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I'm rather cranky at the time shift, and ended up sitting in bed listing out the plants i want for the orchard, checking on vendors and wishing. Blackberries are amazing these days: cultivars have been developed that make it pretty easy to grow. There are so many cultivars! So, i've made tables of cultivars for blue and black berries, sorting through a variety of characteristics to get an idea of what i would want to grow.

We had finally measured one stretch of future fencing, and so now the area is significantly larger on Google maps. It's going to be over a third of an acre. I go back and forth over worrying about it still being too shady for an orchard to worrying about the impact on the cooling bill from getting rid of the shade.

I didn't really do too much else yesterday. I didn't make it to Meeting, sulking about the time change and loosing myself in the distinctions of floricane and primocane fruiting blackberries.

What will i do with too much of a good thing? I suppose take them to family and Meeting to share. I've never bought fruit leathers, but i think i would enjoy them. It's hard to imagine too much, but there was a point last year with the yellow summer squash, but powdery mildew set in and saved me. I'm sure something will eat the berries if there's an abundance.

The smart watch has made it through its first week with much appreciation for the activity monitoring and coaching. Every hour or so it prompts for some movement, counting the reps of "torso twists" or other simple exercise and vibrating when the five are done. If i ignore the prompt, it vibrates when i next get up from the desk to celebrate my being "active" again. I wish there was a bit more programming i could do with it to help prompt some other behaviors. There are ankle strengthening stretches i'd like to be reminded to do.

Amazon brought a new strap for the watch, designed to hold in place with a powerful magnet. I can't decide if i miss the days when holding a magnet to the monitor would make it get all distorted. I keep wondering if i'm going to ruin some piece of tech with the magnet on my wrist.

Also from Amazon, suspenders. I want to wear baggy jeans while working outside; now it's much more convenient. Yay. I wore the suspenders Saturday afternoon as i cleared up behind Christine felling trees, and they worked well. We worked through an area the goats did not get to a year and a half a go. I continue to believe the chunk of change spent on those critters and their handlers was a good idea.

This manual work we are doing is slow and time consuming, but it lets us know the land. I transplanted three ferns - ebony spleeneworts - and mosses to the shaded part of the drive island from the orchard to be area, as well as other moss transplants. I need to move some of the tiny rattlesnake plantain orchids as well. This rescuing wouldn't have been possible without being gentle with the clearing. The orchard is going to be a bit of an invasive footprint -- wait, NO. The apples and figs aren't native, and the chestnuts maybe native-Asian hybrid, but mostly these are native fruits and berries. I might, if i ever get down to the end of the list, get hybrid hazelnuts and a hybrid mulberry (mainly because i haven't found a native mulberry vendor). Ah, the blackberries probably have some global genetic ancestry. OK, the orchard is a cultivated footprint, and i'll feel better knowing that i rescued as many wild natives as i could. (At this point i think uncharitable things about sweetgum trees and ponder that the only niche thing to say is that they probably choke out tree of heaven.)


( Orchard plans )