Permaculture in Northern California

Moving time

2011-12-24T14:36:00.001-08:00

This blog is moving. Please read new posts here.

Lemons and chickens

2011-11-26T18:09:00.000-08:00

Today I did volunteer work for the Master Gardeners, at the Farmers Market. It was foggy and chilly this morning, and I was glad to get home and work in the yard. The chickens came running when they heard me open the back door of the house. I broke a bunch of walnuts for them and they ate with gusto. Later I saw them sitting on the yellow garden wagon, taking a break from being on the cold ground. They stayed there a while and then they all took off and flew/ran to the back garden where they ate various weeds and other plants.

Since I had my camera out, I thought I'd take a photo of the big, yellow lemons growing on our tree in the front yard. They just started turning yellow last week and now the tree is laden with bright yellow, creating a cheery burst of color at the house entrance. So far we have not had a cold enough snap to harm the fruit, and I'm glad about that. One year the cold came early and all the lemons turned black and fell off the tree.

Autumn in the garden

2011-11-19T17:29:00.000-08:00

Leaves are dropping off the trees around the yard. Cool weather and brisk winds are helping with the process. Short days make for not too much time spent outdoors, and that time can be a bit chilly.

Today I watched the chickens make their rounds to various locations in the garden. They came out this morning and I gave them walnuts from the trees in the front yard. I crack the nuts with a rock and then toss the pieces around for the chickens to pick through to find the nut meat chunks. Some of them will take pieces of nuts from my fingers. I'll hold out pieces of nuts and they'll look at me, cautiously, and some of them take me up on my offer. Those brave chickens encourage some of the others to try it out. I do the same with bits of fruit, and they'll take it right from my fingers.

Later I went out to rake leaves in the front yard. This was a body-warming exercise. The walnut trees have really started to shed lots of leaves. I rake them up into piles around a few fruit trees and into the plant border along the edge of the road. The piles of leaves act as mulch and they eventually break down and condition the soil. The leaves are free organic matter falling from the sky. What could be better? I don't have to rake them up and put them into a plastic yard waste bin to be taken off the property, and I don't have to buy soil amendments from somewhere else. It is a good use of permaculture principles. I don't worry about the allelopathic properties of the walnut leaves. The plants I have under the trees don't seem to be bothered by living within the root zone of the trees, which also have allelopathic properties.

This evening I picked a bunch of collard leaves to add to a one-pot chicken, potato, onion, and garlic dish. The collards are doing well with the cooler weather, and the chickens seem not to eat the green leaves. The chard is another story. The chickens devour chard, which is fine with me. I'd rather have the chickens eat the chard than the gophers eat it. I have some plants out of their range, so I can eat some if I want. Though tonight we'll eat collards.

Working with reclaimed concrete (aka Urbanite)

2011-10-16T22:11:00.000-07:00

I've been wanting to delineate the space in the front yard with a border of sorts. I want to build a dry-stack wall at the back side of the berm that is planted with various plants. I'm not particularly handy in this regard, and so I thought I'd do a test run on a smaller wall. A friend of mine has a pile of broken concrete at his farm, free for the taking so long as I load it. I went over there and picked through for pieces of the stuff I could imagine picking up more than once. I don't want to strain my old herniated disc in the course of this experiment. So my pieces were 8-15 lbs.

I've been thinking about this project for a while, but I hadn't really done much planning, other than knowing I'd cover the grass with cardboard, cover the cardboard with the concrete, and fill in the space with soil and plants. Measuring did not occur - this is only a test.

Space before the wall. Grass invades bed, space is not clearly delineated.

Rough draft.

Close up with herbs planted in between slabs. They will act as mortar once their roots grow.

I've built this thing and filled it in with soil and plants, and I'll take a look at how it goes for a while. When I think about it, and observe it, for a good while, I'll think about tackling the wall that will be about five times longer. I planted culinary herbs, since the bed is near the kitchen, I moved in some irises that were out of the spotlight, I planted a couple of echinaceas that my neighbor brought over. Good thing too, since a gopher just made a snack of one of the existing echinaceas in that general vicinity.

I've since dug a trench in front of the wall, and turned the sod over, sowed it with daikon, wheat, and fava beans (my favorite fall mix). I've also put in some cuttings of rosemary and some salvias in front of the wall. This will all help to build soil and to create a place for many of those beneficial insects and pleasant hummingbirds I welcome into my yard.

A hail storm

2011-10-12T16:39:00.000-07:00

About a week ago, the skies darkened and thunder roared through the sky. When the clouds burst we were pelted with hail of mixed sizes, from pea sized, up to walnut sized hail. All the chickens ran for cover, except the Polish rooster, who was running around the back yard in a frenzy. I grabbed a cardboard box for cover and went out after him. I caught him and put him in the box and put the box in the coop. He screamed and screamed, as roosters tend to do, and when I opened the box in the coop, he was limp. Must be some sort of playing dead, survival technique. Anyway, the hail passed and the chickens were unharmed.

The garden took a good beating. Tomatoes, peppers, chard, collards, pumpkins, and lots of other plants were shredded or dented beyond usefulness.

Hail on the back patio

Pomegranate

2011-10-12T16:13:00.000-07:00

One of my pomegranate plants has been laden with about a dozen fruit this year, its first year of fruiting, and the fruits have started to get that nice, red color. Then the rain came and I worried about the fruit splitting. Pomegranates and figs both split their fruit when they get too much water timed with ripening fruit. The figs split, and the chickens didn't mind eating those. A couple of the less-red pomegranates split, so I picked them and tasted them. The variety is called Sharp Velvet, and these two fruits are definitely under ripe, yet edible. I don't mind tartness in certain fruit. I am hoping the other fruits get to ripen more before more rain comes, just so I can find out what kind of sweetness this pomegranate can produce.

I think these are the most beautiful fruits around. The garnet sacs surrounding the seeds are jewel-like.

The Chicken Show

2011-09-25T18:05:00.000-07:00

The chicken show. The small ones.

Small chicks

2011-09-14T23:13:00.000-07:00

Just a few of the eight smallest chicks in their straw yard.

The smallest chicks have been out in the small straw yard, sharing it with the bigger chicks. There is some definite territorial enforcement going on, which according to the chicken book is normal and doesn't need refereeing from me. The two groups mostly stick to themselves except when a larger chick decides to show its dominance and go after the smaller ones. A lot of peeping ensues and the small ones run off, herd like, to another side of the enclosure. Mostly it is peaceful co-existence.

The small ones still sleep apart from the larger chicks, just because their secured enclosures don't offer much room for escape for the small ones. And I can wheel the small ones into the garage overnight if it is going to be too cool at night, which I've done the past few nights. Tonight I am leaving them outdoors, under the covered patio, with several layers of row cover and a topping of burlap on their wagon. The air is still tonight.

My neighbor asked me what I'm going to do with all the eggs once the new ones start laying. Partly it depends on the size of the eggs, since the ratio might be two of their eggs to one large egg, and I could use up quite a few in making fresh pasta and such. The d'Uccle egg size is listed as "tiny" and the Cochin egg size is listed as "below average." I don't know how that relates to standard egg sizes, so I will weigh the eggs when they appear and go from there.

I sort of realized that I hadn't really put a ton of thought into what happens if I get a dozen eggs every day, no matter the size. Obviously my friends are willing to help out by accepting eggs from my chickens, but I could still have many eggs to deal with. It is several months off, so I will make a preliminary plan, and see what happens. I'm still not sure all the chicks are females, so that could knock a few eggs out of the mix.

At any rate, they are so much fun to watch at this point, I had no idea chickens could be so endlessly entertaining. I guess fifteen years without television can do that to a person.

Figs

2011-09-14T22:53:00.000-07:00

Two different types of figs. The purple one is a Mission improved, the stripped ones are Panache. Both are delicious. All the fig trees have been producing this year, the younger ones have made fewer figs than the older trees, but that is to be expected.

I have found that my Polish chickens like figs, so if a scrub jay has hacked on apart and left it on the tree, I'll throw it to the chickens. Also the fallen figs were devoured by the chickens when they were out under the tree.

My oldest fig tree is Conadria and it makes small, greenish yellow-skinned figs with sweet, mellow interiors. They are apparently good drying figs (they'll even dry on the tree, I've read), and I have a tray of them in my solar powered food dehydrator. Hopefully good results will ensue. The dried tomatoes and dried peaches worked beautifully.

I love to eat the figs fresh, right off the tree. During fig season I usually have several figs off the tree throughout the day. They are one of my favorite edibles. They are drought tolerant once established, which is a bonus in our Mediterranean climate. The wild birds also love figs, and this year I tied flashy bird-scare tape to the largest tree, and it has worked better than no tape last year. More figs for me.

More on the new chicks

2011-09-11T17:38:00.000-07:00

Partridge Cochin possibly crossed with d'Uccle

All 13 chicks spent their first night together. In the morning the larger five were picking on the smaller eight, so I separated them, leaving the five in the borrowed growing coop and moving the smalls into my yellow garden wagon. They all seemed much happier being with chicks of their own size.

Today I rolled out some temporary fencing in a small spot outside my office so the five could get out and scratch and dust in the soil. I opened the fold-down door and they were all out on the ground on their own accord, pretty quickly. I threw in some chick scratch and moved their waterer on the ground and they've been exploring the small patch of garden, under a bamboo plant. After they were clearly comfortable with the space I threw in a couple of biscuits of straw, which they took to immediately, scratching at the sides and climbing around on it.

It will be a while before the small ones get to go on the ground, but they seem to be doing well in the garden wagon, with a mesh screen on top to keep them in and predators out. I cover the thing with floating row cover at night to protect them from any breeze.

Weather forecast is suggesting thunder and lightening for the next two days, with cooler night temps, so I'll have to make sure the small ones stay warm enough.

It is definitely different having all these chickens that can actually see their surroundings quite well. They are fast too, when going after a fly for example.

The Polish chickens we've had for a year have excellent hearing, but not such great sight on account of their puffy feather heads. It will be several weeks before the five can get put in with the Polish, and them more time still for the small ones to be introduced. It will be an adjustment for not only the chickens, but for the humans too. Good thing both chickens and humans are very adaptable creatures.

Chicks

2011-09-09T19:22:00.000-07:00

My friend got a call about some chicks a woman was looking to send to a new home. Today they showed up. There were two boxes of them. One group of eight we figured were about 3 weeks old, and one group of five are about five weeks old.
This photo is of the smaller ones.
They are peeping away outside my office door, as dusk falls in their new yard.

Parentage is Mille Fluer or Cochin, or a mixture of the two.

Propagation success

2011-09-05T18:43:00.000-07:00

I pruned my pomegranate during the winter. When I found myself with some long pieces of pruned material I thought I'd stick a branch into the soil and see if it would take. It looked mostly like a dead stick poking out of the ground most of the summer, and I planted all sorts of other things around it. Squash, tomatoes, beans, and some weeds grew there too. It is in a spot I don't get around to very frequently, and today I noticed, beneath the cover of some squash leaves, the stick had sprouted leaves, about 8" high. This has been a good year for various of my propagation projects. The seedling peaches made good fruit, a fig I've nurtured from a cutting finally took off and is fruiting like mad, and it looks like even one of my olive cuttings might have survived. Seeing the pomegranate leaves today made me very happy.

The plant from which I cloned is about three or four years old and is finally fruiting. I will try propagating more of the plant when I prune again this winter. There is a time vs. money trade-off in the process. I have the time to increase my plants in this manner. If I didn't have the time I'd be spending about $25 each for almost any of those trees. More than those two factors, I like the challenge of propagating trees in this way.

Permaculture Teacher Training

2011-08-26T18:41:00.000-07:00

I've just been to a week-long permaculture teacher training and retreat in New Mexico. We were 22 students who have all been through the PDC training. Scott Pittman and Larry Santoyo were our teachers. It was a great and intense experience and it has given me much to think about in regard to the directions I want to go in to explore my place in the permaculture community.

