The lack of money = the lack of opportunity

It's a sad realization, but it is what it is.  It seems that in every aspect of life, you can have A, or you can have B, but you can never have both A & B.  As I continue to look for land (or land with a house) I'm finding that I just have too many criteria.  Call me a dreamer, but maybe one of these days it will magically fall into my hands.  If not, well, I'll have to compromise somehow.

The three major criteria I have are that: 1) I still need to work at my regular job, which means I need to be able to drive a reasonable distance to work.  2) I would like at least 5 acres (preferably 10), so that I may raise at least 1-2 small cows, along with sheep, chickens, turkey, and whatever else.  3) I need the land to be cheap enough that, when I add on the price of building a house, I'm paying about the same as what I'm paying now.

Obviously the last one is the one that jumps out to most people...many claim it to be impossible (maybe it is), but hear me out; Right now, I'm paying an annual property tax of nearly $4,000.  There is a good chance I would not be paying that much out "in the country," and so when you divide, say, $1500/12 months, that knocks $125 off your payments.

Then, you look at the price of water, electricity, and trash, and you're down even more - perhaps $200 a month (in the summer at least).  With wood heat, preferably free from my woodlot :-)  you've knocked even more money off per month.  So what I am getting at is that, yes, living in the country is cheaper per month, but buying all that land to being with is a very high expense. 

So, getting land.  I could compromise on one of the other two, such as less acreage, or moving father away.  Less acreage is exactly how I got into this predicament to begin with, so I doubt I'll go that route.  Moving farther away has already been ruled out from my dear wife, who doesn't like driving that far to begin with.  So, time to either start saving money, or find a good deal on land / house building price.

Recently I found 4.3 acres in Venus, Texas, which was exactly in the area I wanted, and was very cheap.  It also wasn't that far of a drive.  .  I could have pulled the trigger, but I didn't, because it would have meant compromising on land size, and the land was north-sloping.  It was really hard not to buy that land, but, I'm glad I at least stuck to my "goals."  I let out a big sigh, but I'm not sure if it was relief or regret.  Dang that land was cheap.

Until another day...
Stephen

Pretty awesome little story

http://thecontraryfarmer.wordpress.com/2008/09/02/the-man-who-created-paradise-by-gene-logsdon/

Gene Logsdon is awesome.  It's long, but a great read.

Corn & Furrows

I bought "Delectable" hybrid corn, and when I planted about 50 seeds in 3 rows, I was expecting nice results.  I got nothing (okay, I got 1).  What a letdown! 

Now, I'd like to say this is some type of experiment I had come up with, but what it actually was, was just bad gardening.  I am learning gardening, for the most part, from books and the internet.  So when I heard to plant X" apart in rows spaced Y" apart, I did just that.  I planted something like this:

Now, 3 weeks later with 1 single seeds sprout, I dug it all up and re-planted, but this time, I planted at the bottom of the "trenches" I had dug - so,like this:

Now, obviously my rows were nowhere near that high, but I had to use those exaggerated pictures to show you what I meant.  I have found that the bottom picture (planting in the furrows) worked better.  It seemed to retain water better, and did so without flooding the roots, because eventually the rows flattened out, and water didn't set on the bed.

Anyway, maybe that info can help anyone else.  Perhaps the seeds being raised up on the row-tops, they just needed a lot more precipitation than what they were getting (which should have been plenty, but whatever). 

The first garden-grown strawberry

That.
Was.
Sublime.

:(

I want to post.  Boy, do I want to post.  I just can't.

"Here bring your wounded hearts, here tell your anguish; Earth has no sorry that Heaven cannot heal."

So long, pullets

The last of the illegal chickens are leaving today.  It'll be sad to see them go, but it was fun to raise these little ladies from a day old.  I can't believe when we got them, they were the size of a tennis ball.  Here's a few pics before they leave.

(The chickens secret pen which hides them pretty dang well)

Bye ladies!

Egad! Giant Potatoes!

I don't know why, but these potatoes are growing to be monsters!  Now, it could be that my first year growing them, last year, were just small.  But I think these are just huge.  One of them, for example, is over 2 feet tall, though I have "dirted" it twice, to keep the potatoes growing under the ground.

Here are how the potatoes are looking.

Here are the big ones.

Also in my pictures, you're able to see the garden hose irrigation lines I set up.  Here are a few more pics, where you can see the total layout, and the fittings I used.  Like I posted earlier - pretty simplistic.

The past 2 weeks, I've spent many hours in the garden.  It's so relaxing to be out there, walking barefoot through the soil, picking weeds, the breeze keeping me cool even with the temps in the high-80s.  It's one of the few things that is real work, but puts my mind at ease.  I think the Vitamin D I'm picking up is also having quite the effect on  my mentality - it sure is better than sitting in a flourescent-lit office.

