Turkey Damage (or, why I don't let my chickens free-range)

Do you remember in the Little House on the Prairie book (this might be the one on Plum Creek), when Pa planted a huge field of wheat? He planted the wheat, it came up beautifully, he knew he was going to get a huge sum of money when he sold it, so he borrowed against the wheat crop to buy the lumber to build the family a new house. He buys fancy milled lumber on credit and builds this huge (by their terms) two-story house and everyone is happy and then....

... the locusts come.

The locusts descend on the wheat field and they eat it down to the ground. There's not a speck left. The family is devastated. Pa has to leave home to go find work in order to pay off the debt, leaving Ma with a farm, livestock, and three children (and maybe a baby? I can't remember) to take care of all by herself. It's horrible.

I must have read this book 25 times when I was young, and I read it aloud to both my kids, but the thing that I remember most about this part is how Pa would just stand at the window of the house looking out. No expression on his face, just looking out at the millions of locusts, eating up all his hard work and all his profits, leaving him in debt. Total despair.

Now, the good news is, our turkey damage is absolutely NOTHING like this! But I actually thought of this scene when I went out yesterday and found the turkey in the peppers for the twentieth time and I couldn't do anything but stand there and look at the damage. Peppers that I've nurtured from seed since January, getting torn apart by this damn bird who doesn't belong in our yard. A bird that was likely being raised by someone, who for some reason couldn't take care of it anymore and released it in to the wild to fend for itself.

This sort of helpless feeling is the same one I had when I'd walk out and see deer damage, before we fixed the fence. And I've been oh so smug. And the turkey doesn't care a whit for our fence. Turkeys in the wild like to roost 40 feet up in a tree. A domesticated turkey like this one likes to roost 20 feet up. Our little seven foot fence is nothing to her. 

She comes in to our yard from all angles. She flies over from the neighbors yards. She flies over from the street. She comes in at the South side and at the North side, though she definitely prefers the North side since that's where the chickens are. Easy pickings, those bits of seed that the chickens have flung out of their coop with their scratching. Or maybe it's that she's looking for her kin. Turkeys don't like to be alone, and this one is very alone. Which used to make me feel sorry for it. 

But I don't anymore. I'm done with this turkey. I want to catch this turkey and turn it in to dinner. This turkey is decimating squash, corn, potatoes. She has denuded the sunflowers and torn out pepper leaves. I've had it.

Sunflowers

A pepper, half the size it used to be

potatoes

Tom and I got out the PVC arches and the row covers last night, and covered up the peppers so that as least that's a bit of a deterrant. I have burgeoning basil in those beds too, so I didn't want the turkey to get in there again as she also digs and scratches, of course, and finds and eats the seeds.

This is working fine, at least today, but it's not a long-term solution. It's the wrong time for row covers, the peppers want the sun and heat, and it reduces airflow inside which isn't great in the summer. But hopefully it will keep her out for now. 

This, my friends, is why I don't let my chickens free-range. They would do this damage all over my garden. I can't tell you how much I agonize, keeping the chickens inside their coop, wanting to let them go free free free. But it just wouldn't work, unless I totally caged off all my raised beds. And side beds. And containers. You see the issue.

Meanwhile, that turkey is not long for this world. I'm allowed by law to take it by bow and arrow (I don't have one of those lying around. Does anyone?) or net. Net is the answer. Then I just have to screw up my courage and kill her. I've never done this before. I'm not sure I can. 

I've posted notes on our neighborhood website, I've called animal control and the wildlife museum, there's no help out there. We don't have room for the kind of coop a turkey would need, plus she wouldn't like to be alone, so we'd have to get more turkeys. We can't put her in with the chickens because chickens can give turkeys diseases. Plus the coop is the wrong size. Plus the chickens are terrified of the turkey and press themselves in a clump in the corner anytime she is around. 

Which is ALL THE TIME. Mostly early and late in the day, she always comes looking. Every 15 minutes, we are chasing her out the yard and down the street. Why isn't our neighborhood coyote getting her? What about the bobcat someone spotted two blocks down? I just keep hoping one day she won't show up and the problem will be solved.

And she's a beautiful bird. This is just unfortunate all around.

Seedpods, Fruit, and a Shaker Peg Rail

I've been on a seed saving spree. (Say that five times fast!) I've always tried to save some seed from our annual flowers, but this year I'm really enjoying finding new seeds to save. If I can put a dent in our yearly seed budget, that would be delightful! And of course it is a more sustainable practice than buying every year, and it has the benefit of a zero carbon footprint. 

Today I cut, dried, and saved Love-in-a-Mist (or Nigella). (I must say something about these photos. I used, as always, my phone (iPhone 6). I zoomed in quite a lot. Please please please forgive all the detail of my very dirty, work-hardened hands. Please concentrate on the seedpods, not my yucky fingers. Next time I will figure out a way to photograph with a piece of construction paper behind the desired item.)

a slightly squashed seed pod

From the top looking in, you can see the seeds. Isn't this seedpod lovely?

With the top pulled off

The seeds inside

Here's a California Poppy. Not quite so lovely. But then this is a hardscrabble flower, meant to survive severe drought and still bloom. It can't afford to have a nice balloon shape. It makes me think of the word 'sere.' 

Here's one still closed, not dry enough to pop open yet

and here's one sprung open, the seeds all in a row

I also collected quite a few nasturtium seeds. I use nasturtium everywhere in both the flower and vegetable beds, as it attracts beneficial insects (and hummingbirds) and repels the ones I don't want anywhere near my delicious veg. Saving these seeds will help me an awful lot in future.

They tend to grow in a group of three

These will dry and harden further, then they'll be ready to plant. 

And this year we finally have enough Forget-me-Nots to collect some seed. These seeds are the annoying kind that inspired the inventor of Velcro.

sticky, but beautiful

Today (and this whole week) has been enormously hot, so the routine has been: go out to the garden for an hour, then come inside and drink a gallon of hibiscus iced tea, then go outside for an hour, then come inside and have a little lie-down under a fan. I have to say the fruit just loves the heat and is bursting out everywhere. The plums are just a couple of days from eating, as are the peaches, and the tomatoes are clustered all along the stems of the plants.

This is a Santa Rosa plum we planted a year ago, last Spring. We have three plums on the tree this year, which I call a success. They are gorgeous and I can't wait to eat them.

The peaches are numerous and glorious. We have dreams of frozen peaches for smoothies, peaches for pie, peaches to eat out-of-hand, and of course peach jam. About three times a day we go out and squeeze them, or see if they come off easily in our hand. That will be our cue to start eating. We must stay ahead of the squirrels and birds, though we have so many, we can share.

Tomatoes. Can't wait.

We have slicers, paste, and cherry tomatoes all rivaling to be the first ones ready to eat. I'm trying new things with growing tomatoes this year, and I'll write about that in a different post. So far, I really like where things are headed.

Something else hot weather brings out, and they're not as welcome as the fruit, are flies. Gosh they are annoying. But today I noticed flies pollinating both a yarrow and the cilantro, so they're not all bad.

And oh my goodness the cilantro is just a hotbed of activity, I noticed 8 different kinds of pollinators on it at one time today. This is absolutely one of those crops you should let bolt and go to seed. Pollinators really seem to love this kind of flower - an umbel - and cilantro is another one of those flowers that attracts the good guys and repels the bad guys. 

Our garlic harvest was so robust this year that I asked my father to make us another hanging rail for the braids. We have four pegs on our canning shelf, and those are occupied by two garlic braids, a mesh bag of shallots, and a mesh bag of fingerling potatoes. I had six more braids of garlic, and we really don't want to try to fit everything on those four pegs because we need to increase the airflow around the produce if we want it to last longer. So Dad made us a Shaker Peg Rail, and it looks nice in a dark corner by the piano.

Two more pictures to share. I bought a Humboldt Lily at the Watershed Nursery back on Mother's Day, and it's blooming. Spectacular. Why didn't I get more of these?

This is California's drought-tolerant answer to the Leopard Lily

And I just love the way this Scabiosa atropurpurea 'Scarlet' (pincushion flower) looks as it builds up to bloom.

Isn't that something?

Hope you're all having a marvelous weekend!

Some seed saving, and a turkey problem (or maybe not)

Each evening lately, after the sun goes down, I've been working on cutting down flowers and saving seed. I've done this in the past with annual flowers, but I had always been haphazard about it. This year I knew I wanted to get as much seed as possible, so I've been keeping a close watch on the flowers. 

One of the annuals I really enjoyed this year was Breadseed Poppies. I had two varieties, "Cupcake" and "Orange Chiffon," and both were gorgeous. When I saw the amount of seed they both produced, I knew I would want to save some for next year.

Orange Chiffon

Cupcake

Cupcake seed pods

When I noticed most of the flowers were done blooming and seed pods had formed, I cut down the plants and put the seed pods in a separate bin. There, I left them to dry for a couple of days. When dry, I split the pods and shook out the seeds. This yields thousands of seeds, not counting the ones that already self-sowed in the same spot.

some chaff on top

I've been doing the same with Clarkia, both "Mountain Garland" and "Farewell-to-Spring." These seed pods are much, much smaller and it takes a lot more time to collect the seeds.

Mountain Garland are the flowers on tall stalks, Farewell-to-Spring are the shorter, cup-shaped flowers.

Mountain Garland seedpod

seeds and chaff

I'll store these in our garage refrigerator; the clarkias can be sown in late Fall, and the breadseed poppies in late Winter. 

My eye is carefully trained on some cilantro that is blooming right now - I'd like to collect seed for both planting and for canning. We use a lot of coriander when we make pickles.

I also have my eye on some Love-in-a-Mist and some California Poppies. It's hard to get things at just the right time!

Now, about the turkey problem. The past few days, this turkey hen has been flying in to our yard and hanging out near the chicken coop.

She's not a wild turkey; those are everywhere around here but travel in very large flocks, and they are dark grey and black. This seems to be a Bourbon Red, which is a breed of domesticated turkey. I think someone in our neighborhood is raising turkeys and has lost this one. She is always alone. She is always hanging out near the coop. And she is always noisy. And - she is always hard to chase out of our yard. I've posted her appearance on our Nextdoor site, but if no one answers, I'd rather like to figure out if there is a way to catch her and keep her. Our chickens really don't like her; they get very agitated when she is near. And I certainly don't want her free-ranging in my vegetables. So we'd have to build her her own coop. But here's the conundrum: Do we spend time building her an enclosure of some sort, and then hope she comes back again? Or do we try to catch her, keep her contained, and knock together something on the fly? And doesn't she need company? And would she be a good Thanksgiving turkey, or would we want the eggs? The questions are numerous. Please do make suggestions. 

Insect Hotel

My daughter Kate, a 7th grader in Middle School, was given an unexpected late science assignment - she was told that she needed to complete an 'eco-action project.' Grant you, this wasn't a surprise to me, as my current 8th grader Adam had the same last minute assignment last year. I am of two minds about these assignments. I think getting kids involved in ecological and environmental causes is great, and I always have a million ideas if the kids do not. However, I'm not a fan of these 'the school year's almost done, there's not much left to do, oh well, let's do a project' projects. It's busy work. Well-meaning busy work, but still. Anyway, last year Adam didn't have any ideas of his own so I pitched him a bat box, and he and Tom built a really cool one which has yet to be installed on a tall pole in our garden. (What good is an ecological project if it never gets put to use? I'm not sure.) Kate didn't have any ideas either, though many of the people in her class decided to have bake sales and raise money for a local children's hospital and she thought that sounded like an easy way out. I nixed it. Money for hospitals is great, but it's not what I call an eco-action project. So I suggested an insect hotel, something I've wanted on our property for years now.

A little background. We all know the plight of the European Honeybee and by now we are all taking steps (I hope!) to help them from disappearing altogether. But what is not so well-reported is that native bees and pollinating insects are also greatly in decline, for all the same reasons honeybees are. Lost of habitat is right up there as a cause, as are systemic pesticides, weakened immune systems, and a basic lack of food and water. Did you know we have about 1600 species of native bee in California alone? Many of us are familiar with bumblebees, but that is only one kind of bee among many. 

If you're interested in California native bees, you can't do better than to peruse the website of the Urban Bee Lab at UC Berkeley. They are doing wonderful work, and they have lists of bees, ways to help them, which flowers to plant, etc. The researchers also give talks in various places; I've been to one at Pollinate Farm and Garden in Oakland, and it was a truly eye-opening lecture. 

In our garden, as you know, I keep two pollinator gardens going year-round for insect forage. It's so fun to sit down in those gardens and watch who visits. I have a field guide for native bees that I bought from the Urban Bee Lab, but I often forget to look up the insects I saw. Suffice it to say that there are dozens of bees that visit the flowers. I also love visiting insects of any kind - spiders, butterflies, dragon - and damselflies, wasps (other than yellow-jackets!), flies, mantids, true bugs, ladybugs, etc. They all need habitat.

I also leave water out for insects. We have a bubbling fountain with rocks at the bottom, which is an ideal place for insects to drink. There are shallow dishes full of rocks and broken pottery scattered around the garden. Our watering system keeps them full of water. They tend to get dirty, choked with leaves and sometimes mud, but that makes them even more attractive to some insects such as butterflies. 

And though we are addicted to wood chips and mulch here, I leave a portion of bare ground in various places in the yard. This is for ground-nesting bees, like bumbles. 

But what we didn't have here is any place for the other dozens of bees or insects to nest - hollow logs or piles of moss, layers of bricks or rocks. (I do have paving stones for the lizards, as well as a brush pile - but some insects like stacks and crevices.)

Hence, the need for an insect hotel. Here's the one that Kate made.

