High altitude gardening and a great squash soup

Whether it’s veggie gardening, flower gardening, or any other form, at this elevation gardening is a challenge and as the climate changes, the challenges become even more pronounced.
 

We begin our gardening tasks in late March in the orchard since the apple and cherry trees must be pruned while they are still dormant. In April Don pulls the mulch back from the trees and adds more aged compost. Early May will find Don starting the various natural sprays which are based on the development of the year’s growth. The early spray, just as the trees start leafing out, includes liquid fish, neem oil, kelp, and horsetail.  The horsetail which we collect along the stream and dry the previous year adds silicates that help strengthen the cell walls to resist freezing temperatures. A second application occurs just as the tiny flower buds appear in their pink stage. The apple and cherry trees are now in full bloom and the only spray Don uses is bee scent to attract the pollinators. Even though it is the end of May, several mid-30s evenings are predicted so our fingers are crossed. 

In early April I start tomatoes, peppers and squash indoors and mixed greens outdoors in tanks with covers (more about this shortly). Once they are up and it is starting to warm outside, I take the seedlings out to the greenhouse for the day. This year April and early May were quite cold and wet so the seedlings spent more time inside than out. By mid-May, the plants were able to spend nearly every day outside and late last week I planted them in their final locations. Because the summer squash plants get tropical in size and take up too much space in our small greenhouse, I plant them in old stock tanks with covers. The covers are created by using fence wire hoops covered with bubble wrap and secured with a strap clamp. I can adjust the covers depending on the day’s weather to vent one or both ends or remove them completely. Once we stay above 50 degrees at night, I take the covers off for good. 

I planted onion sets in late April and seed potatoes in mid-May. The onions are up about 4 – 5” and I’m still waiting for any sign of the potatoes. In the old days, this Valley was a major producer of potatoes so I expect a nice crop from my small plot (in another stock tank). The garlic I planted last fall is over a foot tall and should mature in late July or early August.

It’s taken ten years to realize (apparently I am a slow learner) that our soils are very poor consisting mainly of ground up Rocky Mountains. While full of minerals, they are very weak in organic matter and support neither growth nor hold water. Every year I supplement the soils with compost and other organic materials only to discover by the end of the season that I am gardening in ground up rocks again. Raised beds were useless because the main problem still existed – my added nutrients were disappearing down into the soils below the summer crop root line, moved there by earthworms and leaching.  Then it dawned on me that if I could prevent the constant loss of nutrients, I might have better luck and all those old stock tanks we were no longer using for horses might just be the answer. Three years into the experiment and I am convinced that having a bottom to my garden beds is the ticket. Now the added organic matter stays put which feeds the plants and holds the water. Plus I can garden standing up which my aging knees appreciate and I can add covers as necessary (like with the early greens and the squash). Since I have the same soil problem in our greenhouse, last fall I added some tanks to one side to see if this will improve production in there. If it works as well as I expect, I’ll add tanks to the other side this fall. I’ll keep you posted.

And now for the great summer squash recipe. Since there is no way you can eat your way through all the summer squash during the growing season, I roast and freeze a lot of the crop. I cut the squash into ½ to ¾ inch cubes, roast it on the grill and freeze it in quart bags. Then, as we did last night, we take out a bag, cook it with onions, garlic, seasonings and a quart of stock (either veggie or chicken), run it through the VitaMix blender and have a great squash soup. With a couple of slices of toast made from Don’s whole wheat bread, we have a wonderful dinner and reminder of last summer’s bounty.

Spring in the High Country

There are so many signs of spring in the high country but one of the first is the frost heaves on the gravel county road. We had never lived in an area of high surface water; where springs and seeps appear in all kinds of places including the road. All winter long you don’t notice them because the road is either snow covered or frozen but come spring these underground water courses start forcing their way upward. One minute you are driving along on a rough but dry section of county road and the next your vehicle is sunk down then throw upward as you pass over a frost heave. It’s a time of year when seat belts earn their keep. As the weather continues to warm and the moisture from the springs and seeps spreads out, the frost heaves slowly disappear and we are back to just rough gravel roads.  Ah, spring!

Spring also brings the return of the birds. The first to arrive are the male Mountain Bluebirds and we find them along the county road leading to the post office. The females show up several weeks later and together the pairs will start searching for nesting locations. Next are the male red-winged blackbirds. In the past we often have a flock of two dozen or more at our platform feeder singing their wonderful songs of spring. This year we only have a couple of lonely males and I’m worried. What could have happened to the rest of the males and all the females?

The final early spring birds are the meadowlarks and my favorite, the spotted towhees. The meadowlarks sit on the fences singing the most beautiful song of spring while the towhees spend most of their time  scratching in the duff and leaves under the trees and scrub oak brush. They are tireless workers looking for bugs and grubs. This year’s record tick crop should keep them well fed.

