Chronicles of a Home Farmer 1

I have been busy with work, crafts, and gardening. I am even having a hard time squeezing in as much chores as I could in the house.

Gardening is done after the mister leaves for work. After is loading laundry, then off to my work space for shipping; listing and other things.

While at the garden this morning, I found out that the young leaves of my cantaloupe, sweet potato, and cauliflower has been eaten by animals.

I think the wild rabbits are feasting on my organic edibles. Well, they must have discovered a different variety of food in my garden. What's good about them is that they didn't munch on the cauliflower heads, and my cantaloupe buds.

These animals are kinder this time. They didn't munch on the whole plant and cut the stem off from the roots. So considerate.

I am not mad, after all, they must live too.

Female Flowers

For weeks, I am frustrated but hopeful with my zucchini plants. This is my second time planting them. The first was the other year, and they all died while we were away on vacation.

My three zucchini plants have been producing lots of flowers already, but no visible fruits yet.

Why?

Skinny stem and flower at the end is male. Only females bear fruits.


I thought of helping them through hand pollination. I follow Bonnie Plants on Facebook and read most of their gardening tips.

Last Saturday, I brought a cotton bud with me when I visited our backyard garden, but I didn't see any female flowers.Yes, there were flowers but all were male. Cotton buds or soft water color brushes can be used as a tool to pollinate flowers if bees aren't frequent in your garden.

Yesterday, while watering them, I saw female flowers in all three for the first time.

Fatter stem and a flower is female.


These tiny fruits aren't out of the woods yet. I hope the gophers, rabbits and squirrels will LEAVE THEM ALONE!

The mister will be adding more beds soon for more varieties of vegetables! Yay!

By the way, we had our second mini harvest of our tomatoes yesterday.

Home Farming Updates

Mood: Excited!

The mister built me a wooden plant box last spring with the help of the boy. I planted zucchini, tomatoes, peppers, strawberries, and sweet potato that grew in the kitchen because I forgot to boil it. By the way, the zucchini died while we were away on vacation in the West Coast.

Some animals have been hanging out in my garden, and have been snacking on my plum tomatoes, and strawberries. They also love to munch on talbos ng kamote (sweet potato tops/leaves).

Crops isn't as abundant as I had expected due to these animals. It's so frustrating that they're enjoying the fruits of our labor.

But, I do not want to wipe these pests out especially because they didn't touch all of our crops. Look! Our first long cayenne pepper. Such considerate pests they are! Right? Hehehehe.



 The mister bought a pack of seeds for me for a dollar at Kaufmann Mercantile over a year ago. Here.

There are more peppers coming, and I hope the pests will leave my garden alone from now on. I got excited when I harvested this pepper yesterday. The mister was too.

I guess we'll be pepper home farmers from now on. Hehehehe.

I Spoke Too Soon

I asked the opinions of my siblings the other afternoon if the reddest one was ready for picking. One said that the largest one (the bottom) was, but I decided to wait for another day instead. The following day, to my surprise, the two redder ones were missing. Holy smokes!



In my mind, I imagined that the gophers found and took them. But why just the two riper ones and leave the not-so-ripe-one? Such a crackerjack!

I knew the animals took them but still,I asked the mister if he harvested two. You know, I had to make sure before I point any finger. Of course, he answered no, and suggested to put the pots on top of our deck table. So, I did.



I don't know what to do with these animals that burrow from the neighbor's yard to ours. Killing is not an option though. I guess, finding ways to outmart them is the only choice I can do.



Today, I had my first taste of my organic strawberry. Here's hoping for more harvests. May I continue to outsmart the gophers, and may they realize that there isn't enough food in our yard and move to a different hood--- to a far away gopherhood!

Till next time!

The Home Farmer

I planted strawberries in pots this year. This is a first time. I put the pots in our deck hoping that the gophers wouldn't find them. I have been checking on them almost everyday, and then this week I noticed red to pinkish fruits. This is so exciting. I don't exactly know when is the exact time for the picking, but I'll just imagine the redness of those strawberries I see at the grocery store.

This photo was taken the other day. I send it to my sister, Charmaine via Viber in Austrlia. As I said, I am so excited that I had to share it.


The following day, both were turning red. I just can't believe this. I fooled the gophers this year again (Read about last year here.) I was really happy that I sent this photo via text message to my friend, Tita Su who's in Las Vegas, and to the young lady who's traveling around America with the rest of the Korea-America International Student Conference (KASC) delegates.


All four strawberry plants in four different pots are bearing fruits now. I am watching them like a hawk. I don't want the gophers to harvest them before we do.



This year, what are new in my backyard are four strawberry plants, a pot of spring onion and two pots of tomatoes. Hopefully, the mister and I can find time to fix our yard and have a permanent garden bed for more fresh harvests of herbs, fruits, vegetables and other greeneries in the future.