September At Windswept Farm

Blue and Remy continue to spend their days in the outside corral and their nights in the barn. They now accept this as their life and are becoming much better behaved because they get so much handling. I lead them between the barn and corral twice each day and spray them with fly spray twice each day:

Remy is smart and playful, a mischievous troublemaker. I still have to keep an eye on him:

The Red Poll ladies are healthy and lead a life of leisure:

I began treating them to a bit of grain again so that I can get them into the barn when needed. Scarlett's calf needs her ears tattooed, Winston needs to be sold and Rosella needs to be artificially inseminated again. All these things require getting them into the barn:

The sunflowers and Daylilies are still going strong:

The plums ripened and I ate most of them, though there were only a few:

More flowers went to church. This vase contained yellow (wild) Goldenrod, Frans Hals Daylilies and various colors of sunflowers, including the "Teddy Bear" variety at the top:

Purple (wild) New England Aster, two varieties of roses and various colors of Yarrow:

Some years I have toads slipping into my mudroom when I open the door. This year I've had a tiny Spring Peeper. I carefully lift it and set it back outside in the garden:

The tallest sunflowers have reached about 14 feet tall and are branching to make a glorious display. I only recently learned that the flowers turn during the day to always face the sun. I've watched them facing east in the morning, then south midday and west later. It's really quite amazing:

But they also seemed about to fall over, so I hooked blue and yellow bungee cords together, then hooked them to the fence and around the stalks to keep them upright:

By contrast, the smallest sunflowers are only one to two feet tall. The one on the left is a Teddy Bear variety, but I have no idea what kind the others are:

It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Autumn

Winston is reaching the age when I will need to trap him in the barn and sell him. It will be a tricky operation, and upsetting for him, for his mother, and for me:

 Blue and Remy have another 6 to 8 weeks in their corral before I can let them loose in the south field. They will be happy to regain their freedom, and I'll be happy that my life will be easier:

 My north field produced a second crop of hay. It was cut, then tedded, then baled. The neighbor did the baling, using the kicker to fling the finished product up into the wagon which was towed behind the baler. His uncle, on another tractor, raked the cut and dried hay into windrows so the baler could pick it up and turn it into bales:

 I love the aroma of hay, both in the field and in the barn. It is also a scenic operation:

I took this photo to show how the baler collects the rows of hay and processes them into bales:

 But there are occasional breakdowns and problems. This stop was to refill the bin with four big rolls of baling twine:

 Flowers were still blooming, so I brought two more vases of them to church. This one contained flowers of Tree Hydrangea, Rugosa rose and Sevillana rose:

 Sunflowers and Daylilies:

I didn't think there would be many apples this year, but like other years, I was wrong. When they began to fall, I was shocked to see there were so many:

 They weren't big, pretty, supermarket apples - but they were good:

 Over on the other side of the house, a Yellow Delicious dropped small apples, and some animal, probably a Chipmunk or Red Squirrel, has been using these old steps as a dinner table:

 The plums began to ripen, but I have learned to wait for them to fall before I eat them. That's how I know they're really ripe and sweet:

Around The House And In The Barn

The first Daylily to bloom was the Chicago Arnie's Choice variety, planted last year, and they are spectacular:

 The five baby roses in the front of the house are still tiny but blooming so exuberantly that I began deadheading them, cutting off the spent flowers so the plant can use its resources to produce more leaves and roots. After the first such operation, the adjoining lawn looked as if there had been a rose multiple murder:

 The multicolored Yarrow has continued to make new flowers faster than I can cut them and put them in vases to bring to church each week:

 And we have a new crop of baby fantail pigeons. The little guy on the left seems to have the same sort of extra personality as the two who preceded him:

The bantam hens are producing fewer eggs, but I still get enough to give a dozen to a friend each week:

 One of the new baby Daylilies, called Always Afternoon, is blooming already in spite of being only about 8" tall and planted only this spring:

 The Rugosa roses are lovely and aromatic, just outside my door and clearly benefiting from the severe pruning I gave them this year:

 And what can I say about the Sunflowers? They are growing so fast that it amazes me - and, as you can see, they're already blooming:

The little plum tree is growing plums - not many, but that's good because it isn't built to bear much weight on its limbs:

 The apple trees have baby apples:

 The pear tree has a few pears, but not too many. Most of last year's abundant pears went to waste:

Its All About The Flowers And Plants

It's summer flower season, and the extra rainy spring and extra hot summer have helped things bloom. My little rock garden passed beyond Iris season long ago and now, in midsummer, the yellow Asiatic Lilies boomed on the south side of the little garden:

Orange Asiatic Lilies and Blue Sea Holly bloomed on the south side of the garden:

I was mowing the lawn when I noticed seedlings springing up around the productive plum tree. I mowed right over some of them, then thought better of it:

I went into the barn and got some bright yellow tent stakes to mark the little seedlings. I may need to select a couple of seedlings and move them, but for now at least, there are six plum seedlings which are safe:

And the mama tree is producing plums as she does every year:

The sunflowers I planted, at least the tallest ones, began producing buds and will soon be blooming:

The six multicolored Yarrow I planted produced buds and the first flowers to open were pink. I don't yet know what other colors I'll get, but it looks like the next ones will be red:

 The baby Carefree Delight rose is blooming freely:

And so is the Emily Carr rose:

 The little Sevillana rose has almost as many flowers as leaves:

 The Morden Sunrise rose is continuing to bloom:

 The first Daylily to bloom and so far the only one, is the Chicago Arnie's Choice. All in all, there are a lot of flowers blooming around the farm house, and the little plum seedlings are a bonus:

Summer On The Farm

There are ten little bantam hens now, seven Barred Rocks and three Easter Eggers. They aren't laying many eggs, but there are still more than I can use:

A pair of fantail pigeons successfully hatched two babies in their cubbyhole nest:

The babies were doing well for several days:

And then one morning, I found one dead and the other missing. I'm afraid this is a common occurrence and I've become accustomed to dealing with it:

I'm glad to say, however, that there are some successful nests in which parents raise healthy babies to help make up for the sad losses. These two are so close to adulthood that I feel confident they'll make it now:

They are growing rapidly and don't mind being held:

Flowers have been blooming in abundance and I collected two colors of roses and three colors of lilies into one vase to bring to church on Sunday:

I also collected an armload of Elderberry blossoms and put them in a vase, then stuck a couple of Ninebark branches in for color variety. Alas, by the time I arrived at church, the Elderberry stems had wilted so badly that I had to dump them in the weeds by the church parking lot. I know now that Elderberries, like Oriental Poppies, should not be used as cut flowers:

A new color of Asiatic Lilies, planted just this year, have been blooming copiously:

You may remember the photo of baby apricots in a previous post. There is now only one marble-sized apricot left and I don't expect it to last. But at least I now know that the tree can produce fruit:

The always productive plum tree is producing nice looking plums, but the other plum tree has lost its fruit:

I planted a whole row of seeds in an area where other seeds didn't take. I now have lots of baby Lupines emerging. They're awfully close together, but I think I'll leave them alone and let nature take its course: