a man and his hoe

every day is a good day

  • Garlic Harvest

    It’s time to harvest the garlic. Imelda and Lucky are there to help, along with a handful of other chickens. It doesn’t take long to pull the hundreds of garlic I planted last fall. It’s a great crop this year, and now I know I can easily handle a crop ten to twenty times the size of this year’s small field. There’s time before lunch to weed and prep the lot for summer-fall cabbage and lettuce. Farming at this scale requires one to use of every square inch and then some.

    It will be another four years before I plant garlic in this plot again. By rotating and not planting garlic here again for a number of years, any pests that especially love garlic and started to get established this season, won’t find their favorite food here anymore and they will die off in the intervening years.

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    • Maintain Healthy Soil with Crop Rotation ~ Mother Earth News
    • Glorious Garlic ~ The Canadian Organic Grower
    • Time Again to Plant Garlic ~ Barbolian Fields
    • Crop Rotation ~ GrowVeg.com
    • Do Garden Crops Really Need Rotation? ~ GardensAlive.com

      Yes, The Sainted Gardener will keep excellent records, follow a dedicated plan of rotations and allow each bed to go fallow or be enriched by a cover crop of green manure every seven years. Meanwhile, the other 98% of us will stumble along, trying to pay attention and generally having lots of fun in addition to the occasional unwanted adventure.
      You’ll never be sorry that you took the time to think things through before planting—especially with tomatoes and root crops—but rotation is just one piece of the puzzle. Think of it as an odds-improver, and not an impediment to outdoor enjoyment.

    If you’d like to purchase some fresh garlic, grown without any herbicides or pesticides, feel free to let me know by filling out the form below or by calling 360-202-0386. I’m selling it for $5 a pound.
    [contact-form to=’theman@amanandhishoe.com’ subject=’Garlic Request’][contact-field label=’Name’ type=’name’ required=’1’/][contact-field label=’Email’ type=’email’ required=’1’/][contact-field label=’Garlic Request’ type=’textarea’ required=’1’/][/contact-form]

  • First Garlic

    It’s the start of garlic season. We’re used to buying garlic in the store, but what does it look like when you go harvest some fresh? Follow the pictures below to see what it looks like coming out of the ground, getting cleaned, peeled and chopped for super.

    The garlic sold in stores is first cured (dried) for several weeks to dry the wrappers. And yet garlic is very good fresh out of ground. Garlic which is fresh out of the ground is called wet garlic and difficult to find in stores. If you’d like to purchase some fresh garlic, grown without any herbicides or pesticides, feel free to let me know by filling out the form below or by calling 360-202-0386. I’m selling it for $5 a pound.
    [contact-form to=’theman@amanandhishoe.com’ subject=’Garlic Request’][contact-field label=’Name’ type=’name’ required=’1’/][contact-field label=’Email’ type=’email’ required=’1’/][contact-field label=’Garlic Request’ type=’textarea’ required=’1’/][/contact-form]
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  • Making Lunch in the Summer

    No matter what time of the year, making lunch starts with going out into the garden and vegetable beds to see what looks good today. Invariably, these ventures include a foray by the pond. What’s the point of going out to the garden if I’m not going to enjoy the pond? The cattails are forming their thick, bushy tails. By the end of summer they will turn to fluff. Come next spring, birds will use this fluff to line their nests.

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    Along the way I spot a welcome garden snake. They are plentiful this year and do a great service keeping the rodent populations down.

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    And I’m back in the kitchen with a bowel of fresh greens and eggs to make a simple, summer lunch. Gathering your lunch ingredients is stressless compared to going grocery shopping.

  • Off to Bed

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    The hen above has four chicks. Two of them are completely hidden underneath her warm feathers. You can just make out the gray and white tail feathers of a third chick to the left of the one chick who isn’t quite ready to snuggle underneath her mother.

    The seven chicks below are too big to snuggle under their mother anymore. She’s on the roost behind them, making sure they are safe on their roost. From late afternoon onward, the entire flock comes home to roost. The oldest ones are the first to bed. The mothers and chicks are next. The last to come in for the night are the young juveniles. Not much different than many people.

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  • Busy Mothers

    Summer is a busy season for mother hens. Every week, there are new hens sitting on eggs. Those with chicks are taking their chicks out into the brush to find good hunting grounds. Each week they take them further and further.
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    The chicks below are a five weeks old. They are already sleeping on the roost at night next to their mother. A few more weeks and they will probably be on their own. Until then, they spend twenty-four hours a day by her side, learning new things every day.

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