Survivor Garden

This garden deserves a post of its own for sheer perseverance.

These plants are from my old healing garden in Minneapolis.  They survived there and I wanted to bring them here.  By the time I finally dug them up late, late last fall, deep into the drought, they were all withered.  Even my Survivor Mint looked brittle and brown.  It was going to snow a lot.  I was unprepared but I borrowed a shovel to dig them up, found what I could, and called Anjali to prep a hole. 

I pulled in after dark.  She had dug a hole next to the big rock.  In the van's headlights, with snow flying I pushed them in and covered their roots without much hope really.  I'd waited too long and expected too much even for them.  Then the snow overtook everything.

Spring came late and fitfully this year with frequent snow storms into April.  My garden showed no signs of life and I lamented its demise.  Didn't know it last fall, but I'd planted them in the worst soil on our property, this heavy clay mess. 

Then one day, Tim was showing me his berry bushes and he stepped back into purple flowers.  I cheered- it's chives!  No sign of anything else but one had lived.  And it was good.  I believed it would be enough.  He marked it with a pink flag so he'd remember not to step on it again.

We've had the anti-drought May and June, with rain every 1-3 days.  And miraculously, everything I planted- chives, garlic chives, sage, spearmint, and spiderwort- everything is sprouting!

Just like me.  

My eyes are full of tears and I am filled with wonder and gratitude. 
More than enough.
Praise be for survivors!

Berry Patch Garden and Kitchen Window Garden

This is going to be another post journaling about our gardens. 

First, the Berry Patch Garden.  It is at the front of our property next to our mailbox on a sleep slope facing south.  This area was significantly altered during construction of the road for the development and the soil is heavy clay.  We hypothesize that the good topsoil has been scraped away or covered over.  So this soil needs to most remediation of any on our property.  Logs are staked perpendicular to the hill and the berries are planted on the up slope side.  

 Tim has planted honeyberries, saskatoons/serviceberries, goji berries, and raspberries with their accompanying nurse plants- rosa rugosa. Nurse plants provide protection, make nutrients more available, and in ways not yet full understood, speed the growth and development of the plants around them, helping them mature faster.  Once the trees/bushes are well established and begin to compete with the rose, we will peel off a strip of bark and kill the nurse plant.  We planted rosa rugosa, a thorny rose bush, 18-24 inches away from many of our fruit trees and berry bushes to test this hypothesis. Eventually the plants will fill in and this hill will be covered with berry bushes and perhaps some other perennial plants and herbs.

 

For now, there is lots of room and lots of sun so I planted squash, melons, cucumbers, and corn in mounds of manure and topsoil I brought in by the bucketful.  I also mulched the sprouts to try to keep the grass down.  Zed, our cat, knocked a tray of cucumbers and squash off the front ramp and when I salvaged the sprouts from below, I couldn't tell cuke from squash so I have a mystery, yet-to-be-determined group of plants.  I also included a number of leftover sprouts from other gardens so here's my best list of what I planted.  Everything is SSE unless otherwise noted.

Zucchini, Golden
Zucchini, Black Beauty
Corn, Stowell's Evergreen
Squash, Burgess Buttercup
Melon, Pride of Wisconsin
Melon, Minnesota Midget
Cucumber, Russian Pickling
Squash, Musquee de Provence
Squash, Butternut, from favorite CSA squash last fall
Pumpkin, Pie, from favorite CSA pumpkin last fall
Popcorn, from store because Mark wanted to try
Cat Grass, Varigated (TSC)
Marigold, Aztec (Richters)
Marigold, Mexican (Richters)
Marigold, French (Richters)
Lamb's Ears
Echinacea, Cheyenne Spirit Mix (WCS)
Echinacea, Yellow Coneflower (WCS)
Echinacea, Powwow Wild Berry (TSC)
Echinacea, Purple Coneflower
Yarrow, Summer Pastels
Comfrey

Update 6/27-
Tim just planted:
Sunflower, Rostov
Sunflower, Tarahumara White Seeded
Sunflower, Humongous

 
Second, the Kitchen Window Garden.  I spend a lot of time washing dishes and looking out the kitchen window at the propane tank and piles of boards, logs, etc. under the trees.  Now that our new, larger propane tank is installed, I wanted to have some shade tolerant flowers and herbs I like that will come back from year to year.  

