now what?

Well, I obviously lost track of keeping up the gardening blog. Now what? A crafting blog? I would like to get my craft jumpstarted again...perhaps this is the way.

sleepless in bend.

It would figure that earlier I was barely conscious enough to update on our corn, and at the moment (about 11pm PST) I am so wide awake that I didn't bother staying in bed. What's keeping me up?

Chickens.

But, you say, I thought you were excited about chickens? I am. That's part of the problem. The other part is that I'm worried to death that I'm going to fail miserably at this venture. I credit my mild obsessive-compulsive tendencies with this fear, as the only way I can be certain to do a good job at anything is to be too early, over-prepared, and wringing my hands with fret. This, of course, is a stupid, stupid way to think but I believe that it is partially not under my control and so I can only try and talk myself out of it. This leads to an utter lack of sleep.

Our very good friends are building the coop and committing to keeping the hens for the next two years at the very least. They will probably do the majority of the feeding, cleaning, and will have to put them out in the chicken tractor every day or so. Raising the chicks seems like a pathetic contribution to all that work, but I am still determined to do it. It feels right and so I will do it. But boy am I scared. Let me explain why my neuroses is turning my brain into a scramble at nearly midnight on a random Wednesday.

The chickens are shipped to Big R on March 20. That's a day and a week. In that time I need to know (see: over-prepared) exactly how to raise chicken babies. (I already know this because I've read the same bloody thing in a handful of different books by now, but my brain insists that I don't know enough.) I also need to get all the supplies that were offered by a friend of Tina's who has raised chicken babies before (and the only panic in this is that I don't already have them). One book mentioned a ceramic socket so the heat bulb doesn't melt the plastic and start a raging electrical fire. There is no way to explain my extreme phobia of electrical fires in so little space, so this particular facet of chicken-rearing has me feeling a little faint. Then there is the issue of working full time after getting said chicken babies. 

I'm terrified. What if something goes wrong when I'm not home? What if the heat lamp explodes? What if it falls into their crate and ignites them and no one is there to help? What if they get too cold and die a slow, freezing death and no one knows? Chicksicles. WHAT IF I KILL THEM ALL?

A good friend who has chickens of her own suggested to get an extra few above the number we're planning for because there will be a couple that inevitably die. How on earth do you choose a number to plan for this? We want six chickens. Do we get three extra? Four? What about six in case they are particularly prone to, well, death? How do I relegate myself to knowing that a good percentage of the chicks I purchase will be dead when I come home from work some time? What if I get attached? (Stupid, stupid question.) What if THEY ALL DIE?

I suppose my main theme here is that I'm responsible for a potential dozen, innocent lives, and I'm terrified that working full time is going to ensure their untimely demise. Yes. Yes, that is the whole thing right there in a nutshell preventing my slumber.

On top of this, I keep reading that hens take 24 weeks from birth to start laying. That's 6 months. I'm no mathematician, but even I know that buying chicks three months before summer (which is when you want them to lay) seems like a useless endeavor. So why are chicks being sold NOW? Are the books incorrect? Will chicks lay at 12 weeks? Are the chicks being sold 12 weeks old already? Are they magic chicks?

I'm going to go look for some NyQuil.

corn stalks.

Well, they aren't huge yet, but the corn has officially gone from "sprout" stage to "baby stalk" stage. (These stages are arbitrary. I made them up.) Erin made a makeshift plastic cover for the seedling tray and the temps inside rose to around 80 degrees. The peat/fiber pots were warm to the touch! Which translates into very happy corn (corn can germinate in soil up to or a little over 100 degrees!). Unfortunately, some of the corn that was still trying to germinate in the paper towels got super moldy - we forgot to account for how much extra heat the plastic cover would generate. Fortunately most of the corn made it and now we know the best ways to germinate the seeds quickly for another batch. We need to move on to a second heating mat/tray combo now.

Here are some exciting photos of our growing corn:

There isn't much else to report at the moment - excuse my lack of posting. We adopted a pound puppy three days ago and we are just tired new moms. In fact, I can't believe it's already been three days - I'm still in shock that we have this little furball altogether. It's been a dream for years that has finally come true. For good measure, I'll include a photo of him here:

In other news, Erin planted two broccoli seeds on the 6th and one sprouted today! She also planted 9 onion seeds on the 7th, but nothing there yet.

