2016-2017 One Year Goals Reviewed

It's the time of reckoning.  How did I do on my goals, due to finish by 31 May 2017 (today)?

1 Year Goals (by 31 May 2017)

• Make 20 bottles of homebrew (cider, elderberry wine, blackberry wine, etc)
• Produce 10 jars of preserves (pickles, jams, etc)
• Track all garden harvest by weight/amount
• Track egg production and chicken feed
• Make a food dehydrator
• Build an outdoor rocket stove

5 Year Goals (by 31 May 2021)

• Fully self-reliant in vegetables, eggs and seasonal fruit
• Raising meat
• Greenhouse built

As you can see, not everything was accomplished.  I updated The Plan early this spring, with some similar goals and a few new ones.  Hopefully I'll get that outdoor rocket and dehydrator by the end of 2017.

At last, a photo of Cookie and her chicks!

An unexpected heatwave

Though last May wasn't particularly warm or sunny, this one has been much more so.  My tomatillo seedlings in the kitchen window have been wilting from the heat--I had to move them onto the counter in the shade.  However, in our variable climate here in Britain, I don't take anything for granted and am not quite tempted to plant out those tenderest vegetables just yet.

I usually plant out tomatoes, zuccinis, squash, etc, around the first week of June, but this year I may wait until the second or third week, depending.  The ones that went out in early June last year just got eaten by slugs;  the temperatures weren't warm enough for them to grow.  Rather than risk that happening again this year, I'll wait just that little bit longer--if they aren't going to grow anyway, no point in exposing them to the slugs just yet.

Thankfully there hasn't been much slug activity this week in the heat!  The forecast is set to change in the next few days though, and no doubt they'll be back in force.

Cookie's family

As the chicks we introduced to Cookie for adoption were nearly a week old, I was more worried about them not accepting her than the other way around--and I was a little concerned about the integration of them and her own younger hatched chick.  However, all is well in the chick nursery, as Cookie and chicks seem happy with each other, and everyone is getting along just fine.

Strangely, all the chicks have the same coloring, although I'm sure her own hatched chick was meant to be yellow (and grow up to be light brown).  They're all black with white underbellies, though the hatched chick is noticeably younger/smaller than the four introduced chicks.  It's only younger by less than a week so it'll catch up in no time.  I watched Cookie showing it how to drink, and it's been tussling with the others in the food dish, so no worries there.

It's very cute to see the chicks snuggling up to their adopted mama, under her wing or on her back.  It's also adorable the way Cookie hovers over them and clucks gently to them.

Cookie did it!

As mentioned in a previous post, we set some fertilized eggs under our little broody bantam Cookie last month.  One has hatched!  I wasn't confident about their chances after a nest mishap about halfway in:  Cookie got up to stretch her legs outside of the house, and came back to sit on the wrong nest (on the day's newly laid eggs instead of her own).  When I noticed the mistake I felt her eggs--they felt a bit too cool, and I doubted their chances of hatching. 

In fact, their due date was last Tuesday, four days ago, and by Thursday morning I was calling around asking for day old chicks (to try and sneak under her at night instead, hoping she'd take them for her own hatched chicks).  That afternoon, the husband came in from changing her water, "There's a chick!"

We still got the day old chicks yesterday (actually five days old) and the husband tucked them in under Cookie under cover of darkness last night, with no fuss.  He said they cheeped at him agitatedly but shut up as soon as they were tucked in.  Here's hoping both parties (chicks and Cookie) accept the adoption smoothly.

(No photos just yet, as I don't want to stress out poor Cookie who's new to this motherhood business!)

Weeds in the perennials bed

Perennials (edible and ornamental) and chicken food (weeds)

I've had a bit of an internal debate about my perennials section in the back corner.  It's the least visited area of my garden, unless you count the front postage stamp of course.  I frequently visit the goldfish pond but only go into the perennial section beyond it once or twice a week.

