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Thai Coconut Soup with Tofu and Mushrooms
A comfort food without the high caloric price tag. This is a soup recipe that has been requested by friends, and is so good that I crave it. So I share it with you. Wonderful even during the summer, it also is fantastic comfort food when sick or on a cold day. You can tweak this dish with lite coconut milk, lime zest instead of lemongrass, or if you have access to Thai ingredients use kaffir lime and Thai basil.
Lemongrass is easy to grow and to use. Just the base of the peeled stalk is used as a flavoring. Cut it only in half so the pieces are easily found in the soup and put aside. I’ve had it without tofu, and without mushrooms, and it is still wonderful. Put the lime in the coconut, and drink it all up! Don’t put too many extra veggies in it; it is a simple soup.
Thai Coconut Soup with Tofu and MushroomsAuthor: Diane C. KennedyRecipe type: SoupCuisine: ThaiPrep time:Cook time:Total time:Serves: 4A simple, delicious vegetarian Tom Kha soup. The lemongrass isn't meant to be eaten because its too tough. The kaffir lime leaf may be eaten only if you use a young one and slice very thinly before adding it.Ingredients- 1 can (1 ½ cups) unsweetened coconut milk
- 2 tsp. grated fresh ginger
- 1 fresh lemongrass stalk, peeled and halved (or 2 tsp. dried, or 1 tsp. lime zest)
- 1 bruised fresh or dried kaffir lime leaf, (if young can be sliced very thinly(or ½ tsp. lime juice)
- Two - three Thai basil leaves (optional)
- 3 cups mild vegetable stock
- ½ to 2 teaspoons Thai red curry paste, or Thai coconut curry paste, or curry powder (depending on hotness desired)
- 1 package (12 – 14 oz) extra firm tofu (not silken)drained and cut into small cubes
- 15 oz canned straw mushrooms, drained and rinsed, or half-cup sliced button mushrooms
- 2 tsp. sugar or other tasteless sweetener
- 2 Tablespoons light soy sauce (I use Bragg’s Amino Acids instead)
- Salt to taste (opt.)
- Fresh lime juice to taste (opt.)
Instructions- Combine lemongrass, ginger, kaffir leaf, Thai basil leaves, and coconut milk with broth in a large saucepan and bring to a boil.
- Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer for 5 – 10 minutes.
- Add the curry paste a half-teaspoon at a time, stirring well and tasting for desired hotness.
- Stir in the tofu, mushrooms, sugar, and soy sauce.
- Simmer for about 10 minutes more.
- Taste before adding additional optional salt.
- Serve as is or over hot rice.
- Offer fresh lime to squeeze on top as desired (it makes the flavors pop).
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Good-bye, Sweet Belle: The Death of a Crossbill Hen
Belle in her bath. Last Tuesday when I opened the chicken tractor to let the girls come bounding and clumsily flutter out for their breakfast, Belle our genetic crossbill Americauna didn’t emerge with her usual energy. I make a custard of blended chicken food, whole eggs, greens and fruit, cooked and cooled, to feed her. The custard contained all the goodies the other hens had, but was easier for her to scoop with her twisted beak. I’d fill her dish before I come down to ‘do the hens’, and she was fed first. Her dish was placed into the top of the quail hut with the door propped open so only Belle coud get in and out; the other hens loved to share her food otherwise.
Although Belle ate vigorously, she never gained full body weight. Her beak prevented her from eating well enough. Out of every five scoop attempts at the custard I’d say that she’d get one mouthful. Yet she was always perky, always running around interested in everything, and even tried dominance tactics over some of the other girls. They’d let her since she wasn’t a threat to any of their food.
Because Belle’s eating habits were very messy her neck and head feathers were straggly, and combined with her twisted beak gave her a comical, slightly crazed look. Because she was handled so much when she patiently allowed us to trim her beak and nails, and give her a bath, she was very friendly. She’d jump on our backs and shoulders any time we’d bend over in the coop. She’d enjoy being carried around. She was very spoiled. We’d read posts where owners of crossbills, who didn’t cull them but kept them as pets, had them live up to ten years and lay eggs. It was all dependant upon to what degree their bills crossed, and Belle’s became severe.
