Category Archives: Gardens

2023 on the Homestead

Back in August I posted with an update on our season up until then. Now that 2023 is over I can give you a review of our full season as I take time in this quieter time of year to reflect.

A Great Butternut Year

I was moved to post about our season in August because of the challenges. I have written many summaries that cite drought as a limiting factor but this is the first one I’ve done where excessive rain is what caused us problems. That issue continued for the rest of the year. However, some of our fall crops were better than expected so our season did pick up towards the end.

To be consistent over time, I have kept most of the same topic headings as in previous years.

Weather & Water

This summer was the wettest on record for New Hampshire with 21 inches of rain recorded for June, July and August, 8 inches more than the average.

Given the recent droughts it’s hard to be annoyed by rain, but it definitely turned out there was such a thing as too much. We did not experience direct damage in our systems, like erosion, but the wet conditions still caused problems, the biggest one being plant diseases appearing and spreading more than usual.

Our water catchment systems came in handy in a different way than intended. Some of the storms had torrential rain that could have washed out paths and other areas. By emptying the storage totes in between storms we could keep the water in place and slowly drain it over a longer time period.

Our biggest crop loss actually had to do with the winter weather. The polar vortex in February destroyed our – and New England’s – entire peach crop. That was a big loss for us, as long-time readers will know I do a lot with peaches!

Rodents, Pests and Diseases

Basil – surprisingly undaunted by the wet conditions this year

As I mentioned, we did have more disease issues than usual this year. There was some sort of bacterial wilt that shortened the lifespan of a few of our crops: peas, cucumbers, and summer squash.

This year we took further measures to protect our plants from animals, especially porcupines and voles. First, for the porcupines, we added another run of fencing that includes a gate across the driveway that we close at night. It did not work at first because it turns out the porcupines can climb fences like a ladder. But with the addition of one string of electric along the top, we finally convinced them that our pear trees were not worth coming after. This also keeps out the deer, which weren’t a huge problem but sometimes did come through and nibble.

Vole Protected Root Crops

To deal with the voles we have started making garden beds that sit on metal mesh hardware cloth and have wooden sides. This uses more materials than my usual mound garden beds, but it is working. So, for the carrots and beets we plan to make more of these beds. We planted our potatoes in big plastic barrels cut in half. It did keep out the voles, but yields were very low. I had been worried about them drying out so positioned them in a somewhat shady area which was a mistake in such cloudy, wet weather. I also think they weren’t draining well enough since in a few of them the tubers just rotted. We’ll try again next year.

Gorgeous Spring Kale, Before the Caterpillars

The past two years we have had big outbreaks of caterpillars eating our brassicas. While I have always dealt with imported cabbageworm and cabbage looper, we suddenly have an overwhelming number of what I believe are cross-striped cabbageworms. These used to only be a problem in the South, but they have been making their way north with the changing climate. We are finding them far more destructive than other Brassica pests. Since we do not use any chemicals, we will look into barrier methods such as growing in hoop houses or under row cover.

Labor

The one upside to less productivity this year, was less physical work to do. Given that my arm injury was at its worst this year, it would have been a struggle to cut peaches for canning or keep up with much bigger yields.

It did give me more time to invest in some other important work in the world. We hosted more Seacoast Permaculture gatherings and classes and I became chair of the board for New Hampshire Peace Action which has been going through a transition in leadership, thus needing more volunteer help. To a large extent I came to farming and homesteading through being an activist, particularly a peace activist, in the tradition of The Nearings and others. So, to me, this is connected and complementary work anyway.

Animals: Bees

I continue to take a break from beekeeping while I try to heal my arm injury.

Diana and her triplets!

Animals: Goats & Pasture

Luna and her daughter, Diana, were this year’s mama goats.

The birthings went well, I’m relieved to say. However, Diana gave birth to triplets (which is a lot for a first time) and did not take to motherhood easily. There was about an hour when we thought she might entirely reject her kids – heartbreaking. But, we gave her support and coaching and she finally figured it out. That said, she was not an enthusiastic mother and did not give a lot of milk, so she will not be incorporated into the herd permanently. Luna, who is our star goat, had twin girls this year, and we will keep both of them. Hopefully at least one will be as great as their mom – healthy, vigorous, easy kidder, attentive mother and good milk producer. Making decisions like this is not easy for us, but we see careful breeding as our duty to the herd. (Note that

Luna with her kids, Maeve and Fionnuala, 5 months old

if you are buying goats or other working animals, I highly encourage you to buy from people who do cull and eat their animals, otherwise you are likely being sold their rejected stock.)

