My Garden 2012

[matt walker]

Yeah, that's news to me too! Not sure if that's the example that's going to get me excited about planting them though. Lol.

Lolly, that's a cool old tractor you have there.

Guy, I'm not sure if "we" are so far ahead as I might be jumping the gun! Not only that, but while it is 46* outside right now, it might very well still be the same daytime temps in June. I'm starting to tune my low tunnel approach and am realizing that if I can keep it together during the winter storms, there is no reason I can't have some greens going all year. This first planting hopefully represents the last time I'll "start" the garden season, as I'm hoping to move to a more four-season approach.

I peeked in the seed starting dome today and most of my little greens are popping up, and I think my onions seedlings are ready to go in the tunnel. We're supposed to get a big windstorm this weekend, so I might wait and see how the tunnel holds up. Once I get past March I don't usually have any problem keeping them together, but this time of the year the weather has the potential to blow 'em away.

I had a good experience yesterday. I stopped at a nursery I'd never been to to ask about Mirabella plum trees, of which I have one, and it's my favorite tree. My version of George's Pear. I posted here that I had dug up a couple "suckers" and planted them in my hugelbed. Well, the woman at the nursery told me that my tree was a type, not a variety, and is often used for rootstock. She then went on to tell me that I should stop looking to buy them and look for suckers and seedlings, since they will breed true. That just made my day, as I've been trying to buy more for 3 or 4 years now. It seems I need to hit up George for some tips on starting tree seedlings on a grand scale.

[matt walker]

My neighbor just called, he's on his way over with a bunch of currant starts, wasabi starts, and hops starts, all from another friend who has been planting edible perennials for a few years. My neighbor too, although he isn't real familiar with PC principles or "food forest" concepts, per se, is savvy on the edible perennials and has been planting for a few years as well. He visited with me last night and promised in addition to those things to provide me with some raspberry starts, and a few other berries I can't think of right now. I'm so excited, I'm going to have the new bed full in no time and need to start digging again.

[pa_friendly_guy]

In an unrelated topic, my Farmall 300 is a 1955 or 56 model, those are the only 2 years they made the 300. I wanted a Ford 8N, made in the early 50's they are about 25 HP and had a live power take off, the 1st live power take off that Ford made. They were $2000 to $2500 back 20 years ago. I looked and looked for one but didn't find one that I like for a price that I also liked. A friend had this Farmall 300 utility [ The Utility means that it has a wide front end ] My property is very steep in the back and I needed the wide front end. The property next to mine is a farm that was owned by a fellow that farmed it all of his life. He was on the same steep hill as I am on. He was bringing in a baler with a load of hay behind it, like he had done many times with his narrow front end Farmall. The grass was wet and he started to slide and the tractor turned over and killed him. I am very afraid of my hill . The 300 utility was in good shape, not too many hours on it and it had a front end loader for $2700. The 300 is about 39 or 40 hp so it is much stronger than the ford 8N and it has a live power take off. There was a 2 bottom plow and a set of spring tooth Harrows that came with it. I told my friend that I didn't want the plow or the harrows and he said, you don't understand, they came with it when I bought it, they go with it when I sell it. So I had to take them. They made very nice lawn orniments up in my field for many years. I gave the harrows to my neighbor and traded a pair of metal wheels to another friend for the plow. The 300 had a 6 volt positive ground electrical system with a gravity flow gas system that you have to shut off when the tractor is not in use or the gas drains out a drop at a time. I had cracked the main arm of the loader trying to push out some trees, it is a manure bucket and not realy made for digging, Oh Well. I also broke off a weld on a hydralic line, turns out I am Hell on equipment. So it sat in the garage for several years. It got to the place where it would not turn over and I thought the main switch was bad. I have a good friend in the electric car club named Rubin , he is a Black man, and he offered to help me get it started. It turns out that Rubin knew how to hot wire a veh, I guess in the neighborhood where he grew up one learned such things. He and I worked on it one afternoon and got it started, and he didn't have to hot wire it. I had asked a very good welder to fix the main arm on the bucket for me and he came out and looked at it. No problem he said, I can fix that like new but I can't come until next week. I stopped back 2 weeks later, he said no problem I will be out next week. This went on for about a year. I found a guy about a mile away that said he could weld it for me if I could drive it to his shop. There was only a very small strip of metal holding the arm on I used large wood clamps to clamp a 4 X 4 to the arm and drove it down the road to his garage, He did a great job fixing the arm and the hydrolic line. But the generator was now bad. I checked the price of getting it repaired and felt now might be a good time to convert the tractor to 12 volt. It turns over sooooooooooooooooo much better now and starts right up. I am very pleased with the way it worked out. I do not have power stearing and when I get into tight spots with it on my steep hill in the back I use the bucket to lift up the front wheels, turn them the way I want to go and pull out. It works Great. The hydrolic fast hitch that Farmall designed to meet Fords 3 point hitch turned out to be not so good. There really isn't a float position on the hitch, so where ever you put your impliment, there it stays. I do what most farmers did in the 50's I use the draw bar instead. The claim to fame of the hydrolic fast hitch was that you could lift a 55 gal barrel with it. Everyone I know that ever owned one of these tractors said that, and I don't know of one who ever lifted a barrel with it. All in all it is a wonderful tractor, but like I said, that operator aint worth a shit.

