A Scout is Trustworthy...

This afternoon was Court of Honor for Benjamin's Boy Scout Troop and we attended.  A court of honor is a ceremony in which ranks and other awards are given to Scouts who have earned them.  It is good opportunity to honor those scouts who have worked hard on their advancements.  Russ earned the highest rank attainable in Scouting back in 2010 and is an Eagle Scout.  Benjamin is just beginning that journey.  We're proud of both of them.

The military and prospective employers look favorably toward men who have attained the rank of Eagle.  These boys are goal-setters, who at the age of 11 set their sights toward a difficult task and over the next several years, diligently work toward achieving their goal.  Along the way they learn leadership skills, outdoors skills, first aid, survival, cooking, citizenship, service toward others and responsibility among many other skills too numerous to list.

It is a lot of work, but also a lot of fun.  You can see below that Benjamin is receiving his awards from his Scout Master.  One of the neat things about becoming a First Class Scout is that the Troop buys the scout their very own tent.  He's holding it in his hand and will get lots of use out of that tent over the next few years.


Benjamin attaining the rank of Tenderfoot and First Class

Shown below are the patches that were awarded to Benjamin.  The one he's the most proud of is the Mile Swim patch.  It is the white one on the lower left with a sea horse on it.  At summer camp, Benjamin woke up at 5:30 every morning and trained for the mile swim.  On the last day of camp they swam it.  It is about 18 laps around the lake and Benjamin made it!  He told me that several times along the way, he wanted to quit.  He said his legs were aching and he was tired.  But he told me that he kept thinking, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me," and he kept going until he crossed the finish line. 

A nice collection of patches awarded to Benjamin today

I like the virtues and values that the Boy Scouts of American stands for and I'm thankful for our Scoutmaster.  He spends a lot of time and energy making an investment in these boys' lives and instilling virtues that will hopefully allow these young men to make a positive impact in their communities.  The mission of the Boy Scouts of America is to prepare young people to make ethical and moral choices over their lifetimes by instilling in them the values of the Scout Oath and Law.

Norman Rockwell Boy Scout Painting

Scout Oath

On my honor I will do my best
To do my duty to God and my country
and to obey the Scout Law;
To help other people at all times;
To keep myself physically strong,
mentally awake, and morally straight.

Scout Law

A Scout is:
Trustworthy, Loyal, Helpful,
Friendly, Courteous, Kind,
Obedient, Cheerful, Thrifty,
Brave, Clean, Reverent

Saving Seeds

Today ended up being a dreary, rainy gray Saturday.  We couldn't really do much outdoors.  Honestly, I always have to be doing something.  I find it hard to sit still.  I remembered that we have some "crack" peas drying in the laundry room that we'll put away for seed for next year.  Once you do this for a few years in a row, you don't spend much, if anything, on seeds or plants for your garden.  There was some college football on TV, so I parked myself in front of the tube with my supplies: the compost bucket, a bowl of peas I've been drying, and a casserole dish to catch the peas as I shell them.  Dried peas tend to fly around the room when you shell them, so it's good to have something sort of wide to help contain them. 


Compost bucket, dried peas, Pyrex casserole dish

Shelling dried peas for seed is much easier than shelling peas to eat.  The dried pod cracks easily and you simply run your finger down the opened pod to release all the peas into the dish.  If you enlist a little help, it goes even faster. 


Here is the dried pea-shellin' process

 Here are all of the peas I have shelled.  Doesn't look like much, but this is actually a bunch of seed and will last me several years.  You can see some darker colored peas in the Pyrex casserole dish.  Those are actually some Holstein Peas and you can see how they got their name as they are black and white mottled.  I will separate those seeds out before I plant and plant them elsewhere in order to maintain seed integrity.


Dried cow peas for next year's garden

Once they were all shelled, Benjamin helped me pour them through a funnel and into a dark-colored glass vitamin jar that we recycled and saved specifically for this purpose.  In saving seed, it is important that the seed stays dry and protected from light.

