jason | KW Homestead

Author: jason (page 8 of 13)

Trellising Cucumbers in the Garden

Our garden is in full production right now, potatoes, tomatoes, and jalapenos are coming in, while the sweet potatoes, oca, and greenbeans are thriving. But one of our most exciting crops this year has been the cucumber. This year we planted three different varieties of cucumbers, Arkansas Little Leaf, Suyo Long, and White Wonder, and they are all doing great in our raised beds on trellises.

Growing cucumbers on trellises, or tomato cages, is an efficient and attractive way to garden.

We grow cucumbers on trellises for a few reasons. First, cucumbers are vining plants that love to sprawl and wrap their tendrils around anything they can reach. If left to wander the ground, they take up a lot of space, but by training them vertically, up a trellis, they take up less of a footprint in the garden.

We plant 4 or 5 seeds in a circular depression about 18 inches in diameter. This depression catches rain and irrigation, ensuring that our cukes are always deeply watered. We use the same technique that we use for tomatoes, a cage made of woven wire fencing staked into the ground. We then train the young cucumber plants up onto the cage where they twine and vine their way to the top.

This has a few distinct advantages in addition to being able to fit more plants in less space. By keeping the plants off of the ground, airflow around the leaves is improved and the mildews and diseases that often plaque cucumbers are kept at bay.

These Arkansas Little Leaf cucumbers have a tendency to stay low and spiral on the trellis, whereas the Suyo Longs grow straight up.

Training the vines upwards also leaves room around the base of the cages to plant herbs, flowers or other vegetables. These interplantings can act as companions to the cucumbers and help to confuse pests. We have sweet potatoes, clover, basil and sage growing under our cucumbers.

By growing cucumbers upwards, on a trellis, we can achieve higher yields, with less pests and diseases, and even grow other crops at their feet. So, next time you’re planting some cucumbers, consider growing them vertically, up a trellis or tomato cage, and make you’re garden more efficient and productive.

Mobile Chicken Paddock Update

July 21, 2014 / jason / Comments Off

Emma wrote the other day about our new mobile chicken run design, and after moving this system twice I figured I would give an update on its functionality. The chickens have been in this new setup for about 1 week. In our old system, we would typically wait 2 weeks before moving them to a new piece of pasture, but in the past week I have moved them twice. As Emma mentioned, even though the fenced area is half of what it used to be, because the coop is no longer inside, the chickens actually have around 75% of the space they used to have.

the new mobile coop and paddock system is easier to move, which means we move it more often

However, thanks to the redesign, moving the chickens is now a much easier proposition. It can be done at any time of day, and is now a 1 man job. Compare this to the old system where we had to wait until dusk, take down the entire thing, pull up posts, roll up the bird netting, put up the posts and panels, zip tie everything, by this point it was dark, we were frustrated, and we still had to untangle the bird netting and fix any rips that had happened. Not fun, and not a chore we looked forward to. This meant that we often put off moving the chickens, and the would end up staying in the same spot for longer than two weeks. This lead to overgrazing, compaction, and further frustration.

Our new system easily slides to a new spot, and because it is smaller (16 ft. by 16 ft.), it fits easier into tight spaces around garden beds and fruit trees. The hawk netting does not need to come off, there are no posts, and this can all be done at any time of the day. I have already done it twice, and at this rate the chickens will have access to 300% more pasture in 2 weeks than before. This allows us to more easily monitor their behavior and impact on the land, and more efficiently harness their energy toward improving our land, and avoid the harm that comes from overgrazing, all while they enjoy more grass, weeds, and bugs than ever before.

bridey watching the chickens in their new paddock

I think we learned a valuable lesson; that if you design an aspect of your life to be difficult, you will dread and avoid it, and when it doesn’t get done, it becomes harder and harder to catch up. This starts a cycle of stress and frustration that is hard to beat. However, if we design these things so that are easily accomplished, we are more likely to do them. This fits in with the permaculture concept of zones, where you design the elements of your property that need attention everyday (vegetable gardens, livestock, etc.) to be closer to your house where you constantly see and interact with them. For example, if you have to milk goats everyday, don’t put the milking area half a mile away, down a steep gully and then up a rocky hill. If you wan’t to remember to take a multivitamin everyday, don’t put the vitamins in that cabinet that you can’t reach unless you get that stool that’s in the garage.

It’s a simple concept, but we all have things that for one reason or another we have made harder for ourselves, whether it’s on a homestead or not. Some of things we can’t change, but the other ones should be designed to fit into our life in a way that enhances it, not make it harder. With thoughtful design, things tend to fit together easier and our life systems function more efficiently, giving us more time to focus on whatever it is we want to focus on, be it writing, working, gardening, or eating delicious eggs from pasture raised chickens.

