Well into autumn

Now a full month after equinox, the clocks have changed--it feels like we've lost so much light.  Tonight sunset was before 5pm, and it's only going to get darker.

The garden is mostly asleep now, both edible and ornamental.  I've still got runner bean pods maturing on their vines and there are a few leeks, kale and chard, but I've let the ducks have the full run of the vegetable patch to tidy it (or flatten it at least).  There are still some cherry tomatoes on the patio still, though the plants are mostly brown and leafless. 

Our mature horse chestnut tree is losing leaves, and some of the fruit trees are starting to turn too.  The son has gone out with the loppers and cut down the old growth from the artichokes (plenty of new growth at the bottom though), and the husband dug up the (small) Jerusalem artichokes, though we haven't eaten any yet.  The grass is very very short now, and the chickens are only allowed about half an hour a day on it;  soon they may not be allowed on it at all.

And the chickens and ducks aren't laying much now.  Maybe one egg per week from the ducks and one per day from the chickens (though not the same color every day).  Surprisingly, the boy chicks are still being quiet--they're still growing, and I don't expect their sisters to start laying till at least January.  I expect egg production to stop any day now (and roosters to start crowing too).

Almond harvest, 2019

The husband went out last week and spent about 20 minutes filling a big bag of almonds off our tree.  It's really grown this last year, particularly since I haven't pruned it, unlike last year.  Still, this year's harvest is similar to last year's at around 160 nuts.  They fill my biggest handmade (yucca and sycamore) basket and are waiting in the kitchen for our Christmas stollen bread once again.

Because the tree hasn't been pruned (and it's too late in the year to do so, as it's susceptible to a fungal disease), it looks like quite a lot of the branches won't be within reach for harvest next year--similarly, out of reach for hand-pollination (rather more important).  I guess we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.  To be honest, while in theory I'd love to have hundreds and hundreds of almonds, in actuality they're just too hard to shell by hand.  Yes it'd be wonderful to make almond paste more than once a year, but is it worth the labor?  Time will tell.

Here's why I can't handle it (for now)

Well, the reason everything became too much for me is that I'm pregnant with child Three.  The son is nine, our middle child would have been two and a half now if he'd lived, and Three is due in March.  I've dropped pretty much everything in my life because I've been feeling so (physically) terrible--even my garden which I love.  I was hoping all the dreadful first trimester symptoms would have faded now that I'm halfway through the second, but no deal.  I've had to accept that my garden is going to be neglected for the foreseeable future, as I simply don't have the energy.

The husband and son have taken over allotment duties (weekends only now) and animal care.  At least I did hard work this spring--we had vegetables all summer long, and we still have vegetables.  (And weeds.  And spent plants.  You know.)  I normally have a few tasks for this time of year, but I won't be doing most of them.

What does that mean for this blog?  Well, I'll post once a week for now.  Gardening is still happening, even if only for 15 minutes per week.

Squash and pumpkins

Hidden squash, September 2019

I'm a little disappointed in my green kuri squash production this year:  only two fruits.  I had about ten plants altogether, but only two of them survived transplanting--slugs I suspect.  Each vine gave one squash, both around the size of a volleyball:  not bad for what it was, but not good enough for what I wanted.  There was one each at the allotment and in the garden (the garden one was actually in a planter and I trained the vine up the house wall).

Next year I'll try direct seeding into manure piles as well as transplants.  And I'll try to get around 30 or more of those transplants:  we have plenty of space for them at the allotment, and I would love to get 30 or more squashes!  I saved the seed from my own fruits from last year, which in turn were saved from a supermarket specimen.

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Pumpkins on the other hand, survived transplant much better;  I would say most if not all grew and produced.  However, the seed was obviously cross bred, as not all of the fruits turned out to be pumpkins!  The obvious ones (different shapes and colors) we just ate as zuccini, and enjoyed them very much.  Hopefully the five pumpkin-shaped and -colored ones are also -tasting.

State of the flock, October 2019

Stuck in jail, September 2019

After the chicks finished off their last 5 kg bag of growers pellets, it was time to integrate them into the adult flock.  We let them all free range together for a few hours each evening over the course of a week, then that weekend the duck pen came away and the resulting chicken wire was used to make a large yard next to the chicken house.  The chicks and their mothers have gone in (and have escaped a few times, requiring minor adjustments to the wire) and now a week later, everyone is sleeping in the big coop, and there is a fairly peaceful pecking order in place. 