Of course we save all the dried pea pods to add to the compost pile.  We try to put everything we can back into the land.  One thing we really try to do is to put more into the land than we take out of it.  If you think about it, all the plants you grow and crops you harvest pull minerals and nutrients out out of the soil.  You really need to be amending organic matter, composted manure and other materials back into your soil so you don't deplete it.  Healthy soil produces healthy crops.  


The compost bucket

And here we have almost a full bottle full of seeds that we will save for next year.  I make sure to label the jar with the type of seeds and the month and year I saved them.  This little practice of saving seeds is a great investment that pays dividends.  Actually its like compound interest since it will produce more peas to eat and more seeds to save in order to ensure the cycle continues for years to come. 

A real pain in the neck!

Rosie is the name of one of our Jersey milk cows.  She's expecting a new calf in mid-December, so we just stopped milking her so that she can save her energy for her baby and dry off prior to freshening.  We jokingly call her Nosy Rosie, because she is so curious.  That girl is always getting her head into things.  She's also gluttonous.  Well, the other afternoon, she was acting funny and had something on her neck.  She wouldn't let me get close to her.

I'm a pain in the neck

After circling her several times, I got a picture of the problem.  She had gashed her neck open!  How'd she do that?  It was a pretty deep cut.


Ouch!

I went out to feed the pullets and found out how Rosie hurt herself.  Rosie the gluttonous pig had rammed her head through the chicken wire on the end of the chicken tractor in order to eat the troughs full of chicken feed inside the tractor, and in the process, sliced open her neck on the wire or a nail or something.  Of course all the pullets were loose and running around and I had to catch them with a net so a hawk or owl wouldn't feast on them.  Aggravating, for sure.  To patch it up quickly, I stapled some rice sacks over the hole.  Of course as the picture below shows, Rosie busted through that as well.  She acts as if she's starving and she's as big as a tank.


All you can eat chicken feed buffet

While we are looking in on them, the 31 Barred Rock pullets are really growing nicely.  We can't wait until they begin laying some nice brown eggs.


Pullets growing nicely

 So armed with my drill, some screws and an old piece of tin, I fixed the busted, rusted chicken wire where Rosie was getting into the chicken feed and injuring herself in the process.  After I snapped the pictures I used some wire cutters to cut off the mangled chicken wire.  Every day, a new adventure, I tell you.



Fixed up - for the time being

Tricia is applying Neosporin, triple antibiotic cream on Rosie's neck to fend off any infection.  Hopefully, my repair job will keep Rosie from having (and being) a pain in the neck!

Crabs in the bucket

Today I heard the phrase, "Like crabs in a bucket."  You ever heard that?  Generally, crabs in a bucket can individually escape, but they pull each other back down into the bucket and ensure their collective destruction.  Humans, sadly, can react the same way. Sometimes members of a group can pull down others who find success and ridicule them and pull them back to mediocrity.  Not good.  We should work together as a team and provide encouragement to one another, so that everyone can attain success.

This past summer, like most summers, we went crabbing.  We drive down to the coast armed with cotton string, chicken necks for bait, nets, and sunscreen.


Crabbing!

It is usually stifling hot, and you want to be sure to bring plenty of water to drink and a way to get out of the sun, but it is a lot of fun.


Shady looking characters

Basically, you tie a chicken neck on the end of a string and throw it out in the waters of the marsh.  Pretty soon, your line starts to tighten as a crab is trying to pull the meat off the line.  You begin to gently pull the string so as not to pull the crab off.  Your assistant holds a net and you pull the crab slowly into the net and he scoops it up in the net, catches the crab and deposits him in the bucket.  Benjamin is an expert with the net.  In fact, we nicknamed him Benjamin Net-an-Yahoo, after his watching his prowess with the net!  

