Garden

As a preface, this post was written about 2 months ago, and is now just being finished.

 While all of our attention was being directed at the chickens, the ducks surprised us a few weeks early with our first eggs! 2 small eggs in the first two days, and then two double yokers the next day! After that we saw quite a few soft shell eggs, with a bit of an adjustment to their diet and them getting into a routine, we are seeing almost 2 duck eggs a day. Not bad from 4 ladies (2 are drakes). We may be having thanksgiving duck with the spare drake! As a way of giving the ducks some more space, I built a deck pond and deck. Using all salvaged lumber and a pond liner, the ducks are happily splashing about.

The gardens are fairing with the weather fluctuations. We began the spring and summer with record rain, and now are into a dry spell. Lettuce and carrots were the first crop to grace our tables. Fresh carrots are a new garden favorite of mine. We had two full bowls like the one below! Second harvest seeds have been planted. 

The real growing season began with squash and zucchini, then bell peppers, and next came cucumbers. The surprise of the season came from the everberry strawberries that we just planted this year, they just keep producing delicious berries. Beans have been making a nice appearance and as of this week, our first tomatoes!

Update: In the beginning of October, we harvested our potatoes. Baxter was very helpful when it came time for digging. We did not get too many, but we had a few nice ones. It was a good experiment and I think I thought of away to simplify harvesting next year. We will build a new box in the spring! 

Our largest tomato of the season appears to be the one that came in at a whopping 1lb 15 oz. One of the largest I have ever grown! I believe it is a pink brandywine, however it could be a german pink. I have too many varieties to remember. 

We have picked a couple spaghetti squashes so far, we have another half dozen waiting. They are also making a run for the heavy weight title by averaging around 7.5 lbs a piece. 

The assortment of varieties and colors has been spectacular out of the tomatoes. Between many pounds of roasted tomatoes, and the many batches of fresh, colorful salsa we have consumed, we couldn't be happier. We will see how long this warm spells sticks around, if it keeps up, we may have fresh tomatoes up until November!

 Until next time