Posts
First of all - HOW did it get to be MARCH 17TH already!? Last time I checked, it was February!
Second - Spring took steroids this year. The crocuses are blooming! The willow over the pond behind my house is that yellowish shade it gets! A flock of red-winged blackbirds followed me in the trees on my walk (which I took without a jacket) yesterday. Sugaring season is already over! WHAT!? Has anyone seen ramps yet? What are the morels going to think about this!? Please, please, weather gone wild, DO NOT kill off the tomatoes again!!
and thus begins the mild insanity we call early spring.
Which means that this weekend/week I will be:
Bringing my cold frame out of winter hiding
Marking out my new garden plot and helping my landlord till it
Going over the tilled plot with a broad fork to aerate the soil (the tiller doesn't go very deep)
planting out lettuce into the prepared soil (if you have spinach you can plant that too)
Picking up a bunch of topsoil from neighbors (anyone have a pickup truck I can borrow?)
I will be doing that on top of what I had planned for this week (err...and earlier), a whole 9 weeks before the last frost:
Starting my nightshades!
Finishing my chicken coop
It's still March and I already feel like the white rabbit! I'm late! I'm late!
In good news - I opened up the cellar and it turns out my veggies were fine. No flooding. And seriously - 5 months later, my veggies are still delicious (except the carrots, which got really woody and are going to the compost, stat), firm, and not sprouting. It has been by far the best root cellaring experience I have ever had. Way easier than the high tech cellars we had in my last house (a really lovely co-op check it out)
Oh, and my darling readers, have I told you that I will be making and selling salves and other things of that sort starting this summer? I haven't figured out the details yet, but if anyone wants to chat with me about it, I'd love to chat. I need a label design - I'll barter salves, gardening advice, garden design, or whatever else we can think up for a label design. Let me know if you can do that for me.
...can you tell that I've had too much coffee today? and one too many little green cupcakes with nothing nutritious in them at all?
Showing posts with label homesteading. Show all posts
Showing posts with label homesteading. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Monday, March 15, 2010
Mud Season
Rain! Rain and flooding and oh my! I still have potatoes and carrots on the bottom step of my root cellar - which floods! Why don't I just go and move it? Oh, because I cannot get the cellar door open on my own - it catches a corner and I can't pull it up without help (as my male guests know - they get used for root cellar access all the time).
In other news, the forsythias are starting to bloom hysterically early. Mud season, my friends, is upon us. I have seen buds on the trees.
If I don't sound that excited, it's because I'm not. Spring is that wondrous season that unveils herself after a cold, snowy, and equally wondrous winter. The contrast of a white, silent, and sleepy winter with the muddy, green, waking humming busyness of spring is the appeal of spring to me. But this year we didn't have a snowed-in winter in the Mid-Hudson Valley. We had a pathetic, broken animal of a winter. The rest felt stolen, unpaid for with shoveling endless walkways, just stolen. With no winter to tail, spring doesn't feel like an unveiling. It's just mud and work and waking green.
I know I'll get excited soon, once the blossoms start blooming and the snow melts off the mountains, replaced by that vibrant, nascent green, that can only mean the start of the busy seasons ahead. The heat and cold will compete for primacy as the seasons kick into high gear and the scurrying of spring with all of the planting and preparing will fade into summer with her glaring heat and constant work and that glorious week, tucked into late June, when everything is planted and the weeds haven't started in earnest yet, and there's nothing to do. And then the weeds will burst up and the summer will be full of swimming off the constant heat of picking weeds, and tomatoes, and the constant, flowing harvest, which will turn itself into hours at the stove canning sauces and jams, freezing everything, and slowly, the tremor of early fall will make me wake in a sweat in the middle of the night fearing a freak early frost until everything is harvested and the frosts start rolling in, and the root cellars are stocked and there's the constant smell of apples and wood smoke in the air. And then, maybe then, we will have a white winter which will remind us why spring is such a magical time.
In other news, the forsythias are starting to bloom hysterically early. Mud season, my friends, is upon us. I have seen buds on the trees.
If I don't sound that excited, it's because I'm not. Spring is that wondrous season that unveils herself after a cold, snowy, and equally wondrous winter. The contrast of a white, silent, and sleepy winter with the muddy, green, waking humming busyness of spring is the appeal of spring to me. But this year we didn't have a snowed-in winter in the Mid-Hudson Valley. We had a pathetic, broken animal of a winter. The rest felt stolen, unpaid for with shoveling endless walkways, just stolen. With no winter to tail, spring doesn't feel like an unveiling. It's just mud and work and waking green.
I know I'll get excited soon, once the blossoms start blooming and the snow melts off the mountains, replaced by that vibrant, nascent green, that can only mean the start of the busy seasons ahead. The heat and cold will compete for primacy as the seasons kick into high gear and the scurrying of spring with all of the planting and preparing will fade into summer with her glaring heat and constant work and that glorious week, tucked into late June, when everything is planted and the weeds haven't started in earnest yet, and there's nothing to do. And then the weeds will burst up and the summer will be full of swimming off the constant heat of picking weeds, and tomatoes, and the constant, flowing harvest, which will turn itself into hours at the stove canning sauces and jams, freezing everything, and slowly, the tremor of early fall will make me wake in a sweat in the middle of the night fearing a freak early frost until everything is harvested and the frosts start rolling in, and the root cellars are stocked and there's the constant smell of apples and wood smoke in the air. And then, maybe then, we will have a white winter which will remind us why spring is such a magical time.
Friday, March 5, 2010
Now What?
I'm still fixating on raising animals - but I think I'm a bit too scared to actually commit and jump in. There's a lot of upfront cost and work. I've been researching a new animal each day. Today I looked into geese. If it weren't for the fact that people don't really eat goose much it would be perfect. Eggs, down, feathers, quality meat, and really good foragers - plus low rates of disease and good at defending themselves. Kind of sounds too good to be true - which it is, seeing as people seem to think that goose is only good eating for Christmas.
