It was a rare adventure-free weekend where I could concentrate on family ties and the Food Patch. Starting yesterday (Saturday) my daughter and I headed over to our local Mennonite farmer to pickup four 17-week old pullets to get our egg operation back in business. They had just arrived at his farm on Wednesday so they were still a bit skiddish. I suspect they were getting acclimated to being outside at his farm and here we were putting them into a crate and bringing them home to a chicken tractor with all of the noises and commotion of being on a major state highway. Just today they managed to learn how the food bin works. I suspect it will be a week or so before they get the nipples straight on the water bucket. We even had to physically grab them and remove them from the hutch portion this morning and put them into the run area so they could get food and water. And this evening two refused to go in to roost so we have to grab them and shuve them into the pop door before we could close them up for the night.
Also today I cleared off the garden of dead cucumber and squash vines and planted the fall crops. These included two varieties of kale, two varieties of collards. chard and beets. These should take us up to Christmas and I also am planning some low tunnel crops to get us into early winter (more to follow).
I also hand aerated the two strawberry beads and strawed in the walkway and edges. Since May, I've been hand-plucking blooms from the Seascape (day neutrals) and the Sparkle (true June berries) plants so they could spend all of their energy to root growth and side shoots and get themselves established. Now, the Seascape will be allowed to set fruit so we can get a few late season berries before frost.
Not to mention the fall brassicas; cauliflower, broccoli and cabbage.
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