• Animals,  Bees,  Chickens,  Gardening adventures,  Other Insects,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Quail,  Seeds,  Soil,  Vegetables

    Protecting the Little Guys… and a little about diatomaceous earth

    Current tomato seedlings
    Current tomato seedlings

    When transplanting little plants out into the big garden it feels like sending your child off to their first day at Kindergarten.  All kinds of things can happen to them in the big world.  For children… that’s too large a topic for me (Kindergarten mother survivor here).  For plants I can give you some advice.

    Besides watering too much or too little, and root disturbance while transplanting, little guys can be eaten by bugs, birds or other animals, or simply get lost and overlooked.  (Here is a container growing tip: as your seedlings sprout and grow, gently pass your hand across them every time you are with them.  It will make for stronger stems.) (And its fun!)(And you can pretend you’re ruffling their hair and say things like, “Hi, Sonny.”  Or not.)

    Celery sown in a flat.  Don't let the small top size fool you.
    Celery sown in a flat. Don’t let the small top size fool you.

    A day before transplanting out of a container or from a nursery bed, water the sprouts well.  If they’ve been in containers for awhile those roots may be going in circles and the water can’t  penetrate from the top very well.  If that is the case, put the pots in water for half an hour until moisture is wicked into the pot thoroughly, then allow to drain.  I say to do this the day before because if you water just before planting the soil around your root ball will fall apart, breaking fine hair roots and shocking your poor little guy.  Some plants hate their roots being touched so much that this would kill them.  By the next day after watering the container will still be moist, but the soil should be solid enough to stick together when tipped out.

    That same celery plant...roots five inches long!
    That same celery plant…roots five inches long!

    Dig a hole twice as wide and twice as deep as your plant, then backfill with a mixture of good compost and the soil from the hole.  This will help acclimate the roots to the soil change.  Water the hole, and if you’re really industrious water with compost tea.  Set your plant into the hole and firmly press the soil around the plant.  If you are planting tomatoes, eggplant or peppers (all in the same family) you can set the plant more deeply into the hole; they will form more roots from the stems and become sturdier.  The rule of thumb otherwise is to plant so that the soil level of the hole is the same as that of the transplant; many plants will rot if soil is up against their stem.  If it is too low, the roots will be exposed and dry out.  Potatoes can be trenches and hilled up as they grow, or maybe you will try trashcan or crate potatoes.  If you live in an arid area, plant in shallows so that rain can accumulate around the plant.  If you live in a wet area, plant on hills so water can drain off.  Or if you’re practicing permaculture, plant on the swales!

    So your little guy is in the ground and gently tamped in.  To keep off the birds and bunnies and mice and rats and whatever else is looking for dinner, I use plastic berry cartons turned over and set in place with sticks or with rocks on top.  Reuse and repurpose!  They are also good for protecting figs . The cartons allow enough sun in, and also makes it very obvious where the seedling is so that you don’t step on it, or weed the little tomatoes out with the almost identical ragweed sprouts.  For larger plants, turn over a milk crate.

    Chard and eggplant with cool hats on.
    Chard and eggplant with cool hats on.

    I have no native quail in my yard.  Due to nearby houseing developments, there aren’t many quail around me anymore.  Quail would fill the niche of beetle and sowbug eaters.  My hens want only worms, spoiled things, and their big feet do a lot of damage if not watched.

    Nothing like a dirt bath on a warm day.
    Madge and Chickpea: Nothing like a dirt bath on a warm day.

    Sowbugs cluster under mulch and do damage to stems and fruit.

    Sowbugs waiting for strawberries to nibble.
    Sowbugs waiting for strawberries to nibble.

    I use a little food-grade diatomaceous earth around the seedlings, new sprouts in the garden, around the strawberry plants, and also around plants such as artichoke, corn and chard where ants have begun to farm aphids.

    Ants farming aphids on chard.
    Ants farming aphids on chard.

    I use it around the trunks of my stonefruit trees to stop the ants, and have been told that it works well around the legs of beehives in lieu of or in combination with cups of oil to keep out the ants.  Diatomaceous earth is the finely ground bodies of ancient sea creatures (diatoms).  The powder on a microscopic level is full of sharp edges.

    Aphids on chard.
    Aphids on chard.

    When a sectioned insect such as an ant, flea or sowbug crawls on it, it rasps their tender areas  and dessicates them.  Not something I really am happy about doing to the bugs. I’m only using it on a very small scale.  Remember that any insecticide, even DE, kills many kinds of insects not just the targets.  You don’t want to eradicate your insects; most of them are helping your plants and your soil. DE will melt into the soil when watered, but only reapply if you still see the target bugs.  The problem might already be taken care of.

    A sprout, a squeeze and a hat.
    A sprout, a squeeze and a hat.

    Use food-grade DE, not the kind that is sold in pool supply stores.  FGDE is used in graineries to keep weevils and other bugs out of grain and beans, so you’ve been eating it for years without knowing it.  It doesn’t hurt us, nor is it bad to breathe (some people wear masks that they can get from https://accumed.com/n95-mask-for-sale-respirator-safety-face-mask-z1.html, just in case).  It is a great, natural and inexpensive way to fight fleas without paying big money for poisons to put on your pet.  I have it all over my cats’ bedding.

    They sell DE sprayers, but they become clogged.  The easiest and least expensive applicator (which can be repurposed)?  A condiment dispenser.  You know, the plastic mustard and ketchup squeeze bottles in diners.  I bought a set of two for $2.  You can practice a little to dispense a finer dust.

    The plant guild into which I'm planting the little guys.
    The plant guild into which I’m planting the little guys.

