It’s been a few months since I last wrote about life on the farm. Summer is a busy time trying to stay ahead of vegetables and starting random projects. We just had Hurricane Isaias roll through, dropping a significant amount of rain. The main casualty was a lot of pebbles washed out of the maple garden and flooding in the koi pond equipment room. Since it’s a little too wet to play outside and I’m not feeling great – blogging is a good activity.

Not much new with the koi pond. We added a full spectrum light at one end of the pond to encourage some growth of good algae on the walls. We also believe the light might be good to maintain some of the koi color since the pond does not receive direct sunlight. We also had new sod put down around the pond. We have noticed some weeds trying to take over the sod already. 😩

I had two shiny little koi that I purchased last winter show up in July. Sadly the ginga perished in the no-niche skimmer. This was a surprise for us since we understood that a no-niche skimmer had a floating design which prevents koi from getting stuck or injured. This koi was approximately 12″ long and still ended up stuck in the skimmer. I have always worried about koi getting stuck in the bottom drains but never a surface skimmer.

I also received two new Shiro Utsuri koi as part of a Mystic Koi growout. I wasn’t planning to play but it’s always fun. I’m always a big fan of Omosako shiro utsuri koi. When I first started in the koi hobby, I wanted a pond full of black and white koi. In Minnesota, the shiro utsuris seemed to maintain their sumi (black markings) fairly well. In North Carolina, the softer water and temperatures might be affecting the sumi quality. We’ll see how these two will do. Thankfully at 20″+ each, I should not be finding them in the no-niche skimmer.

I went to the Netherlands at the end of May to judge the European koi show. It’s nice to judge with familiar and new faces. The show hosts are so nice and go out of their way to make it a pleasure to judge their show. The show had over 100 vats to judge, containing over 700 registered koi.

While summer in North Carolina was pretty hot, Europe had record-breaking heat waves and severe droughts. I was planning to be judging the 2026 France Koi Show in September but the koi show had to be cancelled. It was certainly disappointing for all the French club members who prepared for this event. Putting on a koi show, in the United States and abroad, is a great deal of work. Clubs depend upon volunteers who put in long hours for months before and during the show.

Our flock of 24 chickens are doing well. They are going through their fall molting season so egg production is significantly down. We had been getting on average a dozen eggs a day and now we feel lucky to collect four. There are feathers all over the place. I’m hoping that the new chickens will be laying eggs soon. They are about 22 weeks old now which is when many of my hens have their first point of lay. The new chickens have been dubbed the Spice Girls – two are golden Wyandottes and three are speckled Sussexes.

This fall we are going to start building a little garden by the chicken coop/run. We’ve pretty much ignored the area but decided both the chickens and I would like something a little more attractive than the current scenery. AI (Claude) created a plan for me to follow.

Of course my ever dependable husband put this on his to-do list and created the base boxes for the wattle beds right away. We’ll have to search around the farm for the right branches to weave. I plan to use some old brick that came from the original well rather than stepping stones. The dream is to have something blooming from March through early November. I believe I can create this without the chickens destroying plants but we’ll see.

This is the first full season with the new garden. We’re getting better at growing vegetables.

Succession planting lettuce varieties has been a weakness but I hope to get in some practice over the winter. I have been putting in a variety of lettuce into my garden beds and they will be ready to pick at different times. In November, I’m going to start mini lettuce beds in a temporary greenhouse that I set up on my husband’s office deck. Plenty of sunshine should keep the boxes warm. The lettuce out in the raised beds out in the garden will survive winter with a little help from plant cloth. Fresh lettuce tastes better and you know that you’re not getting something from Taylor Farms tainted with e coli, cyclospora or salmonella.

Another bonus of having a larger vegetable garden is finding a chef who can use some of the produce. My husband thought it would be nice to bring in a private chef to cater a work luncheon on the farm. Google found Chef Will Phillips near me. He actually lives in a town about 20-25 minutes away. More importantly he makes fabulous food. We have had him out for two dinners since the original luncheon. Will is always happy to take our extra produce and sharing what he does with them. It’s like getting free cooking and presentation lessons. For our recent dinner he used items that he scavenged from our garden the day before. Celery top pesto, amazing presentation of squash soup, and delicious Basque cheesecake with figs were just some of the menu items.

Eggs from our girls and figs they weren’t able to reach…

Other random garden projects included cutting one of our long wooden beds in half, moving our compost bins so that I could move my strawberries into a sunny spot inside of the garden and adding four large, circular raised beds. It’s amazing that my husband never complains about how often we have to move dirt around.

In addition to moving dirt, building random things for my projects, planting some new tree or shrubs at least twice a month – my husband is an excellent beekeeper. I originally thought that I would be the beekeeper of the family but the first two hives failed. This year’s hive is doing very well. Tony faithfully feeds them and puts in the strips for varroa mites. Apparently even though I see a bazillion flowers on the farm, bees still need to be fed sugar water to establish a strong hive. I will be planting more bee-friendly flowers near the hive next year. We tasted a little bit of honey the other day and it was quite good.

Nothing exciting to write about the japanese maple trees. However, we will be going to Japan in a few weeks and I’m sure I’ll see a little momiji. We’ll be there a little bit before the peak season but I’m sure it will still be beautiful. This year I finally get to spend a day in the Niigata area with koi dealer, Shawn McHenry of Mystic Koi (Upland, CA). Not really sure what we’re going to see but I’m hoping for some good food and checking out a koi breeder or two.

I am crossing my fingers that my Japanese maples will not decide to change colors and drop all their leaves before I come home from Japan. Checking my photos from last year, I should get to see my trees with colorful autumn leaves.

So that’s mid-May 2026 to now. I hope to post another blog before New Year’s. 😂