The girls were practicing their gift wrapping skills.
Sorry I am late yet again but it has been one heck of a busy last couple of weeks around the OKA. The good news is I have a huge update for you this evening and there are more in the pipe mostly in the way of bee related videos and pics but more on that later. Continue reading
Conetainers Planted full of tree seeds.
I made friends with a guy from down under, a fellow permie and an aficionado of all things nitrogen-fixer. We’ve made a couple trades and this go round I ended up with some varieties that are going to be questionable at best for the climate here on the farm. Continue reading
110 toilet paper tubes planted with tomatoes for our first Farmers Market event of the year.
The last few days I have been getting my chop and drop on. Continue reading
Our temporary makeshift rain catchment.
Ma and I have been hard at work around the farm getting things ready for the upcoming growing season. I found an ad from a friend on facebook that had these lick tubs for sale for $5 each. They will serve as a good part of our water catchment until we get something a little more permanent and then we can use them for tree planters and who knows what else. Maybe a water feature in the food forest. Hey, that’s an idea!
Image Credit goes to Richsoil.com
Hugelkultur is an old German concept/word meaning “hill-culture”. Wood is buried under topsoil (either in a hole or right on the ground) and as it breaks down, it holds lots of moisture and provides sustained nutrients for plant growth.
We’ve been wanting to try some Hugelkultur mounds at some point but I have had a bit of an eyesore that has needed dealt with for a while see in May of 2011 we decided that we wanted to get a few paw paw trees. Continue reading
This doesn’t look like an average garden or orchard, some might think it was overgrown and out of control. Does it look brushy to you?
I woke up this morning like normal, took care of the normal morning business and filled my mug and proceeded to head out for work. As I am making my way to the truck I notice a large pick-up truck with a tank of toxic gick on the back blow past my house. I wondered out loud what was up with that and Ma tells me, yeah, there were quite a few guys along the ditches with back pack sprayers on when I took Fish Taco to work this morning.
Sorry that it’s been so long since I posted last but this is the busy time of year for being in the garden and making the magic happen. As far as that goes, the sheet mulching that we did is working like a champ the garden is not doing so well and I think it has to to with the soil that I used when I planted. In combination with the soil I mixed up and used we have also had a really sort of wet chilly spring. Now, I’m not griping after the last 3 years we welcomed the cooler temps and moisture. Anyhow this post is going to illustrate how I plan to remedy my soil woes by making the most kick ass 18 day compost in the manner that Geoff Lawton teaches on his Permaculture Soils DVD.
This is the third year for my Paw Paws (asimina triloba) and this little Mitchell has blossomed for the first time.
The TexasPrepper2 greenhouse is all set in it’s permanent space in the garden/orchard, that trellis in the front is our newly planted hardy kiwis, I will be following up on them in the future. As far as the greenhouse goes, the rest of this post will kind of show you how we got to this point with it. What I won’t be doing is giving any particulars about dimensions because he is now selling a book with plan on amazon and it would be like stealing from him to do that. Go buy his stuff!
Off-Kilter Acres 