International edible gardening

So of all things I caught a brown thrasher - a thrush quite like the British thrush, in the live rat trap! They are all in it together, devouring the tomatoes. I planted another row of wax beans for later harvest - a yellow string bean, bush style, and a couple more okra; the purple ones given to me being old and with zero germination, so the Clemson spineless instead (they should have been a month ago but I do have 6 plants giving me plenty for my soups.)

The pond is really nice, here is my wife trying out a float we found on the side of the road last year - and some dog paddling.

 

Oh, and fish biting......... Unless you wear clothes in they nip you often. The fish know fabric is uninteresting - but you are not, I guess you are living so potential food. If my shirt comes off then - nip - and no matter how I try to ignore it I cannot. Many years ago I spent a lot of time in the remote semi-tropical swamps with alligators, venomous snakes, turtles, and all kinds of things - I even did some commercial fishing in them so came face to face with biting things. We spent a lot of time back in places like this:



And although I have been bitten by huge numbers of things I still cannot relax when something is going to - and then does - bite me underwater. That really stops me relaxing - so I just take the wallet and things out of my pockets and go in with slip on boat shoes. Here it is so warm you dry off right away with just a change into a pair of shorts when getting out.

 

Got the atmosphere of your pond well - Weasel looks a little unsure. South China Sea off Repulse Bay, HK Island. Biting tiny little fish but not a problem with them. Can't stand jellyfish though,
Jenny

 

Jenny, were you in the tropics long?

And here is that silly brown thrasher - the trap was baited with walnuts, the one thing rodents cannot resist. Only they have! They are focused on tomatoes. So far the creatures en-mass have eaten a shopping basket full worth of tomatoes and have lost three rats in the process. (I let the bird go as soon as photoed.) They are clearly winning.



And here are the meat birds hatched a couple months ago, the first bunch of chicks. I really thought there were a several in this picture but can only see 3 (a black one too, 7 in all in the flock) - which is wildlife photography for you. And nothing to give them size either - but they are the size of pigeons, small because they fill up on forest stuff instead of high protein feeds like most meat birds would be.

 

scrawny comes to mind Colne. Will there be enough meat on them to make a meal?
Jenny.
Only visiting friends in HK - about 5 times over 5 years though.

 

Certinly. They are about 8 weeks old, or so, just thinking back, so give them another 6 weeks and they will be perfect for two. My wife does not each much meat so even a bigger one would make a meal now. The thing is the bantam genes. They have either 1/2 or 1/4 bantam ancestry - and you can see it. The tiniest are half as big as the largest.

I checked my incubator a bit ago, 1 week along, 25 eggs; the numbers seem to be 13 hatch, 7 chicks make it to juvenile stage - cost, two dozen eggs, a hen that would lay 4 - 5 eggs a week is tied up for 6 weeks of non-laying being mother hen, (2 dozen eggs, but eats less feed if not laying) and a dollar of electricity. I am amazed at how little feeds the birds are eating now, it is fat times in my woods! So 4 dozen eggs = $15, feed and electricity = $10, so $3.50 per little bird plus weeks of tending. As always bought is cheaper.

In the past half of ones effort or money went on food, growing ones own is a reminder of the human condition throughout history and before, certainly not like it was, but an indication of how things were. “A man may work from dusk to dawn, but a woman’s work is never done”

The garden clicks along, the melons have some borers - my biggest melon on the side patch disappeared in its entirety last night, but then all life burgeons in this green and hot land - the eaters and the eaten.



Here is my main raised bed, the chicken house is back left. Okra, those beans the flying squirrels leave, peppers of all sorts, occasional squash from the stem borer weakened plants - all picked daily, with tomatoes from protected plants here and there. Cucumber plants thinking about fruiting - some tiny ones - I am giving them the MgSO4 leaf spray (Epsom salts) and the sweet potatoes are vining up very well. I have not put much effort into this garden, working instead on making and filling containers this spring.

 

Isn't it a bit feudal to hang the inhabitants for poaching? The little beasts live there and don't know that you are working so hard to make a garden. It is their woodland, your garden, and their land being enhanced so deliciously must seem like good fortune. Can't you outwit the small beasts with a pail over the melons, a plastic bag over the tomato... one bush for them and one for you. Easy for me to say.
Swimming looks awfully fun. I do love your 'personal outboard motor'.

 

I'd be interested in knowing the plucked and drawn weight of one of your pret a table birds Colne ,
Jenny

 

Strangely I am into feudalism right now, a fascinating condition of life really beginning during the Saxon Dark Ages when all was small kingdoms were fighting and raiding, Vikings, kings killed by their sons and then invaded and all was complete savagery. Prior to the beginning of feudalism each man owned his land (called peasants, small land owning farmers) ( Feudalism is when all lords were basically owned by the king, and then each Earl, Theign and knight owned the men under them - over 1/2 the population being surfs and tied to the land of their master. Prior, the peasant owned his land and himself paying tax. But all Europe broke down post Rome. Then with the fall of Charlemagne's empire by his grandsons infighting all fell to plundering and rapacious tiny kingdoms being wrecked by the Norsemen - and so the populations of Europe had to swear them selves to a lord and surrender themselves and all properties to him for his protection - and the lord the same to a king, for his survival, and so the invention of feudalism. The King then owned all, having his lords manage it in exchange for fighting men and tax, and created large bureaucracies for tax and courts - and that gave the stability for the evolution into the Renaissance. A strong man was vital and the King was him.