    So I plant my little guys, give them a drink, squeeze a little DE around them, give them a berry basket hat until they outgrow it, then take it off to use elsewhere.  If there is still a threat to your plants from critters (somebody was eating my eggplant leaves last year!  I mean, really…ick!), then turn a wire gopher cage over the top or make a wire cage to fit and use sticks or landscape staples to fasten into the ground..  These, too, you can reuse yearly.

    In this plant guild, the combination of other plants will also help hide the scent of the new little guy, until he turns into a full melon vine and takes over!
    In this plant guild, the combination of other plants will also help hide the scent of the new little guy, until he turns into a full melon vine and takes over!
  • Compost,  Gardening adventures,  Hugelkultur,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Rain Catching,  Soil,  Vegetables

    Hugelkultur: Irrigating with old wood

     

    Hugelkultur is a joy forever.
    Hugelkultur is a joy forever.

    Hugelkultur is a German word (pronounced hoogle culture: it should have some umlauts over the first ‘u’ but I have no idea how to do that) which translates as hill culture.  It is a process of building raised beds with a core of old wood.  The benefits are that as the wood decomposes it not only releases nutrients into the soil, but it holds water like a sponge.  Rain water is collected inside the bed, then as the warmer weather sets in and heat dries out the outer shell, it will wick that moisture back out.  Presto!  Irrigation in the dry season.  As the wood decomposes it creates air holes into which deeper roots may penetrate and absorb nutrients that aren’t being washed into the ground water.  Also, growing on a tall hugelkultur bed makes harvesting easier because vegetables are often located higher off the ground.  The process was popularized by Sepp Holzer, although he didn’t actually call it that.

    Hugelkultur may be started flat on the ground, by hand or by machine, dug into the ground, stacked very tall or short, or even level to the ground.  The best way to build a bed is to place it on contour where rainwater will collect, preferably facing North and South so that both sides receive equal sun.

    I have areas of ground that are either very heavy clay, or are decomposed granite with stones left over from the building of the house.  Some trees don’t receive the drainage they need from irrigation because of the clay, which causes the roots to suffocate, or else plants dry up because water perculates too swiftly through the soil.

    This brush pile against the fence was reduced to a quarter of its size.
    This brush pile against the fence was reduced to a quarter of its size.

    I also have stacks of brush that were left when the garden was created as hiding places for animals while the garden grew.  I don’t need that many brush piles anymore now that the garden is large.  I have three wire cages filled with woodier weeds and prunings that are in ‘slow compost’ mode, and leftover trimmings from bamboo used in bridge construction.  Perfect hugelkultur components!

    I targeted an area between the pathway and a plant guild with two apricots and vegetables in it.  When it rains that area has standing water on it because of the clay content. The area should become part of the guild, but the soil needs mucho amending.  I have areas like this all around the property.  How to amend two acres of soil?  How to get rid  of the ever-rising mountains of prunings?  How to make the rain water permiate the soil and perculate down rather than sheet across?  One guess.  Yep, hugelkultur.  I bury that wood!

    I had made a small  hugelkultur experiment a year ago with a raised strawberry bed.  There was old lime firewood rotting on the property, so I placed several of these logs along the side of the bed, then covered them with soil and planted strawberries.  It worked very well.  The strawberries loved the acid, even growing into the decomposing logs, and the logs held the moisture.  Some wonderful showy fungus came up, too.  I will be reworking that bed and this time I will cover the ground with logs, throw on some llama or horse manure, cover with compost and replant the strawberries.  I shouldn’t have to fertilize that bed or add soil for a long time.

    For the big hugelkultur bed I wanted a deep hole that would capture rain and allow the wood to absorb it.  My faithful assistants Lori and Steve and Jacob work on this project with me.  Steve and Lori dug this ginormous serpentine pit about 2 1/2 feet deep and the same wide.

    Lori and Steve digging a huge trench.
    Lori and Steve digging a huge trench.

    Since the paths had just been covered with mulch, the dirt was piled on top of plywood layed over the mulch for protection.

    Plywood over the paths helped keep things neat and tidy.
    Plywood over the paths helped keep things neat and tidy.

    Then we began filling the bed with the largest wood first.

    The empty trench with still-intact drip systems over it.
    The empty trench with still-intact drip systems over it.

    We didn’t have large logs which would have worked well, but we had lots of thick branches.  This hole took a lot of prunings and we jumped on them to compact them down.

    A bear trap!  There are a lot of branches in this pit.
    A bear trap! There are a lot of branches in this pit.

    The hugelkultur bed was left for a few days to settle (and we had run out of time and energy that first day!), and then we worked on it again.  Extra dirt from the rain catchment basins that the men were enlarging was hauled down and thrown into and around the wood.

    Dirt was added to the mix.
    Dirt was added to the mix

    The mound was watered well.  In dry areas it is important to water the wood and the soil well as you are building or else the bed will want to draw water from the area around it, drying up any seeds or plants planted on it.

    Some of the long pieces that really stuck out were pruned off.
    Some of the long pieces that really stuck out were pruned off.

    Of course if this is a temporarily boggy area, the hugel bed would help dry it out.  There were subterranean irrigation lines across the area already, and since we have a dry climate and the wood I used wasn’t old spongy logs and would take some time to become absorbant, we reestablished the drip system across the top of the hugel bed.

    Steve reconnecting the subterranean drip, which runs from a well powered by solar.
    Steve reconnecting the subterranean drip, which runs from a well powered by solar.

    Because there weren’t large logs, there were a lot of spaces to fill with dirt.  Gradually the mound grew and was sloped down to the pathway.  Finally a couple of inches of dirt was packed on top.  Unfortunately this was mostly clay from the excavation site, but if it had been good soil to begin with, I wouldn’t have needed the hugel bed now, would I?  Yes, I did give it a sprinkling of sugar just to get the microbes feeding.

