This morning, as I headed out to do my rounds, the sun room thermometer was at about 10C/50F. During the night, I saw it dip as low as about 5C/41F.
I moved away the reflect to get some photos of the new bins with the kulli corn. The picture of the smaller bin didn’t turn out, though.
Here is the larger bin with 80 toilet tube pots in it. That white plastic is marking off the pots that are empty. When one daughter finished the smaller bin, she started helping her sister from the other side, so the empty pots ended up in a really weird place. :-D
They planted all the seeds, including the little, bitty extras. I don’t expect those to germinate, but who knows? Even without the extras, I don’t expect 100% germination. It should be interesting to see what we get.
The three trays of bulb onions are doing better in the sun room than they were in the mini-greenhouse, but that tray of shallots is really struggling. :-(
The Cup of Moldova tomatoes have recovered from their first night in the sun room rather well. You can see leaves with cold damage on them, but the remaining leaves are looking quite strong. Even the Crespo squash and Canteen gourds seem to be doing just fine.
Likewise with the Wonderberry.
There are some seedlings in the mini-greenhouse that are starting to look like they can be moved to the sun room, as does the tray of bunching onions. We’ll have to do a bit of re-arranging, since the sun room ended up being a feline recovery room again, to make space for everything.
It will be good when we finally have a small greenhouse or polytunnel. Hopefully, we’ll have something in time for next year.
All day yesterday, and throughout the night, my weather apps kept telling me it was snow.
This morning, they were telling me it was raining.
It was snowing when I went to do my morning rounds. :-D
Okay, “snowing” might be a bit of an overstatement. There were a few flakes floating around, and that was it.
There were very few cats out this morning! I spotted only six at first, though little by little, I did see more.
There were also four deer hanging out in the yard. Before I headed outside, I could see one of them digging in the unfinished low raised bed, trying to get at more frozen kitchen scraps in the trench.
I doubled the feed this morning. It’s still just a tiny amount, shared with the birds, but with winter refusing to leave, every little bit helps.
I find it interesting that we seem to have watched a new herd get created. At first, we had the doe and her youngling coming by. The piebald would come along, and if the other two were there, it would chase them away. Then the three of them just sort of made their piece and are now always together. More recently, a lone deer started coming by more often. The trio would chase it away if they crossed paths, but it kept coming back. Now, all four of them are staying together!
After I finished my rounds and was starting to head it, I spotted a cat near the shrine that looked like it might have been Potato Beetle. It was sitting on the snow with one leg up, but that’s something all the cats do when they’re sitting on the snow. I came over to see, and was happy to find that yes, Potato Beetle had come back! He was aiming for the kibble tray under the shrine but, much to my surprise, it was already empty! So grabbed a bit more kibble and topped it up. That was enough for Potato to come closer, and I was able to pick him up and check on his leg. It is looking very good.
Then I started walking towards the house and he started to freak out, so I put him down. He does NOT want to be put back into the sun room again! At least not right now. So I let him be and went inside.
But only for about a minute. Then I had to throw my boots back on and chase the deer away from the kibble tray under the shrine! The deer actually seem to prefer the cat kibble over the sunflower seeds and oats in the feed. I’m thinking the higher fat and protein content is something they are really craving right now.
I was being secretly watched. :-D
As I write this, our weather alerts have changed to a rainfall warning. It’s expected to be next to nothing in our area, but to the south of us, they’re saying possibly 30-40mm/1-1.5in before Sunday, when it’s supposed to turn to snow.
*sigh*
I think I’ll go through some of my seeds and dig out the ones with the longest days to maturity, and see if there are any good to start indoors now. Garden therapy!
Welcome to my second “Recommended” series. Here, you’ll find various sites and channels that I’ve been enjoying and wanted to share with you. With so many people currently looking to find ways to be more self sufficient or prepared for emergencies, that will be the focus for most of these, but I’ll also be adding a few that are just plain fun. Please feel free to leave a comment or make your own recommendation. I hope you enjoy these!
As I found myself delving further into recourses for the “homesteading” community – a term I still find strange, since it’s how I grew up, and no one called it “homesteading” back then – I saw a lot of really great information. It was very encouraging to see so many young families in particular, diving into lives of self sufficiency and self reliance, while also being part of a larger community that was more than happy to share information and help each other out.
