What did you do in the garden today?

[karenerwin]

Pulled weeds out of the raised bed and tossed them to the chickens. Pulled the 2 attempted (but failed) mini greenhouses made out of school bus windows out of the raised bed garden. Left them in the yard for the hubby to haul away.
Took my granddaughter to the park for an hour and then we went to a friend's animal rescue and saw horses, a mini cow, goats, pigs, ducks, geese, chickens, pigs, a donkey, a mini horse, and lambs.
Going to work on the rehab house tomorrow.

 

[pennyJo1960]

God a pretty EE back I had sent to live with friends they said she was lethargic and moody .. Brought her home she is in crate with shavings food and bottle gave her a feeder
she did not seem interested in it put some on the floor she started pecking it happy .. she what she does in couple days there

 

[Sueby]

I picked up a Chicago Fig today. Pretty sure I can actually keep it in a pot for quite a long time. It only gets 10-12 ft tall according to the details on the packaging. With some pruning, I bet its possible to keep it around 6ft. Then I can bring it in the sun room in the winter. Even at 6ft plus the pot it should clear the doorway easily enough.

View attachment 2552893

You can make it any height & shape you want by pruning. Mine is probably 4.5 feet tall (including the pot) which is the perfect height to fit through the doors. I keep it on a rolling plant stand thingie, it goes outside in the spring & in an unheated, dark room in the house for the winter so it will go dormant. I get plenty of figs every year keeping it pruned small & manageable.

Yours is gonna grow like crazy this summer!

Morning everyone. Back to normal temps today, thankfully.

Oooh, looks like my compost pile is going to get a makeover! DH just asked if I wanted these:

 

[Sally PB]

^^ Well, uh, yeah!

 

[littledog]

My redbud tree from Gurney's that FedEx said would arrive today, never showed up, grrr! Oh well, the native plants I ordered from our local conservation district are ready to be picked up this week, so maybe the tree will get here and we'll plant all of them this weekend.

I was going to build some raised beds, but had to build a new ramp for the dog instead - she has bad hips and can't do stairs. I broke the old one when I slipped and fell on it when it was freezing the other night. No serious injuries, just the dog giving me the "I told you so" look.

I did get the compost pile turned - amazing how it's about 1/2 the height it was a couple months ago - lots of great compost down below! Picked up some seedling mix, I need to start some seeds in the next couple weeks. Spring really creeps up so fast here - two weeks ago we were under snow, and two weeks from now we'll be smelling lilacs and the first asparagus will be popping up!

 

[Sally PB]

I walked up to the green house today. Still about 8-10" of snow on the ground, but it's all hard packed and I didn't even sink in. It was 49 degrees in there... Spinach and lettuce seem to be doing well. I'm impressed with their hardiness. The spinach is up to its third set of true leaves now.

Go, spinach, go!

 

[NewBoots]

I did get the compost pile turned - amazing how it's about 1/2 the height it was a couple months ago - lots of great compost down below!

Same thing here, the full compost bin isn't full anymore so I'm going to fork the stuff in the newest pile into the old pile.

Got a bunch more of the weeding in the raised beds done to the great joy of the ladies. Tore a couple of big piles of grass off for the rabbits in the rabbitat and the kids in the grow out plus there was half a banana left over from the sundae extravaganza that I split up among the adults. When I was in town yesterday I picked up a couple more packets of tomato seeds (of course I did). Determinants Oregon Spring (supposed to be super cold hardy for early spring planting) and Saucey since I really do like the growth habits of determinants. I'll never be able to grow hot peppers well enough to keep up with what I need/want I'll just have to buy them as I can. Once we reach the stage of opening the local farmer's market again I'll see who grows what where and see if I can get more fruits and veg for canning in season.

And I talked to the folks at Farr's (Farr's Has Everything!) and they said getting canning jars and lids is going to be even harder than it was last year. That their supplier is rationing them out a tiny bit at a time. I know the Walmart I do my grocery pickups from has been out of everything for months, the while I still see some on Amazon, the prices they're asking are insane. Not likely to be many in yard sales here since this is such a small rural town and just about everyone cans so I'll have to start hitting the Coos Bay yard sales I guess. @WthrLady, you said you reused lids? How do you go about it?

 

[WthrLady]

I reuse them after canning for dry storage.
I also have tattler/harvest saver lids which I only use for dry storage.
I don't reuse lids that have been heat processed for heat processing again. (rings yes, but not the flat lids.)

 

[Sueby]

It stresses me out that the lids are so hard to get! I'm thinking I have enough for this year, hopefully supplies catch up soon tho.

 

[Sally PB]

Last year, I got lids from Fillmore Container. Here's a link:

https://www.fillmorecontainer.com/catalogsearch/result/?q=wide+mouth+canning+lids

One of the options was:

Wide mason mason jar canning flats - These canning lids are silver and available in sleeve quantities of 175 lids.

Cost listed as $94.50 plus shipping.

Good luck! Oh, you might want to get a couple bottles of lemon juice for canning tomatoes. I did in June, and come August, it was harder to find, though not sold out all the time.