About a month ago we noticed mites on her, something that is common on hens, and gave her a good bath and treatment with food grade diotomaceous earth. The FGDE works immediately and is very effective and safe. Otherwise she was bright, fun and perky, burrowing under the other girls on the roost overnight to cuddle.
Tuesday Belle was slower to come around, and didn’t want to eat. A hungry hen not wanting to eat? Bad news. We immediately took her into the house. It was a cold day, so we made her comfortable next to a space heater. On inspection we discovered that she had mites all over her. We also checked the other hens right away and they were all okay, so apparently Belle’s diminishing health encouraged them to reproduce, and as she couldn’t groom herself she was stuck. We coated her with FGDE, not wanting to bathe her while she was feeling poorly since it was a cold day, and dropper fed her food. She showed some energy and wanted to run around, and took the food hungrily.
It was time to trim the Christmas tree, and my daughter put Belle under her sweater to keep her warm and comforted as we worked; Belle loved being cuddled and held, so she put up no resistance, but we could see that she was ill.
We brought in the cage that we used for Viola the ex-house chicken, and for all of our patients, and tucked Belle in for the night next to the space heater.
In the morning Belle was sitting very still. I knew that she was nearly gone. Just after waking my daughter, Belle died as she held her. She is buried outside our bay window where we watch birds, close to the house.
Belle usually can’t wait until she’s served. Birds are so tricky. They can seem perfectly fine, but when they show illness it is usually too late and the end comes quickly. There is little you can do for them besides keep them comfortable. Neither of us expected Belle to pass away; she showed no previous symptoms and was her usual plucky, fun self. Something internal gave way from slow malnutrition caused by that darned crossed bill and her inability to eat enough. On reflection I don’t think that Belle had a bad life. She ate enough to not be hungry all the time, and her custard gave her ease of eating. She was much loved and spoiled. Her end was quick, which was merciful and not granted to many of us. But Belle will always be remembered.
Ah haz a friend! You May Also Like
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Coyotes
A coyote from some years back. Fall and winter are the times of year when many outdoor pets disappear. I’ve blogged on this before, too. ‘Teenaged’ coyotes, hungry (just like human teens!), bolder and less cautious will come closer to homes and people to grab food. If there is pet food outside the house, coyotes will take it if they can. If you have small pets outside, even chained, they can be killed by coyotes.
This doesn’t make coyotes evil. They are predators, a very necessary part of the food chain. Look up ‘trophic cascade’. That is how preditors in a wild environment cause prey animals to keep moving in natural patterns. Unthreatened, not only can prey animals reproduce to extremes, but also they will linger over feeding areas and eat plants down to the ground rather than trim them and move on.
Coyote pawprints by the pond where they stopped for a drink. Dog pawprints have nails; cat (mountain lion!) pawprints don’t because their nails retract. Coyotes are intelligent, loyal, family-oriented, playful animals. They also make very scary sounds when howling and yipping in packs. Coyotes are no threat to humans unless the coyotes are sick, or if a child comes close when a coyote is eating outdoor pet food and is frightened.
Now that our last dog, Sophie, has passed away, coyotes are jumping the five-foot chainlink fence nightly and hunting in our yard. They have been unable to breach the Fowl Fortress (the hens are also locked into their coop within the FF for double protection). Unfortunately on Halloween I let the hens out of the coop about 45 minutes before dark. They had just gone under the Mock Pavilion, and I went into the FF to give Belle some of her special mash when there was a wild clucking. A coyote had come close and grabbed Chickpea our Americauna, and they were gone. My daughter saw it running away, and I dashed after, losing my slippers on the way, and hunted all over the neighbor’s yard but there was no sign of her.
It was tramatizing, and I kick myself because I should have known better, even though I was just yards away and the hens had been released only minutes before. It was a lucky chance for the coyote, who must have already been in the yard but hidden by plants. At least it was a quick death for our darling Chickpea. It hurts us both that she is gone. No more ‘outies’ for the girls, even with a hensitter.
The coyotes leave scat in our yard and we can tell what they’ve been eating.
Sorry. Yes, it is coyote scat. Notice the seeds. Tiny seeds show that they were eating figs off of some volunteer fig trees down in the barranca. Larger seeds and skin in the scat shows that they are eating the red Eugenia berries in our yard. There is never much fur in the scat, so these omnivores have to scavenge to stay alive.
