Starting from Scratch... Here's the progress

Although it's hard to believe, some of you still don't realize that we moved. Yes, that's right... We don't live in the Marblemount wilderness anymore, but moved 55 miles West, right by the salt water in the Skagit Flats. I wrote about it here. Or you can watch the video that explains it here.

I realized I actually never wrote a blog post in the two months since we moved! I'd like to start by showing you the garden progress, and in the next post will show you the progress with the shed and gigantic mountain bike jump Steve and the boys built.

Let me preface this: we LOVE it here. It's so different than our Marblemount homestead, but oh so welcome. There's less rain here, less driving, much more biking, and the beautiful salt water!

Two months ago, we started with a blank slate. Lots of lawn surrounded by huge fields, and a few ugly standard box-store foundation plantings around the house.

Before we had fully moved in, I started digging in the yard.  I had transplanted and potted up some of my favorite plants from Marblemount, and I began finding spots for them here.

Friends gave me plant babies. Other friends gave me gift certificates to my favorite nursery, which happens to be only a ten minute drive from our new house! Dangerous!!!

If you have followed my blog for a while, you know that I like Old English cottage style flowers best, so in they went.

It's much windier and drier here, but my babies seem happy. Below is a picture I took this morning. Not bad from nothing, eh?

There are Old English roses, lupins, lemon balm, irises, California poppies, pulmonaria, chives, and dozens of newly planted dahlia tubers. One of my friends gifted them to me, since he always has lots of babies.  This saved me literally hundreds of dollars!

The other priority for Steve and me was the vegetable garden.  We originally planned on simplifying, and not having a big garden. Ahem. So much for that.

We started rototilling up a plot, and it looked ridiculously tiny compared the huge garden we have in Marblemount.

So the next time Steve had to rent a tractor for work, he brought it in and plowed up another spot.

We ordered a couple of truck loads of compost, which cost $30 each and is totally worth it, and then I made raised beds. The soil down here is much more sandy, and I'll have to water more. But it's good, fertile soil, since this is one of the most famous agricultural regions in the country.

I also put up some of my prayer flags, which our three kids were very upset about. They didn't want other people to think we are all hippies. I tell you, we had a pretty big argument about this, and in the end, Mama won, because I don't care if my kids are embarrassed about this.

Plus, the flags will hopefully act as scarecrows for the birds. Hippy scarecrows. You're welcome, kids.

As of today, the third week of May, our garden is in and thriving. Peas, lettuce, kale, bok choy, swiss chard, spinach, carrots, beets, onions, cucumbers, beans and tomatoes.

We don't have deer problems here, but the @#%^* bunny ate my newly planted Wisteria. I'm letting our big dog Raka chase the bunny, so he'll be deterred by living under the shed and making one hundred thousand babies... I don't think it will work.

We bought and planted three apple trees from Cloud Mountain Farm, because the best time to plant fruit trees is ten years ago.

Although we still have our large orchard in Marblemount, we also want apple trees down here. Not to sound all show-offy here, but our homemade hard apple cider that we made last year with our own apples is better (and cheaper) than store-bought.

So there will be much more cider in our future. Once this friggin pandemic is over, you'll have to come over, sit in the windy yard with us, and admire the view while drinking hard cider.

Next time, I'll show you the progress the boys made with the shed. You'll also see why my hair looks grayer than ever, and not only because my hair dresser is in quarantine. Mostly it's because Luke built a 9-foot high mountain bike jump, and he regularly launches himself off it.

So tell me: what's new with you????

Why yoga with goats is a really bad idea. And: a great spring resource for ya!

Have you seen the viral videos on Facebook of people doing yoga with goats?  Yes, they're cute, but do people realize that if they did yoga with goats, their yoga mats would get peed, pooped, stepped, and chewed on?

Also, have you ever had a baby goat jump on your back?  It hurts.  And not only do they step on your sensitive vertebrae, but they also chew on your hair without you realizing it, and then you have strands of spit hair sticking from your head like a crazed Medusa.

Still.  We sometimes do yoga with goats.  Here are Luke and Eva while visiting our friend with mini Nubians.

Please note the muddy hoof prints on Luke's shirt (another side effect of doing goat yoga: lots of laundry).

This photo op happened when we shopped for goats.  I considered mini Nubians.  They are incredibly gorgeous.

Then, I fell in love with actually owning goats with ears, as opposed to the ear-less La Manchas I've been raising for over a decade.

The white goat below is Fiona, a Saanen I bought from a friend.  I adored Fiona, and she stayed at our homestead for three weeks, until I had to return her because I was ready to slit her throat.

