Look how big Oscar has gotten!! We have had him for about four and a half months and he has grown from about the size of a half dollar to about the size of an adult hand. His diet of fish pellets, worms from our worm bin, and the occasional lettuce leaf has served him well.
Now as Jesus was walking by the Sea of Galilee, He saw two brothers, Simon who was called Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea; for they were fishermen.
The two towering tomato plants have now been removed from the system. The vegetation growth was quite impressive, however the tomato production left something to be desired. It’s not the tomato’s fault. During the time we were growing the tomatoes in the aquaponic bed, we were experimenting with the use of cheap feeder fish. When the fish thrived, the tomatoes thrived. When the fish died, the tomatoes stalled. Just like we would expect.
Now that we have the fish situation stabilized with Oscar, the oscar, and Ally Peters, the algae eater, we are moving on to spinach. In the left side of the picture you will see a tray of Rootcubes Plus. I’ve never used these before, but so far so good on the spinach germination. When these get a bit bigger we plan on transplanting the spinach plants into the aquaponic grow bed to provide spinach for our farm fresh egg omelets.
“Though your beginning was insignificant, yet your end will increase greatly.”
—Job 8:7 (NASB)
So the end of the 2016 home garden season has come to a close. Here we share our successes and failures so that we can learn from our history and make this valuable hobby more fun and productive. Bottom line of the 2016 season … we grew a lot of food … for the deer.
Our main focus next year will be to set up some sort of fencing system. We may install a sonic deterrent as well. Additionally our wood chip project should be completed, at least in the garden area. I’m still so happy about having scored about 10 yards of free wood chips!
We didn’t grow as many greens in 2016 as in seasons past. I’m contemplating if we should focus on that a bit more in the early and late part of the season. We really need to be eating more greens!
Also, because of the cold May and our late start on things, the compost and leaf mold wasn’t prepared in time to add early in the season. The low effort techniques we are using backfired for us due to the cold May, but we will be more than prepared for 2017. Also, we don’t anticipate adding more 4×4 SFG boxes in the next year or so. My hope is that the wood chip project will be conditioning the soil underneath such that we could perhaps grow some tomatoes up electrical conduit and pruned to a single stem as a way to increase our tomato production to make fresh salsa and better utilize the space in between our 6 established 4′ x 4′ gardening beds.
For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; …
Dried fennel ferns make a great addition to meat dishes. But how do I roast a fennel bulb? That is the question. As you can see in the picture below, we had some success in growing our first fennel in our square foot garden this year. The fennel ferns have been plucked and set aside for drying. The task at hand now is to find some cooking instructions or even a recipe for this delightful little fennel bulb.
Reminds me of a celery heart.
With they daylight hours waning, our hens are down to providing us yet a single egg per day. Some of the eggs are small. But on occasion we are blessed with an extra large egg. This one from the other day dwarfs the others, and is so large it doesn’t even really fit into our large egg carton. I’m looking forward to cracking open what I believe to be a double yolk egg for my spinach and cheddar omelette breakfast.
Oscar the fish has now been with us over 2 1/2 months!! So far so good. And like a good little meat eating fish, Oscar has been busy adding his particular brand of nutrients to the aquaponic water. Imagine our relief when the growth stunted tomatoes started to ripen!
I haven’t done many updates on our aquaponics system, but I’ve been considering pulling out the existing plants and making a run at growing fresh spinach at home for my morning omelette. Thus far I’ve extracted the top portion of one of the two rather large tomato plants, but I’ve yet to attempt to pull out the roots system. Of course now that these tomatoes are growing and ripening again, I’m having second thoughts. In the meantime, I’ll be enjoying this Yellow Boy tomato on a sandwich real soon.
Stay humble …. God Bless!
It’s quite amazing that little girls can take to chickens as pets as readily as these girls have. Don’t get me started on the mess they can make in the backyard, but it is refreshing to have pets that don’t shed in the house and will actually produce something edible, unlike our beloved pet cat or dog (not trying to take anything away from our fur-babies!!). The four main hens are kicking out about three eggs per day presently.
The younger hen that we introduced to the flock, New Chick, isn’t old enough to lay just yet. But we are extremely pleased that the main hens are not picking on New Chick too badly. They aren’t thick as thieves just yet, but as she strengthens and grows, it is our sincere hope that New Chick will be fully integrated into our small flock.
In the picture below, our Steeler fan Chloe is introducing Blondie, our alpha-hen, to a baby bird camped out in our compost area. What a neat treat to see this baby bird up close. Soon after the introduction, the baby bird hopped away never to be seen again.
Welcome to Humbleville, USA!! September has been beautiful in SE Michigan. The deer, however, has emphasized the HUMBLE in Humbleville. We will be considering putting up fencing at some point if this continues to be an issue.
We have only spread about 7 of the 10 full yards of FREE wood chips we took delivery on a month ago. Although it’ll take quite a bit of human energy to get them placed where we desire, you can’t beat the price. The project will include us laying down cardboard from reclaimed cardboard boxes to kill any weeds or grass, and then heaping a minimum of six inches of mulch on top. Not only will this help us keep the weeds and grass from growing in our gardening area, but as these wood chips break down over time it will actually recondition the soil beneath it, potentially increasing our usable and viable garden space!
The mint and chives are the crop of the season. Very easy to grow. We also harvested and ate the watermelon we grew which quit growing when it was under the size of a basketball. The crown jewel of the garden this year is the single pumpkin. Unfortunately the butternut squash we were looking forward to have been eaten by Muchie, the deer. The peas are done, but they were fun. And I’m not sure it mattered that we forgot to plan cucumbers this year as the deer have eaten nearly everything that we had growing on the trellis.
Another success? Container gardening! We didn’t do the container tomato update in this video, but we show you a couple of our “porch peppers”. We will need to consider doing more container gardening along with some sort of fence project in 2017.
Here are some thoughts on wood chips from our blog: https://humblevilleusa.com?p=162
Speaking of the blog … we also have a new blog at www.HumblevilleUSA.com!! Have a look and see! Please continue to join us on our journey by SUBSCRIBING to this channel. It really helps. Thank you and God Bless !!
Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.
Ephesians 4:2 | NIV
Fall mushroom hunting in Michigan is a lot of fun. We are definitely novice mushroom hunters, but having a focus or purpose coupled with a beautiful autumn walk in the woods is simply divine. There are a few samples we brought back for further study. If you recognize any of these mushrooms pictured below, would you be so kind as to comment below?
The spreading of the wood chips is going slow but steady. Of course we got the weather with temperatures in the high 80’s and 90%+ humidity the week after we obtained this huge pile of free wood chips. We’ve learned that continually making small steps in the right direction will be met with huge results in the longer term.
One task that is slowing this project down just a little is in obtaining free cardboard to lay down under the wood chips to help kill the weeds and grass underneath. Admittedly we have not been diligent in getting the cardboard, so the slow progress is honestly self induced. The cardboard will break down nicely over time, as will the wood chips, thus conditioning the soil underneath and eventually building the soil back up to a state that would allow for some direct planting into the ground just outside of the garden boxes. I’ve seen one fellow on Youtube who now drives in some steel electrical conduit (like we’ve used for our trellis) and prunes his indeterminate tomato plants to a single vine which he gently ties to the steel pole for support. In several years when our soil is conditioned, we may try this technique.
And to Adam he said, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”