The biggest hurdle to cross for me in starting a small-scale, backyard animal operation is going it alone. Animals, unlike vegetables, require constant vigilance. They require daily human attention, and the infrastructure can be pretty high, depending on the animal (though geese, chickens, and rabbits would only be a little more than putting in a new vegetable garden). Fencing is the most daunting part of the infrastructure. I'd build a little animal house any day, but banging in fence posts in rocky soil is up there on my list of things I really hate doing. Though my landlord wants to fence in the 5 acres behind the orchard anyway, so why not?
It's very conflicting. On the one hand, I want to live in line with my values, and i want to do the things which make me happy. On the other hand, I really don't want to overdo it. I want to be able to go to sleep at night without rattling off everything I have to do until the inside of my head tics like a clock. But I don't want to feel contented and blase in doing very little to move towards my goals - which is how I'm living right now (or at least, it feels like that). Okay, I admit, I've always been an overachiever. I've always started way too many projects, and been in a rush to do it all. I've also always left plenty new tasks undone. It's a pattern of mine, so I'm cautious about taking on anything new - even though I'm less stressed than I have been ever before. And yet, I know I can easily get stuck in this place.
I don't want to become exhausted, over-worked, or resentful. I don't want to fail miserably by taking on too much, or by taking on projects that aren't well suited for me. I want time to sit in my living room and daydream. And to be honest - I want to play second fiddle sometimes. Being the only person around to clean the house, cook food, start seeds, motivate myself, and tell myself to take a break gets very hum-drum. I'm generally stronger, braver, and more productive when I work alone, but it's tiring to always have to be the brave, motivational one. And that's what I feel most strongly with the animal question. I want to do it with someone - someone I trust and someone with whom I'm on equal footing. I want someone to share the responsibilities, the risk, and the blessings with me.
That's one of the reasons that makes me feel strongest about putting off getting animals for at least another year or so. hopefully by next spring there'll be someone to raise animals with. This year I could easily content myself with helping out my friends at Awesome Farm - which doesn't address that I want extra income, but it'll at least give me some experience - which I know I need. My landlords have their own little farm stand that they've offered me selling space on, and I could easily get some friends to sell home-made products for me if it came down to it - I don't have to focus on animals.
As all the reasoning piles up I still wonder if I'm reasoning myself out of committing myself to something that would be meaningful, important, and exciting out of fear and temerity. It's a strange line to walk - and I can't tell which side of it I'm on.
I don't know. It somehow ties in with how this article about the trade-off of back-to-the-land'ing has been on my mind. I don't find radical all-out homesteading to be terribly appealing, and I don't particularly want to put myself on that road, except I'm not even close to being an all-out homesteader. In fact - I'm farther than I'd like to be. but i want those skills. And i want to know how to make do. I just don't know when and how it makes sense to escalate my commitment to all of this.
I've been gardening for 4 years now. I still love it, but I want more, and I want to see myself moving in the right direction - which includes making some extra money and gaining more land-based skills - and animals seem to be a way to marry the two. It's not like I'd be making much money - but if I started small, I could at least break even, given a good business plan. It's not like I'm looking at buying a flock of 250 birds, or 100 rabbits. I'm thinking more on the order of 10-20 animals for sale at the end of the season, plus a small breeding stock. Enough to cover the costs of putting some of the meat on my own table and maybe to cover one of my minor expenses - like heat - for next year. That would make it plenty worth it.
I just don't know.
The biggest hurdle to cross for me in starting a small-scale, backyard animal operation is going it alone. Animals, unlike vegetables, require constant vigilance. They require daily human attention, and the infrastructure can be pretty high, depending on the animal (though geese, chickens, and rabbits would only be a little more than putting in a new vegetable garden). Fencing is the most daunting part of the infrastructure. I'd build a little animal house any day, but banging in fence posts in rocky soil is up there on my list of things I really hate doing. Though my landlord wants to fence in the 5 acres behind the orchard anyway, so why not?
It's very conflicting. On the one hand, I want to live in line with my values, and i want to do the things which make me happy. On the other hand, I really don't want to overdo it. I want to be able to go to sleep at night without rattling off everything I have to do until the inside of my head tics like a clock. But I don't want to feel contented and blase in doing very little to move towards my goals - which is how I'm living right now (or at least, it feels like that). Okay, I admit, I've always been an overachiever. I've always started way too many projects, and been in a rush to do it all. I've also always left plenty new tasks undone. It's a pattern of mine, so I'm cautious about taking on anything new - even though I'm less stressed than I have been ever before. And yet, I know I can easily get stuck in this place.
I don't want to become exhausted, over-worked, or resentful. I don't want to fail miserably by taking on too much, or by taking on projects that aren't well suited for me. I want time to sit in my living room and daydream. And to be honest - I want to play second fiddle sometimes. Being the only person around to clean the house, cook food, start seeds, motivate myself, and tell myself to take a break gets very hum-drum. I'm generally stronger, braver, and more productive when I work alone, but it's tiring to always have to be the brave, motivational one. And that's what I feel most strongly with the animal question. I want to do it with someone - someone I trust and someone with whom I'm on equal footing. I want someone to share the responsibilities, the risk, and the blessings with me.
That's one of the reasons that makes me feel strongest about putting off getting animals for at least another year or so. hopefully by next spring there'll be someone to raise animals with. This year I could easily content myself with helping out my friends at Awesome Farm - which doesn't address that I want extra income, but it'll at least give me some experience - which I know I need. My landlords have their own little farm stand that they've offered me selling space on, and I could easily get some friends to sell home-made products for me if it came down to it - I don't have to focus on animals.
As all the reasoning piles up I still wonder if I'm reasoning myself out of committing myself to something that would be meaningful, important, and exciting out of fear and temerity. It's a strange line to walk - and I can't tell which side of it I'm on.
I don't know. It somehow ties in with how this article about the trade-off of back-to-the-land'ing has been on my mind. I don't find radical all-out homesteading to be terribly appealing, and I don't particularly want to put myself on that road, except I'm not even close to being an all-out homesteader. In fact - I'm farther than I'd like to be. but i want those skills. And i want to know how to make do. I just don't know when and how it makes sense to escalate my commitment to all of this.
