I'm in central Texas (zone 8). Our fall (mid Oct & Nov) and spring (Mar-May/June) have temps in the 70's & 80's. Winter (Dec-Feb-ish) is much like our fall & spring except with some weeks in the 50's & 60's, and some 20's, 30's & 40's occasionally thrown in there.
July, Aug, & Sept are usually HOT & humid. Our family works on inside projects as much as we can during those months. It usually doesn't start cooling down to a bearable temp until after 7pm. So you have about 1-2 hours of tolerable, though sticky, evening time to do outside chores & gardening. Most herbs do great in summer here. As do tomatoes and peppers. But it just seems to get too hot for some of the other things that ya'll probably grow up north during that time. On top of that, I don't want to be out in the heat trying to limp along some struggling plants that I could grow in the fall/winter much more easily. Yes, I'm THAT lazy.
We actually have 2 window units in our barn to keep our dairy cows cool during the hottest part of the summer. The door has one of those refrigeration curtains on it to keep the cool air in and still allow the cows to come and go as they please. The temp in the barn is a cool 78- 80 degrees with about 20% humidity, which is a HUGE difference from 98-108 with 80% humidity.
It has had an enormous impact on the temperment of the cows. They're much less destructive and much less stressed. Research has shown that milk production is decreased by 40-50% when dairy cows are heat stressed. We A/C a 16x19 room for 3 jerseys, and our elect bill has increased by less than $50/mo. in July, Aug & Sept. The increase in summer milk production alone is worth that to me (if the research proves accurate). We're not in milk production yet, so it remains to be seen. But I can definitely say that the difference in their personalities from non-A/C to A/C is quite noticeable. They're calm, rested and playful. Not itchy, fussy, and rubbing all their hair off. It's also a low fly & mosquito zone, since they have to walk through the rubber curtain to get inside. Also, I'd MUCH rather milk a cow in 80 deg. than 100+ deg. Same goes for honey extraction. We do that inside also if it's too hot outside.
We're looking into building an underground barn, so hopefully we won't have to rely on electricity to cool it. We can also use it for root and cheese storage. That's a future dream/project though.
Anyhoo-- that's what works for us....
Oh good. Then you'll get to experience a Texas 'winter', if you haven't already. My DH and I lived in the Hou area for 20 years. They're zone 9 (coastal). We're 2 hours north of Hou now, and seem to have a different 'climate' (if you will). We've been in zone 8 for 5 years now, and I'm still learning about things I can grow here that I couldn't by the coast and vice-versa.
NYS is gorgeous. We were there a few years ago in the fall. Up by Rhinebeck & West Point. The trees were beautiful! Are you in a mountainy area?
Our property is located in what is called a Post Oak Savannah. We have veins of rich soil, veins of sandy loam, and veins of mucky clay & petrified wood running through our property. It's pretty neat, but also poses it's own set of problems. We can't just pick a plot and plant on it, we have to pick a plot and then figure out what trees, etc. would work in that particular vein of soil. LOL!
I use a combination of raised beds, sheet mulching, and guilds, though I haven't tried the three sisters guild yet. Right now I'm setting up our fruit tree guilds.
We found out that in the winter, a nursery chain in Houston, TX marks all their trees down by 70%. The people in that area seem to do more landscape type of planting, so they try to get rid of the trees to get ready for 'spring color' I guess. So my DH & I drive 2 hrs south and load up on fruit trees & vines. 1 gallon pots (trees & fruiting vines) for $4 to $18 each. Most run about $6-8. We bought one untagged "Mystery" tree for $4 just for fun last year. We still haven't figured out what it is.
Things like Kiwi's are in the $18 range (regularly $60). We got 2 females and a male last year to see if they would work in our zone, but the sun killed 1 female and fire ants killed the 2nd female. So now we just have one lonely male. All the 'cheap' plants lived though. Go figure. We'll get another female or two this year and plant them directly under the oak tree to see how that works. I'll also keep a better eye on them for fire ants. If that doesn't work, I don't know what I'll do with our poor little male. He seems pretty happy so far, so it's not the soil. I planted them on the north side of our chicken run which is under an oak tree, so they had something to climb, and they had shade. The male is a little more shaded than the females were though, so I'm hoping more shade is the key.
If anyone knows about kiwi's, I'm open for suggestions.
That's interesting about the cows. We are thinking about getting a cow next year but figured we'd start with a goat to see if we can handle the milking chores. Luckily our summers don't get too bad here in zone 5b. We'll get a few days that get up to the 90's but mostly it hovers in the high 80's. And we live in a desert climate, so no humidity. It makes a world of difference. We don't even have A/C in our current house. The upstairs gets a little too warm, but turn the fans on, and it's not too bad.
We thought about doing those plastic door guards for our loafing shed for the horses to help keep the heat in in the winter. Were your cows scared of it at first? I'm worried they wouldn't go in there at all with those up.
I love end of season sales. We got our 6 fruit trees buy 2 get 1 free. They were 5 gallon pots and we got all 6 for less about $100! They have all survived so far too.
Wish I could help you with the Kiwi but there's no way we could grow those up here without a green house. We have red ants here but haven't seen them by the fruit trees yet. Hopefully they stay away. I used to run a vending machine business (the 25cent candy ones) and we painted this sticky stuff around the bottom of the pole to keep the ants from crawling up it. Wonder if that would work on trees, and how often you'd have to reapply from rain washing it off.
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