I don't have time for this! And, yet, this is the lifestyle I want to live, so I just keep trying anyway.
- My five chickens weren't giving me any eggs for several weeks, but I saw broken egg shells in the coop. My first thought was that I had a break in the fence line somewhere and rats were getting in there to steal the eggs. But then I saw one of the chickens with the shell in her mouth - they were eating them themselves! Long story short: more oyster shells in their diet, still no eggs. So I started pulling them out one at a time and seeing if there were eggs - trying to find the "bad" chicken. Eventually I did find that bad chicken so now I'm getting eggs again. But what do I do with an old chicken who has decided to eat eggs? Really, she should be dinner. But we're not sure we can handle doing that in our backyard. But she wanders about pooping on everything back there, including my back porch. I'll have to build a small coop for just her. What a waste.
- I forgot to harvest my garlic until too late for braiding it. Now I have all these loose cloves of fresh garlic, and no really good way to preserve them for the winter. I might just have to pickle them all.
- I have these huge broccoli, cauliflower, and cabbage plants with no heads on any of them. Very frustrating.
- On my day off work, I took the kids to go U-pick organic blueberries in our neighborhood. A couple hours later, I had a sunburn in the part in my hair and enough blueberries to stuff one freezer bag full into my freezer. For $6. I wish I had had better workers and not such good eaters - luckily you don't have to pay for the quantity in your children's stomachs.
- I tried to can plums in light syrup, using italian plums from the Farmer's market. The family verdict on the result was sour pucker faces - oh well.
- I've managed to make five jars of pickles, after I ordered five pounds of pickling cukes from my CSA farm.
- I did manage to start celery from seed, but then I got busy and forgot to thin them. Tiny little celery!
- I have way too much squash and zucchini, both from my garden and from the CSA share.
- I have not seen a single tomato from my garden. It's planted right below the kids' treehouse and they are snacking on it.
Your efforts sound a lot like mine :) We have good intentions, and lots of learning yet to do. Keep going!
ReplyDeleteOur hens are still young, and not laying yet. I sometimes wonder what we'll do with old hens, and hens that are more work than their worth. I'd be interested to know what you decide to do. Good luck!