Permaculture and Community

2011-08-13T15:17:00.000-07:00

Recently I had the luck of finding out that a friendly couple down the road had an organic garden. I've been walking, cycling, and driving past their house for years and through a series of events and correspondence, found myself invited for a visit to the garden.
Community is important in Permaculture and I've struggled somewhat with that portion of my practice. So it was incredibly wonderful to get to know about the organic garden down the road, and the gardener who tends it. Her garden, like ours, is in gopher infested land. She has several raised beds with hardware cloth under them to keep the gophers from accessing her bounty. Her trellises are sturdy wire (cattle panel) supported by stakes. Her tomatoes were tall and well-supported. She waters with what appears to be a drip system. The set-up produces quite an impressive yield. I came away with my bicycle basked filled with trombetta squash, tomatoes of various sorts, and some Asian cucumbers, all grown on trellises. Sharing from the garden seems to be a fairly common trait among my gardener friends and it was great to bring organically grown vegetables home from her garden.

I brought along a container of winter pie pumpkin seeds for her to try growing next year.

When I return from Permaculture teacher training, I plan to invite her over for a visit to my non-linear permaculture jungle garden. By then the pumpkins and squash will likely have taken over most of the front and back gardens.

Tomatoes, squash, and cucumbers from a garden down the road.

Seedling Peaches

2011-08-06T22:48:00.000-07:00

The large peach tree in the back yard has been in decline since before we moved here. I made a few years of mistakes in thinning and pruning the tree, causing it to lose a few limbs in the process. This year I thinned the fruit extensively and was able to get a good crop. We had a late rain in July, it rained all day and night, and the weight of the rain on a couple of branches was too much and there was more breakage. The tree still has several good, strong limbs though.
The peaches are delicious and I want to propagate the tree via grafting and have been growing rootstock for that purpose. I tried some bud grafting early this year. My grafting knife was brand new and extremely sharp. Fiddling with those tiny buds and trying to slice the exact shield shape off the rootstock ended up with me having two bloody thumbs and grafts that didn't take. I've decided to try cleft grafting in the next go 'round.
Meanwhile three of the peach seedling trees put on fruit this year. I've tried the fruit from each of them. One of them is completely sweet. One was a little bitter (I think the fruit might have been slightly under ripe) and one only had three fruits, two of which the birds devoured and the third fruit I picked when it had only just softened, and it was pretty tasty.
From the seedlings I'll have good peaches until I can teach myself to get a successful graft going from the old peach tree onto a seedling tree.

Seedling peach. Sweet fruit.

Chickens and the clover patch

2011-07-29T22:11:00.000-07:00

My small back yard lawn/pasture has taken hold. It is a mix of grass and clover, with a few various weeds. It took a while for the clover and the grass to get going and I kept the chickens out of the area until it was well enough established to bounce back from their foraging. The area is a small island of green in a mostly bare spot that used to hold a big pile of dead ivy that I'd pulled from the huge amounts of ivy growing in the back yard. Once the ivy pile was truly dead, I used it as a cover for cardboard and newspaper that I used to cover other areas of ivy. The newspaper and cardboard over ivy approached worked quite well. Cutting, pulling, and digging ivy is quite a chore. And with that area bare I decided a small, green meadow/pasture/lawn type space would be nice. And it is nice.
I moved the chicken fencing to allow them access to a portion of the clover lawn/pasture. They moved in to explore and have been eating the clover and grass. I bring them treats from the garden, fallen peaches, seed spikes from salvias - which they peck and scratch at to get to the black seeds, and sometimes a tomato hornworm or a cricket. Egg production has slowed some with the onset of hotter weather.

Rooster in the clover lawn/pasture

The clover has begun flowering and attracts bees and even hummingbirds. The clover takes well to mowing and grows very quickly after. It is fixing nitrogen in a spot that seemed depleted when we got the place, and it is serving wildlife, livestock, and the humans in this system well.

Foxtail millet

2011-07-16T15:40:00.000-07:00

In late May I planted the seeds of German Foxtail Millet I'd ordered from Owen at Annapolis Seeds in Nictaux, NS. He keeps a nice blog about things going on at his farm. I am growing the millet so that I can feed it to the chickens once it matures. I'd previously grown pearl millet, which the chickens seemed to enjoy eating right off the plants. Millet is an easy crop to grow, it does not need as much water as maize, and it requires less processing than maize for it to be fed to chickens. The dent corn I've grown and used for chicken scratch has to be put through the grain mill before the chickens can eat it.

The plants in the foxtail millet stand in the front yard have just started to send out their foxtails, which will eventually extend out of the tops of the plants and hang like fluffy foxtails.

German Foxtail Millet

The stand of millet grows along with some pole and bush beans, which I harvest for dry beans, a few decorative flowers, some soybean plants, several squash plants (which are finally starting their march across the lawn), basil, thyme, melons, cucumbers, and a young almond tree. They all grow together. The pole beans climb the millet stalks.

Seeds forming in bursting patterns.

Hot weather and chickens

2011-07-07T23:18:00.000-07:00

The weather has finally warmed up and it is now officially hot. We've had a few days above 100 F and several in the high 90s (that's approx 36+ Centigrade). The chickens do not appreciate the heat. They have feather coats on year-round, and since they are Polish chickens, they also wear rather fancy feather headdresses. So I put the mister on in their yard to help lower the air temperature, and I replenish their water dishes frequently. Still, they pant from the heat. When they go into the coop to roost they're still pretty hot, the coop has been around 80 F at around 8 p.m., when they go in.
I'll leave the door open for an hour or so, and close them up when darkness falls, still they are hot.
Since their coop is off the grid, putting a fan in there is not an easy solution. I wonder if the coop temperature would lower enough if I hang a block of ice from the ceiling. I will try it out.

At any rate, here's a super close-up view of chicken #2, with her mouth open in a pant.

Chicken #2

Front yard progression

2011-06-07T18:01:00.000-07:00

It started with lawn and some foundation shrubs.

Feb 2007

It got a small strip at the road edge for planting, and a ginkgo, pomegranate.

May 2008

Some circles were dug out of the lawn and planted with sunflowers and maize with beans. The first pineapple guava was planted. Sunflowers an hollyhocks at the road edge.

July 2008

A larger excavation, building a berm and basin designed to catch water running off the road. Planted with herbs, more pineapple guavas, lavender, and more.

November 2008

The shrubs started to fill out the space more, and herbs expanded.

April 2009

A rugosa rose blooms in the berm, and various shrubs expand their reach. Volunteer plants started to grow, a fig tree was one.

April 2010

Lots of herbs, blooming shrubs, the pineapple guavas are laden with blossoms this year, calendula rimmed the edge, bamboo, elderberry, lemon balm, lots of lavender and rosemary. Oregano was transplanted there in the winter and has taken hold. It will make a good, year-round groundcover. Thyme is also spreading.

June 2011

Quite a different view of the front yard from across the road now.

June 2011

June First - downpour

2011-06-01T22:19:00.000-07:00

This time of year usually finds us basking in hot, sunny weather. We're usually irrigating the garden by now, and the warm-weather plants are usually on their way. Usually. This year has been an exceptionally wet spring. Good news is that it ended a three-year drought. Our water reservoirs and snow packs are all looking very well stocked. The trouble is many of us like the hot weather for which this area is known. Some things in the garden will be delayed or diminished. My white peach tree could be counted on for ripe fruit by July 4, but this year that timeline will definitely be delayed. On the other hand, some plants in the garden prefer this weather, especially the raspberries, which have produced quite well so far, and look like they will continue. Having a diversity of plants and microclimates in the garden is important when the weather is not "normal."

June 1, 2011 downpour

Today we had a big downpour, hail mixed with rain, thunder, rainbow. Last week we had all that plus a small tornado or two touching down out in the less populated area.
All this rain means water for the garden. This has become my mantra. Still, we are looking to be outside, sitting under our big shade tree, sipping refreshing beverages, and watching the resident hummingbird work the abutilon blossoms, rather than observing from inside.

At least I know my seeds and seedlings are being watered (some of the seedlings were battered by hail but many have survived). It will be an interesting season.

Weather variations

2011-05-17T00:10:00.000-07:00

Generally by the middle of May our area has warm and sunny weather settled in. This year we've had a cold-ish early and mid spring. The garden has responded a little slower than in previous years. The strawberries are only just beginning to be sweet off the plant, cherries are slowly turning red, nanking cherry is just starting to ripen the fruit. Trees are leafed out and peaches are fattening on the trees, as are apricots. The grape vines have tiny clusters on them, and flowers are flowering. Gophers are having their way with anything they like, and the trapping has been modest thus far.

We'd had a few days into the 80s F, which were rather pleasant in the shade (and the mosquitoes found it lovely in the evening). Then we got a good wind blowing in from the south west (the direction which brings the rain). We had a little thunder, some lightning and the three waves of hail. Small hail was the first pass, then medium (pea sized), then a bit larger size. All this came along with a big rain event and I checked out my water harvesting areas – downspout to apple tree, road to basin/berm) and found it took a bit longer for the water to soak in than with big-ish rain events.

Hail in May

After the storm passed I noted some damaged leaves on various plants, but most things seemed okay.

Harvest

2011-05-11T16:39:00.000-07:00

Aside from rhubarb there hasn't been much new to harvest from the garden. The usual herbs and chard are still around, and the weather has been cool for spring, so the strawberries have taken their time getting sweet. The few red ones were rather tart. Today I went and filled my basket with berries and washed, trimmed, and sliced them. Sprinkled with a little cane sugar they'll make their own light syrup and I'll put them into pint jars and freeze them. The batch of berries contains some sweet and some not so sweet, so by the time they sit in the sugar juice for a while they'll be pleasantly sweet. I did this with several quart jars last year and when I thawed the berries they had good texture, color, and flavor. I ate them just as they were. I also made a strawberry mousse for a dessert (which was much too rich for me to eat, but my dinner companions enjoyed it).

Strawberries

The big white peach tree got a heavy thinning this past weekend (I still have one section to go) and the crop looks very promising. Another harvest on the horizon is raspberries, which I just ate off the plants last year, this year I think there will be a larger harvest to eat.

First tomato blossom

2011-05-11T00:04:00.000-07:00

A friend gave me a few tomato plants, big sturdy things that had been grown in used paper coffee cups. I put them in the garden last weekend and noticed just today a few blossoms on one of the plants.
The plant is growing near an apple tree and its accompanying guild plants — yarrow, comfrey, fava beans, narcissus bulbs, and a few volunteer peach seedlings.

tomato flowers

Chickens - an update

2011-04-18T23:32:00.000-07:00

White-crested, black Polish bantams.

The three chickens - two hens and a rooster - have settled into their yard and coop. They have become a family of sorts. Rooster first preferred chicken number one to chicken number two, and has since switched his preference. This seems not to change the peck order of the hens, since chicken number one will still give chicken number two a good peck on the head if needed. It just makes chicken number one a bit more independent, which I can appreciate. Chicken number two is much more compliant.

They are a family, actually. They are all siblings, but that seems to not matter to their sexual behavior. In fact I've read that it is preferable to breed a hen with her own sire. Chickens are inbred, and a little dumb from it, but with T Rex's closest living relative, we do what we can.

The eggs come, two to a day, most days. It is pretty much maintenance level for the two humans in the house. The eggs are very good quality, nice and rich yolks and strong shells.

Through observation I have decided to alter the fencing of their yard to provide them an amount and variety of space in which they seem to keep entertained.

At one end I've started a compost pile of sorts. I chop down various overgrown things, former plants the gophers have eaten from the bottom, and figure the chickens will either eat some of it or bugs will come and live in the pile, which the chickens will eat.

I sometimes find myself a little surprised that three chickens live in my back yard, and I even want more. Maybe 3 or four more females. I'd like to share the eggs, also keep the rooster a bit more busy.