First Potato Harvest Taste Test of 2014

July 15, 2014 / jason / Comments Off

The other day we harvested the first of our 2014 potato crop. We planted 9 different types of seed potatoes, and we figured it was time to check on 2 of our early varieties, Cobbler and Early Ohio. The vines still had some life to them, but we decided to check on their progress anyway and dug up 1 plant of each. We jumped the gun a bit, but between the 2 plants, there was enough for a nice side dish of boiled new potatoes.

Early Ohio potatoes on the left, and Cobbler on the right.

The Cobblers were noticeably larger, and the plants had just begun to die back, whereas the Early Ohio’s were tiny, and they were many more pea sized potatoes that were still in the process of growing. We harvested some of the bigger tubers from each plant, and then replanted and watered in the rest to give the tiny tubers some more time. All told, we got 3/16 of a pound of Early Ohio, and 5/8 of a pound of Cobblers.

After a quick rinse and scrub, we cut the cobblers into pieces about the size of the tiny Early Ohio potatoes, and boiled them in salty water. Fresh potatoes cook much quicker than store bought ones and in almost no time we began our first of many potato taste trials. The two early white potatoes were similar in flavor and texture but still different. I enjoyed the sharpness of the Early Ohio, while Emma enjoyed the more potatoey flavor of the cobbler which is better suited to boiling and steaming.

Because these early potatoes still needed more time, I fertilized all of the potatoes today with a mix of bone meal, alfalfa meal, and greensand. I for one can’t wait until we have all 9 varieties harvested, and can review and compare them all at the same time!

Easy, Fun, and Attractive Wattle Fencing

July 10, 2014 / jason / Comments Off

Part of the process of clearing land is dealing with the abundance of small trees, branches and other woody material. On our property, we try to utilize as much of the wood as possible, either by burying the wood to make hugelkulture raised beds, dropping it as rough mulch, piling it in gullies to slow erosion, or as firewood. But the other day we came up with another way to use this surplus…wattle fencing.

Wattle fencing is an easy and elegant way to re-purpose waste wood for good use.

Wattle fencing is an ancient technique that farmers, peasants, and the rest of humanity have utilized for hundreds of years. At it’s most basic level, it involves weaving long, thin pieces of supple wood around upright posts to form a solid fence. We decided that a wattle fence would be a great way to make an attractive dog enclosure for Bridey in our front yard under a nice shady maple tree. Much more appealing than the chicken wire paddock she has now.

The natural variation among the different sizes and types of wood looks great in our homemade wattle fence.

Traditionally, coppiced woods like hazel, willow, and chestnut were used for both the vertical poles and the horizontal weavers, but we used the mixture of woods that we had piled up from our recent clearings, mainly oak, poplar, tree of heaven, and some maple. For uprights, we used fiberglass step-in-posts that are used for electric fencing and portable poultry netting. We decided on a circular shape that matched the shadiest area beneath the tree, and placed pairs of posts a few inches apart, every 4-5 ft to hold the fence together. We then slid the long pieces of wood between the pairs of posts, following the natural curve of the branches, and weaving the supple twigs together to form a pretty weave that is simple, strong, and sturdy.

We used step in posts to keep the wood in place, but next time we will probably just use wooden posts.

This is actually a lot of fun, and is half puzzle, half art project. Our mix of woods makes for a rustic look, and we are already planning where else we can build some wattle fencing, but first we’ll have to finish Bridey’s new dog pen. In the future we will definitely use wooden posts for a more authentic feel, most likely digging with a post-hole digger and setting the uprights in place like corner posts. Either way, wattle fencing is an age old technique, but a beautiful one that modern homesteaders should consider when designing and laying out their property.

Small Scale Wheat Harvest

July 8, 2014 / jason / Comments Off

Last fall, I planted some winter wheat in a small part of our front yard. After allowing our flock of chickens to scratch, weed, and manure their 16 ft. by 32 ft. enclosure, we moved their mobile chicken coop, and I broadcast some winter wheat seed. It seemed to barely grow over the winter, and I feared I had planted it too late in the season to get established before the cold came, but come Spring it sprang into life and started to head out. Our beautiful little plot of wheat, bristling in the wind, made us understand the sentiment of “amber waves of grain”. It was quite a site from the carport.