More later!

the more you know.

An undercover investigator has created a documentary based on factory pig farming which premiers on HBO on March 16th. Check out a couple of the clips on YouTube here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yuSSf8oSDtw&feature=related

Support local food. Support humane meat practices. Open your eyes.

mmmm greens.

Just wanted to upload some fun photos of our lettuce/spinach box. It's been approximately a month and a week since we planted the seeds and I have to admit, they are looking delicious...

   

proof of erin's innate farming talents

She may spend the vast majority of her time unemployed skiing and lounging, but when she puts her mind to it, she sure can haul some ass. Have a look at these gorgeous coldframes she built in about two hours each:

 

PS - Please ignore all that crap in our garage, like the door, mattress and.. beading loom.

Unfortunately it was slim pickins at the ReStore for good wood, so we purchased the wood and nails. However, we figured this was only fair since we got both of those windows from a dumpster and they're in perfect condition with sliding windows for ventilation. To be realistic, Erin did purchase a handheld circular saw - but between these and the storage unit she built for the garage, it's already paid for itself.

You'll notice they are angled - this is so they face the sun a little more as it passes overhead. If they were flat they would lose a fair amount of the light and heat (but still work). They'll be used according to how much direct-facing sun each garden gets.

Each coldframe is about 5' x 3', meaning we'll have about 15 square feet to use in each. Now that these are built, we can work on the raised beds that they'll rest on. We are planning to have the raised beds built in stackable frames so that we can make the beds taller as the plants grow (and use the cold frame during a frost). Obviously this is going to be tricky but.. that's what I heard about corn.

Two coldframes totaling 30 square feet of gardening space: $30. 

They look pretty damn professional, don't they? I'm so proud of her.

SUCCESS

Yes, folks, you read correctly - after only THREE days, our corn has germinated. 

Here are some downright awful photos of the tenacious little sprouts.

You can hardly see them, but my crappy camera wasn't getting any closer than that. 

Our control corn (unaltered/untreated) and the corn treated with cloning solution/fertilizer had little to no growth. The corn we scraped with sandpaper also had little to no root growth. All the other corns have either poked out the tiniest nose of a root or have a sizable root as the ones above. Sunglow soaked for two hours had two small sprouts.

The best growers by far were: Sunglow soaked overnight (12 hours) and even better than those were the Precocious soaked for two hours in water. The roots on those Precocious were surprisingly large and hairy - I'm concerned that they were moldy and pulled two out to plant in pots. Two of the Sunglow also went into pots. Needless to say...we are REALLY excited that our corn germinated in two or three days. The conditions inside the baggies seemed favorable - Erin had the light on for about four hours today when she took a heat reading and the temp inside the baggies was around 80 degrees. The paper towels dried out so we'll have to be vigilant about rewatering those and the little fiber pots. 

At the moment we have those four planted seeds under plastic bread baggies. For now these will work as mini hot-houses - when the plants start to grow, we can just unroll them for extra height (read: free mini-hothouses).

What's interesting to me is the disparity between the two hybrids here - the Precocious sprouted much faster after being soaked for only two hours rather than twelve - and the opposite is true for the Sunglow. Neat-o. :)

I found an old mini-blind slat (yeah, just one) and chopped it up for plant markers. It works perfectly with a Sharpie (read: free plant markers). I wrote the type of vegetable and planting date on one side, and on the other side I wrote the hybrid name along with the date of experiment and how long each seed was soaked. This way we'll see who survives the transfer to the pots.

:) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) 

(If you've read this far...thank you.)

the great corn experiment.

Apparently there is some debate as to whether or not corn is difficult to grow. Many people agree that you shouldn't bother trying to transplant it and many others say that's a bunch of hogwash, that their corn transplants just fine. Others still have trouble getting corn to germinate (sprouting the seed) and I've heard all kinds of ideas for helping this process along. 

So I've decided to remember my sixth grade science class roots and do an experiment. The goal is to see which of my 5 or 6 methods works best for sprouting corn - if at all. All methods have come from hearing people say different things, so I figured why not try all of them?

For the experiment, I used two corn varieties that claim to be better suited for short seasons and 'stress': Sunglow (from Nichols Garden Nursery, OR) and Precocious (from Territorial Seed Company, OR). I used three seeds of both types for each method in hopes that controlling for dud seeds would make the experiment more successful. 