I look forward to adding the straw/sawdust/chicken poop mix of the coop bedding to the compost pile. I believe richness of soil life will ensue. The garden will thrive on such a richness.

Still they have no other names than those assigned regarding their gender or peck order. Rooster, Chicken number one, Chicken number two.

I've worked hard to be able to pick up the females any old time I want. They come to me when I go out to their yard. The rooster is less interested, much more macho, so he rarely gets handled, unless he's being too cocky. Then I'll catch him and hold onto him, telling him he's such a nice, soft bird, before returning him to terra firma. He does not care for it, but he's kind of a chauvinist, and I'm kind of not. It could all be for naught, but I do have sympathy for the hens when he gets a little uppity.

He's not a mean rooster though. So... I'm not thinking of learning to harvest anything other than eggs just yet.

I recently read a piece in the LA Times regarding urban chickens and the writer uses the term "owning" chickens. I don't really feel like I own my chickens. I feel like a family of birds, for which I am ultimately responsible, lives in my back yard. Somehow the term ownership doesn't feel right, though I do refer to them as "my chickens."

Rainy weather and planting blueberries

2011-03-25T18:55:00.000-07:00

The weather took a turn toward cold, wet storms, with plenty of wind. It has been going on like this for weeks. The sun is a distant memory. On days when we've had a break in the downpours and howling wind, I've been able to get a little gardening done. I've been doing some weeding, mulching, observing the progress of various plants - red currants, gooseberries, black currants, raspberries, honeyberry - all of which are doing great in this type of weather. The blueberry plants are pushing out new growth, and in a moment of splurging I ordered eight more blueberry plants, which I managed to get into the ground and mulched with pine needles. I'm not exactly sure how many blueberry plants I had already planted before these eight, but it could be a dozen. I've been working on building up my shrub layer, and the blueberries seemed a good shrub to increase in number. The berries are delicious and I have a good source of pine needles to use for a nice acidic mulch. The plants are also attractive once they get a little mass to them.

The cold and wet weather is likely to continue for several more days, longer perhaps, so it is a good time to plant such things.

Blueberry plant with pine needle mulch.

Another hummingbird brood coming?

2011-03-21T21:39:00.000-07:00

Shortly after the last brood vacated the nest, a female bird was there touching things up, and tonight, less than two weeks later, a bird is sitting on the nest. I'd seen her working throughout the day today, and tonight when I went out to close up the chicken coop I saw her silhouette in the nest.
I took a photo, dark and shaky though it is.

Spring – looking and feeling like it

2011-03-09T14:12:00.000-08:00

Seedling peach tree in blossom.

Spring is not officially here until March 20, and the weather has been cold, wet, windy, and it even snowed for one minute within the last two weeks. Snow is a once every ten years event in these parts. I slept through the whole thing since it happened very early in the morning. I was around for the hail later that day though. Various weather reports foretold doom to fruit trees when the night time low temperatures were supposed to drop below freezing for several hours.

Today looks and feels like spring though. It is sunny and warm, with a light breeze. The bees are out working all the blossoms in the yard - nanking cherry, apricot, peach, rosemary, calendula, and more. The hellebore is in full bloom, right on time, and a few other perennials are starting to push through. A few of the seedling peach trees I've grown are flowering this year, and if they make fruit this year I'll be able to determine if they are worth keeping as they are or if I should make a graft and let the scion be the dominant tree part. I have two good fruiting peaches (a yellow peach and a white peach) and have a friend who has collected scion from his peach tree, so I can still have multiple peaches on one good peach stock. I'll be practicing my grafting skills soon.

Today one of the two hummingbirds fledged, and the other one is still in its nest, working on perching technique, building up wing strength with various exercise sessions, and preening. The first to fledge has been flitting around in the mulberry tree while the mother bird chases away various interlopers (scrub jays mostly), and comes back to feed both her offspring. I did not take lots of photos with this set of birds, since they look just like the birds I photographed heavily last summer. It was frequently very cold during their incubation and subsequent rearing that I feared they would not make it, but the mother bird really worked on insulating the nest, and the birds made it. I'm hoping to watch the one still in the nest take its first flight.

Hummingbird yet to leave the nest.

Nanking cherry in flower

First break of dormancy on the lemon verbena shrub (I was worried it wouldn't survive the cold weather)

Chicken out on the pasture.
Both hens are now consistently laying their eggs in the nest box.

Making food with what we have

2011-02-27T21:45:00.000-08:00

I've been perusing the web for good recipes in which I can use eggs. We get at least one egg from a chicken each day, some days we get two eggs. Rarely does one hen skip two days, giving us a day off. So I've made fresh pasta with the eggs before, with delicious results. Last week I used up four eggs in some banana bread. Today I counted eleven eggs in our carton and thought some action was required. The recipes I found online are mostly custards, cakes, quiches, frittatas, and breakfast egg dishes. So I resorted to making a batch of pasta (with a twist) and turning it into ravioli. The twist was some lemon zest added to the pasta dough.

I had to decide on the filling so I looked around at what I had, and thought about what would taste nice with lemon, and came up with the idea for a filling composed of some cooked chicken (left over from roasted chicken), roasted pumpkin (I've had the pumpkin on display for months), and some garlic greens, parsley, and chard – all from the garden. I added a small pile of parmesan shavings, some more lemon zest, and two eggs to help with adhesion, and went to work making the ravioli.

When I cut open the pumpkin, to scoop out the seeds before roasting it in the oven, I found some of the seeds had sprouted and grown roots inside the pumpkin. It was a remarkable sight, so I took some photos. I also carefully extracted a couple of the rooted plants and put them in pots.

A tiny garden growing inside the pumpkin.

One of the sprouted seeds I planted

The rest of the scooped out interior, with a jumble of sprouted and unsprouted seeds

The experimental ravioli filling ended up being absolutely edible, but rather lemony. I was going to serve it with some reheated tomato-based sauce I had in the freezer (left over from a batch of lasagna I'd made a while back). When we tasted the sample ravioli I cooked, it seemed like it would be better with an alfredo sauce. Well I nixed that idea on account of my cholesterol and my waistline, plus it would have meant a trip to the store. So we had it with the tomato sauce.

I froze two trays of ravioli though, so maybe we'll try the alfredo sauce when we cook the next batch. I'll have to invite company though, so I can justify buying the heavy cream.

Almond Blooming Season

2011-02-18T12:48:00.000-08:00

The almond trees are exploding with blossoms. The weather has been cold and wet and I wonder if the bees are even out pollinating. The almond crop might be compromised this year.
The almond trees are the first to flower, and they really brighten up the back yard when they bloom.

Almond blossoms

Just an egg

2011-02-18T12:41:00.000-08:00

Chicken #2 laid an egg.

Egg

Chicken food

2011-01-29T18:39:00.000-08:00

Chickens eating walnuts.

These chickens have well adapted to their new, larger range. I've made a very large yard for them to use for foraging and whatnot. I bought a few rolls of black plastic fencing, which is very light weight and easy to maneuver. Their area now includes a space underneath some small trees that had collected lots of leaf litter for them to dig into. They can also dig around under some shrubs and young olive trees. Since these chickens are not particularly large, they don't seem to do too much damage to the trees. In fact, they are keeping the grass down around the trees, and foiling any pest build up. On occasion I'll let them out of that area and they inevitably head over toward the house and the granite patio. I'll let them hang out around the house for awhile and then lure them back to their own fenced area by cracking walnuts with brick. They know what the sound of walnut shells breaking sounds like, and they make haste to get to the spot where I crack the nuts. They love to eat walnuts, and do so with a real fervor.
Walnuts have lots of that healthy, omega 3 fat in them, so I'm thinking that will make the eggs omega eggs.

The eggs are coming two days on and one day off, from chicken number 1 at this point. Chicken number 2 looks like she's getting ready to start laying (her bottom is starting to get larger).

I am enjoying the chickens much more, now that we have grown more accustomed to each other, and I love that the hen eats bugs and walnuts and other things I don't like to eat, and then makes eggs out of them. The rooster has grown into a beautiful, bird, glossy black feathers shine green in the light. His ruff and tail feathers are fantastic.

I can see how important it is to have animals in a Permaculture situation, they offer so much as labor and as food. They keep weeds down, create food with their eggs, and break pest cycles. They also make fertilizer for the garden. The coop litter (straw and wood shavings) will mix with all their crap and become a wonderful addition to a compost pile.

Hummingbird nest being refurbished

2011-01-25T00:30:00.000-08:00

A hummingbird hen has been working on updating the furnishings of last year's hummingbird nest. The nest was in such a protected spot that it suffered little wear and tear during the winter winds and rains (thus far). A hummingbird has been sprucing up the place, adding pieces of spider silk, and other materials, to the exterior and interior. Soon, I suspect she'll be sitting on eggs, though it isn't even February. I did witness various hummingbird mating activities in the past month or so. The male soaring way up high and other macho acts.

Last year's hummingbird event was so incredible! It is looking as if it will happen again. We have had a pretty mild winter, but we're barely half-way through it, so I'm wondering if she'll lay eggs soon. It will be clear though when she starts sitting on the nest. I'll try to get more photos of the process, but will be mostly content to watch it and not bother the birds.

A Sunny January Day

2011-01-22T20:28:00.000-08:00

Today the weather report said sun and temps of 75 F.
It was a lovely day to spend in the garden. I let the chickens have the run of the whole yard. They like to hang out on the decomposed granite patio and also to dig in the Mulberry leaves, which cover the mostly ornamental beds nearby. The hen that is laying is very focused on finding bugs to eat. She scratches at the leaves and then snaps up any bugs she sees. The rooster and the other hen do the same, but with less focus.
While they were visiting various places in the yard I spent some time collecting scion wood from the white peach and the Moorpark apricot. I'm going to work on grafting in the spring and want to have some dormant wood to work with. I'll try grafting them both on various peach seedlings I have growing in a few places. I also took some black currant cuttings and stuck them in the ground.
Around 2 p.m. the hen which lays went into the coop and settled into her little dent in the straw, and went about laying an egg. I watched her from the window for a while and she seemed to not be making progress. Then the rooster and the other hen came in, and he stood right by her and the other hen took a little nap nearby. All this went on for some time, so I left and waited, until I saw them come out of the coop, to go get the egg. It was still warm when I picked it up. I now have half a dozen peewee eggs in the fridge. This is a collection from the past week or so.
The peewee eggs translate to large eggs with four peewees being the same as 3 three large. Last weekend I used four peewee eggs to make a batch of fresh pasta that I then used to make ravioli. The yolks were such a deep yellow that the sheets of pasta were a brilliant yellow when the sun shone through them.
Chances are good I'll repeat the procedure. The raviolis were delicious. Fresh made pasta is a wonderful food.

Hydrologic cycle & three more eggs

2011-01-08T14:21:00.000-08:00

Sunset Jan 2011.

We visited the Pacific Ocean for five, mostly-sunny days. Every day we walked on the beach, a little further each day. On our last full day there we walked seven miles on the beach, in bare feet. The water was cold and the sand was cold, but there was enough sun to keep us warm, so long as we kept moving. Many days of rain preceded our visit, and some areas to the north and the south of where we stayed were experiencing landslides and broken sewage pipes leaking into the ocean. I wanted to visit Moonstone Beach State Park near Cambria, but that beach was considered too toxic from a sewage leak and other toxins in the water system, and was closed. Knowing that our water will make its way to a creek, river, lake, or ocean, should keep us keenly aware of what we put into it as "waste." In April of 2010 Time magazine did a piece about various pharmaceuticals making their way into water supplies. The hydrologic cycle is a local and global concern. It sure is beautiful to look at too.

Three eggs, in the carton now, with the pointy end down.