Nice Heads of Homegrown, Homestead Wheat

The heads of grain had started to dry out, and were drooped over facing the ground, letting us know that it was time to harvest. I couldn’t find my corn knife/sickle, so I fired up the weed-eater. I made sure to cut in only 1 direction so the stems all ended up in semi-neat rows. Such a small amount took only a few minutes, and I was soon bundling up the straw/wheat combo into sheaths. I then raked all of the smaller bits into piles. The yield was somewhat low, but still a success.

Bundles and sheaths of wheat. The wheat grew right around some of our new fruit trees

What’s nice about growing wheat is that in March I was able to inter-plant some white clover right into the stand, where it germinated,and grew, biding it’s time. The wheat shaded it during this abnormally dry summer, protecting it from drying out too badly, and that the wheat has been cut, it should take off.

The 2 best sheaths of wheat, ready for further drying.

We may end up planting a lot more this fall, and actually try and get a usable amount of wheat, barley, rye, and/or oats, both for us and our birds. I’ll need to brush up on the timing, and seeding rates in my copy of Gene Logsdon’s Small Scale Grain Raising though.

Independence Day

July 4, 2014 / jason / Comments Off

Today being July 4th, I thought it prudent to put together a post acknowledging and celebrating the day that honors the signing of the Declaration of Independence. There is a lot of wisdom and foresight in this document and I wish I read it more often, but July 4th is always a great time to fresh up on the ideals, and reasons behind the American Revolution.

The unalienable rights mentioned in the Declaration; life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, are not granted or established by any man, his pen, or his government, but by his version of god or creator. These rights are universal, and when the enemies of liberty attempt to banish or deny them, it is the duty, right, and responsibility of those oppressed to rise and throw off the tyranny that plagues them. These sentiments, and the others found in the declaration are important lessons from our history and should not be neglected.

So I am glad that we still celebrate this day as independence day, and that at the very least we are reminded once a year of the ideals that this Nation of States was founded on. I try and listen to a reading of the declaration every July 4th, and this year I found one by JFK. I think it’s worth a listen.

Sprouting Grains for Chickens

June 24, 2014 / jason / Comments Off

Sprouting grains to feed chickens and other poultry is a great way to supply top quality nutrition in a cost effective way. We try to avoid feeding GMO feed whenever possible and 1 great way to do that is by sprouting whole grains and seeds into fodder and feeding that instead of pre-packaged chicken food. It’s very easy and only takes a few minutes a day. Our system involves plastic buckets, a scoop, and some grain. That’s it. We modeled it after Jack Spirko’s Dead Simple Fodder Technique, and the birds are loving it. We take grains like wheat, barley, millet, sorghum, and black oil sunflower seed, and transform them into sprouted fodder. This increases their nutritional value, almost doubles their protein, and makes more of the nutrients bio-available to the flock.

3 buckets with holes in the bottom is how we rinse the sprouted fodder.

First, I drilled holes in the bottom of the buckets with a 1/8th in. drill bit. I drilled a lot of holes, maybe 40 or so on each bucket. These buckets hold the grain, and allow the sprouts to get rinsed off at least twice a day in order to prevent mold growth. That’s really the only setup involved, as everything else is the sprouting process.

The sprouting cycle begins with an overnight soak of grain. We do about 1 qt. at a time, but adjust this to suit your needs and your flock size. The next morning this grain gets dumped out into one of the drain buckets with holes, and rinsed. That night, a new batch is soaked overnight, and then dumped into a fresh drain bucket that is stacked into the older one. This flushes all the buckets with water, rinsing all of the grain. This process is repeated until the sprouts reach the stage you prefer.

Soaked wheat and millet in one of the drain buckets.

Right now, because it is so hot, we are only going 3 days before feeding, and only have tiny sprouts forming on most of the grain. The chickens seem to like it this way. You could let it go 7 days, and it would form a dense mat of grass and roots, which would be great for animals like horses, goats, sheep, cattle, and pigs.

The end product after 3 days.

By soaking and sprouting the grains, we change their nutritional profile, and when we add a mineral mix and other high quality supplemental feed, as well as food scraps and garden waste, our chickens get a healthy and well rounded diet that allows them to lay delicious eggs. If you have chickens look into sprouting some grains for them. Go to your local feed mill and ask for untreated barley or wheat and give it a try. If you decide it’s not for you, the chickens will eat the unsprouted grain as well, so there really isn’t much to lose.

Rain Dance Blog Post

June 19, 2014 / jason / Comments Off

This is an official rain dance blog post. It has been really dry here in Stokes County, and we need some rain to recharge our ponds, swales, aquifers, and forests. Somedays I can even hear the thunder in the distance but not a single drop falls on our homestead. It just feels weird without summer storms that sweep in and dump a bunch of rain, and this post is an attempt to change that.