    All topped up!  There was so much clay that this could have been a big fire pit!
    All topped up! There was so much clay that this could have been a big fire pit!

    The next day I dug up soil from the bottom of the wire cages that were now empty of branches, vines, and sticks.  In less than a year since making the wire beds they’d begun to decompose and there was several inches of nice soil at the bottom.  I hauled it over to the new bed and topped the clay with the compost.

    Guess which half has the good soil on it?
    Guess which half has the good soil on it?

    I want to break up the clay soil so I threw around a cover crop mixture of peas and wheat.  The peas will fix nitrogen in the soil, the wheat roots will stabilize and break up clay, I can harvest food from both and then slash and drop the plants to bring nutrition to the soil surface.  I also had a bag of mixed old veggie seeds.  Last year or so ago I pulled out all my little envelopes of veggie seeds that were very old and mixed them all up.  I planted batches around the property and had many things germinate.  I still had about 2 cups of the seed left so I threw it around the new hugelbed along with the cover crop.  Why not?  If the seed isn’t viable, no loss.  If it is, terrific!  I can always transplant the sprouts if there are too many of any one thing.

    Organic cover crop and a bag of old mixed veggie seeds.
    Organic cover crop and a bag of old mixed veggie seeds.

    I watered the seed down, and then raked out the old straw from the Fowl Fortress.  Here is a warning about straw: it will germinate.  People say straw doesn’t have seeds in it because the seeds are all in the tops which is cut as hay, but they lie. They live in a dream. Straw still has seeds in it and I had a nightmare of a time weeding pathways the first year of the garden because they were all strewn with straw mulch.  However if you put straw down for your hens first, they will eat all the seeds, poo on it, kick it around in the dirt, and then you will have a much better quality straw to use.  Straw is difficult to get wet, and it needs to be wet when placed on the bed unless you live in a wet climate or have timed the planting to be just before a long soaking rain.

    A thick layer of wet straw went over the top of the scattered seeds.
    A thick layer of wet straw went over the top of the scattered seeds.

    Even then it is good to soak the straw first and then apply it to the bed.  Some people soak the straw in an enriched liquid, using manure tea, kelp, microbial brews, organic molassas, etc.  The mulch acts as an insulator for moisture and warmth (the decaying wood will eventually produce some heat to warm the little plant feet), and a suffocator for weeds.  It can also be a home for sow bugs if too thin.  In wetter climates the straw layer can be an inch or so thick.  In drier climates the straw or whatever you use as a top mulch should be several inches thick or else it will just wick moisture out of the bed.  The same rule applys when using newspapers as a mulch. TIP: don’t let your chickens near the new bed!  They will ‘rediscover’ their old mulch and start kicking all your work apart!

    If I had wanted to plant established plants on the hugelkultur bed rather than seeds, I would have forgone spreading compost and just covered the poor soil on the mound  in wet newspaper or cardboard, and then piled on the straw mulch.  To plant I would have cut a hole through the paper, added a handful of good compost and planted in the hole.

    So the bed was done, and just before a predicted rain event, too.  As it rains the water will roll into the bed,  be absorbed and held by the soil around the branches which will eventually begin to absorb the moisture as they decay.  The seeds will sprout through the mulch and their roots will hold and amend the clay on the mound.  Eventually the roots of the apricot trees will reach over towards the hugel bed, and that patch of icky clay soil will become beautiful.  All the while I can still grow crops on the raised bed.  My three wire bins are empty, an enormous brush pile is reduced to a small mound, and extra dirt found a new home.  Plus we all had some fantastic upper body workouts.  A winning situation all around.

    More hugel beds will be created in troubled spots; some may only be a couple of feet long below a tree’s root line to help with soil drainage while amending the planting bed.

     

    Wire cages filled with old weeds, prunings and vines are terrific for hugels!
    Wire cages filled with old weeds, prunings and vines are terrific for hugels!

     

    If you are in an area where the top mulch might wash away in heavy rains, make a latticework of sticks held down with landscape pins or more sticks over the top of the straw.  Or cover with wire until the plants begin to sprout; you don’t want the wire to remain on the bed.

    So try a hugelkultur bed, big or small.  You’ll wonder why you never tried it before.

     

  • Animals,  Bees,  Birding,  Chickens,  Gardening adventures,  Heirloom Plants,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Pets,  Photos,  Ponds

    It Might As Well Be Spring: an Indulgence in Prose

    First daffodil
    First daffodil, face to the dawn.

    Mornings find me waking before sunrise, throwing cats off my bed, rousing my elderly dog for her morning ablutions, and scampering down to the hen house in my robe and slippers (and some mornings warm hat and scarf) to feed the hens and the wild ducks, and the tortoise.

    Viola seeing what new seed is available since the night before.
    Viola seeing what new seed is available since the night before.

     Last night when I let Sophie out for her final walk of the night the Santa Ana winds were like a warm caress, riffling through the palm fronds in the dark.  Orion sparkled overhead, moving into the position it was in for the birth of both my March babies half a lifetime ago.

    Mourning doves in a morning sky.
    Mourning doves in a morning sky.

    This morning the air was expectant.  The garden seemed to emit a trembling energy; an excitement roiling to the surface, but afraid to burst out in full in case of another frost.

    Vanilla-scented heliotrope.
    Vanilla-scented heliotrope.

    Indeed another cold front will be moving in with much-needed rainfall later this week.  For now, the bold grasses are up and reckless early stonefruit have blossomed out, much to the joy of the hungry bees.

    White peach.
    White peach.

    I could almost hear Browning’s Pippa chanting in my head.  But not too much.

