Samantha 28, Female United States: Share on Facebook Share Twitter

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Chicken Tractors for Sus…

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Growing Gourmet and Medi…

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Haywood County Gardeners

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Samantha's Discussions

Growing Sweet Potatoes in Western NC
4 Replies

Started this discussion. Last reply by ann adkins May 2, 2009.

Shitake and Oyster Mushroom Logs
5 Replies

Started this discussion. Last reply by Samantha Jan 6, 2009.

Winter Gardens
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Started this discussion. Last reply by Ann Oct 21, 2008.

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Chestnut Mountain Farm

Profile Information

Hometown:: Outside Canton, NC

Gardening Experience:: Novice

About Me:: Interested in gourmet mushroom growing, growing very large gardens, tail gate markets, permaculture, growing organic hops for brewing beer, growing grapes for wine and eating. I am growing a very large amount of produce this year

Favorite Plants:: I love them all except multi floral rose, privet, bittersweet, honey suckle, and Japanese Knotweed.

Garden as a hobby?: Yes

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First Dust Bath

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Samantha's Blog

Chicken Tractors Save Money on Fertilizer and Create Better Eggs and Meat

Chicken tractors are movable pens without bottoms. The pens provide shelter and predator protection while allowing the chickens to forage on a new area each day. Sizes of chicken tractors can vary greatly as can their design. Most tractors hold 3-4 chickens on up to 80 broiler chickens. Generally tractors are no larger than 10’ x 12’.

The advantage of chicken tractors to the gardener is a sustainable source of eggs, meat, and nitrogen. Chickens excrete a high percentage of the… Continue

Posted on February 25, 2009 at 8:49am

It's Time to Plant Garlic in the Mountains

October is the month in the mountains to buy some seed garlic and get started with a garlic bed. If you are reading this and live in the piedmont you can get away with planting up through November.

To get started with garlic you must first procure some seed garlic. Garlic from the supermarket is often treated with chemicals to prevent it from…

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Posted on September 29, 2008 at 12:38pm — 3 Comments

June: The Month for Battling the Colorado Potato Beetle

The time of year has come when we are all starting to notice various garden pests attacking the gardens we have so diligently tended. One particularly voracious pest is the Colorado Potato Beetle(Leptinotarsa decemlineata) which an severely damage your potato plants.. The beetle is about a half inch long when mature and black and yellow striped. Larvae are red and have not yet developed a hard shell. I have… Continue

Posted on June 4, 2008 at 5:25pm

Comment Wall (10 comments)

At 9:46pm on May 20, 2008, Polly McDaniel said…: So just how many goats do you have? And what are your plans for the chicks? Eggs, I guess?

At 3:13am on May 29, 2008, Polly McDaniel said…: How are the little chicks coming along?

At 12:00pm on May 29, 2008, Polly McDaniel said…: Oh, this is so fascinating to me! Thanks for the update. I would love it for you to start a regular blog about how it's going down on your farm.

At 12:43am on June 5, 2008, Polly McDaniel said…: You did it, Samantha! I just posted your blog on the front of the site.

At 7:19pm on June 6, 2008, Jim Childreess said…: Samantha,
Many thanks for answering my questions re tomatoe blight. I tried to answer before but had difficulty navigating the threads.
Jim Childress

At 6:28pm on June 24, 2008, Polly McDaniel said…: What's shaking, Samantha? How about a fresh blog post on your garden. The last one was very informative, but general observations about how you're garden is doing are fine as well.

At 11:57am on September 5, 2008, Michael Coyle said…: Hey Samantha,

I'm interested in starting some of the mushrooms you mentioned in the mushroom group. I have no experience with it, but think it would be cool to do.

It would be awesome if you could do a photographic step by step! I'm sure it would get people excited about adding a really cool new aspect to their gardening adventures.

I'm also quite fond of brewing myself. Any favorite recipes?

Cheers,
Michael

At 12:07pm on October 3, 2008, Michael Coyle said…: Right on about posting the grow threads on the shittake & oyster mushrooms. I'm excited to see how that is done.

I'm intrigued by the brew recipes, are the light malt & corn sugar a dry extract or liquid extract? I want to move to kegging myself, but as it stands I've been able to reduce the bottling headache by using the quart sized tecate bottles for my brews. 19 or 20 bottles per 5 gallon batch is pretty easy to muster, and truth be told, it matches my average serving. LOL.

I've done a few brews recently that match the west coast pale recipe, kind of like sierra nevada, but I've augmented the sugars with honey. I really like the result!

At 6:37pm on November 1, 2008, Kaya said…: kaya_faerie@yahoo.com I would like to get a log or two. I live very close to exit 44 on I-40. Do you have a booth at the Asheville tailgate markets?

At 11:22am on February 10, 2009, Polly McDaniel said…: What's shaking, Samantha? Anything cool going on for a blog post? I see your chicken tractor group. I don't have any chickens or a tractor, urban dweller that I am. But maybe some day ...