Posted on 05/22/2021 6:18:16 AM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin
My kitchen garden is on the downhill side of the pond dam, so no worries about tomato medicine getting into the pond water.
The garden soil drains very well. When we built this place we set aside all of the topsoil that came off all the areas that required excavation. After the finish grading was done around the house there was a huge pile remaining. I used that to build the kitchen garden. The whole thing is one giant raised bed. It’s ~8” above grade on the high side, and ~24” above grade on the low side.
I planted one rhubarb division out there two years ago, and it has done very well. Rhubarb is kind of picky about where it grows and I wanted to make sure it was going to like the spot before I spent a bunch of money on it. If these two take off good I’ll add a few more next spring and call it good.
I’d like to have a strawberry patch, but with free-range chickens I think it would not work out so good for me. lol
The yellow perch seem to be doing very well in the pond. I’ve caught a couple 12”+ this spring, and seen several that are bigger yet when I’m feeding pellets. They pulled off a good spawn spring of ‘20. Conditions were good for them to do the same this spring. I catch two or three young ones every week in the bluegill trap. I’m giving them one more summer to size up before I harvest any of them. By next spring there should be a couple dozen that are 16”+, and a couple hundred in the 8”-14” range.
We are hoping to get some of that rain after you are done with it.
New puppy? Outstanding! What breed?
It’s unreal how fast they grow. Booger fit in my hand the day I picked her from the litter. Not quite six months later she’s pushing 40lbs and has to curl up into a ball to fit on my lap.
Post #55. English Coon Hound. Beau has been wanting this blood line for a while, and finally got her. She’s out of two outstanding bear hunting dogs from dogs he’s hunted with in the past.
So far, she’s being very inquisitive and likes to play tug-of-war, so when we play I tell her, ‘Get that bear, Shasta! Get that bear!’ ;)
Well, I think you would enjoy it more if you just put a picture of it on the wall and you could enjoy it when Alive!
You have your garden and fish and poultry and can get venison or beef locally. Works well!
My Rhubarb does not like the heat and has suffered even with afternoon shade. No big heat this year and lots of rain so it has become enormous.
I have strawberries but they are a challenge this year with the rain. They are also pretty invasive and I do not have that much space.
I understand that a few bales of Barley straw help the clarity of a pond. Don’t know if its true I’ll pass it on.
Sounds like you are doing really well.
So nice she slept through the night. I remember puppies having a few nights of crying after leaving their momma and siblings. I really want to raise one more puppy. We’ve adopted 6 month or older rescue dogs for over 10 years. Miss that little puppy stage and the fast year of growth. Still have our original puppy crate and the puppy bowl set. It’s all waiting to be used again. 🐶
On a gardening note, my new bearded iris collection started blooming this weekend. Huge flowers and neat bi-colors or tri-colors. Got them last summer from Breezeway Iris near Oregon.
I was doing OK yesterday, then I decided to try mowing the overflow swale below the pond.
Buried the Kubota zero-turn in the mud. Had to drag it out with truck. lol
The first summer after renovation the water in my pond was very clear. Too clear, in fact. 5-6 foot clear. Had a mountain of filamenteous algae. I fought that nasty stuff all summer long. Then I got 100 Northern Crayfish from a buddy who lives near Sedalia. Those things made a bunch of baby crayfish and they cleaned up the algae in just a couple months. I only needed to do one algaecide treatment early in the spring last year, and I haven’t had to use any this year.
Saw that after I asked. lol
That’s a good looking pup. I know you’re going to have a lot of fun with her.
4:30 am this morning was a lot of fun. Not! ;)
She is a real sweetheart. This time of year in 2019 I was raising FOUR pups, so this single one is a cakewalk. ;)
Raised bed garden below the dam: Sounds well planned arrangment to to allow gravity siphon watering of your garden, no draining the Well water tank in the house!
Overflow swale. By the time it drys you’ll need a sickle bar to cut it.
Crayfish: so now you can do Wisconsin style perch frys and Cajan style crayfish boils! Best of both worlds! (Although I can’t eat shell fish, hopefully you can!) If you cant eat them I sure others would!
Water clarity; Have you checked to see if you have for zebra mussles? They clean up the water really well I understand! :Ouch! (Hope not!)
For the purposes of laying-out a garden to minimize cross-pollination, would I be well-advised to, for example, plant watermelon (genus: citrulius) between my butternut squash and acorn squash (both genus: cucurbita)?
That’s a stock tank??
OK I see the site you probably went too. We had friends that got a fiberglass tank, bought locally, their was green. Similar to the ones on this website. No painful bumps from metal you may want to consider,
https://www.dtfiberglass.com/customized-chemical-storage-tanks.html
Poor little guy! Their color is amazing! I usually see one or two each summer, but they don’t hang around for long. Great rescue job!
I ‘saved’ a Yellow Warbler last week. He was tangled up in some string in the garden, and was flopping around and making a racket. At first I thought he was a Mama Bird warming me off a nest or something. I grabbed my scissors and cut him free. I hope he was OK, as he still had some string hanging off of him. :(
Up EARLY today - PUPPY! I’m going to hit the garden early before it gets hot again - and we might have some thunderstorms by the afternoon. Tomorrow I am home, and it looks to be a PERFECT planting day - 72 and sunny!
What is this? San Diego? ;)
Beau finally got the gate replaced and a few pieces of fencing fixed so the hunting dogs can go out into their exercise yard after 2 days of being cooped up. There will be a LOT of ‘wiggles’ to get out, today. The steer was enjoying his new ‘pasture’ while Beau worked on the fencing. My dear friend, Judy, who raised all of her own dairy cow stock from her first Heifer in 1961 says, ‘Cows are just like people; they’re always poking their noses in where they don’t belong!’
Pictures later of what I bought yesterday at Cushman’s Greenhouse. This week’s Grocery Money well spent, I think, LOL!
I’m guessing we’ll be seeing some shrub pictures for your Japanese garden. Nice rescue job yourself. After 36 years here we have rescued many many birds as they hit out sliders and most are just in shock. In the winter you have to bring them in for 15 minutes or so. A drop or 2 of water off your finger to the tip of their beak helps They usually start swallowing and seems to help bring them out of shock. Today I am watering all veggies with the Chicken Soup for the Soil we bought for this year. Will do it 2 gallons at a time from a jug so that will be some work. I hand weeded the asparagus bed yesterday, lots coming up.
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