Steev's stuff

[steev]

Weeded the area I'd planted lots of stuff in that never sprouted; used it to plant out peppers, tomatoes, zukes, and lettuce; cloched them all against critters and cold; upped the riega for the day; mulched them well with hardwood sawdust; maybe next week I'll de-cloche them, expecting they'll have outgrown the cloches. Sure wish I had a lot of 1 or 5-gallon cloches; something to keep an eye out for; oh, well, wish in one hand....

When I was leaving the farm, there were four double dumper rigs coming through; they turned north toward the pass; I went south, the back way; as I went, there were 9 double dumper rigs coming up the back way that I passed; I can only assume they were avoiding the climb up the pass, admittedly a tad rigorous, but wow!, what an arduous back way for such a rig, much of it single-lane graded, unpaved. I've no idea what the project is that they were serving, but I can't help speculating that it will impact me somehow. I must speak to my neighbor, my county supervisor, about this at some point.

The favas are now up to two feet and blooming profusely; must weed them soon.

[steev]

Planted out more peppers and tomatoes; mulched them well; weeded the onion/leek/garlic patch; de-cloched last weeks' trans-plants.

Bearded iris are blooming; apples, too.

Saw the first pavement pig of the year; may stop for the skull next week, after the vultures have done a bit of work; also saw the lone rhea, poor solitary bugger.

The wife of the contractor drawing my house plans, which we are presenting as a "shop", for permitting/tax/regulations issues, came by to say the county was being bitchy about permitting a shop before there is a house on the property; so he's getting evidence of other properties that clearly have permitted structures, but no houses; besides which, "where am I to keep my equipment to build my house, out in an open field"? One might think the county has been fiddled before, they're being so careful; I understand that Colusa County is probably the poorest county in Cali, having no industry and little enough agriculture, still, they've not (yet) been fiddled by me, so why are they so suspicious? Really, I just want to put the head in.

[steev]

Planted out more tomatoes and lettuce, well-mulched (temps having hit 90F, the lettuce may not grow palatably, but seed is also valuable); tilled a patch for corn (so dry and dusty; blowing silt-snot, not much fun); finished weeding the Allium patch and put some irrigation to it.

Roses are starting to bloom profusely and the grapes are recovering rapidly; still, frost is not out of the question; I've been told of frost one June 20th that fried everyone's tomatoes.

Bindweed is sprouting, so the battle is on!

[steev]

Thermometer last week recorded 18F; not possible; nothing frost-tender had any damage; I think the min-hand is wonky; time to get another max/min thermometer.

Jiggered some riega around, planted Joseph's Cherry Sweet with mat beans, and completed the lane with Guatemala Blue squash, which I like both as a summer and winter squash; think I'll put some beets in among the squash.

The arbor grapes are coming along nicely; another couple weeks should produce primo hammock-shade; just in the nick, temps being reliably 85/90.

Saw this year's first fawn and grasshoppers.

The hills are browning rapidly from tops down; hope we don't get a fire-year like the past two, inshallah!

[steev]

Pretty good hammock-shade, though I didn't put it to the test.

Mat beans are up.

Favas are getting shot from the heat without having set a single pod.

Plenty of wild arugula that I need to transplant so I can use their lane for melons.

Looks like a total bust year for stone fruit, maybe a few plums/prunes; pears also pretty sparse.

Planted another tomato and Japanese cukes.

Something's been working on the lettuce, maybe a bird; it's not as thorough as a rabbit.

[richardw]

Shame about your stone fruit and pears, blossom got frosted?

[steev]

That's my guess, just bad timing.

[steev]

Got the cukes and Alliums mulched; seeded 16 different Turkish melons.

Joseph's Cherry Sweet is sprouted among the mat beans; Guatemala Blue squash is also coming up.

The arbor grapes are well leafed; I should make dolmas, but I'm a lazy bastard and cooking has become a chore.

I note that the fabas are going heat-dead without setting a single pod.

Seeded several watermelons.

[steev]

Purslane is looking very good; I regret that it's hot weather, since I like my cooked greens in the cold season; things will be different when I'm in charge. I think purslane will be useful in canned soups down the road.

Guatemala Blue squash continues to sprout; I'll be glad to renew my seed-stash, besides enjoying the chow.

The Turkish melon melange is sprouting; no sign of the watermelons yet.

I'm mulling the notion of plastic-bottle cloches on grapes, to keep the birds off while letting the grapes color; haven't quite doped out how to get the cloches on while the the grapes are small enough but still keep the cloches on in the wind; wire may be the trick. Last year, newsprint mostly kept the birds off, but the grapes didn't color well. I think if I really want to grow grapes, I have to out-plant the birds' appetites; not sure I want that many grapes; why is this stuff so complicated? Note that I don't promise "better", only "different", WIIC.