On the funny side, one day a few weeks ago I saw some fuzzy green thing in the yard.
A coyote-delivered squeaky toy. It has since had its squeaker removed, and been slowly shredded by visiting coyotes. It turned out to be what looked like the center of a plush sunflower dog toy. It squeaked. It wasn’t ours. Some young coyote found it in another yard, carried it over the fence and played with it down by our pond. Over the next week it was moved around each night. One morning I found it next to a veggie bed I’d recently planted.
Where is my snake?? Then I realized that the rubber snake I put down in the bed to discourage birds was gone! My daughter and I looked everywhere for the snake, even for pieces of it, but it was gone! Some neighbor is going to have a real bad moment one of these days when walking through their property and they come across my rubber snake.
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Remodeling the Outdoor Sink
I’m thrilled with my outdoor sink. I love it. It is my friend. It is my old kitchen sink, stubbornly hauled around the property until I finally was able to put it on an old fishtank stand and hook it into the waterline out in the garden. Even better, Steve, who used to work here and who was responsible for the Mock Pavilion, modified the stand so that the sink fit down into it more securely. Any water used would be caught in buckets underneath (with long sticks in them so that any creature that falls in can crawl out again), which I would pull out and empty.
The buckets are just another heavy thing with which I had to deal. There had to be another way. A problem with the sink being set down into the stand is that the underside of one of the drains now sat slightly into a bucket, so I’d have to tip the bucket to get it out. Wrestle it out would be the better term, usually becoming wet with old sink water in the process. Throwing a 5-gallon bucket of water somewhere lost its charm quickly, especially as I was the only one emptying, but not the only one filling. Something had to be done. When I made the area next to the Fowl Fortress into an apple tree guild, I now had an area which could use extra water. The sink needed to be moved. Last week I finally did it, and I have to say, I’m pretty smug about how.
I am a disaster with a saw, but I’m pretty experienced with old PVC pipe and Red Hot Blue Glue (all those sprinklers I’ve mowed down over the years). I leveled a place next to the coop and placed some old plywood on it, both to help steady the sink stand and to keep weeds down (and to use up the plywood).
I dug up the water line and placed plywood on a leveled area. I dug up the water line, turned off the irrigation water, opened other faucets to drain and then cut into the pipe. Then I discovered the real pipe beneath this old dry one, and dug it out and cut into it, allowing it to drain as well before connecting a tee.
Beneath the old pipe was the real one. The hens were all pressed against the side of the coop trying to see what I was doing, and desperately wanting to search for bugs in the dirt I’d just dug up. Sorry girls.
I laborously walked the rather heavy and unevenly weighted stand (the sink isn’t in the center) over to the plywood. Then I walked it off again, adjusted, and walked it back. Then I adjusted again. Then I had a sit-down and wondered what my chiropractor was going to say.
Now came the fun problem-solving part. The drains from the sink were open, so how to catch water and send it off into the guild, without spending a bunch of money? The vision came to me from out of the blue: plungers. Some people have visions of how to earn lots of money, others have visions of how to change the world for the better. My imagination provides me with plungers. Yep.
Supplies. I learned from my collegiate daughter, and the hardware store cashier, that plungers were nicknamed ‘magic wands’. No matter how much I learn each day, I’m always in the dark on the important things. However, I felt pretty proud of myself and was excited to get started. I rooted through my barrel of old PVC left from the former owners (I’ve lived here over 14 years and the PVC was already old then) and through my fittings. I only needed a couple new fittings and the plungers from Joe’s Hardware. The plungers had blue cups and clear handles, not the wooden-handled, black-cupped manly plungers of my imagination. If wizards had plungers, I could see them using these. Well this would be a female version and blue is my favorite color.
I screwed in threaded 1/2″ risers and tried them as is, but they leaked, so I put silicone gel around the threads and tried again. It worked after the gel dried. Knowing that the thread of the plunger handle wasn’t the same thread as a PVC riser (how do I know these things? Am I channeling some long-dead plumber??) I grabbed silicone sealant I had recently purchased to seal up leaks in a small fountain so that it would work during garden tours (the sealant worked, but then the motor failed. Sigh.)
