Queenacres Family Living: Reducing the grocery & feed bills

I've spent a bit of time in the garden this week. It was in serious need of weeding, and I still have some more planting to do (more beans and sweet potatoes). I am also experimenting with some grains. I'm planning to till an area strictly for the purpose of growing grains for feed; mainly alfalfa, wheat, millet, oats, amaranth, and barley. I'm hoping to be able to supplement our chickens, ducks, rabbits, and goats with our own home grown grains and greens. Our chickens have been free ranging for about 3 weeks now, with the layers getting no store-bought grains or pellets. They find their own food and we give them grass clippings, kitchen scraps, and goat milk. Our meat flock is supplemented with about a pound of scratch grains a day.

Since we began gardening, we have tried to do it without any synthetic pest control or fertilizers. It does make the garden more challenging, but it also has many rewards. This year we released lady bugs, and hatched 2 praying mantis egg cases. I use manure tea for fertilizer, and we use a combination of feed sacks and hay as mulch. As a result we have a number of garden guests ranging from frogs, toads, birds, and snakes. Yesterday morning I was busy working when I spotted a little garter snake. He was the smallest one I've ever seen in the wild, he couldn't have been over a week or so old.

See him peeking out from under the rock? Look at the very tip of the blade of grass. He was hiding under the tarp that covers the load of topsoil (leftover from when we did some septic tank work). Check out his teeny size compared to the oak leaf.

Here's a little pictoral tour of what we have growing so far. Keep in mind we're only halfway through our growing season here. I have a single Anahiem pepper plant, and it is just starting to develop fruit. It is in a pot on the front porch.

We have several bell pepper plants, greens, reds, and yellows. I try to grow as many bell peppers as possible during the warm months and then freeze or dry them for using year round.

In 2006, I started experimenting with growing pineapples. I still have the very first pineapple plant I started back then, and it is growing well. I am hoping it will bear fruit in the next year or so. I have also successfully rooted 2 others, although they are only about 6 months and a year old; and have 1 other starting to root. Growing pineapples takes a long time, they need to be at least 2 1/2 before they will set fruit.

We are also growing melons this year, both cantaloupe and watermelons. We picked our first cantaloupe yesterday...I can't wait to taste it! Here is a picture of it before we picked it. That's a pumpkin vine growing over it; our pumpkins and cantaloupes are growing into each other.

Here are some other pictures of the melons that are growing in the garden. Pay no attention to the weeds growing amongst them...I try to ignore them.

Here are a few more random pictures I took yesterday morning. This is the first year for planting this spot, and we are really happy with the results so far. God is really blessing us this year!