I've been gardening for 4 years now. I still love it, but I want more, and I want to see myself moving in the right direction - which includes making some extra money and gaining more land-based skills - and animals seem to be a way to marry the two. It's not like I'd be making much money - but if I started small, I could at least break even, given a good business plan. It's not like I'm looking at buying a flock of 250 birds, or 100 rabbits. I'm thinking more on the order of 10-20 animals for sale at the end of the season, plus a small breeding stock. Enough to cover the costs of putting some of the meat on my own table and maybe to cover one of my minor expenses - like heat - for next year. That would make it plenty worth it.
I just don't know.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Excuse me for a minute...
Dearest Self,
You do not actually want to raise a flock of chickens, sheep, goats, alpacas, or anything else. It's just the spring talking. I know it could supplement your income, help you get closer to the things you want to be doing, give you some much-wanted skills, and even give you the best excuse to not go anywhere ever, but do you really want to commit to waking up at 6 AM every day, not traveling at all (including weekends) unless you have a trusted animal-sitter, and otherwise relegating your life to lovable little fluff/feather balls that poop everywhere and do their best to get eaten? I think not. Snap out of it and get some sense! Plus, you do not want to build a fence. I know you don't. You hate building fences.
Love,
Yourself
Dearest Yourself,
What if I stage a coop d'etat and do it anyway?
Love,
Self
You do not actually want to raise a flock of chickens, sheep, goats, alpacas, or anything else. It's just the spring talking. I know it could supplement your income, help you get closer to the things you want to be doing, give you some much-wanted skills, and even give you the best excuse to not go anywhere ever, but do you really want to commit to waking up at 6 AM every day, not traveling at all (including weekends) unless you have a trusted animal-sitter, and otherwise relegating your life to lovable little fluff/feather balls that poop everywhere and do their best to get eaten? I think not. Snap out of it and get some sense! Plus, you do not want to build a fence. I know you don't. You hate building fences.
Love,
Yourself
Dearest Yourself,
What if I stage a coop d'etat and do it anyway?
Love,
Self
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
About that Seed Starting...
I suddenly remembered (yesterday) that I had planned to figure out the details of my seed starting, buy everything, and set it up by now. Oops. Clearly, I've been a bit distracted. Not that I mind being distracted, but these things need to get done!
So what I did was figure out that I need to start 68 plants (I'm started a third more plants than I need of each variety), and then, given that they will be grown in 3 inch pots, I figured out the dimensions of the space I would need (3 pots by 23 pots is 9"x68", 4 pots by 17 pots is 12"x51" and so on). then I went and measured every available surface I had in the house (I don't want to build shelves) and found that the desk I NEVER use in my bedroom is not only a good bit larger than the necessary area, but is in the warmest spot in the house and is close enough to a low ceiling to easily accommodate a florescent light with adjustable chains for height without any other rigging. As for cat-proofing - we'll just have to hope, for now. if it gets bad, I'll make a chicken wire cage around the plants. I'll cover the surface of the desk with plastic so as not to hurt the pretty wood.
So that means I need to purchase:
1 florescent light fixture and bulb (about 40" long)
2 chains - 40" and 30" (it's a sloped ceiling)
2 ceiling hooks that can take the weight
...which really isn't bad at all.
I will make a bunch of little pots out of newspaper. Tutorial to follow.
Added bonus: that desk was a mess and during the lovely snow day I had this morning, I got a chance to finally (and for the first time, I think) clean it off.
So what I did was figure out that I need to start 68 plants (I'm started a third more plants than I need of each variety), and then, given that they will be grown in 3 inch pots, I figured out the dimensions of the space I would need (3 pots by 23 pots is 9"x68", 4 pots by 17 pots is 12"x51" and so on). then I went and measured every available surface I had in the house (I don't want to build shelves) and found that the desk I NEVER use in my bedroom is not only a good bit larger than the necessary area, but is in the warmest spot in the house and is close enough to a low ceiling to easily accommodate a florescent light with adjustable chains for height without any other rigging. As for cat-proofing - we'll just have to hope, for now. if it gets bad, I'll make a chicken wire cage around the plants. I'll cover the surface of the desk with plastic so as not to hurt the pretty wood.
So that means I need to purchase:
1 florescent light fixture and bulb (about 40" long)
2 chains - 40" and 30" (it's a sloped ceiling)
2 ceiling hooks that can take the weight
...which really isn't bad at all.
I will make a bunch of little pots out of newspaper. Tutorial to follow.
Added bonus: that desk was a mess and during the lovely snow day I had this morning, I got a chance to finally (and for the first time, I think) clean it off.
Friday, February 12, 2010
Planning for Indoor Seed-Starting
I'm late! I'm late! The spring season has been ticking closer and the sudden toe-tapping feeling has come over me. Oncoming spring always makes me feel late. I walked into my landlord's house to chat about laundry and thank him for keeping my fire going when I had an unexpectedly long stint away from home last weekend, and saw a fully rigged set up of shelves with florescent lighting to start the lettuces and tomatoes. I haven't even cleared enough space in my living room to start seeds yet! I haven't even ordered my onion sets yet! or discussed my garden plans with my landlord!
But really, it's okay. My farming friends are only starting their onion seeds now (they grow from seeds, not sets - sets are tiny second-year onions started the previous autumn and then over-wintered. They grow faster to ensure nice, fat bulbs, and are easier to maintain for those of us who don't have the faith in our gardening skills to grow onions from seed). They will start tomatoes in March. I will follow their example and chill out. I've already numbered all my weeks in my planner backwards from the last frost for the region (May 20th), so i always know what week it is (The week starting Monday, February 15th is 13 weeks from the last frost). In the mean time, there's a lot to think about.
