Lettuce rejoice!

Let us rejoice! The lettuce is here!

This salad planter is the best. The red romaine is stunning!

No one is happier than me that the lettuce is back, baby. All those meals of bad, institutional lettuce is over and now the salad days are upon us.

Caesar? Sure!

So is the heat so I've been rushing to get everything watered and cooled off so it doesn't go to bolt. I've got some of my salad planters in the shade and within easy walking distance of the kitchen. I'll be working on a bigger bed soon.

I need to take up the broccoli - some of it has gone to flower.

Happy Wednesday, everyone! Are you rejoicing over lettuce?

Green onions in pots? Why not!

This could be the best idea I've never had.... green onions in pots.

Green onions in pots? Why not?

Wut? Aren't I supposed to put them in the ground? Sure but why not in pots? This is the best thing going.

One of these is starting to get big... but that will be perfect to put on the grill.

It's totally not my idea at all... my farm pal, Bourbon Red, came up with this earlier in the year. We had the weirdest spring with warm then cold then warm... so it was hard to figure out when to set out the onions sets. So he put some in a pot in his greenhouse - they got started early and whenever he needed some green onions... boom! There they were.

I guess we only ever think about onions in the ground because we want them to get big and then cure for storage. But this is the best idea ever. Need just one green onion and don't want to walk all the way to the garden? Put them in pots where they are easy to reach.

My salad planter has celery, parsley, radish, lettuce...and more green onions. One stop shopping!

Have extra space in a bigger salad planter? Pop a few slips in there and then just wait for them to green up.

This has worked so well for me that I've put them everywhere.

I've never had luck with starting onions from seeds but I'm going to give it a go - just to have potted up green onions. Give it a try - it's the best thing I've done all spring.

Happy Tuesday everyone! Why not put green onions in pots?

Avoiding the interweb today.....

I have to avoid the interweb today because apparently everyone watched Game of Thrones but me. I need to avoid spoilers so here is Little Mo...

Isn't he cute?

Happy Monday everyone. See you tomorrow!

The Great Meat Migration and more on the bird flu

Yesterday we couldn't take it one more minute. The creepy meats had to get out of the garage. They were ruining everything and completely out of control. We were at our end. So we took action.

Meats in a tub.

One by one we hauled the meats over to the Turkey House where they can sit there and get fat - instead of trampling my hostas. Honestly this is the most hilarious group of meats we've had. They are very free ranging and have a lot of things to do. But it's a veritable meat stampede everywhere they go. So they were sent to the Turkey House and the Small Yard which has chain link fence that they can't get out of.... we hope.

Mostly they just sat in the Turkey House and looked confused. But then they got up and meated around - checking out the scene. They all figured out to go into the Turkey House last nite.

The Dread Commander Zander will be on patrol.... after his nap.

Moving them to the Turkey House is a risk - we've been on an all out Rat Assault for the last couple weeks and I think we've cleaned them out. But the Turkey House is close to the woods and that's where those rat bastards come from. So we'll double patrols and hope for the best. We are thinking the Second Group of Meats will be ready in two weeks. 

In other news..... thanks to my friend, "L" who posted this article about how some of the grocery stores are limiting egg purchases due to the bird flu. Some fast food chains are also limiting breakfast hours to cut down on their egg consumption due to higher prices. Our local news reported no one around here has had these problems. We don't buy eggs from the store so I have no idea if prices have actually gone up.

Also there was this release about how the CDC put out an alert for doctors to be on the lookout for bird flu in people. This is, of course, hot on the heels of when our state banned all poultry events. Overreaction? I dunno... I think it means they don't know exactly what is going on. We are still hiding under our tin foil hats.

That's all the chicken news that is fit to print. Happy Friday everyone!

Guess what we did today?

Strawberries!!!  Yay! My strawberry patch yielded a grand total of five berries this year.... so we went to the Upick place.

 Strawberries, baby, yeah!

It was terrific - so easy for us to zip up there and get to picking. Do you Upick?  It's really fun.