 

We are increasingly skilled at rotating the herd through our pastures, and the land is responding beautifully. Lots of lush green, very little bare ground, soil further coming to life and building up organic matter, carbon and nutrients. The positive power of well-managed grazing animals to improve land is amazing to witness!

Goats on Good Pasture

Our two new boy goats, Zac and Ike, who arrived Fall 2022 settled in well and Zac proved his ability to do his job – Diana’s triplets were his kids.  Ike is the polled (born without horns) whethered (neutered) companion for Zac.  I worried that an unhorned male would get pushed around a lot by our big horned boys, but he has tons of attitude and less threatening hormones so he appears to get his way more than anyone else!

 

Animals: Poultry

New Ducks

We incubated a couple rounds of chickens to raise for new young hens and meat. In the spring our two youngest female ducks disappeared, likely taken by aerial predators. A friend of ours who has good luck hatching ducklings helped us out with two rounds resulting in seven ducks. Only two were female but, well, better than none! Also our drake happened to die over the summer so we were able to replace him.

Grains

Despite last year’s promising test plots, our wheat failed this year. The fall planted crop didn’t overwinter well, and my attempts at spring planting may have been too late, or maybe birds and rodents ate the seed before I got there.

Red Sails Lettuce

Harvest totals 2023

Here is what we brought into the house and remembered to weigh. As you’ll see, some things had decreased yields, notably the cucumbers, summer squash, potatoes, kale & collards. There are a few things that I purposely planted less of, so if you compare years you would notice a decrease.  These were intentional to better match what we need: garlic, radishes, snap beans. Our root numbers, especially beets and carrots are still low but should be recovering as we change our practices. At least this time I did not plant 10 times as much seed to get about the same number of carrots and beets.

On the other hand, check out our winter squash numbers! Also, dry beans and popcorn did extra well. Our small fruits had generally strong yields, too.

Alliums – garlic – 25.5 pounds (#) (155 heads); 150 garlic tops; leeks – 42.25#, perennial onions – 9.25#

Beans & Peas – snap beans – 50.75#; dry beans – 23.5#; sugar snap peas – 3.75#

Brassicas – broccoli – 8#; brussels sprouts – 9#; kale/collard – 12#

Calico Popcorn still on ears

Corn, popcorn – 10.5#

Cucumber – 39.5#

Eggplant – 14#

Melons – 7.5#

Greens – lettuce – 8.25#; nettles – 2#

Herbs – basil – 5#; dill – 1#

Mushrooms, winecap – 2#

Potatoes – 16.5#

Roots – beets – 11.75#; carrots – 30.75#; parsnips – 28.5#; radishes

Winter Squash Vines

– 58; turnips (gold ball) – 13.5#

Squash – summer – 25.25#; winter (butternut, long pie and Seminole) – 939.5#

Tomato – slicing – 29.75#; plum – 14.5#; cherry – 27#

Wheat – crop failed!

Fruit: azarole – 1#; blueberry – 6#; crabapples – 39.5#; currants, red & white – 2.5#; clove currants – 18.5#; elderberry – 3#; grapes – 13.5#; honeyberry – 2.25#; jostaberry – 5.5#; mulberry – 2.25#; raspberry – 2#; rhubarb – 17.5#

Maple syrup – 2.5 gallons

Sea salt – 1 gallon

We brought in 91 gallons of goat milk (from 4 goats); 28.5# goat meat; 3# goat lard

Our poultry harvest came to: 1,571 (130.9 dozen) chicken eggs from 12 hens; 480 (40 dozen) duck eggs from 3 ducks; chicken meat – 56#; duck meat – 6#

Gleaned/gathered off-farm crops: apples – 800#; blueberries we picked from Tuckaway Farm – 49#

Food Preserving

One of our Winter Squash Storage Shelves

Preserving food for the off-season is how we eat from our land year-round. Here’s a summary of what I put up from the harvest I just detailed:

Canned: applesauce – 20 pints; blueberries – 40 pints

Dried: kale/collards – 3 gallon bags; grapes (raisins) – 2 pts

Refrigerated: lactofermented cucumber pickles – 9 quarts

Frozen: blueberries – 2 gallon bags; grapes – 4 gallons; various berries – 6 gallons; snap beans – 12 pts; eggplant – 4 qts; summer squash – 6 qts; basil/garlic pesto – 13 pints; chevre cheese – 10 pints; mozzarella cheese – 12#; and most of the meat.

