Scrambling to catch up...

Gardeners are such an optimistic bunch...no matter how discouraging the passing season has been, next year will "always be better". Here are next summer's garlic cloves going into their new raised bed, amended with 2 buckets of super wonderful compost. My visions of tall green garlic plants with their artfully curling scapes are basking in sunshine, unlike this past summer's monsoon season... well at least with the raised bed they cant wash away.
A little more work on the greenhouse/chicken house. I've really got to figure out the eaves before I can go much further with the cedar shingles. The last few days I've been cutting glass to double the small windows between the doors, and caulking every draft I can find.







These are the plywood doors high up on the inside partition wall that will stay open during the summer to let out the excess heat in the greenhouse. Below them is the window through to the chicken house which can be opened on sunny winter days to let the heat through to the hens which hopefully will make them happy enough to lay.
My max/min thermometer is indicating that the greenhouse is about 4 degrees warmer inside than outside in the dead of night.
The lettuces, parsley and leeks are all thriving and I'm deeper into winter denial with each passing day....

Building up and tearing down

My little greenhouse I built 12 years ago is rotting and will never make it thru another season so here comes it's replacement. I was given a pile of sliding patio doors, thermopanes, so the building is designed around them. This time I'm using pressure treated lumber so by the time it wears out I'll be too old to lift a hammer anyway.

Today I'll work on the right side which will be the winter chicken house/garden tool shed. The window in between is to let the warmth of the winter sun in the greenhouse through to the chickens.

On the raccoon war front...I am losing badly as evidenced by the devastation in the nearly ripe corn. It seems another family has moved into the vacumn created by the removal of the last five. They are driving me crazy, I'm finding the trap sprung every morning with nothing in it.

The little chicks are 3 weeks old now and entering their gangly teenage stage. Momma keeps them close to the house or in the shade of the big trees away from danger from the skies. They are so entertaining to watch them learning their chicken things.

Ready for happy hens

Spring is galloping along here with crocus and coltsfoot appearing as patches of cheer, tulips getting ready to bloom, and the grass slowly turning green, much to the horses delight.

The portable chicken house is finished at last. It's made with no bottom in it, a 5'x8' footprint, so the happy chickens (which I dont have yet) can scratch about and eat grass and worms, bugs and clover. Two people can move it to a fresh patch without too much back work.

This end opens up for feed and water.

The other end opens up for egg gathering in the 3 nest box areas.

This door has a translucent window so the hens wont be traumatised if the foxes are trying to peek in at them. It lifts up so I can get at the trap door that can be bolted shut once they have gone up to the roost in the evening.

It's been a fun project using mostly recycled bits and pieces . In fact the only thing I bought new was the chicken wire. Saint John has a Re-Store, a wonderful warehouse where donated leftover building supplies are sold really cheap, as a fund raiser for Habitat for Humanity. They were a real treasure trove of lumber and hardware for my Habitat for Hens.

Maple syrup time

Our neighbor Jean Marc makes the BEST maple syrup and every spring we look forward to the party at his sugar shack. 50 t0 60 people turn up bringing pot luck goodies and enjoy a great feed with copious amounts of sweet syrup,.... eggs poached in maple syrup, ham baked in maple syrup, maple baked beans....mmmmmm.

When the sap has boiled to just the right consistancy, some is ladled onto a bed of snow where it hardens into the most delectable toffee.

It can be rolled up around a popsicle stick for a disolve in your mouth treat, or even better, dribbled on ice cream.

On the home front, I have been working on a movable chicken house for perhaps 4 birds. There will be no bottom in the structure so the happy hens can scratch and eat grass and clover, bugs and worms. This is one of those projects that evolves to use up scraps and leftover wood and plywood from other projects and is sort of made up as one goes along.

I seem to be going from one job to another, spring is such a busy time here. The raspberries and blackberries have been getting a thorough pruning and there's another construction job going on at our summertime shop at the local wharf.

The "carpenters" who built the place 5 years ago neglected to use pressure treated lumber so we tore out the rotting plywood floor last week and this week the black moldy rotten joists are coming out. What did they think would happen to wood sitting in wet gravel??