The Southern Agrarian

Southern Agrarianism and the culture of the Old South

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Netting to Protect the Garden

April 10, 2011 / / 2 Comments

Netting protecting the strawberries

Guarding your garden against various pests is a never-ending task if you expect to benefit from your labor. Before adding this netting over the strawberry plants, the squirrels were getting them before we were. They still get one on occasion when they can reach through the netting, but most of the strawberries are out of their reach. While a pellet rifle with a good scope does a fine job of thinning the population of “fuzzy tail tree rats”, it just doesn’t compare to netting when it comes to results. It may be more satisfying to see the little thieves fall from a tree, but it doesn’t even put a dent in the population. Netting is far more effective.

The down side to using netting is that if I’m in a hurry in the morning, it’s easy to just take a quick look for ripe strawberries to pick rather than removing the netting and looking carefully under the leaves. I’ve lost some by letting them get over-ripe.

This year, we just had 4 strawberry plants. We will definitely be increasing the number next year.

Bunnies in the garden

April 8, 2011 / / 3 Comments

Most folks see rabbits as the enemy in the garden. Fortunately, that’s not a problem with a raised bed garden such as mine. Even the strongest rabbit couldn’t jump high enough to get to the plants in my garden. For that reason, I enjoy having them around. I have even built up a few places where they can nest unmolested by our dog. Like chicken snakes eating an egg now and then, they are part of the entertainment value of living out here.

This little guy was out in the open (where he shouldn’t be) this morning as I was taking pictures of my water tower project. We have several patches of aloe plants, and rabbits like to burrow under them for their nests. Aloe, by the way, is great to have around for minor burns and other skin injuries; they are a favorite of hummingbirds, further adding to the entertainment value.

How Close to Plant?

April 4, 2011 / / 3 Comments

These tomatoes were planted about as close as I would ever attempt. The results of this planting will determine whether or not next year’s crop is planted this way or not. The advantages of close planting are mainly from better utilization of space, but for tomatoes, it also means that they support each other. Staking is only needed for the plants on the outside edges. Disadvantages include less air flow which could mean greater potential for disease, and more difficult to pick from the inner plants.

My guess is that this will prove to be too closely planted, but it’s an experiment, so it’s not always supposed to work. No matter what a book or web site may say, you never really know what will work for your situation until you try it yourself.

Gardening is experimenting. I take notes and adapt as needed.

A Man to Till the Ground, from Faith and Heritage

April 2, 2011 / / 2 Comments

Plow Days at Dudley Farm, Alachua County, Florida

The Faith and Heritage blog recently had an interesting post, written by Colby Malsbury, titled A Man to Till the Ground: The Christian and Agriculture. The conclusion to that post had a paragraph that contains the essence of the Southern Agrarian movement:

The ‘urban peasant’ who yearns to start a little herb garden is not merely looking for a secure food supply. He is also searching for a sense of purpose and mission that cannot be obtained in a cubicle. Even if he does not realize it consciously, he yearns to return to God’s ways.

I hope to write more about the philosophy of Southern Agrarianism in the future, but this is a good taste of it.

Planting in Stages

April 1, 2011 / / 0 Comments

Looking from back to front in this photo: Tomatoes, the first batch of beans, the second batch (planted 2 weeks later), and dirt where the unsprouted next batch of beans will be coming up in another day or two. These are the Blue Lake variety – our all around favorite.

Bush beans tend to produce in one large flush of beans, followed by a few sparse beans later. By planting in stages, we get fresh beans while also having them ripen in a large enough quantity to make it worth cranking up the canning operation.

Pole beans tend to produce regularly throughout the life of the plant. Those are great when you have a good place to plant them. We have some planted so that they climb up the water tower that supplies water for the chickens (more on that project in another post).

The April 9 Hatching

April 1, 2011 / / 4 Comments

This batch of Rhode Island Red eggs is due to hatch on April 9. This is the first batch of eggs from these hens and rooster, so we’ll see what happens. The rooster has an interesting sounding crow – it is more like that of a small bantam rooster. I hope that is an inherited trait!

Update:
This batch of eggs has been scrapped due to my own negligence. We had a power outage for about 12 hours several days ago. I cranked up the generator and ran the incubator (as well as the water pump and the office), but when I plugged the incubator back into the wall outlet, I plugged in the incubator but not the egg rotator. What I thought was the plug for the rotator was the plug for the seed starting heating mat. They might have still successfully hatched, but if only a few hatched, I didn’t want to try mixing the chicks after starting a second batch. The new batch will probably be started in about a week.

One major point for Wyandotte’s comment! Momma Hen doesn’t care about electrical power.

Hatched by Momma hen - Buff Orpington


Having chicks hatched the “natural way” is, of course, the best way to go. I previously had some broody Buff Orpingtons, but this current group has shown absolutely no interest in setting on the eggs – a major disappointment for me.

Picking Worms

March 31, 2011 / / 3 Comments

Before you can pick vegetables, you usually have to pick worms. So far, I have done all my gardening without using any pesticides, and hand-picking worms has actually proven to be quite effective.

Going out to the garden is part of my morning routine – let the dog out, check the chickens, check the rain gauge, and check the garden. When worm season is here, that also includes looking for damage and squashing the worms that caused it.

Chicken Snakes

March 21, 2011 / / 3 Comments

Chicken snakes always seem to eventually show up when you have chickens. I usually like having them around since they are also known as rat snakes for a good reason. The trick is to gather the eggs regularly so they feed on rats and not on your eggs. If they get an egg or two every now and then, that’s OK with me. It’s part of the entertainment value of having chickens.

These were taken several years ago in my first chicken coop.

Once the snake has found the eggs, nothing seems to disturb his meal. I set up a camera and tripod and took a whole series of photos, and he completely ignored me. The process actually takes quite a while. Smaller snakes will circle the egg and then use their body to push against to force the egg into his mouth; larger snakes simply grab it and swallow. The egg eventually works its way down several inches until suddenly it breaks. You can actually hear the egg breaking as the lump flattens out. A bit creepy, perhaps, but fascinating nevertheless.

The white “egg” in the photos is plastic. Snakes are never fooled.

The Need For Light

March 11, 2011 / / 0 Comments

Seedlings need light – lots of light. This photo was taken on March 2, and shows two tomato plants that were both raised under artificial light, 18 hours per day. The plant on the right was transplanted about 3 days before the photo was taken. You can see how much darker the plant on the left is, having received 18 hours of bright full-spectrum light, while the one on the right received much less light during the relatively short daylight in early March.

Before I had the lights and timer, my seedlings were tall and spindly. They were not strong enough to stand up straight and take full advantage of the sun. With a full 18 hours of light, the plants grow very sturdy stalks and make a much healthier plant.

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