Drilling drain holes in the plunger cups. I had expected to find plunger heads and handles sold seperately, and remembered seeing plungers with threaded holes all the way through. I must have been flashing back to the cheap supplies offered to the parks department when I was a Ranger because all I found at Joes were complete, and the holes were covered (better suction). I drilled through the rubber to make the drain hole (which created some very cute blue rubber curls).
I connected up most parts, but then came the challenge, to space the plungers the correct distance apart, and measuring is not my thing. It seems simple, but it never works for me. My ginko must have kicked in, though, because I realized that I could just place the plungers over the sink holes on top and build it up there, and of course it would be the correct distance underneath.
Ha! I didn’t have to lay in the tomatoes and work around the legs in the back! I could do it on top and still get the length right. I’m still proud of figuring that out.
All ready to go. The trick really was to get this thing in place around the support legs behind the fishtank stand! 
My beauties. My plan was to screw it into a soaker hose that I already had, but I worried that without water pressure it wouldn’t work. It didn’t.
The soaker hose idea failed because of the lack of water pressure, and caused the water to back up and overflow the plunger cups. I removed the screw end from the PVC and glued on more 1/2″ pipe so that the water would directly empty near the apple tree.
There were a few other tweaks, such as widening the drill holes in the plunger for better water drainage, propping the pipe up on a piece of wood so that it fit the drains more securely (it isn’t fastened onto the stand so that if I had to access the plunger cups I could do so easily), and placing screen over the drains so no one would lose a ring down into the device.
Now the water drains directly into the bed. Tip: glue the long pieces on once the main part is in place under the sink. Plants will grow up around the back of the sink to hide it from view. Now it all works, I have less work to do, no yucky buckets to haul, the apple tree receives greywater, I repurposed several items and although I had to buy a few things, I supported a local business, the sink is in a better location, and I like the blue color of the plunger cups.
Best of all, now I have some snazzy clear handles to use for some other project!
Hmm. Threaded magic wands! I wonder how I can repurpose these beauties?! - Animals, Gardening adventures, Hugelkultur, Natives, Other Insects, Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures, Ponds
Then and Now
This photo was taken just as work was begun on transforming the property into a garden, in February, 2011.
This photo was taken last Thursday, Oct. 31, 2013, from the same location.
This view may look weedy, especially in the early morning light on this brilliant Halloween morning. What you are seeing is the first bog, which is the green spot in the foreground. The dirt area is the overflow, if torrential rains ever come again. To the left, the tall bushes constitute the withy hide, and to the left is the big pond, although you have to take my word for it. Tall bamboo arches over the stumps of the palm trees in the above photo, which are trellises for roses and other vines. A nectarine branch is in the right foreground. The tall flowering plants are a native called fleabane. They reseed readily, and I allow them to because of several reasons. They grow five to six feet tall and help shade smaller trees and plants against the harsh summer sun, protecting them from sun scald. They also die off in the winter, making good hugelkultur material. The purple flowers, which are in the above photo now turning into fuzzy seed clumps, are attractive. The most important thing though is that they are excellent hosts for native insects of all kinds. Ladybugs, lacewings, spiders, and hundreds of tiny wasps and flies, many of which are parasitic, all love these flowers. All summer long they are alive with life. Inviting in the native pollinators, and growing a polyculture garden, is the first line of defense in growing naturally.
Allowing nature to define parts of your garden leads to happy surprises and lots of help from unexpected friends, such as bugs, birds and lizards. This kind of garden is endlessly interesting, with new things to study every day.
The following photos were all taken the same brilliant morning, Oct. 31, 2013. Here in San Diego county we were having what is called a Santa Ana, where warm, dry winds from the desert blow westward, as opposed to the more humid eastward flow of air from the ocean that we normally have. Santa Anas can bring heavy winds and make tinder-dry weedy hills a fire hazard, but this year we’ve been lucky and no major fires have happened. We even had almost 3/4 ” of rain, last week, which is practically unheard of for October. The warm Autumn sunshine was intense and lovely, and I had to take photos even though the light was too strong for good ones.
We went up on the roof to view these three greater egrets perched in our trees over the pond. 
Being on the roof is an education. Here is lots of racoon poo between the tiles. Why?! 
We don’t have dramatic Fall colors here, but the subtle Autumn hues of leaves is lovely. 
