Tres Colinas-On the road less graveled: Summer Fun

Tres Colinas on the road less graveled

The garden has continued producing and you can see we've had peppers (green, yellow and orange), corn, peas and beans. We had our first cantaloupe this morning and it was delicious. There are 25 more of them on the vine. The Pumpkins are growing as are the Butternut Squash and the Watermelons. We planted two varieties of seedless watermelons (one red and one yellow). They require a pollinator which does not produce melons. I will have to do a lot of watering as they get bigger (unless it rains regularly). We also have sunflowers as a memorial to Pam's mother (she loved sunflowers) who passed away two years ago.

We have also had a good crop of cucumbers so I decided to try making dill pickles. I found a recipe from an East Texas woman for sun pickles. All you do is put a couple of garlic buds, a sprig of dill and a teaspoon of dill seed in each jar. Cram the cucumbers in the jar and fill with a solution of water, vinegar and salt. Close the jars and place them in a spot that gets full sun. After fourteen sunny days (adjust if there are rainy days) they are ready. The high heat (we are consistently in the high 90's and have had a couple of 100 days) during the days and the cooler nights supposedly seal the jars. You can see that it requires a lot of concentration. We will see in a couple of weeks if it works. Hopefully they won't taste like "Aunt Bee's Kerosene Cucumbers" that nearly killed Deputy Fife.

We had a pretty big thunderstorm on July 3rd. We were at a fireworks display in Caldwell when it hit our place. The major casualty was one of my favorite trees. You can see the before and after pictures below. That's Pam and Cora looking sad at the loss of the tree. It's about 200 yards from the house so I'm sure it would have been loud had we been home. We were fortunate none of the cows were under that tree as it had been one of their favorite places to rest. I need to get it cleaned up sooner than later. The locals tell me that the heat from the lightening strike combined with the summer heat will dry the wood in short order. This will make cutting it up with a chainsaw very difficult if not impossible.

The chickens are doing well. I decided to install a Chicken Fountain to meet their water needs. In the hot Texas summer you don't want any animal going without a continuous supply of water. I considered making my own but it wasn't worth it to save about $20. You just attach it where the chickens can reach it and hook it up to a garden hose. It maintains a constant water level and the chickens quickly learned to get water by hitting the water nipples with their beaks.

They like getting treats on hot days, so Pam is giving them some watermelon rinds in the picture below. All 26 are still with us so we should be getting lots of eggs in about two months. The five Guineas we had have all disappeared. I think I occasionally hear one in the woods but it may be a ghost of a Guinea passed. One of our relatives gave us 3 Guinea chicks so we are raising them to see if they will stick around.