The Farm Report
08-30-2023

New Harvest

"Hey Tim, buddy! I loves me some dat sweet corn!!!"

Annie isn't kidding. She was running out to the sweet corn patch every evening and coming back with her own personal ear to munch on while I listened to Andy Devine on Wild Bill Hickock on old time radio podcasts. She really does love her sweet corn. Look at her face, and that tongue isn't hanging out because she's out of breath. She loves it.

Unfortunately, Annie isn't the only one out here who likes it. In fact, I had to fight like Billy Heck in order to have some for myself. Coyotes, Fox, Raccoons and 'Possums were all in there at night. So in a fit of frustration one morning, I decided to just pick the whole patch and be done with it. I took the wheel barrow and cleaned one row at a time.

I followed that row picking with one of the most valuable tools any gardener can have: A great big lawn mower with an attitude. Yep, Pick a row; mow a row. Pick a row; mow a row.

The corn isn't quite to the maturity I like best, but at least I got some for the freezer this year.

I've shown you how I do this before, but my 'new' method is soooo easy and good, I think you might need a refresher on my methods. Step A: husk the corn - CLEAN, no silks.

Step 2: Get out the old trusty Lee Brand corn cutter and go to town. Obviously from the picture you can see that it splatters a little. Don't do this where you can't clean up. These cutters are the way to go. Once set up, you never need to fiddle with it. Keep it sharp and keep your thumb away from the cutter.

Most important Step III: All the credit for this goes to my Sister, Beth. She said one day, "You cook in those bags, why can't you blanch sweet corn in them, too?" Well, you CAN! I put the corn - measured out with the same amount in each bag, into the bag and vacuum seal it. FIRST. Then, the whole bag and all goes into a pot of boiling water for the blanching treatment. (If you don't do this, the enzymes in the corn will make it taste starchy and 'ordinary' after a few months in the freezer. If you do blanch it, the corn will taste just as good as the day you picked it a year or more later.) After about 3 minutes in the boiling water, the bags come out and land in a sink full of ice water to chill and stop the cooking action.

Out and dry, ready for a sticky label and a trip to Freezer Camp!

As Uncle Red Green used to say on his TV shows, "It's just that easy." and it is.

While I was out mowing off the sweet corn, I got the bright idea that I could mow off the weeds around my wonderful onion crop, too. I set the mower deck up as high as it would go and down the row I went. It wasn't until my garden started smelling like a salad that I remembered I had planted my onions on a raised hill last spring. Yep, I sliced some of the great big ones the John Deere way. We used them as best as possible, but it does make for a big helping of humble pie.....

All in all, I'll have onions all winter. Remember, I have already frozen about two dozen bags of sweet white ones. They don't keep otherwise. My trusty potato fork is great for picking up onions without me having to bend over. Every gardener should have one of these.

I've never had any luck storing my onions. They always rot. Then, reading and talking, I discovered that you have to 'cure' them first. Who knew? So, another 'new' thing for this old gardener. I turned them upside down and they fit perfectly into the slots in this old pallet up in the greenhouse. This time of year, the doors are open 24/7 and I have shade cloth over the top. It seems to be the text book perfect place to do the curing step. In about another week or 10 days, I'll bag 'em up and take them to their wintering home where it is cooler.

See that red machine down there at the end? All the bare earth you see is what was that weedy onion patch a few hours before. I challenge everyone to try gardening without a powerful easy way to control the weeds and till the soil. I get the argument against tillers. If you run the tiller every night all summer, you're going to end up with concrete for garden soil. But I only use it maybe one time before planting/harvesting each crop. In the spring, I don't even do it then. Without a machine, I'll show you would-be gardeners who take up interpretive dance as their new hobby next year!

That white sprinkle stuff? Well that's DE into which I added new beet root seeds for my fall crop. I soak the seeds, then put them into some DE (or sand) and shake that up in a quart jar. When I walk down the row sprinkling the DE, the seeds spread right in with it - A little rake in, and Bob's your uncle. Job done.

The old beet root crop is now in jars on my pantry labeled 'Harvard Beets.' Easy and delicious.

It's mater and cuke season, too. I love eating fresh out of the garden.

But I know where I live, and eating fresh isn't possible here for about 9 months out of the year. This year, I'm trying a new twist with my tomato juice. I found my Dad's old Vita-Mix blender one day and thought to myself, "Why not?" That machine will liquify concrete, if you're curious, and you've never used one. I do this in the shop where Annie can supervise me.

After washing and coring the tomatoes, I put the 'whole hog' into that Vita-Mix and hit the switch. This is essentially a blender attached to a router motor. It takes no prisoners when it is turned on. Seeds, skin, pulp and all become pure smooth tomato juice. We'll see how it goes when I make chili this winter.

