Farm Fresh: Berries, Ducklings, Silver Kits, and Tomatoes

 

Baby A has been enjoying all the summer berries: wild black raspberries, blueberries, and saskatoon berries. The strawberries were plentiful, but have started to taper off now. 

We harvested about 2 quarts of black raspberries in one night. 

I made stinging nettle tea with fresh yarrow, St. Johns wort, and hibiscus.

I also made quiche with lambsquarter in place of the spinach.  Lambsquarter is even more nutritious and is a weed around here. 

The Silver rabbit kits are growing and just starting to open their eyes.

My tomatoes are growing pretty well too. Pruning them for a single string trellis has made them very tall. 

My LGD girls killed another ground hog for us:

The kids are continuing to do a great job helping watch Baby A and also working on garden chores daily. 

We bid farewell to a dear animal friend this week. Big Daddy Trevor passed quickly.  We had a burial and prayer for him. It may seem ironic that people who eat meat rabbits would also bury and pray over one. We respect them all. Trevor was exceptional though. He was a 4 year old sweetie who loved to be petted and had become not just a breeder, but a friend.

Four mama muscovies have hatched ducklings now. There are about 25 ducklings in the high tunnel and fenced garden.  They have been nibbling on the lettuce.  I am not too annoyed since it's just about to bolt and there is plenty to go around. They ducks in the high tunnel have eaten the lower leaves off my pepper plants, which I am VERY mad about.  But it's more the big daddy ducks than the ducklings doing that. 

The ducklings are small but fierce - eating big cicadas and worms from the compost pile. 

Mama duck with her babies in the rain.  Watching the mama ducks has shown that they are a lot sturdier than I thought. 

Big Brothers are the best. And Baby A is in LOVE with being read books --especially ones about animals and vehicles.