When we returned I found three more eggs deposited in the chicken coop. They were on the floor in a corner, not in the nest boxes, so I've put two fake eggs into a nest box to help encourage the chickens to lay in there. I'm not sure if the chickens will get it, since the eggs are purple and green. They are musical shaker eggs but they were the only "fake" egg-shaped thing we had around just now.

After consulting a chicken book I weighed the eggs and found that they weigh 1 1/4 - 1 1/2 ounces each. The formula for figuring out their weight is to multiply the weight of one egg by twelve to get the carton weight. These eggs rate as "peewee" sized eggs. The book also says the eggs should get a bit larger in the coming weeks, so I'll weigh future eggs to check on that assumption. Every chicken book I consulted said that chickens would not lay with less than 14 hours of daylight (which is one reason why many people put lights in their chicken coops). I have no artificial light in the coop, so I'm still not sure what the scoop is with that idea. We are only getting about 9 hours 45 minutes.

First Egg

2011-01-02T15:58:00.000-08:00

Well, there it is.

What a surprise to find a little white egg in the chicken coop, this second day of January.

The books I've read said the chickens wouldn't lay with less than 14 hours of sunlight, so I didn't expect any eggs until spring.

I admit it was exciting to find the egg.

First egg interior. A very deep yellow yolk, which is held high in the white.

The first egg yolk (top) is much deeper yellow and the white is much firmer than the commercial egg (bottom). These two eggs were put into a batter for banana bread.

Chickens are growing

2010-12-16T00:19:00.000-08:00

Chicken number two

Rooster

The three chickens are getting used to things around here. They arrived one hot day in the summer. Now that we've had rain, frost, and a few good north winds with downpours, they're no longer running into their coop with the slightest bit of rain or wind. They generally spend most of the day outside, foraging for plants, bugs, worms, and seeds. They do get particularly excited about worms, so if I find one that is waterlogged on the pavement, I'll take it back to the birds where they pick it up and carry it around, keeping it from one another.

Last week they had a visit from a small hawk. I heard the hens making an uproar and looked out to see them in a flap with a small hawk. The hens fought the small bird off, sending it to a nearby branch, and when I went out to check on the birds the hawk flew off. Assessing the scene I noted the rooster napping nearby while the hens were in rather a froth about the fight. I felt a tinge of pride in those two hens. They all went into the coop for a while, and then came out again a bit later.

The rooster is working on getting his crow just right. He's not singing his song regularly, but more frequently now. Some days his tone is a little better than others. I think with practice he'll have a nice bel canto crow with which to express himself. His black feathers have a lovely greenish sheen in the light and he's learning to share!

The hens have established their peck order and it was heavily enforced for weeks, and now they've seemed to relax about it a bit.

One unexpected delight for me is the sound they make when they drink water. They dip their beaks into the container of water, then tilt back their heads and make a gentle tapping sound while they swallow the water. It is such a simple act, taking a drink of water, but I love watching and listening to them while they do it.

One recent weekend day I let them have free run of the entire back yard. Anywhere they wanted to go I'd let them. I was working out in the garden most of the day and they made their way to points previously not visited. They roamed around—a little cluster of black and white—and explored their larger world. They generally have about 100 ft of fence to explore, but that day they roamed near the apple trees, across the small lawn, and a bit into the main food garden. When they got back to their familiar rosemary bush in the afternoon, I started closing up the fencing so they'd be sure to find their way back into their coop when the time came.

I find it very beneficial to have the birds as part of the garden. I do not feel sentimental about them as pets (though I'm warned that may come) but I do like having them as workers in the garden. Like our cat makes our house feel warmer and comfortable to us, the chickens make the garden feel more alive to me. They are fertilizing and eating bugs, and creating movement out there. I can usually see them from my desk, and when I feel like taking a break, I'll head out to watch them for a while.

Pumpkin pie experiment

2010-11-27T20:22:00.000-08:00

This week I cut apart one of the Winter Luxury pie pumpkins and roasted it in the oven, then made a pie out of the pulp. The flavor and texture were both delicate and wonderful. And the pumpkin produced many seeds, which I saved for growing more of these delicious pumpkins next year. In the past I have made my pumpkin pies out of butternut squash flesh and they have been delicious, but this winter luxury pie pumpkin has a much more subtle and refined flavor. I cut down on the amount of spices which the recipe called for, to allow the pumpkin flavor to be available to the palate. This pumpkin definitely lives up the the description I read in the Nichols Garden catalog which states:

Beautiful 5 lb, 10" diameter, netted pumpkin is what every pie pumpkin promises but rarely delivers. Completely smooth, thick flesh cooks to a rich mellow flavor. A friend asked a market vendor to recommend a pie pumpkin; she reached under the counter and exclaimed, "This will be the bes you've ever had," as she brought out a Winter Luxury Pie.

The pumpkin I used was the largest of the harvest and produced six cups of cooked flesh, enough to make three pies total. I froze the remaining flesh in two-cup increments. I'll be ready to make another pie soon.

Cold Weather

2010-11-22T23:10:00.000-08:00

Lemons

We've got a frost alert for the next few nights. This means various tender plants need to be protected from the cold, mostly citrus. This evening I went about covering and insulating my two lime plants and two lemon plants. I also picked most of the lemons from the lemon tree that bears fruit. Last year the fruit froze and fell off in a cold snap. This year I was looking forward to harvesting lemons on an as-needed basis. Now I have a basket full of lemons that will need some sort of processing. I could juice them and freeze the juice or I could make lemon marmalade. I love the idea of doing some of each.

I started making some green tomato jam yesterday, and it is resting before I'll cook it up some more and then process it in half-pint jars. Since water bath canning is so energy intensive I could do a batch of marmalade and process them all on the same day.

Thanksgiving day in the USA is on Thursday, November 25 this year, and I'm thinking I'll make a pumpkin pie using one of the pie pumpkins I grew this year. I'm going to brine two organic chickens on Wednesday and then on Thursday I'll roast them in the oven. One will be stuffed with tomato and feta from my Greek cookbook, and the other will be unstuffed. We'll have mashed potatoes with lots of butter, perhaps some pan gravy, collards from the garden (which will be nice and mellow from the frost) and perhaps a few other things. I enjoy cooking with things that I've grown. The pie pumpkin and collards in this case. A few weeks ago I made some pumpkin cannelloni with one of the French heirloom pumpkins I roasted and some tomato sauce I made in September, and had in the freezer.

Fall rains

2010-10-31T10:04:00.000-07:00

Cool fall rains have finally arrived and have washed the dust of summer away. The air feels clean and the plants are refreshed.
Walnut harvesting has begun in the orchard across the street. Normally that would mean a dust cloud for days on end but the rain has helped keep that down.
Our walnut trees are dropping nuts and I've been harvesting them. The chickens seem to like walnuts so I've been feeding the broken nuts to them. The best nuts from our trees will be given to friends. It is rather a shame that walnuts do not appeal to my palate since we have so many nuts from the big old trees.

Along with the cooler weather, and the rain, the abutilons have really started to look their best. They struggle a little through hot weather and then they thrive once it cools some.

Abutilon

This yellow abutilon is visited frequently by hummingbirds and is a plant I grew from seed.

Fall Gardening

2010-10-10T21:44:00.000-07:00

The temperatures were in the 80s this weekend, a little warm for the chickens so I put the mister on to cool down their yard, but not too hot for me to move a pile of old ivy and sticks. This pile was created out of branches and pieces of cut ivy. I piled and piled and finally I decided the pile wasn't doing much but making a comfortable home for a few mice. We get such little rain here that it would take so very long for that pile to break down. I had tried planting squash to grow upon it, but the rodents chewed through the squash plants, killing them.

Old ivy on top of new...

I've been saving up cardboard boxes and flattening them for use as ivy suppressors. There is still so much ivy, even though a huge pile has been pulled out. I've put down cardboard in a large area, spreading out a little at a time. I finally had a critical mass of cardboard and laid it down on top of the ivy, then I took the pieces of the pile—sticks and dried out ivy mostly—and spread that on top of the cardboard. Geoff Lawton of the Permaculture Research Institute of Australia says that a forest grows on a fallen forest and so my food forest will have plenty of organic matter to build upon and grow into.

With the pile gone, there is a rather large space, maybe 30ft by 30ft (I've yet to measure it), that is ready for a garden. I am thinking about making a small lawn in the middle, upon which to lounge, and then make the edges into a chicken-friendly pasture. At the back end of the space is a very old almond tree and some old lilacs, at the base of which I am thinking of planting lavender, keeping it pretty drought-friendly. Beyond those trees is the chicken house and yards, with a small foot path connecting the spaces.

At one edge is a group of trees that has been acquired as scaffolding for a large grape vine. The wild birds love to come and eat the grapes when they ripen, creating a cacophony of bird song and various bird arguments. At the parallel edge is an island of ivy with a mature cypress tree and some old fence posts covered in ivy that haven't been taken down yet. Still lots of ivy remains. And at the other end, is the entrance from the decomposed granite patio, where much outdoor time is spent, and also a male American Persimmon which had been coppiced many years ago and how has several long trunks. The grape has made its way from another almond, which resides next to the fruitless Persimmon, into the Persimmon. Once the pasture is installed, it should feel like a nice meadow in a ring of various trees. It will require summer irrigation and I am looking at tall fescue for the more refined lawn area, as it has lower water requirements than many grasses. Plants suitable for chicken forage will go in the rougher area.

I was somewhat surprised at my desire for a small lawn in the backyard. I've been spending time and energy removing the lawn in the front yard and replacing it with various useful plants. We've lounged around on the remaining front lawn in the summer, and it is rather pleasant, save for all the dog walkers and other people who can tend to take a look at whatever we're doing. Our street also gets some maniac drivers who roar down the 25 mph street at 45 mph, or even faster. That makes our little cat nervous, and us nervous about our cat. The shrubs will grow up taller in a few years, but I am not interested in having an audience when I'm hanging out in my gardening clothes and having a refreshing beverage. So I feel that a small lawn/pasture area will make a nice lounging setting that is more private, and have a more pleasant feel for the people and the cat. It will also provide a nice forage area for the chickens.

. . .

Nicotiana tabacum 'Havana'

This year I grew some tobacco plants, just to see what the plants looked like. Tobacco has a long history with humankind and I am interested in plants that people have found or do find useful. The plants made very large, sticky leaves, which smelled of tobacco, and they bloomed with these long pink flowers at the tops of 3-4 ft plants (in partial shade). They are the prettiest plants in the garden bed they're in, and they brighten up our fall evenings.

Berm & Basin and other things in early Fall

2010-10-07T16:13:00.000-07:00

The weather is starting to feel more autumnal, leaves are dropping, the air is cooler, wind has kicked up, we have even had some rain. The walnut trees are dropping leaves in the front yard, and the berm/basin area is a great collector of the leaves. The leaves gather at the edge of the road and the planting area, and they also fall in from above. I'll rake them off the grass and put them in there too, or use them in mulch piles around the pomegranate and peach in the front yard. The bamboo is sending up several new culms, so we'll have a good clump soon enough.

Berm and Basin progress.

The sole surviving pie pumpkin plant made two nice pumpkins, which have been curing in the sun. The other pumpkin I planted is a Cinderella's carriage type, which has more pronounced ribs and is flatter than these winter luxury pie pumpkins. The Cinderella pumpkin is a French heirloom type and is apparently good for pie also. More of the Cinderella plants survived the gopher attacks and so I have many of those pumpkins to try this year.

Pie pumpkins curing in the sun.

The chickens are adjusting to their environment. The male bolts through the chicken door when I open it in the morning, and the females follow a little timidly. I've made a temporary fenced area that connects to their more secure fenced area and I open their gate to let them out into a larger and grassier area. They scratch and eat grass, which seems to be their favorite food, and then when the early evening comes they all go back into their house. The male has consistently been roosting now and the females still want to be in the nest boxes, so I move them onto the roosts when it gets dark. One night this week they all three went on the roosts of their own accord, so perhaps they are starting to get the idea. It is hard to know what goes on in the tiny bird brains.