 

Tim and I trimmed back tree branches, moved two rotting logs together, and put manure and dirt between to create a hugel-inspired raised bed.  We planted it with self-seeding annuals and perennials that will tolerate partial shade.  

 

Also, we did not fence this garden because I want to see if the chickens will ignore it as I hope.  If my hopeful hypothesis proves false, I'll fence it.  I smile when I look out and see all the little popsicle stick labels promising some of my favorites.  

Catnip
Licorice Mint/Agastache (WCS)
Chives
Lamb's Ears- I meant to buy Lamb's Quarters which is edible but bought Lamb's Ears which bees like
German Chamomile
Hyssop
Lemon Mint
Cosmos, Sea Shells
Cosmos, Sensation Mix
Cosmos, Orange seeds from George and Emily Reisdorf's home in FL

In praise of the pickup truck and thanks to my Dad

Until recently, I wasn't a truck person.  When we were moving here, Dad said, "You're going to want a truck."  
"Nah, we don't need a truck.  We're not doing that kind of farming."

My brother said, "You're going to need a truck to plow out that driveway of yours."
"Maybe we'll hire a neighbor.  I don't want a truck."

You see, after observing farms with a critical eye, there were a number of things I didn't want on my farm.
1.  Knee deep mud
2.  Old machinery rusting around the yard
3.  Nasty manure smells
4.  Animals in my bath tub (the pig story set me against it)
5.  Large equipment laying around disassembled and in disrepair
6.  Animal skulls nailed to the fence posts of the front gate (no joke, saw that one)

We weren't that kind of farmer.  We weren't that kind of people.  We weren't going to do that kind of thing.

My dad had a truck with a plow.  Now, a truck person would tell you make and model.  I want to say 1974 Chevy Power-something maybe.  It's red and white and from the same decade I was born in.  When he offered to give it to us as a farm-warming gift, I smiled graciously.  I wasn't that kind of farmer and an old pick-up would quickly lead to #2 and #5 on the No Can Do List.  But I kindly said I'd talk it over with Tim while wondering how we could discretely get rid of it.

Then I mentioned my dad's kindness to a lady from 4H and another from church.  They congratulated me and inquired knowledgeably about all the details, assuring me that we were going to need a truck, even if we didn't insure it but only drove it on the property.  Women + old truck = happiness?  We aren't in Kansas anymore, Toto.

So, reason and experience prevailed and Tim drove the truck home.
And contrary to all my previous self-understanding, we are that kind of farmer.
My brother, Dan, came and gave Tim a plowing lesson and Tim regularly plowed this treacherous driveway all winter long.

Plus, he pulled my van out when it got stuck in a precariously slippery spot over-hanging the gulley.  My hero!

I remember standing at the bottom of the driveway shoveling something out, mailbox maybe, talking with a snow bound neighbor and then Tim comes rumbling down, snow billowing, and shoves the whole pile across the street and over the bank on the other side of the road.  I threw my hands up and cheered.  I love a man with a plow who knows how to use it!  Wow, it's so cool.  And then, Tim plowed the road out all the way to the blacktop road so the neighbors could get out.  Helping everyone with the right powerful tool- super cool!

I could have sworn I took photos, it's so vivid in my mind- the red  paint, the huge dark plow, the flying snow, and that scrapey rumble.  But no, I apparently had both hands full of shovel and no camera.  

This photo doesn't do the good ole' truck justice since there's no hours of labor saved, no rumble and flying snow, no super hero action saving the day. 

That's not a rusty piece of equipment in my yard.  

That's my truck.

Make way for ducklings!

Mama Muscovy

 

First hints

Peeking out

 Much awaited

 Crazy cute

 Mama Muscovy has been faithfully sitting on her eggs, the other duck's eggs, and a couple guinea eggs for the last 35 days. 

Today she was wagging her tail in pride as 11 ducklings hatched.

Way to go Mama Muscovy!

Anjali took over 100 photos.

Mark picked them up gently.

Tim says now he feels like a real farmer.

Amy has been emailing photos like she was the mom herself.

Today is a good day to be a farmer!

