Early Spring Chores

With the garden still a mud pit I figured I had better start pulling back the straw mulch so things can begin to dry out enough to hopefully get a first turn-over with the tiller by next weekend. Not to mention that there is a lot of chicken crap that will need some time to rot in. The new strawberry plants are due in the second week of April so I hope to at least have their new bed in the mid-section ready to go soon. So for now the straw has been pulled back to each end of the patch and we'll have to wait for the wind and sun to do their work. I hand worked a few feet of the tomato and pepper bed to take some early chard and kale seedlings we have almost ready to go out. Hopefully these will provide us with some early greens while we wait to get some seeds into the ground next month.

The winter tarp was removed from the chicken tractor and the girls were moved up a bit toward the house to a fresh piece of ground. This will be their final over-wintering spot until we can start rotating them on green turf. Their crap in their last spot was about five inches deep and they needed to move so I could rake it into the garden. That section will be reseeded with grass later this spring and hopefully will recover back to normal yard.

The DIY nest box pads I cut out of a standard door mat last spring were beginning to break down so we finally ordered in some commercial grade pads from QC Supply of Schuyler, NE. It looks like they will hold up a lot better and not being as flimsy will be easier to keep clean. These things are cheap but the various on line suppliers have outrageous shipping costs. I'm sorry but I refuse to pay more for shipping than the actual cost of the goods being shipped! Luckily QC had a good price and they use the USPS which was cheaper than UPS and they still got here in two days. They are highly recommended.