Male chicken.

Hot weather in early fall

2010-09-29T16:28:00.000-07:00

We've been having a bit of a heat wave here, with temperatures in the high 90s and even cresting 100. My chicken books say that hot temperatures can be deadly for chickens, so I've hooked up a fine mist sprinkler to spray over one part of their outdoor pen to cool the air down. I've been refreshing their water several times a day to keep it cool, and they seem to be doing fine. The male will even stand under the mist, while the females tend to avoid it.

In early September we had cooler weather and so I started thinking about taking fall cuttings of some plants I want to propagate. I took some lavender cuttings back then and put them in a shaded spot, close to my office door so that I would be sure to pay them the care they need – frequent watering mostly. Now I am not sure if they are going to make it with all this heat, but it'll be a good experiment. And if any of them do make it, all the better.

The berm in the front yard is looking pretty good, considering I don't water it much and that most of the plants are from re-seeding. There is a lush growth of new calendula, daikon, and fava beans. The pineapple guavas look pretty good and one of them even has a few fruits. In place of the ginkgo tree that the gopher killed I've planted a lime tree. The poor thing had a crowded root system so I pruned the roots and the top very heavily before planting it, I mulched it very well, and now it is sending out new growth, while in amongst the flush of calendula, etc. A few strawberry plants I moved out there in the spring have taken hold and are sending out runners. Strawberries make such a nice groundcover, and the fruits are pretty good too. The sunflowers have finished their show and are now ghosts towering over the other plants, as are the hollyhocks, their long stalks covered in seed pods and the odd flower.

The bamboo served as a great support for the pole beans, and it has started to push up some new growth.

Alphonse Karr bamboo with pole beans.

Detail of beans on bamboo.

Chickens

2010-09-16T13:30:00.000-07:00

After attending my first Permaculture workshop at a farm in New Mexico, I decided that I wanted to get chickens. The farm had many chickens and turkeys which they moved around the place to help with weed control and insect control. I was interested in the weed and insect control, as well as feeding garden excesses to the birds and getting something I could eat in return, mainly eggs.

And so I returned home all excited about getting chickens and my partner went to work building a 6x8 chicken house with nest boxes and a human-sized door and a chicken sized door. I painted it before the winter rains came and then I stalled on building the fence. I am not particularly handy with certain types of projects. Like building a fenced in yard for chickens. The winter rains came and we got some leakage in the house, but nothing too bad, it just needed a little modification.

White-crested black Polish bantam chickens. Two hens and a rooster.

In my master gardner training and such, I met a man who had raised chickens from his own chickens, and he said he'd give me some of the new flock. And he showed me picture of the tiny chicks with their little white heads on top of their little black bodies.

Off to the hardware store I went and loaded up my little car with fence posts and poultry netting and other fencing. And I went to work creating a fenced yard for the chickens and my partner went to work modifying the chicken house to keep the rain out of the few leaky areas.

The chickens arrived yesterday afternoon, a little hot and a little shaken up from the drive from the farm.

Today they were up and preening and drinking water. The rooster was patrolling for bugs and they all seem to be adjusting to their new surroundings. In a few days they'll get to go outside in the daytime, where they'll be able to scratch and dust and so forth.

Next spring they'll probably be laying eggs and hopefully they'll be helping with weed control and insect control.

Catching up...

2010-09-04T01:36:00.000-07:00

Luxury winter pie pumpkin

September fourth and I haven't made an blog entry for approximately one month. Things are happening out there in the garden. My luxury winter pie pumpkin vine (the sole survivor of the gopher/microtus infestation) has two lovely fruits maturing on the vine. These pumpkins are supposedly delicious for pie – I've been using butternut squash in my pumpkin pies for a few years now, and they've been delicious. If these luxury pie pumpkins are sooooo much better, I'll definitely plant a ton more next year and hope for a bushel yield (unless the rodent population has abated by then–I'm working on it).

What else? Well the popcorn is starting to mature. Various winter squashes are putting on weight with time to mature before the cold weather. I've planted a few decorative things in the immediate patio area. Native dicentra, and a few other things. I've moved some of the crispy heuchera from the front yard (solar oven microclimate) to the part shade in the back. I continue to move the alpine strawberries from the way-back to the near-back. Those seem to like the heavier shade and a bit more water than the dry, baked area I am too scared to water for fear of gophers destroying my figs trees. Some successful trapping has occurred. Four gophers in two days, actually. And then a mole (they share the tunnels and I feel bad when I get one). My gopher to mole ratio is pretty high though, so, it is what is called collateral damage.

The tomatoes which survived the ruthless attack from the gophers are almost exclusively cherry tomatoes. Black Aztec from Suzanne Ashworth via seed savers exchange. These are a very delicious tomato. Sweet and tart and copious in quantity. Also from Suzanne I've had excellent yields on the tomatillo plants I grew from her seeds.

Members of the cucurbit family have not fared entirely well. More than a few cucumber, melon, and squash plants were eaten by rodents. The rodents ate many of my bean plants too. They ate all kinds of things this year and left me feeling rather hopeless at times. A few of the bean plants that did make it through are starting to make pods! Including one that grew with the bamboo I planted in the front yard. The bean has spiraled up the stalks and is hanging seed pods in the air. My corn variety this year was popcorn and has not fared well with the invasion of gophers. I'll have a few kernels to try popping, but my crop was so impacted that I'll not have enough genetic variety to save the seed.

The front yard has sprung to life in the berm/basin area, after a spell of certain unattractiveness. Orange Cinderella pumpkins are growing out front. Various other plants went to seed and are re-growing from new seed - daikon, hollyhock, calendula. It looks sort of lush just now. I've been watering out there some.

The Thompson seedless grape in the front yard produced a few berry clusters this year. They were very sweet and delicious. The lemon tree has quite a few fruits on it, and is also draped in orange Passiflora caerulea fruits.

I've planted some things for the fall garden. Peas, lettuce, arugula, collards, chard. I'll plant some spinach seeds I was sent when I renewed my Seed Savers Exchange membership. I hope they perform better than the German Pink tomato seeds they sent. It is a potato leaf variety of tomato and it produced not one fruit while it grew beside the prolific cappuccino cherry tomatoes from Suzanne Ashworth, across the way from the Black Aztecs, and near some Amish pastes - all of which produced fruit. Perhaps it is just the potato leaf varieties that don't work for me. Last year I planted one in a spot that I felt got enough sun but the plant did not produce. This year I planted a non-potato leaf type of tomato plant in a spot very close by and it fruited.

Back to planning the fall garden......

Feathers

2010-08-05T19:01:00.000-07:00

Sitting out under the empty hummingbird nest I found a tiny feather. I can't be certain that it belonged to a hummingbird. A photo here of the feather in question, a cherry pit for scale, and a scrub jay feather that was also in the back yard.

Ginkgo

2010-07-27T12:05:00.000-07:00

Last week the weather was rather hot and the ginkgo in the berm was looking a little droopy. I don't water there much and the tree had been in that spot for three years - it was one of the first things I planted when we moved into this house. I cut up a little circle of lawn and put in the ginkgo seedling I grew from seed I harvested from a tree in our previous neighborhood. The tree thrived and grew to a height of 8 ft over the few years.
I gave the tree a nice, deep watering and went on with my life. Last night I looked out the kitchen window to see the ginkgo tilting at an angle. When I pulled it out there were no roots and just a chewed lower trunk left.

gopher damage to ginkgo

I wondered why the gophers left the tree for three years and I also wondered why hollyhocks still stood in the berm, when in years past those hollyhocks would have been long gone.
I am now accustomed to the loss of plants to gophers, and I do feel sad about the loss of this tree. It is somehow different to grow a nice tree than to buy a nice tree. I felt a certain pride in the tree. I was also excited at growing a seedling ginkgo, which creates diversity in the gene pool, unlike grafted male trees.

Ginkgo

The tree will not go to waste, the leafy branches will become mulch for the persimmon tree in the back yard and the trunk will perhaps become a bean pole or a stake for something or other. Perhaps I could fashion it into a spear with the special power to pierce the earth and get a gopher every time.

Gardening for the birds

2010-07-23T16:59:00.000-07:00

With the gopher invasion taking down tomatoes everywhere I look, microtus helping themselves to the squash plants, right at the start of their stems, thus rendering the remainder of the plant dead, and the destruction of other various plants by other various rodents, I find myself appreciating the birds who come to the garden. This little yellow bird sat atop this blooming/seeding catnip plant and picked away at the small, black, seeds inside the seed pods, while I stood not more than 8 feet away. While I stood still, with my camera pointing in his direction, I heard a delicate rustling under the plants to my right, and when I looked that way I saw a small, furry creature and the opening to its burrow. I remained calm, so as not to interrupt the feasting bird, and made a note of where that little rodent has made its home. A spade will be dispatched to that area later. A small fig tree I grew from a cutting has had its roots eaten away, and I fear for my larger fig trees. I feel a certain vigor returning in my setting of gopher traps.

Hummingbirds have flown the nest

2010-07-06T22:45:00.000-07:00

Today was the big day for the baby hummingbirds. Early in the afternoon I saw them practicing flight, hanging onto the nest by their toenails while whirling their wings. They took a break to sit on the edges of the nest. A while later only one bird was in the nest and I watched the other rather closely. At some point the bird started the pre-flight practicing again, and then lift-off occurred! Oh it was magical, and the bird flew to a spot about two inches away from the nest. There it sat for some time. An adult bird (not sure if it was the mother or an intruder I'd seen yesterday) came along and nudged it away from the nest. It took flight again, to sit atop the beam around which the string lights are wrapped—still not very far from the nest. It sat awhile there and then flew back to the nest. A few minutes later it whirled its wings and left for good. It was a magical moment to see that little bird take flight for the first time.

An adult bird, perhaps the mother or the intruder, started amending the nest, picking out feathers, fluffing the lining. I'm not sure if a new mother is looking to make the nest her own or if the original mother is making adjustments. It seems as if another round of babies is somewhat likely.

Here's a photo of the two earlier in the day, getting a feel for perching.

First Apricots

2010-07-02T21:29:00.000-07:00

Yesterday and today the first two of four apricots were picked and eaten. One of the four had been tasted by birds a few weeks back, and one remains, ripening on the tree, soon to be eaten.
Peaches are filling out in size and a few, here and there, are starting to show some color. The chard is starting a new cycle, so fresh, baby leaves are ready to eat, and the arugula reseeded itself and is ready to harvest in small quantities. I lost another tomato plant to the gophers today, and of course it waited until fruit was on the plant before severing its roots. I've been tasting the black currants for a week or so now, and they are finally starting to sweeten a bit. The fall gold raspberries are done with their spring crop and have started work on their fall crop. The red raspberries are producing delicious fruit every day. Even the strawberries are putting out a few small fruits. I ate a lovely fig yesterday, from the Mission Improved tree, and all the breba Conadrias are long gone. The Conadria is looking to make an impressive late-summer crop though. One tomato plant, that got in pretty early and wasn't battered by the hail storm, has one fruit on it with a hint of color. I refuse to get my hopes up, but the gopher in the area of that tomato plant seems not to be too interested in tomatoes. Fingers are crossed. Many of the leeks have succumbed to gophers, and the top-setting onions are starting to disappear too. I've been lax in my trapping regimen, and so I pay the price. Much of the popcorn is about 18 inches high now, and some squash plants are finally spreading out. The pumpkins in the front yard have a couple of growing fruits on, and some new ones too. I just planted Alphonse Karr bamboo in the front yard. It is a clumping bamboo with beautiful green stripes on the stems. I am going to try to use the culms (stalks) as stakes once the plant gets established. Around the base of the bamboo I planted seed of popcorn and pumpkins and pole beans. It's a guild! I've started moving the alpine strawberries from the way back yard into the area nearer the house. Back to zone 1 where they thrive and belong. I'll be giving some to my friend who provided the Alphonse Karr bamboo, along with many other plants in the yard. It is very much a friendship garden.

