Proof of Life

It was a very busy Saturday at The Compound, when isn’t it really?!   Started out pretty typical, taking care of the chickens, and mowing part of the acreage.  We’ve decided to try and divide the mowing up in to sections, a little each weekend, that way it’s not too much at one time.  We also worked on cleaning up the garden, pulling weeds and spreading out the mounds of chicken compost we pulled out a few weeks back.  There should be loads of nutrients to pass into our garden.

 

We were surprised and happy to find some already growing watermelon plants.  Since the Hooligans were regularly fed watermelon, I guess it was only natural to find some new growth in their compost.  We've left them undisturbed.

 

 

 

We placed down cardboard in some of the really weed ridden areas, and put mulch on top to help kill them off.  The cardboard will decompose over time, and we should see a reduction in weeds.  This picture looks great, but it basically looked like a hay field, but it was covered in weeds.  Maybe I'll get over my embarrassment and take a photo or two of the remaining areas that need to be done, just so you can see how bad it actually got.  We need more mulch again.  Not looking forward to that work.

 

 

The Moose also helped me by setting up some additional shade cloth so I can grow some of the more delicate plants like lettuce and peas out of the direct sun.  They just don’t do well at The Compound in direct light.  We also set up some water gutters along the walls, so I can plant lettuce, herbs, etc., avoid weeds, and make it one less thing we need to bend over to harvest.  I’m not a spring chicken anymore!  We got this idea from a preppers meeting we had a few months ago.

During the clean-up of the garden the Moose discovered two of these squishy eggs!  Yuk!  They were snake eggs.  I’m wondering how big the snake was to lay these eggs.  They seemed to be about the size of a robin’s egg. 

 

 

 

Finally, while the Moose was rearranging the pond covering, he found this Tilapia.  Proof of Life!  We have some good sized fish in this pond!  There are also plenty of small frys and fingerlings.  OK, not sure on the spelling, but a baby Tilapia fish is called a fry, to make that plural are they frys, or fries?

 

We left exhausted, and actually disappointed we couldn't get more done.  I'm behind in planting the garden, but thankfully I have some seedlings almost ready to go.  There always seems to be one reason or another for not getting the garden planted in time.    Say a prayer that we have warmer weather, longer than the past two years, so we can actually harvest the veggies we plant.