A posse ad esse

Small minds just don't get it...

2011-08-26T22:29:00.020-06:00

I refused to believe that I lived in that sort of neighborhood. That's really what it was... I just plain refused to believe it. All the signs were there - every home was, more or less, a copy of the one on either side of it. With their concrete curbing painting toothpaste like lines around very generic landscaping, a couple of decorative rocks on the grade up to the doorstep and the obligatory flowering pear trees in the mow strip. Lawns of the best turf grass that modern agricultural science can buy paint green in between the neat lines of the sidewalk, the white (don't go crazy with any of those WILD colors like beige...) vinyl fences and the obligatory side yard concrete garden for planting unused "must-haves" such as RV's and four wheelers. And yet I somehow still didn't believe that this was the type of neighborhood that could house people that would plain out just despise us for not fitting into their mould. Well, I was wrong.

Yesterday afternoon we found a neat and tidy little note left taped to our next-door neighbors bedroom window facing our house especially for us to read.
It probably should have made our mouths drop open, but it didn't. Not because we understood their position by any means, more to the fact that it didn't surprise us that these people would do something so frickin chicken shit as leave a sign up rather than to come over and talk with us.

Now, first things first, I don't necessarily mind the term hillbilly because, with a wife from the hills of West (by God) Virginia I have come to know many hillbillies rather intimately and they are among the finest people I've had the pleasure of knowing. My dear wife however does point out that she prefers the term Appalachian American particularly when Hillbilly is being used in the pejorative.

The light to which our neighbor refers is really a non-issue as well, let me explain. We have a back door to our garage that is far from any room of our house that an intruder or burglar could easily use to get access to the rest of our home. After having our car broken into right in our driveway, we made sure to have a light on above our back door as well. It's a safety issue that we are not willing to stop. We've explained to our neighbors that we are sorry, but we're not willing to risk having a secluded entry to our house unlit through the night.

The greater part of this was referencing our "white trash yard". Despite desires to expand our little "homescale farm" into our front yard we have opted to play along. By that I mean that we have maintained the "little boxes made of ticky tacky" appearance for the most part in our front yard as well.

So I could only assume it is to our backyard that they were referring. That and/or our side yard garden where we grow different crops from one year to the next. I was right.

My wife went over to talk with Neighbor "A" about this sign and was told that they just can't stand having to look at our yard. My wife was curious as to why of course and that's when we got the picture loud and clear: because we are different. Of course they didn't come out and say it in as many words, but it was damn near from what I understand. They were simply incredulous that would have the gall to grow corn in our front side yard
I really like it there honestly... and this is the worst it looked all year. We had been gone for a week and then I had surgery and was forbidden from working in the garden for another week and a half so there were some weeds, but really it is well kept up, it's just the fact that we grow food. Can you even believe that? They literally said, "Why can't you just be like everybody else? You shouldn't have moved to this neighborhood if you wanted to live this way!" By "this way" I take them to mean keeping chickens and raising 800+ pounds of food from my gardens. To them it makes me and my family white trash to use our private property to grow and support ourselves with organic fresh foods from a backyard garden. If that's the case I can live with it.

The disappointing part really, is not so much that these people don't like us, they're arrogant asses, I don't really care. What surprises and disappoints me is that apparently they've been going around and commiserating with a number of our other neighbors and it's almost unanimous that we are trashing up their neighborhood with our gardens and our crazy out of the box thinking!! I just refused to believe the stories about neighborhoods that were so close minded that a person was ridiculed for taking care of his family or daring to rely more on their own efforts.

So far the list of complaints as we understand them are our corn, our sunflowers (yes, they can't stand seeing the sunflowers in our yard and hate that they attract bees - isn't that kind of the point??), our gardens and our clothes line. All of which besides the corn are behind a 6 foot solid fence?!

It sucks to be surrounded by people that just don't get what we're all about, but then again they've never tried to get to know us either. It won't deter us though, we'll still keep on with our way of living and probably even expand it.
Say? How do you think they're going to feel about the two beehives we're planning on adding next year??

Take care all, keep growing your own and marching to your own beat!
P~

Imprelis lawn herbicide WARNING

2011-07-21T00:15:00.005-06:00

Hi all,
Sorry I've been so "off the grid" as of late. I've been working hard both in the garden and out of it. I received a Warning Notification today from my friends at Mother Earth news and wanted to make sure to pass it on as soon as possible.
Following is an excerpt from the letter that I received from them:

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We at Mother Earth News want to let you and A Posse Ad Esse readers know about yet another dangerous discovery for gardens and lawns: Imprelis herbicide in treated grass clippings. This new herbicide from DuPont is designed for use on cool-season grass, but its effects have been seen in the garden and on trees throughout the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic states. (We hope it doesn’t make its way out to Utah, but just in case…)

Here’s what we know:
• DuPont warns that grass clippings from lawns treated with Imprelis should not be used for mulch or composting.
• Conifer trees near lawns treated with Imprelis, especially Norway spruce and white pines, have shown signs of damage after Imprelis was used. Signs include brown and curled growth.
• Damage has been reported in Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Iowa, Kansas, Indiana, Nebraska, Wisconsin and Delaware.
• Applicators are supposed to inform residents and property owners of the dangers this herbicide poses and warn them not to use clippings for mulch or compost.
• DuPont recently sent a letter asking applicators to spray well away from the root zone of trees and shrubs and to make sure no drift or runoff could impact those ornamentals.

If you suspect that your trees or garden plants have damage from Imprelis, please get them tested through your local Extension service. They may also have tips to minimize damage.

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I hope none of you have had any problems with this product... I suspect many of you are organic or at least are proactive in knowing what you are putting on your lawns. Either way, it's good to get the information out there.

Thanks for stopping by... Stay tuned early next month for some new NEWS and a fun new project I have to share with you.

Till then. Happy Gardening!!
P~

Asparagus - pickles and soup

2011-06-02T10:00:00.002-06:00

We made another trip to the U-Pick-It farm to pick another 10 pounds of asparagus. This time we decided we wanted to make a few quarts of pickled asparagus spears to enjoy later this year. Our kids LOVE them!

The first thing we did was to measure and cut the asparagus spears. We did this by figuring out how long we needed them to be to fit the jar, with the proper head spacing, and made a mark with permanent marker on our processing cutting board. This makes it a little easier to cut through a bunch of them quickly.

While we boiled our brine which we used this recipe for, we blanched and placed out asparagus spears into the jars with spices, an onion slice and a wedge of jalapeno.

After water bath canning for the proper amount of time (see your local Extension Service Office for your local canning times it can vary by elevation.) we were left with a beautiful little treat for later this year. Can you believe the color? The tips turned a reddish tint from the spices I assume.

But what did we do with all those ends that we cut off??? Some of them were a few inches long. That would be one heck of a waste wouldn't it?

Never fear, they were run through our food processor for a few seconds to prep them for another spring treat. Asparagus soup. This was a first try for us, but I have to say, the result was ... soooooo good!

After some onion and a little garlic were sweated in the pot in some butter; sorry I don't have the recipe, A~ was cooking I was making cheese... Anyway, the asparagus was added along with some stock and boiled for a little while. It was surprisingly quick.

After adding some cream and slow simmering for a bit, the soup was nearly finished. All we had left to do was to run it through a seive to remove the woody parts that were remaining. Remember, this soup is being made of the leftover stalks from our pickles.

And voila... after seiving, and adding a few drops of good Extra Virgin Olive oil and pepper, this soup was done, served and devoured!

Waste not want not. Our frugal ways yielded us a really tasty treat in this soup. I encourage you to search online, find a simple recipe that will allow you to just enjoy the flavor of the asparagus and go for it!
The rest of the meal was great too... this was just our "first course".
Till next time.
P~

Freezing Fresh Asparagus

2011-05-31T23:00:00.001-06:00

We recently decided to make a trip around the corner (Not literally, but darn near...) to our local U-pick-it farm, Day Farms in West Layton, UT to pick ourselves a few pounds of fresh asparagus to put up for this year.

Of course we always eat some of it fresh in the spring as well, but asparagus is one of those very short season crops that we really enjoy having at other times of the year. We can either pay the price, both in dollars and in "food miles", to get it all year long, or we can take a little bit of time when that crop is in season here to not only enjoy it fresh but put some up for later. So that's what that afternoon was about.

After the trip to the farm, where we picked six pounds of asparagus - which cost us a mere $9.00 by the way - we brought it home and immediately soaked it in cool water to let any dirt fall from it and to make sure the spears stayed fully hydrated and crisp while we prepped for freezing them.

The first thing we did was to prep a few pound at a time by trimming off the ends of the shoots. After that we needed to blanch the asparagus in a boiling water bath.

NOTE: If your processing quite a few pounds of asparagus, or any other food for that matter, it can be tempting to try to use a big pot and do a lot at one time. Don't. You'll cool the water off too much and won't get a good blanch. Also, it's easier to work with smaller batches, a pound or two max, at a time.

Blanch your spears of asparagus for between two and four minutes depending on the thickness; ours were all a medium size so we went for two minutes.

After the blanch, you'll need to immediately place them into a cold ice bath to shock them and stop the cooking immediately. Leave them in here for a few minutes until they are completely cool. Usually the time between batches is perfect.

This next step isn't necessarily "in the book" but it's one we took anyway. We laid the spears out on a wire rack to let then drop dry a little. Isn't the color Amazing?! The reason we took this step was because we will be freezing them and excess water will only add ice and too much ice can cause damage to the end product.

After they've dried a bit, we laid them out on a parchment lined cookie sheet in one layer and placed them in the freezer. We've found that it's better to freeze our vegetables this way rather than to bag them first and then freeze because it sort of coats the product in an individual ice shield and allows you to remove what you need later one at a time rather than having one big lump of whatever it is.

After the spears are just frozen through, we separated them out into individual spears and vac-packed them in our new kitchen tool for this year. (We allow ourselves one handy time saver or food prep item per year generally.) We packed them in to groups of 30/pk to allow for five so per family member per meal and a possibility of a couple of left overs for lunch for me the next day.

We packed up 8 or 9 bags of these and will probably try for some more this weekend. Of course, there's other things to do with asparagus too... like pickles and soup...
Stay tuned!

P~

Rainy day musing

2011-05-24T10:55:00.001-06:00

The weather this spring in Utah has been the wettest on record, cooler than usual and seems to just keep going on and on... It's easy, as a gardener, to get disgruntled and wish for the warm summer weather, and for the sake of our farmers I guess I do. I thought it wouldn't hurt though to just kind of accept it for today. It will move on when it's time to move on whether we like it or not. Such is life.
For my gardener freinds:

Rain falls gently on hail beaten earth.
Gardens rise slow in the long, cool spring.
Relish the moment,
blistering summer will shock us awake soon.

P~

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UT Natural Meat

2011-05-18T21:28:00.008-06:00

Last Friday afternoon A~ and I needed to head into Salt Lake for some errands and scheduled a part of the trip to stop by what turns out to be one of our areas only small farms that sells locally raised pastured meat in smaller quantities.

As we spent some time earlier this year tring to find as good source for better quality, more sustainable meat, I thought we were in luck with our local butchers. Wrong! Dons meats, the one in Syracuse at least, was a total flake. He told me that they would be able to order meat in for me from a local producer and that he also brought it in from time to time to just be able to sell it. I've checked with him a number of times, and told him what we'd like to buy but never managed to have him have any on stock but for the first time I was in there. I wonder if I wasn't duped that time and just told it was local.

Of course there's really only one way to make ABSOLUTELY sure that the meat you get is actually a locally grown and pastured product. Go to the farm! So we did.

UT Natural Meat is located on the WEST side off the valley on a pretty modest piece of land, no sprawling pastoral hills our anything like that, but they're average people that care about their animals and about the food that they will one day bring to their and their customers tables.

We had a great time at the farm talking with Kristen and briefly with her husband Shayne in between his caring for a sow pig that had just birthed the night before. It was readily apparent to both of us that they are very interested in making their small farm a local source for grass-fed, hormone free meats. She even had a table full of all the "required reading" for any aspiring localvore like _Omnivores Dillema_, _Everything I want to Do is Illegal_ and videos like Food inc for example.

No doubt though, one of the best parts of the day was getting to see the piglets prancing around their spacious new digs. This is the part of visiting and making an effort to get to know the people that produce your food that cannot be beaten.

At the end of the day, we brought home a couple of Corriante (a heritage breed of cattle) beef roasts, some ground beef for the periodic recipies that we use it in, and a few packages of pork chops. It wasn't a huge order, but that was part of our attraction to this farm. We wanted to get a good sample of what the product that they offer is like without having to invest hundreds of dollars in it. The other reason was that we really don't eat a ton of beef or pork at our house. A~ is largely vegetarian and our kids are picky about meat. Mostly because they don't like the heavily fatted nature of traditional meat. Hopefully this will help with that too.

If your in the General Salt Lake City area, I definitely recommend you check out UT Natural meat. Very Nice people running a small operation and trying to make a good go of it. As for the product, I have great hopes but have not yet had opportunity to cook any. As soon as I do trust me you'll be first to know!
Local First..
P~

Growing healthy soil with a pitchfork.

2011-05-08T23:31:00.023-06:00

When we go about building the soil in our gardens, it's easy to think that we can just add amendments, till really well and fertilize as needed; that's been much of the standard thinking for many many years. It will grow plants, and it does work. The problem is that in our changing world, and by changing world I mean increasing fuel and food costs not to mention the increasing price of those very fertilizers and amendments we've depended on as demand for them increases, that same way of gardening will, and is, beginning to yield diminishing returns on the bottom line.

The way I like to combat this is to spend a good deal of my early season time in my garden working on "Growing my Soil" before I work on growing my plants and my main weapon is to add lots and lots of organic material throughout the year, and primarily in the fall. The complimentary component to adding to the beds in the fall, is turning those beds over in the spring.

This gives a pretty good idea of what I'm talking about. In the foreground you can see the remains of the broken down grass,leaves and compost that was added last fall and some earlier this spring (About a month and a half ago.) and the rich soil laying underneath it after it's been turned with my trusty pitchfork. You might think immediately, "How does laying a bunch of layers of organic material over the top of your bed help the soil underneath it?" but I have another secret weapon that helps me to drag all that organic goodness down into the soil...

Worms... and lots of them! Where there is lots of organic material, there will be lots of worms, it's just a matter of fact. And keep in mind, I added this garden bed as a "lasagna garden" only two seasons ago, prior to that there was nothing here but some unhealthy grass. As earthworms feed many species move to the surface to have access to the rich matter found there. A they burrow back down into the soil they bring some of that material with them. They also excrete their castings (manure) into the soil, something often called black gold for it's nutrient rich qualities. A study by the New Mexico Extension Service found that earthworm castings" often contain 5-11 times more nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium as the surrounding soils"

In addition to helping to incorporate nutrients into the soil, worms also serve a valuable purpose in helping to aerate the soil as well. If you look at the picture above, you can see one of the larger worm tunnels bored right through the soil. This helps to connect the sub-surface parts of the garden bed to the air above and bring needed air to the roots of the developing plants. It also makes for great little waterways for moisture to make its way deeper into the soil. Nurturing this web-of-life in your garden beds is a fundamental idea behind organic gardening and is one of the most effective ways of moving beyond chemical additives and fertilizers. Besides, it's cheap!

OK, so you get that I love my gardens earthworms right, but surely there must be more to turning the garden over that just turning in organic material and finding lots of worms? Definitely.

By taking the time to physically turn my soil over, I have a one on one opportunity, so to speak, to take a look at the garden in general. One of the things I am able to take care of at that time is to find weed stock below the surface and remove them before they become a problem. The photo above looks like just a single stray root under the soil.

After breaking up the soil though, I found it to be a network of rhizomous roots from our most noxious local weed, Field Bind Weed. These roots, as you can tell if you look closely at their tips, will throw off tens of side shoots and more rootstock that I'll have to deal with later. Now's the best time to take care of it.

The finished garden bed after being turned over with a fork. Much like discing a field, the soil has been turned and incorporated with itself and is ready for any tillage that it might need.

And finally, the tilled garden bed, ready for planting. It might look like I didn't till it well enough but I left it a bit chunky on purpose. When you till a garden, or a field for that matter, you don't want to till it to the point that it looks like soft fluffy potting soil with no real character to it. Doing that will, over time, break down what is called the "tilth" of the soil, which is to say its actual structure. If you picture a glass of sand, you can imagine how there is very little air space between the grains, that's because the grains are so small. The extreme example of that idea is clay, which has particles so small that they bond almost at a molecular level which is what makes it so hard to work with. Now imagine a glass of various sized pieces of soil; there's a lot more room for air, water and roots to move through it. That's the idea here. Besides, most of the rock looking objects in this photo are actually just dried soil clods that will, after watering and mulching, soften and break back down into the bed. Also, I wouldn't want to go overboard and drive off or kill off all those lovely little helpers I have in the garden beds would I?

Best of luck working your gardens this season and remember, "Grow the soil and the plants will come!"

Paul~

Last minute hail protection

2011-04-25T23:43:00.004-06:00

We knew we had a storm rolling in tonight, but as it came in it had all the signs of one that might bring a bit of hail. And it did. For some last minute protection from possible damage to our still tender plants in our garden I called into use some of my stock - my wife would say overstock - of pots.

There's also some glass figurine covers that I picked up at a thrift stores for a few cents a couple of years ago.
I placed these over the plants literally as the storm blew in and was immediately glad I did.

A few minutes later the hail arrived. It wasn't a tremendous downpour but the weather forecast for the next 36 hrs is very unsettled and may include more hail and snow so I'll leave these on just to be safe.
Just some of the things that need to be taken care of in the backyard farm.

Any of you have any other creative ways you like to keep your "babies" safe in inclement weather? Share them in the comments section to help us all out and give us ideas.
P~

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Preparing to plant potatoes

2011-04-13T23:53:00.001-06:00

Recently, I dropped by our local nursery to pick up a few additional items that we needed to have. One of those items was another five pounds of Yukon Gold potatoes.

While we were sorting through the 'taters, an older couple was there looking to get some as well and asked us if we'd ever grown them. I was actually pretty shocked, after we said "yes, many times", when they asked us, "what are tubers?" (The sign on the display referenced tubers) I guess I shouldn't be... shocked that is... but I was. I guess our disconnect from our food has been going on longer than I had imagined. We talked to then for a little while, giving them a basic primer in potato growing 101, and went our separate ways. It got me to thinking that this may be a really good time to go over some of the basics of growing potatoes. I Usually have my potatoes in the ground around St Patrick's Day, but this year it's been so rainy and wet - Locally our watershed levels are averaging around 160%-170% of our normal level - that I haven't been able to get them into the ground. I probably could have squeezed them in at some point, but I think I would have suffered from a lot of rot if I had.

First of all, the potatoes themselves are the tubers; and tubers are "...various types of modified plant structures that are enlarged to store nutrients. They are used by plants to survive the winter or dry months and provide energy and nutrients for regrowth during the next growing season..." (wikipedia). Just needed to get that straight from the start.

Potato's are plants in the solanaceae family. That makes them cousins with plants like Tomatoes, Peppers and Eggplants. If you think about the way that those plants bear fruit, you'll have a pretty good idea of the way that potatoes bear their tubers as well. Many folks think that potatoes grow from the roots of the plant, an understandable thing considering the photo above, it does look like they've grown from the roots, But take a look at this photo:

You can see the seed potato that was placed in the ground and can clearly see that the small potatoes are growing from the stem ABOVE the planted potato. Think again about tomatoes... if you pay attention to them they actually grow from a small stem that grows from the main stem. Potatoes are the same, except that they only grow on the stem that is underground. Because of that, they are planted a little differently.

