Cold, Wet, Miserable Weather - NOT

Many of us wake up on a morn like this and think how wet, cold and miserable it is. About 40 degrees and raining. That may be true if you wanted to go to the park. I went out a little bit ago to do some chores and started reminiscing about this kind of winter weather when I was growing up. I've been recreating a bit of that environment in my yard the past few years. I have chickens, a garden, a nice lawn and a greenhouse.

I fed and watered my chickens, something they seem to be utterly oblivious to. Chickens have very simple programming consisting of just two questions: Can I eat it? Will it eat me? My generosity in continuing to feed them while not getting many eggs in return seems to completely escape their notice. Chickens haven't changed that much since I was growing up, I guess. I had chickens two times before I could drive. There had been an old four room sharecroppers house about 60 yards from ours and next to it was a small barn with some chicken wire around it. The house was gone and my dad helped me fix up the little barn for chickens. I could just see myself as a future Bo Pilgrim. I did get a few eggs after a while. My dreams of expansion hit the cold hard reality of a hungry skunk one night, though.

My second attempt was a little more successful. Dad and I built a small chicken house out back and I put up a generous sized chicken pen around it. I guess it never really took off since I can't even remember what happened to the chickens I had in it. I do remember using the chicken house for target practice with my dad's 12-gauge shotgun one day. Dad wasn't real pleased with that.

I had some leftover rice from last night that I spread into the garden. The chickens are allowed to run free in the winter so they can scratch up weed seeds and bugs. They really like anything I throw out for them. I have about twenty chickens right now. Some are about two years old, and some are just babies I bought as day-olds about six weeks ago. Buying chicks in late fall must not be the best of ideas. I started with 26 Banties of different breeds. Eleven of them have died one at a time. They dont' seem to get sick, they just slow down and quit working like a toy with a dead battery. Before long, I should be able to tell which ones are roosters and then I can fire up that George Foreman rotisserie!

Speaking of gardening, I started growing onions and radishes as a kid. Had a simple little cultivator with a plow that fit behind a wheel that I could push. I didn't like onions or radishes, but they were easy to grow. As I got older, my garden grew bigger and more complex. I used to go out and build huge piles of compost consisting of waste hay and fresh manure. I built some when it was cold enough to snow. Loved it even if it was freezing. It always amazed me that you could put a pile together on a freezing cold day and within 24 hours, you'd see steam rising from hot spots in it. Compost piles can reach 160 degrees inside and ti doesn't take long for them to do so. My current compost heap is heavy on dry leaves and doesn't have the nitrogen it need to really start cooking. I don't have a ready manure source and I couldn't get enough green grass to add to it. It will still rot and make a good mulch, but it will take a lot longer than those old ones I built.

Back to the story about my gardens. By the time I finished high school, I had a tiller and built a couple of neat gardens. One was roughly 30 by 30 feet and the other much larger. I followed a philosophy about gardening I hold to this day: rules are made to be broken. Actually, that's a good philosophy about life, but that's a future blog. I could put lots of mulch in the garden and grow tons of tomatoes, beans, you name it. Keep doing that and the soil keeps improving, too. 

My current garden is about 20 by 32 feet. Since I'm out of school for Christmas break, I'll be getting a dump truck load of dirt and expanding it some more. This year, I put up around 70 pints of tomatoes, 20 or so of beans, some peppers (they worked better last year) and bunches of okra. Froze some of all these, too. I'm still using frozen onion and garlic that I grew last winter. It's really a pleasure to be able to cook a meal and say you added some homegrown ingredients to it.

One thing I didn't have as a kid was a greenhouse. I wouldn't have known what to do with one then. One of the reasons we bought this house was the 6 by 8 foot glass greenhouse in back. The previous owners had never used it and didn't know if the heater or electricity even worked. Luckily they did. I replaced two panes of glass and I was good to go! I can't say that I've really done much with it. I haven't had a theme like orchids or anything fancy. Mostly, I've just put a variety of plants in it. I've been able to control the enviroment by using thermal mass to moderate the temperature swings in the winter. I have about 20 of those plastic containers that cat litter comes in. Each one holds a gallon and a half of water, so I keep at least 30 gallons of water to serve as thermal mass. Most of them are on the south side so they get a little heat from the sun. Mostly, they help to reduce wide swings in temperature. I throw away the lids, so they help add some humidity to the air, too. About once a week or so, I'll water all the plants and I'll flood the floor with water. This keeps the humidity up and helps to moderate the temperature.

I just gave away a few large plants. I'm reducing the plants I have in there, because I want to start more peppers and tomatoes again this spring. Starting my own from seed allows me to try varieties I'd never find in the local stores. I also want to start my own pansies and other bedding plants. It take about $60 to plant the flower bed on either side of the front sidewalk. Time to use that greenhouse to save some money, huh?

Enough rambling for now. You can tell I love working out in my yard. Can't do much today but blog and maybe start looking at all those garden catalogs I've been saving.

Comments

[Marilyn Jacobs Coker]

hey Gordon...i really enjoy your "rambling". I can picture you as a young man doing all this in Cornett - which helps me picture you as an older man now!!!!! Your dad would be proud of you. my parents would be proud of me for growing a garden but FarmVille is about my limit these days. My neuropathy helps me to tumble over into the flower beds to easily!!!