We also store these crops in a cold room or on the shelf: dried beans, popcorn, garlic, potatoes, carrots, beets, parsnips, turnips, winter squash, and apples.

Looking Ahead

My homestead plans for the coming year are to continue to refine our current systems to be more effective, easy to use, and in some cases more productive. A lot of the infrastructure work has been done here. I wouldn’t say this is our “lie in a hammock” time, but I do expect that we will continue to shift to even more harvesting with less big project work. That is the goal of permaculture… there is a lot of work up front to create the systems, and they will always need some attention, but the workload should not be as intense as we go along.

I’m going to try again with grain growing this year. And with any luck, I will have lots of peaches to can this time around!

Gorgeous Peach Tree… Hoping for Fruit in 2024

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Filed under Chickens, Ducks, Food Preservation, Gardens, Goats, Uncategorized, Weather

Recipes for: Snap Beans

Back in May I wrote about the importance of knowing how to use the diverse foods we grow. Even though this has been a low production year for a lot of crops, a few finally kicked in and started to overwhelm us – beans in particular. Focusing on snap beans in this post, this year we grew rattlesnake, blue lake pole and concador yellow bush beans (the concadors were not a big success). Because snap beans have a short shelf life, they either need to be cooked or put up for the winter within a few days of picking. Here’s how I use them that I enjoy and that can extend the season.

First, we eat them! My favorite recipe for fresh picked beans we call Cheesy Beans. Here it is:

1 pound snap beans, ends removed and cut to the size you like

1 onion, diced

6 garlic cloves, diced

1/8 cup sunflower seeds

1 cup grated cheese (I like Monterey jack)

a little fat – oil or lard

salt to taste

Take a covered baking dish, put in the onion, garlic and fat, then the beans, and sprinkle the seeds and salt on top. I bake that at 350F for 45 minutes or until the beans are tender. When I remove it from the oven I top it with the grated cheese.

I love this dish, but only like it with fresh rather than frozen beans. So, it is a regular on our table during bean harvest, then disappears from the menu until next year.

Since I have such great luck with growing beans, we always end up with more than we can eat at the time. For awhile that was a problem, because I couldn’t find a way to use frozen beans that I liked. You can put them in winter soups and stews, but I don’t love them that way. Then, a few years ago I rediscovered Three Bean Salad. My mother made a bean salad when I was a kid, using canned beans. For some reason the dish came back to my mind and I adapted it for home-grown instead of canned beans. Here’s how I do it:

2 cups snap beans, frozen (or start with fresh snap beans, cook them, and use them without freezing them)

2 cups garbanzo beans, cooked

2 cups dry beans (kidney is traditional, I use Good Mother Stallards since I grow them), cooked

¼ cup red onion, diced

1/3 cup apple cider vinegar

½ cup olive oil

1 tblsp honey

1 tsp salt

Toss it all together and let it marinate for a day before eating.

When I freeze beans I do blanch them first (steam them for a short amount of time). Others tell me they do it without, but I find the beans can get mushy if I don’t blanch.

Three Bean Salad also uses dry beans, which I grow even more of than snap. Dried beans are harvested in the fall and have a really long shelf life, so there is no rush to get them picked and processed which I appreciate. I use especially use them in the winter, so maybe I’ll write more about them then.

Do any of you have beans recipes to share?

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Wet, Weedy And Weird: Summer 2023

When it first started raining, I was thrilled. We were starting the growing season NOT in a drought! But, as you know, it just kept coming, enough to break records in June and July and cause terrible floods in some places (we did not have that here). While I continue to remind myself to be grateful there is water coming our way regularly, it’s also true that there is such a thing as too much. As Brene Brown said: the opposite of scarcity is not abundance, it is enough.

A Good Year For Lettuce

Early on in this rainy season most of our plants grew quickly and looked great. I thought we were being set up for an exceptional gardening year and harvest. Instead, the excessive ups and downs and weird weather patterns have hindered our production.

It really started last winter.

The spring bloom – or lack thereof – confirmed that the February polar vortex did wipe out this year’s peaches. Peaches are an important crop for me. You may have read about my August and September canning marathons putting up 50 plus quarts of peaches each year. So, I did mourn that loss… but I hoped that the berry season might make up for it, since fruit set on the bushes around here looked great. There was also a late frost in May, but, luckily, that barely touched us.

A Rhubarb Plant Almost As Tall As I Am!