Many happily share their experiences online. Some of the interesting and helpful articles and videos I found where those sharing about the mistakes they made, or what they wish they’d know before they started, and so on. These often included lists of things that they really didn’t think about at all, until after they started homesteading, like unexpected costs of living (home insurance is a big one!).
I also saw a number of sites that had lists of things to help people prepare for homestead living, before they got to actually doing it. One item that I saw cropping up more than a few times was just how much physical labour was involved, and stressing how important it was to be fit and healthy.
Except, in this day and age, when people say “fit” or “healthy”, what they’re really saying is “be skinny.” Also, able bodied and young.
Which is amusing to me, because I’m old, broken and fat, I have a disabled husband, and even my daughters have their own health issues they have to work around. Yet, here we are.
Today’s recommendation is someone who is also breaking all the “rules”, and doing it anyhow: Our Half Acre Homestead.
Don’t have a lot of land? They have only half an acre.
Don’t have a lot of money? They are a single income family that when through a bankruptcy and still managed to buy the property only a couple of years later.
Feel like you’re too old? In one of the earliest of their earlier videos, she mentions that she was 50. That video, at the time of this writing, was 11 years old.
That’s right. This couple has been on their half acre homestead and making videos for more than 10 years! Their oldest video was done in 2009.
As you can imagine, they have a LOT of videos!
The above video was done in 2010. You can see they’re still just setting up their garden, the house is being worked on, they’ve got chickens and talk about the plans they are working towards. Talk about starting from the ground up!
This next video was uploaded in 2011, and shows how things had grown and expanded over the previous years, from the building of a chicken coop and incubating eggs, to building a small barn and getting a calf and goats.
In that half acre, they are able to have chickens, cows, goats, pigs and rabbits – that I’ve seen so far! – supplemented by hunting. Mrs. V is an excellent shot. They’ve got their garden, bee hives, and even tap their own sap and make their own maple syrup.
All of this accomplished by a couple that is older, rounder and kinda broken. Like me! :-D They’ve also been at it for a long time, and have much to share. Along with the many cooking videos and gardening videos, you’ll also find videos like this one.
Peameal bacon is also sometimes known as Canadian bacon or back bacon.
Now that I’ve seen the video, I want to make some of my own! That looks amazing!
You’ll also find “grocery haul” videos, like this more recent one, showing what they add to their food supply.
You’ll find videos sharing frugal ideas, like this one…
… using bits and pieces to make and can stock.
There are also live stream videos, and shorter Tea Break videos.
Like us, they’ve been itching to get out in the garden, too!
They’re in Eastern Canada, which has a longer growing season than we’ve got. While this video was being made, we were getting more snow, and still dealing with the new snow from our recent storm.
You’ll find videos on butchering and how to dress a deer, baking, cooking with a slow cooker or an Instant Pot, YouTube tax problems for Canadians, and even live streams from the Freedom Convoy 2022. There’s videos on how to knit, and make Christmas ornaments. There are videos on freezing, canning, dehydrating, growing, seed saving, product reviews…
There is just so much that’s covered, as one might expect from someone who’s been making videos for more than a decade! New videos are added very frequently, too.
There’s just a vast wealth of information available, and I highly recommend checking out Our Half Acre Homestead.
This week is 6 weeks away from our average last frost date, so we started our next batch of seeds.
We had the Kulli corn, the Chocolate Cherry tomato and Yellow Pear tomato to do. We were also still considering starting the last few Spoon tomato seeds, since they were so fun last year, but in the end, decided against it. Four types of tomatoes is enough!
Of course, I found extra to start.
Looking over our seedlings, I noticed that one pot with Tennessee Dancing gourds still has not germinated, while the other had a single sad looking little plant that was looking ever more wimpy…
… it turned out to be dead.
Well, then.
We still have seeds from last year, so I scarified a few and started them soaking before I headed out for errands.
Then, just because I’m curious…
… I scarified then set to soak the two giant pumpkin seeds that were given out for free at the grocery store near my mother’s place. Her town has a giant pumpkin contest every year and, in the spring, there’s always a big basket full of envelopes with just a few seeds in them, available for free (though they do request a limit of one packet per family).
