Weeding

The garden is finally weeded! Just in time to start back at the beginning... 😅

It was challenging with this little nugget. He didn't enjoy being on a blanket very much, plus the time of day I did most of the weeding was when the whole garden was in full sun and there wasn't a place for him to hang out in shade except for at the very edge. Poor hot, tired, dirty, sweaty baby.

This is what I had to weed through...

Thick, luscious grass. Better than our lawn. And amidst that, teeny tiny plants. Can you spot the keepers in the picture above?

Cilantro! Bottom center. 

Celery!

Baby basil! Can you spot three little guys?

Repotting

My experimental fruit trees need a new summer home. They had been kept up next to the house for easy watering (and to acclimate to the sun), but they've been outside plenty long to acclimate and now that the leaves have come in, there isn't enough sunlight. 

G had the idea to repot them in grow pots and bury them in the ground to help them stay moist longer. 

We have tons of empty grow pots from other trees we planted, so I had my pick of the lot. 

Date palm, fig, two pomegranates, lemon, two bay plants, and an aloe vera. 

The fig has gotten munched by goats and deer, and it was too leggy. G thought I should prune it low to the ground to cause it to bush out. It was hard to do, but chop it I did. Hopefully the new location in the sunny orchard will do the trick!

 

Powdered Sugar

One of my sisters-in-law sent me this recipe months ago and asked me to make it for her. I knew we would be visiting her soon, so I made it as a surprise. 

I ran out of powdered sugar though...

I had heard how easy it is to make your own from regular granulated sugar. Take a cup of sugar plus a tablespoon of cornstarch or arrowroot powder, and then blend in a blender or food processor for 30 seconds.

Here's my first attempt: 

Not very powdery. 

I had the idea to use the spice and nut grinder to grind it even finer. That worked much better!

The only downside is it will only hold about a half a cup at a time.

I wrote my adjusted recipe on a Post-It note and stuck it to my jar so it will be easy to make next time I need it. 

 

Tortilla Redo

Remember the second tortilla recipe where I used baking soda instead of baking powder? 

I tried again. Didn't notice too much difference. 

I definitely like the first recipe better! These are still tasty, just not as soft and fluffy. 

Last of the Peacocks

Not as great a hatch rate for the peacocks. Six total hatched- four on their own and two with help. 

I candled a few before we pulled the plug and found more quitters and a few I wasn't sure about. We cracked a couple open to see if we could guess why the others didn't hatch. The first one had a fully formed chick inside. The other one was a quitter. 

My best guess is that because our incubator was overfilled, the humidity was too high throughout the incubation and/or there wasn't enough air movement around the eggs. Disappointing, but a learning experience. 

First Freeze Drying!

My family went berry picking Saturday morning. 

We saw rain off in the distance, but didn't take it into account for our picking plans. Oops. 

It poured right as we pulled up to the berry farm and continued for 45min. Hailed briefly too. There were plenty of ripe berries out there, but most of them were soft and we had to sort through them all. Note to self, berry pick earlier in the season. 

G and I took home about 15lbs of berries. We ate some fresh; the rest were for the freeze dryer! 

The first batch the booklet recommended was slices of bread, just to make sure the unit works correctly and to absorb the factory smells. 

It takes a long time, but it did work. I loaded the trays with halved strawberries. 

I still had berries after loading the unit, not enough for a second batch, so I dehydrated the rest. 

Both turned out great! 

To store them, I put them in glass jars and vacuum sealed the lids. The freeze dried strawberries got an oxygen absorber in their jars. I don't know if it's necessary with the vacuum sealing, so I'm doing an experiment. I put a small amount in a jam jar and vacuum sealed without an oxygen absorber; the rest have them (I didn't want to wreck our whole batch in case my prediction is wrong). 

The strawberries took over 24h to freeze dry. The booklet said you can load trays with fresh items or freeze them for 48h first, which saves a little time. I wonder how much time it actually saves. It seemed to take forever for the unit to freeze the berries and get to the actual drying stage. Our next batch is mulberries which are prefrozen. 

Peachicks

The eggs are hatching! 

We have five total- two out of the incubator and three in (still drying off)- and one that is clearly pipped. 

G created a little brooder for the dry ones. This one hatched much sooner than the others, and was cheeping nonstop (lonely), so I made a "mother" for it. Got the idea off Pinterest. 

I added some straw to the bottom of the box because the chicks have a hard time standing on the slippery cardboard; their legs splay apart. 

Of the three drying in the incubator, two are doing great. One is a little slow, but that's to be expected. That particular baby needed help getting out of its shell. 

Normally, you don't offer any help to hatching chicks; they can handle it themselves and people helping can actually hurt them or cause them to die. So it's a last resort. 

To hatch, chicks first peck a hole in the egg to access outside air so they don't run out of air when they hatch. They rest after that hard work. Then, they rotate around inside the egg pecking a line in the shell so it will pop apart like an Easter egg when they push. They take rest breaks while they do this and then finally break out. Somewhere during that process, the blood vessel that connects them to the egg yolk closes off so it's safe to detach from the shell. If someone intervenes, it's possible to break the blood vessel if it hasn't closed off, and the chick can die. 

This chick hadn't made any progress yesterday afternoon through late in the evening. We hoped to find a hatched chick in the morning, but still no progress, so at that point we decided to intervene. 

The feathers seemed dried to the inside membrane of the shell. I picked off pieces of the shell in a ring around the egg, trying to mimic its normal hatching pattern. The chick didn't try to bust out, so I took a scissors to carefully cut the membrane 2/3 of the way around the shell and then put it back in the incubator. 

Maybe a half an hour later, the chick broke free! It's resting, but seems to be slowly gaining strength. Nutrients from the last bit of yolk are enough to give the chick energy for at least a day without food or water, so we will leave the chick in the incubator until it is dry and fluffed up.