We still have Monarch butterflies. 
The big pond in early morning light. 
A zuchianno rampicante reclining on a stump. (Its a squash!). 
Morning sun through a Fall-leaved sycamore. Beautiful. 
Mexican bush sage hanging up to dry. 
Our little pecan tree put on about six this year! Next year, tons! 
Beehive warming up. 
Ceder waxwings (my favorite bird) in the big palm. 
The Bee Garden. 
The liquidambers, also known as sweet gums, are just beginning to turn color. Lots of deciduous trees means lots of leaf mulch, and more warmth reaching the ground during the winter. 
The entrance to the withy hide, with the pond in the distance. 
The Mission fig,with artichoke, anise and sage.. 
The canopy is growing. 
Greater egret enjoying the sun. You May Also Like
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San Diego Permaculture Convergence, Nov. 9 – 10, 2013
There is a fantastic, information-packed permaculture convergence coming up at the beautiful Sky Mountain Institute in Escondido.
It will be two days packed with great information for a very reasonable price; in fact, scholarships are available. Check out the website at convergence@sdpermies.com. On that Sunday I’ll be teaching a workshop about why its so important to plant native plants, how to plant them in guilds using fishscale swales and mini-hugelkulturs. Come to the convergence and be inspired!You May Also Like
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Dinner with the Pandas: Harvesting Your Own Bamboo
Hello.
Before you cry, “Imposter!”, let me assure you that I have authorization to be here. Mostly. I happen to be Diane’s daughter Miranda, guestblogging and wordsmithing for you today. You might recognize my powdery feet or recollect me when keeping company with chickens (or from diverse other adventures). As much as I enjoying rolling in dust and home decorating with hens, today I’m here to talk about an unusual topic for Vegetariat – food.
The handy rhyme isn’t the only reason I’m sometimes known as Miranda the Panda – I also have a great partiality for a bit of bamboo, much like the vegetarian carnivore from whom I draw my catchy moniker. Luckily, we happen to have a fair bit of the stuff around Finch Frolic these days (bamboo, not pandas). Bamboo shoots are a common – and delicious! – component of Asian cuisines, and bamboo has been used for many culinary purposes, such as flavoring rice, wherever it grows. During this past summer, I was overcome with the need to find more things to eat on the property and began a foray into harvesting our own bamboo shoots.
Our giant species of bamboo arches over many of our paths — perfect for building material, and any shoots that venture into the soil of the paths are prime targets… 🙂 Before I stepped outdoors and started gnawing on the nearest clump, I had to be sure that our bamboo is an edible variety, and hopefully a tasty edible variety. You need the scientific name of your bamboo for that, but once we ferreted out ours (Bambusa beecheyana), it was easy to find notation of its edibility and delectability online. One helpful and extensive listing is on Guadua Bamboo. Happily, there is a large number of edible and tasty bamboo species.
Proof of mange-ability in hand, the next obstacle was divining the best way to get bamboo shoots from the ground to my mouth. Harvesting can be more or less of a challenge, depending on what variety of bamboo one has and how it’s established (e.g., moisture and soil conditions, obstacles like stones around it). To harvest shoots, it’s best to pick fat green ones poking no more than a foot above the ground. You want to catch them before they get too woody, but old enough to have a bit of meat on them, so to speak. The shoot is mostly leaf (tightly layered sheaths), so bulkier shoots are more rewarding.
Removing our bamboo from the ground and its parent plant turned out to be on the more side of challenging.
Miranda and Diane bust out the Finch Frolic arsenal on the recalcitrant shoot.
First, the inimitable spade is set to the task. 
Legs weary and spade abandoned, the small sickle saw is recruited, to little effect. Diane had just returned home and gleefully plunged into the fray, skirt, white sandals and all.
Finally, Diane wades into battle with the winning implement. 
The shoot, freed from the earth and its parent plant. Once we finally achieved success, processing could begin! It is somewhat tiresome to strip a shoot down to the edible white core, because the leaves cling so tightly and are fibrous. It’s like shucking the most stubborn ear of corn in the world. It’s good to slit the tougher outer leaves with a very sharp knife and peel them away.
Slitting the fibrous outer leaves with a filet knife. 
