Cypress Hill Farm: Farm happenings

May 26, 2011

Hi everyone, It's been a while since i had the chance to sit here and blog. I miss it so much, but life gets busy, and family has needs, and those come first. My oldest daughter had to have surgery, and i have been helping her out and taking care of my grand baby, and loving every minute of it. Recovery for my daughter is long and slow, but doing better everyday. Baby is growing fast and doing fine.

nap time at meme's house

It's grown hot and dry around the farm, we need rain so bad. While some areas along the Mississippi river are worried about flooding, some of us are in a drought and can use the rain. Would it be great if we could tap into the river to water our fields and garden and put that excess water where it's needed!!!!!! The garden is hanging on by watering every day. This new location for the garden has worked out pretty well. We're growing some of the prettiest tomatoes we have every grown, but with the heat and no rain the bugs are starting to get to them.

Hoping to get to eat several of these beauties before the bugs do. Hmmmmmm I'm spying something red in there...........

I can't seem to get the whole salad together, no matter how hard i try, my lettuce gets done before everything else, I guess that's just the way it goes in south Louisiana. This is what was left of my buttercrunch lettuce that finished up a few weeks ago. Now the tomatoes are starting to turn red and the cucumbers are lagging behind as well. My vision of eating a beautiful, healthy salad i grew myself is not lost, even if i have to eat these ingredients one at a time, as they are grown and ready. There is such satisfaction in knowing that you grew this yourself, and you know that its grown in a healthy way with no chemicals.

buttercruch lettuce

shallots

We are starting to have a few ears of corn getting close to being ready. I was feeling disappointed that things were off to a slow start. We had to replant several things twice, corn was one of them, due to the lack of rain and cooler than normal temps this spring. Hubby had to remind me that this location was once the pool site, that needed lots of amending. OK......so maybe next year this site can be more productive.

view of tomatoes, beans, potatoes and corn

This year i planted pole beans and potatoes for the first time and I'm pleased with the way they are growing, spite the lack of rain. I planted a variety called "rattlesnake", it's a long green bean with purple variegation running through it, a beautiful bean, can't wait to taste it.

We also planted pole butter beans (Florida speckled) and top pick pinkeye peas. They are starting to flower, can't wait to see them. Will get pics of those later.

We dug potatoes on Sunday, the kids helped and were amazed at how they grow under the ground. we were pleased with the size of most of them, considering we never grew potatoes before.

The yearling heifers are growing also; the one in the middle is "Oreo" the belted Galloway. She is expected to have her first calf in July. We met a dear friend that raises registered Belted Galloway cattle and he was kind enough to let us bring Oreo to his farm in Jonesville Louisiana for breeding. This breed of cattle is an old breed, does well on grass and easy to keep. It has a small frame size and docile, which makes it easier to keep on small farms. She needed a home, so we brought her to ours a year ago, not sure what we wanted to do with her, we researched and learned alot about this interesting breed and made her part of the farm. We are all anxiously waiting to see her calf come July.

"T-Boy" young black bull (on the right) is the newest addition to the farm. We got him at the end of March of this year. Our two yearling heifers liked him alot........... can't wait to see if his work payed off.

These are some pics of the baby chicks we got at Easter. These were taken a few weeks back, i will have to take some more recent ones..........just wanted to get a few shots of everything growing on the farm.

Our Barred Rock chickens are doing fine, they are free ranging during the day, and surprisingly!!! they are staying out the garden. They did get into a few of my flower beds and scattered things around. I always wondered how do people have these beautiful gardens and flowers and such, and still able to keep the chickens free ranging. These ladies love to hang out around people, they are very social, which i love...........I love watching them walk around my yard and eat grasshoppers. We move the portable coop around, trying to keep them more toward the back of our property. But.........free ranging means sometimes they don't make it back to the coop to lay an egg. We have found a few eggs in the barn stall and flower beds, kids love it, it's like Easter egg hunting everyday.