This might look a lot like how you would lay out any other plant before putting it in the ground. The difference here is that I'm not going to plant them into the hills, but rather will bury them a couple of inches under the soil at the bottom of the furrows. I lay the potatoes out so I know how many I can fit in a row, then dig them in and leave them alone. Potatoes don't need to be watered in because the tuber itself is mostly water itself and is designed by mother nature to support this plant as it gets itself established. I let my potatoes grow until they are nearly a foot tall before I ever irrigate them. The spring rains take care of that for me. After the Potato plants have grown up enough to be five or six inches above the ground, I will then rake or hoe the soil from the hills over and onto the plant itself. After this, I let the plant grow further. When it's another five or six inches above ground level again, I will hoe the soil up onto the plant again leaving furrows between the plants that I will flood irrigate once or twice a week.

As the weather turns hotter and the plants are getting taller, I want to keep mounding over the plants as much as possible, and mulching to keep the moisture level steady and weeds down. Grass clippings work great for this. The reason, in case you were wondering, why I keep mounding soil and mulch over the plants is because, as I said, the actual potatoes grow from the stems above the seed potato, but only where it's covered. I want to make sure that there's as much stem underground as possible when the potatoes are growing. So, the long and the short of it is that with a little understanding about the way that potatoes grow and some of the ways that you can coax them along and get great returns for yourself.

Best of luck with your tater growing!

Paul~

I feel the need the need for MEAD!

2011-04-03T23:59:00.006-06:00

OK OK, I stole that line from a t-shirt idea that was batted around today at my mead making class, but really.. I do feel the need to make some MEAD! From what I learned today, mead, being one of the worlds oldest fermented beverages, is also one of the easiest wines to make.

It stands to reason that it would be when you think about it considering that it was made, almost simultaneously by the Norse, the Egyptians and the Celts throughout history. They didn't have modern tools and sanitation ability like we do and were able make mead quite easily. Also honey, whick in case you aren't in the know about mead, is the base fermentable sugar in the mead, was one of the few available sugars throughout history.

After spending nearly an hour talking "Mead Theory" with the instructor, we got down to it. The mead that we were to make was of course honey based, but also had added in bartlett pears that would increase the fermentable sugars available, while also adding a slight flavor to the mead, and a certain bouquet in the final product.

The Honey and water wort (The base of the recipe)

After mixing the FIFTEEN pounds of honey into water to begin disolving it, the pears and more water were boiled to break down the cell walls and release the flavors and also to kill off any potentially competing yeasts or bacterias. We want to control the yeasts that will go into the mix so this is an important step. While we milled and added the pears to the wort (The base of the mead.) we began to heat another pot of water with other additives that will affect the mead formation in different ways. Peppermint tea, gypsum (yes the stone) and black tea amongst them. This was brought to a boil and was then added to the wort as well.

The "additives" like irish moss, gypsum and spearmint tea...

After everything was added to the wort and it had been stirred vigorously to fully dissolve the honey and incorporate all the additives evenly through the mixture as well as to aid in lowering the temperature to verynear to room temperature, we learned how to "pitch the yeast". Pitching the yeast is much like proofing yeast before adding it to a bread recipe. A cup or so of the luke warm wort was placed in a separate bowl and the yeast was added to this. It was gently stirred into the wort and left to sit and bloom. And bloom it did. After 15 minutes the pitched yeast looked like a bowl of porridge.

Adding the pears for sugar and bouquet. (If you're going to learn to make mead, you should of course learn from a man with celtic knots on his arms yes?)

We had to stop there unfortunately because of legal reasons surrounding the manufacturing laws for alchoholic beverage or some odd thing, but the last steps were simply to stir in the yeast to the full bucket of wort, add a fermentation lock and wait...

All in all I would say that it lived up to its reputation for being a very easy brew to make. If you've not had mead, it is typically a golden-hued wine with a honey sweetness and slight dryness, depending on the recipe. It can be very mild on the finish or can have a strong back-end almost like a distilled spirit. Any way you can get it though, it is very tasty. I look forward to making some this year, and with any luck, getting some bees next year to provide me my own honey to make it with!

Best till next time all.
Paul~

Union Station Fermentation

2011-03-31T00:17:00.001-06:00

After our aforementioned cheese class, A~ and I went down town, Ogden that is, to check out a new store that we had just learned about, the Union Station Fermentation store. While there, we had an opportunity to speak with one of the owners, Nigel; a very cool guy. You may remember back some time when I had my little Mr. Beer home brewing experiment. I was very happy with those results and have decided that this year I will be stepping up my home brewing game to include using fresh hops (Which we'll also be trying to grow in the garden this year as well.), partial mash and really trying to get some good brew going... but I digress. I, along with everyone else in the "north counties", needed to either drive to Richmond (1hr north) or Salt Lake City (1/2 hr south) in order to get their beer making supplies; but no more. Here's the other great thing, they don't just supply products for home beer and wine making, they also have kits and equipment for the home cheese maker. In fact, that's how we learned about them in the first place, through our cheese making class instructor. They carry cheese molds, cultures, wax and other such cheese making stuff. This will come in handy at some point this year when we try to make some actual hard cheese. This weekend however, I'll get to participate in another of their offerings... classes. I'm scheduled to attend a class there on Saturday to learn about making mead. Yep, you heard that right, the ancient honey based liqueur of the Celts and my own personal ancestors... the Vikings! This will be information that I'll add to my knowledge base to keep for future use when we finally put our plans into action to keep bees. They also offer classes periodically on cheese making and both beginning and advanced beer making. I intend to do as many of them as I can. The long and short of it is that the Fermentation Station seems to be the kind of place that we'll be spending a lot of time at in the foreseeable future. If you're in the Northern Utah area and are at all interested in any of the things I've talked about here give them a check out. Here's their contact information:

Union Station Fermentation 274 25th St Ogden, UT 84401 (801) 392-9772

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Cheese making at home

2011-03-30T00:13:00.001-06:00

A~ and I took an opportunity to attend a cheese making class the weekend before last and had a great time. If you're following me on Facebook you may remember me posting something about it. (If you're not, don't delay, I'm making an effort to get more regular posts up there in a timely manner.) Well we had a great time.

Demonstrating the process of making mozzarella

The class was being taught by a man that started one of our very favorite local cheese companies, Beehive Cheese, and was covering the obvious first timer cheese of choice, mozzarella. This was perfectly fine with us since, with summer knocking on the door, we wanted to get a few tricks as to how to make this family favorite so we could add it to our repertoire to enjoy with fresh garden tomatoes this year. The class covered the basics of course, but we did manage to learn a couple of good tricks too. For instance, did you know that even just a couple of drops of milk in normal tap water is enough to negate the effects of the chlorine in it? That's nice to know. Another good tip was to mix your citric acid into a 1/4 cup of water (with a drop of milk in it...) to dissolve it before adding it to the milk. You should also do the same thing for your rennet. The reason for this is to allow the ingredient to be introduced to the milk more gently so to speak. Rather than the shock of a direct hit of citric acid, you can ease it into the milk this way.

Prepping all ingredients. Milk & diluted citric acid and rennet.

Since we were newly educated and wanted to put our new info to use to really reinforce it into out minds we went ahead and made ourselves a batch of fresh mozzarella and ricotta this weekend. We learned a couple of things during this process. 1. If we're going to be making cheese, even just the basic mozzarella and ricotta, we need to get some specific equipment. Namely a large fine meshed strainer and some good quality cheese cloth. (The kind for actually making cheese with, not the flimsy crap from the mega-mart.) 2. The final step in making the mozzarella is to heat the curd and "knead" it until it turns to the silken texture and stiff dough-like consistency of good mozzarella.During this part of the process, there is a time to stop when the cheese has formed... I passed that point slightly and the dough was a little on the rubbery side but still very tasty. I'll chalk this error up to simple inexperience. Overall, I really enjoyed the class and the cheese that we made as a testament to having learned something at it. now I'm looking forward to the lasagna that we'll be having with our fresh cheese! Here's a few pictures of our home cheese making process in the works. Buon appetito!!

First, heat milk slowly to 55 deg... then add citric acid and stir...

Continue heating to 88 deg (F) then add rennet..stirring in.. then let sit while curd forms and increase temp to 98

strain off the whey leaving only curds...

heat curd, continue pouring off whey and knead till silken and dough like...

Separate into serving sizes if you'd like and store in fridge. (or eat right away)

We also made ricotta from another half gallon of milk. The steps are even easier:

Heat milk in a microwave safe bowl until it reaches between 190 - 200 Deg (F), then stir in 1/4 cup vinegar per qt of Milk. This will separate the curds off almost immediately.

After lettin the curd separate for 20-30 minutes, strain off whey and store the ricotta.. BAM! that easy.

The leftover whey from both processes is still a very high nutrient supplement. If you have chickens or livestock they will love it! Waste not want not.

Till Next Time.

good times

2011-03-23T19:17:00.001-06:00

I love walking with my sweetheart on beautiful spring evenings...

Amidst all the work we have to do at this time of year, don't forget to stop and enjoy the season!

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Building the soil in a (sub)Urban Garden I

2011-03-22T22:05:00.002-06:00

When we moved into our current home, nearly seven years ago, the soil we had been dealt was only soil in the very loosest sense of the word. Because we knew we wanted to have a garden, we built raised beds and essentially created good soil right in place. It worked well, and we have been able to use those garden beds for the last six garden seasons with good results.Here's a picture taken during our second spring...

The other thing that we did, while using those beds, was to add copious amounts of organic matter to our soil.every year we mulched the walkways and added manure to the garden beds.in the fall we made sure to add lots of grass clippings, leaves and other available forms of compostable materials to the beds which was then turned into the soil the following spring. This had the effect of, over time, building the soil around our raised beds into pretty good soil as well. In fact, each spring when we've been cleaning out the garden and preparing for the next season, we've been forced to make time to lift our raised bed garden frames to make sure they were still sitting on the surface of our garden paths. If we hadn't done this they would have been buried a couple of years back and the soil inside them would have come over the edges... and I'm not exaggerating.
If you look close at this picture from a couple of years later you can see how the 6" deep garden frames have been buried down to only a couple of inches.

Michael Pollen, in his book _The Omnivores' Dilemma_, mentioned a phenomenon called "uppening" of the soil. I can scarcely think of a better way to describe what's been happening in the garden for these last 6 years. Not only has the soil in our garden become slowly more fertile and friable in our north garden, but the soil has literally gotten taller! Take a look back at that first picture above, see the bottom fence panel? The garden mulch is at about the same level at the bottom of that panel. Then take look at the second picture... notice how the garden level is creeping up the fence panel?

This year, we decided to take advantage of that fertile, friable soil that we've been slowly building in this part of our yard by actually removing the garden bed frames all together and tilling up the whole area.
removing the garden bed frames and getting ready to till in mulched area.

While doing this, we’ll be able to expand our garden area while also increasing the rooting depth of the plants that we grow, something that in our arid climate is a great help to their success. We'll be able do increase the rooting depth because after we double dig and run our cultivator over the garden we will also mound up the soil into loosely formed raised furrows. (I'll have to show that in a later post.)
Digging in fence guards to keep the "uppened" soil in our garden.

After double digging the garden beds, we dug a trench along our fence line and placed 3/4 inch thick 18" wide plywood sheeting between the fence posts to act as a soil barrier because last year our soil ended up actually pushing the fencing in and bowing it. Can't have that.
After cultivating and before mounding the furrows.

By this point we were ready to form up furrows, get ready for spring planting and get on to the other beds.

I've learned through the process of watching our garden evolve, that things in the garden take time. There are seasons not just throughout the year, but also throughout the gardens life cycle. This soil was once "unusable" and it now beginning to become fertile, and healthy soil. I wonder how it will be in a couple of more years...?
How are things going in your garden? Have you had to overcome poor soil conditions. What did you do to improve it organically?
P~

Morning has broken

2011-03-04T07:18:00.001-07:00

Take a moment to look around you at the beauty of every day. The majesty of a beautiful mountain morning can hold you over through the rest of the day.
Best to you all
P~

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Collecting Globe Artichoke Seeds

2011-03-01T10:00:00.000-07:00

I made an interesting observation this weekend past, let me take a minute to share it with you.

Last year we grew globe artichokes in our backyard garden and they were a great success. The plants that we grew were holdovers from the year prior which had been purchased at a local greenhouse. At the end of last season I decided to leave a couple of the artichokes blossoms to complete their life-cycle. mostly just because my wife and I love the electric blue punk rock looking spiked flower that develops.Those flowers eventually grew dry and brittle and died off as the rest of the plant went dormant for the winter. This weekend I cleaned up that garden bed and collected those last blossoms.
I imagined that, based on the shape and appearance of the final blossom, the spiky pieces (the choke) of the flower head that had dried might contain the tiny seeds of new artichoke plants; similar to a dandelion. I was partially right.
As I peeled back the layers of dried petals and choke, hoping to find small seeds connected to the ends of the choke strands, I did... sort of. What I found much to my surprise were actual seeds, and not even the dainty little dandelionesque seeds I had expected, but sunflower seed sized real seeds tucked right in there amidst the choke. Who knew? Well I assume someone did, but not I. The garden never ceases to amaze me. Just letting Mother nature do her thing so often results in little wonders.

So now what? Will they grow? I would assume that they will, and you know I will certainly try, but I don't know if they will produce true to type. It will definitely be a fun experiment to watch though. I'll make sure to keep you informed.
Have any of you ever grown artichokes from seed? Ever grown them from seed that you kept from your own plants? I'm always open to learn from your experiences.
Till next time...
P~

Supporting the Local Economy

2011-02-23T22:52:00.005-07:00

I mentioned a couple of posts back about a Utah seed company that I generally get seed from.

One of the main reasons that I patronized them was because I like to try to support local businesses if I can and to keep those dollars in our state. Well I have a new sponsor to point out to you that you should take a look into for any upcoming seed purchases that you need to make. Hometown Seeds. They are also a UT local company and they have what seems to be a reasonable GMO free policy. You can find a link to them --> right over there in the side bar.

I will add the caviat that I am receiving from them a free herb seed collection and that I have not prior to this ordered from them. I will certainly let you know in the future about my experience, and would love to hear about any input you have.

Support your local companies when you can.
Best
P~

Using the harvest

2011-02-21T23:19:00.002-07:00

As we approach the new season, I thought I'd mention an important part of what goes into planning our garden, how we will use our harvest through the year.

This Monday we decided to make some paninni sandwiches for lunch and one of our favorite additions to our sandwiches are sun dried Roma tomatoes.

Here we have a bag of dried tomatoes from August of last year, that I'm going to make a batch of re-hydrated tomatoes with.

The first thing that I do when I re-hydrate tomatoes is to place a portion larger than what I actually want to eat (if you're going to make them, you may as well make enough to enjoy for a while.) and place them in a bowl.
To this I add some luke warm water, but just less than it would take to soak them all because I like to add a bit of balsamic vinegar to add some extra flavor to them too.

After an hour our so, the tomatoes will be tender and you can either eat them then or store them for later. To store the tomatoes for later, we place them in one or two small canning jars and add some olive oil to just cover them. This will store easily in the fridge for at least a week.

Now... to revisit our homemade ravioli recipe... sun-dried tomato and ricotta??? What's your favorite way to enjoy sun-dried tomatoes?
P~

Planning the planting

2011-02-15T22:50:00.001-07:00

I dug out the seed storage tonight for a little inventory. A few of the seeds that we have are getting a little old so will need to be replaced, but the bulk of the seed we have should be good to go. This year I'm doing something that I should have been doing all along... making a checklist of the seeds that I have and the plants I want to grow and will bring that with me when I go to buy my seed. I buy most of my seed through Mountain Valley Seeds. I get no support from them, so that's not why I mention them, (although I'm not opposed to it if they want to contact me...) I like to go through them because they are based out of SLC, so they are local, plus I am able to get much of my seed from local vendors or nursarys and save myself and the planet the shipping costs. Also, they do a really good job of marking what is hybrid and what is open pollenated or heirloom.

The plant list for this year looks like this:
broccoli,
broccoli romanesco,
brussels sprouts,
cabbage (red & green),
spinach,
carrots,
peas (shelling &sugar snap),
kohlrabi
green beans,
peppers:
green, red, yellow, jalapenos
tomatoes: roma, heartland,
hamson, hillbilly, amish, cherry
fennel
onions : green, yellow and red
shallots,
eggplant,
zucchini,
Charentais melons, butternut squash,
okra,
artichokes,
dry beans,
sweet potato,
celeriac,
kale (italian &curly),
cucumber,
tomatillos

herbs:
basil,
thyme,
parsley,
rosemary,
oregano,
cilantro,
hops,
tobacco,
chamomile,
echinacea,
mint,
peppermint
dill

It's ambitious for certain, but not really hugely more than we've grown before. There are a couple of new additions though worth mentioning, for instance tobacco which can be used as an organic pesticide, and hops for home beer making. (That will be covered in a forthcoming post.) Either way, after last years miserable failure, we are really going after it this year.

Anyone else getting started with their plant lists or garden planning yet? Planning any new trial plants this year?
Love to hear about it
P~

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The Most Local Meat

2011-02-13T21:51:00.007-07:00

In a follow up to the last post that I put up, regarding my search for more sustainable and local meat sources I thought I'd share with you one of the most local sources of meat that I have access to. FISH!

Since just after the new year, our local reservoirs and lakes have been frozen over and ice fishing has been good. I grew up in Southern California, and access to fresh seafood was never an issue, but I really hate to buy seafood here in the Intermountain west, because anything that I get has to be trucked in and is never as fresh as it could be and also has a pretty significant carbon foot print. That isn't even taking into consideration the issues of overfishing of our oceans that really needs to be a concern of everyone.

With the lakes frozen and the ice fishing on, none of those things are a concern.

This reservoir is only a half hour drive from our house, and is close enough that within 1 hour I can be on the lake fishing. What more could I ask for? Well, except for maybe actually catching something that is... And I had a little of that luck too lately.

These little guys averaged 12-15 inches and were plentiful the last few times I've been up.

The funny thing, is that I know Trout are a members of the salmonid family, but in the winter it seems they really live up to their family name, look at how orange and salmon color they were.

AND, they were delicious too. No complaints here at all.
Anyone else been out on the ice or bringing in their own "wild" meat sources? I'd love to hear about it.
Take Care.
P~

I almost gave up...

2011-02-09T21:58:00.012-07:00

Really, I was this close to it. I'd done my homework, diligently looked for alternative options and had come up short. All but for one option that I thought I'd already covered... bingo! Oh geez, sorry, I guess I didn't mention what the heck I was talking about, let me take you back a little ways in my thinking and this might make a little more sense.

Every year I take a look at my life and try to find the things that I think I really have a chanced at making a difference in with it. One year I decided too really focus on learning about and becoming more sustainable, another I focused on really getting a good yield from our garden and so on. Some years have been more successful than others, but all have enabled me to at least take a good look at how and why I am doing things the way I am. This year was no different, I just haven't had the chance to get online and put it down in writing for posterity.

The thing that I've decided on, or had decided on but wasn't sure was going to happen, was to finally put my money where my mouth is and actually make a concerted effort to consume primarily sustainable meat products. I'll get into the details more another time, but let me first finish what I was saying about almost not even being able to do it at all.

So, as I was saying, I had been looking for options to buying what is essentially factory meats, beef in particular, and had not had a lot of luck. Oh there were products available, but really they were pretty price prohibitive because you generally have to buy them by the quarter or the half of beef, which at $3.00 - $5.00/lb and two to four hundred pounds respectively, is quite an investment. I looked into a couple of local producers that I knew of, combed the web for others and talked to friends that I knew had ordered "good" grass-fed beef before. Still I came up short, and that's where we came in to this whole story - with me about ready to give up on the whole experiment before the first month was over.

