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Open for Business, One Nite Only!
I feel like I’m 16 again! I think I’m in love, or at least drooling at the prospect of seeds. I went ahead and hand-pollinated the first round of a self-fertilization attempt tonight and will go out later at 3am for the second round. Hoping I don’t step on a diamondback or end up a snack for the oversize pack of coyotes patrolling the area lately for our chickens. These will be clones if the flower goes into fruit and germinated seeds result, and it will be a game changer for the nursery if they give us an armada of seedlings. If not, there’s always next year and the continued…
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Scene around the Farm
This week’s work gave me plenty of image material for the blog, as is so often the case while tending the different stations on the land. I’ve never seen so many species of swallowtail, and this pipevine swallowtail on a zinnia was striking. Sometimes what I see isn’t so good, namely the grasshopper eyeing the bean leaves, but then our handy egg hens never turn down a snack – there’s a cordless power tool for everything. The orb weaver spider I found one morning on the hard nursery shade cloth created it’s own patterned weave at the center of its web. These always get a break for the insect control…
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Cactus Island is Earning its Stripes…Blooms, Arms and Spines
It has been a spectacular month for growth and transformation with the namesake plants on our farm. I finally have the very first flower buds emerging from the cephalium wool on the Royen’s tree cactus (Sebucan), and I’ve put the word out to growers and botanists who might also have this species of Caribbean island cactus in bloom so that pollen can be exchanged. It’s uncommon in U.S. mainland exhibits and collections so the opportunity to produce fresh viable seeds shouldn’t be wasted. I suspect its blooming season will be a long and gradual fireworks display, luckily. The native Harrisia Fragrans I planted around the East pasture have been putting…
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Rhinoceros Beetle
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What We’ve Been Tending this Week
And what a week it has been. With this heat it’s a good thing the watermelon is plentiful because we’ve been sucking it down to stay hydrated and fueled while caring for everything here. The birds have been working hard too, so their share of the melon crop has been earned. I think they’ve figured out that leaving some juice in the eaten out melon halves attracts a week’s worth of bugs, therefore extending the buffet. Farm and homestead plants need daily monitoring, watering, fertilization and repositioning. Mom’s orchids are flowering for an unexpected bonus round since December, and her Gasteria succulent has divided into a handsome clump on The…
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Everything Loves Our Produce
If it’s turned a bit gnarly and not safe for us to eat, no worries….the chickens will take it. Tomorrow there won’t even be rind left in that coop. It’s better not to attract deer and vermin with aromatic goodies plowed back into the compost situation, so the birds usually get first crack at it. Growing food here has surprisingly been easier and more productive. All of the work we put into creating and building up organic beds now keeps us well fed. The wild blueberries outdid the first-year cultivated blueberries by a factor of at least ten. Watermelon picked today were each 30 and 40 lbs, and it is…
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Observations from a Summer Solstice Week
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The Abundant Mistletoe
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Two Up, Sunny Side!
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Red, Blue, Green, Oooh, Ouch!
In the span of a year here I’ve seen some stunning insects, and in some of those situations my prior background in collecting serves us well. Don’t need to whip out the field guide to know that some of these lawn jewels can hurt real bad or stink up the joint right quick if messed with. The large, fuzzy bright red “ant” is a wingless female wasp called a velvet ant, or cow killer. Though slow to anger it has the longest stinger of them all and packs a wallop. This is the second Spring in a row where I’ve first seen the smaller reddish brown species of velvet ant…
Cactus Island Nursery