Surely these ravenous beasts need weaning soon she thinks. Sorry Charlotte not for couple more weeks.
They are in training to drink water from the spigot. Do you see the little spigot poking through the fence, this is attached to a hose that runs out of the base of a big water barrel on blocks. It is gravity fed and if they nibble at the steel spigot out rushes the water. The moment pigs see water in a vessel the upturn it and lie in the water.
They are learning to eat their solids, the store sends out old grapes and bananas and potatoes, melon skins, bags of old lettuce and carrots. Everyday I pick weeds and silver beet (the favourite), corn stalks, and eggs and grass Any leftovers from the house and the gardens go in their bucket. Raising pigs on food! I am This Close to finding a source of organic grain that I will use as treats to call them in off the fields.
Added to this is the garlic, molasses and flaxseed oil. But they still need their mothers milk for a few more weeks honey. Poor Charlotte. They are so big now. And so noisy and boisterous when they feed.
We grow more than vegetables and meat on the farmy though. We also grow food to nourish butterflies. Milkweed is a protected plant in our gardens and like an Indian cow is allowed to flourish wherever it likes, though not always in the right place and every year we attract more and more Monarch butterflies. Milkweed supplies nectar for the butterflies, and food for the caterpillars. A very important plant for the monarchs. So we let them all grow. In New Zealand we have a plant called the Swan Plant that has a similar status. But the Swan Plant will not survive the cold and I have no seed this year, I forgot to buy my supply when I was home.
So we only have milkweed this year. However there is more than one kind of milkweed, all of which are natives to North America and I am eager to find seed for one or two of the others to sow down by the creek. The older people around here are appalled when they see them shooting up in my flower garden and wild areas, as they were always taught that this is a noxious weed, and hack at it if they find it in their gardens and wild areas.
It is poisonous to humans and animals. In fact if a bird eats a caterpillar who has been eating milkweed he is going to feel very ill indeed – what an excellent plan of the clever monarch. The Ancient Native Americans used Milkweed for glue, fibers and medicine. This is an old wild original plant, it stands upright and its flowers have a heady old fashioned scent that layers itself into the air in waves. I don’t grow it in the fields. But I believe that it is an important part of the ecosystem. And every year we have more and more Monarch butterflies returning. They have put us on their secret map.
The Daily View. I must look back and see when we started this. I know I was going to show you this view for a year.
Good morning. Today I suit up and inspect the bees. I think I am going to have to combine the two hives. Nefertiti’s hive is very very quiet, whereas Cleopatra’s is heaving with bees. I will show you tomorrow.
But first I will move the cows back into Pat’s paddock. They can only be in the Dairy Mistress paddock for the evening, through the night and into the morning. We are reaching a hundred degrees each day now with high humidity, no breeze and full sun, and there is no shelter in there as yet (your Fellowship Forest willows go in this fall – I am growing them from cuttings) but this is where all the good feed is. So in a few hours the cows will come and stand at their gate and I will bring them through the fields, past the pig sty and into the deep shade with the big water trough. After that I open the pigs gate again so the piglets can run out into the long grass while the cows stand under the trees behind the fence and watch. Time sharing a field.
Have a lovely day.
your farming friend, celi
The Kitchen's Garden 
63 responses to “Milkweed for Monarchs and a Daily Piggie Feast”
Char looks like one of those weekend warriors got up in cammo and warpaint as they move through the grass on their bellies, has she got a machete between her teeth?
I think she has hidden it up her sleeve! c
My milkweed is waiting patiently for the monarchs. We usually get an influx of them around August. I am part of the Monarch Watch program that tags them every year. Very fun project for adults and kids! One year I tagged approx. 150 but last year only tagged 25. Thank you for letting it grow!
Brenda
Morning Brenda.. How does one tag a monarch without damaging it, we must have had at least ten flying around the front garden yesterday evening. They have only just arrived. I think I would like to know more about the program. c
I buy mine from Monarch Watch.org. They are a small adhesive tag that you put on the wing. The tag has a number on it and you record the number on a paper and if it’s a male or female. The report then goes back to monarch watch and when they do the monarch count in Mexico, they record all the numbers on the tagged monarchs to see how far they traveled. You can log on to the website and see if any of your monarchs made it to mexico! Monarch Watch is located in Kansas City and is part of a research project at the University of Kansas
What a fantastic idea, have any of yours reached mexico?
No, but I am always hopeful!
Have you read Barbara Kingsolver’s new novel – Flight Behavior? Good read.