The Upick set up is usually about the same. Thankfully with 'the facebook' you can usually check in with your favorite Upick farm for conditions. Then grab some containers (or you can buy them there), drive in, check in at the stand, and they will weigh your containers (or let you purchase them).

If you bring your own containers try to go for shallow containers so the berries don't get squished under their own weight. We used two peck baskets that I kept from last year's auction. 

Then we were directed to drive pretty far back on their property - one of the grandkids was there telling folks where to park. He was happy to tell us to start in the third row and work our way back.

We had a great time and were out of there in a flash - so many berries!  This was just a quick trip for us and not our "for the season" berry harvest. We just needed some strawberry goodness to get us thru the weekend.

There will be pie. Oh yes...

Then we drove back to the check in stand, they weighed our berry-filled-containers, and the gave us the price. Easy peasy!

We paid about $15 total for what was about one full basket (from our two partial baskets)...which was about $1.75/pound. I actually thought that was kind of high...which is why I'll be checking out the auction next time. Our Amish neighbors had some quarts for $2.75 so that might be a good way to go also.

All in all it was easy and fun.

Happy Thursday everyone! Are you eating strawberries for lunch?

Ohio Dept of Ag bans all poultry events

This was a surprise yesterday - the Ohio Dept of Agriculture has banned all poultry events for the rest of this year. Raising birds for the fair, swap meet, or the Ohio National Poultry Show? Good luck, suckers.

My chicken hooligans have destroyed all my hostas. The government can have this trouble maker.

This release says they are trying to get ahead of the avian flu that has caused the destruction of millions of birds in other states. The deadly flu has not been reported in Ohio and they are trying to keep it that way.

I've heard from other friends around the country that their state has done the same thing. I don't know about you but wow I think this was a surprise and that it's kind of late in the season for this decision.

What does this mean for you? If you are looking forward to going to any poultry event - fairs, swap meets, auction, etc.... you'll be standing there alone. I knew I should have taken those ganders up to the auction a couple weeks ago. Now I'm stuck with them.

What about private sales, Craiglist ad, and ordering chicks? No word on that.

Ohio is the second biggest commercial egg producer so I think it's wise to protect those flocks - and the industry. But I always get a little twitchy when these things happen. I worry about the backyard chicken keeper and what it means to them. The meat and egg producers have plenty of attorneys to protect their interest - but you and me? I'm really not interested in the state Ag guys sniffing around.

So what can you do? Not much. Be mad. I feel pretty bad for the parents of the 4H kids who already bought the birds and feed....and now they won't be able to recoup (re-coop?) those expenses thru the sale at the fair. I have not heard from anyone who has received any instruction or information from their own local 4H club.

On the other hand..... this sounds like a terrific opportunity for someone like me to drive around in the big truck and scoop up all the meat chickens that folks are now needing to get rid of... so there could be some upside.

The release from the ODA says to up your biosecurity game - for both commercial producers and backyard poultry raisers. Frankly we did this a while ago. We don't let folks on our property for a lot of reasons - including that I have no idea what you are dragging in on your shoes. If you get new birds it would be wise to quarantine them before putting them in with the flock.

They also suggest limiting contact with wild birds... by, you know, keeping your birds inside as much as possible.

*blink blink* 

I may be pretty country.. and what do I know...but all those commercial producers keep their birds inside and that didn't seem to help them any.

The DOA also suggests that  "...sick birds or unusual bird deaths should also be immediately reported to the Ohio Department of Agriculture’s Division of Animal Health."

Yeah. Sure. Right.

Friends, I don't tell other people's stories... but plenty of folks tell me theirs. All I'm saying is there is no way I'd get involved with that kind of oversight. Pretty much our strategy will be to hide the chickens, lock the gate, and man the gun turrets when they start sending in the drones.

Not to be all tin-foil-hat-y but last nite five military style helos flew over our place... low... real low. We ran the chickens under cover and doubled patrols. I might have shook my fist at the copters and yelled, "IF YOU WANT MAY CHICKENS, COME AND GET THEM!"

Pretty sure I'm on some kind of watch list now. Molon labe.

Happy Wednesday everyone. What's the word on your state and how they are handling this?