Peeling. The inner leaves come away more easily – rather like the layers of canned hearts-of-palm – as you get closer to the heart of the bamboo shoot. The innermost leaves are basically fetal, and so are edible because they haven’t gotten tough yet. They make the tip of your shoot look hairy.
Many layers of increasingly tender leaves. 
The edible shoot. A peeled bamboo shoot can be cut up in whatever way the chef desires. The shoot grows more fibrous towards the base, where there is probably some inedible hard material. My current rule of thumbs-carefully-tucked-away is if a sharp knife can pretty easily get through it, it’ll be fine to eat.
A shoot cut in three different ways. The material behind the knife (upper left) is too fibrous to eat. You just have to boil your slices before cooking and consumption because they contain a mild toxin that dissipates with boiling. The first time, we tried boiling in lightly salted water for only 30 minutes, and while the shoots were tender and not really bitter, they left a teeny tingling sensation in our mouths, like stir-fried Pop Rocks. The last time I cooked them, I boiled them for a whole 50 min. to much more satisfactory, un-tingly results.
Boiling to remove toxins. Bamboo is delicious and a lot of fun (in a somewhat laborious way) to harvest. The beauty of harvesting your own bamboo shoots is that you are saving yourself a trip to specialty markets and controlling your bamboo’s growth at the same time!
Frying up — yummy! So that’s another thing going on here at FFG. Thanks for wandering the bamboo lane with me.
TTFN!
Miranda (the Panda), B.S.
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Tiny Hugels and Fishscale Swales: Small water catchment
In permaculture it is recommended to design long level, contoured swales throughout your property to catch rainwater. Long swales, however, won’t work when the property is small, or if it is already mostly planted, or if the hiring of large equipment or teams of diggers isn’t feasable, or if long swales aren’t part of a lovely garden. What then?
In the gardens for which I’ve written consultations I’ve recommended what Geoff Lawton (of the Permaculture Design Institute of Australia) calls fishscale swales. Small curved swales staggered up a slope so that rainwater can be caught and held. One overflows into another, just like a pinball machine.
Any swale, no matter how small, will help hold water. I put them in just above each plant, the width of the dripline of the plant. I also combine them with burying wood (hugelkultur). I don’t have a lot of branches or logs, but I do have a lot of extra pieces of lumber salvaged when the sheds were dismantled. These pieces are untreated (no paint or pressure treatment), and if they have nails and screws in them, even better! The hardware will mineraize the soil as it decomposes. This wood is already very old and dry, and thus will soak up water a treat. If you soak the wood in water, compost tea or a microbial brew before you bury it, that’s super. If not, don’t worry about it. The idea is that rainwater will accumulate in the swale, percolate into the soil and into the wood below it. There the wood will hold water as it breaks down, gradually irrigating and fertilizing the plant below.
Wood can be placed on top of the soil and buried as the swale is dug, or it can be dug into the ground and covered. The swale is filled with mulch o help retard weed growth; if by a walkway the scale filled with mulch then it may be walked on without fear of a twisted ankle.
This area right above the fig is small, but large enough to catch water. Here I have a Mission fig that has been slow to grow due to irregular watering (NOT my fault!)
I laid out a board right on the ground. Figs like a little water and this area has been on the dry side. In the direction from which rainwater would flow, above the tree, I laid out a few pieces of old lumber, nails and all.
Brewing microbial tea. I happened to be brewing a large batch of microbial tea, so I threw the wood into a bucket of the stuff and let it absorb some.
I soaked the wood in microbial tea for a few minutes. They happen to be the width of the existing dripline of the tree; again, any swale and and wood will help. I dug a small swale the same length, a shovel’s width wide, and threw the dirt on top of the wood.
I dug a swale, using the dirt to cover the board. Then I filled the swale with mulch and voila! the job is done. This will now catch rainwater, hold moisture, and fertilize the tree, as well as finding something useful for junk lumber. Burying the wood sequesters the gasses released in decomposing materials into the soil rather than the air thus helping reduce greenhouse gasses.
I filled the swale with mulch to keep down weeds. Presto! Done! Using fishscale swales and mini-hugelkultur beds when planting most native plants can really help them become established in a low-water situation. This wild rose (rosa rugusa) is being planted in a very dry area, and I wanted to bury the wood below soil level to keep it closer to the roots of the plant. I dug a small trench and laid out some boards, nails down.