Benjamin Net-an-Yahoo exhibiting his skills

Here are the first crabs going in the bucket.  As we catch larger ones, we throw the smallest ones back in the marsh to grow some more.  When you pull the small ones out, though,  you've got to be careful.  Crabs don't have pinchers for decorations, they use them!  You can't go crabbing without a little blood-letting.  They get me every time.  But you can see the whole crabs in a bucket thing going on as they pull one another back down as one of them tries to escape.


Crabs in the bucket

We set out a number of lines and then run back and forth checking lines that are taut, catching the crabs in the net and repeating.  It gets really busy and you hear, "Net! I need the net.  Got a big one on the line!" all along the banks of the marsh.  Usually at the beginning, you miss a few, but you quickly develop your skills and teamwork.  Lots of high-fives going on as the bucket fills up.  The string puller and Benjamin Net-an-Yahoo work closely together and make everyone successful by filling the ice chest with crabs that will be boiled and enjoyed by all.   

Crabbing off the bridge.  Got him!

Although hard work, there is always downtime for some visiting.  Here the cousins are discussing weighty issues, I'm sure.  You just have to keep a close eye on things.
 

Swamp People

The brackish water is teeming with alligators.  None of us wants to end up being gator bait or have Swamp people have to yell, "Choot 'em!" to get a gator off your leg.  That would put a serious damper on a crabbing trip for sure. 

Alligator infested waters

Before you know it, your ice chest fills up and it is time to head home and get a big pot of water boiling with some crab boil seasoning and throw the fresh crabs in along with some corn and potatoes, onions and lemons.


Ice Chest full of crabs



Nice Louisiana Blue Point Crabs

Back to the 'crabs in a bucket' phrase, we should probably all strive to encourage and lift one another up, so we get out of the bucket and don't end up being trophies of those who want to devour us like below.


The devourers



The sower went out to sow

A couple of days ago we prepared the soil, remember?  And then it rained.  So we used that time as an opportunity to get our seeds together and plan where we were going to plant things.  Today we are going to do like Jesus' parable in Matthew 13 in which the sower went out to sow.  However, we are aiming to make all of our seeds "fall on the good soil, and yield a crop - some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty."

After I checked the soil, though, the rain had made it hard and packed and I figured it best that I re-till and re-pull all the rows again.  Won't take long.  Nothing to it but to do it.


Breaking the soil like Charles Ingalls - only with a more modern team of oxen

Once the ground was tilled and the rows were pulled back up, we grabbed our seed and consulted our vegetable planting guide to determine the correct planting depth and distance between seeds.  Russ used a stick to make a small trench along the center of the row that we will plant different types of seeds in.


Making a small trench to plant seeds in

Once the trench is dug, it is time for planting.  Get your seeds together.  Below is a picture of some cabbage seeds we are getting ready to plant.  It is very important to label your seeds.  Cabbage, Cauliflower, Broccoli, and Brussels Sprouts seeds look remarkably similar.


Seeds of Change

This part of planting is a back-breaker.  Using the distance between seeds specification for each seed type, I hand plant each seed.  To be honest, I plant a little heavier than recommended in case some of the seeds don't germinate - better to be safe than sorry.  When you are finished with the row, straighten up, your back will thank you.

The genesis of a head of cabbage

Then I just repeat for each type of seed that I'm planting.  Below are some Swiss Chard Rainbow seeds, sometimes called Bright Lights Swiss Chard due to their colors.  These boogers will pop some serious color and flavor in your garden.  If the seeds look like beet seeds to you, they are in the beet family, but they don't make a round edible root like the beet does.  The leaves and ribs are what you eat and they are delicious.  We repeat this process until we've planted all the seeds we have on all the land we have.


I'm not neutral about Swiss Chard.  I love this stuff!

