Hello!

[catjac1975]

Will you be able to grow oranges ect.? or is it not warm enough in the north? I love artichokes-I bet you can grow those. Mangos????I wonderful place to grow daylilies if you amend the soil.

 

[Meaghan]

I'm not sure if this post will show up right away or not, as the previous one I did is "awaiting approval" from what I guess is because I'm new? I'm not sure.

At any rate, as I promised earlier, here are pictures of the does. At the time the pictures were taken, the brown does were 2 days old, and the black/tan/white ones were 1 day old. They are now 13 and 12 days old, respectfully.

I don't have any pictures of the poultry, as they will be shipped as day-olds so they are not hatched yet. We're getting Berkshire piglets in May-June-ish so they are not born yet either, but here are a few pictures of the last few litters the breeder had.

As far as our pets, I'd be happy to share pictures if people are interested, I just don't want to clog this thread up if anyone isn't interested!

Edit: So, this post didn't need approval. Since the other one isn't showing up, I'll just copy and paste what I already wrote because I responded to a lot of things that just aren't showing!

Previous post:

Thanks everyone.

As far as animal shelters and fencing go, those where already mostly in place on the property. There is a a short section of fence downed that we are replacing, but it isn't a major problem for the time being.. The only thing we are doing for shelter building is buying some prefab sheds for the poultry and attaching runs. Since its so warm year round here in Florida, animals tend not to need much shelter.

Our growing season is pretty much year round. We have had some frosts lately, but then again we had days like this morning when, just before dawn at the coolest part of the day, it was 61 degrees.

As far as small creatures eating the garden, our perimeter fence around the first acre of our house/garden/coop area is electrified. This is more to keep coins and such out of the coops than the garden, though. But I know deer would have no issue jumping a 4ft fence with electric at the top if they wanted. We have seen rabbits around, but more in the pasture than on our first acre. We were going to use chicken netting for the short inside fence and electric wire for the outer fence. It sounds like it might work, since I haven't seen any deer around our property at all, and neither has our neighbor. I just wanted to be cautious.

The reason we were going organic is not for the produce itself being sold but we may be selling our eggs and such as organic, so our produce would have to be "certified" organic standard as well. We are still waiting to see about that, as it's tricky to find organic stuff around here and our pasture can't be certified for three years. Even bedding has to be organic, I believe.

For trees, we already have three types of apple and a pomegranate. We are getting some other types, but we're waiting to buy those until after our move in as we are not out there every day, and we don't want them to arrive on a day we aren't there. We are planting apricot, cherry, nectarine, peach, orange, lemon, mango, avocado, and pear. We have a good section of land that's bare along one property boundary where we already have the pomegranate in the ground.

I will definitely post pictures of the critters when I can! I'm on my cell phone at the moment but I have pictures of our baby goats at home on my laptop. I'll attach those later, along with some of our property. The doeling in my avatar is one of our four babies.

Thanks for all of the suggestions!

 

[Smart Red]

Welcome, @Meaghan, to The Easy Garden! I hope you will find that this is a great group of folks who make up our gardening family here on TEG.

Oh, to be young and starting out again like you are doing! Your plans sound so reasonable and well thought out. The others have given good suggestions. My only addition is to repeat what others have said -- don't start so much at one time that you burn out. All of what you've mentioned is doable if you give yourself a few years to build up your operation as you build up your soil.

LOVE the photos! Keep 'em coming! And put a few on the POW (picture of the week) thread.

 

[Nyboy]

More Photos we love pets !!!

 

[Meaghan]

Alright, here are just a few of our pets. I don't have a lot of good shots of our little furry creatures, but I'll try my best to pick the best ones.

Stella our LabxPit mutt mix, she'll be 4 in May:

Apollo our Great Pyr or Maremma, possibly both, he'll be 2 in May:

Rachel turned 2 in September:

Alex will be 3 in April:

Bubbles turned 2 in November:

Gizmo will be 1 in April:

Gizmo when we first got him at 10 weeks, weighing only 1.25lbs, sick with URI and feline herpes, which he still has:

Jack is our newest cat, and I don't have any good pictures of him. We think is around 6, may be turning 7 this spring:

Salt will be 2 this spring:

Pepper will be 2 this spring:

Emma (black and white) and Darwin (white), Darwin passed in September from cancer at about 5-6 years old. Emma is 6-7.

