Doh! I Broke A Water Pipe

    Two weeks ago I was clearing out a planting area that was full of boxwoods and I was getting it ready for the spring. There were some old landscaping timbers that lined the area and were in really bad shape. I used a shovel to help pry one out, and to my dismay, when I lifted it up and out of the planter area water started bubbling up from below! I immediately ran inside to grab the pliers and then ran out to the water meter to shut the water off. In the video below you can see what the problem was and how I went about fixing it. Luckily it was a quick and cheap fix, but it sure startled me at first.

      This really may have been a blessing in disguise because it helped solve a longstanding mystery about our plumbing and the location of our water heater. Now that we know how this particular bit of plumbing is run, fixing it for good in the future should be much easier.

What Do The Rabbits Eat?

    When people learn that I raise rabbits, after asking if I raise them for food, the most common question I get is "what do they eat?" The real answer is: a whole lot of different stuff. The quick and easy answer is: rabbit feed. You see, through the first year of raising rabbits I have not yet been able to eliminate the need for rabbit feed. My plant density has yet to produce the volume that I need, and my perennial systems are not established enough to provide the consistency that I need. I do try to reduce my need for rabbit feed as much as I can, for several reasons.  
   As a result, one of the things that I do that puts me in a very small minority of suburban gardeners is that I focus a lot of effort on the growing of fodder or forage crops. Fodder crops are ones that can be used as animal feed. If you are going to raise animals it only makes sense to me that you try and provide as much fresh and healthy food for them as you can right from the system in which those animals reside.

Cowpeas grown not only for the peas, but also for the leaves as fodder.

     For us here that means growing large quantities of fast growing forage crops for the rabbits. Things like mexican sunflower, pigeon pea, shiso, cowpeas, jerusalem artichoke, and bidens alba (yes technically it is a weed but the rabbits love it so I encourage several patches around the yard). Most of these crops also provide food yields provided they are not raided too heavily to feed the rabbits. I have been able to successfully cut back jerusalem artichokes and cowpeas and still get great yields. Cutting back shiso vigorously still left me with more than I could use ( I was even putting it in cocktails by the end of summer!). While these crops are planted either exclusively for fodder, or equally for fodder and other yields, almost all of my other crops contribute to the rabbits in some way as well. Rabbits are amazing in the array of food they can and will eat, so almost all garden trimmings, scraps, etc. make their way to the rabbits where they are concentrated into garden gold.

The cowpeas still yielded heavily despite being cut back several times. We had several harvests like this in addition to using the young pods as green beans almost daily. My wife was so tired of shelling peas by the time the summer was over!

      In addition to growing fodder, I have no problem foraging for it as well. During the spring and into summer when the mimosa trees and bidens alba are growing like crazy I stop on my bike ride home and grab a meal's worth from some local trees and fields. I could take all I can carry and still not make a dent. During the heart of summer and into fall I stop at a kudzu patch and take all that I can carry. That's a seriously invasive plant, and while ecologically I don't feel great about it being here, I rejoice as a frugal homesteader. The rabbits love kudzu and me taking it possibly constitutes a public service! I've been asked several times, "What is that?" or "Why are you picking that?" to which I generally reply "I only eat free range vegetables. It's dinner." Ha! you should see the faces.

Once these guys start eating solid food they will be chowing down on a whole variety of homegrown fodder!

   
     Beyond the direct benefit that I see in the form of great fertilizer and meat for the freezer I also think growing food for the rabbits is important for their quality of life and health. I feel better knowing my rabbits are eating a wide variety of fresh healthy food that is contributing to their well being. I hope they find it more enjoyable than standard rabbit feed. I'm not at the point where I can eliminate rabbit feed but if I can keep growing more of their food each year eventually I may be able to get there.