Every single day, she would scream and yell and maaaaahhhhhh very loudly all day long as soon as she lost sight of me.  I spent hours in the barn and pasture to comfort her, although she also had another goat companion, but in the end, I had to return her.  I cried when I dropped her off.

We sure loved the taste of her milk.

Alas. 

I've been making Chevre cheese, yogurt and Feta cheese with her milk.  Oh so good.  And my morning coffee with creamy, raw goat milk?  Ohhhh!!!

You do know I teach a self-paced online course on how to make cheese at home, right? It includes how to make Greek Yogurt, Chevre (or Farmer's cheese if you make it with cow milk), Gouda and Cabra Al Vino.  

And a recipe for the best cheese cake you'll ever make (made with the Farmer's cheese I teach).  My son makes cheesecake all by himself, and he's only 13.

You can check it out by clicking here <----

Spring time is in full swing, despite the record rainfalls we've been plagued with here in the Pacific Northwest.

Despite the rain, I got my potatoes planted!

And my daughter helped me start all kinds of seeds in the greenhouse, and they are all sprouted and growing happily by now.

Best of all, flowers are already popping up everywhere, and the wild natives are blooming, too.

Our six little chickies are growing very rapidly.  They are looking less and less like little fluffballs and more like... you know... dinosaurs.

And of course, you also know I teach a self paced online chicken raising course, right?  In it, you'll learn everything you need to know to raise chickens in your backyard, even if you live in the city.  It also includes a video and step-by-step instructions on how to build the kind of chicken tractor we've used for over a decade to keep our birds safe and happy.

You can check it out by clicking here <----

We spent an hour to clean up our neighbors' chicken coop the other day, so we could move our two big laying hens up there while the little ones occupy the chicken tractor.

The kids had to help and weren't happy about it, but oh well: if you wanna eat eggs, you gotta help clean up chicken poop.

In closing, I'll prove to you that we don't just work all the time.  We take time to play, we really do, and we think it's important.

One day, when it wasn't raining (surprise, surprise), we took our canoe out to Puget Sound and found some magical spots.  

And then we warmed up at home in front of the wood stove.

By the way?  I put together a resource of spring-related tutorials I made, mostly videos.  One series of tutorials is about growing your best onions ever organically, the other is how and why to use a broadfork instead of a rototiller to prepare your garden, and the other is my little movie tutorial on how to make nettle pesto.

You can get the list right here on our Patreon membership site.  By paying as little as $1 a month (and as much as $20, and with that you'll get a traditional long bow Steve made), you get access to membership-only stuff I produce.

Plus, it supports us, so that's nice, isn't it?
Head on over to our membership site to do just that and grab your list for spring!

Why and how to grow potatoes in your garden or containers - organically!

Why grow your own potatoes?

Besides being very easy to grow in a backyard garden or even containers, why should you grow potatoes? 

How about the mind-boggling varieties you can plant? You can pick from a huge variety of taters when you grow your own, with different skin color, flesh color, texture, flavor and use. 

Who needs boring old Russet Potatoes or Yukon Golds when you can grow these tantalizing varieties: Rose Finn Apple, Desiree, French Fingerling, German Butterball, Russian Banana, Austrian Crescent, Red Bliss All Blue, Purple Majesty... Is your mouth watering and imagination running wild at these names?

Some varieties are better for fresh eating (Red Gold, Rose Gold), some are better for long-time storage (Russet, Carola), and whatever your growing and eating goals, I encourage you to plant some of these tasty tubers!

You can even grow spuds if you don't have a garden – just grow them in containers on a patio or driveway!

When to plant?

Potatoes can be planted as soon as you can work the soil in early spring, although they won't begin to grow until the soil temperature has reached 45 degrees F. 

We plant ours two to four weeks before the last frost date. They can deal with a light frost, since the soil will insulate them. However, if the young leaves have popped through the soil and a hard frost threatens, they can get damaged. 

 If a cold snap is forecast, you can push soil or mulch like straw over them, and the leaves will grow back up through it in a few days as if nothing happened.

How to plant them?

Start with certified seed potatoes to make sure they are disease free, since these vegetables can suffer from serious fungal and bacterial diseases. You can save some every year and re-plant. But if after a while yields decline, or their foliage looks weird, just start over again with new certified seed potatoes. 

Don't use old potatoes from your root cellar, since these could carry disease organisms without you knowing it.

Plant seed potatoes whole if they are small (about the size of a golf ball), or cut the bigger seed potatoes in chunks (2 inches square), and make sure that each piece has two or three buds, or eyes, on it. 

Allow the potato chunks to dry for a couple of days before planting so a callous can develop over the cut, which helps prevent rotting.

