Our wee fella, the tiniest of the little orphans, bless his little heart, rose up yesterday afternoon and very, very slowly – took himself for a tiny walk. He is trying to suck on the bottle now. I am calling this an improvement. He might make it yet.
We have gone FIVE whole days without a piggie break out. A success! I completely changed the electric fence set up, putting the lower wire very, very low, so they cannot go under it. And it is working. Finally I can strip graze the pigs across the field with a little confidence.
I am trying here to show you how much grass the field chickens eat. They cut a swathe through the pasture. If I do not shift them four times a day they will eat the pasture down to the ground which would be bad. I love the grass in my fields. Sometimes I hate to share it. But that is fine, because with the light grazing and the chicken manure they leave behind (very generously scratching it in), then add the frequent small rains we have been having, the fertiliser from the chicks has resulted in this.
Fantastic growth. The clover is shooting up in a long strip in the wake of the ark and the bees are working again.
This has been a stunning experiment.
Sheila was fooling around too close to the chook house yesterday and busted a hole in the side. On purpose? Well, we have to ask ourselves. I will repair it as best I can but like the drains in the kitchen and laundry -( the washing machine has been pumping grey water into the garden all summer through a hose out the window and I have been washing the dishes in a bucket and emptying the bucket in the garden 0 the gardens are loving this) because the under ground drains have collapsed and are blocked – and the gates which are not hung, and the doors in the barn that are broken, and the gutters that are down (I could go on and on), and the plastic house that is waiting and the other work that I do not have time or cleverness for – it will have to wait until Our John has a day off. It will have to get in line! And winter is coming. I know that sentence made very little sense but I am sure you get the jist. 
Naughty Sheila. Tired Celi.
Good morning – here is something really exciting. My black walnut tree has grown some walnuts. It is only 6 years old. I am very impressed. The black walnut is a native around here, (I have only just discovered.) So I am going to grow some of these trees for the Fellowship of the Farmy Forest! It makes perfect sense. Shade for the cows and feed for the pigs. Got your name written all over it.
Wonderful.
Have a lovely day.
your friend, celi
ps early this morning after the 4am feed (kittens) I added a few more star images to the Star Challenge. Stars move!! Or is it us?
This top image with a little light catching the gable of the house, I am going to work on that one. I need a little more light on the structure, just a whisper, I might extend that idea into the image I am looking for. The next image of the The Orion? is not sharp. I need to work with these moving stars.
I merrily attach my camera to my new tripod to keep everything still but the stars are moving, I am moving, everything is moving. We think we are just sitting in our little lives but we are in perpetual motion hurtling around in space unsecurely strapped into our little lives. Buckle up.
c
The Kitchen's Garden 
74 responses to “Tentative First Steps”
Yay, yippee, woohoo, little baby kitty! I knew you could do it! SO EXCITED!!!
Have a happy farmy weekend Celi and loving the star shots!
🙂 Mandy xo
Hooray for that Kitten! Love the night sky! Hate all that extra work you are faced with.
Celi, I never know when I am being helpful or annoying with my ‘extras’ but I thought you might find these facts about Black Walnut useful to know. http://www.omafra.gov.on.ca/english/crops/facts/info_walnut_toxicity.htm
It tells about the toxicity of the tree’s nuts, leaves, roots, and also which plants are not susceptible to the the jugalone from the tree. You may not want to feed it to your pigs, and don’t let the dogs play with them either. 😦
I have seen pigs eating them.. They are deadly poisonous to horses and mildly so to dogs. But my pigs and I can eat them without any worries. They are excellent for a walnut grove as the jugalone will deter many weeds, which is fine with me. Thank you for the info though, it is always welcome. i like the idea of planting the trees that the old people had inn their yards.. c
Yes, planting the old and or natives is always a good thing. 😉
Is the Jugalone used to expel intestinal parasites?
Oh, how wonderful for the tiny kitten. You and Boo have saved a precious life, for sure. I just love to see posts about Sheila, lol. Hog with an attitude and personality.
Clever piggy. Here in the high desert of Oregon it is almost winter. 20 degrees at night. We seem to have bypassed our Indian Summer this year. Yes, there is always stuff to fix on a place like ours….never enough time. Wish our pasture would grow without irrigation….you are lucky for such good soil. I see sheep in one of the pics…..next you will have to learn to spin their wool into yarn. Who needs sleep, anyway.
Actually i can spin, I used to when the kids were little, but I don’t have a wheel here, the ones I learnt on are NZ ones and are so dreadfully expensive over here and you are right,, it takes time, but I would love so make some wooly hats and a couple of jerseys, i long for good woolen jerseys to wear when i am working in the cold.. ah well c
I am very allergic to nuts 😦 Pickled Black Walnuts are a very expensive delicacy here! So pleased to see the wee one up and about, bless. Wow, I’m amazed at the chicken tractor picture, those hoekoes sure can eat. Hoping you can ease up a little in your frenetic spiral into winter. Laura
They have eaten so much pasture, i am very impressed.. c
I just read this and thought of you:
“…the Mad Farmer walks quietly away.
There is only one of her, but she goes.
She returns to the small country she calls home,
her own nation small enough to walk across….” (gender changed)
The whole of the manifesto by Wendell Berry is called: The Mad Farmer, Flying the Flag of Rough Branch, Secedes From the Union. I found it on a friends site, here: http://tinyurl.com/kuaglcb
Have a blessed day, Celi.
