco to fill the gas tank. Most places have their gas prices from 157.9/L to 160.9/L for regular. Costco is still at 144.9/L That’s a significant difference!
Now that I’ve been home for a while and recuperated from being around so many other human beings for so long, I’m going to re-watch a video on how to make the original Fettuccini Alfredo, then make some for supper!
I’m really looking forward to trying it!
The Re-Farmer
Well, today started with a bang.
Literally.
At about 5:30 am, I was awakened, first by a flash of light, then about a half second later, a massive peal of thunder! That I even saw the flash of light at all, through my mostly sheltered, small, west facing window, tells me more than anything just how bright it was, never mind being awakened by it.
Almost immediately after, we got hit with a sudden downpour, along with a light show and more thunder. It was gone as suddenly as it started, moving quickly across the region. Looking at the weather radar, the system was a wide, narrow band of severe weather sweeping to the southeast. Later in the day, I was hearing reports from various other towns and cities that experienced much the same thing. Mostly clear skies with just a few clouds, a quick deluge as the system hit, then clear and sunny again!
My plan had been to head to the city early in the day to do our second stock-up shop, so as to avoid the storms predicted for the afternoon. Instead, we got the storms early, and I headed out later!
While doing my morning rounds, I found there was very little damage. A couple of downed branches, and this…
This dead spruce was actually on the ditch side of the fence line. I remember looking at it, earlier this summer, and thinking we could probably take that down before it falls…
I’m not sure how we’re going to clean this up now. It’s not really accessible. The lilac hedge envelops the base, and I don’t want to create a gap in the hedge. It’ll just give the deer another place to jump through.
We’ll figure it out. Assuming the lilacs holding it up don’t just give out and it falls the rest of the way down on its own.
As for the rest of the day, it has been hot and muggy. According to the weather app on my computer, we’re at 28C/82F, but it feels like 30C/86F. We’re supposed to hit 30C/86F tomorrow, then again a couple of days after, before things start to cool down slightly, again. I check different apps, and some say we’ll get more thunderstorms, while other don’t even say rain.
I’d like at least a couple of days of no rain and lower humidity, though, so I can get some painting done outside. Or cooler days without rain, so I can take down more dead trees.
The heat, however looks like it will be hanging around for a while, though!
The Re-Farmer
I was able to harvest another handful of beans this morning, and hand pollinate a few more squash.
The garlic had been curing on the picnic table and last night I trimmed, cleaned, strung and hung them, keeping the different varieties apart. Several couldn’t be hung and I brought them in to be used right away. We have so little garlic this year! A little is better than none, though. We’ll leave them hanging in the market tend for a while longer before bringing them inside.
The chamomile in the wattle weave bed is blooming nicely!
I got a picture of the developing gourds from the drum gourd and zucca melon bed. That is most definitely a zucca melon, not a drum gourd. I most definitely got mixed up with the labels. Which means we have no drum gourds developing at all. Not even female flowers.
We do have a couple of Caveman’s Club gourds, though! Well. One, so far. I just hand pollinated another one last night. We’ll see if it takes.
The Purple Peruvian potatoes in their grow bags are looking absolutely lush! The Irish Cobbler are getting yellow and falling over, and the Red Thumb are getting into that stage, but the Purple Peruvian look like they’re going to be growing for quite a while longer.
Last of all was an unusual find, as I was checking the squash to see what might need pollinating. I found a double flower!
Today is the last day of July, and our growing season is quickly running out. I have seen people in my local gardening groups who are even further north than we are, posting pictures of their much larger squash. I wish I knew how theirs are so much further ahead! Things are growing well this year, but I still can’t shake the feeling we are behind. So many squash plants still aren’t even producing female flowers yet.
Ah, well. We’ll get what we get, and every year is another year to improve our soil and growing conditions.
Oh, something I forgot to mention. Last winter, a neighbour who is moving had offered us a shed they needed to get rid of, that I was hoping to use as a chicken coop. Unfortunately, it didn’t handle the rest of the winter well, and they ended up scrapping it entirely. Now that the renter’s cows have been rotated out, I should grab the wagon along with some tools and see about getting that antique wagon chassis in the car graveyard. I still have hopes to build a mobile chicken coop on there.
