Chop Wood Carry Water Plant Seeds is a blog about Self-Sufficient Homesteading. How can we live by creating a sustainable bio-diverse world, instead of by consuming and destroying the only one we have? What kind of teaching have you got if you exclude nature?

Saturday, October 25, 2014

Creating a Forest Garden

 I was cutting down some young Alder trees in the Willow shrubbery because they are simply taking over this ground. Alder is very invasive and spreads fast. During this adventure I found many young Blackcurrant bushes :) I know the previous farm owners had grown Blackcurrants, which they have removed to grow Wheat and Oil Seed Rape. These must be either grown from the seeds spread by the birds.
 So I move them out of shade into a place with full sun. Our forest garden area got 2 more rows of berry bushes. Will mulch this area with wood chips soon.
This forest garden area will be filled with edible berry bushes in the future, I hope :)

Monday, October 20, 2014

Building a sheep shed

 I have begun building a sheep shed. We are planning to get 2-3 pregnant sheep in January and this will be their shelter from strong winds and rain'n'snow. Apparently the land-race sheep called Spelsau we are to get are outdoors even when its rainy or windy but still they should have a shelter in case they need it.
So far the structure is up and the roof is on. I am using reused planks.

Tuesday, October 14, 2014

Collecting materials for composting

I have two large patches of Jerusalem Artichokes which are withering. I have cut them down with scythe
I ran the stalks thorough the garden shredder before placing onto the compost pile to speed up decomposition. I have coppiced many small Alder trees and now they are sending out new shots. Alder is a very good at fixing Nitrogen so I will make sure to cut them all down together with leaves and run them through the shredder. I have need for lots of compost soil and I better make that happen :)

Saturday, October 11, 2014

Harvesting the blight resistant Sarpo Mira potatoes

I have planted Sarpo Mira potatoes in 2x2 meter raised bed and I did plant them very close to each other. But this didn't cause any issues and they once again (3rd year) didn't get any blight problems :) Truly this sort is blight resistant!
 These will be used for planting next year in our large kitchen garden.
Lots of potatoes from a 2 square meters raised bed :)

Friday, October 10, 2014

The newly sown White Clover is growing well

 We have sown white clover and grasses on 1 hectare for our sheep and bees. They are growing very well. This is the south side of our small forest.
and this is the west side of our forest. To the right you can see a long row of well established Willow
Some of the clover has started to bloom already :)
We will get the sheep in January or February. I must start building a sheep shed soon and fixing the electricity fence.

Thursday, October 9, 2014

Time to plant Garlic

October is the month to plant Garlic for the next year. So I went today into our wood chip garden with tools and a bunch of dried garlic plants and planted lots of it.
This video explains how to plant garlic;