I really like Deli Garlic dill pickles - fermented the old fashioned way. First, I clean 'em and cut 'em into halves. Then they go into a salt water/vinegar brine with spices and dill and garlic. They sit under water (brine) for a week or two at room temperature until they are 'fully soured.' The brine will get cloudy and funky, then it will clear up. That's the cue to go ahead and jar them up.

Dahlias are my new favorite flower. Walmart/cheap. Beautiful. No scent.

This is why you need to prune your fruit trees. The fruit is always out on the far ends of the branches. Guess what happens?

Exactly! The weight of the fruit all the way out there breaks off your limbs. My Dad was a vicious radical pruner. He would always say that 'You can prune the tree where you want to cut it, or you can let Mother Nature prune it for you. You will do a neater, better job.'

Never the less, these plumcots are fantastic. (Good Neighbor Ron and I snuck into town where this little tree lives last spring and sprayed it - while the owner was at work.... We now have permission to prune as we see fit. It's all good. Guerilla orchard spraying is more fun though. Sorta like how a stolen watermelon is sweeter - or so I've been told....)

What to do with them? Since they were really clean and bug free, I just washed them and inspected for 'rots and spots' then put them into the steam juicer. Easy as pie.

I now have over 5 gallons of pure plumcot juice bagged and in the freezer waiting for better weather. I like oriental food, so an Asian Plum Sauce is high on my 'things to make with it' list.  What to do with the other 4.75 gallons? I'm not sure yet.

"Annie told me about O.J. being killed, Tim. He was here longer than me, and he was the King of Oakdale Farm," said Miss Kitty. I've always been amused that the bottoms of her feet are black. She's the one who lives in the shop with Annie.
 

'Wait! So, I guess that makes me the new Queen of Oakdale Farm, Tim. The King is dead, long live the Queen! It was sad, but he had to go sometime. It will be good to be Queen. You can pet me a little if you want - but not too much. I have my new position to consider, after all.'

Cats.

And that's how it is for this month at Oakdale Farm. Hottern' the hubs of hell one week, after a cold rainy week the week before. Hurricane season is on us, then the weather will close in and start to get chilly. I'm already starting to shop for fancier dahlias for next summer's garden Aren't they pretty!

All is well at Oakdale Farm.

A Sad Report: The Farm Report 7-28-2023

A Sad Report

The Farm Report

7-28-2023

From the view off my front porch at Oakdale Manor, I have sad news to share with you today. I'll keep it short, but I know you would want to know. O.J. has gone on to the Kitty Kingdom in Heaven.

Although this isn't a very good photo, it is the last one I took of him hard at work. This was just this week. It has been very hot here, and I have been concerned about him. Neither he nor I like heat. Every summer for the past 20 years he's been the King of the Land here at Oakdale Farm. He has lost weight and become lethargic every year, then recovered in the fall. But this time, it has been different. His hair coat was getting ragged, and he just wasn't himself. Good appetite, but just no spiz.

Annie Oakley was even worried about him. 

So what happened? I can't be 100% sure, but I think I know. O.J. (short for Orange Julius) spends nights outside in the nice weather. It is not by my choice. He just will not! come in. He's sneaky about it. When I try catching him unaware and shutting him in earlier in the afternoons after he comes inside for lunch, he just stops coming in for lunch. He has breakfast with me the next morning, then a nap.

Well, he has passed up his free meals for the last two days. That is never a good sign on the farm. This afternoon, I found his remains laying out on the edge of the field near the peach trees.

You don't need to see what I had to see, but maybe I can explain what I'm pretty sure happened in the hope it will help my 'city' friends understand what goes on out in the country.

O.J. has been enjoying a pretty steady diet of bunny rabbits. He catches them at night. It appeared from the CSI evidence that O.J. had captured a bunny, and was beginning to enjoy the spoils of his conquest. Then, an owl decided that he would rather have that bunny. It happens. Owls are huge silent predators. From the wounds, O.J. was blasted from above by a very big owl and passed without a fight or struggle. He may not have even known what happened. O.J. was too big for the owl to move. The bunny was not. (Even at his slim summer weight, O.J. still clocked in at over 15 pounds.) So, the owl eliminated the original predator, and swiped the meal - then flew off with it.

Owls are vicious large predators who fly silently. They do not read books and wear horn rimmed glasses. They have talons that rival bald eagles. They are serious predators. We have lots of them here in the timber. It is a fact of life. 

So our Oakdale Farm Report has one less player in the cast of characters. In a way, it is a sort of relief for me to know O.J. has come to a noble end. He was always a hunter and fighter of the first order. At twenty, I have been concerned he would succumb to some disease that would make his last days miserable. We're all sad, but there is some comfort in how it all ended. 

