Chicken Theater and Fruit Trees

It turns out this is a great time of year to look for sales at nurseries.  We went to Dig Nursery in Cotati the other day and they were having a clearance sale of 30-50% off.  The guy who runs that place is very nice, by the way.  We got a large Granny Smith apple tree and a Fuji apple tree for 50% off.  Such a deal!

Then a woman in the neighborhood stopped by our door to tell us she'd been noticing our garden and that she had some extra mulch in her driveway.  We had a couple of other trees (Asian pear and a late orange) and that we had been meaning to plant so today was all about digging holes, removing a stump, walking the wheelbarrow around the neighborhood several times and shoveling things.  It is a great workout, especially upper body and abdominals.

Here are the trees in the back if you can discern them from this picture.  In the future, we will be fruit rich fruit-cakes.  Also picked up a banana tree that claims to be hardy to 10 degrees.  I put it in a bigger pot so we will see if it survives.  For the time being I can at least say, "yes, we have no bananas".

Anyhow, every time there is a hole being dug, Halley the chicken is in the middle of it.  Literally.  She is a smart chicken and knows that holes and trenches being dug means worms and other tasty morsels and she is apparently unafraid of shovels.  Please enjoy this latest installment of Chicken Theater, "Chicken In A Hole".

More Trees

One of the first things we did outside when we got this place was to plant fruit trees, since they take so long to start bearing serious amounts of fruit. Along the north fence of the back yard, we planted an Emerald Plum, a Hachiya Persimmon, a Stella Cherry and a Fuyu Persimmon.

We got all of those trees bare root at Harmony Farm Supply & Nursery in Sebastopol. It must have been January or February and the clay soil was extra mucky as we dug it out to fill it with mulch and compost for the trees.

In addition to these trees we also have planted pomegranate, grapefruit, lemons, yuzu, mandarins, blueberries and kumquats which we have picked up from various other excellent nurseries in our area. A few of them are actually producing fruit!

This weekend we went to Harmony to get something else, because they had their fruit trees at 20% off. It turned out it was also "customer appreciation day" and we got free tacos, free "vegan" fertilizer and some seed packets. Our lucky day! We wound up picking an asian pear and a dwarf orange tree. We just need to figure out where to put them now.

We also found out that the best time to get a greater selection of the bare root (much better value) trees was the second week in January.

I can't wait til January. Oh wait, the tomatoes aren't even ripe yet!
Next: Where are my tomatoes!