Friday, June 19, 2015

Back Home and Assessing Damage





After twelve days and nights of being absent from the Small-Hold Mrs. PP was allowed to come home today. All I can say is it's going to be a long haul to get everything set aright around here that's for sure.

The house is a complete wreck. I have never in my life seen the ground so saturated with water as it is now. I have certainly seen worse flooding around here in the past though. On my final few trips into the hospital I had to take my truck as the roads were washed out in a couple of places. Yesterday I ended up having to drive through about 6 inches or so of water flowing over a county highway were a swollen creek had over flowed it's culvert. I could still see the yellow lines under the water so I wasn't too worried about being washed away. One of the gravel roads had washed out so bad the ditch across it was about as deep as the tires on the truck.

A good indication of how much rain we got can be seen in my garden watering tub above. It's just a standard 30 gallon tub I use for hand watering the garden when the plants are still seeds or small. The tub was empty when Mrs. PP went into the hospital so all that water is from rain over the last week.




We got limbs down everywhere that I will have to collect up before I mow again which needs to be started tomorrow if at all possible.




The Buckwheat field now looks like this with standing water over most of it and the Buckwheat itself is now pretty much all killed out except for a section on the high spot in the middle. Even that section has become stunted and wilted now so the weeds are once again pushing above the Buckwheat.




Most of the Pumpkins and Cucumbers look like this poor wilted specimen above too. Most of the raised beds will more than likely be a complete write off this year as well since I am not going to have the time to weed em and it will be a few weeks before the Mrs. can do much either.

I spent the first hour after we got home this afternoon just figuring out her pill schedule as a matter of fact. Since the fence project got delayed, mostly by the rain honestly, I have had to start feeding hay to the flock now as there is not enough forage left in the pastures I have fenced in so far. Hoof problems are starting to crop up more and more often. I suspect worms will be next although I had been worming pretty regularly up until the hospital trip. The barn is flooded on the East side and the fly plague has returned again.

On the bright side the rains are now being predicted to stop tonight and be dry for a few days. Of course that brings with it the 90 degree plus heat. Gonna be smellin awfully yummy around here for the next couple of weeks I imagine.

I haven't even looked at the hives yet. I can't even get to the ones in the orchard down the road or in the back of the pasture anyway unless I walk down there. As long as the bees have been trapped inside the hives by the rain I doubt there is much honey left either.




I did find one pleasant surprise though. My compost bin has sprouted up a volunteer Potato plant. I guess the rain has compacted the semi-composted stuff on top enough to make it's own viable dirt. Compost Potatoes now there is something I had never contemplated.

The amount of work I am going to have to do to get back to where we were is looking pretty depressing about now. All this rain may not be as bad as a drought but for the short term it is much more destructive let me tell ya.

I should be able to start answering comments once again now. I thank every one for the prayers, well wishes and get well cards. They were much appreciated.

Keep Prepping Everyone!!!!!!


21 comments:

  1. Quick, you need to run out and plant rice!
    As long as Mrs. PP is home things will get better, you can't do much in the mud so rest up some.

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    1. Sf - It's going to take a few days for stuff to dry out and a bit longer for the Mrs. to get functional that's for sure.

      LOL I could have planted rice almost this year with all that standing water.

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  2. Glad Mrs. PP is home & praying for her continuing to get better. The rest can wait, not much you can do about it right now anyway. I have a volunteer sweet potato plant come up in my compost bin. Since I'm not adding compost anymore, I'll wait to see what comes of it. Probably 1 or 2 potatoes if I'm lucky.

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    1. DFW - This house is sucha wreck right now and I am going to have to do all the wife's duties as well as my own now as well for a while yet. Gonna be some down sizing on stuff to say the least.

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  3. Mr. ? Cuz I am not sure how to refer to ya but Mr.... I have come upon your blog today and am sorry to hear about your plight. On the upside Mrs. PP is home in her own environment and that is good news! Do hope she recovers well! Most times people do better in their own spot than at them dang hospitals!
    As the garden goes well I wish I had better news for that. Looks like the weather wins this round. We are in for a very wet summer this year with not a lot of reprieve so says the Almanac (my other 'Bible"). Maybe you could plant in buckets for this year a tomato plant or two and maybe some pepper plants....
    Have been saying prayers for all those effected by this last storm and all the storms before....
    Stay healthy and safe!
    May God Bless You With Some Great New Ideas! :)

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    1. MEM - Welcome!!! Ya I guess I am a Mr. or you could try "oh great puhbah of Prepping" that works too :)

      The Mrs. is doing better and happy to be out of the hospital. The real problem right now is she had stretched herself thin taking on duties she had no business taking on and now most of those duties fall to me on top of what I had before. Pretty stressful to say the least. She tires easily still and I must drive her for now. Still she is getting better everyday!!!

      Thank you for your kind words!

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  4. PP,

    It's great to here Mrs. PP is home and resting well. I so feel your pain on the garden my friend. We will have to wade through water and mud to access our garden this afternoon to see what survived the weather from the past couple of days.
    Remember not to worry about the small stuff, just work on what needs to be done. The rest can wait!!!! Take care!

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    1. Sandy - I am just going to let the garden go right now. If we get anything we do if not oh well. Thank you for the lovely card BTW Mrs. PP loved it!!!

      We just got back from running errands and Mrs. PP is ready for a nap so I am going to start mowing...YAY.

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  5. Glad to hear Mrs. PP is home. That's the important part. The rest will come together in one form or another - in fact, I think you may end up gaining some valuable insights to share on the effects of the unexpected event on small holds.

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    1. TB - Well the first thing is to keep each persons responsibilities reasonable. Mrs. PP has stretched herself mighty thin trying to care for every stray animal she can find and it is wearing me down now that I need to take care of them.

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  6. That is great news that Mrs PP is home! Seems the rain and flooding are taking a toll on lots of areas :O(. Since we can't control all this water, guess we just have to go with it. We will get a fresh shot at it next year is what I am telling myself on the garden. :O) I drove home in some really scary rain and flooding a couple days ago. Whew, I had a death grip on my steering wheel when I finallllly got home.

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    1. Texan - I am betting the rains will begin to slack off here now and I will be able to get another planting of Buckwheat in yet this Summer. It also means we should ahve another good hay crop wen it does stop and I can afford to feed hay this Winter a bit more easily. That's my hope anyway :)

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  7. We haven't had any rain here for several weeks now. We could use some of yours.

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    1. MV - Well we have more than we will use. I would send ya some :)
      Most of this will simply go to waste and fill up the rivers and streams with the ground so saturated at this point.

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  8. Glad to hear tour MRS is home. Don't envy you all the catchup work.

    I have been reading a lot of gardening blogs of late and it seem that a lot of folks are having a multitude of weather related problems all over the US. It got me thinking about what problems the commercial farmers must be having. Not just in California but all over. When is this going to have serious impact not just on the availability but the prices for food in general. I mean look at eggs, $3.50 a dozen here for regular Large. The Price of beef is unbelievable. What if the wheat and/or corn crops fail for whatever reason. I know I sound paranoid but we could be in for some very trying times for folks who don't have the means to grow, harvest, preserve any kind of food.

    Carl in the UP

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    1. Carl - Well I am not sure what the Iowa and Illinois guys are running into right now on out into Pennsylvania. Our little section of Missouri although a highly productive area for farming is small enough what happens here doesn't effect the markets. The bottom land corn farmers are having a bad year of course but the upland guys got in their Wheat rotation early and many of them rotated in some Alfalfa too and have had a bang up year on the well drained fields especially if they have the big hay cutter conditioner type mowers. My neighbor has baled his Alfalfa rotation field three times already and got a huge haul off it. His Wheat is looking so good it's almost falling over from the kernel head weight. If the Mississippi comes out of it's banks though it may really effect the price of corn heavily and therefore meat prices once again.

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    2. I should add though none of my neighbors have gotten in the upland corn, milo or soybeans yet and if it's that way in the neighboring states it could well be as you fear.

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    3. Thanks for taking the time to reply

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  9. Glad Mrs. PP is home and on the mend ! Best wishes in all that you do !

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  10. I am glad the Mrs. is home. We have been getting a lot of very hot weather, but fortunately some heavy rain to keep it from getting too dried out. We had a (very localized) 3-3/4" Thursday, and bits and pieces more since.

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