Little by little, it’ll get done.
The Re-Farmer
I had to wash the eyes of only one kitten, this morning.
In the background, around the kibble house, you can see the little tuxedo. That one had the really messed up eye, but we couldn’t get anywhere near it. We still can’t, but it looks like the eye healed on its own!
I heard from the Cat Lady last night. Their cat that was more recently blocked has had surgery and is being monitored at home now. They’re going to be giving us their regular cat food, because they will now be buying only medicated cat food. !!! I just can’t imagine how much that will cost on a monthly basis. They have more cats inside than we do, and the UTI cat food is insanely expensive.
As for our own Leyendecker, I will have to go to the clinic today and see if I can get another syringe for his liquid meds. The last dose we gave him, he bit it hard enough to make a hole. He is responding to the medications – he’s got about a week left, just once a day, now. He still doesn’t seem to be eating much at all, but we’ve still got the problem that sent us to the vet in the first place. He’s peeing in all the wrong places! My younger daughter has taken on the task of deep clean up, and has been mopping the floors frequently. Considering the state of our floors, especially in the kitchen, that is not an easy job. The linoleum is worn down to the sub floor in places, and the mop catches on the edges. If we were using the sponge mop, it would be torn to pieces!
Now if we could just win that lottery jackpot, we could put in new flooring, along with all the other renovations this place needs! 😅
The Re-Farmer
I finished preparing the bed we harvested the garlic from, and sowed for a fall harvest.
I chose Cherry Belle radishes and Bresko beets. I wasn’t sure how many seeds I had left, so I brought two different varieties of spinach. I was able to sow the Lakeside variety, which is what we planted in the spring. I was so impressed with how they didn’t go bitter, even when they started to bolt, I definitely wanted to sow those again.
I used the boards I’d brought out to shelter the tomatoes from the wind in the spring and laid them out around the edges, where weeds are such a problem, as well as across the middle to divide the bed into three sections. I ended up adding a couple more boards at the ends, too. Aside from hopefully keeping the crab grass at bay and dividing the bed, they also give me something to step on while tending the middle rows.
The first thing I did was give the entire bed a watering, using the cone setting on my sprayer for more even coverage. Then I used a hoe to trench out three rows in each section. Those got a watering on the jet setting, because I wanted to drive the water deep. Even though I’d already watered the bed, the moisture didn’t get very far, and the trenches were quite dry. The water also leveled out the soil in the trenches, so they weren’t so deep.
Next, I used grass clippings to mulch along the boards and in between the rows. Once the mulch was down, I used a broken piece of bamboo stake to make the rows the seeds would be planted in.
I picked up a seeder at Dollar Tree, and this is the first time I used it. It worked rather well. In the photo are the beet seeds, which were easiest. The rounder radish and spinach seeds did sometimes get a bit out of control, though! 😄
The beets went into the middle sections, the spinach at the end closer to the house, and the radishes at the far end.
Once the seeds were in and lightly covered, I used the flat setting on the hose to water each row and settle the soil further around the seeds. The grass clippings were toasted dry in the sun, so I used the cone and shower settings to soak the mulch. Last of all, I used the jet setting to clean the loose grass clippings off the boards.
What I will probably do later is put some kind of cover over the whole thing. I think we have some mosquito netting long enough for it. I mostly want to keep the insects from eating the greens. Last year, the radishes seemed particularly vulnerable. As they get bigger, they will definitely be tempted for the deer, too!
We were at 26C/79F while I was out there. Another reason to make sure the bed got extra watering! The two northernmost rows of squash were wilting in the heat again, so I’ve got the sprinkler going on those. Squash need a lot of water, anyhow! I had been concerned that the two southern rows would have trouble because they get so much more shade, while the two northern rows basically get zero shade from sunrise to sunset. With this year’s heat, that shade it turning out to be helpful! Last year, with the flooding, it was the other way around. The squash that were in full sun strove mightily to recover from the flooding, while those in shade basically had no chance at all.
