A little sunshine
May. 30th, 2009 09:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
altivoThis afternoon, we saw the sun. Of course, it's clouded over again now and might rain.
Tess is almost normal again. I put her out in the pasture while I was working in the garden and she ran around and enjoyed it. Even better, after two hours, when I went to get her she ran right to me at the gate. I really love it when she does that. It can be a bit disturbing to have 1200 pounds of horse charging right at you at full gallop, but she always stops in time. She's looking the best, I think, that she has since I got her. After she had her foal, Dawn, she never really slimmed down. I've been weighing every ounce of feed she gets for months now, gradually cutting back until she no longer looks pregnant enough for people to ask me "When is she due?" Of course, she tells me that she's starving, but she looks so much more happy and elegant now that it's worth it.
So, the garden. There's a lot to be done there. I weeded out the strawberries today, and removed all the blossoms once more. We aren't supposed to let them flower and produce fruit until after July 1, so they get their roots established first. If it doesn't rain tonight, I'll need to water them tomorrow.
Inspected the apple trees, and all four of them are loaded with apples. So many, in fact, that I may decide to strip some off so that they aren't too overburdened. This is the first year of production for two of them, and the second year for the other two. The varieties are Esopus Spitzenberg, Prairie Spy, Winter Banana, and Red Astrakan. The bumble bees and little native bees must have done most of the pollination, as we have no honeybees left around here to speak of. There were black native bees working the blueberry flowers today, in fact. I know bumbles can't reach into those flowers, so I'm glad to see that we have someone who may be doing the job. From the amount of green berries starting to appear, it must be working.
Asparagus was overgrown. We've been forgetting to check it during all the gloom and mud. I cut back several stalks that had grown to my own height, as well as getting seven or eight that were still edible size. We'll let it grow one more set of edible shoots and then it can make all the leaves it wants.
I was unhappy a month ago to discover that the Brit neighbor has apparently destroyed all the delicious red raspberries that used to grow along the fenceline between our properties. Today, though, I found a clump of them blossoming 30 feet from the fence, next to the stump of an old mulberry tree. We may still have raspberries, yay.
Lilacs and cherries are done, iris are starting to bloom now. Honeysuckle is still going at it. Spring is headed into high summer much too fast for me.
Oh, and I got zapped by the sheep fence. Ouch! I was about to let them back into the barn, and did my usual dumb trick of reaching across the corner of the fence to turn off the charger. I was all sweaty. The top wire just brushed my tummy at the right instant, and my hand was on an iron t-post. Crack! Up my ribs, down my arm, out through my palm. Buzzzzzz. It took several minutes to stop feeling that one. It takes a good crack to stop a sheep, though. They are so well insulated by their wool, that a light buzz won't even phase them. I, on the other paw, was only wearing a sweaty t-shirt. ;p (Well, and jeans, but they didn't enter into the picture.)
Tess is almost normal again. I put her out in the pasture while I was working in the garden and she ran around and enjoyed it. Even better, after two hours, when I went to get her she ran right to me at the gate. I really love it when she does that. It can be a bit disturbing to have 1200 pounds of horse charging right at you at full gallop, but she always stops in time. She's looking the best, I think, that she has since I got her. After she had her foal, Dawn, she never really slimmed down. I've been weighing every ounce of feed she gets for months now, gradually cutting back until she no longer looks pregnant enough for people to ask me "When is she due?" Of course, she tells me that she's starving, but she looks so much more happy and elegant now that it's worth it.
So, the garden. There's a lot to be done there. I weeded out the strawberries today, and removed all the blossoms once more. We aren't supposed to let them flower and produce fruit until after July 1, so they get their roots established first. If it doesn't rain tonight, I'll need to water them tomorrow.
Inspected the apple trees, and all four of them are loaded with apples. So many, in fact, that I may decide to strip some off so that they aren't too overburdened. This is the first year of production for two of them, and the second year for the other two. The varieties are Esopus Spitzenberg, Prairie Spy, Winter Banana, and Red Astrakan. The bumble bees and little native bees must have done most of the pollination, as we have no honeybees left around here to speak of. There were black native bees working the blueberry flowers today, in fact. I know bumbles can't reach into those flowers, so I'm glad to see that we have someone who may be doing the job. From the amount of green berries starting to appear, it must be working.
Asparagus was overgrown. We've been forgetting to check it during all the gloom and mud. I cut back several stalks that had grown to my own height, as well as getting seven or eight that were still edible size. We'll let it grow one more set of edible shoots and then it can make all the leaves it wants.
I was unhappy a month ago to discover that the Brit neighbor has apparently destroyed all the delicious red raspberries that used to grow along the fenceline between our properties. Today, though, I found a clump of them blossoming 30 feet from the fence, next to the stump of an old mulberry tree. We may still have raspberries, yay.
Lilacs and cherries are done, iris are starting to bloom now. Honeysuckle is still going at it. Spring is headed into high summer much too fast for me.
Oh, and I got zapped by the sheep fence. Ouch! I was about to let them back into the barn, and did my usual dumb trick of reaching across the corner of the fence to turn off the charger. I was all sweaty. The top wire just brushed my tummy at the right instant, and my hand was on an iron t-post. Crack! Up my ribs, down my arm, out through my palm. Buzzzzzz. It took several minutes to stop feeling that one. It takes a good crack to stop a sheep, though. They are so well insulated by their wool, that a light buzz won't even phase them. I, on the other paw, was only wearing a sweaty t-shirt. ;p (Well, and jeans, but they didn't enter into the picture.)
