Planting Seeds

Wren is at that toddler age where gardening is about the best thing. We spend a lot of time in the garden weeding and watering and digging for fun.

This evening we planted summer carrots, summer spinach and some more beans. We also planted some lettuce. I am not sure how these crops will do as we usually have the beds all planted with starts or seeds by now but it was fun to dig and rake and sow. Wren was fully involved just as he was a few weeks ago when I planted beans and peas.

On that occasion, by mistake I left the packet of seed outside and Wren 'planted' or rather threw around some peas in the garden beds. We now have dense little crops of peas sprouting around the tomatoes. I hope they can tangle up together.

Wren's beans are doing very well but are being eaten by snails or slugs. I have put out sluggo but am worried about the chickens if they become big enough to free range. Will they eat sluggo? Will they die? Oh, a moment of googling later and I find its OK. Sluggo is safe for pets including chickens.

I also read this informative piece [from BackYardChickens Forum] which indicates our seedlings would be unsafe from the chickens in a short while.

"All that said, chickens cannot be in the garden - they'll eat all the fruits, veggies, plants, etc. People dream of having chickens that eat weeds and bad bugs but leave the veggie plants and good bugs. But, it's a pipe dream. To a chicken, a bug is a bug (bug=yummy) and a plant is a plant (plant=yummy). They eat it all. I have my garden totally covered with bird netting and I still have to watch my chickens because they try to jump into the netting and eat my plants through it."

I kind of knew this. Just today I fed them 4 arugala / rocket plants which had bolted and they stripped off every leaf and flower within MINUTES. They are hungry chooks.

A raccoon is walking along the fence by the window. If I turn the light off I can spy on her.