Here is a brief list of the things I regularly grow and feed my rabbits:
Radish tops
Mustard greens
Mexican sunflower (tithonia diversifolia)
Jerusalem artichoke
Shiso
Pigeon Pea
Mimosa Leaves (albizia julibrissin)
Bidens Alba
Basil
Mint
Rosemary
Carrot tops
Cowpeas
Sweet Potato leaves
young squash leaves
Lemongrass

Things I regularly feed the rabbits that I collect from nearby areas:
Kudzu Leaves
Mimosa leaves (albizia julibrissin)
Blackberry leaves
Bidens Alba
   

Busiest Week Ever!

     It has been radio silence here for a couple days at Homegrown Philosofood so today I needed to post some updates as things are piling up. The title might be overselling it a bit, but it was a very busy week. Classes started back in earnest so that takes up a fair bit of time as one might imagine. I have two classes and a supervised research course this semester so as much as I hate to say it, I'm already looking forward to summer, at least for the free time aspect. So without further ado here is a roundup of some things that have been going on.

     I'm an uncle! My beautiful wife and I drove down this weekend to her brother and his wife and to visit their newly born beautiful baby girl, Ella. We are both so excited to have a lovely little niece and can't wait to spend more time with her over the coming years. It was fun to get to spend time with family, especially since we were visiting on my wife's birthday. It's funny now how the birthday's line up on the 15th, 16th, and 17th for my brother in law, his daughter, and my wife respectively.


     The rabbits are growing at the usual lightspeed rabbit growth rate. As of today they are 11 days old and now look like this:

Far cry from the pink, hairless, ping pong ball sized bunnies they were just 11 short days ago.

With their incredible growth rate they will reach butcher weight in just over 7 weeks. Even if they dress out at just 2 lbs each (they should be 2.5-3lbs) that is 16 lbs. worth of meat for the freezer with our actual head count of 8. The birthing palace got moved today to an area of the side yard that I finally cleared out. That side yard will eventually be rabbit central as there will be a covered area with several hutches. One step at a time.

    If you remember the introduction to the homestead part I and the diagram depicting dogland, aka the area of the backyard dedicated to running and playing for the dogs, then this picture should be pretty cool. It is for me anyway.

Dogland Fence!

Yes! Dogland has a real fence now. Previously there was just a run of rabbit cage wire staked with bamboo posts at several locations. It worked but it was pretty janky. Now we have a real fence (real gate soon to follow lol). The fence posts are intentionally high as they will be used to incorporate a large trellising structure for maximizing yields from vining crops like gourds, cucumbers, and pole beans. I'm psyched to have this project (mostly) done.

     I also did a LOT of planting this weekend. I redid two large areas out front, busted a water pipe, fixed a water pipe (smacks forehead, post coming soon), and started a lot of new seeds. In fact, I dug into the shed and found a bunch of 12 pack seed flats I didn't know I had in addition to some 6 packs I knew I did, and I started even more seeds than I did in the planting day post. I am actually starting to hit the limit of my little hoop house. Check this out:

Hoophouse full of cell packs with lots of new seeds started.

Of the things I planted on the 4th I have violet jasper tomatoes, mammoth dill, and several flower varieties already popping out. The peppers and eggplant may take a little while given how cool it has been lately, but no worries, as they will kick into gear soon enough. 

      So that's all for now, I need to get some sleep. I have some great posts in the works right now including a DIY medicine cabinet and how I clear and plant a new area. Oh yeah and also a video post about my accidental water pipe breakage/fixage that I had to do as a result of clearing that area. So until next time, take care and keep on planting, spring is just around the corner.

New Seeds!

     As a part of my spring tactic #1, planting early, I ordered the last of my seeds for this year's warm weather season. I ordered some seeds from an old standby that I have used before, and a new company. I wanted to talk a little about what I am choosing to grow this year because if my garden looked unconventional before it will look downright foreign now! I guess though it depends on where you are from.

     The old standby I ordered from is Southern Exposure Seed Exchange. I have ordered from them before and I will order from them again. They have a great selection and great customer service. They also carry a lot of vegetable varieties suited to the south and mid-Atlantic. For me, their southern varieties are super helpful at getting a good  yield during our hot and humid summers. From SESE I got the following varieties:

Seeds for 2015 from Southern Exposure Seed Exchange. They really do have the best seed pack art around!

