Daily Treat

Some days I feel like a zoo keeper. On a daily basis I take a big bowl back to the garden and pile it up with the more questionable tomatoes (you know, the ones with the big holes in them or are getting a bit too shriveled up), along with some bell peppers and squash. I then take a plastic bag out to the walnut grove and fill it up with mulberry leaves from a sapling that is growing alongside a walnut tree. I'll add a few dandelion leaves to the bag. I bring this all in and wash it and then get to work chopping. What I have left is three bowls destined for three very different species.

Today the chickens look forward to their head of lettuce, tomato and cup of day old yogurt. The goats will dine on cut up old cucumbers, tomatoes and a bruised apple.  The tortoises get a bowl of mulberry leaves, dandelions and mixed baby greens. This is just a treat for the chickens and goats, they get their daily rations in the mornings and evenings along with prairie hay. The tortoises get their greens along with timothy hay. I've been trying very hard to make sure nothing goes to waste around here. Before I throw away any food I decide whether it could go to any of the animals. The chickens can take care of almost any scrap food. Lately they have been stuffing themselves on melon rinds from the melons in the garden.

The garden has been giving me enough produce for our family along with a nice daily treat for the animals, it's been nice. I forgot how much the dogs like the garden too. Every day I let Cody and Sophie out to roam the back yard and every day Cody runs back to the garden and plucks the biggest patty pan squash he can find and runs up to the house to devour it in the shade. He is one goofy retriever. Sophie usually joins in at some point.