[matt walker]

Really glad it's working for you again Guy. Sounds like a neat machine. I was talking with my neighbor last night about how both of us are trying to get away from the machine based jobs we've made for ourselves around our places, but we both added the caveat that we love my tractor. They are a useful tool around a place.

I've had a great day in the garden, even though it's misty and rainy out. Neighbor stopped by with a dozen or so currant bushes with rootballs, and some hops. I got those in, and got a whole 400lb round bale spread all over the garden as mulch. Almost a foot deep in most spots, with some cardboard and feedbags underneath along the paths. I covered almost the whole garden with that one bale to that depth. It was a lot of work, but really satisfying.

Afterwards, I walked through the woods to my neighbor's place to help him pack a cast iron tub up to his cabin. He and his brother have self built tiny cedar houses on their wooded acreage, and I love seeing what they are up to. The one brother is the neighbor who helped me with the RMH, and he has subsequently built one in his cabin, so I enjoyed checking out his build. Anyway, he gave me a dozen raspberry bushes with rootballs, a few big fennel roots, horseradish roots, strawberry bushes, and most exciting, some wild Olympic onions he's been propagating. They are like a wild native shallot type dividing onion, and he has had them going for 6 years or so and they keep propagating. I'm so excited.

Planted 3-10-12
Currants, Hops, Raspberries, Fennel, Olympic Onions, Horseradish.

[matt walker]

Hmmm, snowing heavily right now. Perhaps I'm getting a bit ahead of the season. Lol.

[Lollykoko]

Snowing? I hope you weren't direct seeding anything during the last few days, Matt.

[matt walker]

No, just in the low tunnel and here inside. It is cold outside right now, but the snow was blowing down from aloft. Spring, snow then sun then rain then sun. We are supposed to have a big windstorm tonight, so I went and closed up the barn and ballasted the low tunnel.

Sowed more seeds indoors today; Tomatoes, Peppers, and Tomatillos.

[woods-rambler]

Hi Matt, was it windy or what last night I was a bit worried about a tree falling on my place last night! It has happened ones before Just got setup with this site today. About the snow It's always like this in March,Sunny and spring like one minute then snowing the next,rain,then back to sun When I get time I will post some photos and things around my garden.

[matt walker]

Howdy Neighbor!!

Oh man, what a storm! I closed up the barn, and still everything blew around in there. My low tunnel got torn down at some point in the night and everything got snow/sleet/downpour-ed something awful. Currently snowing huge flakes mixed with giant water drops. Some serious precip, like inches of rain for sure. The Trial Island buoy, about 15 miles from here, hit 69mph winds early this morning.

[matt walker]

3-18 Fenced off the old orchard, finally.

3-19 Planted two filberts in the garden.

It's been really, really wet here for a week or two, so I haven't been doing any digging, but I've been planning and will start some new beds and plantings here in the coming days if the weather breaks.