Planted some chitted spuds (I know it's very late, but they're not gonna keep and they might give me some tubers that will); I've still got plenty, of several strains, that I need to set out; scored some Masquerade, a pretty lavender/buff round spud; I have no idea about it quality-wise, but I'm a slut for pretty.

The volunteer self-seeding wheat is doing fine, having expanded its patches; it's getting dry enough to harvest, so that's another fiddly task on my list. I'd like to plant a patch of it this Fall, but it looks like I'll be up to my eyes (or whatever) building my house this Fall; I spoke to the guy who'll pour the slab and we know that concrete hates the heat; it'll be 90F+ for the next four months, so that's when the "fun" starts. It's gonna be a battle to get enough gummint paper under the mattress to cover this, but I'd rather go down with a bang than a whimper; this is going to be a stretch. Oh, well, I never thought I'd get out of this alive.

[richardw]

What is will the house floor size be?, i suppose you have to go through all the same building regulations and paper work that we do here

[steev]

I only want 20' x 40'; grape arbors on the East and West sides for winter sun and summer shade, as well as hammocks; an arbor on the South to double as 2-car parking, shade, rain-block, and solar-panel support; a 10' x 12' shed for battery and control for solar, laundry, pressure-pump, and freezer. If I survive the stress, physical and financial, of getting this done, there are many other projects that would be useful, as time, energy, and jing permit. Don't expect to ever have much in the bank again, but I'll be rich.

[steev]

Finished planting out the chitted spuds; only some German Butterballs and the Masquerades left.

It's looking like the Turkish melon seed was just too old; well, I can sympathize.

Some of the lettuce is working up to seed; tomatoes are blooming like crazy; chilies are working up to it; cardoons self-seeded all over; picked a bag of purslane to be sauteed with bacon grease and onion (I wonder how some Parmigiano/Reggiano would tart that up; might be gilding the lily, given the bacon grease).

Mulched the corn with compoost.

I've been moving my stuff to the farm, putting it on pallets under tarps, sitting in an open field; a bonanza for meth-heads; have I mentioned that I'm a pack-rat; I've got a lot of stuff. Make no mistake, it's only stuff; I've lost my stuff more than once and it hasn't killed me yet. My understanding is that I will eventually leave all my stuff for others to deal with; not my problem; that works.

Got the farm filed as a family trust and a will made: don't resuscitate me and take whatever parts I've failed to wear out; send the rest to a soup-kitchen (I got some cadaver-bone paste packed into my last extraction; I wonder who that was from) lord knows I've done my best to use everything up, but it's hard not to leave leftovers; at least they won't be bio-experiments in the back of the fridge. Honestly, I'd rather just be well-buried in my slow-compost pile; I don't want to be scattered about by coyotes and boar, but I'd prefer to simply return to our Great Mother, as we did for uncounted millenia.

[steev]

Hauled more stuff to the farm; it's amazing how many DVDs, videos, and comic books I have; I can only explain my urge to accumulate by the number of times I've lost all my stuff.

Cut the first zuke of the year; ate the first ripe tomato ( a pea-sized sour thing; there had been a cherry-sized one on the plant earlier, but it was mooshed).

Stumbled and ran my arm down a T-post, scraping off skin and some small scars; that's gonna leave a mark, but it will consolidate evidence of my physical ineptitude into one larger scar; did I mention I'm trying to use up my parts before I have to abandon them? I'm really not a fan of discarding anything before it's totally useless.

Spoke to the contractor's wife about my fear that I may have to go with pre-fab; that will nix several things I wanted, but I've noticed that I can't always get what I want. "Life is a bitch and then you die." Still, there is fun to be had if one has the sense to dance among the gravestones.

[reed]

Have ya thought about pole barn type construction on a slab? Lot of people here are doing that. Some look like crappy little garages but I'v seen a few that were done up real nice. If you had someone put up the poles and trusses nice and strong and square the rest would be relatively easy. I would definitely not go with the crappy little prefab trusses though.

I remember when I built my house I was scared to tackle it all by myself. I learned a person could buy the materials, buy the best tools, screw it all up, learn from the experience, tear it all down, buy it all again and save over what a so called professional charges.

[richardw]

The folks next door to me have a pole barn type construction, it's is really a four bay shed open to the front with one other section there living quarters, the whole thing is clad in corrugated iron, well insulated and very warm.