After being altered, all the seeds were sandwiched in a wet paper towel and placed inside of an open plastic baggie. Here are the 5:

1. 3 seeds of each, unaltered (control)

2. 3 seeds of each soaked for two hours in water

3. 3 seeds of each soaked for 12 hours (overnight) in water

4. 3 seeds of each scraped gently with sandpaper

5. 3 seeds of each whose paper towels were soaked in a cloning solution mix instead of water

 

All baggies are now sitting in a tray on top of a heating mat. Beneath the heating mat I've placed some aluminum foil in hopes that this will help curb heat loss through the bottom of the seedling table, which is just an old futon frame. I'll keep the heating mat on all day but turn it off on night because of that pesky fear-of-electrical-fire thing I have. All I know for sure is that corn is a heavy feeder (meaning it needs compost and fertilizer more than some other plants) and that it loveslovesloves warm soil. They also love light but we're going to hold off on keeping the light on until someone sprouts. We'll see what happens!

And for good measure, Erin planted some seeds in soil and watered it with the cloning solution. (Cloning solution, apparently, is just a fertilizer mix designed to support new root growth and buffer transplant shock - we're using one called Olivia's Cloning Solution, recommended by the girl at the hydroponics store.) Here she is using the pencil method and our little coconut fiber pots (which are a real bitch to water, fyi).

And here is the final product! Stay tuned to see who sprouts first!!

water water everywhere.

Well, last night we got three inches of fluffy snow and today the sun was shining, so it's all melting. Which means, of course, that our future garden plot is a sopping mess. We bought a 32 gallon trashcan today and I filled it to the top with water I collected the last time it rained (I had a couple gallons left over, but it wasn't quite 40 gallons which is what I'd thought at the time). I collected some more in the same method I posted previously, but then shoveled a bunch of snow into the bins to see how much water it would make once melted. I suppose I'll need another garbage bin. 

Erin claims that this makes me 'cute'. I think it makes me cheap, creative, and is a blatant testament to the fact that I can't exercise enough self-control to relax on my days off.

In other news, Erin and I finally got our sweet, essentially-free seedling table set up. We salvaged the futon frame from a dumpster, and the wood she used for the legs was leftover from a different project (which is why they look a little ghetto - but it works). Now we did give in a buy a brand new lighting fixture but that's mostly because I have a phobia of old and/or used electrical things. The bulbs we bought are "Natural Sunshine" fluorescents and claim to be "full-spectrum." Sunlight comes in cool and warm spectrums and a full-spectrum light mimics sunlight by having both. A grow lamp (which they sold on the same rack at Home Depot for more money) features a slightly different spectrum, but also puts out LESS light (measured in lumens) and uses MORE watts. So we figured a full spectrum with better efficiency was the better way to go (unless we totally do not understand wattage vs. lumens, that is - which is entirely possible). Also purchased was some basic chain so we can make the lights higher and lower as our seedling needs change. Below is a photo of an excited Erin once we turned the lights off and the other lights on.

Lights & fixture: about $25

Table: about $0

We haven't planted anything yet, but corn is first on the list. I'm developing a corn seed experiment which hopefully I will get started on this weekend.

team chicken, part one.

Wine, soup, cornbread, and chickens. 

Well we weren't eating the chickens, just talking about them. There's already a space in T & B's back yard for the coop, so now the task is to start collecting materials. Tina's objective is to build the coop completely from reclaimed and salvaged materials, so Erin and I may be heading to a construction site today or tomorrow to see if the stack of building materials they have laying there is up for grabs.

Unfortunately, I am thinking we may be too late for buying chicks. Apparently it takes six months for them to be ready to lay eggs, and we only have three months until spring. I would think we could either get juveniles now or fully grown adults later - still need to do more research on this.

We agreed on six chickens so the four of us always have enough eggs (although I have visions of being buried in a pile of eggs from that many hens) and Tina already had a great plan for the coop. We talked about letting the chickens free-range in the backyard (instead of in a chicken tractor) but the biggest concern for that issue is the fact that Central Oregon is a raptor mecca. Plus T & B have lots of big trees in their backyard - perfect perching spots for hawks and falcons. 