Well that just about wraps up all for today.  I'll have more later!

Borrowed from The Deliberate Agrarian

I, in no way, want to take credit for this - I'll make that clear right off the bat.  I just found this so enlightening and wanted to share with my readers as well.  Herrick Kimball puts out a wonderful blog every month, and this was just a small portion of it.

Find his blog here.

Here is (a part of) what he wrote:

"Every so often I feel the need to reiterate and expound upon the differences between Christian agrarianism, which I espouse, and the industrial order, which I oppose. This is one of those times...

I see industrialism as a usurper, taking, reshaping and reordering all aspects of life as God designed it. The antithesis between God’s order and the industrial order is enormous.

Where God designed simplicity, the industrial order imposes complication. Where God established the beauty of diversity, the industrial order demands uniformity. Where God, for his own sovereign purposes, established inequity, the industrial order declares that there must be equality. Where God mandates decentralization, the industrial order mandates centralization. Where God has declared that man must work and live by the sweat of his brow, the industrial order endeavors to remove this requirement. Where God has said to look to Him as the source and provider of all good things, the industrial order supposes that it will supply all good things, and that all people must be dependent on the industrial providers. Where God thinks and acts multigenerationally, the industrial mindset cares little about the generations to come. Where God says for mankind to trust in Him, the industrial order says to trust in it. Where God has designed sustainability and economy within his creation, the industrial order disrupts, destroys, poisons and wastes creation. Where God created and defined what a family is and how it should function, to best serve Him, the industrial order has redefined and reordered the family, to best serve the industrial interests. Where God declares that a full and rich life does not consist in the accumulation of things and riches, the industrial order loudly declares just the opposite. And, finally, where God has declared what is good and evil and has decreed that there will be consequences for sin, industrialism neither recognizes sin nor believes it has any responsibilities under God."

Ugh, stupid blogger!!!

I try to write often, but I've found recently that the "post at a scheduled" time button doesn't even work.  I have several posts now that I thought were posting, but are still in my drafts.  So dumb.

I'll spread them out over a few days.  No idea why that feature stopped working...it was awesome :-\

Drip system installed!

I'll be sure to get pictures later.  Like most things, I did this in the dark, haha.

So, you can order 250 feet of soaker hose online, but you're going pay a hefty price for it (unless you get the cheap brand that fails after one year...no thanks).  I have debated over what to do with watering, and I've thought of drip systems, sprinklers, soaker hoses, and just watering with a garden hose.  Here's the pros/cons of each:

Drip System
Pros: Long, slow, continuous amount of water provided to plants.  Can be placed right at root level.  Saves money since no water is wasted.
Cons: Expensive to set up, lots of fittings

Sprinklers
Pros: Lots of water provided very inexpensively (since sprinklers are installed in my yard already). 
Cons: Very wasteful of water, due to evaporation and/or wind.  Water is provided from overhead, and must have time to soak through mulch into ground.

Soaker Hoses
Pros:  Water applied at the roots.  Long slow continuous amount of water provided to plants. Cheaper than drip system.
Cons: Some water is wasted, since hoses need to run between rows/plants that is just watering the ground.  Slightly expensive.  Requires lots of fittings.

Garden Hose:
Pros:  Lots of water, versatile to move around.  Very cheap.
Cons: Wasteful due to evaporation/wind.  Annoying to drag a hose to each plant, and very time consuming.

So, what do you do?  Clearly the drip system and soaker hose are the best approaches for the benefit of the plant, but are expensive.  Well, luckily I am an engineer and can never settle for doing things the simple way.  I built my own.

Home Depot was having a great sale on garden hoses, so I bought 300 feet (wow!) of garden hose, for $40.  I created a unit of measurement, which I called a "link," that is a 15-foot strand of garden hose.  Thus, from 300 feet, I have 20 links.  Perfect, since I needed 17 links for the garden.

I also ordered (from Amazon) some 5/8" tees and elbow fittings for these hoses.  I could have done without the elbows, but oh well.  They were a couple bucks. 

Now with my links all cut, and hoses laid out, the fun began.  I tediously walked along and drilled a very tiny hole every foot (or 6", or 10" - whatever the spacing of the plants was).  As of right now, I'm about 3/4 done.  My back said "I'm through!" so that was it for last night.  Then came the test. I plugged a cork in the end of each hose, and turned on the spigot.  It took a little bit to get the pressure up to par, but it finally did, and then I turned it down a bit.  I let it run for 30 minutes, under the mulch, at root level.  Perfect.

In the end, I guess I could add up all of my expenses and it probably would be a little more expensive than the soaker hose plan, but it was a "custom" install, so I'm happy with it.  And it's still a lot cheaper than those expensive drip-irrigation systems.

I'm pleased :-)

Now I have to ask, what will I do when I have a garden that is an acre or so, one day!?  Yikes!