thestudentfarmer - Tumblr blog

thestudentfarmer · 8 days

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Hello and good day!

Just wanted to share a few Planting notes and whats been going on round my garden and kitchen~

Today I planted some

They look very lovely in the pictures, plus the Tubers that grow under them are said to be edible and similar to potatoes. I think their pretty and would like to try them once. I figure if no one in the household likes them I have tried them, and have a neat thing to share with friends at least + can share with the seed library or at a plant swamp :)

Also direct seeded some

Dill and cilantro seed. I've never been real great at making herbs grow well but this year I'm hoping is the year to change that :) with luck in a short time there'll be plenty for us as well as gifting, maybe trading and sharing (which is part of my ultimate grow goals :) ) but I'll be satisfied with enough to use here and self seed for future harvests.

Direct seeded some sugar baby watermelons to replace the bed the chickens dug up. (I'll need to make a new fence for this part of the garden, the old one was just simple wire fence. I'd like to put in a nice wire and wood one with a latch gate)

Tossed out a few handfuls of black oil sunflowers among the unclaimed parts of the back garden. With luck they'll grow pretty quickly to proffer some shade and a snack spot for the parrots again.

And of interest, the regrow from the store green onions is blooming some flowers! They are definatly determined lil plants!

I don't have pictures currently for the rest but I also got a bit of stuff done for both gardening and things to try out

🔨I made 2 olla's to try out in an attempt to reduce watering around the garden as well as to conserve water in the soil a bit more. Their just 2 unglazed Terra cotta pots, silicone sealed together and a cork put in one end. The water coaster I'm using to cover the top in between watering. I've never used them, or seen them used before so at this time its to test out for a future project. Plus i just wanted to see them in function :)

🔨 fully made a 5×2 raised bed for the front garden. A second is about 1/2 made. I need to get more wood to finish. At current fenced in spacing I could fit 2 more beds this size.

⛰️ got that bed lined out with cardboard, paper and filled with compost to settle (currently 6 cubic feet of composted manure) 🪶I still need to lay out water lines for both future rows, but want to get one more of the 3 beds built before I start laying that line down.

I won't be doing ground beds in this section due to the knowledge there are utility lines pretty close to the surface. ⭐️ALWAYS call or find out where your yards service lines are befor digging!! It will save you a lot of stress and financial strain⭐️

Plus I can make the raised beds deeper/taller for root crops like carrots or sweet potatoes without having to dig too deep 😉

Laid out some tarp to die off a section of yard to start an amaranth grow spot (end goal, 2 spaces for this. human food, natural dye work material and chicken feed)

That's it for todays lil blurbs :)

🌱🌻Happy Homesteading and Urban Gardening 🌻🌱

4 19 2024

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thestudentfarmer · 12 days

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Just a little things post today,

Got a few sprouts coming up in the melon bed I got up recently, not too much and did another throw out of seeds for them so we can have a few more later on.

Also found these lil mushrooms under the other protective cover

No idea what kind they are but fungi of all sort are super useful to the environment and help breakdown compost to enrich the soil :) 🍄🍄

That's it for now :)

#homesteading #self sufficient living #thestudentfarmer #studentfarmer #self sufficiency #food #garden #gardening #low waste #chickens #urban biodiversity #urban green spaces #urban homesteading #urban gardening #urban farming #mushrooms #melon #cantaloupe

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thestudentfarmer · 20 days

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Hello everyone!

A lil garden walk through and some updates :)

We'll start with the armenian cucumbers.

I'm hoping they'll pick up soon, but I may just need to do another direct seeding. A few sunflowers have self seeded and a carrot too,.

The patch I though was chamomile turned out to not be chamomile. Instead it turned out to be stinknet, it is considered an invasive weed here and has no current use to native species or humans (as far a si could find) so I pulled it and gave it to the chickens.

It looks very bare now 😭 I'll be building a small raised bed in this space and adding soil, once I've done that I intend to grow an edible herb of some sort here.

