Winter is coming

I love the change of seasons. It's not even Labor Day yet and it seems like fall already. The temps have been very cool for about 2 weeks. We had rain, wind and mist for 2 days. It really felt like September.

We do lots of winter prep here. The chimney gets cleaned, the old chickens get processed for the freezer, tomatoes get made into sauce and get canned, the garden gets cleaned out, the asparagus gets mulched, the generator gets drained and gets new gas, winter clothes get brought out, the clothesline comes down, the flannel sheets come out, the raspberries get pruned.

A friend asked why we have a generator (or rather, why we have plans for a power outage). The answer is that we can't rely on the power grid to keep us going. My friend never considered the possibility that we may be out of power for any length of time. The fact is that the grid can fail for lots of reasons. In 1991 I lived through an ice storm. I lived in Rochester, NY at the time. I had no power for 12 days. Fortunately it wasn't really cold. I had city water so there was no interruption of service. On our farm we have a well. The well pump needs electricity to get water up from 547 feet. Since the animals need water (we do too, but not as much) we have a generator to make sure we can get along for a short amount of time (couple of weeks?) We also have a wood stove for heat. After Hurricane Katrina especially, we have come to realize that we have to be responsible for our own health and safety, we can't count on "the government" to take care of us.

Lots of flowers...

and Blackberries.

Casey

Casey is a 5 year-old border collie. She is an interesting dog. She'll probably never be a real farm dog because she'll never be off leash. Casey is a really good watch dog. She only ever barks for good reason. Even when she sees deer she only whines.

Flowers and vegetables

The squash are yellow crookneck. The flowers are zinnias and a red sunflower, variety unknown.

We're waiting on some rain. The humidity is supposed to break tonight.

Hot Hot Hot

It's broiling. Since it is broiling, we got our big hay delivery. The unwritten rule is that you will be doing hay on the hottest day of the year. Hay harvesting requires dry weather. Dry means HOT. We stuffed 320 bales into our barn last night and it over 90 degrees and high humidity. Only today is supposed to be hotter. I am so glad that is over with. It makes me feel rich to have our winter forage in and paid for. It's beautiful hay.

Summer squash and cucmbers

We had a lot of rain over the weekend. I have summer squash, zuchinni and cucumbers. I split the first squash and zuchinni in half length-wise and grilled them. They were mighty tasty.

I planted golden zuchinni. It's much easier to see on the plant than regular green zuchinni. Pictures to come later.

Voles and rabbits

Holy cow. I have horrible problems with voles and I think rabbits. The mild winter has us with a population explosion of rabbits. The voles have been steadily getting out of hand.

I think rabbits have decimated my peas and beans. They are also hurting my brussle sprout plants.

The voles have been eating my beets. Last year I lost tons of tomatoes because of voles. They ate the bottoms off all the fruit.

I ordered some Mole-med and got another, similar product. However, it's not supposed to be used around food plants. I guess I need to send it back. My other option is to get an outside cat. I don't really want a cat but we have rodent problems in the barn too. There is a cat hanging around (I hope he's hunting). I've contemplated feeding him. A friend also has a batch of kittens. Perhaps I should invest in some rabies shots and neutering and get some. Unfortunately our road is really busy.