The past week here at ABC Acres has been busy.  I have to say I’ve missed spring time in the Rockies, on Monday we started the week off with intermittent snow storms, and the next day we were working in t-shirts. Of course Tim didn’t mind the snow as he has been in Florida all week, he deserves a break, but it was a bit of a dagger in the side knowing he was on a beach while we dealt with frozen water troughs.

A bit of what we’ve been up to, we planted several very large apple trees, it’s always interesting when gardening requires an excavator.  We’ve also been seeding and mulching a lot of areas disturbed by the pigs, farm construction etc.   We’ve also been busy planting and propagating.  Roughly 200 willow cuttings went in the ground as a dual purpose privacy hedge and goat fodder. I’m looking forward to experimenting with making tree hay for the goats to add variety to their winter diet.  We also spent a bit of time in the greenhouse getting things started for the gardens, our tomatoes and peppers have all germinated and even some of the brassicas we planted on Tuesday have even sent up the tiniest sprigs of life.

With the greenhouse now operating at near capacity for starts we look to prepare garden beds.  As many of you are probably also preparing to do the same I’d highly recommend you test your soil before any amendments.  We were going to just add some compost and plant, but being on new ground I was curious to see if we need any micro nutrients.  I’m glad we got the test done as we’re dealing with a lot of Phosphorous in the soil and adding more compost would have added even more.  While not the end of the world, we could have created a long term problem by adding to it, so we’ve pulled the hens out of the garden and will let them work on the site of our future high tunnel for a week then they’re out to the pastures.  This is why I recommend testing your soils because just adding amendments on a whim is like adding oil to the engine when it’s already full.

We also did a minor remodel on coop 1 to prevent the birds from roosting in their nest boxes. They still have plenty of places to roost I just won’t have to remove chicken poop every morning.  Interesting side fact, do you know what the white part of chicken poo is?

It’s still chicken poop.

With that said I’ll wish you a great weekend and happy growing!