Tuesday 4 August 2009

Terra Firma

We would like to plant fruit trees along the east end of our social warming fence, so today I spent several hours digging at the hard clay ground that's littered with shale. It took me ages and my hands are now so sore, but it was so invigorating, I can't wait to get stuck into it again tomorrow. Usually this kind of physical work is PJ's domain, but today it was mine. Helped along by some friends.

The ground is so hard, I don't know how our potatoes grew in it last year. While I was digging, I found some leftover from that crop that we are going to replant elsewhere for their hardiness and taste.

I had such a great day. The most difficult part of it was deciding what to do with all the worms I found: feed them to the chooks (I like to watch them suck them up like spaghetti) or put them back in the earth where they'll work to turn the hard ground into gold.

4 comments:

farmdoc said...

Aren't potatoes wonderful. Worms too. And also physical work. Nicely told, LOM. And nicely illustrated. xx

daylesford organics said...

Hello chookens. Great photos.

eddy carroll said...

What I love most about this, are your helpers-
The description of the hard ground made me anticipate, i dont know a picture of a person with a shovel or a pitch fork or perhaps a few people, or some kind of hand held 'pot holer' i may have invented in my head, but No,
it was an image of three chickies, digging about with their lovely beaks and a worm, all helping to move the earth around.

Petrus Spronk said...

I have heard that here in D/ford, potatoes are considered ground busters. For this reason I use the planting of potatoes for establishing new ready to plant garden beds, works well.