Bird-proofing the Cherry Tree

We have a cherry tree in our backyard that was part of our wedding ceremony.  We actually moved it from our first house to this one in 2010.  Last year we ate exactly ZERO cherries off of it. The birds got all of them and it was disappointing for everyone.

Cherry season in the Northwest is a big deal. We look forward to it almost as much as the Oregon strawberry season (which may open next week!) I bought some of the first cherries of the season last week for $4/pound from Kruger's (a local year round open air farm market)...they were so sweet and delicious.  I unfortunately decided to share them with the family and they disappeared in seconds--poor planning on my part.

This year we built a bamboo frame around the tree and now that it is finished blooming, it was time to net the tree.

Cherry in bloom with the bamboo frame

Cherry with netting

This year we will enjoy some cherries!  Hopefully.  I noticed this week that a large number of the cherries have dropped from the tree.  This tree has never done this before, so I looked it up on the handy internet.  Apparently fruit trees do something called the "June Drop".  The trees will drop some of their fruit if they feel they have too many to successfully ripen during the season. Yet, on another site I read that cherries are usually the exception to the rule...the internet can be so confusing!

The tree has not dropped all the cherries, there are still a good number on the branches, so I am still leaning toward a June Drop situation.

May Garden Update

The weather was surprisingly summer like here in the northwest for a couple weeks.  We enjoyed every last second of it.

Having watched how other bloggers have successfully grown watermelons in our climate in cloches, I decided that this was the year I was going to have the same success. This is my mini greenhouse:

A couple old windows leaning against a wood table.  I used sheet plastic on the sides to keep the heat inside, they can easily be pulled back on hot days for ventilation.

Inside, I planted some watermelon and charentais melon (french cantaloupe) seedlings I started weeks ago in a big deep pot. The cold frame also holds all the tomato starts, they need to be hardened off before I plant them in the garden.

The jugs are full of water and soak up heat during the day to keep the mini-greenhouse warm at night.  The tomato's will be planted and then the melons can take over the entire interior of the greenhouse this summer.

In other news, my artichokes are starting to form some mini-chokes!  This plant now has three growing strong.

Above is a photo of the hugelkultur bed from a couple weeks ago....just hours before it was destroyed for the FOURTH TIME....this time by the one wiley, flighty chicken, Eureka.  I managed to save some of the seedlings and re-plant them, but the jury's out....not sure what is going to survive.  ARGH.  The hugelkulur bed is now surrounded by its own set of fencing on all sides, including the top.  So now, any escapees will have to get out of the run AND somehow get through the second set of fencing to do any damage. Ha.

I plan to plant the tomato's out next weekend, hopefully by then the nights are warm enough and I will not have to wrap them up.  Hope everyone is enjoying their long weekend!

Friday Farm - Asparagus!

For Mother's Day my daughters made me breakfast, that featured an omelet made from our chickens eggs and filled with home grown asparagus:

It was delicious. (There was also a touching and sweet powerpoint presentation and a beautifully hand drawn card featuring all our girls.)

I planted these crowns in 2008 or 2009.  This is the first year I have really harvested any of it - almost two pounds!

Radical Acts of Defiance

Have you seen the cover of Time this month?

I have been trying for the last week to clarify my thoughts about how many ways this cover and the article included inside infuriates me.

Luckily, Erica at Northwest Edible Life has said it perfectly. Check out her post, Radical Acts of Defiance.

I truly hope all the moms out there enjoyed this gorgeous weekend.  Happy Mom's Day, and know that you ARE mom enough.

Dirt Pile = Happy Hens

My mother is subscribed to this blog. (She is a supportive Mom!) She emailed me yesterday suggesting that the all the chickens needed was their own dirt pile to scratch in and then they would leave my hugelkultur bed alone.

It seems like sound advice, however, after having kept chickens for a few years, I am not sure her theory really holds up and so responded with the obligatory "LOL".  Why would I indulge the misbehavior? She wrote back to let me know that I was being an irresponsible chicken keeper, in the only way a mother knows how....indirectly and layered with admonition.

However, as I near my fourth decade, I have learned that my mother usually does know what she is talking about--much to my teenage self's dismay. So to clear my conscience and keep the chooks happy, I dug up some of their run today so they had some dirt to scratch around.

The results are some very happy hens:

There was much chicken babbling and scratching and pecking.

Garden Do-Over

The hugelkultur bed was re-planted this weekend.  It is heavily laden with a few varieties of carrots and beets, arugula, kale, chard, spinach and collard greens.  The collard greens, arugula and chard are new to our garden this year.

This was re-build No. 3, will see how it goes. The chicken fencing is now over six feet high, and so far it has kept the ladies in check....but you can see them pacing the fence line here. That big pile of dirt is too much for them---they think they need at it!

The broccoli, brussel sprouts and cabbage starts also went in the ground.

The brassicas are on the right in the photo above. On the left in front is the artichoke that the chickens destroyed earlier this year, but it is recovering just fine, maybe I will actually have artichokes this year. The potato bed is behind the artichoke and you can see the raspberries fully leafed out behind them.

Here is a closer look at the potato bed.

Despite being dug up a few times by the aforementioned chickens...they are doing just fine. More soil and straw has already been added to their pile.

The herb bed also seems to be recovering and there are quite a few little sprouts emerging. The corn, squash and beans will be sown later this month.

Are you planting anything new this year?

Friday Farm - Chook Ornaments

Last weekend we attended the annual Trash to Treasure event hosted by the St. Johns Swap N Play.    Their mission, from their website:

We exist to establish and maintain a network of families whose mission is threefold: (1) provide material resources and promote sustainability of the Portland metropolitan area through community sharing efforts (2) provide educational resources to children, parents and families, and (3) collaborate in partnerships with other organizations to create and implement large scale community outreach projects that provide educational and material resources for North Portland communities.

They have a shared space in the basement of a church in the North Portland neighborhood of St. Johns where parents can bring their kids to play with other kids, meet with other parents, leave clothes and toys their families have outgrown and take items they need.

You may remember that my sister and I helped with their apple crush last fall that resulted in some amazing hard cider!

The Trash to Treasure event is similar to a neighborhood cleanup, except you can bring more than just the non-curbside recyclables.  You can bring clothes, household items, garden tools/equipment and leave it there...and take whatever you find that is irresistible.  It is like a big FREE swap meet!

Next year I am taking a lot more stuff to give away.  At the end of the day, whatever is not taken is picked up by the local Goodwill for their charity.

The Hubs found these for me:

How could I resist them?  Now what to do with them?

Hens of Anarchy

My girls escaped again last week.  It was a really stormy day and the plywood "gate" in my chicken run fencing blew over.  This allowed the girls full, un-chaperoned access to the entire backyard.

Everything

was

destroyed.

The potato bed.

The hugelkulur:

See the hugelkultur "before" here.

The herb garden:

It was upsetting to say the least.

The Hubs and I are planning our rebuttal.  Six foot high permanent run is in their future.  No more free ranging the entire backyard.  Sorry ladies.....but you are OUT OF CONTROL.