If you've been reading this blog for very long at all then you've probably heard my proselytizing about how we can and will receive those things that we believe in and fully expect will come... well, here we go again. Just as I was about to give up on the whole thing, and I mean the day I had really gotten down about it, I had a friend of mine mention that he was in a conversation with a guy the day before who had mentioned that he bought locally raised grass-fed beef from a local butcher that was literally just around the corner from my house. I had talked with that same butcher last year when they opened the shop about this exact thing and had found them, quite honestly, to be what I thought of as very pro grain fed and not very open to the idea of organic local products. I decided that I at least had to check in with them and see if what I had heard was right and lucky day it was! As it turns out, there are a couple of other families that are also coming to the butcher for local grass-fed beef and he's able to get it in regularly on request. While we were in there he did have some very nice pieces of tenderloin available from the local provider so we went ahead and bought a few steaks.

This weekend we grilled them up and ate them with some homemade butternut squash ravioli and roasted fingerling potatoes and they were delicious! Our boys, who are sort of on the fence meat eaters, like to have steak occasionally but really can't stand fat; that wasn't a problem with this meat. The steaks were very tender with just enough marbling to give them good flavor, but not enough to make them fatty. I think we have a winner.

Oh, and by the way, the butternut squash raviolis... delicious! I'll have to get around to getting that recipe up online for ya'll.
Be well.
more to come soon.
P~

Still bottling

2011-01-02T22:35:00.001-07:00

Late last spring I started with a little bit of SCOBY that I had started from a small piece of culture that had grown in a commercial bottle that a friend had given me.
That was the beginning of the kombucha start that I've had growing since. its grown into quite a "member" off the family, right up there with our sourdough start.
I've even had to separate it a couple of times.
It's not a drink that I find to be to many peoples taste, but my boys and I love it, especially when we make it with a little bit of grape juice like this batch was. Some batches have more fizz than others but it's always tasty.
Anyone else experimenting with kombucha? If so, what's your favorite way to make it?
P~

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Winter veggies.

2010-12-24T18:03:00.001-07:00

These are some carrots and beets that I just harvested from the garden for christmas dinner. It really is possible to keep your carrots, beets and many of the other root vegetables in the ground well into the winter.
I hope your Christmas dinner is as wonderful as I'm looking forward to ours being.
P~

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Whoopee! Fianlly passed!!

2010-12-23T23:06:00.003-07:00

Good news... That big Security plus test that I had mentioned needing to pass a number of times, well I passed it on Tuesday!

This was one of those things that just loomed over my head in such a way that I really couldn't justify doing anything else but study for it until it was completed. Well as I said, I finally passed it and I feel like I've been given my life back! I still have a couple of things that I need to wrap up work wise, but things look like they should be back to normal here at the beginning of the year.

On the health front, A~ and I have both been feeling a lot better as of late so our hopes are really a lot higher for next year and for being able to accomplish more of our goals. After last year anything would be better right?

Another thing new is that I decided to allow myself to finally join the ranks of the technology bound masses and got a phone. I finally feel like there's handheld devices that have gotten to the point where they are not just toys but are devices that can really allow a person to maximize their time and get some things done when they otherwise would not have been able to. To that end, and as a personal present to myself after a very very long year, I went out and got a new Android smart phone the other night and so far I love it! As a matter of fact, I'm writing this post on the phone as I lounge downstairs watching a movie. (One I've already seen of course, I refuse to turn into one of those guys that sits on their phones all the time while the world passes by.) In fact one of the reasons that I wanted to get this phone in particular was because it has a new google speech feature on it. I want to be able to talk into my phone when I have a thought or an idea so that it will save me time in writing or at least I can get the idea down on paper.

Anyway, that's what has been going on with me. Not too much, but things are starting to look up and I look forward to a new year soon where we can talk more often. Until then, I want to wish all who celebrate it a very merry Christmas, to all others I send you all many best wishes as the year winds down.

Be well all.
P~

No, I didn't get lost...

2010-11-30T22:55:00.004-07:00

Every day, I see my own last post as I check in on my google Reader account and read all the blogs that I subscribe to and I realize that with the last post I put up haveing been over a month ago, and then I think "My last post was a month ago and I said I was going up hunting... Hope nobody thinks I fell off a cliff or was eaten by a bear or anything..."

Of course, by now, you've realized that I did not in fact fall off said cliff and am not inside a bear, but am in fact just a slacking slacker that has not made myself get online and write... well seemingly anyway.

I've mentioned deadlines and certification tests that I've been working on, and now I have the holidays to contend with as well so... I'm just kind of tied up for now and likely will be until after the new year.

I did want to drop in here, for those that check in from time to time and wish you all a very happy and blessed holiday season. I hope all is well with you and yours and, but for the occasional pop in post, will see you again in 2011.

Peace...
Paul~

Hunting season again

2010-10-13T22:12:00.010-06:00

It's been hunting season again.

I've been able to spend some wonderful time in the high mountains around here, watch some beautiful sunrises and finished off a couple of good days with spectacular sunsets. I did see some deer, even had a chance to shoot at a small buck, but the little guy just wasn't ready to come home with me. Another couple of years maybe and we'll see.

I did get some nice pictures though, I shared them on my GRIT magazine blog last week, but I was holding out for a good buck picture for you, unfortunately there are none. Enjoy the ones I did get nonetheless.

This video I took at nearly 11,000 feet elevation up in the Uinta Mountains of North Eastern Utah. The view was worth the hike, but I sure wish I had found the four deer who's tracks I was following...

Alas, just like gardening, There's always next year, or in this case, the next season, which starts this weekend for my middle son. I hope he has a good first hunt.

Till next time.
Paul~

This and that

2010-10-04T23:04:00.012-06:00

Just a little bit of this and that today.

Check out the girls at the buffet...

This is a backyard lawn view of the Chicken tractor moving along the lawn. It's amazing how well they will scratch up the dead grass and thatch, and will spread their manure. Our back lawn has loved it this summer!

This years trial plant was a little different. We usually try a new veggie, but this year, a new melon made the list.
It was the "melon charentais". An heirloom french melon that gets great reviews and for good reason; this is a great cantaloupe and it's a actual cantaloupe too, not a musk melon being "called" a cantaloupe like the things we here in the US get in the market. I made sure to save a good bit of seed too. This one's a keeper!

And thought some of you out there from back east, or from abroad may enjoy a look at the fall in the Rockies.
I was out hiking this weekend, scouting for the upcoming Deer and Elk season.
These pictures are from about 2.5 to 3 miles into the back country and after climbing from about 5200' elevation to 7200 feet. It was NOT an easy hike, but I'm happy to say that I've fared alright for as bad of shape as I expected to be in.
I'm thinking that this year, I'm going to camp under stars in the back country for a couple of days during the hunt. I've never pack hunted that far in before, but I've always wanted to. Hopefully the weather will cooperate.

Hope all's well with you.
Till next time.
Paul~

Some quick photos...

2010-09-30T23:50:00.010-06:00

Don't quite have time to write much detail, but thought you might enjoy a few pics from the Fair.

Being a Mother Earth News event, there were of course animals...

I was particularly interested in the wood fired oven demo that was there.

There was also a variety of alternative power generation devices from Wind...

To pedal...

there was a monster wind generator...

and even a wood burning car...

Not quite sure I'm ready to stoke up a fire in the old sedan yet, but It was great to see the out of the box thinking.

Ever more to come...
Paul~

Gary Nabhan on Food Traditions

2010-09-29T16:47:00.012-06:00

One of the Keynote speakers during the Mother Earth News Fair last week in PA, is a pioneer in the effort to restore the Food Traditions in America, an ecologist, ethnobotanist, farmer and author Gary Nabhan. He was one of the speakers that I was really looking forward to having the chance to hear more from. I wasn't disappointed. I had first heard Mr Nabhan speak on my local NPR radio show. I was really impressed. He's been working for decades now to bring attention to the foods that we ate for centuries prior to our "Green" Revolution in a hope that we can bring some of those foods back from the precipice of extinction and begin to re-localize our food stream.

It's known from history, that food scarcity and/or high prices can cause chaos and food riots. It may be something that we generally associate with the "third world" countries, but it's really something that we are every bit as susceptible to as well. In this time that we are living in, with the possibility of dramatic economic and climatic change looming, it is greatly in our best interest to work to learn about and work to restore our local food traditions.

What do I mean by that? Well, local food traditions are kind of like local holiday traditions. Just like people living in Minnesota may go out building snowmen or something and people in Florida may put lights on their boats and cruise the harbour, so too will people in Maine perhaps enjoy some chestnuts roasted over an open fire while in San Diego they may have fish taco's on the beach. All things are perhaps possible in both locations, but I think it would require some serious inputs in the form of heat in Maine to sit around any beach, as well as some serious inputs of gasoline miles in order to get chestnuts to San Diego. The food traditions of our localities may have some items in common, but in many cases they have far more differences. Embracing those traditions will help us to become familiar with foods that are easily produced, with the least inputs, locally to where we consume them.

If we accept, and I know that this is a topic for an entirely separate conversation, but if we accept that at some point in the future we will either have used up or seriously depleted our allotted reserves of oil, then we have to accept that local food will be the only food we will be able to get too. That condition being accepted, we then have to think of the types of food that we will be able to produce in that location with the least amount of inputs in the form of pesticides and fertilizers. (You do know that those two key components of the green revolution are based almost exclusively on oil to produce them right?) The logical choice to turn to will be the foods that were naturally selected over thousands of years of evolution to grow and produce in those conditions. And therein lies our dilemma.

Because our climate is changing, and whether you want to believe that that's because of the natural cycles of the earth or because we are changing it by our behavior, it is changing and some of our local foods will no longer be able to survive. These valuable genetic antiques of our culinary past will be gone. Compound that by the fact that industrial agriculture is selecting only a very very selectively small cross-section of the available foods to focus on and is slowly helping the antique and heirloom varieties to disappear and you will understand why it is so imperative that we learn to grow, eat and sustain these local foods. I think the best reason to preserve these varieties is because most times they taste far superior. They may not have been selected for shelf life or shippability, but their flavor is amazing.

To sustain ourselves in the future we will need to rely on the biological wisdom that has evolved over the millennium. To preserve that biological wisdom, we will need to cultivate and maintain our cultural wisdom. The most important thing is to buy, grow and eat these items though. As Poppy Tooker from Lousianna has said, we must "Eat it to Save it!". Meaning that if we don't buy these local foods and support our local food traditions, then they will be selected out.

So, what can you do?
• Check into RAFT (Renewing Americas Food Traditions) and see what you can do to spread the word and to practice in your own home.

• Know where your food comes from.

• Participate in heirloom seed and scion wood exchanges in order to propagate the species.

• Talk, share and bring attention to this issue with folks you know.

In the interest of full disclosure, I am lecturing myself here as much as I am to anyone else. I've been much better at this in the past, but have been terrible at it lately. How about we all try just a little harder so we can all have more to share in the future.

Till Next time...
Paul~

Mother Earth News Fair recap

2010-09-28T23:43:00.002-06:00

What a great weekend... In case you didn't know, I've been out in Pennsylvania for the weekend at the inaugural Mother Earth News Fair. It was fantastic.

So many things stood out over the weekend that I found myself hard pressed to single out a particular part that impressed me most. The speakers and presenters were knowledgeable and informative, the product vendors - but for perhaps a few - were relative to the overall "theme" of the fair, the organization - particularly for an inaugural event - was exceptional and the venue itself left little to complain about shy of it's sheer "three dimensionality", as I heard it so aptly put.

To put truth to paper there was, at lease in my opinion of it, no single stand out part of the event. Nor, was it merely the event as a whole that was the standout.For instance, imagine you went to a symphony performance. Imagine it was Beethoven's 5th, an incredibly powerful and moving piece no doubt, but that it was just you in the hall to hear it. Beautiful as the music would be, and as much as you may love to hear it, it would ring sort of hollow wouldn't it? There's an intangible quality that comes about when people, passionate about a thing, get together to share in that thing. That passion adds, I think, an entirely new dimension to the event in question. It was that x-factor, that passion and shared purpose, that filled me the whole time I was there. At any junction of the day be it standing in line for a class, sitting down to write a few lines or catching some air after the live music Saturday night, the opportunity to sit and connect on a very personal level with a perfect stranger was more than available, it was unavoidable!

I was moved by the fiery man from Detroit who is fighting to change the zoning laws in the "food deserts" of the inner city. He wants to farm, not garden but actually farm, the vacant lots and abandoned land that's been made available by the auto-industry collapse and economic decline. His passion was incredible.

I enjoyed brainstorming with a young lady who, with her partner, wants to find a way to put themselves on a piece of land of their own. They've been working on an organic farm for that last year or so, so they have experience, enthusiasm and some great ideas but were getting a bit discouraged. I hope they were able to come away as energized as I was.

There were too many individual interactions to list them, but I hope I've made my point. As Bryan Welch, Editor and Editorial Director of Mother Earth News, said in his closing key note address, we are at an amazing point in our history. I could not agree more. We are indeed at an amazing time and seem to be more focused on that future that we desire more clearly than at any other time in history. I am so excited to truly feel like I am in some small way a part of it.

Finally, I'd like to extend a thank you to the Mother Earth News staffers who worked so hard to make this such an enjoyable event, as well as to the presenters for sharing their knowledge and time and for being so approachable as well.

Now, where's my calendar... I need to find out the dates for the next fair and mark them off as occupied.

Hope to see you at the next one.
Paul~

Starting Day Two

2010-09-26T08:16:00.007-06:00

Day one ended up being as fantastic as it started. The classes I sat in on were really really good, perhaps a bit abbreviated for the liking of some of the presenters, they are of course very passionate about what the speak of, but very informative nonetheless. Then after a day of cramming my brain with great info, I got to enjoy a couple of bands playing folk and bluegrass (some of my favorite music by the way) while I ate my dinner. It was a great day!

I'll give you all more information in more detail later, but so far I've been able to get into a class on peak oil and the things we can do to both mitigate the damage and prepare ourselves and our homes to deal with it, should it come to that. I had a chance to sit down and have a great talk with the presenter, Matthew Stein, and found he was a very nice guy with a lot of good information and ideas.

I was also able to get in and listen to a phenomenal keynote talk from Gary Paul Nabhan, whom I'd really looked forward to hearing here, and also found him to be a very approachable and genuinely concerned man. He's doing great work on the local food and restoration of food traditions front and listening to him I really got the sense of passion about what he's doing.

In addition to that I caught a couple of cool demos and presentations, for instance on building a geodesic dome greenhouse and part of one on biochar, and look forward to more today.

I was also given an opportunity to meet with a number of authors and a couple of radio personalities in the sustainable and "green" fields at a publishers reception that evening and met even more wonderful people, with whom I hope to work with in some capacity in the future.

There's much more to do, so I'm going to head out to do it, I'll make sure to get lot's of good info for you all and will write more later. If you just can't wait to find out more, check out Mother Earth News' fair blog for updates throughout the day.

Take care all
Paul

Going to the Fair

2010-09-25T13:33:00.004-06:00

After an exhaustive trip across the country, I am finally enjoying the beauty of the Pennsylvania countryside and the sites and sounds of the first ever Mother Earth News Fair.

I woke up this morning and sat in an old wicker rocker on the porch of the dairy where I'm spending the weekend. As I drank a fresh cup of coffee, I watched the cattle lolling about in the fields just beyond the creek and behind the changing leaves of the hardwood trees. They were happy, or seemed to be in a very cowlike way, and free to roam as they pleased. This is what farming in America is supposed to be like. This is what farming in America USED to be like until we made it not.

After a home cooked farm breakfast, I headed off to the fair. Passing down the beautiful narrow tree lined road, passing by small farms and large, I realized the wisdom in coming to this beautiful, albeit somewhat remote, locale to host this event. This is a lot of what will be talked about, small family farms, community and finding ways to make them work in our new economy.

I'm a little over a half way through the first day now, but it's been wonderful. I've had the opportunity to listen to a number of very interesting presenters, have spoken with a couple of remarkable guys, and have seen a bunch of great products and services at the vendor displays.

Looking forward to more...

Paul~

For all my troubles....

2010-09-14T23:00:00.007-06:00

At least there are still the simple pleasures.

Like a basket (Or three) of fresh tomatoes and peppers and such from our backyard. By the way, that's a 3/4 lb tomato sitting there... 12 oz! Not too shabby...

This year has not been our most productive, nor our least frustrating (Did I mention that we had yet ANOTHER broken bone on second boy, and then the third one, C~, has been in and out of the Dr. with some frustratingly elusive mystery ailment that causes lethargy, 101+ fevers and head & belly aches???) but to still be able to walk out back, harvest fresh food and enjoy it...
Well, I guess when all else fails you, you relish in the simple things.
Be well all!
P~

Going to Mother Earths Fair

2010-09-08T21:45:00.004-06:00

Hi all! Just thought I'd drop you all all a little news bulletin about some big "outta town" type news.

I don't know how many out there read Mother Earth News, either online or in print, but you may recall that I also do some freelance writing for their sister (Or would it be brother??? ) magazine GRIT as well as posting an occasional blog post on their web site. Anyway, Mother's decided to host a "Fair" with "dozens of practical, hands-on demonstrations and workshops" and I'll be heading out to take part.

I should qualify that statement of course, I will be taking part as a spectator and enthusiastic participant, not as a demonstrator or anything. I foresee having a wonderful time though.

The only downside to it is that I'll be making the trip by myself. I wish I could bring the whole family, but on this one we agree that I'd be better off on my own. With the potential of over 100 (And I believe I've even heard of up to 180)demonstrations and two days of Sustainable farming and garden geekery to be had, I tend to get pretty into what I'm doing.

I look forward to getting some great new info that I can share with you all of course, and meeting lots of new people interested in the same things as I am.

If your in the Central PA area, or are close enough to get there, The Fair will be the weekend of Sept 25-26 at the Seven Springs Resort.

That's about it for now... Take care.
P~

M . I . A ???

2010-08-26T21:56:00.003-06:00

I talked to my Dad the other day and he and my Mom wondered if we we all doing well here or if there had been more health issues or what was going on... I hadn't talked to them in what seems like ages and even missed his birthday!? Yeah, I felt like crap! So it got me to thinking... if my own parents have been wondering what's been going on with me, I guess I have been out of the loop. Sorry...

We haven't driven off any cliffs or anything, and my back's been actually feeling fairly good. We've just been busy as bees keeping up with things around here.

Our youngest son B~ broke his arm, his right arm, did I mention that he broke the left one this spring?? He's boy alright... through and through. The worst part was it was one week before school started. They're going to a new school here where they have to commute on the local light rail system. They think they're such cool urban-chic teens! And the best part is that it's saving us a bunch of gas by having them commute that way!

I know I mentioned that I'd been studying for an important test that I needed to take. Well, at the risk of airing my failures... I failed it. It was close mind you, and I had studied incredibly hard, but I failed it nonetheless. So I cussed and pouted and ranted about how ill-formed the questions were but at the end of the day I failed and now I'm studying for it again.

Our summer has been one of our coolest and strangest that has been seen here in some time and I take no small solace in the fact that while A~ and I spent time volunteering at the county fairs Master Gardener information booth we heard gardener after gardener complaining about how their gardens were soooo far behind and how many still hadn't gotten any red tomatoes! That was last weekend!

But you know what? Our kids love there new school, we're both employed, our health is generally better than it has been and if we're going to have a bad weather garden year, this is the year to have it. All in all, things are alright.

I have tons of pics, and there have been some interesting things going on that would be fun to share but, alas, I'll have to get back to you on that. This test must take priority for now. In the mean time, why not check out some of the older posts. Maybe you'll have some questions that I can work on getting answers to you for?

Either way, hope all of you are well and I look forward to hearing from you and being back to blogging regularly soon!
P~

Yeah... I'm a Duck Rangler!

2010-07-26T22:14:00.007-06:00

And so goes my reputation in the neighborhood. I am... the duck wrangler.

Saturday afternoon, I got a message on my phone from a neighbor asking if I had some chick starter. Apparently he had a duck in his backyard with a couple of small ducklings. This wasn't a neighbors domestic duck that had gotten lost mind you. Oh no, this was a wild mallard hen with two very, very little ducklings.