And I am reading on the foxhole fighting of WWII - amazing stuff - only about half actively surrendering soldiers from each side would be taken alive - the others shot intentionally - such was the condition of the mind of a solider having been living in combat. (and shows the incredibly wicked injustice done to the British solider given life for killing that Taliban Afghani fighter) - a solider kills the enemy in combat, the luxury of Geneva cannot always carry to the field of combat, even amongst the best. British soldiers - every solider - kills the enemy even wile he is attempting surrender in about 50% of the time of hot blood up; in livin life fire combat for prolonged times - especially after his mates have died in his company.)

But gardening...... I turned the eggs in the incubator, and will do some weeding and plant a couple plants we collected. Then I am clearing a 1/2 acre I have let grow into a jungle. The big machine is a beast! It throws its belt though - if you disengage it too quickly, leading to miserable work and some bad burns from the exhaust pipe one must work around. I bought that 1/2 acre for $1500 for back taxes 5 years ago. In USA all land has to pay yearly tax. My house runs about $1000 because you get a break if it is your primary residence. This land's tax is $338 per year. If you do not pay the tax your property is sold after three years. - and it just is a patch of worthless land but on a OK road in town.

So I bought it for an interesting reason - and then had to unscramble the deeds which gave me and another ownership but I filed first and ended up getting them to give it up because land squabbles are not for the faint hearted (I have been in them and know). So I let it grow up to over head tall weeds and woody shrubs and trees - and now am clearing it for putting a tiny cottage on (do to some weird zoning it appears there is no minimum size a house has to be built there.)

Anyway, gardening today, whacking weeds up to 12 foot tall and 4 inches thick. And the peppers are thick, okra too, protected tomato bushes good.

Yesterday was a big snake adventure with a really big Cotton mouth moccasin getting away, although I think fatally injured. I just could not chase it fast enough through the forest because the spider web of green briar vines, although I chased it a good way and got a bit scraped up. Green briar is a thorny vine everywhere that is as strong as jute string. Sorry if he dies suffering, but hope he dies.

 

Colne I read everything history after the Romans up to Tudor, my favourite era being the 'Dark Ages'. I read all British history of the above era but my favourite is Scottish. Anyway, getting to the point, I have quite a few books and if there's any I can point you too please ask. One in particular I've just pulled out is 'The Ties That Bound' by author Barbara A. Hanawalt, it takes a look at everyday medieval peasant family life, from their employment and sanitation to childbirth, it's an interesting read.

I'd like to see some before and after pictures of the ground you're preparing with your 'mean' machine if possible please.

 

Hi Sheal -sorry for the incoherent gibbering previous - I had to dash before proof reading. The half surrendering soldiers killed were ones surrendering during, or around, combat. Post combat situations soldiers would be taken without killing.

Feudalism was the state where money had disappeared so labour was how all was paid. Through days a week, year, or during war as military duty. The West had broken to squabbling factions and raiding so owning ones lands was moot anyway as someone would just burn and plunder it. Feudalism was the collectivizing for existence, where freedom was surrendered for survival. It was broken by many factors, the plague being one of the biggest - surfs could run off to where a different lord had empty farms needing working in exchange for him making them Freemen instead of returning them to their proper master for punishment, this being leverage against their own masters. Another being the return of money as currency and coins - labour was no longer the only currency so a man could pay his tax with cash instead of indenture, lords and freemen could hire mercenaries to fight in their place.

Sorry to bother with the above but I could not make sense of my previous.

So I am off to do stuff and re the big machine - I took it out yesterday, replaced the belt onto the pulleys as it seems to require every use (the stop which holds the belt from being thrown when tension is released is too short) and found the key was missing! It was not in the lock where I had left it. So no mowing. I did get some bamboo from the woods behind my place - the bunch goes over the tent in the woods I have talked about. I needed 5 poles to put another wire for my blackberry trellis.



I did video the machine, but it soon ended, before even getting it off the truck, when I went to start it and no key. This bit of land is on a suburban kind of street, but in town - most of it is still empty from hurricane Katrina, and one house still sits there, a block past, falling down and rotting, from being destroyed by the storm. - as many still do exist here and there in all the coastal towns. (house I care for a couple miles away still has big derelicts on each side of it.) But it is a very bland street, blue collar, lots on one side being 1/2 acre, the other side 1/4 acre, but a well kept street otherwise.

