The year didn’t turn out as expected.
Though it rarely does.
We had a nice, long spring this year and were able to get a good bit of gardening work done. We mulched and planted the grocery row garden beds, pruned trees, and planted lots of watermelons, potatoes, yams, corn and pumpkins. It was a very good spring until I got sick. I was out of commission for a week, then got better for a little over a week, then was down for a second week. Bad headache, hallucinatory feelings, aches all over. etc. The second time I got sick I also got a terrible earache, and ended up having to take a long round of antibiotics. For a while, I could hardly hear out of one ear.
It doesn’t hurt anymore, but still feels weird and clicks when I move my jaw. Like it’s trying to equalize pressure but every time it pops, the pressure just comes back.
But that’s enough about weird medical issues.
The two spring sicknesses negatively impacted some of our gardening plans, especially the planting of sweet potatoes. We had lots ready to plant, but life got away from us.
That said, the corn field was great, and the watermelons were even better.
Before I cover the final yields this year, let’s look at how we did fulfilling our goals.
2025 Goals: How Did We Do?
- Finish Alabama Survival Gardening
Yes, sort of. I finished my half of it and gave the book to Noah Sanders to complete.
- Finish The Good Guide to Food Forests
No. A good chunk of it is finished, but it’s not done.
- Get a tiller for the tractor
Yes.
- Get a bed-maker/hiller for the tractor
Yes.
- Get a grapple for the Bobcat
Yes, but the grapple had a hydraulic issue with it and I returned it, then decided not to buy another.
- Set up the cane mill
No. A friend and I were working on it but it got sidelined. We cleaned up all the parts inside and it just needs to be put back together and set up.
- Get a cane boiling pot
No luck yet.
- Make our own cane syrup
Nope.
- Plant a patch of sorghum and make sorghum syrup
Nope.
- Plant a good patch of corn
Yes. We did a good patch. The yields weren’t amazing, but the mix of colors was interesting.
- Grow a large patch of ube yams
Sort of. We planted a somewhat larger patch, but we lost quite a bit of the ube we planted in 2024 (which was still sleeping in the ground when I wrote my goal). In January of this year, we had a snow and some very cold nights that rotted much of our ube. Previously, it had overwintered in the soil. This year, it didn’t do that well. Much of it turned to mush.
- Do better at growing potatoes
No. We did worse, despite planting a lot more and trying to do it right.
- Put in a large row-crop area with the tractor
Yes. Large rows of corn, pumpkins, yams, melons and potatoes were all put in easily thanks to the new tiller on the tractor.
- Plant the death hedge
No. We keep missing opportunities.
- Expand the pastures
No. We started to do this, then got too busy in spring. Later in the year, we sold the cows to buy our new Farm and Garden store – but I’m getting ahead of myself.
- Grow 5,000lbs of food
- Build a better chicken coop
No.
- Get Leghorn chickens
Nope.
- Add at least 20 cold-hardy citrus to the homestead
No. This plan was also put aside due to our record snow and cold in January. Full-grown Satsumas across our area were killed. There are few citrus that can take a foot of snow and 11-degree cold.
- Plant some modern pecan varieties
No, didn’t manage it yet.
- Eliminate popcorn trees from the woods
No. They keep coming back. We removed quite a few with the Bobcat but they grow back from the roots. It seems a nasty herbicide is required.
- Plant papaya trees in the ground in the nursery
No, but we did plant bananas, and they look great.
- Grow enough green beans to freeze for the year
No.
- Grow enough tomatoes to make all our own sauce
No. We experimented with some heirloom varieties this year instead of the Romas we planted the previous year. Bad idea! Though we planted more plants, the yields were much worse.
- Make Steve’s mix again and balance our garden minerals
Yes. We did this, though we haven’t done a new soil test to see where we are.
- Grow out the Grenada Black Pumpkin to start stabilizing it
Yes. We did, but it had crossed with Seminole pumpkins and gave us… ZOMBIE PUMPKINS. Happy accidents. They taste great.
- Grow 1000lbs of watermelon
Yes. We beat this handily. When we get to the totals section, you’ll see by how much.
Reaching 8 out of 27 goals ain’t bad. It’s better than 0 out of 27.
Of course, some of these goals got sidelined because…
We Bought a Store
With AI junk taking over the internet, decreasing literacy, and decay in YouTube revenue, I was praying for a new job.
One came along when we got the chance to buy Atmore Farm & Garden in Atmore, Alabama.
The negotiation and planning on the store started in early June. As I posted in the Survival Gardener Skool group on June 14th:
“I was offered the chance to buy a “farm and garden” store near us. We are looking into it.
Total Yields: 2954lbs
YouTube, the Blog and our Skool group