Finally, keeping in mind the correct planting depth, we gently cover the seeds and water.  You want to cover them because you don't want the birds to come and eat your seeds.  Then we wait for germination.  It is always exciting to see the green shoots breaking ground and marking the rows.  No matter how many times I see it, it is still amazing to me that a dead seed, put in dirt, with a little water added and a kiss by the sun, miraculously comes to life and grows!  We'll show you pictures as our seeds start to germinate.

Covering the seeds

Other than that, That's all, Folks!  We've just got to keep that "wascally wabbit" of our carrots!



Planning the Garden

One of the first things I do in planning out the Fall/Winter garden is determining which things we like to eat.  No sense in growing something if no one is going to eat it.  fortunately we love fresh grown produce and look forward each growing season to the new crop.  We look forward to each mealtime and truly enjoy food, enjoy growing it, preserving it, cooking it and of course, eating it!  It is important, of course, to determine which vegetables will grow well in your area.  Now a really helpful resource I've found is the Louisiana Vegetable Planting Guide that is put out by the LSU AgCenter.  Click here to see it: LSU Vegetable Planting Guide

This helpful publication tells you the crops that will grow favorably in the tropical South, the Planting Dates for Spring and Fall, the depth to plant, inches between plants, and the number of days to harvest.  It also gives you recommended varieties for Louisiana.  This is where I venture off a little bit, though.

I like to plant Open pollinated, heirloom seeds only, if at all possible. Non-Hybrid or Open-Pollinated seeds allow the gardener to collect seeds from a crop for future planting.  I like to be able to save my seeds from year to year and stay away from hybridization and genetically modified foods.  I save seeds each year and we are getting to the point where we have a pretty good inventory of our favorite vegetables.  This is a money saver and ensures that you'll have seed you need to grow the crops you like year after year.

I generally buy from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds.  Here is their link: Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds  You can order seeds directly from their website.  There are many other seed catalogs from which to buy from, though.  You should get on Baker Creek's mailing list.  Their Seed Catalog is like coffee table book with beautiful pictures of different types of heirloom vegetables.  I could look through it again and again.  The seeds are relatively inexpensive and range from $1.75 - $3.00 for a pack of seeds.  If you save seeds, however, that is your final investment because you can save the seeds and never purchase seeds again!

Here are just a few samples of seeds I'll be planting this year:


Packets of open pollinated, heirloom seeds


Record keeping is a must with gardening.  You need to record when you planted so that you know when to harvest.  You need to know where you planted each variety, so that you know which specific plant you are growing.  I also like to plant contrasting colors to accent the garden.  For example, I plant the Bull's Blood Beets, which produce a deep red leaf, right next to the Simpson Black Seeded Lettuce, which produces a light green leaf.  This is no doubt strange, but produces a visual feast, as well.

I really like the Winter garden better than the Spring garden.  First, it is cooler and more comfortable to maintain.  Then the weeds don't grow as quickly and finally, the pest and disease pressure is definitely lighter than in the warmer months.  I try to plant everything from seed.  However, if there are ever germination problems, weather disasters or other catastrophes, I will go ahead and buy hybrid plants from the store.  Last year, our cats knocked over and ruined an entire flat of broccoli seedlings and ruined them.  Better to have some hybrid plant grown vegetables than none at all. 


Example of the Planting Guide

 This Fall/Winter, I will be planting the following:

• Broccoli
• Brussels Sprouts
• Snowball Cauliflower
• Kale
• Rainbow Swiss Chard
• Mustard Greens
• Italian Parsley
• Oak Leaf Lettuce
• Radishes
• Shanghai (Pak Choi) Greens (Chinese Cabbage)
• Black Seeded Simpson Lettuce
• Bull's Blood Beets
• Detroit Dark Red Beets
• Spinach
• Turnips
• Cabbage
• Berlicum Carrots
• Cosmic Purple Carrots
• Mammoth Red Mangel Beets
• Atomic Red Carrots
• Parisienne Carrots
• Rocky Top Lettuce Mix
• Mesclun Salad Mix
• Garlic
• Green onions
• Shallots
• Sugar Snap Peas

I'll plan how I want to lay out the rows and what seed I'll plant in a which location, keeping in mind which seeds, like sugar snap peas, that need a trellis to grow on.  Once you've got all that together and organized, and your seedbed is prepared and ready, it's time to plant.  Get your hoe and gloves, we'll do that tomorrow!

