A stroll Through the Gardens of South Pork Ranch...bring your rubbers.

My blog friend, I call him "Rare" was gracious enough to show me his English garden (Ya know 'cause he lives in England) via his blog several days ago.  http://rarelesserspotted.blogspot.com/2011/06/my-second-living-room.html   All I had to do was ask ! So now I must return the favor and show him our very Non-English Garden, although after seeing his I am dying for some order in mine. It used to have order. When I worked full time as a hospice director, my evenings and weekends were often spent in the garden. I had enough time to even keep ridiculous flowery notebooks about my gardens. Can you imagine ?

Now, I'm lucky to buy a pack of seeds, tear it open with my teeth and broadcast it in the yard hoping they will find a little dirt and grow something...anything. But soon, we hope to be able to get back to those things that give us pleasure. Have I mentioned lately our farm is for sale ?

So here it is. The Gardens of South Pork Ranch. Lets start off the veranda shall we ? As one steps out the front door and out onto our chipped, red painted porch you will see

a hail storm. See the little white specks ? Yeah hail at 0700 in the ridiculous am. In the top right corner are three rose bushes and two lily patches. You will not see any mulch. Never got around to that this year. If you look to the left you will see

more rain and to the left of center between the trees is our large hogcienda. This 3 sided abode houses 5
sows and one boar, Mad Max. They also have several acres around the house where they can come and go at will. On a clear summer's eve, if we are lucky, we can witness hog breeding, allowing us to dash into the hose and jot the date on our high tech piece of poster board.

Continuing left around the house you will see

an entirely different day ! The two fine young men in a heated game of horseshoes (it was very hot that day) are oldest son Colton on the right and youngest son Kyle on the left. Behind them through the overgrowth of untrimmed trees and carefully cultivated weeds you'll notice the barn red color of the red horse barn.

OK, I have lost the patience needed to find photos I've taken in my Kodak Photo Folders and put them in order as if I was really walking around tour like. So random yard photos it is. This next building is my favorite. A tiny brick garage that we believe was built when our home was,in 1895.

In front of it two raised beds. One filled with herbs and the other with salad items like lettuces and onions. They are my only planted vegetable garden this year. The red plastic container to the left is the gas can which is always out because I am always mowing or haven't you heard ? The back of that little cottage looks like this

Looking at this I am reminded how mush I love this shady venue. Why haven't I put a chair and table out here and taken more time to read a book or sip a mint Julep? Most likely because I am not found of mint

Dashing around to the way back yard is our largest barn, the "cow barn" which houses our dairy herd when shelter is needed (they are on pasture 90% of the day) or milking must be done. It also shelters  chickens, ducks, more hogs, dogs, whatever. Our 3 GK's and herd dog Fannie are very busy trying to round up those dang piglets who are loose AGAIN. Only if I greased those piglets ,could this event be any more fun.

Our little chicken house is directly off the back door making it convenient for snatching a few eggs for breakfast. Built by Keith and our sons it is one sturdy egg mobile. Behind it are the fields we went for pasture.

The chicken house also doubles as a  duck manor.

Abandoned by their mother several weeks ago and hand fed after that, these 3 Daffy's had no problem getting in view for their close ups. I was lucky I didn't lose an eye close as I was. See the grain flying out of the mouth of duck number one? Yup, I was close all right.

So enough. I'll end the walk with the front of the house which looked grand a couple of weeks ago when the roses were in full bloom and the weeds were still slightly behind.

Have I mentioned our certified organic farm is for sale ? I can't remember. Yes the mower is included in the sale as are the ducks.