Here's my plan:
This week I will:
- Design my indoor seed-starting set-up
This includes:
- Figure out how many seeds I will be started and what the system will look like
- Figure out if I need to heat the system (I hope not)
- Figure out how to keep the cat out of the seedlings
- Make a full shopping list for what I need
Also this week I will:
- Actually talk to my landlord about my garden plans and the where and when of it
- Buy onion sets, herb seeds, and other things i don't have! I will buy my next round of seeds from Fedco, which is the cheapest and most responsible northeast seed company with a comprehensive variety of seeds)
next week I will (12 weeks before the last frost):
- Buy the necessary equipment
The following week I will (11 weeks before the last frost)
- rig up the seed-starting system
- run a test-start with lettuces, and possibly okra (i need to do some more research on this Southern, heat-loving plant which grows so anemically here in the Northeast)
9 weeks before the last frost (the third week in March):
I will start my earliest seedlings (tomatoes, peppers, okra, and I'll probably start my herbs and flowers as well)
But really, it's okay. My farming friends are only starting their onion seeds now (they grow from seeds, not sets - sets are tiny second-year onions started the previous autumn and then over-wintered. They grow faster to ensure nice, fat bulbs, and are easier to maintain for those of us who don't have the faith in our gardening skills to grow onions from seed). They will start tomatoes in March. I will follow their example and chill out. I've already numbered all my weeks in my planner backwards from the last frost for the region (May 20th), so i always know what week it is (The week starting Monday, February 15th is 13 weeks from the last frost). In the mean time, there's a lot to think about.
Here's my plan:
This week I will:
- Design my indoor seed-starting set-up
This includes:
- Figure out how many seeds I will be started and what the system will look like
- Figure out if I need to heat the system (I hope not)
- Figure out how to keep the cat out of the seedlings
- Make a full shopping list for what I need
Also this week I will:
- Actually talk to my landlord about my garden plans and the where and when of it
- Buy onion sets, herb seeds, and other things i don't have! I will buy my next round of seeds from Fedco, which is the cheapest and most responsible northeast seed company with a comprehensive variety of seeds)
next week I will (12 weeks before the last frost):
- Buy the necessary equipment
The following week I will (11 weeks before the last frost)
- rig up the seed-starting system
- run a test-start with lettuces, and possibly okra (i need to do some more research on this Southern, heat-loving plant which grows so anemically here in the Northeast)
9 weeks before the last frost (the third week in March):
I will start my earliest seedlings (tomatoes, peppers, okra, and I'll probably start my herbs and flowers as well)
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Seeds!
I said it about a week ago, and now I've finally gone and done it - It's time to order seeds! So I chose my favorite seed company - our very own Hudson Valley Seed Library and picked my favorites. Not only is the seed library an incredibly exciting local venture into the often nebulous world of seed companies, it is also a lovely and friendly organization. Thanks to buying a membership I got several free seed packs (see below) and discounts on all of my purchases (which is fairly exciting). Being the wonderfully thoughtful and community-oriented business that they are, the Seed Library works with local artists to design art packs for a selection of their seeds which are beautiful and fun to have around. My favorite perk though? - they're small enough to keep me from buying EVERY seed I can possibly think of wanting! Which is important, because even the 20+ seeds I bought will be excessive for my home garden.
Here's a note from their website for the curious:
"We have three kinds of seed packs now to help distinguish between our seed sources. Our Art Packs are the colorful, flower shaped packs that have original artwork from 16 different New York artists. Our Garden Packs feature a design made by us and contain seeds from responsible commercial sources pre-selected by us to do well in the Northeast. Our Library Packs, which feature an image from an antique 1881 New York seed catalog, contain only local seeds- either grown here on our farm, another New York farm, or a mix of seeds from other seed saving members.
Here's my order:
Membership Pack
Garden Pack All American Parsnip -- included with membership
Library Pack Amish Paste Tomato
Library Pack Aunt Molly's Ground Cherry
Garden Pack Benning's Green Tint Patty Pan Squash
Garden Pack Bibb Lettuce -- included with membership
Library Pack Black Krim Tomato
Garden Pack Blue Lake Pole Green Bean -- included with membership
Art Pack Borage
Library Pack Bridge to Paris Pepper -- included with membership
Library Pack Calendula
Art Pack Calico Popcorn
Garden Pack Chives
Garden Pack Clemson Spineless Okra -- included with membership
Garden Pack Danish Ballhead Cabbage -- included with membership
Library Pack Garden Peach Tomato
Art Pack Painted Daisy
Library Pack Purple Podded Pea -- included with membership
Garden Pack Red Russian Kale -- included with membership
Garden Pack Royal Burgandy Bush Beans -- included with membership
Garden Pack Royal Oakleaf Lettuce -- included with membership
Art Pack Ruby Queen Beet
Garden Pack Scarlet Nantes Carrot
My Reasoning
Yum! As you can tell from my selection - I tend to ignore flowers. I try, really I do, but I have trouble focusing on them. This year, I'm giving in to what I've always known to be true about myself and only growing 2 flowers - calendula, which I need for salves, and borage, which is a perennial and is easy.
I have avoided certain productive veggies that are just too easy to come by in the summer. I'm not a huge fan of cucumbers, but when I need them, the local farmstand (aka - my landlord's farm/garden) will always have them - and they're too prolific for my small needs. Plus, I prefer pickled pattypans (seriously) to pickled cucumbers (same goes for zucchinis). My landlords have a large and prolific herbs section of their garden, and I have decided to rely on their surplus rather than to grow my own.
Then there are my splurges - 3 kinds of tomatoes? Absolutely! 1 for canning and drying (Amish paste - which will be the most dominant plant variety in my garden) 1 for fresh eating (Krim) and 1 for fun (peach). I love tomatoes. Love them. And they make summer worth it (which is why last summer was not worth it)
I already have garlic in the ground and potatoes for planting in the cellar, plus the library doesn't sell these. The only thing left is to get onions, some extra herbs, and possibly a few herbal favorites from Fedco, which I will share with you when I buy.
Share your list with me. I'm so excited and invigorated now that I cannot wait to go home and plan my garden!