Salad Burnet- a perennial herb I've been wanting to get established in some cooler areas of the yard. Supposedly it has a nice mild cucumber taste.

Garden Sorrel- another perennial herb I would like to get established. Should help fill in the gap during the winter to spring transition.

Golden Bush Scallop summer squash- The farmers at our farmers' market always have tons of these patty-pan type squash so I'm hoping to get some yields like that around here.

Tromboncino summer squash- A summer squash of the C. moschata species. Moschatas are especially well adapted to hot and humid environments so this one will hopefully do better than the traditional zucchini here in Florida. Note: The Seminole pumpkin is also a C. moschata and I will be growing some of those as summer squash as well.

Burmese Okra- A supposedly tasty and tender okra variety. Okra loves the heat of the summer and can take drought or buckets of rain. You should grow okra if you live in Florida.

Cherokee Greasy Beans- A friend of mine from work says his uncle grows these back in Cherokee, NC and his grandma makes the best beans ever from them. Can't wait to taste them. We will see how they do here in Florida.

Wonderberry- An interesting solanum berry, actually related to the notorious deadly nightshade( but so are tomatoes and peppers). Supposedly these produce copious amounts of little black berries. I'm hoping they take well to sweetening for use in jams and pies as that is my intended use.

Matt's Wild Cherry Tomato- Supposedly these small cherry type tomatoes will keep trucking right through the hottest part of summer. I read somewhere they are from a wild Mexican strain. I wonder how they will cope with the humidity here. Really looking forward to this one.

     The new company that I ordered from this year is Kitazawa Seed Co.  Kitazawa specializes in asian vegetables and they have a really good selection. The seeds were a little expensive but they did have several varieties I was not able to find elsewhere so it may be justified. The seeds arrived quickly and look good. I'll have to see how the germination rate is.

Seeds for 2015 from Kitazawa Seed Co. Some of the varieties I am most excited to try. 

      I'm banking pretty heavily this year on a lot of SE asian vegetables to keep yields high through the long hot summer. I also recently planted some shungiku seedlings, or edible leaf chrysanthemum to try and get a cool weather greens yield while we still are enjoying mild weather. The varieties that I got from Kitazawa Seed Co. are:

Calabash Long Gourd- also known as opo squash. I first got one of these from our farmers market and loved it. Very similar to a yellow crookneck or zucchini in taste and texture but they grow huge and are ready later into the summer than most traditional squash go.

Tinda Gourd- an Indian variety of edible gourd that is supposedly very quick to flower and set fruit which are small (3-4oz.), round, and squash-like. Like all gourds they take well to trellising which can help save space. This one should do well with the heat and humidity here

Buag Ngu snake gourd- yet another gourd. This one grows long thin fruit that are used like squash or zucchini. These are supposedly heavy bearers over a long season. I have even heard someone familiar with them say that if you plant them, you will have more food than you can eat.

Round Winter Melon- This is one of the crops I am most excited about. It is a wax melon which as I understand, this is the answer to winter squash in many places throughout asia. The wax melon develops a layer of wax on the outside, hence the name, that gives it a very long shelf life. I'm very excited to see how these do, and to taste them.

Numane pickling melon- These are melons that are more like cucumbers that are grown for pickling. The grow quite large, up to 12 inches and quite wide. They are also traditionally eaten stuffed with meat and baked. This is one of the few cool weather crops that I got to try out in our early spring.

Giant Bottle Gourd- This is not an edible variety, but I wanted to grow them for use as containers and to make a cool gourd water bottle. These can get up to two feet in length and be big enough around to use as bowls! I hope to get at least one good one to use as an old school water bottle for working in the garden.


     So those were the last of the seeds I am ordering for 2015. I got a bunch of seeds for Christmas from my lovely wife, and I'm sure I will pick up a few things locally before all is said and done, but I'm pretty much set for what I am growing this year. I am so excited for the warm season I can hardly contain myself. Now if I could just stay on top of planting and keeping the garden tidy!

