We have peas to shell in our quiet time. Megan is stripping the last of the peas from the garden. Pea plants are cool weather plants – with the heat they dry up quickly. So we sit and shell the peas when we have a moment – then bag and freeze so that we may have peas all through the summer. Freezers are wonderful if you can’t can things.
Still working on Megan’s house. Possibly you thought no update meant no progress.Or you are the glass-is-half-full type and thought that meant we were done and didn’t need to talk about it anymore.
We are, rather, still chipping away at the project.
Mud, tape, and plaster is done. Up next: sanding plaster, then painting, then floor, then….
We have to be diligent to keep the ants away from the olive trees. Ants can eat all the leaves on a dozen or so trees in the space of a day. They are leaf cutter ants, big and either red or black, and travel a great distance from their nests. So Jon and the guys make regular checks for ant nests or evidence of ants. So far the only thing that has been successful at killing the ants is an ant poison applied directly into the nest.
You can spot a nest by all the twigs piled in a mound The black center in this picture are the ants.
Towards the left center of the picture is the twig mound, then this far away is the dirt hole into the nest where Jon is spraying the poison.
The olive tree that was there is gone now. This was an ant nest that went undetected for a long time.
As the trees get older they are less likely to die from ant damage. But younger trees are easily killed by leaf cutter ants. It is one of the most time consuming parts of having a younger plantation. In fact, according to our consultant Marcelo, newly planted plantations need to be checked three to four times a week for ants when newly planted. It was a good thing we worked in the olives daily when we first started out. Otherwise we would never have managed to add ant inspection four times a week to the heavy list of chores we currently have.
It is that time of year again, to shear sheep. It is, in fact, past time to shear sheep. Because the weather has not been cooperative, we did not shear as planned in October and are just now getting the task completed. In theory, sheep should be sheared about two to four weeks prior to lambing. I say ‘in theory’ because if lambing happens when it’s still cold then you kill the sheep. Some farmers here in Uruguay (not many) put on coats (not what Megan considers real sheep coats, rather feed bags with ties on for the neck and back legs) so that they can shear when cold. Farmers with barn put on coats but also the sheep get to stay warm and cozy in a barn and not out on pasture. But for those of us without barns, real coats would be useful but feed bag coats only work if it’s not exceedingly windy or going to rain. This year we lambed in September, as we have in the past. Which was very stormy. So not good shearing weather, even with make-shift coats. As usual. What wasn’t usual is that it then went cold rather than warm and we didn’t get to shear a few weeks after lambing as we have in the past. Hence the late shearing.
Last year we bought shears and hired a man to come shear using our equipment. This year, one of our guys, Ruben, knows how to shear, so we did not need to go with someone else’s schedule. We have been shearing in groups, a few sheep each day instead of a marathon day of shearing. It has worked out well for us. Ruben has also been able to teach Oscar how to shear, and the two have been taking turns Alejandro supervises it all and keeps it happening smoothly. Jon has even stepped in to help.
Megan hasn’t skirted any of the fleece yet so we don’t know how many second cuts we are dealing with, the quality of the shearing, or the state of the wool. One of the only drawbacks to having Ruben shear – he’s not a professional. But second cuts aren’t necessarily avoided with professionals either. Prior to shearing the wool was evaluated ‘on the hoof’ for breaks, fever, etc. which helped a bit for how many wool bags we needed. And which sheep Oscar could learn to shear on.
The mamas have been sheared, but the babies still have their coats. Can you see the difference?
Once again we needed to fertilize the olive trees. We fertilize about three times a year. I say about because really we fertilize the olives whenever our expert consultant, Marcelo, tells us to fertilize the olives. Which is usually four times a year. Fertilizing the olives involves sprinkling a fixed amount of chemical fertilizer around the base of every tree. Over the years we have, thankfully, graduated from two types of fertilizer to one – the first year everyone had to carry two buckets – one for each type. This year we ran into the snag of not having quite enough fertilizer. So we are nearly done – but not quite. 20 bags of fertilizer took three people to apply and only one day of work. The weather was sunny but not hot, and it rained the next day, so the fertilizer was able to be absorbed into the soil. Yea for us! I don’t know if you remember, but past fertilizer applications have taken longer and more people, so the improvement in speed and man power is a big thing for us!
It’s the first time that when you walk the olive plantation it feels like a plantation. Some of the young trees are gaining ground and the older ones now look like trees. This year Jon has been able to stay on schedule with olive care and it really shows. The grove looks healthy and strong. Marcelo, our expert consultant is very, very pleased with the progress. In fact he can’t believe the progress we’ve made in three years. Hopefully within the week we can count the Spring/Early Summer fertilizer as done – the last four bags have been acquired and will be applied soon – with luck before the next forecast rain.
We have one garden plot that will be just tomatoes. It is a shame that Megan is allergic to them and cannot enjoy all the different flavors from all the different varieties. That doesn’t stop her from planting new varieties. I’m not sure how many colors are planted this year but I don’t pick tomatoes – ripe doesn’t necessarily mean red with Megan’s plants.
Preparing the tomato bed – and hardening off seedlings. The bed was rototilled and mounded just like the rest of the beds. Unlike the rest of the garden beds it will have permanent trellis supports installed. Tomatoes are one of the few vegetables that like to be planted in the same place year after year. As long as the soil gets a good dose of compost in between growing seasons.
Due to the wind the trellis supports are fairly well interred – end posts with buried dead heads, three posts in the row, three rows of taunt wire, four foot stakes well-hammered and tied to the cross wires – in a hope of helping the tomatoes flourish despite our constant wind.
With the new irrigation tape (YAY) there is one stake every 60 cm – or two feet – creating spacing for about 450 tomato plants.