The bears

Been getting calls and emails all week about bear sightings in the neighborhood- a mama and twin cubs.  Ruckus with a neighbor's dog on our property, raiding a bird feeder next door, sighting in a back yard across the street right after our kids were playing there.  Small black bear from reports.  Typically dens up on Hazelden property and walks around here as part of her routine territorial circuit every month they're not hibernating from what we hear. 

I had been hoping for mutual avoidance since running into a mama bear in my berry patch or orchard would be bad.  If they are here and we are here and we never see each other, that would be ideal. 

Alas, Tim saw them a month ago.  They walked right by him from our yard across the street to the neighbors' close enough to Tim to get my heart pounding. 

Last year, our next door neighbors out on a walk had to turn around, retreat to a neighbor's, and get a ride home because a single bear stood in the middle of the street and wouldn't move. 

Now that they aren't avoiding interaction as much as the DNR people said they normally would, I'm at a loss for how seriously to take the threat.  Some neighbors love the wildlife and one has been waiting 3 years to see the bear and called happy that she finally has. 

Conversely, the DNR says we can shoot them. 
A.  I don't have a gun. 
B.  If I did have a gun, what are my chances of killing anything on my first shot?  And if I didn't, then I'd have an injured and enraged mother bear running around. 
C.  As a general rule, I don't move in and start shooting the neighbors.  They were here first and we as the new neighbors have a duty to try to get along.

We've been putting the garbage in the garage since that's a favorite draw. 
We don't have bird feeders but it just occurred to me last night that we do have chicken feed around.  (I can be literal sometimes- ask me about egg candling.) 
We'll be tightening security by keeping all the food in the garage and  keeping the garage shut all the time.

I also have a large whistle- a super noisy air horn type whistle which I bought last year on advice from the Bear Center up north.  I felt a little silly about it, a city-slicker greenhorn and her bear whistle.  Yeah, that'll work.  Nevertheless, when Anjali came running in saying three bears had walked by Dad, I grabbed it with shaking hands and hustled out.  When I heard the mama's warning huff from the end of our driveway, and I couldn't see Tim, believe me, I was wishing for something a lot more powerful than a whistle.  I was berating myself for moving to the forest without a gun to protect my own. 

I wish a lot of things.  I wish the bears walked through and we never interacted at all.  I wish I had a reliable dog.  I wish I was as nonchalant as the police and neighbors.  I wish I had a gun, knew how to use it, and never needed to.  I wish I didn't have to worry about my kids.

I wish I felt safe.

I remind myself that I felt the same way when I moved to Minneapolis and I learned how to avoid danger and stay safe there.  I'll feel a lot more sure of myself a year or two from now.

I wish I had it now.

Lust

After 42 years, I still surprise myself.

Farming has brought out my acquisitive side.  I find myself wanting, lusting really, after things I've never thought about before.

First, was dirt.  I had dirt lust bad this time last year.  Tim and I would drive past fields of plowed black dirt, oohing and aahing.  In our U of M Extension Living on the Land Class, we had a speaker who presented a 45 minute power point lecture on soil.  The dirt on dirt.  Sound dull?  Hardly.  We left class agreeing that we'd had no idea how special our dirt is in MN.  Like a century to make 1 inch of topsoil.  How geologic forces of glaciers and wind combined with microscopic life forms over thousands of years to produce black gold.  We were hooked and started daily searches of the Geological Soil Survey, talking about tilth.  We touched soil on various places we visited and could feel for ourselves that nice crumbly texture that means fertility.

I don't know if this cracks you up as much as it cracks us up.  We'd never before given dirt a thought.  And suddenly, we had to have it.  At one point we put an offer on 40 acres in WI before we came to our senses and withdrew it.  We pondered a 20 acre place east with fine dirt, a really beautiful 12 in southern MN with deep black dirt, and several mediocre dirt places north. 

We had looked at this place, the dome house, online and ruled it out- too far, too wooded, too much slope.  But dang, it's got good dirt.  Then months later I woke up imagining myself waking up in a dome and we were strongly leaning towards permaculture style agriculture and the great Sepp Holzer himself lives in the Alps so maybe slope could work.  We came out and peeked in the windows.  Tim skipped under the maples, we walked in the violets, breathed the spirit of the place, and fell in love.  I told Tim we'd better get the permaculture farm consultant out to give us her opinion regarding whether this place would be suited to permaculture because I wanted to get my heart broken right away if it wasn't going to work out.  And this time, there was a happy ending.

