After our wonderful rain and some cool, overcast days last week, this week dawned sunny and warm. The next few days are headed for the 90s again! :-/ Oh well, summer deserves a "last gasp," and it'll stretch out the garden's production.
As predicted, the rain brought nearly instant green. See the green haze across the dry lot?
Unfortunately, I think it's all weeds.
I was going to pick our own prunes and apples and work on them yesterday, but a farm store chain sent out an email that all remaining produce from last week's boxed produce promotion would be 50% on Sunday only. Hoping to score enough tomatoes to restock our pantry shelves, I drove into town to check it out. Came home with two big boxes of RIPE tomatoes, a box of pickling cukes and a bunch of dill. Finished the day with 21 quarts of canned tomatoes, five quarts of condensed tomato soup (and enough puree for another batch in the frig), and three jars of pickles lacto-fermenting on my kitchen counter. Since the rest of the cukes won't wait the 2+ weeks it will take to see how those pickles turn out, I'll have to put them up conventionally.
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| Very timely addition; I was down to my last two quarts! |
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| The hens enjoy the cast-offs and trimmings |
One of our Buff Orpington hens went broody at least 2 1/2 weeks ago, and is still at it.
I've never had a broody hen before. She's a determined thing! If you pick her up and set her on the floor, she'll just brood there for awhile. So we've taken to putting her out in the hen yard, where she will usually scratch around for a bit before going back to her – empty – nest box. That's right, she's not sitting on anything. Silly, stubborn girl.
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| I hope she doesn't waste away! |
Full steam(y) ahead, at . . .
8 comments:
It's dry dry dry here. One extreme to the other this summer. Very hot and I'm ready for some rain and cooler fall temps. I'd love to have a nice looong cool (but not freezing) fall. My tomatoes are just now starting to really produce, but I got them in the ground late.
The Buff's can be very broody--one of the reasons I don't really want them at this time. They are very good natured though, just so persistent.
Tammy
If you have freezer space, freeze those tomatoes and can them when the weather is cooler.
I've had two Buffs go broody. Per-sis-tent! I finally had to give them eggs and let them be mamas.
Tammy, tomatoes are always a bit iffy here; our nights are generally too cool. That's why I jumped on the chance to buy some reasonably.
Leigh, both my freezer AND my henhouse are full up, so can't save the tomatoes OR give the girls some eggs!
Lookin' good there cooling on the counter.
I've seen several blogs where they are making tomato sauce in crockpots, where were crockpots when I was into canning. Think it would be much cooler way to cook down sauce.
Use your campstove, set up outside, for the canning part.
Look at all those wonderful jars of tomatoes! You seriously scored on those boxes.
Stay cool these next couple of days!
I make my apple (and other fruit) butter in a crockpot and it works very well.
Wanda, I don't have a campstove, just a stove IN my camper. And trust me, my house is cooler than that camper....
I'm totally envious of your canned tomatoes. We can't grow enough ripe ones up here to have enough to can. :o(
I've never seen a hen go so persistently broody without at least one egg under her. I do know it's very hard to break a broody hen from her self-appointed mission when you really don't want more chicks!
Hope you continue to get a little moisture!
Glad I'm not the only one breaking a sweat canning goodies.
I had one of my Buff's go broody this spring also. She sat for a full month, despite my best efforts to break her up. She'd complain loudly when I kicked her off the nest (where she was trying to hoard everyone's eggs. No 'roo, so they're all infertile). She finally gave up on her own.
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