    The ornamental pear trees all around town are in full glorious bloom.  Yesterday while driving from the Community Center to the bookstore there were enough petals strewn in the road as to cause a whirlwind of white as I drove through.  An eddy of petals around my car.  Joy.

    Almond just breaking bud.
    Almond just breaking bud.

    This weekend is the Great Backyard Bird Count, as well as my two regular bird count days for Project Feederwatch.  Before breakfasting I filled seed feeders and enjoyed the show while eating my fresh egg, asparagus, toast and cinnamon tea.  Twitterpating is definitely in the air as birds pair up and rival mallards chase each other over the big pond.

    A white crowned sparrow splashing his friend.
    A white crowned sparrow splashing his friend.

    A Northern mockingbird sips from the bird bath dripper sizing up his territory and listening for new sounds to add to his repertoire.  A buzzy rufous hummingbird guards the nectar feeder from the larger and flashier Anna’s.  A long-mated pair of crows hang out preening each other on the telephone wire.

    A green-white pond calla.
    A green-white pond calla.

    Frogs are croaking amorously in the damp rushes. To my complete joy, far earlier than the bulbs strewn across the property which are just peeking green out of the earth, just outside my window are early daffodils and sweet violets, two of my favorite flowers.

    Daffodils, Earlicheer narcissus and a little blue squill.
    Daffodils, Earlicheer narcissus and a little blue squill.

    It is still February, and I’m not that great a fan of such a beastly month as February , but for today the paperwork will lie ignored, the cold weather clothes will stay in the laundry basket, and after I take my cat to the vet I will spend the day in the garden (although that isn’t so unusual for me, is it?) listening to the Nuttall’s woodpecker try to drum holes into the telephone pole and smell the scent of Gideon’s trumpet flowers.

    Sweet violets.
    Sweet violets.

    I look forward to tomorrow when I’ll be making two new friends, and to casting seed which will add new life to the garden.

    Easter will be early this year.
    Easter will be early this year.

    It is all about possibilities, and possibility is definitely in the air today. I will believe Punxsutawney Phil that although it is technically winter, for today it might as well be spring.

    A meeting of the  minds.
    A meeting of the minds.

  • Gardening adventures,  Heirloom Plants,  Natives,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Soil,  Vegetables

    Valentine’s in the Garden

     

    A rainbow chard and parsley bouquet for Valentine's Day
    A rainbow chard and parsley bouquet for Valentine’s Day

    Another gorgeous day in the garden today.  I gave a chard bouquet to my friend Lara who has been so kind as to teach me piano over the last two months (I’ve progressed from the ‘clink clink’ stage to the two-handed ‘clink-clink-CLINK’ stage.  Lara deserves chard!).  My best Valentine’s was receiving my box of organic seeds from Botanical Interests.  Yep, ordered too many again.  At least it won’t make me fat.

    2-14-13 027
    Great seeds! Can’t wait to plant!

     

    It was warm enough for shorts, and since my neighbors can’t see me, I indulged for awhile.

    Shorts on Valentine's Day!  (No I'm not THAT short, and go figure what my hand is doing to my hat!)
    Shorts on Valentine’s Day! (No I’m not THAT short, and go figure what my hand is doing to my hat!)

    At the end of December I had planted two flats of seeds and stuck them in the greenhouse; one had winter veggies and the other native plants.

    Bladderpod and leeks.
    Bladderpod and leeks.

    A couple of weeks ago I was telling my daughter in college that only one of each had come up so far.  She pointed out that the two were curiously linked: bladderpod and leeks!  It seems even my garden is a comedian.   Today I transplanted the bladderpod into larger containers.

    Transplanted bladderpods.
    Transplanted bladderpods.

    Bladderpod (Isomeris arborea) is a true California native living at home in the desert or at the coast and usually in the worst soils.  It flowers most of the year even in drought conditions, providing nectar for pollinators and hummingbirds.  The plant doesn’t smell so great, but it has wonderful balloon-like pods that rattle when dry. It is a fantastic addition to gardens.

    In planting seeds in flats it always looks as if roots are shallow until you take the plant up and find a healthy and sometimes long root system.  Don’t let the top growth make you think that the roots aren’t developed.

    The root ball of this little bladderpod seedling is healthy and full.
    The root ball of this little bladderpod seedling is healthy and full.

    No more natives are showing their faces in the flat yet, but they have their own schedule and I’ll continue to watch the flat for signs.   Just as animals (including  humans) respond to circadian rhythms with the 24/hour sleep/wake cycle,  plant growth is cued in not only by warmth, but by length of daylight hours.  For plants it is called photoperiodicity.  You can casually throw that into a conversation over the dinner table tonight and see if anyone notices.  A plant’s response to daylight length is called photoperiodic.  There is much more to this, and you can read up on it here.  So to make a short story longer, I don’t manipulate the light in the greenhouse so I wait longer time than recommended for seeds to sprout just in case they really don’t want to get out of bed yet.  I can empathize.

    Little celery and parsnip sprouts and leggy leeks that need transplanting,
    Little celery and parsnip sprouts and leggy leeks that need transplanting,

    In the veggie flat celery and parsnips have decided to sprout so I’ll transplant them out in a week or two.

    Elsewhere in the garden the nitrogen-fixers are working away.

    Pea ready to grab onto a bamboo support pole.
    Pea ready to grab onto a bamboo support pole.

    Fava beans have sprouted from leftover seed from last year and they are already in bloom.

    Bees love the blooming favas.
    Bees love the blooming favas.

    The weather is so beautiful that I want to plant the summer veggies… I’m yearning for tomatoes!  I will be good and wait a few more weeks until all chance of frost is gone (hopefully the weather won’t be too crazy and frost in March!).  Then, look out!  Seeds everywhere!  And yes, by popular demand I will write about trashcan potatoes.