Before freeze last fall, Tim took soil samples.  We got the results back and we have glorious soil- 2-4% organic matter.  When you walk on the soil, an observer can see the soil give several inches and then spring back.  In some places we could push the fence posts several feet into the ground by hand.  Aah, tilth.  This is something organic gardeners brag about achieving after 10 years effort.  We are so pleased and thankful because we did absolutely no work to achieve it.  We simply received it as a gift in trust from all the others before us for those after us.

When I feel jealous of farmers with more land and labor-saving devices who actually know what they're doing, I say to myself, "Yes, but what you lack in quantity, you make up for in quality."  I am, however, keeping my eye on several adjacent vacant properties just in case they should go up for sale. 

Then, came truck lust.  It happened on the umpty-umpth snow day and we had just made it to the street after getting stuck in our driveway, stuck at the bottom of the hill, stuck at the stop sign on the top of the hill- all in the first 500 yards.  I slowly slipped and slided toward the plowed blacktop ahead when around the bend came this huge, gas guzzling, shiny, 4-wheel drive pick up.  A wave of lust washed over me and I really, really wanted a fancy pick-up.  I got to plowed blacktop and the feeling passed.  But one never knows.  I'll write about the pick-up we do have soon.

Now, I've got chicken lust.  I had 27, 25 of which were supposed to be layers.  Now I only have 20 and only 12 are hens I'm keeping.  This is not enough.  I can give you the rational- too many roosters (8), too many deaths (7), accidental mystery chickens who can't forage well and need a new home (2)- but really, I just want more than a dozen eggs a day.  A dozen seems skimpy somehow after the promise of a dozen and a half or even two dozen early on.  Pink eggs, blue eggs, light green eggs, white eggs.  Dang, I gotta get myself some more chickens.

After being me for more than 4 decades, I had no idea that dirt, pick-ups, and chickens could inflame my passions or make me happy.  It's good to be alive and on this adventure!

Notes of Three Sisters Garden, Oval Hugel, Tomato/Pepper Guild Garden, and Jajarkat-Inspired Polyculture Garden

As you can see from the title, this entry is going to be my notes on 4 different gardens we've planted this last week.  We've been encouraged to keep a gardening notebook and I've decided to keep mine here.  This is going to get pretty technical so feel free to skip it of you're not interested in permaculture, polycultures, hugels, and such things. All these gardens are comprised of annuals so they can be rotated year to year.  All perennials are going into the orchard and berry patch gardens. 

We're trying a number of different gardening hypotheses. These ideas are inspired by Gaia's Garden chapter 8 by Tony Hemenway and Paula Westmoreland's Natural Capital Plant Database.  Seeds thanks to Seed Savers Exchange, West Coast Seeds, Territorial Seeds, and Ritcher's Herbs.  

S

N

First, the Three Sisters- a classic.  I read and followed Hemenway's instructions except that I planted everything at once, no staggered planting.  All the seeds are SSE unless otherwise noted.  Three corns- Mandan Bride (cornmeal), Black Aztec (cornmeal), and Two Inch Strawberry (popcorn).  Three beans, all pole, with inoculant- Good Mother Stallard (dry), Cherokee Trail of Tears (snap or dry), and Hidatsa Shield Figure (dry).  Three squash- Table Queen, Waltham Butternut, Honey Boat Delicata (WCS).  We put them in the new hugel-inspired raised bed made of logs which Dave installed with his tractor last weekend.  Manure from Johnsons.  Dirt from pile saved from when the foundation was dug.  Mulched thoroughly with our own wood chips.   Clover around bed and on paths to suppress weeds.  

Second, the oval hugel- an experiment in two parts.  Anjali took the southern facing side of this hugel and I took the northern.  I planted about 20 sweet potato plants, and I can't remember where I ordered them from.  I couldn't find any info on sweet potatoes and planting with other plants so I decided to make this my one monoculture this year.  My whole section of the hugel is covered in sweet potato plants. Hugel is constructed of logs, manure, dirt, and was well mulched with leaves and then covered by cardboard during the winter to prevent spring erosion.  Virtually no weeds. 