Readying the ground for planting

I originally started this process of preparing my seedbed on September 16th, but I got interrupted by a 4 inch deluge from above.  Because I have things growing in the garden currently, I plant the fall/winter garden around existing production and pull in that dirt once the summer harvest is complete.  The plot between the field peas and the fence I'm showing you below is just a fraction of the whole garden, but it gives you an idea of the process.  Here is a photo of what the ground looked like before I began along with a bucket half filled with fresh picked Ozark Razorback peas:


Overgrown with weeds

You can see the compost pile in the corner behind the blue handled shovel.  I scattered all the compost on the ground with the shovel.  Composting builds the soil with nutrients and amends organic matter.  I mix hay, grass, weeds, and other organic materials with cow manure, chicken manure and turn it over.  The compost pile, full of good bacteria, "cooks" the materials down into great stuff for incorporating into your soil.  Building your soil up is a slow process.  You have to be really patient and keep feeding as much as you can into the soil each year.  Before long, though, you'll begin to see a change taking place.  For starters, the ground doesn't pack as much as it used to.  It begins to have some texture to it and you begin to see a number of earthworms, insects and other beneficial critters in your soil as you turn it over.  Look at all the chickens around the fence.  When I moved the compost, a lot of insects were scattered and the chickens are helping themselves to an all-you-can-eat buffet!


Broadcasting good compost on the soil

Then I took the tiller and worked it all in real good.  I work the tiller in east to west planks and then till diagonally.  Now, this is the part that is hard for me.  My goal is to get to where I don't till and just plant seeds.  I have a couple of problems, though, with that as I have a lot of weed pressure and I need to pull up rows since the garden is low.  Additionally, I want to work in the good compost into the soil.  One of these days I'm going to figure out how to no till - that is on my to do list as it would save me time and work.  The really bad part about tilling is I can see that I'm killing some of the earthworms I've worked so hard to grow and I need them to aerate the soil, increase porosity, and produce castings for fertilizer.  The other downside to tilling is that when you turn the soil over, you expose the beneficial bacteria in the soil to the sun.  The sun is good at disinfecting and sterilizing, which is a good thing in most cases, but not in this case.  Sunlight sterilizes your soil and you don't want to kill the good bacteria you've worked so hard to inoculate into the soil.



Incorporated compost into the soil

And then I begin to pull up the rows with a hoe.  My garden is very low.  If I don't pull up rows and get the seedbed up a few inches, the crop would drown and scald during the first rainfall.  As I pull up rows, I try to throw out a lot of the Bermuda rhizomes and nut sedge and weeds as they'll just sprout right up again.  This is a never ending battle and one that you never win.  You just try to stay ahead.  In the photo below, you can see all of the green weeds in the rows.  Some of these will die on their own, but some will re-root and grow.  So to be safe, this must all be pulled.  Whew!


Pulling up rows

 The picture below is a favorite of mine.  I think it is beautiful.  I know, I'm weird.  This dirt is good.  It smells good - a rich, musty, "earthy" smell.  It is the where the good vegetables are going to grow.  If you don't have good soil, you aren't going to have good crops.  If you take care of your soil, your soil will take care of you and pay dividends in terms of rich, nutrient dense foods for you and your family to enjoy.


Good Soil

But then the rains came.  This is a picture of the same land as shown above, it is just taken facing west versus from the eastern facing perspective above.  See what I mean about the necessity of rows?



Raindrops keep falling on my head.

 You really can't control the weather and I'd much rather too much rain than not enough, so I'm not going to belly-ache too much about it.  The rainfall made me slow down.  While we wait for the rain water to drain into the soil, we'll plan out the garden.  I'll talk about planning the garden tomorrow.  As with anything, you've gotta have a plan if you want to be successful!

