Farewell Barry, We Hardly Knew Ye

Last week was a busy week at work. News reports showed that a hurricane would be moving across our area.  I work for an oil company, and we spent an abundance of time filling all of our customers' tanks with fuel and delivering oil to ensure their inventory was stocked in the event of disruptions in supply.

Tricia and I spent time as well at home, walking around outside, securing anything that could blow around during the storm, and preparing for the storm.  We took the swing down that hangs from chains off of the big live oak tree in the back yard.  In an earlier storm it was blown into the tree and was broken.  We brought the American flag inside so it wouldn't get wet and exposed to the weather.  We laid the basketball goal down as in an earlier storm, it blew over and bent the rim.  We put stakes and ropes around a tree that falls in windy conditions to help prop it up.

Then we waited.  The storm was slow in getting here, but Barry finally arrived.  We were blessed to not have any damage.

Barry didn't quite pack the punch that some prognosticators predicted, but it always helps to be prepared.  Barry's effects were less than some thunderstorms we get during the spring and summer.  We always think about where our exposure is with these storms.  One of the biggest is the loss of power and thus possibility of losing all of our meat in the freezers.  We've thought about getting a generator, but we can't bite the bullet in spending money on something that we may never use. 

When all was said and done, we got less than 3 inches of rain and gusty winds that knocked down some dead branches from our trees.  The power only blinked on and off a couple of times.  I think the animals actually enjoyed the inclement weather as it cooled things off and allowed them to comfortably eat grass in the pasture all day long.

Water Break

Water is the Driving Force of All Nature. - Leonardo da Vinci

You step out of the door at 5 AM and it is 83 degrees.  The humidity is so thick you 'wade' through the air.  By the time you get 5 steps in the garage, you can feel a trickle of sweat running down your back.  Ugh!  The middle of July.  We have several months of this left to go!  We're not the only ones who are affected by the oppressive heat - our animals are too.

One thing that really refreshes me on a hot day is a tall glass of cool water.  It is no different with cows.  They love to drink water after a hot day out eating grass.  I like to watch them walking in to the water trough in the evening.  They stand in front of the trough and drink it in in long, slow, gulps, swallowing it down.  You can practically watch its invigorating effect.

I read somewhere that a cow can drink about 27 gallons a day.  Lots of times I turn off the water valve and re-fill the trough with rain water, so I carry 5 gallon buckets.  I've done the math and 27 gallons per day is about right.  Once the three momma cows and the two bulls drink, they can really put a dent in the water inventory in the trough.

Sometimes it's kind of crowded at the trough, but on some days, cows can walk up and have it all to themselves.  I like the photo below as it captures Rosie shortly after she's quinched her thirst.  She is standing there enjoying the shade of the pecan trees and the nourishment of the water.

Unfortunately, she's found another way to stay cool.  She goes and finds the nearest mud hole to lie in.  She gets muddy like a pig!  Oh well, just like humans, they just want to be cooled off in the hot, summer months.

The Giant Sucking Sound

I heard the news today of the passing of Ross Perot.  Although only 5 foot 6 inches tall, he was a giant of a man.  I had once read his book, entitled, "On Wings of Eagles" about Perot putting together a team to rescue some of his EDS employees from a Tehran prison.  On the drive home today, I learned some other notable things about the man that made me think. 

Now, I preface this post with a statement that Ross Perot was not perfect.  He was a man with failings and shortcomings like all of us, but I think we do a disservice, especially today, when we judge people in the past by today's standards or when we negate a lifetime of goodness by focusing on the negative in people.  If all were held to that standard, well, we could honor no one, for we all fall short.

First, I learned that Ross Perot believed that family meals were a sacred time.  He insisted that the family eat together, and he would sit at the head of the table and say grace, thanking the Creator for His Goodness and Mercy. 

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I think it is important to place family meal togetherness as a priority, especially in our busy world.  It is a beautiful thing to humble yourself and be thankful for your food, your sustenance, your blessings, and realize that it did not come by the sweat of your brow or from money you spent that you are partaking in a meal, but by the provision of a benevolent God.