Before filling the bins with toilet paper tube pots with soil, I decided to count how many corn seeds we actually got. Each package was supposed to have 25 seeds, but I know sometimes there are extras, and we were going to put one seed in each tube.
There turned out to be a total of 106. :-D Granted, some of the extras were really tiny, but we intended to plant them anyway.
I didn’t get a chance to take a picture, so here’s an old one of the larger bin. It fits 8 rows of 10 tubes. I actually ended up changing the tubes in the picture out for different tubes. The tubes from some brands are longer than others, and I ended up switching to a brand – the Costco Kirkland brand – that had taller tubes.
The big bin held 80 tubes, while the smaller shoe-box size bin held 4 rows of 8, so we would have empties. We still filled them all with soil, so that the tubes could support each other.
Before we started filling the tubes with the growing medium, I set the corn to soak. My daughters did their best to fill the tubes without getting too much of the soil in between the tubes, while I potted up the gourds and pumpkin seeds, then started working on the tomatoes.
Which is when I got a phone call from my brother, to talk about the latest on our vandal’s court case against me that was supposed to be today, but got cancelled. I’d sent a message to the court clerk about the conflict in dates, saying that I’d been told on the phone our vandal had picked 2 dates, and some of the issues we have to deal with as to why we chose the November date. I added that the earlier December date would work better for us, but I didn’t think our vandal would agree to any date we selected and suggested the court simply assign a date and we’d all just work with it.
We got a response saying that, since we couldn’t agree on a date, we’d have a teleconference call in early May with the court clerk to set up a trail date. The response was to my email, with our vandal’s email added on, so he got to see what I wrote.
Well, he responded in a reply-all. One of the first things he said was that he had NOT selected the November date, just the May one, and said something about how he felt my comment on not agreeing on dates was inappropriate, and he just wanted to get the whole thing over with as soon as possible. I’m paraphrasing of course, but it was pretty brief.
Hhhmmm. Now that I think about it, his wife probably wrote it. He’s not typically that succinct.
Anyhow.
Basically, he tried to make it sound like I had lied, and that he was a victim.
Of course, I forwarded the emails to my brother, since he’s my witness and he’s the one that needs to book time off work to attend. He phoned me this evening and we talked about the situation.
Which is kind of funny, realy.
You see, our vandal goofed. I had written that I was told on the phone that he’d picked the two dates. He basically accused me of lying – however the court clerk (or whatever her official position is; I can’t remember right now) who wrote the email is the same person who phoned me, telling me she’d already called him and the two dates he’d picked. Which means that, in trying to imply that I was lying, he was actually implying that the person we’ve been corresponding with is the liar.
I don’t think he realizes that at all.
I’m guessing his attempt to play the victim backfired on him.
By the time I finished talking with my brother, the girls were done with the corn, putting the lids on the bins to protect the pots from the cats, and tucking the tomato seeds out of feline reach for me. So I finished those up.
A few things got moved out of the big aquarium greenhouse and into the mini-greenhouse to make space. The ground cherries stayed. Those are the super tiny seedlings you can see on the left. This is on the warming mat, so that’s where the gourds and pumpkins went.
The tomatoes should also be getting extra warmth, but there isn’t room for them over the heat mat until we can move the ground cherries out. (The bunching onions just got moved over to the upcycled plastic stray you can see on the right.) I ended up putting 5 tomato seeds in each cup, with 3 cups per variety, half filling them so the seedlings can be “potted up” later, by just adding more soil. It should be interesting to see how many germinate, and if we’ll get enough strong seedlings to thin by transplanting.
We’re going to have an awful lot of tomatoes. Which is weird with just 2 out of 4 people liking tomatoes – at least for fresh eating. Still, I’d rather plant extra and have enough to afford losses.
The kulli corn went straight to the sun room.
Potato Beetle got out of the sun room while I was using the wagon to bring my earlier purchases through (yes! I was able to get big bags of cat kibble!!), slipping under the wagon and out the door before I could do anything. The sun room was over 25C/77F !!! at the time, so I left the outside doors slightly open as much to cool things down, as to give Potato Beetle a chance to come back in.