More than half of the chicks are boys and destined for the pot within a few weeks, but until then I admit it's a little crowded, particularly on the roosts at night.  Right now there are 21 chickens, nine of which are juveniles.  I think there will be 15 or 16 left for winter;  I'm still not positive about one chick:  maybe a girl, maybe not.  However, I've been watching my three oldest hens, ages five and six, and think at least one of them won't survive the winter.  We'll see;  our six year old hen really slowed down over summer and lost weight, but then she molted and is now as frisky as such an old lady can be.

The ducks are back to free ranging (they had been penned in at the pond for about two months), and the chickens get to free range an hour or so in the evenings.

We are getting around two to four eggs daily, though the ducks may have a hidden nest (we've been collecting one or two a week from them).  A couple of hens are currently in molt and I don't expect egg production to pick up again until the new year.

The importance of food storage (I broke the Vegetable Challenge)

The wind blew these down, but I hope they still make seeds, September 2019

I broke the Vegetable Challenge a month early.  I broke it on 5th October, buying onions, carrots, swede, and two bags of frozen veg.  Instead of lasting seven months as planned, it lasted six months, the same as 2018.

I didn't break it because we're desperate for vegetables.  We still have plenty of chard, potatoes, several pumpkins, some tomatoes and runner beans...the list goes on.  However.  For several months I have been considering breaking the challenge early because the end date coincides with the date for Brexit, by which time we are not assured that there will be vegetables (or even anything else) in the shops.  We have been slowly building up a stockpile of canned and jarred foods for the last year:  mainly meat and fish, but other staples we use like tomatoes and beans.  I have been filling up a shelf with dehydrated foods too, catalogued here on the blog.

For the next few weeks I'll be buying the cheapest in-season veg and storing them for winter.  I think most will be dehydrated (or stored in a cool cupboard), but we'll stash a few more bags in the freezer too.  I don't plan on serving any of this veg until we reach the official Challenge end date:  2nd November.  We'll also continue adding to our general food stockpile.

I really do hope that these precautions are not needed, and that the beginning of November will go on with no interruption to national food supply.  Regardless, I know from past experience the value of having food storage:  when I was a child we sometimes had to rely on food my parents had stored.  And in my adult life, we have had bad snow which prevented us as well as delivery trucks from driving--the longest period was around two weeks without access to any shops (any shops with food in them, that is).

In the allotment, October 2019

Well, it's been a few weeks since I've actually been to the allotment.  All I know of it is secondhand information, from the husband and son.  Still, here's what's been up:

Five pumpkins have been harvested, four of which are almost fully orange;  the littlest is likely the newest and I doubt it'll ripen much now that it's been picked.  They had to be harvested though, as the weather is turning colder--a neighbor told me her husband had to scrape ice off his car early in the morning the other day (no ice witnessed by me yet).  One green kuri squash also came home on the same day.  Two pumpkins are big, one pumpkin and squash are medium, and the other two pumpkins are small.

The husband has also been digging up potato plants at a rate of about one per week for more than a month.  It's time to get them all up now, before the tops completely wither away, obscuring their locations.  He's promised to get them up this weekend, and we'll store them here at home.

The remaining brassicas--Brussels sprouts, purple sprouting broccoli, red cabbage--are all growing strongly, though it looks like we won't be harvesting very soon.  Certainly the broccoli won't be ready till spring, and the others might need a month or more.

Everything else is done;  hopefully the weeds are done too.  I'm collecting as many cardboard boxes as possible, and sheet mulch will be happening over the autumn and winter, probably with used stable bedding (from the horse stables at the allotment site).  Maybe next spring the weeds will be more subdued and we'll get more of a harvest.  Still, I'm happy with the amount we managed to grow, and look forward to next year.

Food Totals September 2019

The view from the kitchen sink, September 2019

Vegetables:

156 oz potatoes
15.5 oz cabbage
78.5 oz runner beans
93.5 oz cherry tomatoes
33 oz spring onions
8 oz Aztec broccoli
74 oz tomatoes
5.5 oz French beans
13.5 oz chard
2 oz celery
0.5 oz chili pepper
14.5 oz zuccini

Total: 494.5 oz or 30 lb 14.5 oz

Note:  I weigh all my vegetables after preparation:  peeling, trimming, etc.  Does not include some fresh herbs which were too small a quantity to weigh, i.e. less than 0.5 oz.

Fruit:

21 oz figs
17 yellow raspberries
182 plums

Eggs:

Total: 106 eggs from 12 hens and 2 ducks
Total feed bought: 1 bag layers pellets (20 kg), 2 bags mixed corn (40 kg), 3 bags growers pellets (15 kg)

Preserves:

1/2 medium jar dehydrated cherry tomatoes
3/4 medium jar dehydrated figs
2 medium jars dehydrated plums

Homebrew:

1 L apple cider vinegar begun (from wild harvested apples)