Sunday, March 29, 2020

I made 4, 5 gallon buckets of yard waste, clearing and cleaning my flower beds.  I barely made a dent in all the volunteers in my flower garden.  I put those four buckets in the chicken yard to let the chickens spread around and cover up their poop.  I think it may take 6, 5-gallon buckets of yard waste to cover the whole chicken yard.  I gave the bunnies a big bunch of grass too.

I saw a lot of garden animals while I was digging and pulling out volunteers: a chrysalis of an underwing moth buried in the soil, 3 Jerusalem crickets clinging to plant roots, ladybugs, rollie pollies, cabbage white butterflies, hummingbirds, earthworms and orb-weaver spiders.

I planted my medicine and food plants that I'd collected from the hike yesterday.

As I was working a Red-shouldered Hawk flew over carrying a small rodent.  It was getting dive-bombed by crows.  Because of this it flew really, really low and I could see it well.  They wanted it to drop its food.  It kept flying southeast.  It flew in the direction that I saw a pair of Red-shouldered Hawks the other day feeding each other.  Maybe it was one of the pair?

I also saw 2 Red-tailed Hawks fly over. They are very unusual for my yard.  What are they doing here?

When I went to close up the rabbits they had dug a big hole and escaped again.  This is the first hole that they have dug since they escaped that first day.  I wonder why they dug another hole today?  Was it something to do with the weather?  This time, we were ready.  We had a plan to corral them and it worked!  I noticed that their digging was great in turning and fluffing up the soil in the chicken yard deeply.  Also, they succeeded in burying 1/3rd of the yard with their digging, meaning I didn't have to rake the chicken poop.  Thank you, bunnies!  I wonder if I can use the bunnies to clean the chicken yard every day?

The chickens only ate 3 cups of food again today, so adding yard waste and kitchen scraps to the chicken yard seems as if it will save me from needing to buy so much chicken food.

Tonight I put Sara on the roost to sleep.  Now Popcorn is on the floor.  Why are they not going to roost with the other chickens?  Are they getting pecked?

Garden Math: If yard waste could be measured in gallons, and today I put 4, 5-gallon buckets of yard waste in the chicken yard, solve how many total gallons of yard waste I put on the chicken yard today.  If I need to do 6, 5-gallon buckets a day to cover the whole yard, how many total gallons is that?

🐞Farmer Ladybug

Saturday, March 21, 2020

Sara likes warm hugs.

Mosquito and Cob-weaver started to clear the medicine wheel.  They want to make it into a garden with corn.  We have not ever grown corn at our house.  They clear about 1/4 of the circle by hand and we feed it to the chickens.  We find these wild plants growing in the medicine wheel: grass, sourgrass  (Oxalis pes-caprae), burr clover (Medicago polymorpha), chickweed (Stellaria media) and stork's bill (Erodium cicutarium).  We see these wild animals as we dig and work: California slender salamander (Batrachoseps attenuatus), ladybug, slug, earthworm, spider eggs, ant colony, orb-weaver spider, funnel weaver spider, painted-lady butterfly, cabbage white butterfly, American crow, Western gull, and Golden-crowned sparrow.

Cob-weaver collects all the bulbs of the sourgrass.  These are the tear-dropped shaped tuberous parts on the roots.  They look like little nuts. She wants to eat them and snacks on some raw. We peel and roast them for dinner.  I like them but Beekeeper Ant says they poke in the throat.

Garden Math: If we clear 1/4 of the medicine wheel a day, how many days will it take to clear all the wild plants from the medicine wheel?

Beekeeper Ant and Mei Mei Cob-weaver decide to make chocolate chip cookies after dinner.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

makes 7 dozen, from Guittard chocolate chip package

2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1 cup butter, softened
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups chocolate chips
1 cup walnuts (optional)

1. Preheat oven to 375F.
2. Mix flour, baking soda, and salt.
3. In separate bowl, cream butter, sugars, then add eggs and vanilla until smooth.  Gradually add flour mixture until combined.  Stir in chips and walnuts.
4. Drop by teaspoonfuls onto an ungreased cookie sheet. 
5. Bake 8-10 minutes.
6. Freeze leftover dough for another day.

Farmer Ladybug 🐞