Henry will be 3 this spring:

Luna turned 3 this month:

Sol turned 3 this month:

Peach will be 1 in May:

Pear will be 1 in May:

Together:

Phew, that took a while! Lots of animals, all from shelters, rescues, or plain showed up on our front porch. It's like they know where I live, that I provide good food, and that I won't throw them out.

Each has it's own story, and if anyone on particular strikes your interest feel free to ask, I'd be happy to tell their stories. Again, don't want to take up too much space as there are, y'know, 15 of them.

 

[Carol Dee]

Meaghan - WOW you jumped right in. I see you have already gotten some good advice. Come back often and let us know how it is growing.

 

[thistlebloom]

Meaghan, welcome from the north! You're going to have quite the setup, best wishes with all your endeavors! I see you have Nubians, they're my favorite goat breed, they can be such characters.

 

[catjac1975]

I'm not sure if this post will show up right away or not, as the previous one I did is "awaiting approval" from what I guess is because I'm new? I'm not sure.

At any rate, as I promised earlier, here are pictures of the does. At the time the pictures were taken, the brown does were 2 days old, and the black/tan/white ones were 1 day old. They are now 13 and 12 days old, respectfully.

I don't have any pictures of the poultry, as they will be shipped as day-olds so they are not hatched yet. We're getting Berkshire piglets in May-June-ish so they are not born yet either, but here are a few pictures of the last few litters the breeder had.

As far as our pets, I'd be happy to share pictures if people are interested, I just don't want to clog this thread up if anyone isn't interested!

Edit: So, this post didn't need approval. Since the other one isn't showing up, I'll just copy and paste what I already wrote because I responded to a lot of things that just aren't showing!

Previous post:

Thanks everyone.

As far as animal shelters and fencing go, those where already mostly in place on the property. There is a a short section of fence downed that we are replacing, but it isn't a major problem for the time being.. The only thing we are doing for shelter building is buying some prefab sheds for the poultry and attaching runs. Since its so warm year round here in Florida, animals tend not to need much shelter.

Our growing season is pretty much year round. We have had some frosts lately, but then again we had days like this morning when, just before dawn at the coolest part of the day, it was 61 degrees.

As far as small creatures eating the garden, our perimeter fence around the first acre of our house/garden/coop area is electrified. This is more to keep coins and such out of the coops than the garden, though. But I know deer would have no issue jumping a 4ft fence with electric at the top if they wanted. We have seen rabbits around, but more in the pasture than on our first acre. We were going to use chicken netting for the short inside fence and electric wire for the outer fence. It sounds like it might work, since I haven't seen any deer around our property at all, and neither has our neighbor. I just wanted to be cautious.

The reason we were going organic is not for the produce itself being sold but we may be selling our eggs and such as organic, so our produce would have to be "certified" organic standard as well. We are still waiting to see about that, as it's tricky to find organic stuff around here and our pasture can't be certified for three years. Even bedding has to be organic, I believe.

For trees, we already have three types of apple and a pomegranate. We are getting some other types, but we're waiting to buy those until after our move in as we are not out there every day, and we don't want them to arrive on a day we aren't there. We are planting apricot, cherry, nectarine, peach, orange, lemon, mango, avocado, and pear. We have a good section of land that's bare along one property boundary where we already have the pomegranate in the ground.

I will definitely post pictures of the critters when I can! I'm on my cell phone at the moment but I have pictures of our baby goats at home on my laptop. I'll attach those later, along with some of our property. The doeling in my avatar is one of our four babies.

Thanks for all of the suggestions!

We love pictures!

 

[journey11]

So much adorableness!! The goats, the piggies, pibble-smiles and I love the rats curled up too!

 

[Meaghan]

Thanks everyone! Animals are definitely my thing.

Sad news on the organic tree hunt. After running into several road blocks, I discovered why I can't find any organic citrus trees in Florida. An organic orange producer near Miami confirmed that it's illegal to sell citrus within the state of Florida without being sprayed with one of two pesticides, neonicotinoids or methoprene, both of which have been linked to CCD in bees (my main reason for going with organic instead of just buying one and waiting for it to become organic by treating it as such). It's also illegal to import from other states' nurseries, period.

Might have to get my family from California who are driving to visit later this year to bring a few organic trees with them.