The spot where they want to put the garden is huge, which is exciting, and they also have a few fruit trees and a berry patch. I forced upon them the two books I mentioned in the previous post since they'd never heard of them, so I'm excited for all the possibilities. Tina jokingly called me "obsessive" for having our seedling table and corn seeds already to go (except for figuring out which kind and how much of a fertilizer to use/buy) - but she'll be happy when I have transplants with which to fill her garden...

our friend mel.

Well, he's not really our "friend," but he sure helps us out when it comes to gardening. 

Mel Bartholomew is the author of Square Foot Gardening and is a famous gardening guru. In the first edition of his book, he outlines everything you need to know to be a successful gardener - and then goes one step further by profiling a variety of commonly-grown vegetables (including basic information, fertilizing tips, how to start seeds, etc). It's impossible for one book to be all-inclusive but Mel's book is a great place to start because it goes over all the basics thoroughly.

The theory of square foot gardening seems pretty common-sensical, but if you notice, a lot of gardeners/farmers grow their vegetables in rows. Row cropping has its benefits but in smaller spaces, square footing rules. The idea is that each vegetable can be grown in increments of square feet (one tomato per one square foot, sixteen beets per square foot) - so you maximize your crop for your space. Then, when one vegetable is harvested, something else can go in the square. The gardens that Erin and I are planning contain approximately 70 square feet or so. There's at least 50 sqft in the gardens that will be up against the house and I'm estimating another 15-25 against the fence where we want to plant our corn. One day I'll upload my sketches so you have a better idea of where we're planting.

Along with Mel's book I've been doing extensive reading in another gem called Carrots Love Tomatoes by Louise Riotte. This book goes over vegetables, herbs, cover crops, trees, natural pest controls, and more. One of the main issues this book covers (and my favorite thing about it) is companion planting, which is the act of planting certain species together that benefit each other. For example, basil enhances the flavor of tomatoes and helps protect them from insects - so these two can be planted together. Flowers can be good companions too - corn and sunflowers may be planted together as a 1970 study showed that when sunflowers were interplanted with corn, corn yields were higher than fields planted with only corn. 

For some reason I get really excited about companion planting. Diversity in the garden is important and using plants that benefit each other just seems like the most natural way to enhance your productivity. Also, there are certain flowers like nasturtiums, coreopsis, and marigolds that act as natural insect-repellents for your garden. While they are obviously not as effective as some chemical weapon, they are a natural aide and add color and texture to the veggie plot. 

There are also some exciting combinations that reduce how much space you use. For example, even though we have a troublesome growing climate, we're going to try growing corn. Beans may be planted amongst the corn and allowed to grow up the stalks. The corn helps to protect the beans from searing mid-day sun, and beans help restore the nitrogen to the soil that the corn eats up. However, pole beans do not do well near sunflowers - so will I plant the corn with sunflowers or with the beans? It becomes an exciting puzzle (and experiment).

monsanto 2.

In response to my Monsanto post, Jennie wrote:: Did you know that Monsanto also doesn't let the plants produce seeds? They are [genetically-modified] to spontaneously abort so you have to buy more. Lame.

If this doesn't scare you, you aren't thinking about it hard enough.

(I'll help you - plants that spontaneously abort further create conditions for a monopoly of humans that own all the food. If you can't grow your own because their self-aborting seeds have infected your crops or the crops of the farmers in your state/country/planet, then there are people that get to choose who eats and who dies. Sound like a crazy government conspiracy? Because it's truth, and it's happening right now.)

killer deals bru.

Here is a selection of containers that we've picked up from thrift stores for cheap. That big boy on the right is a 19 gallon tub - $3 at the Humane Society Thrift Store (killer place and all funds go to the Humane Society), the two big black tubs that are standing on each other we got from ReStore for $.50 each, the little green dude on the left was $.75, and the others I think were like $3 each. The smaller ones were pricier, but they're in perfect condition and have pans which is nice. The smaller ones will be good for herbs and small flowers. I washed all the planters out with a mild bleach solution in the event that they were harboring any nasties.

At any rate, we have three mega-sized containers that are at least two or three square feet each (more about square feet in the next post) - which means multiple vegetable plants in each - for $4. Score.

just don't dig up the whole lawn, the landlord said.

On a warm snap in the middle of January, I purchased our first gardening implement - a hoe - and we went to town digging up our future victory gardens. If you can believe it, there are hardy pansies planted in the garden where I am working in the photo and they are *still* in bloom right this very moment. 