Megan has about 400 tomato seedlings to plant, about fourteen different kinds this year. She currently has about 150 planted. It’s late to plant. But our last frost was in late October – so better planted late than dead from a cold snap. With the crazy weather the seedlings are such a variety of sizes that produce is going to be varied. With the dry weather – and drying wind – the only reason we have any chance of a summer tomato harvest is the drip irrigation that allows us to deep water the roots even when the wind blows and dries out the top soil. Hopefully this summer crop will do better than last year.
Typically Uruguay has three distinct seasons – four if you want to count the very brief period of almost-winter where frost is possible. At least that’s how Megan feels as someone who grew up with snow (i.,e. Real Winter). This past year we’ve kind of lumped eight whole months into Drought and skipped the typical seasons. But with the resumption of irregular precipitation (the weatherman LIED, it was NOT a wet spring) we tentatively planned on a spring. Which has sped by ridiculously quick. So quick in fact we never really got a chance to talk about it. And so, before we mention the lovely summer vegetables that are being seeded, here’s a look at what we planted in spring. (Or, more correctly, planted in late spring because the once warm winter weather went cold and didn’t warm up enough to plant. Why no, Megan wasn’t bitter at all.)
The switch from Spring to Summer was abrupt – one day it was too cold to put out the tomatoes and the next the greenhouses had an internal temperature of 42C (107F) and the spring vegetables are ready to be harvest all at once – even when you are not ready for them to be harvested. The lettuce has been delicious, we have had a few varieties to enjoy, and about the time I thought we were going to have Romaine lettuce for a Caesar Salad, it bolted! It was quickly joined by the Roxy lettuce, and the butter lettuce. All three were in the greenhouses, of course, Oh well, the chickens have really enjoyed them. The lettuce outside is holding on a bit longer but will shortly be ready to be cleared and summer vegetables planted. The beet harvest is starting (Jon is very happy about this), the mustard is starting to go to seed (Megan is hoping for home-made mustard), the Kale has gone to the chickens and who knows what the Broccoli, Cauliflower, and Cabbages are up to – they’ve neither bolted nor headed up.
Here are a few garden pictures:
What we’ve been harvesting isn’t quite the same as the garden beds – the greenhouses – which are now over-hot – provided summer vegetables in spring.
velour beans that turn green when you cook them, sweet and tender (with the high temps are now just pretty leafy plants – did you know that green beans don’t flower or set pods above 32C (90F)?)
Burran Sweet peppers – but the peppers are happy with the heat and are setting lots of flowers and fruit. With regular water they are very content with the saunas that are the greenhouses.
Zucchini and more peppers. Did you know that a normal, small, bushy zucchini plant goes a bit wild in a greenhouse? The greenhouse plants are nearly three times taller than their normal outside counterparts. Megan didn’t quite plan for that and is cursing them at the moment. But the zucchini sure is tasty.
Cucumbers, planted in spring, but really, until the greenhouse heats up, they don’t even consider flowering, let along fruiting. They’ve decided it’s hot enough now and have started to yield lots of tasty fruit for pickling. Megan doesn’t even have seed for slicing cucumbers so all of our cucumbers are pickles.
Megan is busy planting, weeding, and harvesting. We all are enjoying the veggies of her hard work. The irrigation system for the greenhouses has been a lifesaver. The main garden irrigation is nearly complete – otherwise there will be no summer vegetables.
Our son has this really cool weather station that not only let’s him view the weather data at his house, but lets others view it too. This is really cool. So we decided we needed one for the farm. We bought it, brought it through customs with no tax! and Jon installed it. It is attached to a temporary dowel, in it’s permanent home – attached to a fence post outside the front of the blue house. The dowel is temporary as it’s not quite strong enough – the wind has already caught it a few times and turned it around – so we need an iron rod. But the rain gauge works as does the rest of the sensors.
The wind gauge is the most exciting to watch. We can watch as the wind gets strong and the gusts stronger. We have often wondered how strong the wind really is. Since activating the weather station, we have seen it measure 48 kph with gusts at 56kmp. Which Jon says it really not that impressive, but if you are standing in it trying to work, it feels strong. We are also learning how to read a barometer. Storms blow in here quite often without apparent warning – but not if you keep an eye on the barometer. It’s really quite fascinating.
There is a subscription to an international site that allow others to view our personal weather station. It is free to view all the data for you weather junkies. We do not have the web cam set up yet so you can’t see the storms roll in, but we will eventually get to it. So for now if you are interested in our spring weather the address is: http://www.wunderground.com/cgi-bin/findweather/getForecast?query=pws:IMALDONA5
Or you can go to: http://www.wunderground.com/ and search for “Garzon, UY” in the top-right search box. By default the result is the “Capitan Curbelo International ” weather station, listed under the Garzon, UY title at the top of the page. Then click the “Change Station” link next to that, the top listing is “La Piccolina Farm, Garz n, MALDONADO (IMALDONA5)“, woohoo! Click that to get the weather for the farm 🙂
Yay, we have picked our first head of lettuce! This variety is Roxy Lettuce and tastes delicious. It is the prettiest head of lettuce I have seen in a long time.
We had our dinner salad containing everything we produced here on the farm. YUM! ( Lettuce, carrots, radishes, tomatoes, and egg)
Congratulations to us, we are slowly achieving our goal of being self sufficient.
Between the weather and pure neglect the fact that the trees we planted last year are still alive this year is a miracle. Then to discover that the hardy little things are not only budding out, but flowering – and in some cases fruiting – is amazing! The almond trees, which, if asked we’d have said were dead twigs, have actually set a few fruit. Here are our first almonds:
Maybe someday we will get enough almonds to be able to make almond flour. This year we’re just relieved the trees are alive.
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