Last night was The Fourth of July. Our 26 miles of beach were packed with parties and firework watchers. Huge bonfire stacks were set on the sand waiting for night - one every few hundred yards. Then at night Massive firework displays were done at the beach front casinos, then the wealthy beach homes had constant, big, fireworks - and the harbours which dot the beach had displays. It is a big sight when darkness falls. Miles and miles of fireworks and massive bonfires and it went on for hours. I lit my $3 - 10 minute lasting sparkling, cracker throwing, firework where we sat and watched it all - The 4th is really worth watching here - the night warm and the sea beautiful. (You can drive the majority of the beach with only the occasional harbours being between the road and the beach. On the inland side are the mansions, towns, or other things.)

Those books are always great fun. I recently read one of the life of a Roman and am still a bit haunted by the brutality of it all though.

 

You celebrated American Independence yesterday and we celebrate Tynwald day here on the island on Monday, although the official date is today 5th July. Tynwald, our island Government, is said to be the oldest in the world.

http://www.tynwald.org.im/about/tynday/Pages/default.aspx

 

Well done, with the unusual sheep and cats why not have the oldest government in the world as well - and what is cool is that it is a Norse government still going. (I have, of all unlikely things, a direct tie to Greenland - another Viking place)

It is time for bed but before a quick walk with the dogs here is tonight's picture - we were out visiting till past dark and so did not lock up the henhouse and a couple opossums were in it, little ones, when we got back, and the dogs went nuts. I let both opossums go after a bit of manhandling and dog chomping - I had to reach in and get the first one from the dogs who went right into the hen house and grabbed it - opossums are slow and not aggressive. This one is totally alive and being held by the tail. I went back into the house for a light and the camera wile the dogs kept the second one on the celling, then he got grabbed, photographed, and tossed into the bayou long grass with his friend. The hens were able to remain on their perches as they had not been attacked - chickens will not arouse in the dark which makes them so helpless; you see this one looking very baffled. Both opossums should be fine.

 

So, off off do some planting - the list of things needing planting from the video earlier still sit under my live oak greenhouse waiting. I got a in depth fishing report from the neighbor. Down the road (two houses on my road other than my two) is a vacation home seldom visited but the son came down for fishing. He is a fanatical fisherman and hunter - shooting all his own meat, and usually takes a cooler full of frozen fillets home with him. (He and his girlfriend go out at dawn in their small boat and then in the afternoon till dark every day - both are expert fishermen and cruse the banks throwing soft bodied lures)

The report: 2 days hard fishing, 2 flounder! Really really bad. This season has been like nothing I have ever seen here, No fish. This was a ground zero for the oil spill - sometimes standing on ,my porch you could hardly breath for the petroleum fumes - hope that has nothing to do with it. (Of all things I worked in Valdez Alaska the two years after the great Exon Valdez oil spill) The other thing is the weather has been totally contrary - winds always from the North and West where this place was developed hundreds of years ago for its prevailing SE winds off the Gulf keeping nights cool and bug free. Weather in the plains and Texas have made our weather odd.

The good news is maybe the Summer and Fall will have amazing fishing because so few were taken this spring. (Sport fishermen down here take a very large catch - very little commercial fin fishing is allowed to leave the fish for the locals to catch for their own use, it is a traditional food source and recreation.) You should know this cooler well by now, but no catching - probabally August - Sept I will be showing it a lot with my catch, eating fish is the norm for us till this year:

(last year photo)



I did not mention but the opossums are big chicken killers - these were on the small size, and we came home in time. I let then go just because I was not in the mood for killing them, not having a pistol handy and not caring to club them wile holding them, and a flashlight and a club all at once. (I carried one into the house to show my wife and she was appalled and told me to get it out so would have been no help.)

But this morning I became resolved to thin the herd this fall when it cools off and food is getting less in the forest. There are just too many animals out there and the winter will see them starving and thus getting desperate and getting destructive.

Here is a raccoon from last year who was eating chickens - during winter, they were hungry. A squirrel has two litters, 6 each, every year - life is hard for the beasts, born coming out of winter and all is plentiful and so many are growing up - and then winter and the forest is a lifeboat that will only carry 1/3 of its occupants. I think some chilies and stews are coming when it cools off.

 

Those Opossum's have faces like Longtails (r-a-t-s), I bet they can give a nasty bite! Oh, another island quirk Colne....we don't say r-a-t-s (I'm spelling that out) here, the Manx are quite superstitious about them so they are called Longtails but do have other names too. It's strange, although I'm not superstitious I just can't bring myself to say the other word anymore, it's surprising what you get used too.

With the damage that's been done with the oil spills and the variations in climate it's not surprising that it has a knock on effect on wildlife of all sorts, let alone the fish. As British gardeners, we have noticed this year there is a lack of butterflies to be seen. Last year there were very few bees around. Have you any big differences from year to year regarding wildlife? A lot of it has to do with climate change surely?