You see, Ross Perot despite achieving tremendous success and being a billionaire, started from humble beginnings.  He was raised in East Texas in Texarkana and his upbringing shaped him.  When he was 25 years old, he dug his father's grave with a shovel and filled it in order to honor his dad.  He was frugal.  A story that made me chuckle is that he entered the U.S. Naval Academy at age 19 and when sworn in, he was given several pairs of shoes and a dozen sets of underwear.  Up to that point he had never had more than one pair of shoes and three pair of underwear at one time.  Perot said, "This was possibly my first example of government waste."

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Later, he brought to our national consciousness the subject of waste.  I had to laugh as I thought about how we are frugal, too!  We waste nothing!  We compost everything.  We aren't hoarders, but the only things that go into the trash are items that can't be shredded and composted.  We produce very little garbage.  We feed our soil and even feel guilty on vacation when we throw away a banana peel!  We wash and re-use zip loc bags, plastic forks and spoons and plastic sour cream containers.  Stretching a buck is important.

Another thing I remember about Perot is his charts and graphs.  He had a keen ability to be able to communicate things in a simple fashion that anyone could understand.  In fact, I think he would always say, "It's that simple." as he would finish a point.  He was the one that brought attention to the nation about the need for balancing the budget and the dangers of NAFTA.  Remember "the giant sucking sound?" 

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I've always believed in the following Bible verse and have been averse to debt from a personal standpoint.:

Romans 13:8 Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law. 

I think it works on a national standpoint as well. 

I believe that Ross Perot loved his country, saw trouble brewing and wanted to sound the alarm.  He wanted to serve.  His son said it best when speaking of his father.  As quoted HERE: Perot Jr. said his dad truly loved the country, and that’s why he ran for president, “It wasn’t for personal gain,” he said. “He was a businessman, frustrated by what was going on, and wanted to help fix the country.”

Feeding the Corn

We harvested one row of corn.  I wasn't that impressed.  The variety was Fisher's Earliest Corn and it was the first time I'd grown that variety.  While it was the earliest, it just wasn't the best.  It wasn't that sweet, it only had one ear per stalk, and only grew to maybe four feet tall.  Even though we amend our soil with lots of compost and add composted chicken manure and cow manure, I suspect we are still lacking in fertility.  Corn requires lots of nitrogen.

For the second row of a different variety called Stowell's Evergreen Sweet Corn, I want to give the corn some 'food' to help boost productivity.  Here's the thing that may amaze you.  Even with three cows and three bulls grazing all over the pasture, producing lots of poop, we don't get to use a lot of cow poop in the garden.  The reason is that the chickens quickly spread the cow manure over the grass while they search for tasty morsels in the poop.  The fertility isn't lost.  The pasture soil gets it instead of the garden soil.

This year I'm trying Gurney's Sweet Corn Food.  The ingredients are bone meal, corn gluten, kelp meal, dried molasses, poultry manure, soybean meal, and sunflower ash.

It has good reviews.  It smells kind of funky and looks a little like chicken scratch, but I'm gonna give it a try.

The package says to wait until the corn is 5 or 6 inches tall and then dig a shallow trench and apply the sweet corn food as a side dressing.

The suggested rate of application is 2 cups per 25 feet of row.  I sprinkled the prescribed amount in the trench and then will cover and gently water in.

I'll report back with results.  What I'm looking for is a 'greening' up of the leaves and a 'jump' in the growth rate which will hopefully result in higher productivity/yield.  If this doesn't work, there are many other products to try.  I'd like to stick with organic fertilizers.  Today I was reading about using earthworm castings.  I also use fish emulsion from time to time.  Next year, I may do a test plot to compare different organic fertilizers on the same row of corn to determine which one gives me the biggest bang for the buck.  For this year, I'm hopeful that the Sweet Corn Food will do the trick!

