Nomadic Vacation Hiatus 9/22-9/24

I spent a good 3 days to rest and recover from the boar hunt. Back at home, the garden was in a fine shape. The tomato plants were hanging on strong due to absorbing the warmth generated from the compost pile. The turnip seeds had all sprouted into 3 emerald rows of turnip leaves. Turnips being a cold-resistent plant will continue to grow even during the harsh autumn and winter months here in the North East. The beauty of it all is that turnips serve 3 purposes. It grows fine white tubers which are edible, it's leaves are also edible, and it's non-edible roots fix nitrogen into the soil, thus making it more fertile for next year. Turnips are perfect crops to improve the conditions of the soil. Since next year, I plan to triple the total surface area being farmed, the turnip land will make a fine base to grow a heavy feeder such as squash or sweet potato. I added on another layer of fresh grass and leaves to my manure bins and topped it off with heavy helpings of water and half-rotted grass clippings. The bins are now up to the brim with rich black compost. This fine compost will be made richer one's the leaves start falling. Next spring there will be enough of the black gold to fertilize some 9 square meters of garden land!!!



I gathered some 10 tomatos on saturday. There are at least another 40 tomatos still on the vine. I plan to transplant the remaining green tomatos to an indoor location within the next two weeks, before the first frost sets in. It is critical that the green tomatos not be exposed to a frost since that would induce rotting rather than ripening. However, detaching green tomatos from the vine would immediately stop these tomatos from growing any bigger. Thus a careful balancing game must be played to maximize the number of big tomatos ripened.

On the fishing front, a quick trip to the lake on sunday netted 3 sunfish and 1 yellow perch.