Harvesting Sweet Potatoes

In an earlier post I showed pictures of the sweet potato vines that take over the garden each year at this time.  I never even have to plant them as they come up "volunteer" every year.  The 30' by 30' area that I allow them to grow in looks like a jungle.
 

Sweet Potato Vines

Usually around the first of October, we dig up the entire sweet potato patch with a shovel.  The boys help me out and enjoy the sweet potato harvest as almost every shovel full that I turn over has a potato to put in the bucket.  Sweet Potato vines actually make a flower that looks sort of like a morning glory.


Sweet Potato Flower

Benjamin is busy harvesting below.  We picked about a two foot swath that we started harvesting in.  I'm sure the commercial growers do this with equipment, but a shovel and some manual labor is how we do it.  We just dig up a shovel full and turn it over and collect the sweet potatoes and put them in a bucket.  If you look closely, you can see two nice sweet potatoes in Benjamin's shovel.  Off to the side are some clippers with red handles.  We clip the vines for only what we want to harvest for the day.  Since the vines grow out horizontally and put down new roots every few feet, clipping them doesn't kill the plant.  In the photo below, I've cleared the patch that we'll harvest today.  You can see the difference between the first picture above and then below to see the portion of "jungle" we've cleared.


Barefooted Boy digging sweet potatoes

At Our Maker's Acres Family Farm, we don't waste a thing.  Everything either gets put back into the land in the form of compost or fed to the animals.  In this case Daisy and Rosie make their presence known by the garden fence and beg.  We oblige and throw the vines over the fence.  They absolutely LOVE sweet potato vines.  Even better are the sweet potato tubers that are too small to eat.  We hand feed them to the cows.  The cows must think they are candy and keep coming back for more.

Rosie and Daisy - Sweet Potato Vine Crazy

The next few pictures show some of the produce that we got after digging just a little bit.  We will continue the harvest over the next week or so.  It takes a while to dig up all the potatoes.  Its is always a competition to see the weird shapes that sweet potatoes grow in.  Here's a really big one:
 

Benjamin showing off a HUGE sweet potato as big as his head!

Here's one that looks like a pear

 Here is what I think is the perfect sized sweet potato:


A nice one!

 Once we dig them, you can't just cook and eat them, LSU AgCenter researchers say the following: 

Sweet potatoes are not very sweet or moist when first dug.  It takes six to eight weeks of proper curing and storage before they have the sweet, moist taste and texture desired when baked, says LSU AgCenter horticulturist Dr. Tom Koske.  After the roots are dug, they should be cured to heal the cuts and trigger development of the sugar-creating enzymes, the LSU AgCenter horticulturist explains.  Cure by storing in a warm, humid room for five to 10 days. A temperature of 80 degrees to 85 degrees and a relative humidity of 80 percent to 90 percent are ideal. These exact conditions will be hard to establish around the home, so select a room or building that comes close to these conditions. After curing, store roots at 55 degrees to 60 degrees for six to eight weeks. This storage further develops the sugars and maltose sugar-creating enzyme. This enzyme will really kick in while baking at 350 degrees to 375 degrees to develop the sweet, syrupy sugars that Louisiana yams are famous for. Stored cured roots may last several months or more.

You can see below I've started the first step of the curing process by hanging the harvested sweet potatoes in an onion sack from the pecan tree.  I'll leave them there for 10 days before bringing them inside to finish curing.



The curing has begun



In the up-coming week we'll harvest many more and will repeat the process.  Once that is done, all that remains is TO EAT THEM!!  They will last for several months in our pantry.  Tricia normally makes empanadas, sweet potato pies, sweet potato fries, baked sweet potatoes, sweet potato candied casserole, mashed sweet potatoes - all family favorites.  Hard work getting them to the table, but good eating!