  • Animals,  Birding,  Compost,  Gardening adventures,  Living structures,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Photos,  Ponds,  Rain Catching

    Frost on the Pathways

    It doesn’t often frost here in Fallbrook, which is located about an hour from both the mountains and the Pacific in northern San Diego county.  When it does, the fruit growers have to take drastic steps to keep their citrus, avocados and other tender plants from dying.  The last frost happened after a long steady rain, just after a thick mulch was applied to all the trails here at Finch Frolic Gardens (thank you, Lori!).  I awoke to a magical result: just the pathways had turned white with frost.  Beautiful! (You can click on the photos to enlarge).

     

     

  • Animals,  Bees,  Chickens,  Cob,  Compost,  Composting toilet,  Gardening adventures,  Health,  Heirloom Plants,  Herbs,  Natives,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Ponds,  Rain Catching,  Recipes,  Salads,  Soil,  Vegan,  Vegetables,  Vegetarian,  Worms

    Southern California Permaculture Convergence! Be there!

    Southern California Permaculture Convergence

    If you are interested in any aspect of permaculture, such as organic gardening, herbs, planting native plants, aquaponics, natural ponds, beekeeping, keeping chickens, and so much more, then you must come to the Southern California Permaculture Convergence.  It happens on March 9th and 10th at the Sky Mountain Institute in Escondido.  The keynote speaker will be Paul Wheaton, lecturer and permaculturalist extraordinaire of www.permies.com fame. Oh, and I’ll be one of the many speakers as well (cough cough).  The Early Bird special of only $50 for both days ends at the end of January, and then the price will rise, so buy your tickets now!

    Also, for a full-on demonstration of taking bare land and creating a permaculture garden, there will be a three-day intensive class taught by Paul Wheaton on site the three days prior to the Convergence.

    You can read about the convergence here at the official website, which will give you the link perm.eventbrite.com where you may purchase tickets.  Also visit the SD Permaculture Meetup page to see all the free workshops that happen monthly all over San Diego.

    This convergence is such a deal, you really shouldn’t miss it!  And such a bargain, too.  One of the best things I find that come out of these convergences is the exchange of ideas and networking among the attendees, and all the practical information you can take home and use right away.  One of the largest parts of permaculture is building community, which means sharing with and assisting others.

    Really.  Don’t miss this!  Tell your friends!

  • Cob,  Gardening adventures,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Soil,  Vegan,  Vegetables,  Vegetarian

    Harvesting Sweet Potatoes with Gratitude

    Beautiful yam harvest.

    I am in sensory heaven.  Outside frost is again settling – a rarity here in Fallbrook, CA.  Inside…. mmmm.  My daughter is juicing today’s harvest of oranges.  On the stove I’m poaching the last of the Harry and David pears my son sent before Christmas, in a bath of Julian apple cider (I’ve had frozen since October!), cinnamon and vanilla.  There is a touch of woodsmoke from the wood burning stove.  The mingled aroma of vanilla, orange and cinnamon in the air is incredible.  In the fire are two homegrown potatoes in foil baking for dinner, and I’m cutting squares of homemade bread (it rained the other day… great baking and soup day!) to toast in the fire on fondue forks with mozzarella cheese and drizzled with Just Dip It (an olive oil, vinegar and herb blend from Temecula Olive Oil Co.).  I am saturated with contentment and gratitude.

    I wanted to write a blogpost for the first day of the year about gratitude.  Instead I’m writing about harvesting yams and sweet potatoes, which, I believe, amounts to the same thing.

    Tiny Russian Banana potatoes I grew in a nursery container

    Today the air was clean and almost 60 degrees F.  Maxfield Parrish clouds filled the sky making it hard to pay attention to anything else.  My daughter and I finally fired up Harry Mud, the cob oven.  We experimented by baking small frozen pizzas, to success.  Then in went homegrown, wrapped sweet potatoes, garlic and russet potatoes to slowly bake in the ashes.  I hope I can convey sweetness of sitting outdoors on New Year’s Day eating pizza and smelling home grown potatoes and garlic cooking in a mud oven that we built, from mud from our property, as a snowy egret watched us carefully from the pond and our hens figured out how to beg. Peace.  Enjoying the payoff of hard work.  Eating health.

    In the last few days we’ve dug up several patches of yams and sweet potatoes, the greenery of which had just been frosted black.  I plant them all over the property to fill the groundcover niche of the plant guilds.   I also grew some in my raised veggie beds.  Some of the sweet potatoes had been small last year and so I left them in the ground.  They grew.

    This enormous one was six pounds!

    The flavor of homegrown, organic potatoes is beyond description.  You don’t need sugar and marshmallows dumped on the yams; potatoes aren’t just a vehicle for toppings.  I steam them, eat them with butter, salt and pepper.  Phenomenal.  On Christmas I roasted wedges of yams with garlic and olive oil, and not only were they terrific, the leftovers I mixed into a hash for breakfast and  it was sensational.

    Freshly dug sweet potatoes

    Yams and sweet potatoes are what Americans call the orange or white tubers, respectively, sold in the grocery stores.  There are actually hundreds of varieties of sweet potatoes of many colors and flavors.  They are semi-tropical and like warmth.  To grow, buy an organic sweet potato or yam and allow it to sprout on your counter.  This is the easiest way.  You may also buy slips from organic growers.  Please, please don’t buy non-organic seed, slips or bulbs.  Please don’t be Round-up Ready.

    Colorful yams full of antioxidants.