It seems like we are following the model for an El Nino year, a warm and dry summer, but hopefully we’ll swing the other way soon. Some rain would be much appreciated. That’s it. Let it rain!

The Chicken Bucket

June 17, 2014 / jason / Comments Off

What do you do with your food scraps? You know, those tiny bits of leftovers, peels, and stems. Some people toss them on the compost pile as a decent source of nitrogen, or in the trash, but we are lucky enough to have a flock of 28 avian composters right outside our door. Our chickens readily devour anything from pizza to outer cabbage leaves from the garden. In order to separate these nutritious treats from the rest of our waste, we employ a simply, yet effective strategy.The chicken bucket.

Old ice cream containers make great chicken buckets for holding and transporting food scraps.

Almost everything except coffee grounds and eggshells go into the chicken bucket.

We have found that an old 1 gallon, plastic ice cream container works perfectly as a chicken bucket. The cheap, store brand version is best for the application. It has a handle that makes for easy transport, is made of rigid plastic that holds up at least 6 months, and is easily rinsed and cleaned. Right now we have our chicken bucket on top of the trash, and any time we peel sweet potatoes, snap green beans, or have leftovers that are just a little too old for our taste, we dump them in the bucket. Then, about once every few days, we dump the contents into the chicken yard and stand back and watch as they turn our leftovers and waste into high quality eggs. What do you do with your food scraps? Let us know in the comments!

Sweet Potato Slips: The Start of Something Great

June 10, 2014 / jason / Comments Off

Last year’s sweet potato crop was a great one. We are still eating them to this day, and have a few dozen more to go through. This will probably coincide nicely with the first round of early potatoes from the garden, which is exciting because that means we have not had to buy any sort of potato or root tuber since we harvested our potatoes last September, and our sweet potatoes last November. This is definitely one area where even a small homestead can achieve self sufficiency.

jason, placing freshly dug sweet potatoes in a box

Some of last years harvest

In that regard, I tend to favor sweet potatoes as a self reliance crop. They store better, are healthier, are more adapted to our humid summers, are more tolerant of drought and pests, and they are easier to propagate. To start a new crop of sweet potatoes, you must produce slips, small green shoots that sprout from the tubers. These shoots are then pinched, cut, or slipped off and transplanted into the garden. 1 small tuber can produce over 1 dozen slips, and will do so readily in many conditions. Compare this to Irish potatoes, where you plant seed potatoes. These are small potatoes, or chunks of larger potatoes with at least 1 eye. These must be stored from last year’s harvest, and we have found it much easier to store sweet potatoes, which seem to only get better with age, than Irish potatoes, which want to shrivel up and grow numerous long, creepy, eyes.

a tire makes a nice place to start some sweet potato slips

Last year, Emma’s father got some sweet potatoes from a local farmer, and started the slips for us. This year, we tried a few different methods on our own and are now overrun with sweet potato slips ready to be transplanted. Some of our slips were started from tubers planted horizontally in tires filled with garden soil. The black tires absorb the heat from the sun, and stimulate slip production and growth. These slips are nice because they are already partially hardened off to the outside world, and are growing roots from the parts of the shoots that are under soil.

The shoots growing out of the tubers are the the slips.

We also started some slips in mason jars. We picked small tubers for these and jammed them together in the jars making sure that about half of the tubers were over the top of the jar. A few toothpicks helps to keep everything in place. We then filled the jars with water and placed them in a sunny window. By keeping the jars inside, the temperature never got too cold and was often in the 70-80 degree range that triggers slip production. Slips began to form in about a week, and when they were 5-8 inches long, we separated them from the tuber by pinching, nipping, or cutting it off at the base, and then put them in water to produce roots.

Store the slips in water before transplanting so that they start to grow roots.

These slips, along with some given to us by Emma’s dad, will be transplanted soon. Some will go into the new hugelkulture woody beds we are in the process of making, some will go into other beds in the garden, and I want to experiment with some as a ground cover around the fruit trees in our new food forest. I know that this is often done in the tropics and sub-tropics where sweet potatoes are perennial, so I don’t think its too far of a stretch to try it in our temperate climate as an annual herbaceous support species. Either way, we hope that this year’s will match last year’s sweet potato harvest, and we look forward to dining on sweet potato ginger soup, sweet potato fries and hashbrowns, as well as roasting and adding them to hearty stews. Mmmm….

KW Homestead

Pasture Raised Poultry & Edible Landscaping Plants Since 2013