Over the last few weeks my daily walks have led me through the forest to the sounds of the male Northern “red-shafted” flicker drumming away on the hollow dead trees. These sounds are meant to attract females – hopefully it is going well. How they don’t end up with bent beaks and a bad headache is beyond me.

As spring moves into summer, many more birds will arrive to the diverse habitat of our place.  But it is the early birds of spring that bring the hope of another wonderful year.

One last note – thanks to everyone who said they really enjoyed the story of “Inky the barn cat” (http://homesteadingwiththewild.blogspot.com/2012/11/inky-barn-cat.html ). We have a wonderful update. After twelve plus years living alone, either at the barn or in our old cabin, Inky is now a full-fledged member of the household. In December we moved him from the cabin to our study and spent the next several months giving our two indoor adopted feral cats the chance to get acquainted with Inky. We are happy to report that the three of them get along just fine and Inky is now a house cat.

Years ago we fenced off about a half-acre adjoining the house with seven foot high fencing. The plan was to keep the kitties safely in the yard and the deer out and it has worked well. It’s a beautiful area with big cottonwoods, aspens and oak plus my flower and veggie gardens and the small greenhouse.  The three cats are spending more and more time out there as the weather improves but before it gets dark, they are back inside asleep on the couch.

From FleurCreek Farm

Spring Equinox

The Spring (Vernal) Equinox arrived this morning at 5:02 Mountain time. I actually slept through it but an hour and a half later I was ready to celebrate the change of seasons, the point at which the earth is in balance. 

Rather than signaling the start of spring, in the Rockies the vernal equinox starts the battle between the seasons where we have a short hint of warmth and green only to be tugged back to cold and snow. True to form the weather forecast for the coming days includes snow and highs in the low 30s. We are hoping for snow, lots of snow.

After the terrible wind storm of November 2011, we built a simple altar to honor those bits of nature who were lost and those who survived. We placed the altar on the remains of a grandmother cottonwood tree who was so badly damaged in the wind storm that she had to be removed. At her widest point she was 40" across. 

I add to the altar when I find something unique or special like a pine cone from a Ponderosa pine who makes the largest cones I have ever seen or a rock from the base of a tree that was hit by lightning. The native peoples believe those rocks have powerful energies. 

Today I meditated for a while then visited the altar to give thanks. Thanks for another long, dark season behind us; thanks for another season of life ahead of us. 

From Fleur Creek Farm

Elk Wallow

The warm weather of the past days has melted much of the snow in the meadow revealing an elk wallow. During the fall rut (breeding season), the bull elk create a mud hole where they urinate then thrash around in the pungent, wet earth. Trees and shrubs are often torn from the ground by their massive antlers. 

 

 The bull elk use this process in an attempt to increase their presence and dominance for it is the most dominate male who will have the greatest success during the breeding season. 

Even now, nearly five months later, the earthy, musty smell still lingers. In a matter of months when the meadows green up and the aspen trees breakout in leaf, the elk calves will begin arriving fulfilling the cycle. 

From Fleur Creek Farm

 

What's in a name?

Folks have asked us how we came up with the name of our place – Fleur Creek Farm.  Try as you might, you won’t find Fleur Creek on any map of the area, no matter how detailed.  For those of you who took French in high school and still remember any of it, “fleur” is the French word for flower.  That’s your first clue.

It didn’t take long after seeing this place for the first time to discover some of the wonderful native plants that exist here. Armed with field guides each investigation would turn up another special discovery, some we had seen elsewhere and some we had never seen before. Our first surprise was the identification of the wood lily – a blazing red flower standing nearly a foot above all the surrounding green. The following year we found the beautiful yellow lady slipper, a delicate orchid. Both the “lilies” and the “ladies” along with numerous other rare or endangered plants are located in the spruce bog areas of the wetlands.

 

The “lilies” and the “ladies” bog found on the eastern edge of the wetlands is fed by numerous springs and seeps that flow into a main spring fed creek we’ve named Fleur Creek. The headwaters of Fleur Creek were nothing more than a bog itself before a previous owner tried to turn it into a pond. Long story shortened – surface water rights in Colorado are strictly regulated and the pond had to be breached. While there is only a small pool left there, the pond construction served a new purpose – to concentrate all the waters that originally created the headwaters bog and channel them into a small creek. And so was born Fleur Creek which continues through the lower bog area of the “lilies and the ladies”, gathering up other spring and seep fed creeks finally leaving the place at the north end as a pretty nice little creek.  

It seemed only natural to name this special little creek which winds its way through an amazing collection of native flowers as Fleur Creek and the place where it is found as Fleur Creek Farm.

And now you know the rest of the story. Future blog postings will feature the incredible diversity of this special place including photos of the "lilies and the ladies".

From Fleur Creek Farm