I love her work! She is a great writer.. c
I’m reading Flight Behavior at the moment, and love it, plus BK’s others also. Fascinating stuff… it’s nice that the Monarch’s get to have a stopover at the Farmy 🙂
Hi Celi! We had to combine our bee hives too! We had two, and one didn’t make it through the weird winter. Then we requeened and added workers to it, and still it didn’t fare so well. So we combined the two and just last week we harvested over 7 quarts of honey from 7 frames from the top super! This was our first go at harvesting honey and it was very exciting and so thrilling to be getting our very own honey from our very own bees!!! Hopefully we’ll be able to harvest a little more this fall, but we want to make sure they have plenty to last the winter!
Gosh you are fast, I never get to harvest before late August.. I have not even added a honey super yet, we had a very wet cold spring I suppose.. Seeing your own honey in a jar is an awesome feeling.. c
We have an abundance of milkweed and butterfly weed but we’ve not seen any Monarchs this year.
This is your first summer though, I am sure they are on their way! They literally arrived here yesterday.. c
I remember harvesting the first of the milkweed as it poked through the ground and eating it for greens when I was a youngster. (More than 70 years ago.) Not edible as it matured. I carefully protect it now….but no monarch caterpillers for the last few years.
Hmm, now that does sound interesting, i had heard a rumour that the native americans ate it but did not want to poison someone by encouraging something i did not have first hand knowledge of. But you have eaten milkweed! Excellent, i shall try it next spring! along with the dandelions and lambs quarters! I love my weed salads!.. c
The poison in milkweed is water soluble, so if you boil it in a couple of changes of water it is very, very good. I have done this. I put on a big pot of water, and a small pot of water. When the big pot is boiling, I throw the milkweed (young leaves, young pods, and/or shoots) into the small pot and boil for a minute. Then I pour it off and add more boiling water from the big pot. Boil for TWO minutes, drain, refill from the big pot. After three or four changes of water (one minute for the first, two for the rest), it is ready. It’s great with butter, and I have half a mind to go gather some soon.
Oh yes – the reason for the two pots is because if you put the milkweed in cold water after it has been boiling, it sets the bitterness. So once it’s hot, keep it that way.
Hmm, how very cool. Thank you Jomegat! I am going to add them to my spring menus next year.. c
Delightful smorgasboard for both piggies and beautiful butterflies! Hang in there Charlotte. Laura
How beautiful your farm is – I would love to run through the fields… okay if I wasn’t anti-nature… but it’s gorgeous! And, you know how I feel about Charlotte – ::heart:: Her babies are growing up so fast. XOXO – Bacon
That’s like saying Mint Sauce to a field of frolicking lambs (which my stepson used to do!)
bacon loves piggies!! c
Milkweeds have popped into my flowerbeds, too, and I leave them, for the Monarchs. I think my husband wonders why I don’t pull those “weeds,” as we were taught on the farm. They are actually quite lovely plants.
i love reading about your Farmy..thank you for the priviledge
A treat of a post. Thank you Celie.
So interesting about the milkweed. I think there are a number of plants condemned as ‘noxious’ which are actually of benefit to the ecosystem in one way or another, and the poisonous ones are not often consumed by animals – they generally know better.
Those piggies are certainly coming on. Careful with the garlic as too much may taint the flavour of the meat!
Christine
Would it make it garlicy? Because that doesn’t sound so bad…. I always wondered if you could make some sort of gourmet cheese out of cows milk when the cows get into onion or garlic patches. Some sort of naturally garlic or onion flavored cheese?
Oh i should explain the garlic, it is a natural dewormer and I give it to them for a week once a month.. I fed garlic to Daisy as well and it never came through in her milk. There is a dairy in Japan who feed lavender to their cows and make a lavendery cheese product. The sheep eat a lot of garlic too as a drench and their meat is tasty. So the the garlic is not all the time. c c
3 years ago I had a couple milkweed plants grow in the fenceline. I haven’t see milkweed around this part of the country for a long time. I just read an article that they are becoming an endangered plant because people are so adamant to get rid of them. I have let them grow and spread. Not only do the Monarchs use them but several other species of bugs frequent the area. A win-win for everyone as I love the fragrance and with a little breeze, it drifts over the yard. Good to see that so many others are nurturing this lovely plant.
I have planted rue and fennel for the caterpillars and lantana and butterfly bush and verbena for the butterflies. They have found them, and I’m delighted! I’d love to have milkweed for the monarchs but I”m having a heck of a time finding seeds.
hmm, maybe I can put some seeds in an envelope for you, or better still some root, they are like tubers and run along popping up shoots from below, you could try a root cutting. I have successfully transplanted some, you are in the States right? c
I am in the states! In North Carolina. That’d be lovely! How do I message you privately?