Update on what we have growing at the Estate

It has been a warm wet summer so far in Michigan. Winter was pretty mild as well which put a lot of things well ahead of their normal schedule. It's a 180 degree shift from last summer where we had near drought conditions for much of June, July and August. For the plants at the Estate, this year has been wonderful. Though, I imagine they would like to see less heavy thunderstorms and more gentle rain. I don't think there has been a full week where it hasn't rained at least a little. The property is green and the plants and trees are all thriving!

Egyptian Wheat - Labrador for Scale

This year, I planted some Egyptian Wheat in the front as a kind of screen from the road. It should grow very tall and give us a little privacy after the leaves fall. I also put some out at the large food plot to act as a screen and a place to put my pop-up blind for deer hunting. With our soil being absolute trash, I was surprised that it is doing as well as it is. It's not growing like it would in good soil, but in our sand, it's holding its own. To say it's inconsistent would be an understatement. There are places where it is nearly 5ft tall and some where it looks like it just emerged from the ground. The tall areas are places where the soil is "better" and the short areas are the straight sand areas. I think it will still do ok and provide us with some screening as intended. Next year, I hope to bring in some better soil to mix in with the disc to promote better growing. For now, I have just fertilized it to give it a boost and get it through the heat of the summer.

Potato plants partially covered by cages to prevent deer damage.

My potatoes are also doing better than last year. I built cages (as seen in previous blog posts) to help keep the deer from eating them to the ground like they did last year. Well, even the plants that didn't get cages aren't doing too bad from deer damage. I think this has to do with the excellent growing conditions for everything else. There is a lot more food available than last year, so they are leaving the potato plants alone-ish. They are still getting nipped at, but not demolished as before. The plants under the cages are doing fantastic! I am hoping to end up with over 100lbs of potatoes this year. I like potatoes because they will grow in just about any soil. Sure, they will do better in richer soil than in the beach sand we have, but I will have potatoes regardless.

Blackberries ripening on the plants

The Estate has wild blackberries growing all over. When I made the large food plot, I left a decent sized patch of them in one corner. This was mostly for us, but I'm sure the wildlife also appreciates it. With all the rain, the berries are really coming! All of the plants are full of berries and they have already started ripening. In a week or so, we should be swimming in blackberries. We also have a good sized red raspberry patch way in the back. It's close to the low ground on the neighbors property and is usually well guarded by mosquitoes about the time the berries are ripe. If you want them, you will pay a tax in blood to the mosquitoes. Usually, we let the animals have these berries. They are also heavy with berries from all the rain and warm weather this summer.

With the rain and warm weather helping the "crops" it also helps the not-so-helpful plants to grow at an amazing rate. I've mentioned before that the Estate is full of Autumn Olive and this very invasive plant also loves the wet weather. I've had to cut back the trails more than once already this year. Most years, I only have to clear the trails at the beginning of summer and again at the end. This summer it seems every time I go up, the trails are getting grown over by Autumn Olive or Virginia Creeper. We've also noticed quite a bit of Poison Ivy starting to show up in the last 2 years. With the weather this year, it has grown very quickly. It is a never-ending battle to keep it under control.

Common Milkweed with Seed Pods

One of the things we are most proud of is our Milkweed stand. We have a lot of Milkweed on the property. In the front of the property, we don't plant anything around the milkweed. I do have the potatoes at the back of the area, but it doesn't interfere with the Milkweed. From what I saw, there will be a ton of seeds this fall which we make available for people who want to start their own milkweed stand. There are lots of seed pods starting to show up, so we are hopeful that means there will be ton of new seeds. We collect some of the pods to extract the seeds. The rest of the milkweed gets plowed under in the fall to get it ready for spring. This has proved to be a great way to keep the stand free of other weeds as well as spread the existing milkweed around the area we want it to grow.

In all, I'm very happy with how things are looking so far. If the weather keeps up and we keep getting rain all summer, the Estate should do well and the deer will have no shortage ot food for the fall/winter.