Actual farm living is not necessarily farm life

This month I am up to my elbows in other people's business! Not by my choosing because firstly, it has nothing to do with me and secondly, I already have 3 full-time jobs! Farm living is not strictly about farm life.

I ended up catering a friend's birthday picnic as the only other options were ridiculously expensive or grocery store platters of sausage rolls and oily samoosas. I am not a caterer by a long shot but I learnt (read stole) plenty from my business neighbours in Jo'burg who are first class caterers. (www.exquisitetastes.co.za) It took me a week of squeezing things between planting, mowing, doing school and all the other jobs, to prepare everything for the 50 guests. For once, I was grateful when Casanova began crowing at 4.30am so I could cook everything fresh and deliver on time. We were half an hour late but since the birthday boy only rocked up an hour after us, we were on time!

Isn't Casanova a beauty? Actually Romeo was even prettier but more aggresive. Romeo took a bite of Granny and Pepper (the lab) so of the 2, he had to go. It was so intense to watch the 2 roosters fight over the hens and on one day, poor old Mimi had both of them on top of her every time she turned her back. Let's hope Casanova lives up to his name and gives us some chicks.

Other than the solar geyser installers coming to wrong farm, things are a little quiet around here. Right now, we don't have any wwoofers with us and so the pace is different. Things have to be done as they are done. Doesn't make a stitch of difference whether I want them done quicker either. The last couple of volunteers helped fix our road a bit, filled a hole in the dam, cleared planting land, made compost and pulled lots of weeds. The next couple will be here during a maintenance week- mowing and collecting hay, cutting edges, collecting manure etc. You only realise how essential these tasks are when you can't see the night adder being pointed out to you by the cat, in the grass next to the path.

We have had some nice wildlife encounters recently. We saw the baby owl at the dam twice- and that is really difficult as it is so well camouflaged. We caught a brown house snake, red-lipped herald, night adders and saw 2 skaapsteekers. They are too fast to catch but so pretty with their stripe down their back. Kingfishers, blue cranes, Egyptian geese, spurwings, swallows and swifts, weavers, kori bustard, bateleur, hawks- just so many birds!

Heralds are not poisonous but can give a nasty bite and until we have identified a snake we always use extreme caution- and gloves.

The onions and blue congo potatoes are doing very well in this weather. We are fending off the snails and have fenced everything in so the duiker and bushbuck don't eat all the tops. Our strawberries have been wonderful. We pick around 3kgs every second day and 1kg in between. Everything else is just taking too long to fruit for my liking. More Bach please! Obviously, my singing is not working.

 How's that for anti-oxidants!

This last pic is an unusual view for us from our neighbours fence line back towards the house. From the day we drove onto this farm to view it, it has felt like home for me. Today Max said he loves living here and that just makes it even more so.

Where the maize is to be found.

So just an additional thought onto the last post (with attached article I hope you read). Have you given any thought to all the places we find maize in our daily lives and don't give it a second thought. It's horrifying! And really I'd rather use ostrich vision on this but I must think about it for Max.

These are the most obvious "unobvious" places I found maize in some form:
-cornflour (Maizena, unspecified starch or cornstarch)
-corn syrup (or glucose which is found in most sweetened drinks and confectionery)
-baking powder
-some personal care products containing magnesium stearate, linoleic acid
-anything beginning with "malt"
even MSG and Xylitol can come from corn. Glycerine can be a waste product from making bio-diesel from...corn.

We just can't win on everything so just READ THE INGREDIENTS and make your best choice.
Recipes for corn-free products that work coming soon!

GM maize and its evils

AI am growing a lot of mielies this year but now I see I'll need even more- just to feed our hens and ourselves. What a shocking comment on our country this is. The only thing to be done, is to be independent in any manner you can.
 http://www.acbio.org.za/index.php/media/64-media-releases/401--south-africans-call-for-immediate-ban-on-gm-maize-after-shocking-cancer-study

Solar and gas- and a fire for heating.

So with all our wwoofer and other visitors, we did not know there was a problem with the gas geyser being either scalding hot or cold. Somehow, when you switch the hot on, the geyser comes on just fine but as soon as you try to balance with cold, the geyser switches itself off. I have to say I am stumped. And some people did not understand that the small solar panel cannot support their appliances as well as give them light. I guess just as well we put out some candles and oil lamps too.
And did you know most people cannot light a fire in a fireplace? Well, I will be re-painting our beautiful cottage due to massive (the whole living area) soot damage. Grrr! No more fireplace to heat the cottage. By next winter, we hope to have passive underfloor heating in place.

A nice biomass digestor and a big water tank on a tower for extra pressure with a solar pump to get it up there and a solar geyser and a clean burning wood stove and...

It seems, we always choose the difficult route.

Spring Planting

So on this spring day, we stayed indoors due to vicious winds and occasional rain showers. Here I thought I'd be planting up a storm so I had several seedling trays all prepared and ready to rumble. Perhaps  the actual day doesn't matter because tomorrow is supposed to be less windy and more sunny.

So far, I have 12 pumpkins/ squashes, 4 tomatoes, 4 lettuces, 4 chillies and many other seeds planted. Waiting another week for aubergines. Last week was a nice warm one and it was up to 23 deg C in the wunnerful germination cupboard my slave built for me. It's made of brandering and wrapped in clear agricultural plastic (does it matter what kind?). It has a temperature gauge. Everything seems to be germinating on schedule which is a little disappointing as I am doing some soil tests and had hoped for quicker results.
Well the next thing to see is how strong those seedlings are in my special soil. If it works well, I'll reveal all!

Picture of the germination cupboard to follow.

The other thing which has kept us busy has been clearing a steep slope and "reclaiming" the area for growing with tyre terraces. There was a huge dump of tyres in town so we helped ourselves to as many as our car could carry every time we went in. Previously, we used the tyres only for potato stacks but this terrace system is looking very promising. Again pictures to follow...

So happy spring day and this year please try to grow your own tomatoes and basil. They cannot be beaten by any shop bought variety.

Growing Greener: First fig of the year.

Growing Greener: First fig of the year.

I love Daniel's quote from Margaret Mead.
And I have only trolled around for a few minutes and already learnt a lot. Thanks Daniel.

Value

Over the last few days, I have been considering my value in the world. Sounds very deep but just think of it in a purely logical, practical way. There is no doubt in my mind that without humans, the world would be a better place. And in the cosmic sense, we are just a speck. But let's say that the species does somehow continue, then where would the value of each of us be?

Perhaps it's in the beauty and love we leave behind - not logical or practical at all! But perhaps that shows in our deeds and teaching how to help create a thing of beauty or how to love. A new plant grown, a story read when you don't have the time, an animal rescued or maybe just a real smile to someone you don't know. Very practical.

Ok- I give in. You decide for yourself.

Thank you to my partner of 20 years. I knew you the first time I saw you- a person of beauty and love.