Apparently that morning, while outside, My neighbor heard some quacking in the corner and upon investigation found a doting mother with her two chicks. They observed them for a bit, but as they didn't move on, she called the county animal control officers to come out - hoping that they'd assist the happy family back to the wetlands area a few miles away. Ah, yeah....NO! What they did do was to try to throw a blanket over the hen and scared her off into the wild blue yonder leaving her little ones behind.

Enter, I, the duck wrangler. We had the ducklings in a crate, with a bowl of water and a little powdered chick feed; now, how do we get mom back? She finally flew back, gliding in at top speed like an F-16 and cruised over to the neighbors driveway and began the squawking. We dropped off the ducklings across the street and she promptly waddled over to pick them up. It was then that the problem came about.

She immediately led them right back across the street to the shade of the neighbors garage. Um, did I mention that this was the same neighbor that has like 5 cats that roam the neighborhood. Yep, that neighbor. So now you see the problem right?

OK, plan two. The neighbor (Is all this neighbor reference getting confusing? The one neighbor I keep referencing was actually two neighbors, husband and wife.
Just FYI) Anyway, the neighbor and I began herding the ducklings toward my side of the street. The original plan being that, we'd get them into our backyard and let them have their place there until they were ready to go on. Our yard is safe, fenced and I have equipment available to make a duck tractor if the need came about. At least they'd be safe until I could find a way to take them to the wet lands. Well that changed quickly when she find a nook in the fence between my house and the next one and holed up there. So now came the wrangling.

We had no way to get her and the kids out but it needed to be done. The ducklings were so small that they took a few minutes just to get across the street; They would never make a couple of miles to the safe wetlands. I got on a coat (to protect me from claws, yes they do have them) and some gloves and my kids butterfly net. The plan was to get a hold of mom, get her into my dogs small carry crate and get her to the wetlands with her kids. So, with the fates on my side, I made a clean move and was able to get mom on the first try. She didn't like the crate at all and hissed heartily at us for the ten minute ride to the wetlands, but she made it in one piece.

We put the ducklings right out in front of her and flopped the door open for her to join them and it worked perfectly. Out she came and took her little ones into the water and they were on their way.

So anyway, nowadays I'm just known as the Duck Wrangler.
P~

Just the way things are...

2010-07-18T23:19:00.009-06:00

I'm tired. I have to admit my mortality and I'm not happy about it.

I know I've probably whined enough about my back and such lately, but it continues to make me accept things that I really don't want to accept. The last couple of weeks, since I had the cortisone shot put through an epidural into my back, I've felt quite a bit better. The problem is that I haven't really been doing much of anything, so really I've only been been feeling better from not exerting myself. Not really a realistic picture of my day to day; at least not as it has been to this point. That will be changing for at least the rest of this year.

What do I mean? Well, typically at this point in the season I would be harvesting and turning over quite a few of my garden beds and preparing to plant another whole batch of second crops for the fall. I generally keep working the garden intensively right up until the end of the fall and then put in a couple of long weekends prepping for the next year. Not this year. As of this point, for the most part, what is in the garden is all that will be in the garden for this year. I have some sunflowers that I will be planting in the next couple of days mostly just to take up space, but that will be just about it.

What I will be doing is beginning to work on my end of the year stuff now. I'll start turning in organic material like grass clippings and straw, I may even sprinkle some cover crops like vetch or alfalfa to let that enrich the soil while I neglect it, but that will be about it. With the help of my strapping young boys, I will try to make some progress toward cleaning up our back yard and hopefully will be able to put things in place this summer and fall so that next year we can have a better year.

The other thing I will be doing is trying my best to get myself healthy. Stretching, exercising lightly and losing some of my extra poundage. As I said, I'm tired. Not tired from working too hard, just tired of dealing with this unhealthy, miserable, achy no good way I've been feeling.

Time to take charge, accept some things for being just the way things are and do what I can to change others.

Sorry for complaining, but life is not always perfect I guess.
Take care all.
P~

Ah, Kohlrabi... the sputnik of the garden!

2010-07-16T22:49:00.029-06:00

It's funny, that's how I first heard kohlrabi described, as resembling sputnik! I had to look it up to find out exactly what sputnik looked like.Guess what? good description don't you think?

The edible part of the kohlrabi, besides the leaves that is (yes those are edible too. but I'll get to that.) is not a root or a bulb as many would think. It's technically the swollen meristem of the plant and forms above ground just like in the picture above. As the kohlrabi forms, it looks a lot like a kale plant or a broccoli plant. Then, after a few weeks of growing the stem will start to swell just above the ground. That's the good part, just like what you see below.

This oddball brassica relative of both broccoli and cabbage definitely HAS become a family favorite though. We first grew it three years ago on a whim. It was one of the first of what would become known as our annual "test crops". Crops that we would sow a small section of just as a test to see how they would do and if we would like them at all. It's funny that the more you get into gardening and the more confident that you feel, the more you want to try odd and unique plants. Well, with three kids at home I was hesitant to grow large amounts of anything that we didn't know for sure we would eat.

We have learned a few things in the last few years and have come up with some good ways to prepare and to cook kohlrabi. Because I've gotten a couple of requests and because it is apparently showing up now in CSA shares, I thought I'd share them with ya'll.

First off, bigger is not necessarily better with kohlrabi. This was a lesson hard learned last year. Because we had determined that we liked it, we wanted to maximize our yields from the plot that we were growing. So we let our kohlrabi get to a really big size, like softball sized. When we got around to cooking them, we found to our dismay that the insides of the "bulb" had gotten stringy. Not stringy in a good spaghetti squash kind of way, but stringy in a woody, not pleasant to the palette kind of way. Anyway I digress, The point is, you can harvest some as they form up, and then continue to harvest as they get larger. if you start to see them stall at a particular size, chances are they are done.

To prepare kohlrabi we cut off the stems and set them to the side. Then I like to cut the top and the root section off the bulb and work my way around with a knife cutting off most of the woody outer section. I finish peeling the outsides off with a regular potato peeler. You can tell when you've gotten down to the good part because it will look exactly the same as if you had peeled a thick stem of broccoli. That's because they are essentially the same thing! Now that you know that, I bet you have lots of good ideas on what to do with them. First though, let's talk about those leaves.

The leaves of the kohlrabi are a totally edible part of the plant. They're a sturdy leaf, much like kale for instance and can be treated much the same way. After harvesting a good number of kohlrabi plants, I generally take the young new growth leaves from the center and set them aside in a separate pile. These should be sauteed as soon as possible to get the best flavor and texture from them. The older leaves toward the outside of the plant have a much woodier stem that needs to be removed before cooking; the easiest way is to fold the leaf in half along the stem and slice the stem right off, even up into the leaf portion. You can slice the leaves up thin and steam them or sautee with some onion or use them much the same way you would a kale or Chard leaf for instance. They're not the best part of the plant, but they're definitely a usable part of the plant particularly if you are a fan of greens. The other thing to do, if you have chickens, is to slice up the leaves and feed them to the girls. They love em and it's a good source of green vegetation too. Now, on to the good part... the bulb!

I don't know about your families, but in our home one of the ways we can always count on veggies being scarfed down is to put them in a dish with a little veggie dip and just go at them raw. Kohlrabi is great for this. After peeling the bulbs you can cut them into thin french fry size pieces perfect for any veggie tray.

Of course you can cut them into chunks and steam them till they're just tender to the bite, and plate them with just a little salt (and butter if you like) and they're great too. If you like the ole cheese sauce thing with broccoli that's a perfect way to serve them as well. (I personally am not, but to each their own!)

If your a fan of stir fry, broccoli beef for instance, you can take the peeled bulb and run it over a course grater or mandolin to get a thin julienne that you can drop in a hot pan with some garlic and onion and a little soy sauce for instance for just a few minutes till the strips are tender. If your vegetarian some marinated tofu would go great with this.

Probably our biggest family favorite for kohlrabi is to put them into hobo dinners along with whatever else is fresh from the garden. Early potatoes, turnips, carrots, onions and a ground beef patty seasoned well and wrapped in an aluminum foil pouch and placed on the grill or around a campfire till the veggies are done. Mmmm, we just had these last weekend while we stayed up at a cabin in the mountains and they were as good as ever!

The flavor of kohlrabi is familiar yet unique and the plants are reliable as an early and late crop. Where broccoli can be picky in some climates and bolt early or not form heads at all, Kohlrabi is generally a lot less finicky, gives good yields and has a very similar taste profile. If you haven't tried it, give it a chance, if you do I think you'll find this interesting looking veggie will become a favorite of yours as well!

If you have any personal recipes or if you decide to try any of the ones I've mentioned please share your input. I'm always looking for more ideas and would love to hear how your taste tests worked out!

Best of luck!
P~

Rhubarb-aide

2010-07-08T00:01:00.001-06:00

A~ was reading something or other online a while back and read about an interesting thing called... Rhubarb-aide?!
I'd never heard of such a thing but as we had a big harvest of Rhubarb that - coincidentally - needed to be processed and since I'm always up for something new and interesting, well, here we go...

The way we like to process our rhubarb is to clean cut and sheet freeze them. Doing it that way allows us to store the frozen rhubarb in bags and lets us take out only what we need for a recipe.

In the back of this picture is a couple of the sheet pans that we filled with our cut rhubarb. In front is the cuttings and little bits that didn't make the cut... Didn't make the cut... hee hee.. get it? OK, I'm a dork.. anyway, they're in the food processor where we pulverized them with a little water, into a thin completely pureed slurry. We then filtered that slurry through some cheese cloth until we had this...

Essence of rhubarb. To which we added water and sugar to taste and voila.

The strangely iridescent green color that is Rhubarb-aide.

I'm not sure whether to say we loved it or not, but I'm gonna go ahead and add it to the list of at least once a summer tonics that we'll tweak and work with over the years to come. It certainly holds promise.

Have you tried it before? Any hints? recipes? Care to share?

Best to you all til next time.

Kombucha Making

2010-07-07T00:01:00.001-06:00

I spoke some time back about how I was experimenting with making some kombucha and I realized that while I had taken pictures of the progress I hadn't shared it with you, so I thought I'd take a minute to bring the blog up to date with the progress on that front.

To start with I needed to get a SCOBY started. For those not yet initiated in the ways of kombucha, a SCOBY is an acronym for Sybiotic Colony Of Bacteria and Yeast.
This was the "mini"-SCOBY that I started with. It was collected from a store bought bottle of kombucha that a friend of mine gave me. To grow it into something that I could make a sizeable quantity of Kombucha from I placed in this bowl full of sweetened green tea. The Yeasts in the SCOBY consume the sugars in the tea and ferment it producing alchohol. This alchohol is then consumed, through further fermatation, by the various (beneficial) bacteria to produce acetic acid. An additional by product is the Cellulose that makes up the body of the SCOBY.

Now, biology lesson completed, I was successful in culturing my SCOBY into a nicely formed disc of Bacteria and Yeast which I would now send forth to do my komucha bidding!
That white color is from the cellulose that I was talking about.

Although you can't really see the bacteria, being microscopic and all, if you look in the photo below you can see the whispy tendrils hanging from the main body of the SCOBY. Those are mainly yeasts. Many of them being the same types that do our work for us in other goodies like Sourdough and kefir.
In fact, I was successful enough in culturing my SCOBY that I am now able to have two gallon Suntea jars going constantly brewing for me.

Now that only problem I have is that I'm running out of bottles. These bottles were from my Mr Beer experiment last year and have come in handy for bottling the finished product.

Kombucha is a naturally effervescent drink because as the yeast comsume the sugars, they also "breath" out CO2 as a by-product. After bottling the kombucha, I let it sit at room temperature for 3-4 days during which time it continues to brew and breath. The bottling holds in the CO2 and when it's opened. Phzzttt... Carbonated!

It's an acquired taste, I will say that for it, but once you've acquired it, you gotta have it. There's been some issues with the labeling on some of the store bought Kombucha out there lately and some of it has been pulled form the shelves. The nice part about making your own, as with all things, is that you always know what's in it, and more to the point that you can always get it!

You should try it out. You may not even like it after trying, but it's a great science experiment and fun to watch progress. If you do try... good luck!
P~

Strawberries and the new Dehydrator

2010-07-06T12:01:00.002-06:00

You may remember the dehydrator we were able to get this winter because of an arrangement I made with CSN stores. You know, the online store that offers everything from Lighting to, well, to dehydrators for instance. We've used the dehydrator a couple of times so far for jerky, but now we have fresh strawberries that we wanted to be able to use for things later this year and decided we wanted to test out dehydrating them.
The strawberries weren't huge, so I cut them right down the middles and lay them flat after a quick dip in a citric acid bath (To preserve color and flavor.)
They really thinned out quite a bit, but the flavor is like.. POW! STRAWBERRY! These will be great in some recipe or on dry cereal.

But of course when the strawberries are fresh for that little window of the year, you have to have some fresh! When A~ makes fresh sourdough waffles (Yeah you heard that right, sourdough waffles.) nothings better on top than a little whip cream and fresh strawberries.

Maybe if we ask real nice we can get A~ to start blogging on here with some of her great recipe's? I think I've almost got her conviced... anyone else out there want to hear fromthe other (read: better) half of this equation?

Take care all.

Date Night at Ogden Botanical Center

2010-07-06T00:01:00.001-06:00

I told you I was behind on things and by golly I was not lying. Waaay back in mid-June, A~ and I had a nice little date night out together at a local garden park. The Ogden Botanical Center is the sister site to the Davis Botanical Center which is our local Botanical center, the place where A~ and I did our Master Gardener training.

Of course, as with any time I get around a bunch of flowers, I took a bunch of pictures... Enjoy.

Two things A~ and I love are Gardens and Art. So of course, we had a great time.

The walking paths through the gardens were lined with booths set up by local artists. We walked through and enjoyed and thought about some time in the future when we could maybe buy the art we love... one day.

Looking out from the bridge in the "Japanese Garden" section of the center, we see the raised garden beds of the centers vegetable gardens. We walked through the garden and sat on the wide edging of the beds and determined then and there that in our next homes garden we will invest the money necessary to build this type of raised gardens. Bending was limited, the height was just right and the beds were narrow enough (I would guess 3 feet) to easily allow for reaching across them.

Just a very nice little river feature, oh and I love any kind of garden structures!

One of the local farms was out selling their local made ice creams. I think the tractor was just there for looks. It was a nice one though, old but perfectly restored.

Over in the evening shade near the rose garden was a very nice little Pavilion with a local String Ensemble playing classical music. We sat and listened for a time and just enjoyed each other.

Then, of course, we had to take time to smell the roses...

Is that not a beautiful rose?

We weren't the only ones out enjoying the garden.

As we were leaving, I noticed a little feature that I would suspect probably escapes a lot of the visitors to the Center; it was a Swale. A swale is a garden landscape feature that works in conjunction with the terrain's natural drainage tendency to help slow rain runoff and to allow the ground to receive more water.

In the Arid areas of the western United States like the one where we live, this is a great technique for capturing water that would otherwise find it's way to our rivers via the fastest way possible and the faster the water runs off the more sediment it takes and erosion that is caused. Bad all the way around.
Above you can see the way a berm was built along the contour of the lawn area. The area to the right of the lawn is a hillside that would naturally runoff a lot of rain water in our stormy seasons.
The berm make a shallow area between the hillside and the lower area that allows the water to slow and pool. During a large storm, this area will no doubt fill quite a bit and become a temporary pond area. As the pond sits, the water has a chance to percolate into the ground hyper saturating it and allowing a water plume to flow under ground where it can be used for months by the plants and trees around the gardens.

All in all we had a great time together that night. After walking through the gardens we headed down town to try out a new restaurant that we've thought of trying for some time. The food was good, deserts were great (Creme Brule for A~ and fried peaches and ice cream for me!) and we needed a walk around the block to let it sit.

Good times... Good Times!
Best to you all.
P~

Trying my hardest...

2010-07-05T14:46:00.001-06:00

OK, I've embraced my fate...

I guess relaxing's not THAT bad. I can do this once and a while!

Truth be told, after Friday's little "procedure" I layed around watching movies all day and really felt like a bum. Saturday morning I woke to fresh coffee the boys had made for me and sat on the porch in the unseasonably cool morning air writing while A~ spent the afternoon outside with our boys doing yard work. Mowing, picking and deep watering the garden. I watched from the porch feeling a little too much like "management". I'm more of the hands on type. It drove me nuts.

You know what I did get out of the whole thing this weekend though? Appreciation. Not just thanks, but appreciation; the kind you get when you get to see how blessed you are. My wife, in between yelling at me for LOOKING like I was gonna bend over for something, worked so hard at taking up my slack in the garden and my boys - little men more like it - worked side by side with her picking our last peas and cleaning up around the house and yard. Let it be known I am a lucky man. I tried my best to reward them all that night with a rotisserie roasted pork shoulder that I slow cooked all afternoon on the grill.

Sunday, after making sure all chores were finished Saturday, was spent enjoying our home. We did go out for a bit that morning to let the boys burn off a little energy at the local skateboard park, but the rest of the afternoon was spent lazing aroung the backyard. With our shade canopy up, we sat in the cool shade on an absolutely beautiful Fourth of July Day. The high for today didn't even quite reach 75 degrees! Our oldest serenaded us with his guitar and I tried my best to play harmonica along with him. The boys played off and on again in the pool we finally got this summer and even Marcello the dog layed around in the sun chewing the bone from the night before. All was good. Sunday night we sat out in the front yard while the boys enjoyed a few fireworks and we talked with each other and the neighbors.

There's still a few things that I'd like to try to get done this weekend if possible, having this afternoon and evening left in the day, but I'll have to wait til A~'s not looking. Maybe then I can sneak off to pull some peas plants that are spent and harvest a few early potatoes. There's second crops of the season to think about now you know!

Hope you all had a great weekend. Happy Fourth to all my fellow Americans and look forward to the coming posting blitz.

P~

Taking it easy for a weekend

2010-07-02T18:41:00.008-06:00

By Doctors orders.

Not Doctor A~, although she is doing her best to keep me still, but by my actual Doctor. I've mentioned recently that my back has been giving me a lot of trouble, well, the trouble has been getting worse and the simple fixes haven't been helping. I've been taking it easy, not been working around the house like I'd like to, and was prescribed a course of oral medication to reduce inflammation which I diligently took. Still, last week I found myself almost unable to get up and walk around. For over a week now I've been subsisting on pain medicine and little sleep.

This morning I had an appointment to get an epidural injection of cortisone to - hopefully - improve my situation. With any luck, the inflammation will reduce and I can start doing some mild exercise and stretching and allow myself to heal. In the mean time, I've been ordered to take it easy, not to work too hard at anything for the weekend and let my back rest.

I'm going to take that as an opportunity try and catch up with some of the blog stuff that I've been wanting to post and just haven't had a chance to put up.

I may post up through the weekend, but mainly I'm going to write and format. Look forward to a nice sized posting blitz in the next week.

Have a great weekend all.

Around the 'Stead

2010-06-23T23:20:00.035-06:00

It's getting to be that time of the year around here.
Some things have been a surprise, others a little slow to get going, but over all, I've been pretty happy so far. I guess I just have to keep in mind that after all, it is only June 23rd.

I could go into more detail, but in the interest of my just getting caught up, I think I'll just give you all a little over view.
Enjoy.

These are my Hamson Tomatoes. A very good producing, heirloom, determinate canning tomato.

Peppers. Two varieties of Green Bells, some Reds, and Jalapenos.

This corner is harder to get to because of the fountain, so we filled it with Beets and Turnips.
This is the first year that we're trying out Turnips. So far they seem to be doing well!
Here's a new tomato trellising method that I'm trying. I needed to find a way to effectively trellis along my back wall. Hopefully this will hold up well. This trellis is holding 14 plants (7 heirloom San Marzanos, and 7 Roma Tomato plants that I saved seed from.). At the end of the row is some Eggplants too. The front is my spinach beds. They've been producing really well too.
One of my three cut and come again lettuce beds. These will be getting trimmed this weekend. Mmmm Salad time...
A perennial family favorite, Kohlrabi. I never seem to plant enough of these.
Early Girls setting tomatoes should be reddening soon.
Peas... filling out and nearly ready to harvest the bulk of them.
One of this years biggest surprises. Our Artichokes.
You can't see it very well from here, but there were 13 artichokes on the plants at the time I took this. I've harvested a few already too. These were the Artichokes that I over wintered in the greenhouse.

