Wednesday morning I woke in the night to the sound of heavy rain. It was predicted and expected: first an inch and a half, then two and a half. From a daffodil planting standpoint, this was close to disastrous: water-logged clay soil is heavy and messy to work in.
After a full day of heavy rain, it finally tapered off around 10pm. Just over four inches had fallen on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Thursday morning, I headed out to test the ground around the last 52 apple and pear trees. Would the bulb planters work?
Happily, they worked beautifully. In fact, with Phil's help, we did all the remaining pome orchard trees, well over 600 bulbs. We have less than eight of the original 29 bulb crates to go.
Looking up at the orchard from below, the plants are brown and dormant.
Looking down at the orchard from above, the tilled earth and broadcasted ryegrass is green and growing.
Perhaps tomorrow the peach swales will have dried somewhat. By this evening, they were still long pools of water. (Phil was pleased yesterday to see how the swale water was actually flowing out toward the ridge: exactly what a well-designed swale will do.)
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A few other things of note: back in mid October, I suddenly started burning food in the toaster oven. It took about a week of diagnostic baking, but I finally realized the element was only capable of full heat. Since then, I have baked many loaves of bread at full heat. Sourdough bread cooks to completion at 450 degrees in 40 minutes, rather than the more standard hour at 350. (The charred top of each loaf does need to be trimmed.)
I had ordered what I thought was an identical oven (same make and same store), but when it arrived and was fully unpacked, it was ridiculously too small to cook a chicken or two loaves of bread. Soon we will return it.
But today arrived our new toaster oven, large enough to cook a five pound chicken. We inaugurated it with a batch of brownies.
The garlic is coming up well. I need to mulch it soon, but I like those green sprouts!
We have four different types of eggs right now. The white leghorns are opaque and fairly large. The mallard duck lays little white. Tux, the black Australorp lays brown eggs. And the Welsh Harlequin lays white eggs with a little translucent sheen.
It may be hard to tell the difference from the photo, but the leghorn egg is on the left, the duck egg is on the right.
And, finally, some animal photos.
I spotted Charity grazing on hay today. She's eating solid food, and appears to be growing well at three and a half weeks of age.
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