Also, check out this wonderful and well thought-out article. We need more of this kind of debate in our lives: (I found it on Bitten)
Here's a note from their website for the curious:
"We have three kinds of seed packs now to help distinguish between our seed sources. Our Art Packs are the colorful, flower shaped packs that have original artwork from 16 different New York artists. Our Garden Packs feature a design made by us and contain seeds from responsible commercial sources pre-selected by us to do well in the Northeast. Our Library Packs, which feature an image from an antique 1881 New York seed catalog, contain only local seeds- either grown here on our farm, another New York farm, or a mix of seeds from other seed saving members.
Here's my order:
Membership Pack
Garden Pack All American Parsnip -- included with membership
Library Pack Amish Paste Tomato
Library Pack Aunt Molly's Ground Cherry
Garden Pack Benning's Green Tint Patty Pan Squash
Garden Pack Bibb Lettuce -- included with membership
Library Pack Black Krim Tomato
Garden Pack Blue Lake Pole Green Bean -- included with membership
Art Pack Borage
Library Pack Bridge to Paris Pepper -- included with membership
Library Pack Calendula
Art Pack Calico Popcorn
Garden Pack Chives
Garden Pack Clemson Spineless Okra -- included with membership
Garden Pack Danish Ballhead Cabbage -- included with membership
Library Pack Garden Peach Tomato
Art Pack Painted Daisy
Library Pack Purple Podded Pea -- included with membership
Garden Pack Red Russian Kale -- included with membership
Garden Pack Royal Burgandy Bush Beans -- included with membership
Garden Pack Royal Oakleaf Lettuce -- included with membership
Art Pack Ruby Queen Beet
Garden Pack Scarlet Nantes Carrot
My Reasoning
Yum! As you can tell from my selection - I tend to ignore flowers. I try, really I do, but I have trouble focusing on them. This year, I'm giving in to what I've always known to be true about myself and only growing 2 flowers - calendula, which I need for salves, and borage, which is a perennial and is easy.
I have avoided certain productive veggies that are just too easy to come by in the summer. I'm not a huge fan of cucumbers, but when I need them, the local farmstand (aka - my landlord's farm/garden) will always have them - and they're too prolific for my small needs. Plus, I prefer pickled pattypans (seriously) to pickled cucumbers (same goes for zucchinis). My landlords have a large and prolific herbs section of their garden, and I have decided to rely on their surplus rather than to grow my own.
Then there are my splurges - 3 kinds of tomatoes? Absolutely! 1 for canning and drying (Amish paste - which will be the most dominant plant variety in my garden) 1 for fresh eating (Krim) and 1 for fun (peach). I love tomatoes. Love them. And they make summer worth it (which is why last summer was not worth it)
I already have garlic in the ground and potatoes for planting in the cellar, plus the library doesn't sell these. The only thing left is to get onions, some extra herbs, and possibly a few herbal favorites from Fedco, which I will share with you when I buy.
Share your list with me. I'm so excited and invigorated now that I cannot wait to go home and plan my garden!
Also, check out this wonderful and well thought-out article. We need more of this kind of debate in our lives: (I found it on Bitten)
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Sprouting Seeds, Dreaming Dreams
At home last night I could not bring myself to look through the seed catalogues. I am not ready for the decadent laziness of winter to come to an end. Don't get me wrong, I would love to run outside without 7 layers on as much as the next person, and I know that it's still only early January, and I'm nervous I don't have enough wood, but I do find the winter's glorious laziness to be a spa treatment, just as much as I find the meditation of gardening to be a balm for the over-stimulated soul. That being said, I'm nervous and humbled every year before the commitment of gardening. I dream for weeks before planting my first seed about the impossible miracle of a seed sprouting and growing for me. How is it that this tiny seed will grow for me? Am I worthy of its life? Why would she want to grow in my garden? As absurd as it seems, these questions start running through my slowly waking mind as the sun moves toward her longest day. There is nothing left but to be awed and humbled by the miracle of a seed growing for me in my garden.
So if you have the energy to look forward into a new year of garden work and toil, and if the miracle of a sprouting seed doesn't humble you to the point of immobility, check out this awesome blog which tells you all about how to check the germination rates of your old seeds which, it turns out, you don't have to throw out! So if you're prone to overdoing it (like I am) it might not all be for naught. And if you're in the Northeast, do order a few seeds for them. Their artist packs make for great presents, and they're very much worth supporting.
Ah, but my dear readers, I'm worried about the spring. not to the point of immobility, but to the point of vivid dreams. I've worked full time before while having a large garden. It's possible, and even enjoyable, after a day of office work to come home at 5, when the heat has abated, and work until 9, when the sun is just setting, in the garden. But I am worried. What if the potatoes won't grow for me, or the soil turns out to be too rocky to smile on me? What if I really don't want to work full time at this desk through the summer? What if I'd rather be making salves and teas and jams and selling them at farm markets? What if, what if, what if!?
But, my dear readers, we must all work for a living, and that, in itself, is not and cannot be a tragedy. The tragedy, I find, is when it forces us to dream our dreams in secret.
So if you have the energy to look forward into a new year of garden work and toil, and if the miracle of a sprouting seed doesn't humble you to the point of immobility, check out this awesome blog which tells you all about how to check the germination rates of your old seeds which, it turns out, you don't have to throw out! So if you're prone to overdoing it (like I am) it might not all be for naught. And if you're in the Northeast, do order a few seeds for them. Their artist packs make for great presents, and they're very much worth supporting.
Ah, but my dear readers, I'm worried about the spring. not to the point of immobility, but to the point of vivid dreams. I've worked full time before while having a large garden. It's possible, and even enjoyable, after a day of office work to come home at 5, when the heat has abated, and work until 9, when the sun is just setting, in the garden. But I am worried. What if the potatoes won't grow for me, or the soil turns out to be too rocky to smile on me? What if I really don't want to work full time at this desk through the summer? What if I'd rather be making salves and teas and jams and selling them at farm markets? What if, what if, what if!?
But, my dear readers, we must all work for a living, and that, in itself, is not and cannot be a tragedy. The tragedy, I find, is when it forces us to dream our dreams in secret.
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
The January Garden To-Do List
Every year, usually around May, I realize with a sudden flash of fear and clammy palms that it will be another one of those years where I will always be at least one week behind. This year, that happened today, IN JANUARY, the same day I found my favorite seed catalogue in my mailbox.
Thankfully, I am no true homesteader. My life and livelihood doesn't rely on getting onions into seed trays anytime in the near future. In fact, I fully intend to wait until the end of February to do anything along the lines of starting seeds. Hell, I don't even have a garden to speak of! A whole new year of garden planning and seed ordering and seed starting awaits!
So, to keep you from breaking into a cold sweat sometime in March, here's a quick reminder: Gardening starts in the winter. (Other things that homesteaders do in January include ordering hives and bees, hunting small game, and trying not to freeze to death) So start your gardening adventures now and stave off winter boredom. Here's how:
The January Gardener:
Overview:
-Plan garden
-order seeds
Planning your garden
This time of year is when you can day dream all you want. If you don't have a garden, plan your garden now. Helpful tools include John Jeavon's guide: How To Grow More Vegetables, which I would go ahead and buy. I would go ahead and scour your library's garden section and talk to anyone you know who has a garden and ask for tips.
Here are some of my garden-planning tips to live by:
- Don't over do it! (I have always overdone it.) No one person needs, in their first (or even third) garden enough space to have a small farm, unless you intend to sell produce and farm. If you are a part-time gardener, figure out how much time you'd like to spend in your garden and about how much produce you'd like to harvest and plan accordingly. You will never eat a 20 foot row's worth of lettuce, and 20 feet of tomatoes is only plausible if you intend to can them.
- Plan your garden out on paper, and work from concepts to details. First plan out where the garden will be and how big you want it, then move onto how to lay out beds and how to make the beds (double digging, sheet-mulching, etc.), and only then figure out what to plant where. When figuring out what to plant where, your future self will be grateful if you plan in a simple vegetable rotation plan.
- When thinking about where to put your garden, consider important details such as shade (you want good southern exposure), runoff, soil compaction, soil structure, previous gardening in the area, and anything that grows in the area that might thwart the garden (such as a black walnut tree or thistle).
- Plan your garden close to home. A garden in a distant back corner of the yard is not a garden you will ever tend to. put your garden somewhere that will require your attention - preferably on the front lawn staring you down on your walk to your car. That way, you will see every weed popping up and will be compelled to actually work in your garden. If you refuse to plant in the front yard, at least plan your garden next to a path you walk on every other day or so (such as the path to your compost). You will want to be in the garden at least 3-4 times a week (depending on the weather), so plan accordingly.
- Do not lay down anything permanent, like stone paths, for the first few years. Just trust me on this one.
- If there are deer where you live, you will want a fence. The easiest dear fence is wire stretched across posts- one string 2 feet off the ground and another at 6 feet up. If there are rodents, rabbits, and groundhogs (who just don't respect fences), I'd invest in a garden-friendly cat.
Ordering Seeds
-Once again, don't overdo it. (and once again, I always do). Seeds don't last forever (most don't at least), so buy only as much as you need, which is a surprisingly small amount
-Catalogues are always cheaper than buying at nurseries. Fedco, Seed Savers Exchange, and local seed libraries such as Hudson Valley Seed Library are awesome, grass-roots sources for seeds grown, saved, and kept alive by family farmers and the like. Most other seed catalogues carry seeds owned by major conglomerates such as Monsanto without letting you know.
- Quick vocabulary: Organic seed refers to seed grown by certified organic standards. Organic farmers are required to use organic seed. You can grow your plants organically even with conventional (read: non-organic - grown with chemicals and whatnot) seed. Open Pollinated (also known as "OP" or "heirloom") refers to seeds that are bred and saved using traditional seed saving techniques. Seeds saved from plants grown from open pollinated seed will produce a second generation true in kind. You can only save seed from open pollinated plants. Open pollinated plants are not hybrids. Hybrid seeds (commonly listed as "F1" in catalogues) are high-performing seeds made from two very different varieties of plants that were forced to cross. This forced cross creates a seed that will produce a plant in its first generation (F1 refers to the first generation cross) that has certain favorable traits - usually productivity. However, any seed saved from plants grown from hybrid seed will produce a second generation of plants that is completely confused and not true to kind. This is because seed breeding is actually a long and extended process that requires the stabilization of traits over several generations. If you want to know more about seed saving, check out this book. In general, I would buy OP for the variety and the beauty, with the exception of sweet corn, which, in its OP form, isn't actually sweet.
- Don't even bother buying: seeds to commonly found perennial plants that need to be split or grow abundantly. Instead, talk to your friends and neighbors and see if you can split some of their plants. So many people have rhubarb that needs to be split, or bee balm that you can transplant, etc. that it just doesn't make sense to wait 3 years for the plants to mature. Things that fall into this category include: comfrey, mint (which grows so abundantly that it would be a sin to pay for - excepting special varieties) almost all flowering bushes, most perennial herbs (which are easier to propagate by cuttings or transplanting than seed), etc.
-Certain things aren't typically grown from seeds - and so you shouldn't look for the seed. The examples of these are potatoes and garlic (which should have been planted in October anyway). Also, people tend to buy onion sets rather than seed - which are second-year onion bulbs which will grow faster and easier than seed.
Enjoy your garden plans and don't stress too much! We're all in this together.
Thankfully, I am no true homesteader. My life and livelihood doesn't rely on getting onions into seed trays anytime in the near future. In fact, I fully intend to wait until the end of February to do anything along the lines of starting seeds. Hell, I don't even have a garden to speak of! A whole new year of garden planning and seed ordering and seed starting awaits!
So, to keep you from breaking into a cold sweat sometime in March, here's a quick reminder: Gardening starts in the winter. (Other things that homesteaders do in January include ordering hives and bees, hunting small game, and trying not to freeze to death) So start your gardening adventures now and stave off winter boredom. Here's how:
The January Gardener:
Overview:
-Plan garden
-order seeds
Planning your garden
This time of year is when you can day dream all you want. If you don't have a garden, plan your garden now. Helpful tools include John Jeavon's guide: How To Grow More Vegetables, which I would go ahead and buy. I would go ahead and scour your library's garden section and talk to anyone you know who has a garden and ask for tips.