Like so many things, I sometimes have higher expectations of myself and my garden than are realistic, but it seems every year I feel behind. I can only assume that it's because the season seems so much longer as I work on my off season growing and preparing.

The biggest thing I can say was successful so far this year, is this. With the exception of the Artichokes. Every plant I just showcased for you was started from seed. This is a first for us. Some did better than others, and lessons still come with every year, but I have to admit I am proud.

Hope you enjoy the tour. More to come soon!

All the best to you all.
P~

Cruising the West (Day 3 & 4)

2010-06-22T22:33:00.043-06:00

I decided to get to the chase and wrap up day 3 and 4 together. Particularly since day four was just a drive home.

As we left off I asked if anyone had any ideas of where we may be stopping next... I heard crickets chirping and lurkers lurking, but no guesses. (Must've been my excellent riddling skills right?)

Well after day two's long drive through a part of Arizona, that I actually found to be surprisingly much prettier than I expected it to be, we made it to major stop number three... and with that, I again leave it to the photos to tell the tale.

As the sun set over the desert, and the heat finally slipped off us, we made it to the rim...

I was so pleased to find that, even with their generations dependence on electronics and seeming need for quick fix entertainment, our teenage boys still had a deep appreciation for the wonder that was
" T h e G r a n d C a n y o n ".

This was a trip that we had debated for literally years. My wife and I had both been there and though we remembered it, albeit with far less grandeur than it truly held, we didn't have it high on our list of locations... we were wrong.

Because it was really not on the way to or from anywhere and required a concerted effort to get to, and because we wanted our kids to be old enough to remember it while still being young enough to have the child's fascination with it, we had waited. I think we found just the right time.

The morning of day three we hiked the rim of the canyon. There were so many views it was hard to find the right ones to share.

If you've not made it here, you must.

The Colorado River nearly 4800 feet below us. It was truly a great experience.

After spending the morning checking the canyon and marveling at it's depth, we again hit the road for "greener pastures". This time heading out toward Las Vegas.

But man must after all have his diversions, And what would a true American Road Trip be without a detour to Historic Route 66!

And if your gonna detour off to see Route 66, you may as well grab a frosty root beer float at Delgadillo's Snow Cap in Seligman AZ! It's just like the real life version of the little town in Disney's Cars movie.

It's a pleasure to be able to say I sat on the side of an old American Main Street and just "Watched the cars roll by...". The boys soon joined me with their treats and we certainly had a moment.

We also pit stopped for a few minutes at the Hoover Dam. It wasn't as wide as I expected it to be, but let's just say I was never able to get a good vantage point to see to the bottom. It was Deep!

The new bridge that will be bypassing the damn-top road for national security reasons. A reasonable thing I would say.

We finished our drive to Vegas, walked the strip till we were completely worn out then all crashed hard for some sleep.

The next day we were to head out and back home. but we HAD to make one quick stop just because... well, just because!

A~ and two of the boys heading into the Gold And Silver Pawn in Las Vegas. Otherwise known as the home of the "Pawn Stars", one of our favorite History Channel shows.

We got to meet "The old Man" who, honestly, was just as we would have expected. My son ended up finding an amp for his guitar that he's been looking for and we picked it up there. The old man was nice enough to give him an autograph on the top of it just for memories sake.

We caught a glimpse of "Big Hoss" and "Chumlee" as we were leaving and they were coming in.
Not much to say about Big Hoss but I do have to say, Chumlee, was a arrogant ass from what I could see. I mean I know it would suck to always have people pestering you, but no one's twisting his arm to be on the show. When a person was nicely asking him if he minded letting her take a picture he waved her off and made some snide remark to her. If you're busy, you're busy but geez, ask like a decent person. Anyway, I just had to say that. After that stop we were on our way home.

It was an uneventful ride, one we've made many times before. But as a passenger for part of this drive I found myself truly enjoying the view. We are so blessed to live in such a beautiful country.

And yet, amidst the pastoral beauty, a coal processing operation... Sad but true. One day we'll move beyond this... One day we'll HAVE to!

Closer to home, near Mona UT, I began thinking.. Hmmm, could I commute from hear?

The last photo taken on this trip says it all. From the sun rise peering through the clouds on our opening day of driving to this Sunset welcoming us home, we were treated to a wonderful time together.

Thanks for coming on our little trip with us. I hope you enjoyed it even a fraction of how much we did. We're home now though, and harvest season is upon us.
Soon to come, a well deserved garden update!

Till then, all the best.

Cruising the West (Day 2)

2010-06-18T22:00:00.016-06:00

As promised, Day two of our long weekend found us waking in Mesa Verde Colorado.

I had been to Mesa Verde a long time ago. It left a very vivid memory in my young mind. A lot of the things I loved to do as a kid were directly traceable to the visit that I made there I think. I was absolutely fascinated by the fact that these prehistoric peoples we able to construct and live in these beautiful homes in the sides of sheer cliff faces. I remember trying to copy and replicate their Atlatl and even showed my boys when they were little the idea of it as an example of leverage. Who knows, may be the reason I want to have an earth sheltered home in some way comes from the homes I saw in these cliffs and from walking in the cool shadow below the cliff faces...

Enough with the waxing poetic though, I promised photos and by golly photos you shall get... Enjoy...

A view from the top of the Mesa. The Ancestral Peubloans farmed this flat sun drenched mesa for corn, beans and squash beginning nearly 1400 years ago. Look below to see what a task that was.
This is the 30 ft ladder that we climbed to get into the dwelling knows as the Balcony House. Keep in mind, the Native Americans that lived in these homes did not use ladders... They climbed the rocks. All throughout the area you can see the hand and foot holds carved into the sandstone cliff walls.

The Balcony house dwellings. These buildings have been fortified and strengthened, but they have not been rebuilt. They are original buildings that were left as is around 1200 A.D.

The detail and craftsmanship were amazing! For anyone who's ever built anything, let alone from stone and clay (with no metal carving implements mind you) it was a wonder to see the plumb walls and perfectly straight and square corners.

The wood you can see sticking out of the buildings indicates a ceiling and floor. Did I mention that these dwellings were two, three and even four floors high? The wood is also original.

After going through the Balcony House we headed over to a different part of the mesa to the largest Cliff Dwelling of it's kind, the Cliff Palace. It's huge and amazing and, and, and, well, I'll let the pictures talk...
The Cliff Palace from the side of the cliff on the way in.

A four story dwelling... like prehistoric sky-rises!

This is a Kiva, the center for religious activity in the community. Each family had one of their own. They had ceilings that were constructed making them flush with the ground above so they were walked right over and used a ladder to get in through a whole in the roof.

Here you can see more of the dwellings and the Kiva.

As the park ranger put it, "We like to paint and decorate our homes... and so did the puebloans that lived here. Look up to the second floor and you can see the original paintings on the walls.

Prehistoric apartments at another location called the Spruce Tree House. Here you can see the ladder coming out of a Kiva that has been rebuilt to demonstrate how they looked.

Note the blackened ceiling from the prehistoric fires.
And that was the majority of the Mesa Verde. There was more of course, but you get the gist. Very amazing and historically significant. If you can make it there once in your life it would be worth it!

Late that afternoon we headed out for our next stop. On the way though we wanted to make one quick pit-stop. At the four corners of the states Utah, Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico.

And to our disappointment it was "under construction." But I did take this picture just for posterity. We did try after all!

And on the way out, the funniest State sign award goes to..... New Mexico.

Keep in mind that this is two sides of the SAME SIGN! I guess if I stood right next to one of the side posts I would be in New Mexico, too funny.

The day was wearing on though and we had another 500 miles to go. so we were on the road again. Till the next stop. Any guesses? Here's a hint. It's probably the deepest sight the you can see in the Southwest.
Till next time!
P~

Cruising the West (Day 1)

2010-06-16T00:48:00.017-06:00

The weekend before last, the family and I hit the highway for what amounted to a miniature version of a great American road trip. We left our home in Northern UT early Friday morning and headed South to parts yet un-seen. Day one found us driving through the Southern UT red rock and Arches country and we made the best of it.

As it turns out, by luck or dicine intervention, we happened to land smack dab in the middle of the very hard to hit 3 week desert bloom season. What followed was an amazing sight of beautiful rock formations, scenic landscapes and surprising floral beauty. For anyone resigned to thinking that deserts are barren, lifeless, moonscapes... I offer the following. Enjoy!

A little reminder... The desert is ALIVE!
Balancing rock... obviously!?

This view is of a place called "Garden of Eden".
Can you believe this flower? I didn't even know this shrub bloomed!
A place called the "Windows". We hiked up with our lunches...
and this was the view from our "table".

If this old tree could tell stories???

I loved this flower! I could hardly believe something so delicate was out there.
Utah's famous "Delicate Arch"

The hills were almost glowing with the green haze of grasses. A sight seldom seen in this arid landscape!

Aren't these beautiful? They were all over the roadside.
This was one of our final views before leaving the park.

It was truely a magical day of adventuring and getting to enjoy each others company.

After leaving Arches, we continued South through Moab and toward Cortez CO, on the way I found this tourist stop. I've tried to remember where it was at for many many years. I went here as a child and have always remembered it. It's a home that a man carved, by hand mind you, into the side of the native sandstone cliff. It was once he and his wifes home where they ran a small diner. Today it's a little tourist stop with a tour through the home. I HAD to take the boys through it. Hopefully they'll remember it as much as I did!

And of course, how could I not get a picture of this??

Hope you enjoyed the photo tour. Day 2 will find us in Mesa Verde CO. Home of the Ancestral Pueblo Cliff dwellers. Very very cool. You'll like it I promise!

Till next time.
P~

Catching up after a long long spring

2010-06-03T23:26:00.003-06:00

This Spring has been a bear!
Last years spring was wet. I thought it odd, but hey, it's spring in Utah. That stuff happens. This Spring however makes last years look timid.

Looking at the local weather station stats I found that the temperature was below average for 26 of the 31 days in May by an average of over 7 degrees lower. Eleven days were lower by 10 or more degrees and a few of those were nearly or even at 20 degrees below normal!!

It was wet too. having rained or snowed on 14 of the days. Nearly half the month. Now, this is the normal time of year for us to get a good bit of wetness, so that's not a big deal. The odd part is the number of rain storms this year that have hammered the crap out of everthing. The wind gusts have been far higher and nearly every storm of any kind, results in hail. That is not cool for leafy veggies!

The cool wet spring has been good for peas though. The annual favorite of the wet spring weather has not yet let us down. We planted three beds of peas this year and all are doing fairly well. Here's one of them all tied up to the "square in the air" that I like to use. And here's another in one of the few beds that doesn't yet have a trellis set up. No worries though, a few bamboo stakes a little creativity and the peas have been supported.
And here's another big surprise of the season. I never would have guessed when I over-wintered theses babies in the greenhouse that they were so cold tollerant. My first harvest of the year has been an artichoke!
And there's another on the way...
Last weekend was one of the first weekends that we've had in some time that were worth getting out and getting much done. I took advantage of that weather to get some of the plants from the G-house out and transplanted.
Here's the Meyer Lemon tree all pruned up and re-potted. Looks good eh?
And here's an experiment for this year. Potted Tomatoes. In these pots I planted the three cloned Heartland tomatoes from last year, Two Rutgers Tomatoes and a San Marzano.

And speaking of the cloned Heartland tomatoes... how about this.
They're fruiting!

One...

Two...

And yes, all three cloned tomatoes are fruiting!
The plants are a bit stunted looking, but I think they'll come along. The point is. These plants are fruiting and that means they are a success in my book!

This year I'll make it a point to also save some seed from them, but at least I'll have the opportunity.

Today I'll leave you with a picture of the summer iteration of the greenhouse. Shade cloth included.
The weather man says it's supposed to get into the 80's this week, so some adaptation was in order. We'll see how this does for me.
Hopefully the bad weather's behind us for now and we can move on into the growing season. This weekend I'll be getting beans started so it better!
P~

A little community work

2010-06-01T22:22:00.017-06:00

I've mentioned in passing, here and there, little tid bits about community gardens. I've wanted to get my hands into a community garden in my area for sometime. This spring, I thought I was going to get that opportunity.

A nearby city, wanted to start a community garden. A co-worker of mine brought in a newspaper with an article that he had read that said they were looking for a coordinator to help provide them some vision and to bring the project to fruition as it were. A~ and I went to the first meeting that they had, as interested parties. There was one other person that showed any interest in helping and he was there as well.

As it turned out, he and I were about as far apart on the community garden front as two people could possibly be. I, to put it plainly, believe community gardens should be organic poly-cultures made up of plots that are "owned" by individual gardeners or families. I think they offer a great opportunity to learn from each other and to offer instruction to the community. The other fellow is more of a "traditionalist" shall we say. He likes to have big rows of one crop. He's big on chemical fertilizers, even to the extent of telling me that he's "planted a little late when it's been cold weather and then just really go heavy on the fertilizer for a few weeks to catch them up." and when we discussed classes for beginning gardeners his belief was that we'll tell them when they have to spray for this bug or that. Yeah, like I said, we're really diametrically opposed on the basics.

Long story short, and believe me it was a long story, I ended up not doing the community garden at all. Not so much because I'm not willing to work with others well or anything. Basically I guess I was just not willing to put the things I believe in so strongly to the side for the sake of working with what was a very very... ummm... Strong personality. Yes, that's it, a strong personality.

If I'm being honest about the whole process, I don't blame that guy at all. He was reliable, he was motivated and he was a hard worker from what I saw. He and I were just from two different schools of thought. The problem I have with the whole process was with the city and it's representatives through the whole process. From the get go, I realized that we envisioned two distinctly different visions for the garden and I put my vision together on a very clearly stated "mission statement" for lack of a better description. I sent this to the administrators and said basically "This is where I'd like to take you, if you want to go there, I'm your guy. If you don't them he's your guy. No hard feelings either way." Still, the city had no commitment to a particular vision of their own, and from what I can tell were just bulldozed into doing whatever was in front of them by a "very strong personality".

In the end, I did end up going down and helping the five families that ended up having small plots in the garden to get a few things planted. I donated some tomato plants that I had started and I felt good helping out to some degree. It was a learning process and one that pointed out a number of things to be concerned with the next time I take on a venture like this again in the future. And I will take one on again I'm sure!

Here are a few picture of the garden as is stood on the 22nd of May when we went out to plant. It had rained hard for two days prior to planting so it was a bit of a mess, but we did get get planted nonetheless.This is the whole garden. It's a really good sized area that the city decided to use. You can see some of the plots along the back and right side that have been planted already. Corn, Tomatoes, peppers and tomatillos. That's it. All planted by one guy, paid for by the city. It will go to the local food bank so that's good. But apparently the local families will have only corn and salsa?
This section. has a number of smaller plots laid out and are the plots allotted for individual families. The plots on the right side were complete soup. Very very wet!

And here were a few of the families that showed up to plant.

I hope I don't come off too whiny about the whole process. It was a great thought that the city had in wanting to have a community garden for it's citizens and I wish them all the very best of luck. I just can't help but see so many possibilities that are being missed.

One day.... Till then, best to you all.
P~

Fermentation Friendly Home(stead)

2010-05-18T23:05:00.013-06:00

Yes, I think I can safely say that we are a fermentation friendly home(stead).
We've made home-made lacto-fermented sauerkraut, traditional sour brine pickles and pickled corn,
We've grown Lactobacillus cultures to ferment milk into yogurt,
We've brewed our own beer,
We've kept our sourdough starter as a member of the family for nearly the last three years.
Now... well now it's time to welcome "Mother" home.

I'm talking about a Mother SCOBY for kombucha of course. If you're not familiar with what Kombucha is, it's a fermented tea that many claim has many healthful properties. I cannot speak to that yet, but it is a good tea from what I've had of it... good enough to try making some on my own! My kids really seem to enjoy what we've had of it; we've tried a few different varieties from our local health food store.

The first thing we needed to do was to start a SCOBY of our own. SCOBY is an acronym for Symbiotic Colony of Bacteria and Yeast. It contains the different bacteria and yeasts that consume the sugars in in the sweetened tea and create the acids and bubbles that are indicative of good kombucha. There are places, I'm told, where one can purchase a Mother SCOBY, but me being me, I had to try to start on on my own.
This is a bowl of tea that I made from Jasmine Flower Green tea and added about a third of a bottle of RAW kombucha that had a small piece of culture starting in it. This little piece was about the size of a quarter and I hoped it would have enough of the live micro-organisms and yeasts to start a new SCOBY.
I left it, covered with a towel, for about ten days on top of my refrigerator and it bloomed very nicely... for lack of a better definition.

Here you can see the new home that I moved it over to this weekend.
It's a two-gallon FOOD GRADE plastic bucket. I brewed a large batch of the same Jasmine Green Tea and sweetened it with about a cup and a half of sugar. To that I added about a cup of the tea from the small batch that I used to grow my new Start and slid the new SCOBY start into it.
And here's the new SCOBY that I have so far. It's darker than most that I've seen, but it's also just started. My hope is that as the new "daughter" SCOBY grows it will form the typical whitish cellulose SCOBY that I've seen before.

So then, I know some of you have made these before, can you tell me if I'm on the right track? How's it looking so far. With any luck, I think that in the next week and a half or so I should be able to drink it!

Are you a fermentation friendly home(stead)? I'm thinking I need to come up with a neat little side bar banner for that? what do you think?
Well, best to you... till next time.
P~

Growing Raspberries

2010-05-11T22:46:00.011-06:00

I teach quite a few classes every year as a Master Gardener through our local extension service. Every time I teach one of the classes it seems that I get the same questions over and over again.

One of the questions I will get almost invariably, is about raspberries. There's few berries, I think, that are more coveted than fresh sweet raspberries so it doesn't surprise me. That being the case, I thought I'd go over a couple of the basics and take it from there.Here's half of my raspberry patch. I'm standing right where my other half is "supposed" to be growing. Last year it was overtaken by a really bad infestation of field bindweed and needed to be clipped to the ground to let me get a hold of it.

Here are a few basics of raspberries:
1. There are two main types of raspberries, Summer bearing and double or "ever" bearing. The names may sound a lot like the names given to the different strawberry type, but they aren't really the same. I'll get to the reason why in just a minute but suffice it to say that with summer bearing varieties you will get one crop per year from them and with ever bearing you will get two.

2. Raspberry plants are made up of two different types of canes. Primocanes and Floricanes. The primocanes are the fast growing soft skinned canes that grow up to 4- 6 feet tall in one year. You can see one below... You can see the very green tissue of the plant and the healthy flush of new growth coming up from the center of the plant. This is a new cane and it will grow very quickly throughout the summer. At the end of summer this cane should NOT be pruned out. Raspberries, at least the traditional summer bearing ones, will form on these canes the next summer. At that time, when the dry and dormant canes begin to grow, the canes are known as floricanes. These floricanes will fruit heavily in the summer and then will be finished. At this point, the canes can be pruned out.
EXCEPTION to the rule is made for double or ever-bearing varieties. For these varieties the same thing applies to the primocanes growing rapidly throughout the summer months. They will look the same but towards the end of the first year they will grow fruit. The harvest from this fruiting won't be as big as the summer harvests, but it's kind of a bonus one. The next year, as a floricane, it will bear fruit in the summer. Again, this is the last harvest for this cane and it can be pruned out to leave room for new primocanes to grow for next year.

Here's a picture of one of my patches floricanes from this year...Like I was saying, it looks like a dead dry stick. It will be tempting to prune these out at the end of the previous year, or to do so in the early spring but hold off.