Third, Tomato/Pepper Guild- this one is inspired by the Natural Capital Plant Database and includes tomatoes, sweet peppers, basil, and summer savory (Richters).  The tomatoes and peppers are plants from SSE.  They arrived in perfect condition and stayed that way until planted.  Peppers include: Bull Nose Bell, Jimmy Nardello's, King of the North, Mini Chocolate, Mini Red, Mini Yellow, Orange, and Tolli's Sweet Italian.  Tomatoes include: Amish Paste, Brandywine, Cherokee Purple, Dester, Gold Medal, and Italian Heirloom.  Basils: Holy (good germination, WCS), Cinnamon (best germination, SSE), Lime (SSE), and Mrs. Burn's Lemon (SSE).  This is on the south facing slope of the first and tallest hugel Tim built out of logs and lots of manure.  We covered it with boards to prevent erosion which we removed this spring and now it's covered with wood chip mulch. 

Brief aside.  I don't care for basil.  When I was pregnant with Anjali, I ate basil and noodles during the early-months-queasies and couldn't eat basil for years, although eventually I liked it again.  Then I got pregnant with Mark and ate fresh basil tomato pizza early on.  Haven't really gotten back to it yet.  So why, you may ask, are you planting basil?  Well, hope springs eternal.  Maybe this year I'll like basil.  And why four?  Well, because I learn by comparing and contrasting.  I want to be able to see which ones grow better, taste better, last longer.  More than just a yes or no, I want to compare.  So in most things, I got several kinds, sometimes up to 8 kinds of the same vegetable to see what works and what I like.

Jajarkat-Inspired Polyculture Garden- this one is inspired by Hemenway's description of a polyculture developed in Jajarkat, Nepal.  Polycultures are many plants cultivated together and then harvested individually as they mature.  I loosely followed his instructions.  I did start the cauliflower, broccoli, and cabbage inside but I also planted all the beans today rather than waiting.  Where there was mulch, we planted inside-started sprouts.  Where the ground was bear, we weeded and planted mostly seeds along with a few sprouts.  Where there were more weeds, I tried to plant more things I'd recognize easily like Rainbow Chard or onions or carrots.  On the bottom of the V, we planted deep root crops like turnips and parsnips away from the cauliflower on the northwest end as these inhibit each others' growth.  Otherwise, everything was seeded together.  His explanations are excellent so I encourage you to read Chapter 8 of Gaia's Garden for more details.  This is the largest annual garden.  Here is a list of the 40 types of seeds I recorded.  They are SSE unless otherwise noted.

Anise
Leek, Blue Solaise
Carrots, Rainbow Blend, WCS
Rutabaga, Joan
Watermelon, Cream of Saskatchewan
Beet blend, WCS
Parsnips, Cobham Improved Marrow, TSC
Turnip, Purple Top White Globe
Parsnips, Harris Model, WCS
Bean, Hidastsa Red, bush, dry
Bean, Empress, bush, snap
Bean, Arikara Yellow, bush, dry
Purslane, Tall Green, WCS
Swiss Chard, Five Color Silverbeet
Radish, Easter Egg Blend, WCS
Sage, White
Broccoli, Calabrese
Cauliflower, Multi-color blend, WCS (I'm big into multi-colored)
Broccoli, Hybrid blend, WCS  (I'm hoping the open pollinated ones will work as well as these)
Pac Choi, Ching Chiang, WCS
Cabbage, Mammoth Red Rock
Cabbage, Premium Late Flat Dutch
Broccoli, Romanesco
Heriloom Lettuce Collection- Forelenschluss, Bronze Arowhead, Amish Deer Tongue, Red Velvet, Crisp Mint, Flame
Onions, Spanish Red and Cipollinni

The Prow Garden is the outside east facing slope of the two big hugels.  I planted meaningful seeds here since this is what people will see as they drive up- morning glories from our old house, orange cosmos from Emily and George Reisdorf's house, melon seeds we saved from our favorite La Finca CSA melons last year, along with seeds from a scrumptious Gardens of Eagen yellow melon.  Seeds from the past to bless us into our future.

We're trying raised beds and hugels, polyculture and monoculture, mulched and thickly seeded, seeds and sprouts.  Just like our seeds, we're going to be comparing and contrasting our gardening styles.  We'll keep you posted.