Thank you i shall go and read it, it sure is an alone job.. 1.30 pm here and I have just fed the kittens again, gosh they are a rowdy bunch now, and am off into the field to shift the field chickens again and then drag the hoses around to everyones barrels. c
Good that the littlest kitten is doing better. He may not yet be out of the woods but it sure sounds like he’s nearing the forest’s edge. Your night pics are looking good, Celi. My experiments have been nothing like these. I buy black walnuts from the Honey Man in Michigan and used them in an upcoming recipe. How nice would that be if you could plant a few on the farmy? It was supposed to rain today but we’ve not seen a drop yet. I hope it gets here and leaves quickly. No need for a rainy day tomorrow with the marathon to be run. Have a great evening, Celi.
Ah yes the marathon, it is broody here, started to rain then didn’t – a while ago, we will see ..I had better get out and do some more chores before it does then! c
Bless that baby! I’m pulling for him and for you, with all the chores and repairs to do; I sympathize. Even here, with just a house and yard and one cat (!), it seems there’s always something that needs to be done. One other thing: we had a big black walnut tree in our yard when I was a child. My dad hung a rope swing from it, and I remember the ground underneath was always bare earth, except for when the walnuts came down. You triggered a great memory!
Wow! Those star pictures are amazing, Celi – and you caught a beautiful shooting star….I love every instalment I manage to get to here at the farm. A never ending story 🙂
Oh Celi, SO many things on your list… But, reusing the greywater and bypassing your septic? Brilliant!
(Despite seeing your name a hundred times at Joss’ page, this is my first visit, so please forgive me if I’m repeating the words of others here; )
On piggy-proofing? FarmGal is currently visiting family out West, but may have some useful advice (on Sheila and maybe a few more things; ) http://livingmydreamlifeonthefarm.wordpress.com/
I also remember a great article on grey water in the original Harrowsmith Magazine (there is a link where the article is mentioned, but it’s a (Canadian) federal government site and is being a pain loading on my phone): Just so you can look it up for yourself, if you like, the following info is (paraphrased) from its google description “… by Robert Kourik: Volume 80, July/August 1988” – found with search parameters: “Harrowsmith/greywater”
We had a problem with the weeping bed once – it turned out that the Macintosh had been planted too close… Good luck with all your endeavours!
Thank you.. Life is full of ways to adapt, thankfully.. c
Wonderful news about kitty #3 🙂
As the G.O. works 6 long days, and our real home which still needs maintenance despite our absence is 6 hours drive away, (sometimes the city apartment too) I get that list and the feelings behind it, as there is always that other primary need for rest and quality of life as well, competing for available time and energy. I get so frustrated that I do not have the strength and skills to be able to do some of the things on our list, and try to remember that my abilities and what I do makes a difference, and our life would be deficit without them.
Love the starry sky – sometimes looking at it feels like the Universe is a giant celestial fairground, and the earth is a merry-go-round on which we’ve chosen to ride 🙂
A merry go round indeed, and your mention of a list is a god idea, in fact maybe i will make a huge list of everything.. sometimes it clarifies things.. c
You could use a written list to triage maybe…
Top 5 would be so much easier to contemplate than 20.
Our list has never taken written form – the G.O. has a historical antipathy to to-do lists, plus it would scare us, but occasionally we have a conversation, and then decide it’s all too much.
Just catching up after months away… I can see you are as busy as ever x
Nice photos of the shooting star (awesome colour; ) and yes, that is Orion. Seeing him appear normally makes me a little melancholy as it means we’re moving into the Winter Skyscape, but this year, Fall has been absolutely incredible here! Great to hear your bees are doing well too (and you certainly do cover a lot of ground in one post; )
Have you wormed the kits yet?
I have the stuff, but was waiting for them to get stronger and I guess they are.. good point, I will do that tomorrow… c
Buckle up indeed. I don’t have a clue why, but as I read I felt the need for a map of the farmy, a pretty artistically hand drawn and painted one, much like the 100 Acre Wood in Winnie the Pooh books. I think it was your phrase “Fellowship” that got me thinking that direction. Have a lovely weekend!! xx
I have promised myself that i will do this, maybe I will get down the watercolour pencils.. soon.. soon.. I love Winnie the Pooh. i am naming my next heifer Winnie.. c
Just reading your daily schedule does leave one breathless, as others have mentioned before. No wonder ‘tired Celi’!! And the house[hold] repairs are a never ending . . . too big for you so write them down on a big sheet of paper and perhaps there are fairies at the bottom of the garden . . . trust Boo to be right there when Kitty #3 takes his first steps . . . sleep well when you get there . . .
Good idea to write them down darling girl, i shall, and yes i need a BIG piece of Butchers paper for that list!
We have a whole bunch of black walnut trees here and the brambly weeds are thick under them! i keep hearing nothing is supposed to grow there but it does. The most aggravating aspect, other than twisting your ankles on the nuts whilst walking under them, is that the squirrels carry them into the barn to eat. Whenever you move ANYTHING in the barn you have an avalanche of black walnut shells. Quite the mess. I hear you on the chore list, sometimes it seems everywhere you look something needs doing. I scramble to get the things I can’t manage by myself done all summer, as soon as fall and the various hunting seasons start I’m pretty much on my own. Sometimes I do get so very tired but then I think how lucky I am to be living out in the country with the gardens and critters and peacefulness even though it is an awful lot of work.