What did you do in the garden today?

[chickengr]

I remember back in the days when we went haying, always the fear it could rain while the hay was lying on the ground to dry you had to rely an the radio for the weather forecast, no internet app which tells you when it might rain ( or sunshine for longer periods) and when the hay got wet, you had to buy expensive hay I think round bales had just started to be produced, kind of a novelty, the square bales were the ones which were normal, also, they could be carried and stacked, the round bales were just left on the field, too heavy to be moved by one person , nobody had the money to buy a baler, so we had to rent one for 3 days and pray during that time the hay would dry and no rain would come

when I was a kid I remember my grandparents and other people did this:

 

[Sammster]

Speaking of grapes. Catawbas are ripe! I only got a third of the way down the line before my bucket was full. I'll need to go back for a bigger bucket. We are going to have a bumper crop of grapes this year.... And just imagine that the Concords were even more prolific and they won't be ripe until September.

View attachment 3593473

We used to have concords. They were awesome, for a few years. Made the best jam! But, we knew nothing about pruning, and were tired of fighting the yellow jackets for them. We removed them

 

[Sueby]

Speaking of grapes. Catawbas are ripe! I only got a third of the way down the line before my bucket was full. I'll need to go back for a bigger bucket. We are going to have a bumper crop of grapes this year.... And just imagine that the Concords were even more prolific and they won't be ripe until September.

View attachment 3593473

What are you doing with them? Jams I assume?

Was a crazy weather night - had a tornado nearby. But boy is it beautiful out there today! 61 & NO humidity!

Still need to pick those beans...

 

[Sammster]

Had to take a picture of this pretty weed I got out of my garden. I put it up against my son's blue shirt so it would show up. Check out all of that Zucchini I was talking about. My two different types of yellow squash isn't doing too bad either. Ha, can't see all of the zuc's. View attachment 3593521

"He, Buddy - turn around. I need you for a back-drop"
Kind of a pretty weed, though, hey?

 

[littledog]

Got the big coop set up with a temporary nest box, and the small coop and run all cleaned, a layer of clean chips, some repairs done to the wire, set up feeder and waterer, and got the 5-week-olds out there!

I did not complete the door in the opening between the little and big coops (but DID solve the door problem, just need to install the pieces) so we just stapled a square of hardware cloth over the opening, where you can see the hen peering in.
We went ahead and put the shrink-wrapped baby in with the others, since she's totally caught up to the others in growth, and all of them are so confused about the big wide world right now, having a new one among them is a relatively small thing - they could see and hear each other while in the brooders anyway. Shrinky is a bit timid, but nobody's picking on her, and she's fine about coming in among the others to eat.
There's only one I'm positive is a cockerel, it's the mostly-white one on the left, and the brown one with greenish legs I'm pretty sure is a hen. The rest I have no clue as yet.
The big hens are really curious about them, and keep coming over to the fence to stare at them and cluck at them. Do they guess that these are their own babies? Or just drawn to the babies and sound of their chirps, I don't know but it's really entertaining to watch them.
We got the brooder they came out of all cleaned, disinfected, new shavings, food and water, all set up for tomorrow when these little guys will move in:

Out of 15 eggs we only got 5, and I'm willing to bet that's all we will get - the other eggs show no sign of even a pip. Even so, I'm trying to wait patiently and not open up the incubator until Sunday night (day -1) even though "Early bird" hatched Friday morning, we do not want a repeat of the first hatch with one shrink-wrapped baby and two that never made it out of the shell.
35% hatch rate and 40% fertility rate seems pretty bad, doesn't it? Part of the problem might be with two roosters, they seem to spend more time chasing each other away from the hens, than actually breeding the hens! The other factor is, one rooster is 6 years old, some of the hens are even older, and possibly not as fertile. So I've probably been choosing the wrong eggs to set.
But hey, we still got a bunch of good ones and we're continuing to learn a lot!

 

[WthrLady]

when I was a kid I remember my grandparents and other people did this:

View attachment 3593644

Hay racking, yep. We used to have one here. I kept the frame around for the longest time, but finally recycled the wood.The amount of hay you could stack and compress was amazing. You raked the outermost layer to help shed the rain.

 

[WthrLady]

First batch of puree of this canning season is heating on the stove, the jars are sterilizing as we speak and I'll have them in the canner before I go out to mow all day.
Can't believe it's that time of year already.

 

[TJAnonymous]

What are you doing with them? Jams I assume?

Was a crazy weather night - had a tornado nearby. But boy is it beautiful out there today! 61 & NO humidity!

Still need to pick those beans...

DH wants to try to make some wine. I also want some jelly and juice. So between the Catawbas and Concords, that's the plan.

 

[Wee Farmer Sarah]

Good morning all. Glad to hear you didn’t get any damage from the storms yesterday @Sueby. We got a seriously hard rainfall but no damage. We did get about 1/2 inch of rain. Nice and cool now and no noisy AC units blasting. Just a quiet fan here and there. The green beans are definitely slowing down. I only got 6 ounces this morning and I skipped picking yesterday. I’m hoping I get a couple of pounds from the pole beans in the 3 sisters garden. The corn stalks are all at least hip high with a few up to my chest. That would be nearly 4 feet. I need to put the new grape vines outside to harden up for a few days. I will be getting another bale of straw for mulching but that will have to wait until Tuesday or Wednesday. I’m making bread tomorrow and am having bloodwork drawn on Tuesday morning. Still waiting for the tomatoes to ripen. The good news is the bees are buzzing away around the butternut squash and I’m excited about finally getting a decent harvest of them.

 

[Sammster]

I checked over the garden, after yesterday's neighbor's party. Tossed a football and volleyball back over the fence. Pleasantly surprised to find almost no damage. One tomato plant had a couple bent over (not completely broken) branches. I secured them to the stake, and will wait to see if they recover. Phew! I'm sure all the trellises, tomato cages and stakes saved the garden from extensive damage. While out there - I treated for blight. Pretty bad. We've had SO much rain