Garden Tools

    The wife and I headed down to Micanopy this weekend. I needed to get some more cage wire for what I hope will be the last cage I build for a while so a trip to Reddick Brothers Hardware was in order. If you are anywhere near Micanopy this is a great place for all kinds of farm and hardware needs. The place sure isn't much to look at but they have what you need at the price that you want and the guys there are always super friendly. When I decided to start breeding rabbits I went there to buy all my cage wire. I bought a 100ft roll of the 1x2 wire for the sides and top and I bought the length of 1x1/2 that I needed for the floor. Today I needed one more length of 1x1/2 for the floor.
   
    Since we were already down that way we decided to go check out a place we have always seen but never been to. There is this huge junk sale place on 441 between Gainesville and Ocala, I don't even know if it has a name, but the place has sooo much stuff. Everything you could imagine. I was able to pick up a couple of antique knives to use in the garden for harvesting and other general uses. I must have looked at 500 knives but I found these 4, all interesting and made in the USA. I like that these guys have character and that they will go from sitting on a table in the rain to being used to harvest veggies and maintain the garden. A second life for them. Best part, they were a dollar a piece!

Antique knives that will be part of the garden harvest and maintenance tool set. Since they spent the last who knows how many years in the rain and sun I won't feel so bad if I accidentally leave one out.

This one is by far my favorite. I love the butcher style sweep and the the shape and balance of the handle make it very nice to hold. It says "EKCO STAINLESS USA" on the blade. 

Success! We Have Bunnies

    On December 7th we bred our buck Fezzik with our doe Angry Girl. On Jauary 7th (31 days) she gave birth to 7 babies (that is the best count I could get so far without too much intrusion so the number may change). The night that she had her babies was also one of the coldest nights so far this winter. We hit 27 and didn't get out of the 40's the following day. Luckily I had moved her to the birthing palace.
    The birthing palace, as I affectionately call it, is an extra large cage with a built in drop down nest box that I built for the bred does to move into when it is time to give birth. I moved Angry Girl in about 3 weeks after she was bred to give her a week to settle in before the babies were expected. She settled in just fine and had her babies right on schedule. The nest box is pretty big so I stuffed it with a lot of hay so that she would have all the nesting material she could want. When I went out to feed and water everyone on the morning of the 8th she had spruced the nest up with a little of her added fur and I could see the hay moving where the little fellas were squirming. I left them tucked in nicely for the next few days and protected from the wind with a large tarp but today it warmed up a bit and I went out for a quick head count.

Angry Girl gave birth to these little guys almost 3 days ago. They grow very fast and will be up and hopping on their own before you know it. Looks like 9 in this picture but I swear I only counted 7.

    I feel like I must have missed or double counted at least once or twice but my quick count showed seven. That's a great first litter and should be a great start to the rabbitry operation here at Three Oaks. I'll post more pictures as they start to grow to show just how fast the process is. I have 8 weeks now to figure out everything I need for the first butchering run, but we will get to all that later.

Battle Spring 2015- Tactics!

     I never liked the notion of nature as something to be conquered. I'm much more of the learn from and work with nature school of thought, but alas one has battle tactics not cooperation tactics. I was set on using the word tactics so yeah. Here is what I am thinking after a fairly successful but less than stellar production level spring 2014. 

Planting Tactics 2015

#1 Plant Early

      I started my solanums this past weekend, in seed flats that are staying in the hoophouse until we pass the last frost date. I also have some water chestnut, okinawan spinach, an avocado, some citrus seedlings, and some other perennial tropical greens overwintering in the hoophouse. All of those things will be ready to hit the ground running.  I want all of these guys to get a big head start going into the warm season. The perennial tropical greens will be ready to bridge the cool season to warm season gap and provide a little something coming from the garden at an otherwise slow time.

