Washingtonians

[Cowgirlgrace]

OK, off to make salad mix for the co op tomorrow. Lettuce, spinach, arugula, baby kale, mizuna, mustards, bok choi and a few other asian greens I can't recall right now. I also add Bulls Blood beet leaves and Corn salad but haven't got around to planting it yet. Then off to mow a few lawns. Bye!

 

[Chickielady]

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Little jerks as in slugs ?
Bugs?
or peeps ?

I am going to encircle the garden with fencing..and let a flock out to free range in the area.
The rest are allowed up the hill, but NO chickens are allowed OUT in my garden !

No No No!!!http://bestsmileys.com/nono/2.gif
THAT is our food !
And I take it seriously, the cost & work alone.
The food grown will be blanched, frozen, stored, dehydrated, canned or pickled, for winter stores

CL, have you planted buttercup squash before? this is my first time and I cant figure out if it's going to vine or grow like a zuchinni (sp). I was going to have them trail over the sides of my raised planter beds but they are trying to grow taller than my tomatoes!https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/uploads/83510_img_0444.jpg

I do not have Buttercups this year, but did last year.
They were vines.
But I think you can get a Buttercup in either a bush or a vine type.
Up until 2 years ago, I had a vine-type heirloom Zuchinni, did well in NorCal, and NO ONE had one that I could ever find.
And I always left a few to go to seed, and planted them the following year.
But they did poorly here, never produced at all, so no more vining zuchinni.

You will have to look at the seed pack, or plant tag or look up where ever you bought the seed, and find out if it is a buch or vining type.
Edited to add: Your squash looks like a bush, and also looks very happy.
Look inside the clump for vining shoots coming out, if a vine, it should have some growing out by now.
If no vines, but flowers starting from the clump, it is a bush.
Vines have their flowers on the vine itself, not the center clump.
Hope this helps...will have to waite & see I guess???

 

[Stumpfarmer]

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These [URL]https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/uploads/25179_261943_10150219890352081_704822080_7092738_5524948_n.jpg[/URL] are some beads a friend of mine makes. You like ?

I LOVE lampwork, something I have always wanted to learn! I bought the beads in this bracelet I made from Farmer Dave in Portland. It has far too much bling for me to wear, but always draws in people at shows until they look at the price. I paid nearly $100 for the lampwork in it and the remainder is Swarovski Crystal, sterling silver, and vintage pressed glass, and people offer me $50 for it. I dn't make stuff to sell in that range anymore. The green bracelet in the other photo is also one I only do as gifts - I peyote stitch each of those tube beads from 40 seed beads, and there are 24 of those beads! Again, the remainder is swarovski and sterling silver. Someone offered me $35 for it. That is less than the materials. I even told her so. I ended up trading one like it for one hour of my daughters harp lessons. Took me 8 hours to make it. I wouldn't dream of bartering down her rate for lessons, yet so many people fell that they should get something I made for less than the materials used, and then they will turn around and buy someting from the Silpada catalog for twice what I ask!

https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/uploads/72609_m_farmer_dave_lampwork_close-upt.jpg

Gorgeous- not what I do, but twice as complicated and wonderful results! The peyote-stitch tubes look like they'd be really nice-feeling on the wrist, especially.

I'm not doing much beading lately, I need an adjustment on my upper back or something, because using my hands for fine work screws up everything else right up to the spine. I make beaded chain neclkaces and earrings and multi-row memory wire bracelets, and multi-row beaded necklaces- the last one of those I finished is labradorite beads in...eight? shapes and sizes, with which I'm not yet sufficiently satisfied to photograph- it supports my sterling silver bottle of Bulgarian Absolute Rose, which I used to wear on a bootlace before I needed quite so much moisturizer. The wire-and-bead hanger isn't yet what I want, nor the clasp, and I suspect I'll need to buy Sterling wire, work out a fourth pattern in craft wire, and then work it in sterling, but at the moment it works well enough for how rarely I go anywhere calling for a necklace.

