New Life On A Homestead » Gardening

Pinch ‘Em Off!

Kendra at New Life On A Homestead — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 14:34:22 +0000

I can’t believe I almost forgot to do this!!

My broccoli seedlings are looking great, but I noticed that they were beginning to fall over. And then I remembered I’d almost forgotten a crucial step in growing seedlings…

Once the true leaves have begun to grow, pinch off the first set of leaves so the plant’s energy is focused on true growth!

See the heart shaped leaves at either side of the larger, center leaf? Those are the first leaves. And they gotta go.

It’s easy. All you do is use your fingernail to cut the first leaves from the stem. Or you can use scissors, if you want. Just don’t yank or tear them off, as this might uproot your tender seedlings.

And here they are all pinched off! Yes, they look bare now, but don’t worry, your plants will thank you for helping to lighten the load.

Garden Planting Planner Must Have!

Kendra at New Life On A Homestead — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 01:04:02 +0000

Our friend, Janise, tipped me off to the most awesome website ever the other day, and I am so in love.

It’s called Sprout Robot, and if you haven’t already created an account there… DO IT. Like, right now.

It works like this. You type in your zip code, check off which plants you’d like to put in your garden, let them know if you are using containers or planting in the ground, and they will give you a month-by-month weekly schedule of what you need to plant when!

There are also detailed instructions for how to plant each seed variety, and they’ll even send you a reminder email when it’s time to get something going! It tells you when your seedlings should start sprouting, when you should be ready to harvest… it practically does all the work for you!

It’s free to join, but you can upgrade if you’d like the additional service of having your seeds sent to you when it’s time to plant. Genius.

This website is the ABSOLUTE BEST gardening helper I have come across, hands down!! Love, love, love it!

Check it out. Thanks, Janise!!

A Chicken Moat

Kendra at New Life On A Homestead — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 02:55:33 +0000

I just came across the most brilliant idea ever.

A chicken moat.

Have you guys heard of this, yet?

Basically, it’s a tunnel of wire for your chickens to roam in, which runs around the perimeter of your garden. It’s like a chicken run that borders your entire garden area. The idea is that the chickens in the moat will catch many of the grasshoppers and other bugs that are making their way into your garden, before they get to your plants.

Is that genius, or what?!

Here’s an example of one I found on Back Yard Chickens. Although it’s very nice, to me it looks very labor intensive and expensive. What I have in mind is taking some sturdy wire fencing, bending it into an arch, and attaching it in tunnel form from the existing garden fence to the ground with yard staples. It sounds good in my head, anyways.

Another thing I love about this idea is that one of the problems I have in our garden is not being able to till right up against the fence… which means weeds take over like crazy all around the sidelines of my garden. If I have a run there, the chickens will make quick work of scratching up these encroaching weeds, and I won’t have to waste any time pulling them out!

Mother Earth News has an article on how to build a chicken moat, you might wanna check out for some ideas. Their plans are more of an open run than the enclosed tunnel that I envision for our moat, but you can kinda get the gist of it.

I’m thinking it would be awesome to have the moat connect to a small run, which leads back into the coop. In the mornings we could let the chickens out straight into the run, they could wander throughout the moat at their will, and go back into the coop to roost for the night. That would be ideal.

Ooooh, I can’t wait to get one of these installed around our garden!!

What do you think? Have you ever seen a chicken moat, or do you have one yourself?

And My Spring Garden Begins!

Kendra at New Life On A Homestead — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 01:38:14 +0000

Today, I caught a glimpse of the beginning of my spring garden. My little broccoli seedlings are emerging!

Last year, I started my broccoli seeds on Feb. 7th, but I felt like I’d gotten in a little late in the game, so this year I decided to start my seeds on Jan. 22. And they’re sprouting! Well, 6 out of 24 are peaking out anyways, so that’s a start.

Actually, I also stuck 9 broccoli seeds straight into a raised bed on the 15th… out of sheer impatience. But there’s no sign of life among them.

Now that I’ve got my growing light hanging over the kitchen counter again, I’m ready to start a bunch of other things and fill up that empty space beside the broccoli seedlings!

Spring, I just might be on time this year!

Greenhouse Progress

Kendra at New Life On A Homestead — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 14:52:38 +0000

I couldn’t wait any longer to show you the progress we’re making on our greenhouse. I’m getting so excited!

It might not look like much right now, but I think it’ll look really nice when it’s all finished up. A coat of white paint, some lattice around the bottom, and a few plants here and there… it’ll be gorgeous.

So far, we have zero money in the project. That’s right, every bit of the materials have been salvaged! The floor of the greenhouse is made from shipping pallets, the windows are the old ones we took out of our fixer-upper house when we remodeled, plus some windows we salvaged from a friend’s father’s house remodel, and the walls are made from scrap lumber we had leftover from some of my husband’s old skateboard ramps. We had the 4×4 posts and some bags of concrete leftover from other projects… so yeah, we’re doing really good so far! We may have to buy a cap for the peak of the roof, we’ll see.

It’s on the south side of the house, so it’ll receive maximum sun exposure. We decided to build it up off the ground to accommodate the crawlspace underneath the house.

We’re totally just winging it. Although I have skimmed my books on how to build a greenhouse, we aren’t following any particular plans. I’m sure we’ll make mistakes, but we’ll deal with that as they come about I guess.

I’d love to put a gutter system on it, and have a downspout into the greenhouse to fill a rain barrel, which could then help water the plants inside. If we paint a plastic rain barrel black, it’ll absorb the sun’s heat and help to warm the greenhouse in the winter. We don’t have any other heating system planned as of right now.

We’re hoping to use the greenhouse to extend our growing season, and to start seedlings to transplant into the garden. And maybe, if we can get the humidity and temperature regulated just right, a few dwarf fruit trees like bananas, oranges, and lemons will be grown as well!!

Anyways, I just thought I’d share how it’s coming along! I can’t wait to fill it with plants!

And… This Is Why You’re Supposed To Mulch In The Winter.

Kendra at New Life On A Homestead — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 03:57:31 +0000

Remember these beautiful artichoke plants I just shared with you a couple of days ago?

Yeah.

Now look at ‘em…

I know. I’m cringing too.

I looked out my front door yesterday and was horrified to find three out of four of my poor artichokes shriveled and gray.

I gasped, “What the heck happened to my artichokes?!” And my husband recalled that it had gotten down to 19* the night before.

Dang it!!!

I totally should have mulched these plants. I’m the worst procrastinator ever.

I read that one way of protecting artichoke plants from hard freezes is to make an enclosure around them with chicken wire, and fill it in, completely covering the plants with leaves.

Guess I’ll have to do that to my last surviving artichoke. Although… there is still a tad bit of green left on the other three plants. Maybe there’s hope yet!

Lesson learned. Mulch your plants in the winter. Or at least pay attention to the weather, and throw a blanket over them if it’s gonna freeze!

New Life On A Homestead » Gardening

Pinch ‘Em Off!

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