When I came in with the bins holding the corn, I found a skunk eating Potato Beetle’s kibble! I shooed it outside, and found a second one in the kibble house.
I shooed that one away, too, then topped up the kibble trays just enough to make noise and maybe get Potato Beetle’s attention. A bunch of cats came running, but no Potato. :-(
Well, now that the corn is in the sun room, he lost one of the spots he likes to sit in, anyhow. I do wish we’d been able to get him back in for the night, at least.
I’ll get pictures tomorrow, when it’s light out again. So far, the toilet paper tubes in these bins works out very well. The final word on it, though, will be when we have to get them out for transplanting!
Now that Lent is over, I’m back on social media and my gardening groups. Today, one of them posted a list of seeds to start indoors over the next week. Based on that list, we’re behind, but our June 2 frost date is quite late, even for a zone 3. Most of the people in the zone 3 gardening groups have last frost dates in the second half of May. Still, because we have so very many seeds to start indoors, I think I will slowly work on them over the next couple of weeks. The remaining gourds would probably do better with an earlier start, I think, and some of the winter squash probably would, too. As long as they are all done within the next 2 weeks, it should work out, and not be too overwhelming when it comes to finding space for all the pots before the older seedlings also get added to the sun room.
Meanwhile, we’re still getting weather alerts, and still being told we may get as much as 10cm/4in of snow, just on Sunday. We’re supposed to start getting snow tonight, and mixed precipitation tomorrow. But then, according to the weather apps, we’re snowing right now, and there isn’t a flake to be seen in the infrared flash of our security camera (though I’ve been seeing plenty of cats and skunks running around on the driveway! :-D ).
It seems to strange to be starting seeds for relatively heat loving plants, when we’re possibly getting yet another snow storm!
While going through the fridge, I noticed a container that got pushed to the back and…
… discovered we completely forgot about the soya sauce pickled eggs!
So I had one with my breakfast.
We were missing the Mirin sauce, but it was still quite good. Definitely something worth making again. It’s too bad we forgot about them for our basket. They would have looked a lot like milk chocolate eggs in there! :-D
I spotted this, outside our kitchen window this morning, while getting ready to do my morning rounds.
They were after that little strip of expose ground, for something to nibble on.
With winter dragging on, they are doing a lot more digging to reach any food at all. In the foreground is the pile of grass clippings for mulch they’d uncovered. Beyond that is the unfinished low raised bed. It had a trench in the middle with kitchen waste to be buried as we finished it. The deer dug it up and have eaten most of it. Thankfully, they have no interest in the two garlic beds beyond it.
I spotted only nine outside cats at first. I have not seen Tuxedo Mask, Chaddiccus, or Agnoos for a while. The older males seem to be gone, too – no more females in heat to keep them around, I guess.
Ghost Baby did eventually show up, though, making eleven (plus Potato Beetle in the sun room, who is looking quite well after his visit with the vet).
Before finishing my rounds, I had to chase a deer away from the shrine, where it was eating kibble, even though I’d already dropped seeds down at the feeding station. Then I had to chase a skunk out of the kibble house. Once it was gone, all the outside cats converged on the kibble house again.
I was just petting Potato Beetle before going into the house when I had to go back out and shoo the deer away again!
This afternoon, we’re looking at a high of 5C/41F, with no rain or snow before tomorrow morning. We’ve got seeds to start today, but first, I’m heading out to see if I can find some big bags of cat food somewhere! I did get some seeds scarified and soaking first, so they will be ready for planting by the time I get back.
Of course, I’m adding extra to what we’re starting. :-D I’ll explain what and why, when I post about it later today.
We’ve got another Colorado Low building up again. The Dakotas, southern Saskatchewan, Manitoba, northwestern Ontario – even the central region we are in – are expected to be hit with possible 25-50cm/10-20in of snow over the weekend. Plus freezing rain. As if the snow wasn’t enough.
It does have the disclaimer that “Colorado Lows are notoriously difficult to predict” and to keep a close eye on local forecasts, but still… sheesh.
If the court date had not been cancelled, I would have been running errands while in the area. I’ll be heading out again today, anyhow, and hopefully find more big bags of dry cat food.