Anyone who thinks jewelry making is for sissies needs to track their BG levels when they do it; I use up more energy making beaded chain for a couple hours than mopping the whole house.

 

[Chickielady]

OK, I too am off to get some work done...so I will be back later.
Gosh I cannot believe how DARK it is getting here.
And supposed to be in the 70s ???????
Be prepared for a humid day today, rare as that would be here on the coast.
The No-see-ums are very happy about it.
I do not think they will ever die off this """summer""" as long as it is damp, they live on............

BYE!!

 

[Stumpfarmer]

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We were out walking along the river in Woodinville this afternoon. It was only in the low seventies, but sooooo humid. We were sweating.

I thought Washington did not have humidity. I was hoping to get away from it when we move there.

Not midwest style humidity, and rarely ever day after day of humid weather. Yesterday and Sunday afternoon got muggy-ish: over seventy and intermittant showers, and no wind at all. We have intermittant showers and no wind quite often, it's just usually under 50F! The relative humidity meter in my office has gone above 33% for the first time in... forever, so long I was sure it was broken... to a magnificent 44%, with the window wide open. What's really rare is humid nights, and it takes a monster of a heat wave for nighttime temps to stay above 70F, speaking in out-of-town terms. Anywhere with lots of pavement stays hotter at night.

Some places are more humid: the Willamette Valley for notable instance, and some places like Pe Ell and Cinnibar which sit in closed basin valleys get hotter and more humid under very specific weather conditions.

Of course the real fun about living on the wet side is that the topography leads to some whacky microclimates: my house is 10 degrees colder in winter, on average over 25 years and 5 degrees warmer in summer, ditto, than my cousin's place twenty feet above me and a hundred feet away, and both of our places get around five inches a year less rain than my sister's place, which is 1.2 miles away as the crow flies. Even worse, we are all colder/hotter/much, much wetter than the official weather station at the Olympia Airport, which is five miles away but in a little pocket rain shadow of the Black Hills, which top out below 3000 ft (useful to remember that our plateau is at 200 ft or so). The airport gets just under 40 inches of rain a year; The Evergreen State College, ten miles north and in the opposite of a rain shadow, gets 60.

Remember that when you look for a farm, here. Look for oak and avoid cedar. Get a topo map and check to see that you're not in a closed basin (my winter lows are because I'm in a stagnant air trap). Avoid the north side of hills.

 

[Stumpfarmer]

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You might, but it looks as if the rest of us are just barely north of the path of the storm. Bad day to go to Hoquium, though.

 

[Stumpfarmer]

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Some lady had the nerve to ask me to deliver chickens to Onalaska! Four hours of my time and 12 gallons of gas. Ya, sure, I'll get right on it.

LOL I had a very old woman call me for Buff Orps last summer, she could not drive any longer but wanted the birds so badly as she had them in her childhood.
She lives in LeBam, not too far from here.
She tried to pay me for gas ($10) but I refused it.
It was nice to see the old woman happy & immediately spoiling the hens.
Does the heart good.

I've been to LeBam: it's attraction is that it's not close to ANYWHERE.

 

[DIYSeattle]

Ive been in Arkansas and Missouri in teh summer, as well as Fla, Al, Ga, Ca, and Ar for periods of time. The heat and humidity here in Western Wa is nothing compared to the heat and humidity back east and in the South. Az and Ca get hot but int eh shade it isnt so bad as the humidity is very low generally. Az gets super hot in teh sun though and that is bad. In the South and much of the east even under a shade tree it is about as hot as not under the tree or shade.

 

[rsarns]

Good Morning fellow Washingtonians. I am looking for someone who lives close to me who might have some Wheaton Marans for sale?

 

[SadieSue]

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Adorable chicks! Nice set-up! And you do have some of the most beautiful Orpingtons.... Gorgeous birds!