Well, onto the hummingbird photo.....

The babies are growing up.

View a series of photos of the mother bird arriving to feed these two babies here.

Hummingbirds are growing

2010-06-28T13:17:00.000-07:00

The nest is probably starting to get a little close with two growing hummingbirds packed into it. The mother bird has started to feed the babies even when we are at the far edge of the patio, something she wouldn't do when they were smaller. She comes and feeds the birds and they eat and then do some stretching and flap their little wings. One of the babies is definitely larger than the other.
An interesting phenomenon is the spattering of droppings under the nest. We've seen the little specks come flying out of the nest.

One baby hummingbird chin

2010-06-24T20:29:00.000-07:00

The mother hummingbird has now started sleeping elsewhere, which means the hatchlings are feathered enough to regulate their own body temperatures. I've seen two little chins poking above the nest, and today while the mother was off foraging I got close for a quick photo of one tiny chin.

Hummingbird eggs hatched

2010-06-20T15:42:00.000-07:00

The mother bird has been feeding babies for several days now. In the past two days when she feeds the baby bird beaks have been cresting the rim of the nest.
I set up the tripod in the living room and waited for her to come back from a foraging flight and took many photos when she returned.

Hummingbird Nest Decorated with Lichen

2010-06-04T17:44:00.000-07:00

The hummingbird has added a considerable coating of lichen pieces to the outside of her nest. It would work great as camouflage in a tree. I'm not sure she's really blending in with the string lights though. She is on the nest for longer periods of time, and away for shorter. Makes sense. She will bring back little pieces of fluff and tuck them inside the nest.

She'll feed at some nearby flowers in the back yard, and also at flowers in the front yard.

I'll start watching for babies in about a week or so.

Lovely Lavender

2010-06-03T17:48:00.000-07:00

Lavender, oh how I love this plant. I have planted many lavenders and yet I never seem to have enough. It is easy to propagate by cuttings though, so I'll be making more. I even grew out seeds one year and got some good plants.

I had big plans to harvest the lavender and have long beautiful bundles of it, to give as gifts and so forth. I paid attention to when the lower two flowers opened, and cut the stems before noon. I banded the bundle of stalks with a rubber band. I followed the directions I read in the Lavender book by Robert Kourik. It was time consuming and tedious. And this from a person who is growing wheat with which to make bread. I'm into process, but something wasn't doing it for me with this process. And it made a rather unimpressive bundle once it dried.

A week passed and the flowers opened and drew the bees in. And I had a thought, since I was getting a little low on my batch of lemon verbena syrup, I thought I'd try making lavender syrup.

Harvesting was simply cutting the stems just at the base of the flowering head. I stripped off several heads and got about half an ounce of flowers and calyx. It was fast and easy.

I massaged the flowers a little, to help release the oils, while the sugar water boiled for 5 minutes. 2 cups sugar, 2.5 cups water.

When the 5 minutes of boiling was up, I took the pot off the heat and added the lavender to the sugar water. Cover and let steep at least 30 minutes.

The flowers shrank considerably. I strained it into a bowl while I cleaned the pot, then strained it back into the pot to boil for another 30 seconds.

I let it cool a bit and then poured it into my bottles. What a lovely color the syrup picked up from the flowers. I got myself a glass of ice and put a teaspoon or two of the lavender syrup and topped it off with water. Delicious!

Another bird...

2010-06-02T22:46:00.001-07:00

The front yard has large English walnut trees along the street and there has been quite a ruckus lately with a few starlings. We were sitting out on the front porch this evening and spotted what the immediate ruckus was about. An owl has taken up residence in a hollow of a branch of a big walnut tree. Last year, in the summer, we noticed a pair of owls up there and this is the first sign of them this year. I got out the long lens and tripod and still managed to get blurry photos. The owl blends right in with the tree and through the viewfinder it was hard to get the focus just right. I could also go on about camera shake, but that might get boring.

Here are a few photos.

Back to the garden

2010-05-31T12:20:00.000-07:00

The hummingbird has been taking up lots of space so I thought I'd best get back to the garden for a bit. This spring has been terrible for gophers. They've been going after the usual favorites (theirs and mine) like leeks, garlic, onions and potatoes. They've expanded their diet by also eating a couple of abutilons (common name is flowering maple but they are not maples), they decided this was the year to eat up the campanula, and interestingly they've been eating tomato plants, which I had understood they would not eat. I have lost several tomato plants to the rodents and, while I've been toughening myself to the losses over the past few years, I find the tomato losses a bit hard to take.

When I look at the front yard and see the lovely, large hollyhocks in bloom, I know it is only a matter of time before the gophers will chew the large roots up until the things fall over. I'm enjoying the flowers while they are here. Life in the garden is transitory anyway. In a side note, Hollyhock flowers are frequented by hummingbirds.

The gopher situation in the back yard (where the tomatoes are) is the most bothersome. I set traps, and so far I haven't had near the success in trapping as I've had before. Though I did manage to snag one in a trap I set last night, which buoyed my hopes of at least getting the leeks to go to seed, so I can disperse them to a wider area. Leek blossoms are also rather beautiful, in my opinion. I suppose I would rather lose leeks than my fruit trees. And I am unwilling to sink hardware cloth into the soil, so losses must be accepted.

Hummingbird update

2010-05-29T22:12:00.000-07:00

The Hummingbird has been spending much more time in the nest the past few days, and she is in the nest tonight. I did a little research on the nesting habits of hummingbirds and it seems the female builds a nest soon after mating, then after a day or two lays up to two pea-sized eggs. She'll incubate them for two weeks or so, then she'll tend to the babes by keeping them warm and feeding them frequently until they are feathered enough to regulate their own body temperatures. Not sure how long that process lasts, a few more weeks I think, then they'll leave the nest.

You won't see any egg pictures from this nest because I feel that would be too intrusive. I've been out in the general vicinity of the nest, keeping my distance, moving slowly, and she's stayed in it the whole time. She usually makes a chirp as she leaves the nest and goes off for a while, then returns for a while. She was gone in the late afternoon and early evening, but I did see her profile out there tonight, so I'm guessing she's incubating eggs.

I'll be sure to try for photos of the babies, without bothering the family. It is all a bit wonderful.

Hummingbird in the Nest

2010-05-26T15:09:00.000-07:00

This hummingbird will avoid the nest if I am hanging around nearby outside, or too obviously gawking from the living room. It has been chasing away scrub jays and doing the intimidating hover/chirp at the cat. I have found if I hide behind the curtains just so, with my camera focused on the nest, I can get more photos of the bird in the nest. It doesn't stay long, so I have to be quick, but I got a few that I've cropped to show more of the bird.

Nest Expansion

2010-05-26T12:12:00.000-07:00

Day two of nest building. These photos are shot from underneath the nest and it looks like those green pieces could be lichen, but I do not know. Top photo taken around 8 a.m. and bottom photo taken around 11:45 a.m. The bird is building at a pretty fast pace, but I suppose that is what one might expect from a hummingbird.

New Resident

2010-05-25T12:23:00.000-07:00

We light our patio with LED string lights, which look very festive and are much easier on the eyes than the bright spotlights that were installed before. We've noticed a hummingbird hanging around the string lights, and hanging around the patio area - buzzing by for a close look at us while we drink coffee in the morning, and taking a close look at the cat, when she's on the other side of a glass door. The hummingbird has been a regular visitor.

Today I noticed it buzzing around and stopping by the string lights rather frequently. It seems to be building a nest on the string lights. I took a few photos of the brown duff after it had been back and forth all morning.

A little later the hummingbird was back at the nest site, and I caught a picture of it, sitting there. The nest site is in a spot I can see from my office, at a short distance, and directly out the living room window, at close range. I'm a bit thrilled with the idea of having a hummingbird nest to watch all summer.

Nanking Cherry Harvest

2010-05-22T14:35:00.001-07:00

Almost half a pound of nanking cherries in today's harvest. These fruits are about the size of a garbanzo bean that has been soaked. They are a little tart and have a pit, but not so large as to make it undesirable to eat the fruit. The pit comes away easily from the flesh. This is the second spring for these plants, so I'm impressed at the amount of fruit on such young shrubs.

In future years, and larger harvests, I imagine I'd make preserves out of these, but this year they'll just get eaten up.

Solar Powered Laundry Dryer

2010-05-12T14:23:00.000-07:00

The weather has finally been warm enough to fire up the old solar powered laundry dryer that I use in the warmer weather.

Our place came with a big electric plug for the motor-driven laundry dryer, so I'm glad to be able to lighten the electricity usage.

Some things are a little stiff if they dry on the line, so I sometimes put the things in the electric dryer for a few minutes to get them a little hot and pliable, then I hang them on the line and that seems to really make a difference in the feel of the cloth. Some things go directly to the line without going in the dryer, like these sheets and pillow cases. They'll dry pretty quickly with the warm, gentle breeze we have today.

Making Dolmades

2010-05-11T23:16:00.000-07:00

The grape vines are producing lots of leaves, many of which are rather tender just now. I also have a couple of small fennel bulbs and lots of top setting onions, scallions, leeks, and various herbs around. I decided to make vegetarian dolmades for an upcoming art reception at a non-profit art gallery, where I have a couple of pieces on display. I looked at several recipes, in my various cookbooks and online, and I had a couple in front of me for reference as I went. My practice run went well enough that we ate all of the dolmades and I decided to refine my process based on the first go-round.

Today I went out and picked many grape leaves, no smaller than the size of my hand, and only the tender ones. I also harvested the other things I mentioned above: fennel bulb, leeks, top-setting onions, scallions, mint, and parsley. I used a store-bought yellow onion (certified organic and grown in California) and I used Arborio rice (I do not grow rice in my garden, but live in a rice-growing region so it is a locally produced ingredient).

Fresh grape leaves, and other ingredients.

Bamboo steamer lined with fresh grape leaves.

Preparing the leek. Sliced down the middle eases rinsing of any dirt caught inside.

Chop chop chop.

Mixing leeks and rice.

More chopping.

Laying out the blanched grape leaves.

Filling

Folding

Rolling

Uncooked dolmades in the bamboo steamer lined with fresh grape leaves.

On the stove for approximately 45 min.

Cooked dolmades await.

Viola! They are steamed to perfection! Now they will cool and then wait in the fridge (where the flavors will develop overnight) until the reception tomorrow evening. Of course I had to sample one to make sure it was cooked!

Alpine strawberries

2010-05-09T12:58:00.000-07:00

I picked a small bowl of alpine strawberries.

These are small strawberries packed with a concentrated strawberry flavor. These are a real treat to eat, and grow in part shade and take summer drought (the plants go semi dormant) and will produce all summer with some water. I grow them back under the big oaks and with the fig trees. Not very filling, but very delicious.

Garden walk with insects

2010-05-08T18:53:00.000-07:00

I took bumpy walk through the garden last week and found some insects in various places. Lots of chard is in this video, and ants on the fava beans at the end.

Currants & Gooseberries

2010-05-08T11:44:00.000-07:00

currant

gooseberry

These gooseberries and currants bloomed early this spring, and we had lots of rain and cold during and after their blooming so I was worried the berry crop might be compromised. Same situation for the peaches and apricots, all were rained upon during bloom. I went out today and lifted a prickly branch of the gooseberry (last year's wood) and found a lovely row of berries filling out quite nicely. On the black currants I found clusters of the immature fruit here and there. I still won't have enough for jelly this year, but I'll eat them out of hand when they are ripe. In the fall I made a few cuttings of the black currants and put them in the front yard, in the berm and basin area. I just stuck the dormant wood into the soil. They seem to root fairly easily, so I will continue to increase my stock that way. They don't seem to be bothered by the walnuts either, so they will make a nice addition to the walnut guild.

