Sunday, April 29, 2012

Steer Auction coming up

I have commited to purchasing a whole steer. I'm scared to death. This is a huge investment. My sister has commited to purchasing 1/4 of this critter from me. I had orginally committed to buying 1/2 a steer from the child of a friend of mine (4H kid). But seeing how quickly Ken and went through 1/2 a lamb and 1/2 a hog, I realised we really needed more than 1/4 of a steer.

The auction is Wednesday, May 9th. I've taken the day off from work so I can go out there early and get my feet on the ground.  One the steer is purchased, it will be shipped off the processor and made into meat.

It will be interesting to see if I can get a whole steer in my freezer (we are talking somewhere around 1300 pounds of meat!) My sister will come and pick up 1/4th of it but it will still be a lot of meat in the freezer. But since my cost is going to be somewhere around $2 a pound plus processing, I'm feeling that I'm getting a good deal on organic, pastured beef.

Sunday, April 8, 2012

Garden Progress

We planted very early this year. But it has been, over all, unusually warm this year.

We are also managing three different gardens (well, four, if you count the flower gardens).

I'm hoping to also toss together a quick and dirty herb garden using a simple raised bed. Ken is thinking seriously of expanding our vegetable gardening at the last minute by expanding the straw bales. He really wants to put in more green beans, peppers and egg plants.

I had hoped we would be eating lettuce by now, but we've had a spell of cold and dry weather that is seeing temperature dips into the mid 30s (just above freezing), and daytime temps in the mid 60s. Stuff has sprouted but appears to be waiting for a stretch of deeper warmth. We've been covering the tomatoes and hot peppers at night with a tarp but while they are surviving, they seem to have stalled in upward growth for now.

My purple cabbages are doing the best and in the garden in the front of the house with a southern exposure and protection from the house to the north, one row of squashes have come up and and the other row just hasn't. Rather odd. The cauliflowers there are doing very well.

I planted spinach in pots last week. I probably should have put it in before or at the same time as the lettuce, but it will be interesting to see if potted greens do better or the same or differently from the straw bale grown.

In the root garden, which was covered in cut hay most of the winter (it was one of the sites where we fed the sheep), the ground is staying moist despite drought. We've not had rain in over two weeks and none is expected for a least another five days. This garden used to be my herb garden and was deeply enriched over the years with compost and mulch. It is in this area we planted all of our root vegetables this year: parsnips, carrots, beets, turnips and radishes. We also stuck up and trellis in the middle and put in some cucumbers. The beets have come up and the the turnips and radishes are just starting to poke up. There is no sign yet of anything else, but I think the ground is still cold.


From the perspective of the worm

I found this short talk very interesting:

Different Perspectives