sleepless in bend.

It would figure that earlier I was barely conscious enough to update on our corn, and at the moment (about 11pm PST) I am so wide awake that I didn't bother staying in bed. What's keeping me up?

Chickens.

But, you say, I thought you were excited about chickens? I am. That's part of the problem. The other part is that I'm worried to death that I'm going to fail miserably at this venture. I credit my mild obsessive-compulsive tendencies with this fear, as the only way I can be certain to do a good job at anything is to be too early, over-prepared, and wringing my hands with fret. This, of course, is a stupid, stupid way to think but I believe that it is partially not under my control and so I can only try and talk myself out of it. This leads to an utter lack of sleep.

Our very good friends are building the coop and committing to keeping the hens for the next two years at the very least. They will probably do the majority of the feeding, cleaning, and will have to put them out in the chicken tractor every day or so. Raising the chicks seems like a pathetic contribution to all that work, but I am still determined to do it. It feels right and so I will do it. But boy am I scared. Let me explain why my neuroses is turning my brain into a scramble at nearly midnight on a random Wednesday.

The chickens are shipped to Big R on March 20. That's a day and a week. In that time I need to know (see: over-prepared) exactly how to raise chicken babies. (I already know this because I've read the same bloody thing in a handful of different books by now, but my brain insists that I don't know enough.) I also need to get all the supplies that were offered by a friend of Tina's who has raised chicken babies before (and the only panic in this is that I don't already have them). One book mentioned a ceramic socket so the heat bulb doesn't melt the plastic and start a raging electrical fire. There is no way to explain my extreme phobia of electrical fires in so little space, so this particular facet of chicken-rearing has me feeling a little faint. Then there is the issue of working full time after getting said chicken babies. 

I'm terrified. What if something goes wrong when I'm not home? What if the heat lamp explodes? What if it falls into their crate and ignites them and no one is there to help? What if they get too cold and die a slow, freezing death and no one knows? Chicksicles. WHAT IF I KILL THEM ALL?

A good friend who has chickens of her own suggested to get an extra few above the number we're planning for because there will be a couple that inevitably die. How on earth do you choose a number to plan for this? We want six chickens. Do we get three extra? Four? What about six in case they are particularly prone to, well, death? How do I relegate myself to knowing that a good percentage of the chicks I purchase will be dead when I come home from work some time? What if I get attached? (Stupid, stupid question.) What if THEY ALL DIE?

I suppose my main theme here is that I'm responsible for a potential dozen, innocent lives, and I'm terrified that working full time is going to ensure their untimely demise. Yes. Yes, that is the whole thing right there in a nutshell preventing my slumber.

On top of this, I keep reading that hens take 24 weeks from birth to start laying. That's 6 months. I'm no mathematician, but even I know that buying chicks three months before summer (which is when you want them to lay) seems like a useless endeavor. So why are chicks being sold NOW? Are the books incorrect? Will chicks lay at 12 weeks? Are the chicks being sold 12 weeks old already? Are they magic chicks?

I'm going to go look for some NyQuil.

corn stalks.

Well, they aren't huge yet, but the corn has officially gone from "sprout" stage to "baby stalk" stage. (These stages are arbitrary. I made them up.) Erin made a makeshift plastic cover for the seedling tray and the temps inside rose to around 80 degrees. The peat/fiber pots were warm to the touch! Which translates into very happy corn (corn can germinate in soil up to or a little over 100 degrees!). Unfortunately, some of the corn that was still trying to germinate in the paper towels got super moldy - we forgot to account for how much extra heat the plastic cover would generate. Fortunately most of the corn made it and now we know the best ways to germinate the seeds quickly for another batch. We need to move on to a second heating mat/tray combo now.

Here are some exciting photos of our growing corn:

There isn't much else to report at the moment - excuse my lack of posting. We adopted a pound puppy three days ago and we are just tired new moms. In fact, I can't believe it's already been three days - I'm still in shock that we have this little furball altogether. It's been a dream for years that has finally come true. For good measure, I'll include a photo of him here:

In other news, Erin planted two broccoli seeds on the 6th and one sprouted today! She also planted 9 onion seeds on the 7th, but nothing there yet.

More later!

the more you know.

An undercover investigator has created a documentary based on factory pig farming which premiers on HBO on March 16th. Check out a couple of the clips on YouTube here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yuSSf8oSDtw&feature=related

Support local food. Support humane meat practices. Open your eyes.

mmmm greens.

Just wanted to upload some fun photos of our lettuce/spinach box. It's been approximately a month and a week since we planted the seeds and I have to admit, they are looking delicious...

   

proof of erin's innate farming talents

She may spend the vast majority of her time unemployed skiing and lounging, but when she puts her mind to it, she sure can haul some ass. Have a look at these gorgeous coldframes she built in about two hours each:

 

PS - Please ignore all that crap in our garage, like the door, mattress and.. beading loom.