O.J. died with his boots on.   

Tool Time: The Farm Report 07-25-2023

Tool Time

The Farm Report
07-25-2023

Tool Time! This time, it is with Tim - me, not Tim Taylor of TV fame.  I get questions about my favorite garden tools and which ones I have. So, I thought maybe it would be good to take a little time out and show you some of my favorites. Some you buy, some you make.

Everybody has, or has seen, one of these old fashioned hoes. They are a dime a dozen at garage sales and farm auctions. They are NOT a dime a dozen at the new hardware stores! This one, as shown is NOT my favorite. I don't know how they ever came to be so widely accepted.

This is called a 'Dutch' hoe or push hoe here in the USA. It is much more practical and common sense. The old fashioned one relies on your arm muscles and vocabulary of cuss words to make it work. It gives credence to the old expression, "You looked like you were killing snakes out there," when somebody sees you out in the garden trying to whack out weeds. The Dutch/push hoe uses the mass of your body and the inertia of pushing towards the weed. Once you get going (especially if you're a big old guy like me) the weed can't stop the forward progress and the hoe - kept SHARP! - simply slices the weed off at ground level. When it 'fits' you right, the blade just slides along the top of the soil much like a shuffle board pusher works.

I think I may have mentioned on here once or twice that I am a native born Iowan, and that gives me license to be 'thrifty.' I've wanted one of these Dutch hoes for a long time. But gee whiz! Pete. These things cost almost a hundred bucks. Too rich for my blood.

What to do? Ask Good Neighbor Ron if he might happen to have a used auction hoe laying around handy, fire up the torch, and make one of your own. Yep! That is a picture of the old standard hoe with the crook in its neck bent out straighter. It don't look so fancy, but by golly, it works!

This is the angle I bent that fits me. I keep it super sharp with a handy bench file, and away we go. I can scoot it along on the top of the soil, I can use it to jab down hard on a stalk, and I can use it to bend a single weed over in the melon patch before I give it the Anne Boleyn decapitation whack! And, best of all, it didn't cost me a hundred bucks.

That tub is my first onion harvest. These are the Texas Grano 101's; at least some of 'em.

This is a lazy way out, but I'm trying to show you the Ruth Stout potato fork I use to 'pull' the onions. With this tool, I don't have to bend over. I use it to pick up potatoes, too. Ruth was the sister of Rex Stout - author of the Nero Wolf mystery books. Ruth was a character and a true master gardener. She pioneered the 'No Work' garden system of heavy mulch. She was a writer in her own rite, and published a number of garden books. If you don't know about her, or if you do and it has been a while since you've read her stuff, then it is time to do it. Refreshing and valid to this day. I love her attitude. She's been gone a long time, but her books are still available. You can actually see her in a Youtube interview. She always went on patrol in her garden carrying one of these little forks. I do, too.

Click here to watch Ruth Stout

A bucket of onions! These are not keepers, but they are sweet and good.

After decades of trying to grow and keep onions, my sweet mother told me one day - as I was expressing frustration - "Oh, why don't you just freeze them? They freeze really well." Thanks, Mom. Well, better late than never I guess. So, I tried freezing onions and Mom was once again right. They DO freeze well and keep a long time, too. Perfect for winter cooking. I sit on the shop park bench and peel the onions before I take them into the kitchen for chopping. I put two cups of chopped onions in a bag.

More food toy tools! After a good wash, I slice the onion into good half-inch thick slices. That's usually three or four whacks per onion. Then the fun happens!! I put my French fry cutter on the counter (it has a suction cup foot to keep it locked in place). I get it up as close to the sink as I can. Then I put a big plastic bowl down into the sink to catch the chopped onions as they EXPLODE through the cutter. You can't stop laughing, even though I've done it this way for years. Permanent 5th Grader....

I say they EXPLODE into the pan because you can't just push the handle down gently. It won't work. You need to BASH that handle down with a high speed flick of the wrist. Bam! Sometimes, the onions actually shoot all the way across and get into the other side of the sink. But it works.

Twenty-seven bags later and we're ready for winter. I like to vacuum bag my onions before I put them into the freezer. Two cups (about two medium onions) per bag. The vac bags won't let the onion smell get out into the freezer. I've mentioned this before, but the real secret of vacuum bag storage isn't actually the vacuum - it is the BAG. Plain old ZipLock bags are made of polyethylene plastic. It is water proof, but water vapor will go through it. ZipLock freezer bags are thicker to make it harder for the water vapor to exchange, but it still does. Vacuum bags are made of laminated plastic with a nylon layer in the middle. Nothing goes through nylon. And they last and last. I found some onions 2-years old laying in the bottom of the freezer and guess what? They were just as good as when they went in. 

