April 19, 2007

oday made up for being a sloth the last few days after I was sick. Worked on magazine stuff and emails until 10 am and then headed outside to do the chores. That takes close to an hour these days. The turkeys have no snow in their pen now, so I hand carry them out in the mornings and hand carry them back in at night. 

I took the Barred Rock rooster which is getting beat up by the other ones and who is not as good as the other 2 roosters and put him in a cage and culled one of the Dark Brahmas as well. They will go to a friends house to upgrade their little mixed flock. 

No baby chicks hatching in the incubator yet, but today we could hear them cheeping in their shells. Mary got to hear them anyway. We could not get them to do it again when Amy came here. 

My boyfriend and his friend who is a professional faller came over and they took down alot more of the dead standing trees. His wife and 2 kids came over and 10 of us had dinner here tonight. BBQ's bison burgers and fries. A quick and simple meal. 

From after chores this morning until  5 pm, I transplanted all the peppers and tomatoes into their permanent pots and got them all labeled. so 6 hours of transplanting? We got the herbs done as well. Nicole was here for a bit and so was Mary. I farmed a few plants here and there out to them. 

This is a little less than 1/4 of the plants I/we potted up today. I have 12 more bell pepper plants to do after "Teenager" took my 4th bale of potting soil from the mudroom to the greenhouse for me. It was an open and partly used bale, so I did not feel like hefting it myself. With him doing 750# weights with his legs and bragging about it, I figured we may as well put those muscles to use *wink*

(These are for my notes so I do not lose them- these are the new flats we started tonight)
Flat Y
Row
1   "Copenhagen" Cabbage
2   "Copenhagen" Cabbage
3   "Perfection Savoy" Cabbage
4   "Perfection Savoy" Cabbage
5   "Green Sprouting" Broccoli
6   "Green Sprouting" Broccoli
7   "Di Cicco" Broccoli
8   "Di Cicco" Broccoli
9   "Snowball X" Cauliflower
10 "Snowball X" Cauliflower
11 "Calbrese" Broccoli
12 "Calbrese" Broccoli

Flat Z
Row
1   "Chinese" Cabbage
2   "Early Snowball" Cauliflower
3   "Early Snowball" Cauliflower
4   "Early Snowball" Cauliflower
5   "Early Jersey Wakefield" Cabbage
6   "Early Jersey Wakefield" Cabbage
7   "Early Jersey Wakefield" Cabbage
8   "Early Red #61" Cabbage
9   "Early Red #61" Cabbage
10  "Early Red #61" Cabbage
11  "Long Island" Brussels Sprouts
12  "Long Island" Brussels Sprouts

Me and my friend (who is the fallers wife) and her two little girls walked through the mud and went back to see how the guys were doing. If I did not know better that the trees really do have to come down, I would have cried. I did not take a picture of the whole thing, as it will soon be cleaned up and look beautiful and park-like, but this looks horrific with all the trees laying down which are pine. Thankfully we have a mixed wood in our forest, so it is not 100% clear-cut. But it is pretty bald. Once the cat goes through with the brush blade, it will look quite beautiful soon. 

From where our Faller/bucker/chainsaw expert extraordinaire is standing, (in the bottom picture) our property goes back for about 1/2 mile from there. So much of it is beetle kill.

Late Evening Update:

I just went out to check at 11:45pm and the first egg is hatching