SPRING IN THE ORCHARD

 I got the orchard area all cleaned up, it's SO nice now.

It's a multistep process.  First, I edge around each raised bed.  Then I go into each bed and edge inside (careful of course to avoid the base of the trees/bushes).  Then I use the little electric push mower to get in between the beds a bit more.  Lastly, I get the big Zen Machine and go around as much as I can and it "cleans up" all the grass from the prior events.

In the end, it looks like this and it makes us happy.  Now in the upcoming weeks, I'll add soil as needed and top off with mulch and it will be picture perfect and good for the the season.  But for now, we're happy and the trees are happy and blooming.

Speaking of blooming...

Nectarine...

Plums...

Cherry blossoms (bush cherries)...

Fig tree (no blooms but happily leafing out after almost not making it last Summer)...

Both pear trees...

Blueberries (two varieties) are flowering...

This is the mayhaw, flowers and buds all over...

One apple tree...

And the other apple tree!

Spring is definitely doing its thing!

ORCHARD AFTER THE DROUGHT

Last week, it rained all night....and at 8am the next morning, this was the radar...

...and at noon, this was the radar again.  The red pin is the farm.  We ended up with about 2 inches of rain.  The ground was too wet to mow last weekend and hadn't grown that much, but it sure is all greening up.

But in the end, all this rain after the drought has been great for the yard and plants.

Things greened up but the newly planted apple tree is confused.  Blooms???  I plucked them off of course but too funny.  Even nature is confused, ha.

The fig tree was looking horrible all Summer and at one point, dropped all its leaves and was just some sticks sticking up out of the ground.  We almost gave up on it, but now it's looking pretty good.

However, we lost a blueberry bush.  This was the weekend before and we were hoping the rain would bring it back but nope.  Dead.  Still dead.  Thankfully. this isn't one of the two varieties that gave us so many this past Spring, this is one of the other two that didn't fruit this year.  It's definitely dead, the branches just break off with no green at all.  Not sure it was the drought/heat as the other one like it is still doing pretty well.  Maybe this one was just weaker for some reason.  We'll have to look for another variety either like it or maybe just try another blueberry.

On the plus side with fruiting bushes, the Gogi berry bush, still on the porch and not in the ground, is covered in blooms.  Since it's not in the ground and we don't have to worry about root development, we'll let the blooms continue and see what develops.

We are thankful for the rain we've had, though I did  enjoy having the Summer off from mowing in the oppressive heat.  I should have some good mowing to do this weekend for sure!

TWO MEN AND THE CASE OF THE MISSING APPLES

Well crap...

This was a few weekends ago.  We had a little over half a dozen apples developing nicely...

And this was last weekend.

They are all gone!

There were no half eaten ones on the ground.  No parts or cores.  No remnants at all. 

Now we know there are various predators lurking around.  These were a good 6 to 8 feet up into the tree.  There were no tracks around (and the ground was wet) and no broken branches.  There was bird netting over the top and most of these were more "inside" the tree than on an outer branch.

Squirrels?  They were probably too big and heavy for a squirrel to handle without dropping one, plus in ten years, we've never even seen a squirrel.  Deer would have probably damaged the tree getting to them and there are rows of fishing line all around it.

Opossum?  Raccoons?  Do they climb trees?  The branches are not exactly strong enough we would think to support a climbing animal.

The only other thing we can think of is that a storm blew them off onto the ground and THEN wildlife had an all you can eat buffet, ha.

We will just have to learn to coexist and figure out a way to keep them next year.

FRUIT FROM OUR ORCHARD

The only thing as wonderful as fresh vegetables from your own garden...

Peaches and blueberries

...would be fresh fruit from your own orchard!

You probably saw the posts for the peaches and blueberries as we gathered them but we had taken this picture when we picked them and thought we'd share.  This picture makes us smile.  Sure it's not a bushel of peaches or quarts of blueberries, but we grew them and that makes everything better. 😁

We made more blueberry cream cheese...

We bought some Blue Bell homemade vanilla ice cream and added blueberries, peaches and a cookie...

One night for dinner, we put peaches in our salad with tomatoes, feta cheese, and roasted sunflower seeds...

And then we made THESE with the last of our peaches AND blueberries:

OMG so good (recipe/technique coming soon).

Backyard orchard area

It's still small, but it's growing and producing and as time goes by, our harvests will (hopefully) only get bigger and better.

BLUEBERRIES GALORE

Friday, we posted about our peaches.

Today we'd share that our blueberries were still doing their thing as well...