A view in the hoophouse right now. This thing will be packed with planted seed flats and rooted cutting by the time March rolls around. The hoophouse is my weapon of choice for early planting this year. 

#2 Plant Often

     For all of the other non frost tolerant plants that are warm season crops my plan is to succession plant my way past any frost issues. Starting the 1st week of February I will start planting watermelon, cucumbers, and melons once a week until the frost has passed. It has been my experience that the latter half of February is equally likely to have 1 freezing night as it is to have 5. It's the luck of the draw from year to year. So if I start planting early February and keep doing that until the chance of frost is gone I could end up with a whole month worth of succession planted crops already cooking by the time mid March rolls around or I could end up planting everything for a final time in mid-March. I'm not a commercial grower so I can gamble a few dozen seeds, especially when the reward is so tasty and the risk so cheap. 

Just keep planting.

#3 Turn to the Tropics

   Almost all of the tradition temperate crops(think anything your grandparents grew up north, except maybe rhubarb and asparagus) do well in Florida in the spring and fall if you time it right, but most things go belly up by July. This is where we look to the tropics for help. Think cowpeas and okra from Africa, longbeans and tropical greans from southeast Asia, gourds from India, and Calabaza from the Caribbean. And let us not forget yams. Wonderful yams. All of these kinds of "outside the box" crops are built to thrive in the summers and take the worst heat and humidity Florida can throw at them. They also thrive in the torrential rainfall but most are just fine with mild to moderate drought as well. The depths of summer is where you need to have these tropical crops chugging along and providing massive yields while everyone else in the neighborhood is lamenting their sad looking tomato twigs.

Okra anyone? Still tender at that size too!

#4 Don't Forget to Look at Home

    Also never forget things that grow right in your backyard, whether you planted them or not, that is to say look at native plants. One of the best examples for Florida is the Seminole Pumpkin. These badboys have been cultivated by the native Seminole Indians for generations and they are about as well suited to the environment as a plant can be. I have mentioned before but the seminole pumpkin was my runaway success for 2014 with one plant producing 36 pumpkins. That is a lot of food. 

That is one half of the seminole pumpkin plant I grew in 2014. Yes there is a equal or greater amount of plant behind me in this picture!

#5 Shoot For Density!

    The number one thing that has held my gardens back in productivity is not planting densely enough. I don't mean crowding plants, but using all the space available. Chives and cowpeas can be happily tucked in all over the place. Pole beans and malabar spinach are happy to climb any portion of fence next to which they are placed. I need to work on using all of the space that I have available. I have been in regret of unused space far more often than I was in regret of having to thin plants out. Florida rain and sun will support an amazing level of plant density, all I need to do is be there to referee and add some nutrients as necessary, if necessary. Using vertical space will be key as I try to maximize production going forward. 

#6 Relax and Enjoy

    Despite the heat and humidity and bugs and daily thunderstorms, summer in Florida really is great. There are few things I enjoy more than walking outside on a summer morning, feeling the humidity heavy in the air and the heat of yesterday still lingering reminding you that it will be back again today, and walking through the garden to see the wealth of productivity. These are the times in the morning before work that I will harvest longbeans and okra for my breakfast and I just think, "What an amazing life I have been blessed with." It's funny don't you think that of all the things in life that you think might bring you happiness you find a bean, yes a bean, trumps so many of them. This year I will try to enjoy the successes and failures more, for I truly am blessed. 

My greatest blessing is my wonderful wife who humors me when I come running in at 7 before work saying "Look at this bean! Will you take a picture for me?" I love you beautiful wife o mine. 

Planting Day Video! Wait, What? Oh and A Hoophouse Too!

    Florida gardening is strange to those not living here. The timing seems all wrong. To me though, having known nothing else it just seems like the normal cycle of things. I say this because today on January 4th I planted my peppers, eggplant, tomatoes, gooseberries, and various herbs that I will be growing this spring. To anyone north of Gainesville this will likely seem absurd but consider that 8 weeks from now is March 1st and our last frost date is about the 10th or so of March depending on the source you consult. 