    Take a sharp knife and cut slices from your sprouted yam, each containing at least one sprouted ‘eye’ , and lay them out to air dry for a couple of days in a cool, dry place out of direct sunlight.  This hardens them off. Don’t plant a whole potato because the plant will have all the food it needs to produce greenery and won’t feel the need to make as many tubers.  Plant the slips in well-drained soil that isn’t heavily manured; as long as water doesn’t sit around the roots, they will probably grow.  I’ve had luck in many kinds of soil.  The plants will spread out in a lovely, glossy-leaved groundcover that protects the soil and reduces weeds.  Let the vines run and enjoy the small yam flower.  Harvest in late fall, or when the greenery dies off.

    Frosted leaves of sweet potatoes

    Carefully dig and lift the potatoes. The skin will be more delicate than on yams store-bought. Lay the dirt-caked potatoes out to dry off before you store them in a cool dark place.  Keep small slips and roots for replanting.  The flavor of homegrown organic potatoes will make you wonder what the tasteless mushy things you’ve been eating have been.

    This last year had its share of terrible losses, worry, pain and disappointment, along with great joy and contentment if I opened my eyes to them.  They say that you reap what you sow, and as the garden and my experience deepens, and as my life mellows, I feel the truth in it.  This morning we had fresh juice made of passionfruit, guava, oranges and pomegranates, all of which we grew.  The potatoes, garlic, squash, greens, pickles, passionfruit curd, strawberry jam, dried tomatoes, all are at hand because of planning, sowing, nurturing, harvesting and preserving or storing. This may seem incongruous, but I am astonished at how many friends I  have gained this year, through my volunteer work and exercise classes, in addition to those gained while working with County Parks, Sullivan Middle School, and the SDZoo Safari Park.  So many that I wrote out the names and counted and marveled.  Perhaps the list would be small for others; I don’t know, but it is wondrous and enough for me.  At age 51, I have more friends and good acquaintances than I’ve ever had in my life. I am so grateful. I not only reap what I sow, but just as in my garden harvest, I have more than I could have imagined.

    I do not follow a religion.  In Buddhism it is said that life is a walking meditation; that every step you take is a prayer.  As I put one foot in front of the other walking through the last part of my life, as I dig yams and eat them redolent with the health of good soil, as I watch those Maxfield Parrish clouds, as I laugh and work with friends who miraculously smile when they see me, I wordlessly pray my gratitude to the universe.

    I very truly wish for you a year filled with gratitude and peace, and health-giving food that nourishes your heart and soul as well as your body.

  • Animals,  Books,  Breads,  Chickens,  Compost,  Gardening adventures,  Giving,  Health,  Humor,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Pets,  Recipes,  Reptiles and Amphibians,  Soil,  Vegetables

    The Life of Di, or Fall At My House

    “And here’s another fine mess you’ve gotten me into!”

    I like to be involved with many projects at once.  I picture my life as an opal, my birthstone, full of swirled colors and hues.  I have several books going at once, projects chipped away at around the house, volunteer responsibilities strewn across my week, and far too many animals and acres to care for.  When I’m exhausted I can spend a day on the couch reading with no trouble at all being the picture of laziness.  Prior to Thanksgiving I underwent a skin cancer preventative treatment on my face and hands, which required applying a topical cream twice a day that brings suspicious cells to the surface and burns them off.  By the end of the second week I was quite a mess, and then took another week to heal enough to be seen in public without alerting the zombie hunters.  The treatment, needless to say, kept me from being in sunlight, therefore housebound.  Always loving a clean, organized house but never actually completely cleaning or organizing, I figured I’d get some work done.  I tried sorting about 15 boxes of photo albums left by my mother and grandmother… and got through one box before I had to stop.  I wanted to bake bread, and I wanted to find something to do with the small amount of hops we harvested, so I experimented with a recipe that had a starter, sponge and rising that altogether took five days.  The Turnipseed Sisters’ White Bread from the classic Bernard Clayton’s New Complete Book of Breads .

    Turnipseed Sisters’ White Loaf starter made with hops.

    The starter really smelled like beer. Not in a pleasant way, either.  However the bread was good, and baking was fun.

    Good sandwich and toast bread.

    Just the extra carbs I needed for sitting on my butt for two weeks, right?  Then I wanted to thin, clean and alphabetize the fiction section in my living room.

    Books piled alphabetically… a little later there was a small avalanche.

    Yes, I have enough books in my house that they are in sections.  Former school librarian and bookstore worker here.  I haven’t done the non-fiction section as yet, which extends to most of the other rooms in the house.  Maybe next year?  I did a little writing, a lot of reading, surrounded by my elderly dog Sophie

    Sophie enjoying good sleeps.

    who keeps returning from the brink of death to sleep about 23 hours a day, and one of my hens, Viola, who suddenly went lame in one leg.

    Viola on a healing vacation.

    All advice was to cull her, but I thought that she pulled a muscle and hadn’t broken her leg, and being vegetarian I don’t eat my pets.  Viola has been recuperating in a cage in the dining room, gaining strength in that leg, laying regular eggs, having full rein of the front yard, and crooning wonderfully. As I count wild birds for Cornell University’s Project Feederwatch, I keep an eye on the hen.  The cats ignore her, thank goodness.  I’ve quite enjoyed having a chicken in the house.  Yep, I’m starting to be one of those kinds of aging ladies.

    In between I’d spend time crawling under bushes to push and shove my 100-pound African spur thigh tortoise out of his hiding spot and into the heatlamp-warmed Rubbermaid house he shuns so that he wouldn’t catch cold in the chill damp nights.  I always come out victorious, with him angry and begrudgingly warm, and with me wet, muddy, hair full of sticks and hands full of scratches.  Does anyone have a life like this?

    “I’m performing advanced trigonometry in my head, don’t bother me, Woman!”