Unfortunately it was slim pickins at the ReStore for good wood, so we purchased the wood and nails. However, we figured this was only fair since we got both of those windows from a dumpster and they're in perfect condition with sliding windows for ventilation. To be realistic, Erin did purchase a handheld circular saw - but between these and the storage unit she built for the garage, it's already paid for itself.

You'll notice they are angled - this is so they face the sun a little more as it passes overhead. If they were flat they would lose a fair amount of the light and heat (but still work). They'll be used according to how much direct-facing sun each garden gets.

Each coldframe is about 5' x 3', meaning we'll have about 15 square feet to use in each. Now that these are built, we can work on the raised beds that they'll rest on. We are planning to have the raised beds built in stackable frames so that we can make the beds taller as the plants grow (and use the cold frame during a frost). Obviously this is going to be tricky but.. that's what I heard about corn.

Two coldframes totaling 30 square feet of gardening space: $30. 

They look pretty damn professional, don't they? I'm so proud of her.

SUCCESS

Yes, folks, you read correctly - after only THREE days, our corn has germinated. 

Here are some downright awful photos of the tenacious little sprouts.

You can hardly see them, but my crappy camera wasn't getting any closer than that. 

Our control corn (unaltered/untreated) and the corn treated with cloning solution/fertilizer had little to no growth. The corn we scraped with sandpaper also had little to no root growth. All the other corns have either poked out the tiniest nose of a root or have a sizable root as the ones above. Sunglow soaked for two hours had two small sprouts.

The best growers by far were: Sunglow soaked overnight (12 hours) and even better than those were the Precocious soaked for two hours in water. The roots on those Precocious were surprisingly large and hairy - I'm concerned that they were moldy and pulled two out to plant in pots. Two of the Sunglow also went into pots. Needless to say...we are REALLY excited that our corn germinated in two or three days. The conditions inside the baggies seemed favorable - Erin had the light on for about four hours today when she took a heat reading and the temp inside the baggies was around 80 degrees. The paper towels dried out so we'll have to be vigilant about rewatering those and the little fiber pots. 

At the moment we have those four planted seeds under plastic bread baggies. For now these will work as mini hot-houses - when the plants start to grow, we can just unroll them for extra height (read: free mini-hothouses).

What's interesting to me is the disparity between the two hybrids here - the Precocious sprouted much faster after being soaked for only two hours rather than twelve - and the opposite is true for the Sunglow. Neat-o. :)

I found an old mini-blind slat (yeah, just one) and chopped it up for plant markers. It works perfectly with a Sharpie (read: free plant markers). I wrote the type of vegetable and planting date on one side, and on the other side I wrote the hybrid name along with the date of experiment and how long each seed was soaked. This way we'll see who survives the transfer to the pots.

:) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) 

(If you've read this far...thank you.)

the great corn experiment.

Apparently there is some debate as to whether or not corn is difficult to grow. Many people agree that you shouldn't bother trying to transplant it and many others say that's a bunch of hogwash, that their corn transplants just fine. Others still have trouble getting corn to germinate (sprouting the seed) and I've heard all kinds of ideas for helping this process along. 

So I've decided to remember my sixth grade science class roots and do an experiment. The goal is to see which of my 5 or 6 methods works best for sprouting corn - if at all. All methods have come from hearing people say different things, so I figured why not try all of them?

For the experiment, I used two corn varieties that claim to be better suited for short seasons and 'stress': Sunglow (from Nichols Garden Nursery, OR) and Precocious (from Territorial Seed Company, OR). I used three seeds of both types for each method in hopes that controlling for dud seeds would make the experiment more successful. 

After being altered, all the seeds were sandwiched in a wet paper towel and placed inside of an open plastic baggie. Here are the 5:

1. 3 seeds of each, unaltered (control)

2. 3 seeds of each soaked for two hours in water

3. 3 seeds of each soaked for 12 hours (overnight) in water

4. 3 seeds of each scraped gently with sandpaper

5. 3 seeds of each whose paper towels were soaked in a cloning solution mix instead of water

 

All baggies are now sitting in a tray on top of a heating mat. Beneath the heating mat I've placed some aluminum foil in hopes that this will help curb heat loss through the bottom of the seedling table, which is just an old futon frame. I'll keep the heating mat on all day but turn it off on night because of that pesky fear-of-electrical-fire thing I have. All I know for sure is that corn is a heavy feeder (meaning it needs compost and fertilizer more than some other plants) and that it loveslovesloves warm soil. They also love light but we're going to hold off on keeping the light on until someone sprouts. We'll see what happens!

And for good measure, Erin planted some seeds in soil and watered it with the cloning solution. (Cloning solution, apparently, is just a fertilizer mix designed to support new root growth and buffer transplant shock - we're using one called Olivia's Cloning Solution, recommended by the girl at the hydroponics store.) Here she is using the pencil method and our little coconut fiber pots (which are a real bitch to water, fyi).

And here is the final product! Stay tuned to see who sprouts first!!