    My lovely wife was along to film the whole affair and she put together this little video to show my setup for the process including the newly fabricated hoophouse (hoophut?) and there is also a good view of the current winter garden. I guess the only thing that could be improved in this multimedia experience is the looks of the gardener, but hey, I was born that way. Below the video I included an explanation on my planting early for anyone who cares to know more. 

    So I am looking at having 8-9 week old transplants to put out after the last frost. This really isn't such a big deal for the peppers or eggplant. Honestly our season is so long I could wait until April 1st to plant seed and still rest assured that I will get a crop from all but the latest varieties. No joke, as of today I was still harvesting peppers off of unprotected plants (a handful of habaneros and limon peppers in case you are curious). But for the tomatoes this is crucial. You see tomatoes really struggle with the summers here. After the chance of frost has passed there is a very small window of relatively mild weather before the thermostat gets cranked up and the humidity blasts. Tomatoes can take some heat, but not the melt your face off combo of heat and humidity. They start to get all kinds of stress problems including fungal attacks. For this reason you really need to have big, strong, healthy transplants ready to go so that they can shoot up and produce as much as possible in that mild weather window. 

     It's funny, while the tomato is THE definitive home gardener crop in most of the country, I really have come to believe it is more trouble than it's worth here. That being said I still find I am a sucker for trying. Last year I did a good job of getting my plants out early but I still had the other issue here: pests. It never gets terribly cold here so pests are always active and the hot and humid late spring/early summer is like jet fuel for their proliferation. I have been very fortunate to have relatively few pest issues here, likely due to my haphazard mishmash planting of a large variety of plants. The major exception is tomatoes. I lost about 50% of my crop last year. Feel not bad for me though, we still ended up with more tomatoes than we could eat, and I hope to continue that trend as I am armed and ready to persevere and preserve this year!. As long as some make it to the table I don't mind a few losses. 

Garden Pictures- Winter

    I went out into the garden last week to snap some pictures of the winter crops moving along and thought I would share them here.

Beets- Lutz salad variety

Left to right, Red romaine lettuce, bibb lettuce, lutz salad beets

Left to right, bibb lettuce, wong bok cabbage, shanghai pak choi, turnips in upper right corner

Bloody Dock aka Red Veined Sorrel 

Onions

Florida broadleaf mustard, huge volunteer plants.

Cabbage, just starting to head, I forget the variety.

Apollo Broccoli, just starting to head.

Radish

Lettuce

Mix of Radishes and arugula

Little Marvel Pea flowering

Purple peacock broccoli. Lagging behind everything else by quite a margin.

View across the garden 

My Parents' Chicken Coop Part II

     I've got a backlog of content lined up that I'm trying to get published here at Homegrown Philosofood. The funny thing is, the more time you spend doing stuff around the homestead, the less time you have left for writing. Double edged sword I guess. I do however have an update from my parents in regards to their chicken coop.  
  My dad finished up the chicken coop and my mom sent over these pictures of the final product. It really turned out beautiful and I think it will serve them well. Here are the pictures of the completed coop.

The coop from the laying box side

The laying boxes with a fold down door for easy access to the delicious eggs

The builder himself, my Dad. Don't let the scowl fool you, he's a very kind fella behind the beard. A darn fine coop constructor as well if I do say so myself. 

Mom would never let even the chickens have a place without a little artistic touch. As a note, we discussed closing off the open area above the door with cage wire as well, my only guess is pops ran out or has a more aesthetically pleasing fix in the works. 

    So there you have it, a coop that I am a bit jealous of. I'm sure that Dad will get back to me with all the things he has changed or would do differently the next time and I hope to incorporate those into my design when it comes time to get our chicken system rolling here at Three Oaks.

    As you can see they wasted no time in filling the house.

Rufus and the ladies

Just today 4 Rhode Island Red hens and a Cochin Bantam rooster, henceforth known as Rufus, became the proud new tenants of these sweet digs.