I dug a little ways into the dirt and laid out the soaked wood. Then as I dug the swale I layered the wood with dirt and a couple more boards until buried. I filled in the swale with mulch and planted the rose on the downhill side.
Here you’ll see the rootball of the new wild rose in front of the wood. I threw in some coyote scat since it was lying there so conveniently. There’s quite a microbial boost for the rose!
Some coyote scat went in, too. Sorry! Remember that here in a dry climate we need to plant so that the root ball is even with the ground, or make the whole catch basin a little lower. Otherwise the roots will dry out. Planting so that the root ball is a little above the ground is a common practice is rainy areas.
Here is the planted rose, with mulch pulled up around it. Remember native plants have communities. Certain plants grow with certain others because they are mutually beneficial. This rose was planted within the dripline of an Engelmann oak, one place it is found.
Many native trees like the company of other natives. I planted this rose just outside the dripline of this oak, one of the places it would naturally grow in the wild. So swales don’t have to be gigantic earthworks projects. They can be small and alternated down a slope, or just individual ones above new or existing plants. Throw some wood into a mini-hugel between the swale and the plant and you’ll water less, fertilize naturally, and compost leftover wood. Don’t forget cotton clothing and bedding… that all works, too!
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Belle: Adventures of a Crossbill Chicken
Belle looks much jauntier than she is while being rinsed in her bath. When we added to our flock of five last March by acquiring chicks, we soon discovered that our Americauna (ironically already named Belle), was a genetic crossbill. Crossbill is a genetic mutation found particularly in Americaunas which causes the beak to scissor so that they don’t meet. Some unfortunate crossbills are affected so extremely that the hen eventually would starve to death. Because of the crossbill, the hens can’t peck at food.
Aww! Belle as a baby. Sigh. So far Belle is able to eat, provided that we give her special food. We also use nail clippers and a nail file to trim as much of her beak off as we can without nipping the wick and making it bleed. Belle is very patient during the process. Mostly.
Gently and carefully trimming and filing Belle’s beak, keeping clear of the wick. She also can’t preen well. Preening in hens means that they dip their beak into an oil gland over their tail feathers and smooth that over their feathers, knitting them together and combing out the pin sheaths emergent feather shed as well as dirt and other itchy things.
Grooming is a challenge for her. Here feather sheaths and bits adorn Miranda after we finger-groom Belle. Belle’s food has to be mushy so that she can scoop it rather than peck at it. We grind up the foods we feed our other hens and then mix it with water until it has a scoopable consistancy.
Lay pellets, egg shells, oyster shell, cracked corn, and greens are ground up then mixed with water for Belle’s mush. We feed Belle the mush in a deep container with enough room for her twisted beak. Because the pecking behavior is so natural to her she finds it hard even with months of practice to scoop to the side. She shakes her head often but miraculously enough goes down.
Belle’s eating habits are not a pretty sight. Although what we feed Belle is exactly what we feed the other hens, only wet, they still are jealous and will push her away from her food. So she is fed in a special upside-down milkcrate of my daughter’s design, in the upper portion of the quail coop (the quail won’t go upstairs). The door is closed to just a Belle-sized crack and held open with a sophisticated latching unit (a stick). Even so some of the bolder girls will invade.
Belle eats upstairs in the quail coop. A crate helps keep her food from being raided by other hens. Some food does go down Belle’s throat, but much of it decorates the crate.
The wall of splatter inside her eating crate. After giving her a bath (as in the top photo) to soak off the dried hen food, her feathers looked so pretty (and she strutted around the porch so much as she dried) that I endeavored to find a solution to keep her clean. Alas, nothing worked. We ended up trimming her neck feathers to reduce the dried clumps.
I tried an old bib of my children’s on Belle to try and protect her clean feathers from splatter. It didn’t work. With all the handling Belle gets she has become a spoiled girl. She lives outside the hen’s pecking order, often scooting under their legs or pushing them out of the way when a treat comes even though she can’t eat it and has to have hers separately.
Belle, the falcon. Or the time is quarter-past Belle. Belle likes to help. I usually feed the hens in the morning while in my bathrobe. As I bend to scoop their food I find there is a chicken clawing her way up my back. She enjoys sitting on one’s head as well, particularly on my daughter’s as she has so much hair coiled up that it gives Belle a nice place, albeit an unwelcome one, to perch.