Ants

2010-05-03T14:16:00.000-07:00

Warmer weather means ants in the garden.

The image on top shows the ant on a leek leaf. The image on the bottom shows ants on a swelling flower bud on a peony plant. I expected to see aphids in association with the ants on the peony, but since I noticed them I've been looking every day and do not see any aphids. Perhaps the peony is secreting something the ants are harvesting? I'm just not sure.

Ants spend a lot of time moving material in the garden, they are an important part of building soil. They aerate the soil, add organic matter, move seeds around, and eat plenty of fallen fruit.

Strawberries

2010-04-26T11:50:00.000-07:00

The strawberries are starting to ripen. I picked this group this morning. Everyday brings more sweetness to them. I've yet to taste from today's harvest but I'll eat them even if they are a little tart. It is the first fruit from the garden.

Lovely Chard

2010-04-13T13:43:00.000-07:00

Various chards I harvested and washed. The ones with the wide stems and pink streaks are likely a cross between some red chard and some Glatter Silber chard. Chard will cross readily with other chard. I generally cut the thick stems out and cook them separately from the leaves. They can be blanched in water with a little lemon added, and served on their own. Sometimes I chop and sauté them with onions to add to soups. The leaves are delicious steamed or sautéed with a little garlic and olive oil, or with a little bacon, wine vinegar and red pepper flakes. Chard is very versatile and its mild flavor makes it very pleasant to eat frequently. It is also extremely easy to grow, and if let to go to seed (in its second year, it being a biennial) many delightful variations can occur. When it starts to send up a flower stalk, it can be cut and used as mulch too, which is handy when transplanting seedlings that might like a little mulch.

Spring Rain

2010-04-11T21:16:00.000-07:00

Rainy day today. We had a good downpour for a while. Rain delays turning on the irrigation. I wish I had installed my rainwater tanks last fall. Big projects take time and money though, so I'll get to the tanks when I can. I've calculated the amount of water I can harvest off my roof by using Brad Lancaster's books Rainwater Harvesting vols. 1 & 2.

They are both filled with excellent ideas for using water more efficiently and valuable information on how to harvest water. I checked the average annual rainfall in this area (26 inches or 2.16 ft) and measured my roof area. I'd be harvesting water from less than half the roof surface, since I'd put larger tanks in the back of the house and probably no tanks in the front of the house. The formula is catchment area (sq ft) x rainfall (ft) x 7.48 gall/ft x coefficient (80%). Two downspouts in the back of the house would put out approximately 16,500 gallons per year, much more than I could reasonably be expected to store in tanks. That's why Brad Lancaster says "the cheapest place to store water is in the soil," and he advocates the generous use of mulch, and turning one's garden soil into a sponge of organic material - roots, organic matter, organism, and more.

I'm looking at getting two 1550 gallon storage tanks, which would make a tiny dent in my watering needs during the summer, but those drops add up. One of the main issues in this climate is we get our rain over half the year and then no rain during the hot half of the year. Until I get those tanks, I'll be working on building the sponginess of my soil.

Most of the water in the front of the house goes into the soil. The driveway and sidewalks drain into garden beds or to the ever-shrinking lawn. Some water from the road runs into the berm & basin I put next to the pavement, watering the plants in that garden system.

Tomatoes

2010-03-27T18:12:00.000-07:00

Some of the tomatoes I started in pots have sprouted their first true leaves.
I'm growing several different kinds of tomato plants this year. I'm trying for a major haul in tomatoes this year, some to dry, some to can, and many to eat fresh.
Last year I got some seeds from other members of the Seed Savers Exchange. They are Black Aztec and Capuchino. I'm also trying German Pink, which I got from SSE when I renewed my membership last year. I'm growing Corne de Bouc, Siberia, Tropic, Glacier, Amish Paste, and San Marzano. I started them in pots on the sunny side of the house, in a garden wagon that I covered with row cover.
I've also rigged up a trellis I've never tried before. Two 2x2's pounded into the ground about 15 feet apart, running north/south, garden twine running horizontally between the two posts, approximately 12 - 18 inches apart. I'll plant 8 or so tomato plants under the garden twine and hope the whole thing doesn't collapse when the plants get big.
The set up will also shade a young apricot tree from the low, hot evening sun in the summer.

Patio 2010

2010-03-24T23:36:00.000-07:00

After hacking out some more ivy and wheelbarrowing-in some more decomposed granite, there's a nice, big patio with planting beds that will get morning and late, afternoon sun, but mostly shade throughout the day.

I've sown the bare soil with daikon seeds, and other various cover-crop seeds (they're growing now but that isn't shown in this photo). I transplanted a few strawberry plants there and a lovely red chard plant too.

We got a lovely north wind today, then some rain tonight. I was hoping for a little more rain before the dry season sets in, if only to delay the need for irrigating from well water.

I envision currants and perhaps edible honeysuckle in these beds, also alpine strawberries, which take some shade, and even more blueberries (I can't get enough!).

Food Forest

2010-03-13T21:54:00.000-08:00

I just watched Geoff Lawton's Food Forest DVD again. It is so packed with information, especially just being able to see his designs at different ages and the close spacing of the trees, shrubs, and other plants in the designs. I'm slowly incorporating those concepts into my own half acre. I worked on the shrub layer last season, and now those shrubs are breaking dormancy and offering examples for good and less good placement. I'm also noticing my zone 1 is a little lacking and will be building that up in this season. Zone 1 is especially important to me during the winter, and my lovely red romaine lettuces were planted too far from the kitchen last season. This coming lettuce planting season (late summer) I'll plant a larger quantity of lettuce and have it closer to the kitchen.

But spring-like things are happening around here now, and though we've had a cooler end of winter than we'd like, the promise of abundant harvests is here. I've started many different types of tomato seeds under agribon, on the sunny-side of the house, and they've popped up their cotyledons. I'm starting to see shrub cuttings I put in the ground last fall starting to grow (some figs, lemon verbena). I've noticed some peach seedlings popping up where I put pits in the ground in the early winter. I'll be able to try my hand at grafting on those seedlings. The chard is exhibiting perfect eating characteristics, since we've had such a lot of rain and a little bit of warming a couple weeks ago. The parsley (of which I have many plants) is starting to bolt, and the strawberry plants are starting to bloom. The cherry tree has broken dormancy as have a few of the figs. Both of the older peach trees are blooming, the yellow peach and the white peach.

Many of the bare root trees I planted are breaking dormancy. The pear, quince and pomegranates are all pushing out buds. The plum and apricot have not pushed out yet.

The berm & basin in the front yard, which the gophers worked to make less basin-like, is bursting with daikon blossoms and the Spanish lavender is blooming too. The Ginkgo has not yet broken dormancy, but I think it waited til April last year.

Great progress was made on the ivy-removal project in the past few weeks. With more ivy gone I extended our patio space by moving in more decomposed granite. The DG is a great surface for a patio, it allows water in, it wears well, and is easy to touch up. It is also a regional resource since the Sierra Nevada mountains are made of granite and are fairly nearby.
Ivy March 2010

Ivy May 2009

The first section of patio was done in 2008, and covered bare soil where ivy had grown. That first section was just big enough for a few chairs and two small outdoor tables, but we spent many hours out there after putting down the decomposed granite. It made a lovely outdoor space in which to spend time.

Patio 2008

More blooms

2010-03-04T18:36:00.001-08:00

The return of flowers to the garden brings a hurry up and wait feeling. Plants are breaking dormancy and blooming, offering the possibility of future fruit. When I look at the flowers of the nanking cherries and the edible honeysuckle I wonder if they'll fruit this year and then I get hungry thinking about eating delicious fruit from the garden. That activity is still a few months away, but the promise is present in those blossoms.

Edible Honeysuckle - yellow flowers
I ordered these plants from Territorial Seeds and also Raintree Nursery, both in Washington state. The first plants I got are two years old now and one of them made a single fruit last year. It was a small, droopy purple thing, about the size of a single peanut. They like it a little less hot that this climate, so I have planted them in a microclimate in my garden that gives the idea of a long, cool spring. They grow near the raspberries and the currants, both of which dislike hot summers. It is worth trying to grow such things, though, for I love to eat fresh raspberries and currants. They grow in a place that gets only early morning sun.

Nanking cherry - soft pink flowers

I first saw nanking cherries at Mary Zemach's permaculture garden in Los Alamos, New Mexico while on a field trip during the permaculture course. They were big bushy things, laden with red tart fruit, about the size of a large blueberry, but with a pit inside. My climate is a little hot for them, so I planted them in a spot that gets some shade in the summer afternoons.

Wheat

2010-02-28T18:06:00.000-08:00

My second crop of wheat is really starting to grow after slowly hanging out through the cold weather. I have two little patches growing this year and I wonder how much harvest I'll have upon maturity.

insects

2010-02-17T17:02:00.000-08:00

The rosemary was buzzing with bees.

This bee at a borage flower has big yellow pollen packs on her legs.

The first almond blossoms opened today and I found this little insect visiting the stamens of one flower. I'm guessing it is a Dance Fly, Empis, but I'm not totally sure since my insect book image shows it a different angle.

Mid-Winter treats

2010-02-10T14:32:00.000-08:00

Days are getting noticeably longer. Various plants are showing signs of breaking dormancy, while others have been blooming through the fall and winter.

Almond buds

Rosemary blossom

Bare Root planting day

2010-01-13T16:22:00.001-08:00

My order of bare root trees came yesterday from Trees of Antiquity, and I planted them today. I ordered a plum called Bavay's Green Gage from Belgium circa 1832, an apricot called Pink Ume from Japan, a Quince developed by Luther Burbank circa 1899 called Pineapple Quince, and two pomegranates – Sweet, and Kashmir.
I went out to photograph the plantings and noticed I received a pear tree rather than a quince. Both are called Pineapple.
I talked to the dude at the nursery and he was super nice and said he'd ship out a quince right away and that the pear is a good one, is self-fertile, and that I should grow it if I have space, or give it to a friend. So, I think I'll grow it and then plant my quince, when it arrives, in a different spot.

I've ordered trees and berries from this place before and the plants are always in great shape and thrive when I plant them. They have a huge selection of certified organically grown apple trees (I have three different apple trees from them), among other fruiting trees and bushes. Their website is loaded with lots of good information and photos.

Old Olives at Mission San Miguel Arcángel

2010-01-10T22:50:00.000-08:00

Olive trees at the mission.

On the way to the central coast of California for some exploration of the oceanic portion of the hydrological cycle we stopped at an old mission site. The Mission San Miguel Arcángel is in a state of restoration and we were able to visit inside the adobe structure. The old kitchen and living area were open to the public, as was the church. The interior courtyard garden was not available to walk in, only view from a roped-off area. I was hoping to see some old fig trees, but saw none. They had olives though. Some had been cut to the ground and were re-sprouting, others were still large and producing fruit that the birds were enjoying.

Exploring the hydrological cycle

Leaves through the frost

2009-12-25T17:44:00.000-08:00

The lovely leaves of red romaine lettuce made it through the frost, totally unprotected. Seen above, with some leeks growing nearby.

The collards, below, seem happier than ever with the cool weather. The frost seems to have sweetened the flavor of the leaves some too.

Both plants provide delicious leaves to eat in the winter.

Preparing for a Freeze

2009-12-06T17:14:00.000-08:00

We're expecting temperatures in the mid 20s and rain mixed with something called snow. It won't stick, I've read, but it doesn't usually come down to the valley. When we want to see snow, we drive up to the mountains.
Anyway, the citrus plants need to be protected from such cold temperatures, so I went about the garden putting frost protection on the lemons, oranges, and limes. I still have to rig up protection for the mandarin and the kumquats, which I'll do tomorrow.
I thought my lemon tree looked as if it had a visit from Christo and Jeanne-Claude after I wrapped it in its blanket.