Goodbye to our Teddi Grumpkins

We said goodbye to our oldest cat, Teddi Gumpkins, on Friday. She passed away on her favorite bed with me washing her face and telling her that she was loved. We rest in the assurance that we gave Teddi a good home but we are deeply grieved.

Teddi was happy exactly one day. This was it.

The truth is that no one is overlooked in The Good Land. Everyone is important and no one gets lost in the shuffle. Teddi may have hated me most of her days here but we loved her. She was our hard luck cat. She came to us half starved with broken teeth on a rainy winter night. You can read more about her story here.

She loved to sleep in a full tuck position.

The vet thought that Teddi was about eight when she first came to us, but we pegged her more at 8 to 10 years old. We think she was about 17 when she died. She had a good long run and got every last dime out of her 9 lives. We like to think that she was happy here but she was our grumpiest cat so it was kind of hard to tell. We always said that she must have been the cutest kitten... the older she got the smaller and more kitten like she looked. She had very expressive eyes.

We couldn't believe that someone would actually dump an older, declawed cat out in December in Ohio. So we made up a story that was easier for us to fathom. We figured that Teddi was owned by a single, older man who we know loved her because he only ever fed her fried chicken and ice cream. She always liked my husband - which was why we know she was owned by a man.

But then this imagined older man must have died and somehow Teddi got out or something. But she made her way to us and saw the visible-only-to-cats-with-expensive-vet-problems sign above our house that says, "Come on in, wanderer, you have a home here."

From time to time she would do very funny things... like to try to figure out who that other cat was.

More realistically, if her owner died I'm sure that the family dumped her or left her when they moved away. The vet thought she had been outside for at least three weeks when we found her. It's a miracle she survived that long. But she did and she begrudgingly became part of the Insane Cat Posse.

A couple years ago she figured out that, not only did I have body heat and was a warm place to sit, but that I was actually trying to understand her needs and meet them. We did what we could to make an angry, older cat happy. She started to fail a couple years ago but the vet and I propped her up as best we could. We were pretty much at the palliative care stage when we tried another medication to ease her pains. 

Several weeks later at a follow up appointment the vet looked at me in complete surprise and declared that Teddi's heart murmur - that I could pretty much across the room - had all but disappeared. "What did you do?" He asked.

I shrugged and said, "I loved her."

Never underestimate the healing power of love. Since I was sure that Teddi was on the way out I determined to double down my efforts and do everything I could to make her happy. Despite my efforts Teddi did not love me back at all - it wasn't until these last several months or, at most, for the last year, that she could even tolerate me.

But she learned that if she meowed at me I would figure out what she needed and give it to her. We believe she was one of the good works that we were appointed to do. She was a reminder to never grow tired of doing good - even if you don't get anything out of it. I was a warm place for her to lay down on and that was about it.

Mostly she just tolerated me. But that was OK.

Did I get loving looks and joyful snuggles? Nope. The best I could hope for was that Teddi wouldn't eat the butter off the counter. But love keeps no record of wrongs. So we went about our business making sure she had everything she needed. Turns out it worked, she was in relatively good health for these last two years.

The last couple of months Teddi needed a lot of care. She had gotten very frail and the other cats were picking on her - she was an easy target. So we shuffled the cats around, gave her a quiet place to sleep, and made sure she could always get to the food and water without anyone bothering her.

The Grand Dowager Teddi Gumpkins. What a gal.

In the end she cried for me one last time and she knew I heard her voice. I put her on her favorite bed and wrapped her in soft covers. I washed her face and told her that we loved her. She had the most gentle passing.

I may not have done a lot of things right in this life but the one thing I can point to was that we gave Teddi a good home. Someone else might have thrown her away but we kept her. She didn't die that winter a hard death of starvation, or being ripped apart by coyotes, or run over by a car. She was safe and warm and lived a good long life here in The Good Land.

We praise God for giving us Teddi, grumpy tho she was. We are grateful that she was one of our good works to do -  which was not a burden. We are thankful for her teaching us that lovingkindness is a gift to give with no expectation of return but is it's own reward. And we say farewell to the Grand Dowager Teddi Grumpkins. Amen.