The nasturtium is doing really good,

I intend to have another human and chicken harvest this week from them. They look a little wilty as it was warmer than it's been the last few weeks I also want to collect a small pint jar of the immature pods to try and turn into pickled capers :)

The broccoli are starting to get dried pods so I've been snagging them as I see the ripen or the birds start really cracking at them.

By the white arrow is the eggplants, which I believe I shall be pulling these ones and planting carrot seed here soon (after I trim down the seeding broccoli a bit)

The few carrot left arr still growing okay, but I think they are going to be spent very soon. Right now they've been more to keep ground cover around the tomatoes while they grow.

And a suprise sunflower sprouted among them, there is already flowers and even 1 tiny tomato!!!

An overview all of the current end row.

Sunflowers coming in too :)

And in exciting news~

We'll be working on extending the garden too. The tarps worked great to kill of the bad grass and keep it gone. I won't be digging the beds up for this one, instead I'll be doing a few raisedwooden beds.

That's it for now :)

🌱🌻Happy Homesteading and Urban gardening!🌻🌱

4.7 2024

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thestudentfarmer · 26 days

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Chicken pic and share

Went to the feed store to restock and get some Alfalfa.

I spread some of the Alfalfa hay across the yard for their enrichment since nothings really growing right now

Their enjoying a meal of nasturtium clippings, broccoli seed thin-outs and some other various chicken safe weeds from the garden.

That's it for now :)

🐔🌱Happy Homesteading🌱🐔

4.1.2024

#homesteading #self sufficient living #thestudentfarmer #studentfarmer #self sufficiency #food #garden #gardening #low waste #chickens #chicken husbandry #chicken keeping #urban biodiversity #urban homesteading #urban green spaces #urban gardening #chicken enrichment #chicken enrichment idea

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thestudentfarmer · 1 month

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Good afternoon everyone! Today I decided I was gonna try something new.

🌟🌟 Before proceeding any further, if your unfamilair with a plants edability and want to eat it? RESEARCH IT! 🌟🌟

RESEARCH, RESEARCH,RESEARCH

🌟Do Not Eat Plants You are not confident are edible

🌟 check at least 2 sources ( ag or permaculture extension or a relatively knowledgeable individual, book or online source)

🌟 when researching always check out potential health risks as well as proper cooking/cleaning and point of picking.

🌟always do small tests of eating with allergy protocols.

🌟🌟Thank you for reading the warning before proceeding :) 🌟🌟

Nasturtium leaves!

Now I've eaten the flowers before in salads and as omlette toppings, but I haven't eaten anything else of the plant. So today I decided to give it a go.

This is todays harvest spot. Most the time when ive trimmed nasturtium before it's been to feed the chickens some extra greens and tonuse less purchased grains. (I'll actually still be harvesting a bit more today for them, I was just on a time budget)

My scale wouldn't weigh this, but after cleaning and separating

Flowers (buds) and seeds separated.

The seeds, according to most of the internet search I've found says they can be pickled like capers. Or dried, ground and used as seasonings. After chicken harvest I'll figure out if I'll be drying or pickling them.

The flowers, I'll likely wash and use to top breakfast omlettes or mix in a salad.

The stems, Ive got about 3/4 of a gallon ziplock bag of them. I want to make a sort of spicy sauce to toss w/them for trying them.

The leaves I took half of them and chopped them (the other half I haven't fully decided its fate)

Mixed with some eggs and flour before pan frying in a little butter.

To make this :) simple veggie fritter.

Flavor wise the leaves are pretty bland in this dish. It does remind me a bit of spinich, so I don't have issues eating it again. (Just season it up a bit more.)

The rest of the leaves I may just steam or blanch and mix with a little sea salt to flavor it.

At this time, I think I shall continue adding nasturtium to the garden, but probably for more than just the pretty appeal/ground cover and potential critter meals they provide. I may find another spot for a second patch in rotation though.