For the next week to ten days, we’re going to see increased heat. Depending on which app I look at, we’ll either have no rain at all, have several days or rain, or several days of thunderstorms! It’s awfully hard to plan things with such conflicting information!
The Re-Farmer
I got a harvest this morning!
Just a wee one, but big enough that I didn’t have room in my pocket for the patty pan. I’m going to have to start bringing out my harvest colander, just in case!
Also, it is SO much more comfortable to harvest bush beans in a high raised bed. Even in the low raised bed we grew some in last year, while much better than harvesting at ground level, it was still painful. The high raised bed is just awesome!
Not a bad first bean harvest, considering the plants got eaten by a deer. Especially the green beans. They’ve still got a lot more recovery, but I’m seeing so many developing pods in the process! I did pick some beans a couple of days ago; just a tiny handful, and not enough to call a “harvest”, really. Plus there have been a few early Romas ripening every few days or so. I picked one of the two larger G Star patty pans, leaving the other to get larger, while still more are developing.
While checking the garden, I found more blooming female squash flowers to hand pollinate. It looks like we’ve got a few squash that have pollinated successfully. Here are some of them.
In order of the photo slideshow above, we have:
Goldy yellow zucchini. I’m happy to see that large one developing, as there were no male flowers on the plant. I hand pollinated from a hulless pumpkin that was blooming, and it seems to have taken!
G Star patty pan. These are easily the most successful plants we have. I picked one of the larger squash, choosing the slightly misshapen on, leaving the other to get bigger. There are many more developing.
Georgia Candy Roaster. Another one that got hand pollinated from another variety.
Sunburst patty pans. The one surviving plant is looking strong and healthy now, and starting to bloom.
Pink Banana. The first, tiny female flower! I’ll have to keep an eye on it, to make sure it gets pollinated as soon as it opens.
Honeyboat Delicata. There’s still just the one, even though we have the most plants of these. It seems to be doing all right.
Red Kuri. We have a couple of these, one on each plant. Previously, we grew these on trellises. It should be interesting to see how they do, without climbing.
Endeavor zucchini. One sad green zucchini plant is finally looking stronger and healthier, and starting to produce female flowers.
There are others, but I didn’t take pictures of everything. The entire squash patch looks SO much better than last year. The slugs may have done a number on the summer squash, but now they seem to be leaving them alone.
July is almost gone, though. We’re really going to need a long, mild fall for the winter squash to reach full maturity.
I’ll have to remember to take photos, but I’m wondering if I’ve miss labelled the little patch with the African Drum gourds and Zucca melons. While transplanting, there were three labelled Drum gourd, three labelled Zucca melon, and three where I could no longer reach the label, so it could be one or the other. These got planted and replanted when starting the seeds.
Right now, we are seeing female flowers in the drum gourd row that I’ve been hand pollinating. As they get bigger and start dropping down, I’m seeing that they are developing a sort of hourglass shape.
Kinda like this shape, except tiny, and fuzzy.
That is an image of mature zucca melon, from the Baker Creek website.
This is the Baker Creek image for the African drum gourd. The developing gourds we have do not look like that.
If I accidentally mislabelled things, does that mean the other plants, which have no female flowers yet, are the drum gourds? Or are they all zucca, and no drums? The flowers and leaves for all the gourds we’ve grown look very similar. Even compared to the attempted apple and canteen gourds from last year. The plants on the chain link fence were the surviving first seed starts; one of each, and I know those were labelled correctly. They are blooming, but the vines are so long and skinny, and there are only male flowers, so there isn’t much to help identify there.
Curious!
The Re-Farmer
Look what I found under a chair this morning!
After emptying a flat of Coke, I put the box under the chair to get it out of the way and forgot it there.
Cheddar and Leyendecker decided they both fit in it.
They kinda do…
The Re-Farmer
I am so tired.
And sore.
Mostly tired.
My brother came out this morning to install a vent for the portable air conditioner they brought for us. It look longer than expected, of course, but we now have an AC in the living room! Yay!