Here are some of my garden-planning tips to live by:
- Don't over do it! (I have always overdone it.) No one person needs, in their first (or even third) garden enough space to have a small farm, unless you intend to sell produce and farm. If you are a part-time gardener, figure out how much time you'd like to spend in your garden and about how much produce you'd like to harvest and plan accordingly. You will never eat a 20 foot row's worth of lettuce, and 20 feet of tomatoes is only plausible if you intend to can them.
- Plan your garden out on paper, and work from concepts to details. First plan out where the garden will be and how big you want it, then move onto how to lay out beds and how to make the beds (double digging, sheet-mulching, etc.), and only then figure out what to plant where. When figuring out what to plant where, your future self will be grateful if you plan in a simple vegetable rotation plan.
- When thinking about where to put your garden, consider important details such as shade (you want good southern exposure), runoff, soil compaction, soil structure, previous gardening in the area, and anything that grows in the area that might thwart the garden (such as a black walnut tree or thistle).
- Plan your garden close to home. A garden in a distant back corner of the yard is not a garden you will ever tend to. put your garden somewhere that will require your attention - preferably on the front lawn staring you down on your walk to your car. That way, you will see every weed popping up and will be compelled to actually work in your garden. If you refuse to plant in the front yard, at least plan your garden next to a path you walk on every other day or so (such as the path to your compost). You will want to be in the garden at least 3-4 times a week (depending on the weather), so plan accordingly.
- Do not lay down anything permanent, like stone paths, for the first few years. Just trust me on this one.
- If there are deer where you live, you will want a fence. The easiest dear fence is wire stretched across posts- one string 2 feet off the ground and another at 6 feet up. If there are rodents, rabbits, and groundhogs (who just don't respect fences), I'd invest in a garden-friendly cat.
Ordering Seeds
-Once again, don't overdo it. (and once again, I always do). Seeds don't last forever (most don't at least), so buy only as much as you need, which is a surprisingly small amount
-Catalogues are always cheaper than buying at nurseries. Fedco, Seed Savers Exchange, and local seed libraries such as Hudson Valley Seed Library are awesome, grass-roots sources for seeds grown, saved, and kept alive by family farmers and the like. Most other seed catalogues carry seeds owned by major conglomerates such as Monsanto without letting you know.
- Quick vocabulary: Organic seed refers to seed grown by certified organic standards. Organic farmers are required to use organic seed. You can grow your plants organically even with conventional (read: non-organic - grown with chemicals and whatnot) seed. Open Pollinated (also known as "OP" or "heirloom") refers to seeds that are bred and saved using traditional seed saving techniques. Seeds saved from plants grown from open pollinated seed will produce a second generation true in kind. You can only save seed from open pollinated plants. Open pollinated plants are not hybrids. Hybrid seeds (commonly listed as "F1" in catalogues) are high-performing seeds made from two very different varieties of plants that were forced to cross. This forced cross creates a seed that will produce a plant in its first generation (F1 refers to the first generation cross) that has certain favorable traits - usually productivity. However, any seed saved from plants grown from hybrid seed will produce a second generation of plants that is completely confused and not true to kind. This is because seed breeding is actually a long and extended process that requires the stabilization of traits over several generations. If you want to know more about seed saving, check out this book. In general, I would buy OP for the variety and the beauty, with the exception of sweet corn, which, in its OP form, isn't actually sweet.
- Don't even bother buying: seeds to commonly found perennial plants that need to be split or grow abundantly. Instead, talk to your friends and neighbors and see if you can split some of their plants. So many people have rhubarb that needs to be split, or bee balm that you can transplant, etc. that it just doesn't make sense to wait 3 years for the plants to mature. Things that fall into this category include: comfrey, mint (which grows so abundantly that it would be a sin to pay for - excepting special varieties) almost all flowering bushes, most perennial herbs (which are easier to propagate by cuttings or transplanting than seed), etc.
-Certain things aren't typically grown from seeds - and so you shouldn't look for the seed. The examples of these are potatoes and garlic (which should have been planted in October anyway). Also, people tend to buy onion sets rather than seed - which are second-year onion bulbs which will grow faster and easier than seed.
Enjoy your garden plans and don't stress too much! We're all in this together.
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
An Homage to Home
My beautiful wooden dish drying rack broke sometime this weekend. No one told me it was collapsing, so one side caved and the second side, held together only by a peg, twisted and pulled the peg out with the force of the uneven weight of drying dishes. With time to kill as a date was running horribly late (to the tune of 3 hours), I tried my options. I whittled down some twigs to use as pegs - which were too weak to hold without twisting while I hammered the thing together. One broke and is now stuck in the hole for the peg - which will be easy enough to dislodge with a sharp knife (I hope). So tonight I'm going to go and buy some pegs. It's a beautiful dish rack that's very fixable and I have no intention of throwing it out.
Most of our waste comes from things not being reused or not being seen as reusable. We seem to generally refuse to accept the possibility that things actually are fixable, and therefore are reusable. Of course, it makes perfect sense that replacing is easier than fixing - things are cheap, and with at least 40 hours of each week going into work, who has time to fix what could just be replaced?
When things around the house break or clothes rip, I feel morally obligated by my own frugality to fix them or sew them up, and not to waste by throwing whatever broke out and getting a new one. As a result of financial need, a tinkering habit, and a deep love of older, well-crafted, simple (and therefore fixable) objects, I have turned frugality into a hobby. This hobby of mine makes living cheap fun and easy, and makes my sense of moral obligation to waste not less preachy - and less central to the point. Morality is far less effective in motivating me than simple pleasures - so I try to combine the two.
***
When my date finally did arrive (I did not turn him away at the door. I'll be honest, a part of me had wanted to, but I was far too excited to see him), he was surprised by my house. He paid me a compliment I had not even considered until the moment. "I have never seen a 23 year-old," he said "with a house this well kept."