Belle likes to help whenever she can. When we fill Belle’s food dish with water outside the Fowl Fortress, she often sneaks under the door as it is closing and makes a leap for her food. Usually this results in food everywhere but in Belle’s very hungry stomach.
Belle usually can’t wait until she’s served. Belle is a happy chicken, eager for attention and enjoying being ‘teacher’s pet’. She doesn’t mind being carried around like a small football.
With all the frequent handling she gets, Belle enjoys being carried around… spoiled girl! After making fried zucchini for dinner one night I had extra beaten egg and soy milk left over. On a whim I cooked it into a custard for Belle. Well. I’ve never seen a hen eat so much. It was the perfect consistancy for her to scoop and it was tasty. Giving her a few day’s break I eventually made her a more nutritious custard. In my handy-dandy Vitamix (I really should be paid to sponsor them, although hen custard probably isn’t in their advertising scheme) I mixed quail eggs and their shells, lay pellets, ground cracked corn, oyster shell, buttermilk, and celery greens which I happened to have right there (from home-grown celery). The custard turned out very unappetising.
Although it looks like a cross between brocciflower and a sea sponge, it is really a dry custard. Apparently it was only unappealing to me and Miranda.
After-custard clean-up is necessary due to the dairy products. Belle’s not happy about being dabbed. It is worth the extra effort to insure Belle has a good meal and a full crop at the end of the day. When she’s full of custard she actually struts around the yard, happy with her fullness and the fact that she had a treat no one else had. Belle is of laying age but her size is smaller than the other hens and she’s still growing. I don’t mind if she doesn’t lay; she’s a darling friend and a neutral hen in the coop. I’m sure Belle will be the source of many more stories and certainly a lot more mess. Just another crazy, high-maintenance, unproductive little animal here at Finch Frolic!
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Celery Soup
Celery soup, served hot or cold, is delicious and great for you! I thought I had posted this wonderful soup but apparently I hadn’t. Celery is a remarkable food for helping combat mental aging, among other attributes. This year we grew our own celery which is strong, fiberous and slightly bitter. We use it diced in stir-fry and many dishes including Celery Soup. This soup can be served hot or chilled, and you can either use cream at the end to finish it or just rely on the included potato for the thickener. Add a little cayenne to spice it up and increase its medicinal value. This is a blended soup that doesn’t freeze well (the flavor changes), so eat it all up! This is a lovely light green soup… great for Halloween! For another green soup, try my Zucchini and Rosemary Soup, too.
Celery SoupAuthor: Diane C. KennedyRecipe type: Main DishCuisine: AmericanPrep time:Cook time:Total time:Serves: 6 - 8This easy, delicious low-fat soup can be served hot or chilled, or dressed up with cream.Ingredients- ½ cup butter or butter substitute
- 10 ribs of celery (3½ cups) coarsely chopped (no leaves)
- ⅓ cup coarsely chopped shallots, or sliced leeks
- 1 small baking potato (russet-type) (6 oz), peeled and cubed
- Salt
- Pinch celery seed, ground (if using organic, stronger-flavored celery you may omit)
- ⅛th teaspoon cayenne pepper (optional)
- 6 cups vegetable broth
- ¼ teaspoon nutmeg
- ¼ cup heavy cream, or to taste (optional)
Instructions- Melt butter in a large saucepan over medium heat.
- Add celery, shallots or leeks, potato, celery seed and cayenne (if using), and a pinch of salt.
- Partially cover and cook, stirring occasionall,y until vegetables are soft but not browned, about 15 minutes.
- Add stock and bring to a simmer.
- Reduce heat to low, cover and cook 30 minutes.
- Stir in nutmeg.
- Allow to cool enough to be comfortable for you to puree in blender or food processor, in batches until completely smooth.
- If necessary pour through a fine sieve into a large bowl, pressing with a spoon to extract as much liquid as possible. If you have a Vitamix, just blend it on high and don't sieve.
- Return soup to pot, reheat slowly and adjust seasonings. (If serving cold, just adjust seasonings and chill.)
- Stir in cream (if using) and serve, garnished with celery leaves or croutons.