Once that was done, it was almost lunch time, and we both left at the same time. I’d hoped to be able to at least buy him lunch as a thank you, but he had too much to do when he got home. His day was already a long one by then!
Once in the city, I had two places to go. The first was Canadian Tire.
I almost got a heavy duty hose on sale for the water tap project, but then I saw something else and put the hose back.
We needed this kit, more!
We’ve found all sorts of drill bits all over the place, but they’re all mixed up, many are worn out, and quite a few have broken as we tried to use them. What we don’t have is this range of sizes – or maybe we do. Somewhere. These can be used for metal, wood or plastic, and was 69% off. A much better deal than the hose, which would have cost more, even on sale! I had a budget for today for one, not both, so the hose went back.
Altogether, I got:
A 2 gallon watering can, to replace the one by the Crespo squash that is falling apart. $16.99
Plastic hardware cloth, 3′ x 25′ for the raised bed cover. I hope it works out. $34.99
Replacement spool for our weed trimmer. $12.99
A gallon of outdoor paint for the garden bench and “new” folding table. $54.99
The drill bit set, which would have been almost $150. Instead, it was $39.99
The total, after taxes, came out to $179.15
One thing I was looking for was more fire bricks for our eventual outdoor bread oven that I am slowly accumulating, but apparently this location didn’t even have a section for things like wood burning stoves, etc. The woman I asked while she was mixing my paint thought it was a seasonal thing.
Well, at least I got the paint and something to use on the third raised bed cover. If it works out, I’ll use it on the fourth frame, too.
Then it was off to Costco. I actually picked up gas, first. Driving through the town my mother lives in, one station was up to 160.9/L, while the other was still at 158.9/L Costco was 144.9/L !! I wanted to fill my tank but, unfortunately, the dust from driving on gravel roads tricks the gas pump into thinking it’s full, so it kept doing the auto shut off. I kept turning it back on until it was getting close to $25, then just hoped that was enough. When I started the car, the needle was just barely touching full!
Then it was time to do the shopping.
This being a Saturday, I was expecting it to be busy, but still, I find the crowds so draining! That, and so many people just park their carts willy nilly. Annoying enough at the best of times, but I’m using a flat cart!
When it was time to check out, though, the staff was absolutely fabulous, and I was through in no time.
This is what $682.30 looks like.
Ouch.
This trip was a big bigger with some things, as I’m also thinking ahead to our winter stockpile and pantry.
First, there was the “bottom of the basket” stuff that didn’t get unloaded.
Cat kibble; four 9kg bags at $29.99 each I would have gotten more, but not while using my mother’s car.
Wet cat food, $38.99
Two packs of Kirkland toilet paper; $22.99
A flat of Coke Zero; $14.69, plus 32¢ enviro fee
Box of spaghetti; $13.49
9 pack of mixed pasta; $13.99
Then there was the stuff that got unloaded onto the belt.
Pork chips: $20.10
lean ground beef, one package at $27.38, another at $26.29
ground turkey: $27.88, minus $5 at the till for a sale
ground pork chub: $19.99
4 pk of bacon: $19.99
Marble cheddar: $14.99
Old cheddar: $14.99
Extra Old cheddar (a white cheddar): $19.99
two 1L cartons of whipping cream at $4.79 each
4pk of cream cheese: $9.49
Large bottle of Coffee creamer for the girls: $7.49 – that is typically a good price for the smaller bottles anywhere else!
6pk canned chicken: $17.99 (it’s actually gone down in price! A bit.)
Walnuts for baking: $11.49
Butter, 5 pounds at $5.49 each
2pk of lemon juice: $4.89
Kirkland brand chocolate chips: $15.99
Glass cleaner; we keep losing our glass cleaner, so I got a set with one spray bottle and a huge refill jug: $17.99
Pork rinds (and this time I remembered to tell my husband it’s for cooking with!): $10.79
Iced tea mix: $9.99
Peanut butter, 2kg size: $10.49
Rotisserie chicken; two at $7.99 each
2pk rye bread: $4.49
two packages of tortilla wraps at $9.99 each
A double flat of eggs (60 eggs): $18.89
Sub total was $651.97, plus $30.33 in taxes, for a grand total of $682.30
Ouch.