My home is an homage to the concept of home in the same way that a poem is an homage to the concept of a poem. My home is a work of art. How could it not be? These walls are the only walls that contain me and all things mine. I have chosen them. Home is a simple and modest shrine made by and in honor of daily tasks. There is a holiness in the home. It is the only holy place I have ever known. It is the sacred heart of the tasks and objects of life, love, and family. If home is not beautiful and well cared for, if our shrines are not places of exaltation, how can we exalt within them? The quest for a life of grace, wonder, and beauty is an uphill battle if a home is not a shrine to the best that we hold inside ourselves - to the holiness of even our most mundane daily tasks. These tasks that are not only necessary, but are themselves an homage to the potential of their own perfection. it is all, on days when the sun shines and the home holds its sacred heart, a poem.
Most of our waste comes from things not being reused or not being seen as reusable. We seem to generally refuse to accept the possibility that things actually are fixable, and therefore are reusable. Of course, it makes perfect sense that replacing is easier than fixing - things are cheap, and with at least 40 hours of each week going into work, who has time to fix what could just be replaced?
When things around the house break or clothes rip, I feel morally obligated by my own frugality to fix them or sew them up, and not to waste by throwing whatever broke out and getting a new one. As a result of financial need, a tinkering habit, and a deep love of older, well-crafted, simple (and therefore fixable) objects, I have turned frugality into a hobby. This hobby of mine makes living cheap fun and easy, and makes my sense of moral obligation to waste not less preachy - and less central to the point. Morality is far less effective in motivating me than simple pleasures - so I try to combine the two.
***
When my date finally did arrive (I did not turn him away at the door. I'll be honest, a part of me had wanted to, but I was far too excited to see him), he was surprised by my house. He paid me a compliment I had not even considered until the moment. "I have never seen a 23 year-old," he said "with a house this well kept."
My home is an homage to the concept of home in the same way that a poem is an homage to the concept of a poem. My home is a work of art. How could it not be? These walls are the only walls that contain me and all things mine. I have chosen them. Home is a simple and modest shrine made by and in honor of daily tasks. There is a holiness in the home. It is the only holy place I have ever known. It is the sacred heart of the tasks and objects of life, love, and family. If home is not beautiful and well cared for, if our shrines are not places of exaltation, how can we exalt within them? The quest for a life of grace, wonder, and beauty is an uphill battle if a home is not a shrine to the best that we hold inside ourselves - to the holiness of even our most mundane daily tasks. These tasks that are not only necessary, but are themselves an homage to the potential of their own perfection. it is all, on days when the sun shines and the home holds its sacred heart, a poem.
Friday, November 13, 2009
Jumping in - a note on purpose
When I was a child traveling with my family, we would drive past little homestead farms in Costa Rica or Botswana or Italy and I would think, "This makes sense. It's beautiful." And I would think that this simpler life - working for food rather than working for money that buys food - was perhaps better than our own. From inside the air-conditioned van I'd stare out the window, reasoning with myself in that strangely astute and unselfaware manner of childhood, that this simpler life was not to be had in America. That it was not allowed here. America was where we came to escape poverty and sadness and the demons of the past, and since the past was an infinite beast that blurs and won't sit still long enough to let us see its true nature - where one leg ends and the torso begins - our escape required us to also escape homesteading.
For years I have sworn that I really want to homestead. Every step I took that brought me closer to a simpler way of life has made me happy. But I've never taken more than two or three steps together. I've root cellared, gardened, canned, kept chickens, and dried. I've saved seed and sewed. But the truth is - when everyone tells you that there's a reason people live in cities and suburbs and it really is better and that I'm just being ungrateful - it's hard not to second-guess myself.
*******
When my ex and I moved into this house, we were excited because it was the kind of house that's a constant project. Its beauty lies in its imperfection and how it calls you to work on it. Its success in being a home lay in the work that it required, a work that would come out of love and build love. When he moved out, the house became daunting. He was the one who knew how to use a wood stove. He was the one who could use the circular saw. I'm terrified of circular saws. I staunchly and exclusively use a hand saw, and while I'll use a power chop-saw, I have an old, manual one that I prefer even though it needs a new blade.
So now I'm here, in this house, on this incredibly beautiful farm land, and the only thing keeping me from jumping in is a bit of fear and nagging doubts. So I'm jumping in. Head-first.
I promised myself when I was a child that I would try to live a simpler, soil-based life (I also once pinkie swore myself that I would never work 9-5, but look where that's gotten me), so I'm trying. Because if i don't jump in now, I might never get the chance to do it again. Because somehow I've managed to forget that I can do the things in life that matter - food, friendship, heat, laughter, joy - on my own, in my own house, with only myself for company. And I need to remember that.
For years I have sworn that I really want to homestead. Every step I took that brought me closer to a simpler way of life has made me happy. But I've never taken more than two or three steps together. I've root cellared, gardened, canned, kept chickens, and dried. I've saved seed and sewed. But the truth is - when everyone tells you that there's a reason people live in cities and suburbs and it really is better and that I'm just being ungrateful - it's hard not to second-guess myself.
*******
When my ex and I moved into this house, we were excited because it was the kind of house that's a constant project. Its beauty lies in its imperfection and how it calls you to work on it. Its success in being a home lay in the work that it required, a work that would come out of love and build love. When he moved out, the house became daunting. He was the one who knew how to use a wood stove. He was the one who could use the circular saw. I'm terrified of circular saws. I staunchly and exclusively use a hand saw, and while I'll use a power chop-saw, I have an old, manual one that I prefer even though it needs a new blade.
So now I'm here, in this house, on this incredibly beautiful farm land, and the only thing keeping me from jumping in is a bit of fear and nagging doubts. So I'm jumping in. Head-first.
I promised myself when I was a child that I would try to live a simpler, soil-based life (I also once pinkie swore myself that I would never work 9-5, but look where that's gotten me), so I'm trying. Because if i don't jump in now, I might never get the chance to do it again. Because somehow I've managed to forget that I can do the things in life that matter - food, friendship, heat, laughter, joy - on my own, in my own house, with only myself for company. And I need to remember that.
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