I wrote this update a while ago but haven’t had the chance to post it. Enjoy!
For a gardener, the winter months can be discouraging here in Zimbabwe. There is no rainfall, everything dries out to a crisp and if you don’t have municipal water (we don’t) or a prolific borehole/well (we don’t), things don’t grow well.
This winter has been my most ‘unproductive’ one in the almost 9 years we have lived in Zim. The borehole on Carrington has almost dried up and my magnanimous efforts in planting hundreds of winter vegetables has come to just about nought. The kohlrabi is the most heroic, somehow growing while the kale, spinach and beetroot wither pathetically because they don’t enjoy only being given a tiny sip each day.
Last week, I threw in the towel on trying to keep the vegetables alive. I dug up the kale and spinach that were relatively healthy and moved them to my tiny veggie patch at our rented property. I then gave instructions for what little water we pump on Carrington to be given to the kohlrabi and the various fruit-baring plants on the property.
We are making plans to get water to Carrington shortly because the rainy season only arrives in about November, by which time everything will be almost dead. We will be trucking the refuse water form the distillery to Carrington. Distilleries need a lot of water and the wastewater they produce isn’t fit for human consumption but is certainly good enough for vegetables and fruit trees!
We will also be installing electric fencing soon because our trees have become desirable to passersby, and we are constantly trying to make sure no one is wood poaching. What this also means for me is that I will be able to move my rabbits back onto Carrington because the stray dogs won’t be able to get in and feast on them. The more of our livestock we can move across, the happier I will be because our rented property isn’t really conducive to free range animals.
For an update on our Sasso chickens, you can read this update for our latest and won’t repeat myself here.
My ten layer hens are doing very well and I’m using them in a new composting experiment I’m running. I watched a short Youtube video where a farmer explained how he uses his chickens to create compost and break down his natural materials. I thought it was a great idea and would keep my hens wonderfully busy – I was right.
I forgot to take a photo, but we started with a pile of kitchen scraps and the bedding from all our livestock. It was quite a tall pile. After a week of it in the hen yard, it is now at ground-level after the hens have scratched and pecked at it all. We will gather all of it then move it to a different section of the yard, where it will still be available for the chickens to work in it. After another week or so, we will have a closer look and decide whether it can be put straight into the garden beds or if it should be stacked into a compost square and left to decompose more.
Sunflowers
As I ease well into my thirties, I’m finding it easier to shift my idea of how things should go and adjust to practices that are better suited to my or my family. One such example is my journey with sunflower growing.
A while back I planted a lot of sunflower seeds and had the noble idea of growing food for my chickens. The naivety of it makes me chuckle, as I sit here typing in hindsight.
Turns out, birds are cunning and clever scavengers that will find ways to eat sunflower seeds no matter your efforts. Look, I have only tried really cheap ways of guarding the sunflowers, but still.
After a mini melt down, I thought of advertising bunches of sunflowers to our community. And do you know what? They were sold out in 15 minutes. I did the same thing a few weeks later and again, sold out within 30 minutes. And so here I am, not growing sunflowers to feed my chickens. But earning a tiny bit of money to buy veggies each week.
That’s it from me but I would love you to leave me a comment. Do you have an ingenious way to guard lots of sunflowers from birds? Do you have a homestead? Do you dream of raising chickens?