So what’s new on the homestead….
The greenhouse is growing like crazy. DH finally got the pH and water balanced to add fish. We got feeder goldfish from the pet store to see if things would work before getting our fish for eating in there. In the meantime the nitrates and nitrites went craze which is just plant food. So exponential growth.
The Pit (aka the fish pond) is 90% complete. We just need to add padding and insulation then the liner and we can add our fish to eat.
The deck pond (aka his experimental pond) is supporting goldfish for a week now and no fish losses for 3 days straight. Most of the tadpoles have developed into frogs/toads.
The medicinal herb garden has more plants in the ground and DH got some good deals on rosemary while out and about and now we have some to harvest and even sell accept donations for our overage pots.
We have dried a ton of herbs; basil, lavender, chives, lemon balm, spearmint, chocolate mint, curl leaf parsley, flat leaf parsley, peppermint, and oregano. All available for donations $5 per dried oz. All 100% organic, no pesticide, herbicides, or manmade fertilizer. We are going to attempt to go 100% organic and only in a real bad situation use Seven dust. Seven if you don’t know can be used on pets for flea control and tick control. It is relatively save, but like I said last resort. We also have a bunch of tomato starters if anyone would like them. $1.50/donation per potted plant. Most pots have at least 2 plants.
DH has been researching and learning about permaculture (planting with nature vs against). It is really hard to explain without seeing it. If anyone is interested in gardening podcast we recommend The Self Sufficient Gardner on iTunes. It is free.
We are adding seedlings and planting to our vegetable garden almost on a daily basis. We got more blueberry pants (again DH got good deal), more garlic (again DH deal), more onions.
We just started another 100 pots in the greenhouse, with another 100 waiting to be potted.
100 more strawberry plants going in, and another 100+ garlic plants. Can you tell we like garlic. We learned something new with garlic. The bulbs you get in the store to eat look just like the kind for planting. But here is what we learned. Each clove in the bulb is a seed started. So we got 40+ bulbs. Reduced to 60% off.
We are having to reinforce the chicken barrier to our garden. Dang ravenous garbage disposals are eating everything. Took out ½ the horseradish plant, ate every spinach plant in the ground and 3 lettuce plants that were close to harvesting. Last week they ate the watermelon rinds. I mean everything, picked clean. All that was left was the hard leathery rind, paper thin. We are thinking about raising meal worms to give them some extra protein. That is DH’s latest idea, well that, then not watering the garden all season, installing another pond and the list goes on.
We checked out the Indianapolis downtown farmers market recently and it was enjoyable. We learned what other farmers were selling and the pricing. There is a wide range of prices, and some didn’t have the same kinds of things we do. We might look at selling at the farmers market next year. We may check out Greenwood’s farmers market this weekend. It is at the public library. The Bargersville flea market also has some good deals on plants, and assorted items.
We may start taking requests to grow items, or start your own plants in the greenhouse. If you would like help creating your own house into a homestead we can help. Share what we have learned, and even make a site visit to help give you some ideas. No yard? Grow on a patio. Have hanging baskets. You can have your own aquaponics system growing fish to eat and supply your edible plants in a window at your house/apartment. Even if you have a dog that pulls up your plants in your garden….you can still plant in other places or have a small cage around them. You know who you are….Any of this interest you, respond to the post, or send e-mail to the DH Rbeach_kk@hotmail.com.
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