Vegetables, Chickens, Fruits, Nuts and Bee's - An Update

Just a quick update.

Vegetables
On the 13th, I started a bunch of my vegetables and herbs, including:

Asparagus- Mary Washington
Broccoli- Decicco
Siberian Pepper- Grandpa's Home Pepper
Bell Peppers- Early Mountain Wonder
Early Tomato- Sub-arctic Plenty
Early Tomato- Gem State
Brussel Sprout- Long Island Improved
Leeks- King Richard
Kale- Red Russian
Early Cabbage- Early Mountain Wakefield
Chinese Celery- Kan Tsai
Mache/Corn Salad- Verte De Cambrai
Red Romaine- Cimmaron
Spinach- Bloomsdale Long Standing
Red Leaf Lettuce- Red Saladbowl
Sweet Basil- Ocimum Basilicum
Italian Parsley- Plainleaf

Chickens
Last night I finally took the 34 chicks out of our walk in shower. We moved them to a heated room in our barn. I think they are enjoying the new casa.

Fruits and Nuts
Today we planted two new walnut tree's as well as two new peach tree's. I'm not sure how many fruit and nut tree's that makes between my parents and us. It must be 50 or more. You can never have too many though, in my opinion. And nothing beats a freshly picked peach in the summer.

Bee's
When we arrived home this afternoon, my bee hives were sitting on our porch. My good friend had finished fixing them up and had dropped them off for me. He gave them a nice red paint job so they'll be the sharpest looking bunch of bee's in the neighborhood.
These are the traditional looking langstroth hives.
For my other hive, I think I've decided on the Tanzanian top bar hive rather than the Kenyan top bar hive. This is only because the sides are straight and I will be able to transfer the foundations from my nucs into these hives.

Apple Tree From Seed

After eating an apple about a while back I decided to save the seeds and grow a tree. I know that almost all apple tree's are grafted nowdays. So if I use seeds from one of these apple's, I will most likely not get the same type of apple tree as the apple that I got the seed from.

However, there is a really, really old orchard on our place from the original homestead. I enjoy these apples and I think that they should produce the same tree if I take the seeds from these.

Unfortunately, there are no apples on the tree at the moment and anything on the ground is covered in a few feet of snow. So for my experiment, I am just going to use some fuji apples that I got form Azure Standard. Later I will get some of the old orchard apples and use them.

So, after researching the best way to sprout the seeds on the internet, I decided to try three different approaches.

1. I planted 12 of the seeds in some potting soil after letting them soak for about two weeks.
2. I placed 12 seeds in a wet paper towell in the refridgerator.
3. I placed a bunch of seeds in a glass of water and let soak until sprouted.

Some of these seeds in each method were dried out for a few weeks first. Unfotunatley, I mixed them with one's that were not dried out first and now I'm not sure which were which.

I did not have any luck with the first two methods. But, by allowing the seeds to soak in water I was able to finally get a few of them to sprout. I had been changing the water in the glass whenever it would get really dark. I'm not sure if this helps or hurts the process.

Once I had two seeds that were sprouting well (I think they had a sprout about 1/8 of an inch), I planted them in potting soil. I added some water and then left them alone. After a few days, I noticed that one of them was actually coming up. So, it looks like I may actually be able to grow this thing. I will keep updating this little project.

Unfortunately by growing a tree this way, I will have to wait quite a few years to see any fruit. But it is more about gaining the knowledge and having the experience. And hopefully I will be able to enjoy some nice apples some day.