Currently it has many shrubs, both decorative and food producing.  It also has some herbaceous, aka non-woody, perennials, but most of all it has weeds:  everywhere!  Now I'm not a fan of bare, exposed soil.  I certainly prefer weeds to that.  However, I'm torn as to whether I should leave the weeds (as they're great chicken feed), or go with the more tidy look of thick mulch;  After all, the rest of the garden is pretty tidy looking, especially compared to that riot of weeds.  You can't even tell where the paths are any more.

It's true I don't let many weeds grow in my veg beds:  they shelter slugs, the bane of my life.  Some weeds I permit, however, like the current covering of chickweed amongst the broad beans, or the occasional dandelion here and there.  I know the chickweed will die off in warm weather, and even if it didn't it's easily pulled or hoed out.  And dandelion, besides being the chickens' favorite food, doesn't take up much room either above or below ground, so a few here and there with the veg doesn't bother me;  I harvest the tops every once in a while for the chickens, leaving the roots in situ.  A whole bed of dandelions would be more of a problem, of course, but that's not the present situation.

But back to the perennials.  Right now I don't dare let the chickens in to self-harvest, as I don't trust them not to dig up the newly transplanted sorrel, or help themselves to the young redcurrants and gooseberries.  In fact, for a good proportion of the summer, they just aren't allowed back there because of the damage they do.  So either I have to cut the weeds myself and bring them to chickens, or just let them grow and grow until it's safe to let them in.

On the other hand, a thick layer of mulch will also produce some chicken feed:  bugs and slugs, although those weeds also produce bugs and slugs.  Mulch is easier maintenance--just topping up and raking it back into place every once in a while.  And it looks nicer than a tangle of weeds.  It's also good for the worms and other soil life, and in turn good for the plants.

So there's my dilemma.  On one hand, free, high quality greens (with bonus bugs) for chickens;  on the other, healthy soil resulting in healthy plants (again with bonus bugs).  Both would serve to give us high quality food, in both eggs and fruit.  But which one is best?

Chicken yard remediation update

Chickens amongst the mustard greens

In the old chicken yard the mustard greens matured--nearly flowering--when I let the chickens on it;  I didn't want the plants to flower and cross with my kale (which I want to collect seed from).  I sowed them in Jan/Feb as green manure/cover crops, to help remediate the soil back there, which had been bare for several months thanks to too much chicken pressure.

The patch I grew only covered about a quarter of the old yard--a little bit of the yard is paved, and elsewhere holds some shrubs;  however, there are still some bare spots where my seed broadcasting skills obviously failed.  Actually, I take that statement back;  it's pretty much all bare again, as the chickens demolished that patch of mustard--they loved it!

I planned to let them on it for a week, but took them off after five days as they discovered a weak spot in the fence and escaped multiple times.  The mustard is nothing but a few short stems now;  I don't know if they will regrow, but I'll get out there and sow some more seeds (mustard or something else, not sure) and try to get the whole yard this time.

The promise of fruit to come

Blackcurrants in flower

All of a sudden, everything's growing, especially my fruit.  It looks like a good year for nearly all of them.

Redcurrants forming

 None of my fruit trees or shrubs are very old.  The oldest is the morello cherry (planted just over five years ago), followed by the blackcurrants.

Tiny almonds

 It looks like the only non-player this year is the Williams pear, again.  I picked the immature fruits off the Asian pear (its pollinating partner) to encourage growth, but none of the fruit on Williams seems to have actually been pollinated.  Sigh...

Baby figs

 Since the morello cherry was moved over winter, I won't be surprised if it drops its fruit before ripening, but at the moment it's covered in cute little green cherries.  We only recently finished off the last of its frozen cherries from 2016:  yum.  They make an amazing cherry pie and crumble, so much nicer than from a can.

Green morello cherries

The strawberries are forming little fruits too, after beginning to flower in March (?!) but none have ripened yet.  I keep trying to increase our strawberry plants, and every time I do, the chickens break out and scratch them up.  At the moment I've got about five maincrop plants and five alpine/everbearing plants.  Not enough!