It was also a chilly spring so the heat lovers stagnated, like our eggplant. But the kale, collards, broccoli and Brussels sprouts flourished. The lettuce was huge, tasted great, and lasted extra long before bolting. The rhubarb and asparagus were big and beautiful.

Looking Up At The Peas

Most of our plants looked fabulous, truly lush in the gardens, orchards, pasture and wild places. Many of our climbers – pole beans and peas especially – outgrew their normal trellising, we added more, and they continued to keep going. The leeks, root crops, corn, and flowers for pollinators were vibrant and big. It was such a contrast to last year’s meager greenery in the drought.

Brussels Sprouts & Broccoli, Well-Mulched

But along with the crops growing well, the weeds proliferated. We have a low-weed system, using lots of mulch and not tilling at all. Despite that, there has still been weeding to do, especially in our newer orchard areas where there is a strong seed bank and the trees are too small to shade out new growth. So, while we didn’t have to water at all, we have had more than enough unwanted plant removal to take up that time. At least the goats love most of the volunteer plants so it doesn’t seem like a such a waste.

As the season has been moving along, many of our yields are just not spectacular. The peas grew tall and tasted great – but died after just a few weeks. Our zucchini plants had a similar trajectory. Our rattlesnake pole bean vines are huge, but not that productive. My first plantings of cukes wilted quickly – I’m not entirely sure which disease it was, but in the wet conditions it hit them hard. My later plantings look ok, but since it continues to be so rainy I won’t be surprised if it gets to them, too. The eggplant and tomatoes are only trickling in. Blueberry picking was awesome – until the spotted wing drosphilia numbers rose. We used to have over a month of picking, but the past few years only get about 2 weeks until the berries get mushy because of the larvae

Tomatoes Ripening Very Slowly

Also, even though there have been some serious spikes in heat, we have not had the extended, less intense heat that many plants produce best in. It felt great to us humans when the heat broke… but with highs only in the 70s, lots of plants slowed way down.

 

Lush Pasture for the Goats

Not everything is doing badly. Some other crops look good: winter squash, root crops, dry beans, yellow summer squash, our unusual berries (clove currants and jostaberries especially). Our basil has been excellent and most of our garlic is big and beautiful (the red variety is smaller than usual). Our animals are thriving with such lush grass and greenery to nourish them.

However, overall, this is turning out to be our least productive growing season yet.

In these difficult conditions, we are once again glad that we discovered permacultural principles and growing methods. Having healthy soil filled with organic matter and humus can moderate the extremes of wet and dry. Keeping the soil covered with plants and mulches suppresses weeds, retains moisture when needed, and lowers soil temperature when it is hot and sunny. An emphasis on plant and animal diversity means we never have a year that is a total loss. Earthworks such as swales help our land slow and capture the bursts of heavy rain, stopping erosion and keeping the groundwater and well charged. I can’t imagine trying to live this way without all that in place.

Permaculture also encourages big picture thinking, beyond our own place and time.

A lot of work goes into growing good food

It is very likely that weather will continue to be volatile and hard to predict, probably more than we’re currently experiencing, and it is going to be challenging to grow food. People seemed to understand the importance of maintaining our food supply when shelves were emptying at the start of the pandemic and then with recent price spikes at grocery stores. I’m not sure if people grasp how much harder it is to grow food in these times of climate disruptions.

I don’t want to frighten anyone – I am not sure fear is a great motivator of real, intelligent change. I hope that we can become aware of these issues, even though they are scary, and deepen our appreciation for food and farmers and our planet’s life giving systems so much that we are inspired to act in support of all of them. There are many ways to do so. Here’s one:

Building Good Soil Is Possible

Right now the Farm Bill is being worked on in Congress (it comes around about every 5 years). It is a great opportunity to ask for change. The bill’s current priorities favor agribusiness and destructive technological and market schemes. Instead, these resources could support the small farmers who actually feed most humans and real solutions addressing environmental problems. How food is grown deeply matters – it’s why Steve and I have committed much of our lives to doing it well! Agricultural methods can destroy the earth or help to stabilize the water cycle, put carbon where it belongs, stop soil loss, reverse desertification and more. You can learn about how to advocate for change at NOFA-NH and AFSC.

Back at the homestead, it’s hard not to get discouraged in a year like this, but we will keep our own gardens going and hope you will, too, as another way to strengthen our resilience and food security and lessen the stress on the biosphere. We’ll also remember to take in the beauty all around us this season, such as the extraordinary vista of blooms in our front yard.

Our Herb & Pollinator Garden

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Filed under Gardens, Permaculture principles, Uncategorized, Weather