As I was saying, after the floricanes have fruited in the summer of their second year, they are expired. They don't fruit anymore after that. At least not enough to warrant keeping them. My hardest thing to keep track of at the end of the summer when I get around to pruning them is which canes to thin out. That explains my little red yard pieces.I decided that this year I was going to mark the canes that are already growing and that I expect to harvest from this year. After the harvest is complete and I have time to prune, I will just go along the bottoms of the canes and thin out all of them that have red yarn on them.
Now, mind you, this isn't a technique that is practical for any sort of larger production. However, it is one of the perks of running a little nano-farm with a small patch. I can do things like this to help manage the patch. I'd like to perhaps find some sort of organic, or plant based paint that I could slap on the bottoms of the canes instead, but for now, this will do the trick.

Hope this clears up a few of the questions that you may have had regarding raspberries. I know it just skims the surface, but that was kind of the point. For more references about raspberries in your area, try checking online to your local extension service.

Best to you all, hope all's growing well!
P~

When life gives you lemons...

2010-05-04T22:48:00.027-06:00

Well, maybe it's because you have a new Meyer lemon tree??

Alright, I admit it, I'm cheesy. But I did get a new Improved Meyer Lemon Tree last weekend.

I've been wanting one of these for a couple of years now. Then, last year when I got some of my mom's lemons I was sold. They are soooo good! So Saturday afternoon, my gift for my (gulp) thirty ninth birthday, was a lemon tree.
And here she is. My little limoncello machine! right there in her current home in the greenhouse. We've been having some really off again on again cold spells punctuated by hot days so I think I;'ll keep her in there for another couple of weeks to be safe. Later she'll be in a nice pot that I inherited from my uncle and will be kept outdoors for the summer.

And there's lots going on in that thar greenhouse too. As you can see below. I can hardly move around in there any more.There's lots of tomatoes, a lemon tree, peppers, cantaloupes cucumbers, tomatillos, marigolds, herbs...
Even some pumpkin starts that are doing really well.
And I found this on one of the little heartland tomato clones that I was able to hold over the winter. Guess there's no better testament to a healthy plant than that huh?

But Wait! There's more... There's life outside too!
Our onions are coming along well, and just about ready for a good mulching with some straw. I would love to do it earlier in the season, but our winds here just undo all my hard work.
It may be hard to see, but this bed has one of our first carrot plantings of the year growing up in it. There's five rows with a couple of extra wide spaces in the middle section. On either side of the bamboo stakes that are laying there will be planted beans for this year. The carrots will grow right along with them in the shaded area.
Here's a closer look.

And some peas. These are not doing too well. Late winter storms beat them up. Not the cold mind you but the winds. They broke a lot of them off right at ground level.

The first Kohlrabi plantings had trouble too. notice the front (windward) side of both beds were hit the hardest?
This bed has my bok Choi Chinese cabbage and is surrounded by carrots. Later in the season I'll fill the bed in with pumpkins and squash.

Not much to say... more peas!
And last but not least, the potato garden. Lots of green popping up here too!

So there you go, all caught up right? well, kind of... still have a couple more posts that I'll try to get up soon. Too much to do, not enough time!

hope all's growing well with you all
P~

a question answered (Plant Propagation)

2010-04-25T21:37:00.008-06:00

I had a question posed to me today from a new(ish) reader. I thought I'd take a minute to give a quick answer.

Jasonbx asked...
Started reading through your blog earlier this spring. (I tried starting tomatoes from seed this year, and was looking for any info I could find.) I'm curious if your thinning cuttings dipped in rooting hormone made it? Also would this potentially work with larger tomato "branches" or only main stems?

Well Jason, Yeah... They did great!
As a matter of fact I'd even go so far as to say that they did even better than I would have hoped. I kept them very wet for the first week and a half, sort of to mimic the way that I had had them in water like I had done in a previous test. That trial ended up rooting them pretty well even though I hadn't used any rooting hormone at all. This time I was putting them into a soil-less medium so I thought a little hormone wouldn't hurt any.
Tomatoes tend to do very well as it is for setting new roots. You can see above that the roots have easily established themselves in the cell pack that I placed them in. Below is a picture of another tray of cuttings that I just did the same thing with last weekend.This tray has the extra cuttings from some bell papers, jalapenos, a few more tomatoes and even some eggplant.

That leads me into the answer to the second part of Jason's question. Can you do the same thing from regular "branches"? Yes, absolutely. In fact, if you've ever had a large tomato plant droop till it touches ground, you may have found that it will readily throw down roots mid-branch and start a new plant. As long as you don't cut too large a piece of new growth (it needs to be able to support itself easily) it will root fairly easily.

I hope to do some more interesting propagation trials as the season progresses. I'm glad to know that they've helped a little, or at the very least piqued some interest!

Happy propagating!
P~

Happy Earth Day!

2010-04-22T08:00:00.004-06:00

Just wanted to wish you all a happy earth day. It's not a holiday per se, but I like that I now find it on calendars. It's good that there's at least one day a year that we can take some time to focus on ideas, alternatives and possibilities.
This year, we went to a local nature park that holds an annual Earth Day festival. We ate some lunch there, took a look at the different exhibits designed to raise awareness and took a walk through a long winding forest trail. It was a great time to be together and I believe it helps to raise our children's consciousness about sustainability and alternatives to how we do things regularly.
We had to take a picture with the giant solar panel array that they have there right? This is a goal of ours. To have our energy provided completely off grid and in a sustainable way. It'll happen too, I can promise you that!
How can I be so sure? Because I believe in "A posse ad esse" - "From possibility to reality"... that's why!
Happy earth day all.
P~

baby Chickens!!

2010-04-20T23:35:00.000-06:00

How I managed to go since the 31st of March without mention number one of the fact that we've had "house guests" I'll never know? And of course, by house guests I mean we've got 8 new chicks in a Chicken Condo in the living room!

The current chickens that we have are just over two now and their egg production is slowing and becoming less regular. They've been keeping up their end of the bargain for sure, but rotating hens and how to deal with "end of life" issues is one of those pragmatic things that I think any keeper of livestock needs to take into consideration. It's also a place where there is a lot of difference of opinion to be found. I believe that as a steward of my hens I owe it to them to make sure that they are well taken care of. I don't spoil them mind you, but I make sure they have fresh water every day, constant access to food and grit and that I keep their coop clean and sanitary. That's my end of the bargain. I decided to add chickens to our nano-farm to do a couple of things. The first one, of course, was to provide eggs to our family. They've done that very well. The other was to help me close the loop so to speak. Chickens are great at turning scraps, trimmings and leftovers into two things, I already mentioned the eggs, but their excellent fertilizer factories too! By giving my hens a constant diet of trimmings, greens and grass they provide me with wonderful organic soil amendments that help me to further provide food for them and my family. A closed loop. At some point, the ratio of their inputs to outputs will get skewed to the point that they will need to be replaced. I anticipate that will be towards the end of this summer. Hence the second stringers in the living room.

Of course there are those that keep hens as "pets with benefits". They will keep them for companionship and eggs and let them run their natural lives before they replace them. This is of course totally valid ideology as well, it's just not the one I subscribe to.

So then, with that out out of the way, how about some cute and cuddly pics of our little ladies???Here's the lot of them. I thought it was the cutest thing ever! All eight were laying with their heads on another ones butt. Strangely almost completely in matching pairs by breed.
If you can tell breeds you'll notice that I have two each of white and brown leghorns, buff orpingtons and Rhode Island reds. This year we decided to include a couple of brown egg layers to see how that goes over. I had really really wanted to get some barred rocks but there were none to be had.This is a brown leghorn chick. They really are the coolest looking chicks I think. Particularly when they're compared to their very plain Jane white leghorn cousins. While I'm on the subject of leghorns; they really are the most flighty and easily spooked of the breeds that I've had before.And on the other side of the coin is the mellowest and friendliest breed so far... the Buff Orpington. I really look forward to this hen being a part of our flock.

But then... there's the Ugly duckling phase. Here's the ladies when they're having a "bad hair day" so to speak!It's amazing the difference in just under two weeks isn't it?
And here they are taking a little nap. I love how they just flop out, heads sideways, looking like they just came back from a long night out with the girls or something. I think they're about ready for a training roost.

So there they are. Cute, cuddly and fun but future hard working garden buddies!
Anyone out there starting their own flocks this year? Maybe you're working to change the laws where you live so you can have them. If so Check out Backyard Farming Blog for a really good article on how to get started with doing just that. Of course, I'm not biased because I was one of the main subjects of the article. :)

Till next time... best to you all!

Greenhouse work - transplanting

2010-04-19T22:45:00.000-06:00

A couple days ago, when talking about the greenhouse and the work I've been doing in it, I mentioned how I had thinned out and transplanted the majority of my tomato seedlings. I also promised to go into a little more detail about that later on.

Well I can do you one better. VIDEO! I've been talking about starting to do more video stuff - well, talking to myself, but still talking about it - and I finally got around to it and of course your the first to know! I've just started a new YouTube channel where I'll be posting walk-throughs, how-to's and well, I guess just about whatever comes to mind. I'll be putting up new videos there as I make them and some will be posted here if they apply to what I'm talking about, but I hope you'll check it out from time to time and let me know what you think. Also, if ideas come to mind or I talk about something that you just need a visual of, let me know and I'll do what I can to get it online!

For now, here's one of the first new videos I've put up. I hope to make the "production quality" a little better as I go along, but it does get the point across.

Pruning out the excess seedlings from the tray...
The rooting hormone... Tomatoes are really good root starters, but I wanted to make sure they set root early to give them the best chance of survival.
The new cuttings set in the damp potting medium. This is a very vermiculite/peat rich medium that will hold a lot of water to keep the stems damp.

Coming soon, an update on the cuttings progress.

!! IMPORTANT GARDEN ADVISORY !!

2010-04-17T23:14:00.013-06:00

I received a surprising and significant email yesterday from a representative of MOTHER EARTH NEWS magazine. I felt obliged to post and share the body of it with you as it contains important and relative information to consider as our garden seasons (In the Northern Hemisphere) begin to ramp up.

As the garden season ramps up, we at Mother Earth News want to let you and A Posse Ad Esse readers know that you may want to screen any hay, grass clippings or compost you bring into your gardens, to assure the materials are not contaminated with persistent herbicide residues (most often clopyralid and aminopyralid). As our reports included below indicate, these chemical residues can kill plants or severely stunt their production, costing gardeners money and time.

What do you need to know about contaminated compost?
•Affected plants show signs of curled, cupped leaves, wilting new growth and poor germination in tomatoes, peas, beans, lettuce and other garden crops.

•The chemical residues causing the problem can be present in grass clippings, in manure of livestock that has eaten sprayed plant matter or in compost made from contaminated materials. These herbicides do not biodegrade during composting and can persist in your soil for several years.

•Contaminated materials have been found in municipal, organic and conventional bagged compost.

•To prevent contamination, ask questions before buying manure or compost that contains manure. If the seller doesn’t know if it’s safe, don’t buy it, or use this cheap and easy home test to be sure it’s safe.

•Anyone who suspects they have detected contaminated material should notify their local Extension agent and news media, as well as Richard Keigwin at the EPA and the product manufacturer (if purchased).

This information isn't new, as you can tell from the dates of the linked articles. However, it is still very relevant. I can't help to think how much of an argument this makes for continuing to make any little steps that we can towards becoming more and more "closed loop" in our own gardens. By learning to make our own compost or building lasagna gardens and growing polyculture gardens with attention to the natural world we can go a long way towards that.

A few of my related Links:
Cooking in the garden
New Additions (Worms and kitchen scraps)
Compost Day IV
Compost Day III
Compost Day II
Compost Day I
Starting a Lasagna Garden

Hope something in there is of some small help!

Thank you Brandy, I appreciate your concern for my garden and my readers as well!

Keeping up with stuff

2010-04-15T23:06:00.022-06:00

Sorry for the absence, so much to do so little time. It's amazing how fast time slips away from me. So much to do so little time, you know. I guess after a week I'm about due for an update though. Some of you may remember I mentioned a while back that I have a test I need to take for work - Security Plus. It's honestly about as boring a thing as I can imagine having to put myself through, but it's required so I've been working on that. Of course there have been taxes to file, storms and other projects that, while I won't mention them quite yet, are pretty exciting but have taken some time! Excuses, Excuses... right?

In my last post I mentioned the big Spring storm that swooped in on my honey and I's date night. We ended up getting somewhere in the area of 3-4 inches of snow in our neighborhood - where we live in northern Utah the amount of rain or snow you get can vary greatly within a small area - but the next day, as is typical of spring storms, it was warm and sunny. In the picture below you can see how I covered over my cloches at the last minute with a couple of the recycled window frame cold frames that I put together. They were there mostly just to keep the snow from piling too deep over the cloches and making them like little freezers.
Luckily, it worked great as you can see from the healthy little napa cabbages under their individual greenhouses.

Thursday evening (Last Thursday), with a good weather forecast in mind (The lows have been between 36 and 40 and highs well above 50 - 60F for the last week.) I took the plunge and moved my plants to the greenhouse. It was not without reservation and some precautions of course, but they're there, transplanted and ready to really get going!

The main thing I transplanted was my, by now quite leggy, tomatoes. I took care too to try to maximize my work by attempting to root the cuttings that were trimmed out. I'll talk a lot more about that in another post in case you were interested.
Above you can see most of the plants that I brought into the greenhouse. Artichokes are in there at the back of course, in front of them are some mixed flats with early cucumber and squash starts and in the foreground are a whole bunch of tomatoes in 6 pack cells ready to get a new home.

********* F - L - A - S - H **********

And by using the magic of the blogosphere, here's a shot of a part of the tomatoes that I put in to plastic cup "pots". These should hold most of them over until they're ready to go into the ground.And here's a shot of a few of the larger ones that I put into 1 gallon nursery pots. I was able to pick these up a the local nursery used for .30 a piece.And in case you were wondering about my little heartland tomato plant that I cloned last year and held over... well, now there are three.
They're all doing great. All are about 6-8 inches tall at this point and just getting ready to take off I think.

I've more to share, but I'll have to get that up over the weekend. Till then, all the best to you all and Grow On!!
P~

A blustery Date Night

2010-04-06T00:20:00.008-06:00

This week is Spring Break for our kids. They all go to the same school right now so they all get to get off at the same time. Today they went down to Salt Lake City to visit family and get to see a concert. They were going to spend the night afterwards so tonight got to be an unplanned date night for A~ and I. We got some dinner at a local Mexican place where we haven't been in ages and then went and caught the movie "Clash of the Titans" courtesy of some free passes that we've had, literally, for nearly a year. I remembered this movie from when I was a kid and was really looking forward to watching a new version of it when they could really make it seem the way I think they wanted to back in the 80's but just couldn't. It was good, pretty much what I had expected. It wasn't spectacular, but it was certainly entertaining!

The real Titan tonight turned out to be the weather though! We went in and it was raining a little and dropping the occasional snow flake. It was forecast to snow a little but hey, we've heard that before this year. I expected a little snow over night, nothing to stress over. WRONG! An hour and forty-five minutes later we left the theater and walked smack into a whole new and very white world! There was already close to four inches on the ground and more on our car. ???Where the heck did this come from?

We drove home slowly and I went about the farmers duties. Its funny isn't it, that in our modern era of automated everything that when we make the decision to slow down a little and produce more of our own food it comes with a lot of responsibilities. I went out to make sure the chickens tarp was pulled down to keep snow from blowing into their run, ensured the portable greenhouse cover was pulled tight over the kohlrabi starts (that have already had a tough time thanks to some serious wind storms I might add) and added my recycled window frame cold covers over my cabbage starts and their cloche covers to keep the bulk of the future snow from burying it. They were already essentially covered by snow like miniature little snowmen in my garden bed. It will be a really good test of the covers effectiveness to see how they perform through this storm. Particularly since it's supposed to snow most of tomorrow too.

Well, I guess we'll see how it turns out... Wish me luck. How's the weather been this spring in your neck of the woods?
Stay tuned!
P~

Well that was nice...

2010-04-06T00:11:00.004-06:00

I was informed that I was given a little bit of a shout out today. One of what they consider to be the 50 best gardening blogs. Thank you for the compliment!
Still can't figure out what it has to do with physical therapy... but Thank you anyway!
P~

Goings on.

2010-03-30T22:12:00.030-06:00

Still much happening around the homestead. I'll narrate, while letting some pictures tell most of the story...

Plants have been in the seed starting unit in the east window for almost a month now and are coming along nicely. Lights under reflective material. I used one of those .99 cent survival blankets that you can pick up in the outdoors section of may stores to concentrate the light back onto the sprouts. This picture was actually taken 10 days ago and the difference is impressive. (I'll try to get some more of them up soon.) I started running my oscillating fan over these a couple of days after this picture was taken. It simulates the weather that the plant would be exposed to outdoors and helps to keep the legginess down and build stronger plants. Iceberg lettuce sprouts under the lights. Starting these indoors let's me get enough of a head start that I can get some from them before they bolt. Last year they did OK. Hopefully even better this year!For those following the progress of my last robust little cutting from last years tomatoes. I've now got it split into the original cutting and two other "daughters". I placed the cuttings into soaked vermiculite and let them sit for about 2 - 3 weeks until I began to see roots along the edges of the cups. They've now been transplanted into soil and are coming along well. She's a tuffy!Here's a little plot of salad greens that I'll be using for cut and come again salad harvests until I can get more from outdoors.
LOOKOUT!! ALIENS!! OK I'm a dork, we all know that, but don't they kind of look like the invasion of the body snatchers or something? These are some "Garden Cloche" that I picked up at a local thrift store for 1.50 each last year. I've seen this same exact type of Garden Cloche for sale for 20.00 a piece so I was pretty happy to find these. So is my Chinese Cabbage I think.Here's a close up. The only noticeable difference with these is that they don't have the neat little glass knobby thing at the top. I think they were for displaying figurines or something originally. See, just goes to show, a little imagination goes a long way.I finally got out and got the greenhouse cleaned up over the last weekend too. It needed a lot of work but is in a much better state now. Soon the nights will be warm enough I won't feel bad putting out the sprouts! Those are recycled buckets of water to help hold some of the days heat through the night.Did you notice that little bit of green in the back of the G-house? Those are one of my biggest greenhouse successes and for some reason I have yet to mention them. Last year I tried to grow Artichokes in two largish pots. They didn't do well. Didn't die, but never thrived. I did, however, manage to overwinter them in the pots in the greenhouse. As soon as the weather started to warm at all, they started to throw up new shoots and really took off. This past weekend I split the second of the two plants into new starts and now have a total of twelve! The four on the left were split from the first plant a couple of weeks ago. I have a place I'll be planting these babies out by the potato garden this year and with any luck, I should have at least enough artichokes to enjoy fresh through the summer and then can get them thriving enough to over winter again!This weekend also had me cleaning out and prepping some of the harvest baskets that we use. Just seeing them there makes me excited about filling them!
As you can see, Things are coming along. There's more queued up, but just not enough time to get to them.

Hope Spring's coming along well for you all as well. Care to share your progress with everyone? Drop a comment and feel free to link to your own blog if you have one too. This is a community isn't it?

Namaste all...
Paul~

High Density Pea Planting

2010-03-25T23:04:00.018-06:00

I had quite a bit of interest in my high density PEA planting last year so I thought this year I'd go into a little more depth about it.

Peas are one of the true harbingers of spring. They're cold tolerant to the point of pushing through snow in some cases and later, when they plump and fill their pods with the sweet little green bites of goodness, you can be assured that the growing season is here. Like many beginning gardeners one of the first crops I was interested in growing years ago was peas and, also like many new gardeners, I failed miserably for the first few years.