I found the box on Amazon, as it seemed to too hard to construct something with a lot of little holes. For the fillings, Kate choose two kinds of moss, hollow bamboo (cut in to small sections), a cardboard box cut in to strips, some cut-up straw, some cut-up jute twine, and wood blocks that she drilled using Dad's drill press. This should provide nesting sources for many different kind of insects. We'll hang it up on the fence in one of our pollinator gardens, and will enjoy watching it to see who comes to stay.

If you google 'insect hotel,' you'll see lots of photos of very elaborate constructions which are really neat, but too big for our yard. Perhaps you'll be inspired to make your own insect hotel!

Apple Pruning, Thinning, and Windfall Kitchen Projects

I'm a summer pruner. 

There's a good reason for this. According to my pruning guru, Ann Ralph, summer pruning is the best way to keep your fruit trees of a manageable size. There's no reason for a family of four to have huge, overwhelming fruit trees. We simply do not need that much produce, plus, if I can't reach the fruit? It's wasted.

I took a course from Ann last summer and I learned SO MUCH. Mostly not to be afraid of pruning and thinning fruit, both of which need to be done ASAP in your home garden. I already thinned the peaches and I will wait to prune that tree until after harvest, which should be within weeks. But today I tackled the plum, cherry, fig, and apple trees. (Our new Asian pear is still small and doesn't need pruning until next summer.) All but the apple tree are still on the small size, though all are bearing, so all needed a bit of a tune up. Mainly with those I pruned out branches on the inside, trying to keep the tree in a 'vase' shape, letting air and light in to the middle. 

But the apple, oh the apple. It always gets away from me. Here's a before and after.

Before

After

I'm mainly concerned with taking out three kinds of branches: 1) Those that are sticking straight up, 2) those that are crossing or rubbing, and 3) those that are dead or damaged. I have three tools that I use for this job (and most other trimming jobs in the garden): A bypass pruner, a lopper, and a Japanese pruning saw that I borrowed from my dad and never returned (sorry, Dad). These three tools I consider essential.

While I was pruning, I also thinned the fruit. Clusters of 5-6 apples were thinned to 2 or 3. This still left plenty of fruit on the tree for harvest in a couple of months. 

The brush was added to the official brush pile (the lizards will be thrilled).

 And about 20 pounds of unripe, or windfall, apples, were destined for the kitchen rather than the compost.

The chickens got a small share, of course. But the rest I had plans for. First, I made pectin. It takes all day, but it's quite easy to do. (I use Mrs. Wheelbarrow's recipe.)

Roughly chop four pounds of unripe apples.

Put the apples in a large pot with six cups of water.

Bring to a boil, then simmer for 45 minutes. Mash them early and often with a potato masher, on the stovetop as they cook.

Drain into a jelly bag for 4-5 hours. I have a makeshift rig. My mom gave me the jelly stand, but this is a 'nut milk bag' I bought a while back, and I clip the bag on with whatever chip clips I have handy. If you don't have a MacGyver outfit like me, just go the colander lined with cheesecloth route.

Do not squeeze the bag, you want only the clear pectin/thick juice. Then bring the juice to a boil you cannot stir down, about 210 degrees - this might take up to 30 minutes. Let the juice cook at 220 degrees until syrupy. Then ladle into hot 4 ounce jars and water bath can for 10 minutes. No extra acid needed. Apparently the canned pectin lasts for a year, but we usually use it right away for peach preserves in June.

For my next apple project, I wanted to dehydrate some apple pieces to use for snacks or in oatmeal. We don't have a dehydrator, so I figured I'd use the oven on its lowest temperature. But, it's 90 degrees here today, no humidity to speak of (like, ever), so why not use solar power? First, I sliced up the apples with my mandolin, and soaked them in water spiked with lemon juice while I got the slices all trimmed and ready. I did not peel the apples.

Then I placed them on drying racks placed on cookie sheets and sprinkled them with cinnamon.

I placed them out on our sunny patio table

And then I covered them loosely with a bit of recycled row cover. They'll stay out there until the sun goes down tonight.

I've still got about 12 pounds of unripe apples. I'll probably make 'pink juice' tomorrow, which is nearly the same process as the pectin - I'll cook apples down with water and mash them, then drain them - but I'll squeeze the drainage bag to get as much nutrition from the apples as possible (all that cloudy juice). I won't cook it any further, I'll just maybe add some honey and then we can drink it, or I can water-bath can it for later. I might also make some very tart applesauce. I'm not sure, that's all tomorrow's project! :)

**** Update, two hours later: Apple chips are already completely dehydrated! Who needs a fancy machine???

The power of the sun!

And the pectin is such a pretty color, I had to share.