That's it for now

🌱🌻Happy Homesteading and Cooking 🌻🌱

3.28.2024

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thestudentfarmer · 1 month

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Hello hello~

I've got some garden pic updates :)

New sunflower patch, I'm only doing a small patch here as It's to tide over till I get some more scaping/zoning planned up. These are from 4th gen mix seeds (I got them from some friends and classmates)

Same row, I purchased some jalapeno starts as the peppers I seed started are still super small currently.

Same tows, some super late starting spinach. I'm letting it grow to see if I can see what seeding for spinach is like and share that with you all :)

In the white line/square is a wild seeded chamomile plant. I pulled it and gave it to the chickens as a treat.

Further up is the remaining carrots and some tomato starts we purchased, now interplanted with them. There's 2 slicer types and a grape variety. I don't remember offhand if they are determinate or indeterminate. Unfortunately the ones I seed started died off once they were returned outside.

:( thankfully we've all agreed to go light on tomatoes this year due to that.

In ground some direct seeded squash, these are a patty pan/Starburst variety and a couple zuchinni. With luck this year we avoid the squash bugs!

The direct seeded nasturtium in the back and front is careless wildseeded chamomile (I swear it's the best way to grow it and will be sowing another patch like this)

The few eggplants I've left for now have flowers, pointed to by the white arrows.

And the broccoli currently, the seeds aren't ready quite yet, but I pulled a pod the birds got to to check them, still pretty green but the seeds are of good size. Still lots of lovely flowers for the various pollinators of the area. Unlike carrot flowers, broccoli seems to attract mostly bees (the honeybees) I haven't seen too many butterflies, moths, flies or otherwise.

Just a bee enjoying some broccoli pollen~

For pest report,

So far I've seen flies and stink bugs.

No ants, aphids and thankfully no squash bugs so far.

Beneficial bug report,

I did see some ladybird gators while doing maintenence cleanup. Some small soil roachs in a few of the beds earthworms while trimming off roots to old sunflower stems.

Mixed bugs:

What I believe to be praying mantis egg cases, I don't know how old or how new they are though.

Pillbugs in some of the beds.

Our parrot visitors have stopped coming by, unfortunatly we no longer have any sunflower heads available for them. When more sunflowers come in I hope they will visit again, or perhaps even when the hollyhocks start seeding. Plenty of the smaller birds of the area still visiting though. I find the thought they might get broccoli seed and wild seed it elsewhere very funny.

This week I plan to work on getting a water line in and some more deep beds set up for growing more sweet potato vines/spuds. As well as getting some melon seeds direct seeded if I can (I may need more soil first to refill the bed).

Started some new spuds to vine for the sweet potato's and ordered some sunchoke tubers and seeds to start out some new herbs/spices and teas.

That's it for today's post and update 😊

🌱🌻Happy homesteading and Urban Farming🌻🌱

3.21.2024

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thestudentfarmer · 1 month

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The base cure time has arrived!!

We are going to eat one of the sweet potatoes we grew and harvested for the first time ever!

We ate the biggest one (we split between 2, but hoenstly 3 or 4 could have eaten from this behemoth!)

I just did something super simple, a baked sweet potato :)

Wrapped it in foil and cooked it in the oven at 375*f till soft. Peeled the skin back and split it.

Had some homemade meatloaf + fresh baked green beans with them. Super simple meal.

Sprinkled a little sea salt on top. It was super good, to be quit honest I might need to make a sweet potato pie with the next monster potato as this one was a lot sweeter than we expected.

I also think we'll need a few more taller raised beds to add to rotation as I think sweet potatoes will now be a more common grow for my garden. They produced vines we humans and our chickens can eat (plus I believe all parts of sweet potato are edible to them), were easily trellised to create a bit more shade, grew fast and the spuds that grew were sort of suprise bonus as I didn't think they were in the ground long enough before they died off.

This is our gardens first potato success 🙌 now to repeat it at a little bigger scale :) that I will be working on a bit this week 😀

Thanks for swinging by!