As I mentioned, peas are cold tolerant. This isn't just a convenient truth, it's a cold fact (pun not intended) that we have to take into consideration. The truth of the matter is, peas aren't even so much "cold tolerant" as they are "cool mandating". What I mean by this is that they actually need that cool weather to do well. The first year I planted peas I did it when I felt the gardening season began...late May. I planted, watered, watched with excitement as they sprouted and started to grow and then stood back scratching my head as they abruptly wilted and died in the heat of late June's heat. I did a little research and learned that they like cool weather. The next time I planted them it was early April and they did much better. My few little rows of peas grew proudly and filled nicely and in the end we had peas for dinner... one time! While I had planted them correctly, I didn't plant nearly enough. Following the directions on the package, I spaced them as instructed and got a harvest of about one full bowl.

The last few years I've managed to work out a way that has yielded us very good results, has given us enough yield to can peas that we can eat through during the winter months and manages to get the peas in, grown and out of the garden to make space for the next crop rotation in good time.

Everything starts for us with pre-germination. This isn't something that's generally instructed to do, but I think of it as mandatory. I'll go into why in a few minutes. What I do is to put the peas that I figure I will need, plus a few percent more just in case, into a large container and completely fill the tub with luke warm water. This I leave to sit overnight. The next day, I strain out all the peas and return them to the container, which now has a paper towel liner in it, and cover with plastic wrap with a few breathing holes in it.
After a few days I check the peas and if they look dry I will mist them just a bit and re-cover. After less than a week you should be looking at something that looks like all the peas have stuck out their tongues and are daring you to plant them. Take them up on that! Wait too long and they'll start to rot.

Looking at the picture below you'll see that by high density planting I don't mean only that they're planted close in the row, which they are (about 4.5 to 5 inches), but that the rows of plantings are just as close. it's like planting on the corners of a 4.5 inch square.

Here's where that pre-germination comes in handy. Because I will be planting my peas in a high density way, I need to know that most, like 95+% of them, are going to come up. When the seed has germinated successfully you know fairly surely that that is a viable seed. Some will rot or die in the soil, but most will emerge successfully.

The other reason for pre-germinating seed is for situation like I had this year. I had a good bit of seed that I needed to use because it was from 2007 and was getting old. By pre-germinating I was able to identify whether the seed was still good or not. Because I wanted to make sure I still had enough time to get new seed if I had to I did the whole process a few weeks earlier than usual. Luckily the weather's cooperated and I had this handy cold frame that I built last fall that I could insulate them from any extreme nights with.

The peas have now come up and are out from under cover. If all goes well I'll be able to start my harvesting of these a couple of weeks earlier than last year even.

Peas are a great crop. They're sweet right off the vine, easy to work with and with a little planning can really yield a good harvest. I hope this sheds a little more light on how I like to do them on my little backyard farm. What's your favorite way?

Paul~

Let's try again...

2010-03-14T22:31:00.008-06:00

Well, I don't know Belani, and I'm really sorry to have to do this, but I don't want to miss out on the opportunity of giving someone the Food Dehydrator and I have yet to here from Belani.
Sooo...

Again with the random generator and this time it looks like it's Paige! So I'll be waiting for some word from you then Paige. Hopefully in the next couple of days anyway.

Looking forward to it, and from your post it sounds like you could use one too.
P~

And the winner is.....

2010-03-11T15:54:00.009-07:00

... Balani !!

And here's the real kicker, she's from right here in Northern Utah. (And I swear I didn't play local favorites.) I took number of posts I got, subtracted out the few duplicates and spams that I got, and used a number picker.

So Balani, here's what you need to do. Send me an email, and I'll reply with the details. You can find my email address on my profile page (listed at the top right side of the page). The email address is written out in my "ABOUT ME" section
Looking forward to hearing from you.

Paul~

TO all others, Thanks for participating, I have a couple of other ideas for some smaller scale give-aways as the season progresses, so keep checking in.

Going once, going twice...

2010-03-10T22:13:00.005-07:00

Just in case you've been on the fence about it, here's your last chance to get your name in for the give-away I'm planning for tomorrow.

I've been enjoying hearing from so many of you. Honestly I've been a little embarrased at the love fest. I guess it is my fault, I did say "let me know what you enjoy about my blog" after all. I was mostly looking for some constructive critisism and wanted to learn about what kind of stuff you all enjoyed reading about, but hey, who am I to turn down a couple of compliments huh?

Anyway, because I've been able to root out a comment from so many of you, I now know you're really out there and it's not just some random person popping in from all over the globe. I hope you'll continue to chime in from time to time even after the give-away.

I'm going to give it until I get home from work tomorrow afternoon so that will be about 4:00 Mountain Standard time tomorrow. If you haven't put your name in yet, better head over there and get it in.

See you tomorrow.
P~

A new Food Dehydrator...FREE for you!!

2010-03-03T23:44:00.009-07:00

Last week I mentioned what happens when opportunity knocks.

Today I'd like to help it knock on your door.

Part of what I told the representative from CSN stores was that I was not willing to endorse a company to the people that trust me enough to take the time to invest in what I have to say, without having any experience with their company. Well, I did. I ordered the Dehydrator you see on the right from their housewares store and have actually been amazed with the service. After the order was placed, I received quick confirmation. Then, shortly after, I was informed of the shipping schedule; order would ship in 3-5 days... I figured I'd have it this week some time. What surprised me was the notification that I got the next day that my order had been bumped up (free of charge) and was on it's way. The next day it was on my doorstep! I would never have thought it would come so fast.

So then, the next part of what I arranged to do was to pass on the giving to you! If was happy with the service, then I was willing to share that with you in the form of another FREE food dehydrator. It's my first give away, and I can't think of a better item. With the upcoming season upon us I just know there has to be someone out there that could use one of these babies. After all, it may only come with 4 trays but it's expandable to 12!

So here's what I'm asking for from you. Don't just leave a comment on the post, share a little something with me please. If you've been a reader for some time, let me know what you enjoy about my blog. If you're a new reader, I'd love to know what led you here or what you're looking for. Help me be a better blogger and get a chance at a FREE FOOD DEHYDRATOR!

I'm Looking forward to it. Share with your friends or link to this post if you like, but either way one entry per person please. I'll announce a winner in one week, so that's March 11th.
Good luck!
Paul~

A word on consideration

2010-02-25T22:20:00.008-07:00

A~ had her shoulder surgery today. She has a very hard time with medications, particularly narcodic ones. We try not to take drugs here other than the occasional ibuprophren or Acetomeniphen for the standard aches and pains so she's very sensitive to them. She came through the surgery alright, they found a bone spur, scarring and tissue inflamation and her joint was "loose" and they "tightened" it (don't ask... it's kinda gross.). The hardest part was waking and being able to eat/drink. She made it and I love her for how she pushed through it in her own time.

I have to ask as a result of today though, "What has happened to consideration?" I can understand the other patience in a room being a little loud or loopy, they're on God knows what kind of drugs. But while A~ tried to deal with nausea and falling in and out of sleep, she was jerked awake more than once, or thrice for that matter, by loud laughter and talking. And I'm not just being sensitive because it was my sweetheart. It was ridiculous. People talk and laughed behind the curtains like they were in their own rooms! And here's the kicker; the nurses and doctors were the loudest. I know all about where one doctor likes to vacation with his family down in southern Utah, and where another nurse used to live on the east side of the valley. Oh yes, and let us not overlook the nurse who felt the need to sing happy birthday to some other nurse over the PA system! Yep, that was one of the times A~ jerked awake and looked at me like I'd just shaken her bed.

I'm sorry to have to subject you all to this rant but honestly, I just had to get it off my chest. I'm so tired of the prevalence of inconsiderate people! It's a sad commentary... isn't it? Or am I just a whiner who's over reacting? Are people more and more inconsiderate of others around them or is it just me? Maybe I'm just out of the loop because I don't use a cell phone normally so I'm not used to thinking I'm always in a "private" conversation. Who knows?

In the end, I just thank the lord my wife is well, I pray she heals quickly and I thank you for letting me vent!

Peace all...
P~

When opportunity knocks.

2010-02-23T22:22:00.000-07:00

From time to time offers and opportunities come our way that sound good but we're just not sure. Perhaps they're too good to be true, perhaps we just never give them a try so we can't really say?

That's kind of been the line that I've taken on supporting advertising here. I've had offers from companies before and, whether it's because the person contacting me just seemed "pushy" or maybe it was a company that didn't really have anything to offer my readers, but for whatever reason I just never made the commitment to dip a toe into that world. It's something that I've thought about doing a little of this year, but wasn't sure how I was willing to do it.

Well, yet again the world seems to be pointing me in the direction I have decided to move and opportunity knocked...err.. emailed as it were and I find myself prepared to test these waters. The company that contacted me provides, from what I can tell, everything from Bar Stools to Writing desks and very seemingly everything else in between. They're called CSN stores and I have to say, I've been impressed so far with my dealings with them.

So then, what's the rub? What do I get in return for my endorsement? First off, re-read what you just read. See any endorsements? Nope, not yet. Links maybe, but heck those are a dime a dozen. One of the things that I did like about this company, was that when I told their rep that I wasn't willing to give an endorsement of his company blindly and told him that I can't offer my opinion to my readers without experiencing that company myself, well he thought that was a perfectly reasonable position to come from. I respect that.

To that end, I went about searching their extensive catalog. I was pretty surprised actually at how easy the site was to navigate. As a full time web developer I can definitely appreciate an easy to use web-site. At any rate, I found my self lost in the food section (surprise!!) and found something that I am willing to test my user experience out on. A food dehydrator. It's something that I need terribly anyway and if I'm going to check out a web-site they darn well better offer something I'd be interested in anyway right? Right!

There's also another reason that I decided to try out this product. It's a pretty good reason, but one that I'm going to have to make you wait for. After all, I did say I wasn't willing to stand behind anyone that I didn't have experience with right?
So just a little bit of patience and hopefully if all goes well I can have some good news for you next week... about the Dehydrator... and what I think of it... and what I think of CSN stores. Till then, I'll just be watching my dried tomato stash dwindle knowing next year I will have many many more!!

Wish me luck.

The lone survivor.

2010-02-21T23:17:00.001-07:00

Last fall I embarked on a new experiment. Cloning Tomato cuttings from some of my favorite tomatoes from last years garden.

The going was great to start with. I was able to get all the cuttings to root nicely, they all transplanted to soil with no rejections and all was going along like I'd done this for years. And then old man winter snuck up and clubbed me over the proverbial head with weather that stayed in the teens and twenties for weeks and weeks. I was able to cover the transplants with some plastic, that helped a bit. I even brought an electric heater into the greenhouse to keep the chill off under the plastic overnight by running it with an on and off schedule using a timer, that helped too, but just not enough, I kept loosing plants here and there through the winter.

Sadly, I finally met my match with a final hard cold spell some time in early January that took nearly all the rest. But one hearty little guy held out. He was scrawny and a little cold burned on the tips but with some love I've been able to pull it through!
It's one of the heartland tomatoes that I grew last year and lucky for me that was at the top of the list of tomatoes that I wanted to be able to keep over the winter.

Right now, this little Heartland tomato is about eight inches tall and starting to fill in a bit more. My hope is that I can let it grow for another couple of weeks and then split it again from this stock and get at least three healthy plants from this lone survivor. This is a known to be a particularly good patio tomato variety, meaning that it can do well in pots, and I plan to try my hand at growing a few of them that way this year. Because they are also indeterminate (meaning the harvest doesn't come all at once, but rather trickles in all season.) the plan is that if I have them established well in the pots come fall, I can move them into the greenhouse and have tomatoes well into December.

Of course I've had these grand ideas before and they didn't work out as planned, but since when has THAT ever been a good reason to quit?
Wish me luck!
P~

For the love of "Scratch"

2010-02-18T22:43:00.019-07:00

I've been meaning to put this post up for a week but just haven't had the time to crop photos and make the post. I just can't let my wife go un-heralded though. She starting working this year, and has been recognized for all the talents that I knew she had which has led to more demand for her at work. The best part is that she's working with me (in a way) so I get to hear all about how great she is to which I look at people and say " Um, yeah?!! I know!".

Yet even with that, and a shoulder that is still giving her pains from our car accident a few months back, she continues to bless us with such good food... and so often from scratch!

Like these cheese rolls:
They're a big time family favorite. How could you not love homemade bread wrapped around a tasty cheesy middle? And if you glaze the top with salted butter it leaves the golden brown color with a just a hint of saltiness. MMMmmm MMMmmm good!

They're great with a bowl of homemade chili too.And I can't say enough how nice it is to make chili that just screams from flavor because its made with canned tomatoes and tomato sauce from your own homegrown tomatoes, fresh onions from the cold storage and green chili's that we picked from a local farm and canned ourselves. If you haven't had the pleasure of fresh food from ripe ingredients you have not lived!

For dessert we feasted on a brand new recipe for scratch made yellow cake made bright yellow of course with the dark golden yolks of our back yard chickens eggs.A~ found a new way to make the chocolate frosting that is the creamiest and tastiest that we've had.

It's one thing to talk about eating from the storage cabinet and survival food has it's place, but honestly, the best gift gained from building the habit of growing and putting up your own food and learning the ways of preparing it on a regular basis is really just in the enjoying of your labors and the flavors that they bring.

Hmm, I think I'm getting hungry again just talking about it. Life is good. Some days better than others, but days like this are among the best!
Best to you all.
P~

Knock knock knockin...

2010-02-16T21:36:00.011-07:00

On Springtimes dooooor....
Oh man! Can I tell you how bad spring fever has kicked in with me? It's crazy I tell you, I can't wait to get growing!

This afternoon, I ended up having to come home early because I had a hurt little one. (He's 14 but hey they're ALWAYS your little ones right?) Anyway, when we got back to the house, the sun was out and it had to have been a balmy 45 degrees (F) out. Now I grew up in Southern California and in years past I would have been coated up on a 45 deg. day but today I just had to get out and fork some dirt!!

I was able to get our whole potato patch forked over along with one of our back yard raised beds and another smallish bed that's along the house. It felt soooo good to see the rich black soil turning over. Getting to reach down, pick up a healthy sized clod and easily crumble it in my hand. I found the clippings and chicken manure that had been turned in last fall was making it's way nicely into becoming nourishing humus for the upcoming years garden and had helped to grow an incredibly healthy population of earth worms over the winter.

Soon I'll be setting the seed starter up in our east facing sliding door window and getting things started there too. Then in another couple of weeks things will be filling the greenhouse in preparation for planting. In fact, A~ and I had wonderful Valentines day together and then treated ourselves to a breakfast out together on Monday morning as we were both off from work, and being the the madly in love, nano-farming couple we are what do you think we did? We ate breakfast, chatted about exactly how in love we are, and then whipped out our garden journal from last year and started hammering out our list of things that we'll be growing and where we want to put them of course! What? Isn't that what you'd call a romantic morning out? I mean what can be more romantic than talking about your goals together, planning for the things you want to do together and then working out the details of how you'll get them done together by working side by side? Ha! got you thinking now don't I?

Well anyway, I suspect this is just the beginning of the suffering that is Spring Fever in the inter-mountain west. Today will be warm and inviting then tomorrow it'll rain and snow but by evening it will all melt off and be warm again but too wet to work. Oh and I wish I were kidding, alas, I am not. But never fear, Spring is on it's way, so if you haven't started planning your attack you'd better start thinking about it soon.

Best wishes and Bring on the Spring!!

Paul~

Yeah, we got skills...

2010-02-04T18:00:00.001-07:00

The wife and I that is. We make a heck of a team.

You see, she comes up with these great ideas for how we can make use of a particular area, and I build the solutions for her. Then, When I'm done, and there's this kinda OK looking piece of wood sitting in some room, she comes along with a gallon of paint and a truckload of creativity and **POOF** "Dang that looks good honey!!"

Case in point, She decided that the open area just under our railing in the front room needed a nice bench to sit on while we change shoes and that we could maybe store backpacks or blankets in.

A trip to the hardware store, some doodles on a scratch pad and a few weekend days later I built her a bench.... with storage of course.

In fact, she liked the idea so much she decided we needed a matching piece for the library that we finished almost exactly two years ago.

Yep, more storage, can a growing family ever have enough?

But what I built her in wood was only half the project. She went in, painted and "aged" it...

...and then sealed it with multiple coats of protective clear coats and we now have a great looking bench in the front room.

And an equally good looking mini bench/ottoman for our library.

And there you have it, if you can't find what you want, or if what you do find just costs too darn much, give building your own a try. The first few times they may be a little skewed or wobbly, but each time you'll get better and better. Pick up a good how to magazine like "home handyman" for example at the library and do your research. It can be done and let me tell you, there's no better feeling than showing off your own creations.

Now, I hoping the "if you build it they will come" rule will apply. Think the bench in the library will get the kids reading more?
We'll see.
Best
P~

Beekeeping class finale

2010-01-31T21:25:00.012-07:00

Well, I've decided that there is one definitive rule in beekeeping....
It's all relative!

Seriously, the guy last Tuesday told us all the things that we "needed" to do and "how" we needed to do it; here's the catch, two thirds of it was in direct conflict with the things we were told that we "needed" to do and "how" we needed to do them by the guest the previous Tuesday. I do have to say, however, that the guy this last Tuesday when asked "Why?" to certain parts had specific reasons and studies that proved it or at least supported his point of view. He was an extension agent with Idaho and actually studies these things after all.

So, now we are at the point of deciding what and how we are planning on doing this. As one might expect there are quite a few decisions to be made and, at this point, not a lot of time to make them. I mean, we're not rushed by any means but there are decisions that need to be made within the next month at the longest.

For instance, what type of hives do we want to set up? We've pretty well decided that we want to stay traditional and use Langstroth hives ; they're readily available and have a large basis of information to pull from which will be particularly useful for beginning beekeepers like us. The biggest issue I have with respect to the hive styles is the materials that I choose to have them made from. Typically they are plain pine boxes that are painted on the outside and left plain on the inside. This is more cost effective to start off, but will require more time and money later in maintenance to scrap, clean and repaint them, and can also decrease the movement of moisture through the box walls. As the bees fan the fresh honey in order to lower its moisture level to the correct amount, that moisture needs to be able to leave the hive. This isn't normally a problem, but it is part of what causes hive box paint jobs to weather quickly. The best solution to eliminating, or at least greatly reducing the maintenance dilemma as well as to solving the need to paint at all, is to invest in a more quality hive body. Some I have found are made of cedar or cypress. Both of these woods will wear well when exposed to wet outdoor conditions and will not require paints at all. This is the direction I am currently leaning.

The other, and probably more obvious, decision that we'll need to make is what kind of dang bees to get? There are many sorts of production bees that can be gotten, and on top of that a selection of queens to be made too. I don't have all the information yet that I'll need to make that decision, but we are doing our due diligence. Any suggestions, experiences or opinions are not only welcomed but needed! I know from my initial post on the bees that there are a good number of you out there looking into starting your own hives as well? I hope you'll share your research and opinions with me? If you've taken the time to write a post on your experiences leave a comment with a link or send me over an email and I'd be happy to check it out and post a link to your place as well. The blogging world has so much to offer us all in the way of collaboration I'd hate to see us all have to do all the work on our own!

Right now that's about all I have on the bees, but there'll be more for sure.
Till next time,
Best to you all!
P~

Cwap.... I habba code.

2010-01-31T21:20:00.002-07:00

yeb, I got one. I habba full on code. wunny nose, sneezes, copfs... da works.
I pinished da beekeeping cwass doh, and learned some weally good stupp. Hopfuwwy I can share it wit you soon.
welp... back to the sack! **ahhhh.... choooo!**
~scuse me~
P~

A loss tonight

2010-01-25T21:38:00.007-07:00

Just a quick note. More for the record than for anything else.

Tonight one of our hens needed to be put down. I don't use the more technical work "cull" because while I don't keep them as pets,don't name them and even though I know that they're a part of our "farm" as an integral working animal, because of our size and the personal nature of their keeping requirements they're more than just livestock.

