Comments for Eat The Yard

Comment on Grafting skills by Curbstone Valley Farm

Curbstone Valley Farm — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 20:15:57 +0000

Wonderful, congratulations! Hope the pears emerge soon, ours are just starting to wake up.

Comment on Grafting skills by Mike Crolene

Mike Crolene — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 20:12:45 +0000

Well done Professore! I saw this video on TED.com about sustainable farming by a chef named Dan Barber, who examins how chefs will be able to include fish on the menu for many years to come, and how the vary process that makes this possible also necessarily means the fish will taste as good as anything wild caught. Here’s the link, well worth a watch.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EUAMe2ixCI

Comment on Grafting skills by Jason

Jason — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 19:14:11 +0000

Great work with your peaches and plums. I think once they start to bloom out it means they took.

Comment on Grafting skills by Angela

Angela — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 08:10:52 +0000

An amazing ability indeed. One of the many strange things that plants can do and animals cannot.

I am also celebrating what looks like success in my first attempt at grafting. I did it with peaches and plums and the grafts are just at the stage that you show in your photo. I do hope it means they took.

Comment on A whole meal of food by Nenita Cadorette

Nenita Cadorette — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 07:39:56 +0000

Too good dude! I liked it!!

Comment on Lies, damned lies, and avocados by Jason

Jason — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 06:06:44 +0000

I had read that avocados don’t graft well. I have had some success grafting apple, and hopefully pear — but supposedly the avocado are trouble.

A good suggestion, though.

Comment on Lies, damned lies, and avocados by robbie

robbie — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 05:58:34 +0000

why dont you graft one branch and let the other(s) pruduce the new titan of avocado?

Comment on Winter 2.0 by villager

villager — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 21:33:40 +0000

Timing the succession plantings is always a challenge for me too. I always wind up with all the broccoli heading up at once, despite planting early and late varieties. Sounds like you have several good strategies in mind.

I’m with you on making the lawn disappear. Our next project will be to plant dwarf fruit trees to replace the small front lawn. I’d love to be rid of mowing.

Comment on Winter 2.0 by Laura Morefield

Laura Morefield — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 19:19:43 +0000

Wow…those carrots sounds like they will be amazing! I’m loving this project from afar!

Comment on A little room for natural selection by Curbstone Valley Farm

Curbstone Valley Farm — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 17:27:26 +0000

Actually, Marek’s is more common than you might think in unvaccinated backyard flocks. It’s good that your chicks are vaccinated, as a little extra insurance. We’re also vaccinating our new birds that arrive March 29th.

As for predators, we had many of the same concerns as you. I recently wrote a post about the considerations we made when building our first coop:

http://curbstonevalley.com/blog/?p=1267

Those hens are now three years old, and despite seeing bobcats climb the outside of the run in broad daylight, and numerous coyotes walking through, nothing has made it into that coop. We’re in the woods here, so predators abound, but so far we’ve managed to keep our flock safe. Hawks haven’t bothered our birds, although they do fly and circle overhead sometimes while the girls are free-ranging.

As for raccoons…we use a lot of spring catches on our coop and slide bolts. If the latch is a two part mechanism (like hold back the spring and lift up the latch) raccoons have a much harder time figuring those out. I hope our post is a little helpful, at least in regards to what we’ve managed to keep out!

We’ve no issues with pecking/cannabalism, and unless you overstock your coop, you’re highly unlikely to have those issues. Good luck with your girls! They’re growing fast!