More Rain

We moved to one of the wettest areas of Texas, we are having record amounts of rain this year...the month of November we had about 12 inches of rain.  The first year we moved in, it was a drought year, and so was last year...but, there were times we got 4 to 8 inches of rain in one day.  Most of the time, when we get that much rain, it comes down so hard and fast we have rivers running through the yard.  I took the dogs for a walk this morning and water was running on the path in several areas and there were pools of standing water about a foot deep.  I only went as far as the creek at the back of the property, it was too wide for me to jump and foamy, the dogs wouldn't cross it...so I didn't try.

I have been trying to think about some way to house my millions of roosters to get them out of the mud.  It is almost like liquefaction in their pens...it is very wet and it didn't rain today.  We got close to 4 inches of rain this last go round.  It was cloudy today, but it didn't rain...it also didn't dry out in the pens.  I do have a pallet in each pen, I put straw in half of them to give them something to stand on besides the pallet, the also have roosts...but a lot off them choose to stand in a puddle.  So, I need to do something...I am afraid they will start having foot issues.  I may have to rebuild pens in another location...and build small coops with floors for each pen, I am gonna need a lot more pallets.  I haven't been able to work on my bigger coop because of the rain.

Today I put all the heavy paper feed bags I have been saving down in my smallest garden, that and cardboard boxes I have been saving...why?  I will tell you...weed control, hopefully anyway.  One of my main problems has been weeds growing 3 feet tall very quickly in all of my gardens...when it rains a lot...they get big very fast.  When it dries out, I have to cut them...then till several times to get rid of them...can't do it if it rains, I sink in the mud...even if I manage to get it tilled and it rains before I plant anything, the weeds grow back before it dries out enough to plant anything.  I wasn't able to plant anything in my bigger garden because of weeds and rain this year.  The pigs that visited stayed in that garden and took care of most of them for me and the poultry has been keeping the weeds down since then.  But, the poultry will eat anything I plant in there too, so I will have to close it off and try to keep them out next Spring...I will need weed control so, I figured if I save the feed sacks and cardboard and use them as mulch it would help.  Right now there is water standing in my lower garden...but, I have water still running down the hill and have big puddles the ducks and geese are loving playing in.  It is bad when ducks can actually paddle around in rain puddles.

I will probably try and start a garden in a different area.  The largest chicken coop and run will have composted chicken manure that I can use for fertilizer, plus I started a good sized new compost pile this summer.  The chickens got into my last compost pile and spread it out over their yard.  Hey, I am learning...note to self, chickens do fly...so do turkeys...and a four foot fence will not stop them if they want something on the other side.  Yes...yes, they got into my little garden too.  Yep, ate almost everything...if I had not picked all the green tomatoes, between my poultry jumping the fence and the rabbits...I would have gotten nothing at all out of my Fall garden.  Lesson learned, I will have to extend my fence up and possibly cover it with bird netting...or move my garden elsewhere, maybe someplace they can't see.  I may have to make raised beds and put them in the side yard...or front yard.  I just need to be able to water wherever I put them...if we have another drought year.  If it is really wet again...raised beds should fix that.  I was hoping to be able to plant a large garden...but until I can afford to fence another area and get dirt amended so that vegetables will grow in it, I will have to stick with a smaller garden or take the risk of loosing crops to rabbits and other wildlife.

Ahhh well...I only have a small hand tiller anyway, I wanted to grow enough so that I could supplement my poultries feed.  I guess that won't happen until I can get a tractor...it just about killed me tilling my 2 big gardens so many times with the hand tiller, and hey we're only about 30 feet by 65 feet too.  My neighbor tilled a small area for me and hit concrete in the ground...so, I am sure there is probably more crap scattered around the land.  The previous owners buried a bunch of stuff, every time I dig...I find metal, glass, concrete and evidence of a burn pit.  I have been using a digging fork and turning dirt too, I found a lot of rocks that were a good size for edging a flowerbed.  Too bad the chickens, ducks, geese and turkeys wrecked my flowerbed and all the flowers.  They even move the smaller rocks...I had no idea they would move rocks...or could move rocks.  They dig holes everywhere too, big holes...I use to fill them up and move the rocks back into place...I gave up.  I may have to get a taller fence for around the area that I would like to keep decent looking, and we have discussed building an enclosed screen porch with a solid roof eventually...we have a 20' by 20' slab and have a gazebo on it now, they tore up the top on it.  I have a shade sail over it now...they haven't wrecked it yet.  It is a temporary fix, I hope.  I just needed a place to rest when I am building or gardening, or whatever.  The poultry has taken it over...and it usually has a lot of poop all over the place.  We try and hose it off every night, but since the time change I have skipped several days between cleanings...it just gets dark before I can get it done.