We are having a beautiful February first here in New York state. I am amazed that our weather is so spring like in February! It is not normal at all, and I expect it to take a turn for the worse any day now. My husband likes it because he is not having to do so much shoveling this year. Of course, this year he bought the new Snow Wolf, which is a new type of shovel. He hasn't had the chance to use it in a really heavy snowfall yet this year. I figure though, that day will come.
Today I am studying my seed catalogs over. I have plans for our homestead garden this year. During the fall my husband took down four trees. One was our heirloom apple tree that was really old, but gave us a good yield every year. Last year was its best. The apples even tasted better than previous years. One whole branch was dead and had dried up leaves on it. The rest of the tree was covered with apples and we had plenty for us and our horses. One morning we looked outside and it was on the ground!
After it was gone, I was liking the openness of the area without it. We had just been talking about taking down the dead branch and the cherry tree next to it. So Larry took down the cherry tree but it was a complex chore. The tree was huge and had two parts, almost like having two separate trees. The roots of the tree had grown under our house and since we fixed that, didn't want it to damage it again. Besides we were afraid it might grow toward the well and damage that. If that happened, we'd be in BIG trouble! So down it came.
Once that tree was down, the backyard had a whole new look to it. I loved it! Now the garden would get a lot more sun. We discussed how we can make changes back there to improve our garden. Soon Larry took down the clothesline so he could take down two other trees back there. Both of them were in the raised bed I call the "snake bed" (due to its shape not the snakes). It is more open now, not only allowing more sun on the raised beds, but the big trees were blocking wind from reaching our wind turbine. The turbine is now producing even more power for us. We can really see a difference.
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© 2016 Kathleen G. Lupole
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Photographs Copyright © 2016 Kathleen G. Lupole
Updated 2018
