Thursday, April 16, 2009

A Well Manured Garden


Springtime! The time of new life emerging . Forsythias announce that warm weather is just around the corner and that we should not despair (even though temps dropped to 24F a few nights ago).It's also the time to plow and appreciate the dark moist soil sending forth its earth scent .I'm glad for sunny warm days to get out there with my tiller so I can drop seed peas ,barefoot ,into their rows.
Now I can appreciate the hard work cleaning the barn , dumping and spreading the horse, sheep and chicken manure into the garden over the past year.The chickens and turkeys also work for a living here scratching and further spreading this wonderful fertilizer into the soil.Every year the soil improves ~ richer and blacker.
In February we had a stretch of mild rainy weather.A fellow contacted me and asked if he could get some chicken manure from my barn. HAH ! "Sure ! Help yourself!", I said. He then asked, "How much do you want for it?" Well, a little birdy told me not to look a gift horse in the mouth (unless he's bony in the hips- that's another story!). I told him it was free and showed him the coops and stalls, etc, where they roost. He arrived with a pickup filled with friends and these fellows had my barn clean as a whistle! ~~~~ Thank You Lord!
Yesterday and today we plowed up sections of the garden to plant cool weather vegetables- peas, spinach, onion sets and a few other things.I hear the weather will be beautiful over the weekend.That's good! Fishing season starts too ! Too many things on my plate competeting for my time!

1 comment:

  1. Manure on hand is like gold! My brother finally broke down and came to get a load of manure for his garden. He was shocked at how nice the soil was after being infused with some good ole manure.

    I am enjoying your wonderful blog! I will be back!

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