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[Akka Homestead <akkabhomestead AT yahoo.com>]

Just to offset all the political posts I've made lately....

We spent part of the weekend making that wood shed/butcher area I spoke
of last week so that we will have a covered area to store wood long
term(more than one year). For whatever reason, this simple project has
been a real drag. Neither one of us can seem to find the energy to
finish what normally would be a half day project. I guess it is the
humidity zapping us.
Part of making this butcher table/shed requires deconstruction of the
old buck shelter. Termites ate part of it, but we will be re-using
4x4's that were off the ground. I spend 30 minutes with the pry-bar and
my arms are killing me today.

Saw my very special little grandbaby on Friday and Saturday...what a joy
she is. How did I ever live without her? She's 9 months old this week
and we got her up on a horse for her first time. She loved it..she loves
all animals, even stuffed ones on the wall..She giggled as Rebel(the
horse) sniffed her and licked her and gave her kisses. Rebel is a 28?
year old Tennessee Walker who is great with kids..he lives in my pasture
sometimes, belongs to my best friend who got him when she was 12.

Found a pine snake, about 5 ft long, in the chicken nestboxes on
Saturday. It was kind of weird because on Friday I had found a snake
skin behind the house under the fig tree. I was picking some figs,
looked down and about had heart failure as the skin was right next to my
foot. I seem to just attract snakes, I think. I looked at it, realized
that it wasn't from a pit viper, and I *thought* from the shed that it
might be a pine snake. I am getting too good at this! I haven't been
missing any eggs other than the one he regurgitated when he was removed,
so I am guessing he was just passing through. They are listed as
threatened, but I've seen a lot of them over the years. They are pretty
snakes, too.
http://www.uga.edu/srelherp/snakes/pitmel.htm
Piney was re-located across the road.. I hope he doesn't return to the
scene of the crime.<g>

The moon is right and my garden bed is ready, so today I'll be planting
my garlic for next year. I know I am a bit early, but while the ground
is soft...I'm planting about 150 cloves, intensively spaced 4" apart, in
my monster raised bed. This will be the first time I plant garlic in
one of my beds as I usually put it in the ground, wide rows in a 3-2-3
pattern about 5 inches apart. My garden soil holds moisture, and the in
the summer heat, the garlic does well in the ground, but this year, I
will need to water it regularly as the raised bed doesn't hold moisture
as well, even when mulched. I plan to mulch the garlic using the
cleanout hay from the chicken coop like I usually do. I used to only
use the colder poops like from the goat barn, but after I gave up goats,
the only manure hay I had was chicken litter hay, so I used that.
Luckily, it hasn't adversely affected the garlic, I guess because by the
time the garlic really starts growing the poop is gone/aged/decomposed.
I wish I could tell you what kind of garlic it is, but I can't. I've
been replanting it so long I have forgotten the variety, and it has
obviously adapted to my soil and wouldn't be that variety anyway. I can
tell you it is a softneck. I am planting about 20 cloves of a hardneck
variety from a friend, but I have no idea of what that is either.
I may toss a few carrot and radishes in the ground, you never know.

Projects for the week include finishing the wood shed and moving several
cords of wood over to it. That entails loading the wood back in the
truck and then unloading it and stacking it under cover. Some will need
to be split first.
I also plan to move 5 azaleas to a new bed where they will receive more
sun. With all the rain lately, I suspect I'll be mowing again by the end
of the week.

The skids on the chicken tractor need replacing. We have the 2x6
replacement lumber, but the rebuild will take some time. I'll spend
this week assembling all the rebuild materials, maybe cutting some
boards to length and such, and then next weekend DH and I will re-roof
the sucker then flip it to rebuild the bottom part. I have to get some
more birds in the Spring and I like keeping my meat birds in the tractor.

I really want to start my next big project, a tire tread edging for the
garden area and a few other places, but I doubt I'll get to that this
week. I have quite a few old tires laying around. I use some in the
garden, but others are just breeding mosquitos. I plan to cut the
sidewalls off with a sawzall, leaving only the treads, then cut the
tread to create a long rubber strip that would be about 8" wide
depending on the tire size, and then using wood screws to catch the
steel thread in the tire, screw strips together to create a long rubber
edging material that can be placed into the ground to create a curved
border. I got this idea from a website online a long time ago. I made
a small prototype edge a few years ago out of two tires that worked very
well, so now I will use up the 30 or so tires that have accumulated on
the place making it look even more junky than it is.

I suppose, too, that I'll be trying once again to clear all the
blueberries off the bushes(we picked another gallon yesterday), and
since the pears are ready, I need to do something with that, too. I
picked about 50 pounds of Keiffers<sp> this morning, so tomorrow I'll be
wrapping some and maybe making pear butter or something. I dunno yet. I
have already gotten the good Moonglo and Maxine pears off the tree
inside the garden fence. Yesterday, I picked the Red Delicious Apples
and got another Spokane Beauty that had fallen onto the ground(those
things are huge!) There are two SB's left on the tree. The Arkansas
Black tree is loaded, but they aren't ready yet. I have no idea of what
to do with those..maybe eat as much as we can and make applesauce with
the rest? That would be quick and easy.

Of course, in the midst of working, I'll be checking in to play with you
guys. I get my physical exercise in by doing the outside work; I get my
mental exercise in by talking to you guys.  You  make me research; you make 
me think.

Akka B




>From lisakvperry AT gmail.com  Mon Sep 15 17:37:15 2008
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Date: Mon, 15 Sep 2008 17:37:13 -0400
From: "Lisa K.V. Perry" <lisakvperry AT gmail.com>
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Subject: [Homestead] Fall crops to overwinter
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Other than garlic, onions, and spinach (?), what could I plant now to
overwinter?

All the talk around here (sw VA) is that it's supposed to be a hard winter
this year. Do I need to protect the garlic and onions? I believe I've read
that I need to put a row cover on the spinach. Is that right?

What else could I do now in or for the garden? We've recently started a new
compost pile.

Thanks.