This particular hen was the smallest of the flock but seemed to get along just fine on her own. Last month, a little after Christmas, I found her sitting in a corner alone looking not well at all. She was brought inside our garage where the temperature is more moderate and where I could keep a better eye on and take special care of her. I gave her warm mash, fresh water with cider vinegar and kept her warm with a lamp but she stayed unhealthy. It finally got to the point where she couldn't roost, and had a hard time standing.

Tonight I put her down to end her suffering. As I said, I don't really see my hens as pets, but as their steward I feel a responsibility to do everything in my power to give them a chance to recoup. I'm sure there are some more efforts that could have been taken, but I feel that I took reasonable steps.
Best to you all.

As an aside... tomorrow is the second and final night of the beekeeping class. I look forward to it and thought I may be able to take advantage of the experts there on all of our behalf's. If any of you have any particular questions that I can pass along for you, leave a comment tonight or tomorrow and I'll do my best to get an answer.

Peace~
P~

Want to hear the latest "Buzz"

2010-01-21T21:25:00.012-07:00

There’s a good bit of "Buzz" going on here on the homestead. A~ and I have been kicking around the idea of dipping our fingers into the honey pool and making the commitment that is beekeeping. It’s an idea that we’ve been bouncing around between us for about a year and we’re currently taking a class from our local extension service to learn the basics of the biology, management and legal concerns regarding beekeeping to help us decide to help us on our way... because we've decided! We're getting bees!!

It all started last year during our Master Gardener class. One of our fellow classmates kept bees and was a great advocate of it. We, being the avid gardeners that we are, are of course aware of the issues facing our beloved bees and are horrified by the idea that they could one day leave us for good. We’ve also recognized the need for the increased pollination and a homegrown sugar source on our backyard farm. It didn’t take too much advocating by our classmate to make me start thinking about it. The funny part was that I never thought A~ would go for it, potentially stinging flying insects being encouraged to make a home in our yard and all, but it was her that first broached the subject. In fact, she said that she really wants to have them; go figure…will I ever fully understand this wonderful woman? Apparently she's always secretly wanted to keep them and never shared it. So now, prepended onto our every growing to-do list, is the acquisition, set-up and populating of two hives.

Life has again proven that is will lead us in the direction we need to go if we allow it too. After we'd begun talking about it in a very cursory way last year, we met the fellow classmate that was such a good advocate to us. Then, as we thought about it more over the fall and winter months, suddenly we got an email about the class that we're currently taking. (Yes, the class came to us...) Then, last month, after our accident, the physical therapist that we're going to turns out to be quite the homesteader too and had just last year started keeping bees; he was another great advocate. In fact, even as soon as Tuesday, when we had our first class, the "signs" continued. In the class was a really nice local woman who is also a Master Gardener and a pretty serious homesteader/prepper as well whom we met last year at our Master Gardener Conference. As it turns out, she also started keeping bees last year and was a great resource to talk with. Even our M.G. instructor from last year was in the class and we talked about trying to set some hives up at the Botanical Center. (Need to line up those volunteer hours for next year you know.)
It all came together to make us feel really comfortable about doing what we've been really wanting to anyway.

I don't have a lot of details yet, but as always, I'd love to hear what you have in the way of experience and advice. And of course, more details will be shared when I have them.

Best to you all... now I'm gonna Buzz off till later.
P~

Our long talks

2010-01-18T17:20:00.009-07:00

This weekend A~ and I made our annual trek through the desert, following the trail forged by pioneers of the past making their way to California in search of riches and GOLD. We too went in search of riches and gold... in Wendover Nevada! For those not "in the know" (Which is most likely like 92.4% of you.) Wendover is our local point across the Nevada border where A~ and I have made a tradition of going for one night together for our anniversary. Well, the gold escaped us... but I think I was able to score some riches after all.

The drive out to Wendover takes us usually about a hour and half each way. It's not a scenic drive per se, but it's one that kind of grows on you after a while. The west desert is sparse to say the least, but in a strange sort of way it kind of takes on different faces with the different seasons. Before this trip the fog has been very heavy here for days and even weeks on and off, so the sparse desert was transformed into a beautifully frosted wonderland. Every blade of grass, every head of tumbleweed and every bunch of sage was covered in a beautiful while halo of frost. Besides the scenery, I have another favorite part of our drive out there; our long talks. It's almost become a sort of tradition with us. While we drive out we tend to fall into and out of good radio station reception and that void has been filled with some great conversations.

Perhaps it's the time of year. I mean it is right after the new year and our thoughts of goals and resolutions are on our mind. Maybe it's truly just the void of entertainment that gets us going, I don't know? The fact is, though, that on these drives A~ and I have had some great long talks. We sometimes bounce from topic to topic, or other times we really zero in and hash out an idea in detail. The point is that we take a regularly scheduled break from the world, we spend time with each other and get to talk and listen without the rush of the world around us. I treasure those times. And I learn a lot about her too. Sometimes it's just a small thing, sometimes she or I will really let go of how we feel about something, but it always brings us closer.

So then, as I said, I did end up with some riches after all. A rich conversation and a great weekend with my very best friend! The actual date may not be for a few more days, but thank you for the last 8 yrs together honey. looking forward to many more!!
P~

A new year... a new start

2010-01-10T22:00:00.000-07:00

Ah, 2010 is here, snuck up on us, but here it is nonetheless.

Since I started this blog I've always been pretty dutiful about having a well thought out list of goals and aspirations for each new year. This year I don't. Well, to be honest, with the way our year ended; accident, Thanksgiving, visiting relatives, Christmas, work deadlines and a New Year, all lined up bing bang boom, I didn't have a chance to really reflect on what I wanted to do in 2010.

I did manage to pull a few ideas out of my hat though, so let me lay them on you:

• I want to complete my greenhouse evolution. By evolution I mean progressing it from being the mere shelter from the elements that it currently is, to a functioning respite for tender plants to hold over, if not all winter, at least through the fall and early winter and into the new year of 2011. I'll need to bulk up on the thermal mass, provide proper shelves and work spaces and find a way to generate some sort of supplemental light and heat for the winter. Good news is that I have all summer to do it so the prospects are promising.

• Last year we made a goal of 1500 pounds of food from our yard. Because of a terrible bout of squash bugs and perhaps just a little over exuberance in our estimates we came in short of that with a mere 810 pounds. (I of course say that very facetiously, I'm way way happy with 810 pounds. Who wouldn't be?) This year, I think that very realistically we should be able to get to 1000 pounds. So that is goal number two.

• Getting back to basics. A lot changed this year for A~ and I. She started working part-time (this was planned for next year but the right opportunity presented itself so we acted on it) and it really threw us both out of whack. I knew I depended on her as my partner, but I had no real idea of HOW dependant I was on her. We really struggled throughout the year to find our balance and to be able to maintain our lives the way that we had worked into them. Because we had some extra money for the first time in a long while it was really easy for us to fall into some habits that we hadn't had before because we were so conscious of our income. Eating out more often than we wanted to and not effectively using all the food we were able to grow, not keeping up with making our own organic cleaners and not making the most use of the time we did have available because we were just feeling hectic we welcomed the chance to relax. This year A~ and I want to re-ground and get back to our basics. Time to re-group.

• Finally, now that we've been able to get a new computer up and running, I want to get a little more consistent with my posts. I really needed to give myself a break last year after blogging for a couple of years I was getting to a point where I was losing focus on what was important to me. Not that you're not important to me of course, but family time... isn't that really what it's all about? I began to feel like I "owed you" a post on a daily basis. I don't know what made me think that I was so fascinating or important that I would need to be constantly updating the world, but I did. I'm now nearing the end of my third year blogging and what I want to do this year is to concentrate on being more consistent and regular with the things that I say and to try to keep the posts interesting and informative. Rather than quantity, I want to focus on quality. On this note I also have some other interesting ideas that I want to pursue, but details of those will have to wait a little longer until I know for sure what I can do.

I think that about does it for what I can think of. The goals are more modest this year, and I think to a certain degree a little more ambiguous than I've given in the past, but I'm happy with them. I'm looking forward to a good year 2010 and I hope you'll accept my invitation to go through it together.

All the best to you all...
P~

A very late Christmas update.

2010-01-06T21:45:00.014-07:00

Just a quickie post here. It's about time I cleared up this handmade Christmas present wait don't you think. By the way, I loved the Cheese and Machete guesses... Classic!
Well, seeing as how our youngest little "Mountaineer" is 12 and our oldest 14 I figured I've run the course on handmade wooden toys, cool as they may be. So this year, I broke out the heavy artillery!
Knives!! Real ones, full tang, cold steel tempered (best I could), shaped and sharped by hand.The boys loved em!
I've made one of the sheaths as well. I have the leather for the other two, but need to finish them. Anyone interested in the process before I get started on them? I'd have no problem taking a few pics and sharing. The leather work is easy enough and the process could be used for a lot of things.
This picture gives a better look close in at the blade. I engraved the initial with the help of a dremel tool. Looking closely you can still see some of the tooling marks and scratches. I think they give it the handmade look though so they're staying!

Guess what I got from A~ and her brother? They pitched in and gave me this lifetime quality safety razor and a package of refills. No more plastic in the land fills for me!! Yeah...Sustainable personal hygiene!!A~'s brother is really knowledgeable about them and recommended this one to her for me as a good quality starter set-up. Maybe one day I can pass it down to my kids. Funny isn't it? You never think in terms of durability any more. Oh, and guys, the shave is very nice. I haven't cut myself yet, which I'm told is a hazard when you first start with these, but I love the lavender soap that G~ (the brother in law) got me. Smells great and shaves very well!

And my sweet wife and awesome kids got me this baby to "take the garden to the next level"!This summer I will officially become a local weather station for my own record. The garden journal will be all the more detailed for it.Needless to say, I have lots of new experiments in mind for that baby!! Bwah ha ha... can't you just hear my evil laugh now?

More to come soon.
Till then!
P~

Just Checking in.

2010-01-04T22:55:00.005-07:00

Hi all,
Just wanted to take a second to say Happy new year and to let you know I'm not just flaky and not following up on the Christmas gifts question or anything but lots has been going on.

First of all we finally got a new desktop computer. For those that have followed this blog for any time at all you've probably heard me complaining about the sluggish and horribly slow computer that we had. Well, that problem has been remedied. I have lots to share, but alas, I have no photo editing software, and second I've not yet installed all the files or software that is necessary. Bear with me, I'll ping you with something before the weeks out, I promise.

Secondly, I have a Security + (Network security) exam that I need to take for work so much time is needed for study. The next month or so will be slow for me, but I have lots of plans and news so I'll bring you up to speed on all of that soon too.

Hope the new year finds you all well and I look forward to a great 2010.
Peace and hope to you all!
P~

Merry Christmas

2009-12-25T00:36:00.004-07:00

Just thought I'd bob in here and wish you all a wonderful Christmas and holiday season. I've been home enjoying some time with my sweetheart the last couple of days and now the boys are home from their gramma's house and nestled "snug in their beds" so all is well with the world.

I did finally manage to finish their presents thought it required a final push worthy of the records book. I'll post more on things soon, but suffice it to say that I had a pretty SHARP idea for this year, one that's cool because it knows how to hold it's TEMPER. Any guesses?

Merry Christmas all
Best wishes.
P~

Oh so cold and snowy.

2009-12-14T22:04:00.008-07:00

We've had more than a few inches of snow in the last couple of weeks. In fact, after I finally got my garlic in the ground just before thanksgiving, it snowed. Then the next week got bone chilling cold and snowed, and I do mean bone chilling. When I checked the weather underground website it showed our local weather station reading in the tens (not teens, tens) and the lowest I remember seeing one morning was 3.7 degrees F. Yeah, freaking cold!

On the upside, the chickens did fine with a little help from a heat lamp and timer set-up and a weather stopping clear plastic covering that cuts the wind but still let's them get natural light and fresh air. The greenhouse, well that's a little different story.

I finally got an artificial heating set up in place and it helped for sure. However, I still want to be conscious of how much power I consume to keep everything alive so I have it also on a timer that alternates the heater off and on for an hour at a time through out the night. During the days it will heat up just fine in there, it's the middle of the night that gets me.

Also, thanks to everyone who gave me the great passive heating ideas. I have implemented a couple of them like moving a barrel with compost into the greenhouse to try to generate a little heat and I have water bottles around my actual planters that hold some of the heat from the day in there over-night. The compost hasn't really gotten kicking yet but I'm still working on it. I also just acquired 10 or so 5 gallon barrels that I'm going to fill with water and place in the greenhouse to gather heat during the day. Right now the tomatoes that are still alive, did I mention that I had a devastating freeze kill at the beginning of the big chill? I did... it probably halved the number of plants that I had in there.

All in all, I'd say things are going pretty well though. As always I take the lessons with the triumphs and press on ever forward thankful that (for now) my living is not dependant on this. So then, how are things in your necks of the woods? Cold, maybe hot for my southern Friends? Everyone about ready for the holidays? We're pretty much ready for it here, but I personally am waaaaay behind. Every year I make a handmade present for my boys. This year it took me a long time to even think of something to make and I am just starting this week.

Crunch time!!

All the best!
P~

Planting fall garlic.

2009-11-30T00:00:00.002-07:00

Garlic is one of those things that I've never really put any effort into growing. I've planted them in the spring before and got from them a few heads that were smallish and not too impressive . However, I literally only planted some 8 or 10 cloves and it was in my first year of growing so I'm not too worried that I'm garlic growing impaired or anything. Finally this fall I've put a little effort into it and I'm hopeful for next summers harvest. At the $8.49-lb that it cost to buy the other day I sure hope so!

I decided that for this first serious attempt at garlic growing on my little urban farm I'm going to try to use a part of my potato patch that last year was the least producing and at the same time hopefully I'll be able to deter some nuisance pests at the same time. The potato garden at the front of the house is essentially one large raised bed. The area at the outside edge of that bed was not easy to mound up to help the potatoes produce to their best capacity and also made it harder to irrigate. That's where I'm planting the garlic. It doesn't need to be mounded and will make a nice "stinky" border around the bed too.

I'd already "amended" this bed by turning in all the grass clippings that I had used to mound the potatoes with as well as some straw to help break the soil up. I've had good results with this in the past. To further amend the beds now, before planting, I also turned in a good helping of coffee grounds gotten from our local Starbucks "Grounds for the garden" program. They are high in nitrogen and slow to release into the soil so they should really help out next year. Here's what it looked like before turning-in and planting.After turning in the clippings and grounds, I laid out the spacing (around 5" apart) of the cloves. These were specially purchased certified seed cloves, not just garlic purchased at the grocery. Those will grow too, but may not be disease free and if they're hybridized varieties you may not know exactly what you'll get from them.If you've never planted garlic here's the quick and dirty of it. When you buy them you get a full head just like you do in the store more often than not. Just like you would break off a single clove from the head to cook with, you break the head into individual cloves to plant as well. When planting them, the pointed end points up, and the flat part (from where the cloves were all connected) goes down. The cloves get pushed in far enough that the pointed tip is about 2" under the soil.After planting, whether in spring or fall, a good 3-4 inch cover of mulch, you can see here that I used straw, is needed. This will insulate the bulbs over the winter, and will help maintain even soil moisture through the early growth and summer.

It may not be too late to plant where your located. My research tells me that after a first hard freeze but before permafrost sets in is the best time to plant the fall bulbs. I got these in just before Thanksgiving.

Wish me luck! All the best.
P~

Thankful!

2009-11-27T22:17:00.004-07:00

We are thankful for so many things in our lives. My wife an I have each other, our kids and our families. We have passion for each other and passion for life. I've been blessed to have the opportunity to work for a great company for the last nine years and have recently added A~ to that "work family" as well.

Tuesday of last week we were given another reason to be be thankful...

We were all in the car, and we are all alright for the most part though the boys are very adamant about us "slowing down" regardless of how we're driving and their hearts skip each time we have to stop quickly at all.

I have to say we're really lucky that the damage done was all that there was. As we were going through an intersection in the evening, a 19 yr old kid cut short the corner from the turn lane and tried to make it onto an on ramp before we got there. He didn't make it. Almost, but no. I was able to swerve enough to only catch the back tire of his jacked up jeep but it was hard enough to set off both of our air bags and whack us around a bit. A~ was on the side that caught the brunt of it and smacked her head on the ceiling hard enough to break a few CD's that were in our visor cd-holder. Fortunately, the guys jeep had so much lift and big tires it avoided a lot of contact points, it could have been a much worse accident.

So, now three of us are on ibuprofen and my hip and lower back are killing me and A~ has on / off headaches but hey, we're all here. And we're thankful.

I hope your Thanksgiving was great and that you were able to get together with family and friends, enjoy some great food (hopefully some of your home grown goodies) and relax.

All the best to you.
P~

Potting Time (34 Days)

2009-11-12T22:45:00.016-07:00

So then, tired of these cloning posts yet? Well, the final phase of the actual cloning process has finished for the most part so you may be in for a break from them.

The roots that had begun to poke out at the time of the last update have come out in force now. The stems of tomato plants that I left in water to root are now well rooted but are beginning to show the signs of nutrient deficiency. The lime green color and yellow and purple hues in the leaves in particular.
Now is the time to get these babies into some soil. I mixed up a basic mix of well screened homemade compost, some leftover peat and some vermiculite and added a bit of slow releasing organic fertilizer to give a nutrient boost to the plants.

You can see this cutting has rooted really well. I've removed it and need to prep it for planting.
All I did to prop the cuttings was to trim off the lower and longer leaves that would just be sucking energy from the plant. I want to make sure the cutting is focusing it's energy on setting roots and growing taller. This kind of excess growth will just delay that.

Here it is ready to be put into the potting mix in one of the pots that I've made sure are clean and ready for planting.

Because of the length of the roots and the stem that has roots growing from it, I decided to use my larger size pot.

I put a small approx .5 inch layer of soil into the bottom of the pot and then held the cutting in the center of the pot while I loosely filled in the soil around it. Using my fingers and by shaking the pot, I was able to get the soil to fill in between the net of roots.

And voila, One down. Now, trim, plant and repeat 40 or so more times and you'll have this...

Actually this is only a portion of the cuttings. There's enough to fill a large table. At least one of each will hopefully make it through the winter.

And that brings me to my next project... heat! I need to find a way to get some kind of heat into the greenhouse. And I need to do it pretty quickly I think. The weather here is turning cold fast!

Any ideas? Anyone have any passive heating ideas? I'm thinking solar gain into some kind of heat sink. Well, at any rate, the experiment is going well so far.
More to come.
P~

Keeping things clean (21 Days)

2009-10-27T19:42:00.005-06:00

One of the most important and probably opt overlooked things one can do to help themselves be successful in thier propagating is to keep things clean.
There are a number of plant diseases that could easily prey on young, newly propagated plants if given the chance. Many of these can lay dormant in the very pots that we use to plant them in. Like many gardeners, I try my best to stretch my dollars and to consume less resources by re-using many of the pots that come through my garden. Taking the necessary care to make sure those pots are clean is a pretty simple tasks that can help to avoid a lot of problems.

I started with a regular bucket filled with water. This is just a preliminary wash to get off most of the dirt and grime off the pots before I sanitize them.While I rinsed them off I used an old rag to wipe down the pots quickly to remove as much dirt as possible.

After wiping down and generally cleaning out the pots I put them in a sinkful of warm bleach water. Using the bleach water is for basically the same reason as you would use a sanitizer when washing dishes. It kills bacteria and keeps disease from being able to spread easily.

After cleaning I stacked all the pots that I cleaned so that they could air out and dry completely. Bleach is not a good thing for plant roots so you do want to make sure that they are dried completely.

So now that I've gotten these all cleaned and sanitized, it's time to get those plants into the dirt.

I did plant one variety of tomato into a few of these pots, some of the romas that I am working to clone. I didn't want to jump in and plant too many of them for fear of they having a problem accepting the transplants. Best to stick a toe in the water first you know?

In the last few days we've had a dusting of snow and a serious cold front. I'll get out to plant some more this weekend comeing up. Watch for more and some photos then.

Anyone else trying to clone cuttings this fall?
P~