Not all of the Texas Grano 101's went into the freezer. Homemade French fried onion rings are to die for! Couple that with some real brats and a dash of Martin and Carola's recommended German Currywurst Sauce and you're ready for Heaven. Or a long nap anyway. Delicious!

Back to the 'truth in lending' department of Oakdale Gardens. This is the carrot row. On either side of the carrots were the onion rows. These rows were/are three feet apart! The Texas Grano's were about one third of each side. They are gone now to freezer camp. The rest of the onions on down the line are sweet yellow Spanish onions. Interestingly, the Grano's had given up; their tops flopped over to tell me they had spent their time in the garden. But the sweet Spanish onions are still growing. I'll let them go a while longer to see how big they'll get. They do keep pretty well, so maybe I'll try to save some of them for fresh onions into the fall and winter. Or until they rot in the bags ... again.

 

My spring green beans just did not like the hot dry spotty weather we had. They were woody and irregular. I mowed 'em off. Then, I planted these. I mixed three different kinds of POLE green beans in the planter and put in a nice long row for my 'fall' garden.

That is MY fall garden. As you can see, Mr. Bunny Rabbit thought they were for HIS use. NO. That little yellow wire is my way of telling him that, too.

Another important garden tool is electricity. You don't need much of it, but you do need it to be VERY HIGH VOLTAGE. Inside the buckets is hidden the electric fence charger. ZAP! Mr. Bunny. Take a hint and go someplace else.

All you need is an insulated wire and some clips to get the Zappifier connected to the fence. I use cheap Walmart battery jumper cables. The red one is the HOT wire; it is connected from the charger in the bucket to the insulated fence wire over the bean row. The black jumper is the GROUND wire; it is connected from the charger to the steel fence post that is driven into the ground. When Mr. Bunny (or Annie) touch their wet little noses to the wire, the path to pain follows from their nose down through their toes and back to the connection on the post. ZAP! Message delivered. For a permanent 5th grader, this is a hoot to watch. It looks like something you might expect to see in a Road Runner cartoon. Feet spinning a hundred miles an hour. A mammal that shouldn't be able to that is flying, and the fur is standing on end with electricity coming off it. Yes, I have touched it. Yes, it hurts. No, it doesn't do any long term damage. But Yes, it will get the message across!

I don't know if this is a 'tool' or not, but it is handy. These are actually two cattle panels held up for the beans to grow on. A steel post at each end and some plastic zip ties and you're good to go. No bending over to pick, and I think pole beans are more flavorful, too. Stay tuned.

I'll be planting California Zinnas again next year. If you look way down there at the end, you'll see the remains of the blown over sweet early corn rows. We all had some to eat. The raccoons and Annie Oakley got more than their fair share.

No picture, but another top 10 in the must-have garden tool list is a big strong mower. I mowed out the spent sweet corn, and I'm getting ready to move the fencer over here any day now. The bunnies have been 'messaged' as we say in the modern world, and it is now time to 'communicate' with the possums and raccoons. 

I make these little wind jammers from 2-liter soda bottles and a piece of bent wire. They make noise when the spin in the wind. I think it helps keep the 'coons and deer out of the garden at night.

I got the idea and copied the plan from Mr. Sam the Allotment Man on Youtube. You can learn a lot from Youtube.

This mess is the musk melon patch. I left 6 feet of space for them, but they've taken 12 or 15 feet! There are a lot of melons hiding down in there. I can't wait.

Here is my cucumber fence. Another cattle panel job. That's my cheap 'Iowa' Dutch hoe leaning there with another neat little tool. It's a 'tying stapler' I paid actual cash money for. With one whack of the handle, it will wrap a neat little strip of bio degradable plastic around the fence and the plant vine, then staple it and cut it. In one whack! I used to use twine and tie it, but when there's a tool, I say go for it!

They're all over the internet. I think I got this one from eBay.

So I do have a lot of cukes coming on. This is the hydroponic dill project. Actually this is the hydroponic dill project that went FFFUTTTT! A big disappointment, but now we know. I've got friends who have lots of dill for me.

Tools you can make from nothing. This is just a plain old coffee can with a wire bail put on it. The bail lasts, the cans don't. I carry new potatoes, a few cukes and whatever into the house with it. I know... but still - it is fun to do something with nothing.

You just bend the wire, poke it through a hole in the plastic and then give it a kink with your pliers. Easy peasy.

There you go. The roses are not quite what I'd hoped for, but they are blooming. We're at the end of garden planting time, and the days will soon be getting shorter. We've had a coolish summer so far and that's just fine with me! All is well at Oakdale Farm.