Salad season

2009-12-05T11:46:00.000-08:00

In late September the weather was so nice and warm I thought summer would never quit. Still, I planted some seeds for the winter garden. Lettuce mainly, and snow peas. I have lots of chard and collards growing here and there already, but those leaves need to be cooked. The late fall and winter weather is the a great time for salad leaves. I forage for tender dandelion leaves, picking only the smallest and most tender (in winter the leaves are not bitter). I pick arugula and lettuces that I've planted in various spots, and pull up a daikon radish and a scallion for good measure. This year I planted red romaine lettuce for a change (I've planted various green lettuces too). The red romaine was brilliant in the sun this morning and could be part of a delicious salad this evening.

Remnants

2009-12-05T11:40:00.001-08:00

Temperatures are starting to drop into the low 30s at night.
I found a few green tomatoes, hanging on to withered plants, and glowing in the sun.

Frosty morning

2009-12-03T08:27:00.000-08:00

A chilly 36 degrees Fahrenheit this morning.
The orchards across the street were white with frost.
In the garden I found this lovely rose-scented geranium covered with frost.
Now I wish I'd made one more batch of rose-scented geranium syrup before the cold weather came.

Autumn Color

2009-11-24T22:35:00.000-08:00

A small maple tree turned red with the cool weather.
So beautiful.

Tomatoes

2009-11-10T16:56:00.000-08:00

Frost has yet to visit us, but it is looming, and so I've still been picking tomatoes. The flavor is milder than the tomatoes from the hot months, but it is still pretty good. I picked three tomatoes just today, the others are from throughout the past week or so.

Millet

2009-10-24T20:39:00.000-07:00

I'm growing millet, and many other crops, in anticipation of being able to feed the future chickens (eta Spring 2010) with lots of things grown on site. They'll be able to eat lots of fresh greens and bugs too. Pearl Millet is somewhat drought tolerant and the seeds are edible for humans too, but the seed coat needs to be removed first. Birds don't need the seed coat removed before eating the seeds. Millet is sold in bird seed mixes.

Early Autumn in the garden

2009-10-08T12:40:00.000-07:00

Maize plants with drying ears.

Some of the husk peeled away to reveal the red kernels of the maize.

Freshly painted chicken house. A second coat of paint will be applied, probably a reddish color, before the rains start. I bought the paint at the paint store, they were contractor returns and were very inexpensive compared with buying regular paint, thus the multiple colors. The door was found at the Habitat for Humanity Re-Store.
Looks like it used to belong on a hot water heater closet.
The house still needs windows and hinged tops for the nesting boxes. A fence, too, needs to be erected. Estimated time to get chicks is spring 2010.

Saving seed - Dry Beans

2009-09-23T14:59:00.001-07:00

Today I threshed some of the pole beans. These are the bird egg pole beans I grew on strings and other forms of support (sticks, old wire fencing, sunflowers). I picked the dry pods off the bean plants and then piled them up and crushed the pods to release the beans. Then I sorted the seed from the chaff (winnowed) for later use. The best of these seeds will be planted next year. I'll select for good color and shape. The remainder will be eaten in soup or other meals. The plants are still bearing so this process will continue through the autumn. I prefer to thresh and winnow small batches of beans rather than do them all at once. It is a very meditative process.

Grape Harvest

2009-09-07T21:22:00.000-07:00

The grapes on the giant old grape vine, which climbs up into the trees, have become ripe and ready to pick. Last year I made 4 quarts of grape juice concentrate, which I canned and then drank throughout the winter. The year before that I made grape jelly. I haven't decided which way I'll go yet, jelly or juice, but I've harvested a basket of grapes, washed them, removed them from the stems and cooked them. They are currently sitting in cheesecloth inside a strainer to get all the good liquid out. I'll put it in the fridge and decide how to proceed later.

Saving Seed - Black Beans

2009-09-06T15:07:00.001-07:00

During the cold weather we like to eat black beans in various recipes. Black bean chili with butternut squash is a staple winter-time meal for us. I've been buying organic black beans from the grocery store for years. I've grown plants for the past few years. This year I got a pretty good yield from a few plants I grew in the front yard. Some of the plants are still maturing but I cut some of them today and gathered a pile of seed pods. Once all the plants mature and the seed pods dry fully I'll thresh and winnow the seeds and maybe I'll get enough for one pot of chili.

Saving Seed - Artichokes

2009-09-03T18:39:00.000-07:00

Today I went out and found some of the artichoke plants hunched over and dropping mature seeds on the ground. I cut the dried heads and put them into some white paper bags. I gathered the bag up around the stem and started whacking the thing against the back of a patio chair. I could hear the seeds falling out into the bottom of the bag. When I poured the contents of the bag onto some row cover the seeds came tumbling out along with various insects and spiders. I picked out all the seeds and put them in an envelope. Once I finish collecting seeds from all the artichokes, I'll count the seeds and determine if I have enough to offer through Seed Savers Exchange annual yearbook, which members of SSE are given each year. SSE suggests having enough seed for 10 requests of 25 seeds each, for a plant like artichokes. I could offer as "limited quantity" if I don't have enough for 10.

The recommended number of seeds varies by plant type. For example Maize (corn) should have 200 seeds for the minimum offer since corn needs lots of genetic diversity to avoid inbreeding. Suzanne Ashworth's book Seed to Seed is an excellent source of information on growing plants for saving seed.

I obtained the seeds for my Imperial Star artichokes from the Natural Gardening Company in Petaluma, CA. They offer certified organic seeds and plants. I also got my organic strawberry plants from them.

Wheat

2009-08-23T20:14:00.000-07:00

Last fall and winter I grew out some wheat seeds I obtained from a Seed Savers Exchange member who also runs Sourcepoint Seeds, a small seed company offering rare and ancient varieties of food crops.
This wheat variety is Rouge a Bordeaux and, according to growseed.org, is a "winter bread wheat preferred by French artisan bakers."
I started making artisan-type bread last year and thought it would be nice to try a wheat variety that is suited to such an endeavor.
I received a small packet of seeds in 2008 and planted it that fall. I did not have many plants, but the idea of Seed Savers Exchange is to share small amounts of seed and have other gardeners grow them out to make more seed. It helps expand the distribution of heritage seeds.
I harvested the wheat in the late spring, when it was looking dry enough to cut. I cut the shafts long and left them in an uncovered box in my warm, dark office, to dry fully.

Today I finally got around to threshing and winnowing the wheat. It wasn't too big a deal since I had such a small amount. I cut off the long straw so I only had the seed heads, then I rubbed the seed heads together to separate the wheat from the chaff. I then dropped the seed and chaff onto some row-cover fabric that I placed in front of a fan on low speed. The chaff blew away and I scooped up the seed.

I'll plant this seed in the fall and expand my stock further. I'll repeat this until I have enough wheat to grind into enough flour to make bread. Fun no?

Ripeness in Siberia

2009-08-17T21:20:00.001-07:00

This tomato variety is called Siberia and has finally started ripening in the last week or so. These are small tomatoes with a nice, sharp tomato flavor (lots of acid). When my other tomato plant —called Cappuchino— starts to ripen, I'll be slicing these Siberias in half and drying them in the solar food dehydrator. Sun dried tomatoes are delicious.

From the Melon patch

2009-08-06T19:26:00.000-07:00

I found a promising discovery on a melon plant (Delice de Table).
A nice melon forming under the canopy of leaves. I grew this variety because I liked the Seed Savers Exchange description:

French heirloom listed by Vilmorin in 1885. Translates as “Delight of the Table.” Ribbed fruits have sweet orange flesh and weigh about 1-2 pounds. Very hard-to-find, almost extinct. 85-90 days.

Also under the canopy of leaves, and about a half-gopher length away from the forming melon was a gopher hole.

Seems that gophers like to feed on the fruits of melons. Much to my dismay, another loss to those underground pests.

My permaculture training suggests I don't have too many gophers but too few enemies of gophers. Should I import gopher-snakes to reduce the population? The local cats are not doing their part, and birds of prey have little chance with all the cover my garden offers to gophers.

Too many heartaches from gophers eating my garlic, onions, potatoes, hollyhocks, and pea plants (to name only a few), led me to trapping.

I have kept count of the gophers I trapped. Nineteen gophers in as many months is what I consider an infestation. I still have a few gophers working the garden, but 19 is ridiculous.

In any garden some crop loss is expected—to birds or bugs—but last year gophers took more of my garlic crop than I got and they would have taken it all if I hadn't dug it up. They destroyed an entire fig tree by eating its roots all the way to the trunk, until the tree just wilted and flopped over. They have eaten the roots of mature hollyhocks, have eaten many plants worth of potato tubers, and taken down mature leeks just at their peak.

I observe their activity, and will trap when I take too many plant losses in an area. This melon still needed weeks on the vine to ripen, and it takes such a long time to even get fruit on some melon plants. In times like this it is difficult to not get discouraged.

Eliot Coleman, in his latest book The Winter Harvest Handbook, writes about a crop-devestating problem he had with meadow voles, and how the only solution he found was trapping.

Eliot Coleman writes "Although I am a mild-mannered sort and show great kindness and respect to wild creatures in general, I admit to a strong aversion to voles in the winter greenhouse."
"I know from my records that one year I trapped over fifty voles in the vicinity of the greenhouses during August and September, and a neighbor's cat probably got almost that many. Come winter it didn't seem as if we had even made a dent."

Knowing that Eliot Coleman, the organic gardening and farming guru of our time, traps meadow voles made me feel less monstrous in my own trapping efforts.

I hope I am able to grow some of these melons to maturity so that I might taste such an old variety and also that I might participate in saving and sharing the seeds of an amost extinct food.

Basket of produce

2009-08-02T21:19:00.000-07:00

Today we picked some conadria figs, lemon cucumbers, a tomato, and yellow peaches.
Also pictured are some red torpedo onions and some other onions that have been curing in a warm, shady spot outside for several weeks.

Olives

2009-08-01T23:00:00.000-07:00

I planted three olive trees in January 2008. The first olive fruit came this year and is on a tree that gets the least amount of water and attention.
Olive trees can live many hundreds of years and are evergreen. I planted the olives along the back fence to provide some greenery in the back yard during the winter when other plants have gone dormant. I chose olives because they are drought tolerant, live many years, and can produce a useful fruit. I planted two Maurino and one Taggiasca olives. The fruit is on a Maurino, which is a Tuscan oil type.

Popping beans (aka Garbanzo beans)

2009-07-28T21:12:00.001-07:00

I'm growing a type of garbanzo bean (aka chick pea), Cicer arietinum, that produces small brown seeds that are supposed to cook quickly in a small amount of oil and pop, but not like popcorn. Having a bean that cooks quickly saves time and energy. No long soaking required and long simmering times are not needed. I got my seeds from another member of Seed Savers Exchange and I'm growing those out to increase my stock. Most of the seeds I produce this year will go back into next year's crop, but I'm going to try popping a few, since I've never actually done it (only read about it).

I've never even grown garbanzo beans before. Only bought bags of the big pale seeds at the bulk section of the market. The plants very much resemble lentil plants, which I have grown. The pods hang under the foliage, so I've pulled this plant back to show the pods.

Permaculture video - Geoff Lawton, Greening the Desert

2009-07-28T16:48:00.000-07:00

This short video shows the advantage of using Permaculture in a desert environment.
Geoff Lawton is based in Australia and his DVD on creating food forests is great. More about Geoff Lawton's Permaculture practice can be found at the Permaculture Research Institute of Australia website. He is the former manager of Tagari farm, the place where Bill Mollison practiced Permaculture before heading off to teach the rest of the world about it.

Cucurbitaceae - A good family

2009-07-28T16:33:00.000-07:00

Went out looking at the cucumber and melon plants today.
I found fruits growing on a lemon cucumber (Cucumis sativus) plant, a white cucumber (Cucumis sativus) plant, and a watermelon (Citrullus lanatus) plant.

White cucumber

Watermelon

Lemon cucumber