    Finally my skin healed enough so that I was able to venture outdoors.

    Garlic and seed sprouts guarded from birds by a rubber snake.

    I planted seeds of winter crops: collards, kale, garlic, onions, carrots, Brussels sprouts and broccoli rabe, and prepared raised beds for more.

    Yellow perfection tomatoes still ripening, as are the green zebra.

    I ordered organic pea, lupine and sweet pea seeds from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds , all nitrogen-fixers to plant around the plant guilds.

    Pepperoncini still producing.

    On Thanksgiving I hiked 1200 feet up Monserate Mountain in a record slow time; all that sitting and all that bread causing me to often stop and watch the slow holiday traffic on Hwy. 15, and be very glad that I was on a hike instead.

    The neighbors had their annual tree butchering, paying exorbitant sums to have the same so-called landscapers come in and top their trees (shudder!) and thin others… for what reason I have no idea.  Because being retired Orange County professionals they believe that trees need to be hacked back, contorted, and ruined?  Possibly.

    Please, please, please, friends don’t let friends top trees!  Find an arborist who trims trees with an eye to their health and long-term growth and immediate beauty.  A well-pruned tree is lovely, even just after pruning.  A topped tree is brutal and ugly.

    A topped coral tree. Ugh!

    Anyway, the upside is that I claimed all the chips, giving new life to the ravaged trees as mulch for my pathways.  Two truckloads were delivered.  I think I have enough for the whole property.

    “The bear went over the mountain to see what he could see. He saw another mountain…”

    How to spread it?  Yep, one wheelbarrow full at a time.

    One wheelbarrow at a time.

    I can now condition myself for more hiking and weight lifting without leaving the property.  The heaps have a lot of pine in them (they thinned the pine trees!???) so there is a pleasant Christmassy smell emanating from the heaps.

    Hot steamy mulch.

    They are also very high nitrogen and were hot in the center on the second day and this morning were steaming right after our brief rain shower.  Mulch piles can catch fire; when I worked for San Diego County Parks we rangers would joke about who had been called out by the fire department when their newly delivered mulch pile had caught fire in the  night.

    Steam from the mulch mountains. I stood on it just now and steam went up my pant legs and warmed me up!

    I also received a gift of seven 15-gallon nursery containers of llama poo!

    The wealth of llama poo.

    Hot diggity!  Early Christmas: My diamonds are round and brown, thank-you.  I layered them in the compost heap and am ready for more.

    I also wholeheartedly participated in Small Business Saturday, finding happy locals and crossing paths with friends and aquaintences at several stores.  I received my first Merry Christmas from a man at Myrtle Creek Nursery’s parking lot as he waited for his son’s family to pick out a Christmas tree.  I do love this town.

    Sweet potatoes ready to harvest for Christmas dinner.

    That catches me up.  Lots of projects, lots of volunteering, lots of cleaning up to do before my daughter comes home for the holidays and despairs at my bachelorette living.  Lots of mulch to move. Lots of really great friends.  Lots of sunscreen to wear.  Lots to be thankful for.

  • Gardening adventures,  Natives,  Other Insects,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Soil

    Native Planting

     

    Milkweed and wildflowers are host to butterflies, and the garden is still full of them.

    Today the forecast searing sun hid behind clouds all morning, making it a perfect Fall day for planting natives.  The area all along the northern property fenceline is dedicated to plants found in our San Diego coastal sage scrub habitat.  The dirt along this area is bad. It is sandy dirt over hard clay, a product of years of runoff flowing in from the neighbor’s yard.

    The native California strip with dirt, not soil.

    Last year coastal live oaks, cork oak and Engelmann oak were planted along this strip, and little else.  The soil was covered with sheaths of palm leaves, and they helped protect the soil and hold in some moisture, but there is little decomposition rate from them. The soil needed oak leaves.

    A coating of oak leaves will help fire the soil; more leaves will be coming soon.

    Last Monday Lori, a friend who is working here weekly did a tremendous job carefully raking back all the palm sheaths, then bagging oak leaves from the walkways around the massive old oak on the embankment and spreading them around between the new oaks.  There are plenty of leaves left for the health of the big oak; just the leaves on the slippery stairs were moved.  The oak leaves will decompose and provide the soil with the nutrients to host fungal action in the ground; the start of soil building.

    Planting lemonade berry and sugarbush.

    Today Jacob and I planted a number of lemonade berry, sugarbush and deerweed, as well as two replacement coastal live oaks.  I had purchased packets of seed mixes as well as several types of lupine (nitrogen fixer), making sure there was no alyssum, evening primrose or borage in the packets (they do very well on their own on the property!).

    Take a lot of seed packets, empty them into a bucket, stir and voila! Diversity!

    I also took some seedheads from a couple of non-native sunflowers and threw them into the mix.

    Breaking up a sunflower for seeds.

    In every damp spot from the subterranean irrigation we planted wildflower seeds.

    The subterranean irrigation leaves damp spots on the soil, where I plant flower seeds. They’ll choke out future weeds as well.

    We’ve had stunning results from this method for several seasons.  It is the middle of October and there are still flowers blooming, providing beauty and food for insects and birds.

    Stands of wildflowers feed the insects and look wonderful.

    Some herbs such as purple basil and parsley have come up late.

    Purple basil showing up between the last of the squash vines. Either I use it or let it go to seed to feed insects and reseed itself.

    California poppies that have died off are showing new leaf growth around the base of the plants.  So all-in-all a very successful day, thanks to the hard work of my helpers and the cooperation of the weather.  These native plant guilds of plants, mulch and flowers will all work towards turning that soil alive and begin the communication between the native plants that will make this habitat for native animals priceless.