🍠🌱Happy Homesteading and Gardening 🌱��

3 14 2024

#homesteading #self sufficient living #thestudentfarmer #studentfarmer #self sufficiency #food #garden #gardening #low waste #chickens #home cooking #meals from scratch #urban homesteading #urban gardening #will it grow?#grow what you eat

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thestudentfarmer · 2 months

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Hello and Good Day all,

Wanted to share what's hopping in the garden so far this week 🌱

Baby sunflowers coming up (gen 3 I believe if I recall right)

Armenian cucumbers, I'm going to attempt to trellis these ones to see how well they'll produce this way. After a winter with 0 of them I hope we get plenty thus spring/summer!

Update to the broccoli seed

A friend came by and happened to see them growing and got very confused, asking when I had planted green beans?

It took a moment for me to realise they were pointing to the broccoli and not the bean row behind them 🤦‍♀️ (where I had a few months ago planted some fresh beans that never sprouted due to the weather). We had a nice convo about how some plants seed.

The nasturtium is now blooming in 3 colors 🎉 🤩🤩

I will definatly be saving seed from this year's mixed batch and with luck have enough to take to the nearby libraries seed-library program 🥰 and to share with a few gardeners in the area.

A second year HollyHock returning, this excites me pretty good too, so far as I've grown them none have returned, so I am thrilled to see what colors come from this one (I've seeded red, deep red, pink and white and I believe a purple variety. )

And I learned how to poach eggs this week for the first time! It was kinda weird the first try (as seen here) but the pupper enjoyed a nice lil snack :)

As well, I got a new panel of fencing made up for the front garden space. I'm not yet 100% on what I'll do in the extension but will be figuring it out eventually 😂

As to the back extension, i got some planning laid out, next is getting the beds made and water lines laid out. I really want melons this year, so I am going to work very hard to get them :)

That's it for the update for now :) Thanks for coming by!

🌱🌻Happy Homesteading and Gardening 🌻🌱

3 12 2024

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thestudentfarmer · 2 months

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Thought I'd share some of what I've cooked this week so far :) and a lil garden excitment

Top left. We have cajun burgers w/cheese, sunny side eggs and a seasoned oyster mushroom fry.

Top right, scrambled eggs w/diced tomatoes,peppers, onion and garlic [eggs courtesy of our wonderful hens]

Bottom was a chicken soup I tossed together from some random stuff. Mushrooms, chicken, onion, corn,garlic and peppers.

The broccoli didn't end up heading, but I've got flower stalks and seed pods coming in! :D

I've got to keep a super close eye on them now, so that the birds don't eat them all and I can try again next fall/winter.

That's it for now :)

🌻 🌱Happy homesteading and health 🌱 🌻

3.5.2024

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thestudentfarmer · 2 months

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Hello everyone!

I've just gotten back from a much needed vacation. So things here are gonna be a lil off for a short bit.

This week, I've got to do some cleanup in the garden, plus some seed selecting and starting/direct seeding. And some new garden space set up, now that we no longer have the ducks, this space is being used for more garden area. in addition I'll be getting home ready for swinging back into "normal" mode. (Yay meal planning!)

Thank you for being patient with me while we get back into the swing :) there will be a few small random posts this week as I'm able to get to things~

For now, this lil pic to tide over :)

Sunflowers, kale, hollyhock are finally taking off :)

I'm hoping to use this area as a supplemental feed zone and shade zone. If I can get it to mostly self seed even better :)

I seeded a bit thick as this is a "minimal/no touch" zone. As they grow out I'll thin a bit more, but mostly I've been leaving this to do its thing alone.

🌱🌻Happy Homesteading and Gardening 🌻🌱

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thestudentfarmer · 2 months

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Hey everyone,

my apologies, but it may be a little sparse on picture posts for a week or two. I've been working on taking care of laundry now that theres some calm, sunny weather again for a bit and been getting around to a bit of a home cleansing/purge while preparing for the next planting season :)

For now, i thought id share a bit of a ramble. I found a store near me that sells packs of beef fat which is pretty rare so I grabbed one to see if I could figure out how many I might need for a master batch of tallow for the month. Finally got around to rendering it and For $4.00 and a few hours of time I got 1 and a little over 1/2 pints of beef tallow. This'll be enough fat for cooking for maybe a week? Depending on what I'm cooking.

