What did you do in the garden today?

[U_Stormcrow]

Ok, well, I'll try them. There are a lot of health benefits to eating them, so maybe I can find a way that I can tolerate them. Never had them dehydrated...

Thanks for the heads up on them staining stainless steel.

Actually, I have shredded dehydrated beets as a forage material for my goats, just rehydrate before use. But the more I handle it, the more convinced I am that it would make excelent mushroom substrate...

 

[Sally PB]

I love dehydrated fruit as a snack. I wonder if drying beets would concentrate the sugar enough to cover the dirt taste...? Tune in a few months from now...

 

[SheaLoner]

I swore off Gurney's last year. I ordered some Red Baron onion sets, and they arrived rather late. I got a couple of emails saying they would ship on such-and-such date. Then it would be delayed. They didn't look that great when they got here, either. Lots of them were dried up, shrunken little bits.

This year, I've ordered onion sets from someone else, the Maine Potato Lady. Never ordered from her before, so we'll see what we get.

I love dealing with the Maine Potato Lady. Good service, great plants. I have ordered from them many times. The potato onions are a nice specialty they carry. Perennial onions everyone should have a patch.

 

[WthrLady]

@Sally PB Dirt, yup that sums it up.

I feed beet shreds to the alpaca in the winter, but even those smell of dirt.
====
Started painting the hoop house rails in the workshop.
5" of snow is coming tomorrow night, so the cover won't be going on yet, but I'll be ready when the day presents itself.

Didn't make it into the shed yesterday, maybe today.

 

[Wee Farmer Sarah]

Apologies are due. Yesterday I read an article online regarding the avian flu. Digging deeper the story was a news article from a TV station in Chicopee Massachusetts. Very misleading article. After checking with APHIS I found that the only cases of the virus was in two Canadian geese in Barnstable, Massachusetts. Easy how misinformation thrives on the internet.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Apologies are due. Yesterday I read an article online regarding the avian flu. Digging deeper the story was a news article from a TV station in Chicopee Massachusetts. Very misleading article. After checking with APHIS I found that the only cases of the virus was in two Canadian geese in Barnstable, Massachusetts. Easy how misinformation thrives on the internet.

Adding up the APHIS numbers (as of 3/6), its 2.8 million birds so far, I think we can spot you a couple as mis-reported. I'm still waiting on results for the ones found in east central FL last week. No harm, no "fowl". Which, in this case, is a very good thing.

Still, appreciate the honesty in calling out your own error.

 

[Wee Farmer Sarah]

Adding up the APHIS numbers (as of 3/6), its 2.8 million birds so far, I think we can spot you a couple as mis-reported. I'm still waiting on results for the ones found in east central FL last week. No harm, no "fowl". Which, in this case, is a very good thing.

Still, appreciate the honesty in calling out your own error.

Thank you. I’m still a bit confused as to what exactly is a “backyard flock (non poultry). Please inform me.

 

[Sally PB]

I love dealing with the Maine Potato Lady. Good service, great plants. I have ordered from them many times. The potato onions are a nice specialty they carry. Perennial onions everyone should have a patch.

Glad to read this.

I have some potato onions, from another source. This will be my second season with them. I treated them like garlic, in that I saved the largest ones to plant, and kept the smallest ones to eat. Even the largest ones weren't very big, so I'm hoping they "size up" a bit this year. Any tips on how to coax some size into them?

We're going heavy on the onions this year. I have Egyptian Walking Onions, potato onions, and 200 sets each of Red Baron and Stuttgarter. I am stretching out last year's harvest, and they're nearly gone.

 

[WthrLady]

Apologies are due. Yesterday I read an article online regarding the avian flu. Digging deeper the story was a news article from a TV station in Chicopee Massachusetts. Very misleading article. After checking with APHIS I found that the only cases of the virus was in two Canadian geese in Barnstable, Massachusetts. Easy how misinformation thrives on the internet.

No worries. I couldn't even find Mass listed on the Federal Notice side, but I figured you were local, so you'd know better.
They found one positive goose in a pond 20 miles from me and the news has worked themselves up into a tizzy. Which is why I don't watch them anymore. I do get their twitter feed, which headlined 'local poultry keepers in a panic'. Um no.. NO one is in a panic, it's an annual thing. Even the big costco farms can't keep wild birds out of the barns/pens. This is a major, I mean MAJOR, flyway for migrating birds, there's no way to avoid exposure unless you have a clean room outside your pens to fully change into all new clothing EVERYTIME you come and go. I still have to walk through the yard to get to the pens.

That said, if you like to watch birds the cameras are up and running. One million cranes on the river. 200,000 at any given time. Predawn and dusk roost are the most active to watch, back the camera up to just before dawn to watch and listen to take off. NOISY here.
The day is cranes, geese and ducks..right now is a huge flock of pintails.
https://explore.org/livecams/national-audubon-society/crane-camera

 

[WthrLady]

OK so NON-poultry flock.
I have actually called the Mass State bird division people to clear this up, because it is driving me NUTS.
Their own site states
"The definition of poultry includes, but is not limited to chickens, guinea fowl, peafowl, pheasants, partridges, quail and turkeys."
So what the hell was it? Butterflies? Pigeons (could have been racers or flocked), flying monkeys?
So I should get an email response eventually.