  • Animals,  Bees,  Birding,  Gardening adventures,  Other Insects,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Ponds,  Reptiles and Amphibians,  Soil,  Worms

    Fall Morning

     

    The birdwatching garden.

    I use the kitchen table as a work center, but spend a lot of time not working.  That is because from the big dusty windowseat, through the spiderwebs that catch sunlight in the corners of the glass I watch a fairytale of animals.  Song sparrows with their formal stripes and classy single black breast spot hop along the uneven flagstone walkway.  The walkway, recently weeded, is again being compromised by sprouts.  The small pond wears a heavy scarf of peppermint along its north side, and a mixture of fescues and waterplants around the south.  A waterlily bravely floats pads on the still water after having been drastically thinned last month.  A calla lily opens partially white, partially green.

    Below the window in a dish of seed set low for ground feeders are house finches, the males’ proud red fading like the leaves of the Japanese maple behind the green bench.  Lesser goldfinches skeletonize the leaves of sunflowers that have sprouted from birdseed; a nuthatch and a mountain chickadee take turns on the hanging suet feeder, both noisy and reminding me of pine forests.  A pair of crows who have lived near this garden for years, but who have been about other business during the summer, are reunited on the telephone line.  She grooms his feathers and he leans into her.  I’ll have to put treats out for them, to keep on their good side.  A Nutall’s woodpecker looks like a childhood toy by hopping straight up the big pine.   I grin a welcome to a couple of white crowned sparrows, the forefront of the migratory flock.  These spirited and chatty birds shuffle leaves onto my walkway every morning, and I quite happily sweep the leaves back for the next round.  It is a ritual just between us.  A young scrub jay swoops in with much show, seeing how big a reaction he can get from startling the smaller birds clustering at the feeders or taking warm dirtbaths. He lands on a small trellis and pecks out seeds from a sunflower I propped up after its yellow glory faded.  Finches visit when he leaves and take their share of this high protein food.

    House finch nabbing sunflower seeds ( photo taken through a dirty window! Sorry!)

    The outside water is turned off; I should be on my knees in mud down by the chicken coop right now fixing a break in the pipe but I am held here by the autumnal light. Even in the morning it slants at a kinder angle, bringing out the gold in the leaves. Later when the water resumes the dripper on the bird bath will start and sparrows, finches, towhees and random visitors will sip drinks and take cleansing baths.  One of my favorite sights is watching a group of finches taking turns in the bath, daring each other to stay longer and become wetter.  Their splashing sends a cascade of drops into the sunlight.  They give Finch Frolic its name.  Now the only visitors are honeybees taking water to hydrate their honey.  I emphathize with these bees.  Only the older females do the pollen gathering, carrying heavy loads in their leg sacks back to the hive until they die in flight.  A useful life, but a strenuous and unimaginative one.

    Perhaps  today there will also be a house sparrow, or a common yellowthroat or a disagreeable California towhee, what everyone knows as a ’round headed brown bird’.  Or maybe the mockingbird will revisit the pyracantha berries, staking them out as his territory while finches steal them behind his back.  I hear the wrentit’s bouncey-ball call, but as they can throw their voices I usually don’t spot them.  Annas hummingbirds spend all their energy guarding the feeders, stopping to peer into the window to see if I’m a threat.  My black cat Rosie O’Grady stares back, slowly hunching, mouth twitching with a soft kecking sound as if she could hunt through a window. I see that the hanging tray of grape jelly needs to be taken in and washed because the orioles have all migrated. Rosie is given up by the hummingbird and instead she watches cat TV as the birds shuffle in the Mexican primrose below the window.

    I don’t see either of the bunnies this morning, Primrose or Clover.  They live under the rosemary bush, and perhaps in the large pile of compost in the corner of the yard.  I’ve watched them nibble the invasive Bermuda grass, and pull down stalks of weedy sow thistle and eat the flowers and seeds.  They do no harm here, and are helping with the weeding; I love watching them lope around the pathways living in cautious peace.

    Unseen by me by where I sit, mosquito fish, aquatic snails, dragonfly larvae, strange worms and small Pacific chorus frogs hang out in the pond and under the overhanging lips of flagstone I placed there just for them.   Under the plants are Western fence lizards big and small awaiting warmth from the sun to heat up the rocks so they may climb the highest stone in their territory and posture while the heat quickens their blood.  A mouse scurries between plants, capturing bits of birdseed scattered by the messy sparrows.  The soil is good here, full of worms and microbes and fungus.  Everything is full of life, if you only know how to look for it.  You can smell it.  You can feel it.

    Now comes the spotted towhee, black headed with white patterns on his wings and reddish sides.  Once called the rufous-sided towhee, he is bold and handsome, his call a long brash too-weeet.  He sassily zig-zags down the narrow flagstone pathway looking for bugs.

    Spotted Towhee grubbing in his fancy clothes, so bright after a molt.

    I haven’t seen the rat family for a few days.  The four youngsters invade the hanging feeders, tossing each other off and being juvenile delinquents.  At night I hear the screech of a barn owl, which might be my answer.

    The oxblood lilies – always a surprise during the dry and the heat of September, have almost all faded, but sprouts of paper white narcissus are beginning to break ground.  They are Fall flowers here, usually done by Thanksgiving.

    It is Fall.  Finally.  The world of my garden is tired and ready for a rest from the heat, the mating, the child rearing, the dryness, the search for diminishing food, the hiding so as not to become food.  Although the days here are still in the high 80’s the evenings bring coolness and a much-needed dampness.  Rain won’t come until November or later.  But we wait for it, the animals, the plants and I.  And time passes as I sit at the table and watch.  I know of no better way to spend an autumn morning.