Plus a decent chunk of the crumbles tuff afterwords for salad topping. :D. It's delicious fresh and hot tossed with seasoning too!

But if your someone who doesn't like the crispy bits, if you've got chickens its a liked snack for them too.

Next time I'll see about probably double the amount to render for at least 2 weeks so we can pull away from butter for a bit (it's gotten very expensive for butter and heavy cream recently).

I'm hoping this store will have some chunks of pig fat similar too. If so I'm going to buy some next month to render and make soap. I'm down to the last few bars now and have been procrastinating heavy on making the next batches.

If not I suppose I may need to research a good tallow bar recipe to add to the homemade recipe book. Good thing I'm cleaning house, it'll make some space for curing bars and help me find the molds so I can make a few batches at once.

End of my ramble for now, the laundry pile calls.

🌱Happy Homesteading everyone🌱

2 16 2024

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thestudentfarmer · 3 months

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Yaaay!! We have a confirmed sighting of 2!

Cute, Cheeky lil visitors! They are definitely enjoying the sunflowers. ❤️I was only able to get good pictures of one though, but that's okay :)

Now to finish what I can on the fence panels to expand the garden and to half birdwatch too 😉

🦜🌱Happy homesteading and green spacing! 🌱🦜

2 3 2024

#homesteading #self sufficient living #thestudentfarmer #studentfarmer #self sufficiency #food #garden #gardening #low waste #urban green spaces #urban biodiversity #enjoy the little things #enjoy the moment #we are part of the life cycle #wildlife #wildlife in urban spaces #respect nature #live with nature

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thestudentfarmer · 3 months

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Hello hello, just wanted to share what I've been up to~

I harvested a cabbage yesterday!

This one, I tried to twist the head off in an attempt to grow a second crop of head(s), but it twisted the whole thing right out of the ground. Alas, that didn't work this time, but next time maybe.

I didn't end up weighing this cabbage, but I wanted to take a pic to share how big it grew alone. The rows I grow in currently are roughly 2 feet across.

I took this head and peeled it apart a bit. While all the leaves are edible, or could eb used for cooking or plating meals, i wanted to give our chickens a lil extra greens. So to them they went :)

This is what it looked like inside.

I sliced 1/2 the head up to enjoy with bbq chicken sandwiches last night. (And we used quite a bit!) But still had enough for an omlette this morning and a bit extra. The other 1/2 I'll probably slice for similar meals.

That's it for now :) thanks for coming by 🌱

🌱🥬Happy homesteading and garden success🥬🌱

2 1 2024

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thestudentfarmer · 3 months

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Garden update today :)

We had some more gloomy wet weather so unfortunatly some chores and errands fell through and I'm a little behind on some maintenance as well as seed uppotting

Sadly I don't think any of my peppers are going to grow. A few of the tomatoes have sprouted so there is at least that. Unfortunatly i dont think they will be ready for transplanting by valentines day. They'll be a little behind anyways.

Here's the cabbages now~

I'm very excited to see these growing so well this season :D they are transplanted and these 4 are the survivers so far.

The carrots (don't mind the weeds, I'll be yanking them as soon as I catch up, as long as I get them before seed they make excellent salads for the chickens)

The nasturtium, there's some flowers tucked up inside them, a few yellows this season, not to many red or orange so far.

The broccoli and a close up of one that seems to be growing multiple little florets now :D

The lentils I put in the L bed are starting to sprout now too :) I think this upcoming season I may plant cucumbers or melons of some sort.

And a bit excited, a lil garlic peice is starting to peek through!!

Oh! I also saw 2 of the wild love parrots this morning in one of the neighbors' trees!!! I have no choice but to always have sunflowers growing and will need to accommodate some grow space for them now 😂 their pretty rarely sighted in the area im at so I am super stoked to see them.

hopefully, they are able to find enough food to hang out for more than flying through, and that people get to see why having green spaces in cities is important to more than just human benefit.