The sad thing is, I didn’t get everything on my list. I was running out of space. I’ll have to go over the list – and the budget – and make another trip out. The price for dry cat food alone makes the drive worth it.
I was feeling dehydrated by the time I was done Tetrising everything into the car, so I stopped at a gas station just outside the city to pick up something to drink. There was a fruit stand just across the parking lot, so I checked it out. I ended up getting some plums (actually a plum hybrid; he told me what it was, but I can’t remember now), cherries and avocados. The avocados were only a dollar each, which is much cheaper that most places. Altogether, it was another $26 for fruit.
I am so glad to be home now.
I think I’ll make myself a supper using rotisserie chicken and enjoy it in an air conditioned room! We’re at “only” 22C/72F outside right now. It’s almost 7pm, but my weather app says we’re still supposed to go up to 23C/73F before things start cooling down for the night. Last night, we actually dropped to 7C/45F – I had my window open and almost felt cold! 😄 Today is a brief respite, though. Long range forecasts have us approaching, and reaching, for one day, 30C/86F. No rain in the forecast, though, so we’ll be watering the garden. I’ll get to use the nice new watering can, with a rose that doesn’t have a crack in it, nor chunks of plastic braking off the opening! 😄
It doesn’t take much to make me happy. 😊
The Re-Farmer
I didn’t get back to the trench with anything to cut the roots, yet. I wanted to wash away as much of the soil as I could. First, to uncover the roots to better see them, but also to get a better look at the pipe itself.
I just don’t know what to make of this!
There are sections of the wider pipe, all along the main pipe (I agree with 53old; it looks like irrigation pipe). Once I get the roots cut away, I will take off one of the couplings I put on in my attempt to repair the pipe, and I should be able to take this length of the pipe out, all the way to the tap. Then I’ll be able to take a good look at what is under those wider sections of pipe.
The only thing is, I have yet to find the end of the pipe. I’ve been digging around at the bottom of the tap but keep hitting roots and rocks, and that end of the pipe is quite a bit lower than the rest of it. My brother will be here tomorrow morning, and I hope he’ll have time to see this!
I also managed to get the bed the garlic was harvested from almost completely ready for planting.
The first photo in the series is the “before” picture.
After clearing away the grass clipping mulch, you can see that there is a fair bit of weeding to do, mostly along the edge. That crab grass comes up from under the log border. I broke up the entire bed to weed it, and was finding plenty of rhizomes making their way into the middle! Then I added a bag of manure to work into the soil.
Because the edges are where the most trouble is for weeds, once the manure was worked in, I raked the soil away from the log edges and into the middle. Then I took some of the grass clipping mulch and packed a thick layer tight against the logs. They won’t be enough to choke out the weeds, but they will at least make it harder for them to get through. Plus, it’ll make sure we don’t accidentally plant too close to the edge.
Last of all, I raked the soil back towards the grass clippings and leveled it off a bit. There are a lot of hard clumps, though, so I’ll have to come back to it with the cultivator tool and break those up. Once that is done, it’ll be ready for planting.
What we’ll most likely do is plant in three blocks, square food gardening style, with the beets in the middle. The radishes are a fast crop, so having them near an end makes sense. The spinach is a cut and come again crop, so having them near and end also makes sense. While the beet greens can be eaten, we’ve don’t tend to eat them a lot, their roots will take the longest to reach a harvestable size. We will likely harvest them all at once at the end of the year, so they can stay in the harder to reach middle zone.
Once these beds get converted to high raised beds, reach won’t be as much of a problem. The lower the bed, the harder it is to reach the middle of it. If you’re short like me and thinking of growing in low raised beds, I would recommend not going more than 3 feet wide for that reason. Ours are 4 feet wide, which is great for a high bed, but gets pretty painful on a low one! Even the box beds, two of which are about a foot high, it’s still uncomfortable to reach into the middle and actually do anything of substance.
That’s where we’re at now! Once the bed prep is finished, we just have to choose which varieties we will be planting. 😊
The Re-Farmer