Drying Figs for a Healthy Snack

Russ' new home has a big fig tree in the back yard.  They have been ripening and he picks well over a gallon of figs every single day.  He's been sharing the wealth with us.  After freezing several gallons for making smoothies later, we began to dry a bunch of them, too.  Once dried, they are shelf-stable and can be placed in a jar or zip loc bag for snacking on. 

Here is a batch of fresh-picked figs all washed up and ready for processing.  You can see that they are ripened to a state of perfection!  They are literally bursting with sweetness.

After washing, we slice off any remaining hard stems and slice in half.  It usually works best if one person slices and the next places the figs on drying trays.

We try to place the figs on the tray to use every square inch of space.  Once dried, they'll shrink up some.

With a little help, it doesn't take long to have all the figs washed, sliced, and placed on drying trays and all ready to be dehydrated.

We pop them in the dehydrator and put them on the fruit setting and leave them drying for approximately 36 hours.  All of the water will be eliminated (or most of it, anyway), leaving nothing but concentrated sweetness and flavor of figs.

They are perfect for snacking on.  The farmer that Benjamin works for dehydrates them like this and sells them at the Farmer's Market.  He markets them as "Fig Candy." 



We place them in a jar for snacking and have two additional batches completed now, so we are filling gallon-sized zip loc bags with "fig candy."

Let's hope this satisfies my sweet tooth!

Happy 243rd Birthday, America!

This morning I woke up and hung Old Glory on the front porch.  I immediately thought of how blessed I am to be living in the United States of America.  I love our country.

Oh sure, we have our warts.  But I am proud to be an American.  I am thankful for the freedoms that we are able to experience.  The blood of patriots afforded this opportunity to me, and I won't forget it or take it lightly.

May we as a people unite as our Pledge says and "be One Nation Under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."

God Bless America!

Summer Garden - Almost Done

This weekend I had ambitious plans in the garden.  I wanted to work up some rows and plant a few more things.  First I moved the electric netting fence 10 feet back. You can notice the grass on that side.  I'll let the goats in there to eat it.  On July 4th I plan to pull up 4 hills in there and plant four types of pumpkins.  You can also see the Louisiana Purple Sugar Cane growing tall.  It is really healthy.  The other day I cut off a section with my pocket knife and ate the can.  Wow!  It was so sweet and delicious!

 Next, I moved the "metal mulch" off of the ground that I wanted to work and placed it on the garden walkway.  The ground under the metal mulch was soft and moist.  I could tell it was going to be easily workable.  So I got my garden spade and got busy.  I finally got it done.

I pulled up two rows and planted one row of white buckwheat on the last row you see on the left.  I'm trying a new experiment with buckwheat as a cover crop/green manure.  I intend on turning it under when it begins to bloom.  Buckwheat is a "miner" that pulls nutrients from deep within the soil so they will be available for future crops.  I like to eat buckwheat, though, and may try to grow some for grain.  We'll wait and see how it goes.

The other row, I planted multicolored zinnias from seeds I saved from last year.  I just thought it would be good to have some color in the garden.  It will be nice to pick flowers for a bouquet for my wife.  The next row is a row of black-eyed peas.  Then the row on the right is a row of okra that contains 3 varieties: Clemson Spineless, Burgundy, and Beck's Big Okra.



On the other side of the garden (the north side), I planted a row of sunflowers.  You can see them popping up below.  These were from some seeds from 2010.  The germination after nine years was about 100%!

And here are some cantaloupes:

Here is another row of sweet corn.  This variety is an heirloom, Stowell's Evergreen.

Here is some Burgundy Okra.  You can see the burgundy veins in the leaves.  They produce a burgundy-colored pod.  I notice something is eating on some of the leaves.

Here is a zoomed in photo of the blackeyed peas.

What I didn't have pictures of are the birdhouse gourds, luffa gourds, and butternut squash that I also planted.  I also planted three varieties of green beans since my early crop didn't do well.  I don't know how they'll handle the heat, but I'm giving it a shot. They are all popping out of the ground now.  As I said, I intend to plant four varieties of pumpkins on July 4th and that will complete my planting until early August when I put in the fall potato crop.