Speaking of court dates…
I was told on the phone that our vandal had picked two dates that worked for him; one in May in the big city, and one in November, in the smaller, nearer city. After talking to my brother, who needs to book the day off work to attend as my witness, we chose the November date.
Then I got an email saying our vandal chose the May date, while we chose the November date, and were told to come to an agreement on one of the other dates. After talking about it with my brother, we went with the earlier December date, but we figured our vandal wouldn’t accept that. When I responded to the court clerk, I mentioned being told our vandal had picked the two dates, and that’s why we chose the November one. I mentioned why we wanted the closer location and longer time frame, mentioned the December date, adding that I didn’t think our vandal would agree to it. I suggested the court simply assign us a date, and we’ll just have to work with that. It’s a shame the court didn’t have any summer or fall dates available.
The clerk responded to my email, adding our vandal to the response, saying that since we couldn’t agree on a date (I suspect our vandal already responded as well), we now have a May teleconference date specifically to set a trial date. At least for that, my brother should be able to book a meeting room at work and not have to take the entire day off. :-/
What a pain. And I know full well our vandal is just f**** with us out of spite. :-(
I just got back from taking Potato Beetle to the vet, and we’re much relieved!
The poor thing did NOT like being there. The vet quickly found a wound on the leg he was favouring – one we were never able to spot – but he had to be sedated before she could shave the area and get a good look at it.
Part of the area was already hairless from a scar, but hidden in the fur were two puncture wounds. One is barely visible in the photo. She thinks the critter that did it (and I have a good idea which one it was!) hit a tendon while yanking the way critters do. My guess is that one fang basically got hung up, causing more damage than a simple bite would have done.
The vet gave him a thorough examination and spotted another wound.
This was on his other paw, and probably causing him pain, too. She was thinking he probably had a hard time deciding with leg to limp with! It’s an older wound, though, and scabbed over, so she didn’t want to poke at it too much.
After a cleaning, both wounds got some antibiotic cream on them. Then, because as friendly as Potato Beetle is, he’s still very much a yard cat, he was given a 14 day antibiotic. He also got a 24 hr pain killer. We talked about the possibility of a pain killer we could administer at home, but that’s just not going to happen. He’ll have his 24 hrs of relief, and that’s it. We’re not going to torment him, trying to give him oral medications.
She also put a gel on his eyes so they don’t try out, since he wasn’t blinking while sedated. The sedative should wear off in a couple more hours.
I had arrived about half an hour early, but they were able to get us into an examination room right away. By the time we were done and I was paying the bill – which was quite a bit lower than we feared – we were leaving just minutes after the actual appointment time. Bonus!
For the next few days, we’ll continue to keep him in the sun room, continue to keep the wounds clean and use antibiotic cream on them. He should recover just fine. When I brought him into the sun room with the cat carrier and opened the door, I left him be and brought the food bowl closer. He actually got up and left the carrier, but kept slumping down every few steps. I put him in the soft pillow nest we’ve got for him in there. He rarely uses it, but it’s in a box and is a more secure spot. I’ve also left the cat carrier in there for now, in case he wants a “cave” to curl up in once he’s more active again.
In other good news, today turned out to be a very lovely day. While my phone’s animated display thinks we’re snowing, it’s been a lovely, sunny day. We even reached a high of 5C/41F. Things have been melting away quite nicely.
As for tomorrow’s cancelled court date, my brother chose a reschedule date that worked for him – in November. We should get a letter in the mail, confirming the date. Maybe over the next few months, our vandal will realize he has no case and withdraw the file. I doubt it, though. He’s doing this out of maliciousness, not reason. Whatever. It’ll work out. I’m just bothered by the fact that my brother keeps having to book days off work for this, and nothing is moving foreword.
I might still make the drive, though, if only to get to a Walmart or something, and hopefully find another big bag or two of kibble. I was only able to get one big bag, locally. The Walmarts have been out of stock on cat kibble a lot, too, but at least I’ll have other places I can try. We’ll see how it works out.
For now, I’m just happy that Potato Beetle was not hurt too badly, and should heal up soon. :-)
I just got a call from the court office. The court date tomorrow has been cancelled. They did not say why.
They sent an email with a selection of dates to reschedule. The nearer dates are in the city. The courts there are a pain to get to, and expensive to park near. The dates at the nearer location are in November and December.