Some people expose their seed potatoes to light and temperatures between 60 to 70 degrees to encourage sprouting a couple of weeks before they plant them. That way, they take less time to mature and are less likely to rot. Make sure to plant them when the sprouts are still less than one inch long.

Potatoes are very easy to grow. They are pretty forgiving when it comes to soil conditions, but ideally they like slightly acidic soil (PH of 5 to 7) and light, loose, well-drained soil.

We practice crop rotation so they're not grown in the same garden bed every year. It's best to wait four years or more until you plant them in the same spot.

There are several ways to plant spuds.

The easiest way to plant them is 3 inches deep and 12 inches apart, then keep hilling, or just mulch with compost or straw. Mulching helps keep soil cooler and moister, which benefits potatoes and cuts down on watering and some pests.

Here's how we plant: We dig a trench that is 8 inches deep and sprinkle organic pelletized fertilizer on it.  Place each piece of potato with its cut side down and eyes pointing up every 12 inches. Space the rows 3 feet apart. Place 4 inches of soil on top of the potatoes. The plants will begin to grow, and as they do, continue to fill the trench. Eventually, we “hill” the potatoes, meaning we mound the soil around the stems of the potato plants as they grow. This prevents light from reaching the tubers. You don't want the potatoes exposed to light, since this can make them turn green and produce solanine, a mildly poisonous substance.

Some people don't even dig trenches, but just loosen soil, throw the potatoes on top, then keep covering and mulching them with straw. This way, they don't have to dig them up later. However, you get less yield that way, and mice or voles might have a field day in there, munching your crops!

Keep the plants well watered throughout summer, especially while they are flowering, since this is when the plants are creating their tubers. You want them to be happy so they produce lots! 1 to 2 inches of water per week is ideal.

In late summer, foliage begins to turn yellow and dies back. Stop watering then, since this will help your taters cure in time for harvesting.

How to grow potatoes in containers:

You can plant potatoes in large pots and just keep piling soil onto them as the foliage grows. Or use commercial growing bags (constructed of heavy, dense polypropylene), which is a great alternative on patios or places where there's no good garden soil. 

 Put a few inches of soil and compost in the bottom of the bag, plant three or four seed potatoes, then cover with three inches of soil. Keep adding soil as the plants grow until the bag is full. 

When harvest time comes, just dump the bag on its side and grab the potatoes. Make sure you water adequately and deeply enough throughout the growing season!

Some people even just use a large plastic garbage bag for this, punched through with a few holes for drainage.

You could also use hardware cloth with 1/4-inch mesh, or chicken wire, to build these potato towers. Make them into a cylinder about 18 inches in diameter and 24 inches tall. Follow the planting and growing procedure above, and then just lift the cylinder when harvest time arrives.

When and how to harvest

Let's talk about harvesting – our favorite stage of the whole growing process!

Digging up potatoes is like a treasure hunt, and I usually invite my kids and their friends to help with this fun activity. Use a garden fork or shovel to dig, but be careful when you dig spuds: its easy to spear them. 

Make sure you get every single one, otherwise they'll overwinter and pop us as “volunteers” the next spring, which will mess up your crop rotation.

You can stick your hand in the soil and sneak baby potatoes 2 or 3 weeks after the plants have finished flowering.

If you want to keep them for storage, wait until they are fully cured, typically 2 to 3 weeks after the foliage has died back.

One trick to tell if your potatoes are ready for harvest is to dig one up, rub your thumb hard on the potato, and if the skin rubs off easily, they are too young to store. Potatoes with a thicker, tougher skin that won't rub off will last the longest in storage.

If the weather is dry, we leave the potatoes on the ground for a few hours to dry off. Some people leave them in the field for up to three days to cure them. I don't like leaving them exposed to light for so long, so I just make sure they are dry before I store them. 

 If you harvest in wet weather, allow the potatoes to cure in a dry, protected area, like a garage or covered porch. Curing for a few days allows the skins to mature, which helps with long storage.

How to store:

We store our potatoes in cardboard boxes in our dark crawl space, which is like a root cellar. They need to be stored in a well-ventilated, dark and cool place that's between 35 and 40 degrees F. Stored in this manner, we often eat our own potatoes until it's time to plant the next crop in spring.

How much to plant:

A single potato plant yields 2 to 5 pounds of potatoes, so you should plant 10 to 15 plants per person. 5 to 8 pounds of seed potatoes will plant a 100 feet row. You can grow 60 pounds (1 bushel) from a 30-foot row.

Now it's your turn: Tell me if you grow your own potatoes, what your favorites are, and when you plant them!