That's it for now :)

🌱🌻Happy homesteading and gardening 🌻🌱

1 26 2024

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thestudentfarmer · 3 months

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Super mini did it grow? Update!

The subject? Green onions

I snipped about an 1.5 inches up from the root and just popped em in the ground.

And yes! Their currently starting to go upward!

Not sure why when i check on them there's usually 1 or two popped up out of the ground on their side.

Best I can figure is mayby a bird or perhaps when they get watered since their not yet fully rooted they wiggle out? I just pop em back in and cover them up with a lil soil pat.

Nothing above ground yet for garlic, turmeric or ginger. The lentils I hot for green manure for the "L" bed are starting to sprout though :)

🌱🧅Hapy Garden growing and experimenting! 🧅🌱

1 21 2024

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thestudentfarmer · 3 months

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Repost :)

Plus this carrot harvest

I used the greens for salad, stirfry and omolette :)

The carrot became snacks and soup :D

Good day everyone :)

This week's garden update~

The beans and pumpkin that grew with the sunflowers are gone now and I've begun thinning out the sunflowers as the seeds get selected by birds.

I like to leave the smaller heads for the smaller native birds of the area. The heads i save, I've been setting into a drying rack where no birds can get to them.

The stalks I've been discarding the leaves in our cities green barrel (compost) program and I'm saving the stalks to either burn, or to chunk up and try a Hügelkultur grow bed. Not sure 100% what will eb grown in it, might be flowers or herbs, maybe strawberries.

This is currently the biggest sunflower yet! That pole is about 6ft off ground. I'll definatly need a ladder when it's time to take a few of the heads.

The broccoli row, there's some little florets now on most the plants! :D

Cabbages, all four are similarly headed now.

The nasturtium, which i need to go through and clean up a bit. The cold did get one side of em pretty sharply.

The carrots.

This is the batch I used the cornstarch planting method. So far, while they lined up real nice I feel like they aren't growing as well as i hoped. Now weather that's the seed, the planting spot or the season/weather I'm not entirely sure. I think I'll do a summer grow as well, just to test it out again.

The back 'l" bed, ive direct seeded some lentils with the asparagus. I intend to grow the lentils then till them back in to the soil. We were going to dump this bed, but it seems we like it still so we'll likely be doctoring it up for a few more seasons.

Well thats it for now :)

🌱🌻Happy Homesteading and Gardening 🌻🌱

1 18 2024

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thestudentfarmer · 3 months

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Good day everyone :)

This week's garden update~

The beans and pumpkin that grew with the sunflowers are gone now and I've begun thinning out the sunflowers as the seeds get selected by birds.

I like to leave the smaller heads for the smaller native birds of the area. The heads i save, I've been setting into a drying rack where no birds can get to them.

The stalks I've been discarding the leaves in our cities green barrel (compost) program and I'm saving the stalks to either burn, or to chunk up and try a Hügelkultur grow bed. Not sure 100% what will eb grown in it, might be flowers or herbs, maybe strawberries.

This is currently the biggest sunflower yet! That pole is about 6ft off ground. I'll definatly need a ladder when it's time to take a few of the heads.

The broccoli row, there's some little florets now on most the plants! :D

Cabbages, all four are similarly headed now.

The nasturtium, which i need to go through and clean up a bit. The cold did get one side of em pretty sharply.

The carrots.

This is the batch I used the cornstarch planting method. So far, while they lined up real nice I feel like they aren't growing as well as i hoped. Now weather that's the seed, the planting spot or the season/weather I'm not entirely sure. I think I'll do a summer grow as well, just to test it out again.

The back 'l" bed, ive direct seeded some lentils with the asparagus. I intend to grow the lentils then till them back in to the soil. We were going to dump this bed, but it seems we like it still so we'll likely be doctoring it up for a few more seasons.

Well thats it for now :)

🌱🌻Happy Homesteading and Gardening 🌻🌱

1 18 2024

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