*sigh*
In the end, it’s up to my brother, as he has to book time off work for it.
Well, at least I don’t have to worry about driving on icy roads tomorrow.
We did get a little bit of snow last night. According to the past 24 hr data, we never dipped below 3C/37F. Which means the seedlings in the sun room handled the less severe temperature drop last night just fine, from the looks of it so far.
I had quite a surprise this morning, though.
While setting food and water out for the outside cats, I suddenly heard a very distinctive mewing sound. ALL the cats (only about 7 or 8 this morning) whipped their heads around to look! It took a moment, but I finally spotted Ghost Baby running across the snow by the storage house.
With a kitten in her mouth. A little, dark mewling baby.
Poor thing! It is way to cold and snowy to be having kittens this early.
Last year, I believe she had her kittens under the former workshop that is now stuffed with my parents’ belongings. How many she had – or how many survived – we have no way of knowing. I think one of the ‘iccuses is hers.
I figure she was trying to bring her kitten(s) closer to food, water and more secure shelter by the house. It’s unlikely she’d be bringing them to the cat’s house. The space inside it too big and open, and too many other cats use it. She was headed in the direction of the pump shack, where I know Rosencrantz has had kittens before – though last year she had her kittens in the junk pile near the chain link fence, which is why we now have a kibble tray under the shrine. I don’t think she was actually going for the pump shack, though, but just heading that way because my presence startled her.
We have a shelf by the sun room door with leftover pieces of rigid insulation covering the bottom two shelves, with openings, so that cats can use it as shelter. The “floors” have sheets of insulation, too. They’ve been pretty rough on the insulation across the front, and one side was almost completely broken up and off. It’s unlikely but, just in case, I found some more scraps of insulation and recovered one side, leaving smaller openings into the two bottom shelves. I think the spaces inside might still be too open for the comfort of a mama cat and kittens, and certainly there’s too much foot traffic, but if the adult cats use it, that leaves more hidey holes for mamas.
I did see Ghost Baby again, running into the kibble house to join the others for food. She came from a completely different direction. Another possible location for kittens is the junk pile at the edge of the spruce grove. I supposed I should stop calling it a junk pile, since we’ve cleared off most of the junk and it’s mostly a stack of salvaged boards. Butterscotch has had several litters tucked away under there since we’ve moved here. With Butterscotch now indoors, that leaves some prime real estate open. There’s also the space under the old garden shed, but there’s a lot of snow in the way, and there’s a groundhog den under it now.
With the cold and snow we’ve been having, the chances of any kittens born now surviving are not that good. I think Ghost Baby is a good mama, though, and has found a better place for her litter, however many there may be.
Meanwhile, as I was fussing with the shelf shelter, Potato Beetle got outside again! I let him be while I finished with the shelf, then snagged him back into the sun room. His appointment with the vet is this evening, so we don’t want to loose track of him! He is still favouring the leg, but moving around fairly well. I hope that means the injury is fairly minor. I think mostly we need to just keep him away from the other cats that are beating on him. He’s not the “top dog” anymore.
I think we’ll need to keep an eye outside today, and see what’s going on with Ghost Baby. If we can figure out where she’s put her kitten(s), we can move some food and water trays closer, so she doesn’t have to go all the way to the kibble house. Assuming we can get to where she is, through the snow. :-/
The weather forecasts have, of course, changed. The predicted temperatures are a bit lower, and we’re now supposed to be getting small amounts of both rain and snow over the next few days. Tonight, we were supposed to get sleet, but now it’s saying “ice pellets”. !!!
As long as the roads stay clear and relatively dry. Not only do we have the vet appointment this evening, but I’ve got to go to court tomorrow morning. Hopefully, the judge will see our vandal has no case against me and throw it out, but the way things went with our restraining order application that took a year to finally get settled, it may well just be a 10 minute session to book a new trial date. My brother is taking time off work to be there as my witness, though, so this is a major inconvenience for him. Our vandal is retired, and has all the time in the world for crap like this, so he doesn’t care. :-/
What a pain.
Well, it will be what it will be. Not much I can do about that now.
I’m going to go bake some bread now, and angst about newborn kittens in the cold.
The Re-Farmer 