These are so pretty. This batch had LOTS of plump and "blue" berries...we always say that when they are wet with dew, they look like sapphires on a bush!

At $5.42 for a package, we are happy to have four bushes producing for us, ha.

We got a nice jar full again this time...

Just like the picture of the peaches last week, I had to take an "artsy"photo of the blueberries.  I pulled out a white dish towel and scattered them around.  Another picture ready for the kitchen?  Ha!

We 💖 blueberries!

(post later this week showing how we used our limited fruit bounty)

WE HAVE OUR OWN PEACHES

Instead of having them just from my coworker's family, we now have PEACHES OF OUR OWN!

Early this spring, our little peach tree that we replaced after the "big freeze" had seven little peaches on it.

We watched as they grew bigger and I put up extra fishing line "fencing" to keep the deer and whatever else passing through the yard, at bay.

Even put bird netting over the top to keep the birds away.  Sadly, when I was doing that, I knocked one of them off...and then there were six.

They kept growing until last weekend when we were able to harvest six peaches.

I couldn't resist taking an "artsy" photo of them. I think it came out nicely!  2nd Man said we should frame it and put it in the kitchen.  We like to have a record of our harvest to look back on and a pretty picture is always a good way to remember, ha.

We 💖 peaches!

FIG UPDATE NATURE FINDS A WAY

Well so this has happened:

How it started...

How it's going!

The fig tree that had died (read about it HERE) and was dead all the way to the ground, has come back.  After I accidentally broke off the trunk when I was checking it out, we just ignored that raised bed while we looked for a new tree.  Haven't found one yet, haven't really looked much, but now, it is starting to come back and looks pretty good!

Image courtesy Aggie Horticulture

There are apparently two ways to prune a fig tree.  One way is to make it into a tree form and another way is to train it into a bush form.  

Here it was after we planted it, we were letting it become more bush like before.  Since it's coming back in "bush form" again, we'll just let it grow as it wants.

Not sure if this means it is going to come back and produce fruit but at this point, we

As long as we get a lot of figs, we'll be happy.

BLUEBERRIES WASPS AND PAIN OH MY

So this happened:

Look at these plump, wonderful blueberries!  Yay!  Let me go get a bowl and pick some as a surprise to bring back into town.  I pulled some from the bottom and then I decided to reach in from the top and get some...

Did I look before I leaped?  Nope.  If I had, I would have seen the above.

But no, I stuck my hand into the netting and...

Boom!

Got stung.  Twice on my hand.

The stings were immediate and then the itching.

Then the swelling.  Here was my hand yesterday at work.  No knuckles.  You can see in the first picture that I DO normally have knuckles, ha.

Read that swelling can last for 3 to 7 days, especially when it is on an extremity like hands or feet (now THAT would hurt, yikes!).

But I was able to snag these beauties and it made the pain worth it.  They are huge and plump and, as 2nd Man said, better than we get in the store.  I guess just like tomatoes fresh from the garden, blueberries are just as awesome.  I was honestly surprised how big they got and how truly 'blue' they really are.

We had another handful in the fridge from the last time we gathered some out there (a bit smaller).  Luckily, we have just as many left that are ripe and more unripe and the second bush of that variety has just as many coming on.  We love that we're starting to get some production from these bushes.

PLANTED THE APPLE TREE

Finally got the new replacement apple tree replaced.  A few weeks ago, I dug up the old one and let the bed sit so the soil would get wet with rain and loosen up some.

Now this was done the weekend before last, when it was sunny and gorgeous.  This weekend was rainy and more rainy, ha. 

I got out our Earth auger that we bought several years ago.  It has been such a lifesaver around the property, or should I say backsaver, ha.  A great tool to have in the shed.  It's big and heavy and you have to be steady and have a good grip when you pull the throttle.  I have the blister to prove it, ha.

I put it into the raised bed and went down about 2 feet or so.  I took a shovel and pulled out the fresh soil and widened the hole a bit.

Then I popped the new tree in the hole, fluffed out the roots and filled in with soil.  I still need to mulch the top of it but I have to do that to all the beds.  I'll be taking Bill the truck to load him up with bags of mulch soon.  Need to get them all mulched for the season.  Just need some dry weather for a bit.

And speaking of apple trees...  

The "Anna" apple tree that's doing so well (albeit growing with a bend, ha) now has apples on it.

One here...

...and a couple more here.  There are a few more higher up but I couldn't get a good photo in the wind.  Hopefully, we'll be able to get a few apples this year.  This apple tree is obviously happy.

Here's hoping the new one is just as happy!