The two spots that we are working on in these photos are the future sites of our raised vegetable beds. Both sites will have removable cold frames (thanks to a SWEET dumpster find of two perfect-condition windows with sliding doors for ventilation!! WOO HOOO!) so we can experiment with planting early and harvesting late. You'll also notice that we have a bunch of huge lava rocks - these excite me, but I'm not sure what we'll do with them yet. Maybe a makeshift raised bed for our corn and squash?

Look at her go. Isn't she just so cute ripping up that turf?

   

  

commuting communally.

Today was the first time I've ever really commuted from home to work and.. it was *awesome*. Despite the post-commute 20 minute walk to work I had to endure (that was sarcasm, but I was pretty tired). The shuttle is free (::big googly eyes::) which means less gas money and less wear on my car (which needs at least $300 worth of more work on top of the $500 I just put on my credit card for it). I love my car but I would love to drive it less. It seems the shuttle gods have smiled upon me. 

Unfortunately there is nothing new happening with the garden. I am frankly too lazy right now to hang our grow lights by myself so I am patiently awaiting my lover's return so she can help me. Then she'll be starting on the raised beds and coldframes, and Monday we're meeting with Team Chicken (or shall it be Team Cock to make an amusing ironic dash at lesbianism?) to start planning the coup. Or, coop. Planning a coup sounds much more exciting, like we are overthrowing Republicans with our earth-loving and self-sufficient ways. Take that, conservative America. We're lesbians and we're FARMING, goddammit. 

On that note, what is it with lesbians and farms? I swear to God I know at least 5 lesbian couples who own farms or just have backyard farms. Well, when in Rome.

Here is me scooping up water the last time it rained. My roommates thought I was crazy (they were inside the warm house watching TV while I scooped rainwater out of the mud-hole that used to be our backyard in the freezing rain). I felt proud though, because after all my hard work I had collected nearly 40 gallons of water. I learned a great lesson that night: being sustainable is not always going to be easy, or comfortable, or convenient - or dry - but the feeling you get when you've done something long-lasting for the earth and yourself is worth every second of collecting muddy water in the freezing rain.

monsanto.

While I'm on this soapbox, why not mention a horrific act of pure evil that most people don't know about at all?

So farmers grow corn. We know this, right? Corn is in EVERYTHING. If it's not corn, it's corn syrup. There are huge swatches of land that are deforested every year just to grow corn (and, by the way, monocropping is a big fat no-no when it comes to environmental health - but that's for another post). Farmers, for the most part, do the best they can - you don't make millions farming and it's really, really hard work. When bugs or other plants infest your crop, you could lose your livelihood for that year - a scary concept for anyone.

So a "biotechnology" company called Monsanto decided it would be dandy to develop an herbicide called Roundup. We all know this herbicide because Monsanto is full of aggressive lobbyists and this product is all over the place. What you don't know is that Monsanto has genetically engineered a type of corn that is Roundup-resistant, meaning that you can spray this toxic herbicide to your heart's content and it won't hurt your corn one bit. 

This doesn't sound so bad for people who aren't into organics, but the problem is really that Monsanto has patented this corn and the government let them. What's the problem with that, you ask? Ethically, if someone 'owns' a type of food, they are able to monopolize access to that food and charge whatever price they want. They are also able to sue anyone else who gets it without permission. 

A startling documentary called "The Future of Food" revealed that when Monsanto representatives discovered their corn growing in a farmer's field (without his knowledge - he was just going about his business) - they sued him for just about all he was worth. And they were allowed to. Now, this farmer didn't plant Monsanto's corn, who knows how it got there (wouldn't surprise me if Monsanto planted it there themselves) - but they were able to sue him because he didn't have permission to grow their patented corn. See where this is going? If we lose the ability to share food and share seeds, we are setting the world up for mass starvation.

The controversy against genetically-modified products is raging right now. Again, there are no federal standards that make it necessary for companies to label whether or not their products contain genetically-modified products. I'm not talking "hybrids" here, which many farmers use - I'm talking plants that have things in them that shouldn't be there, like the genes of a virus or the genes of a fish, for example. And yes, the virus part is a reality. Many companies (usually in places like Whole Foods) are kind enough to put on the label "genetically-modified free corn/soy/whatever" so the public knows. But again, the government isn't doing shit about this food problem.

I highly recommend the documentary. The More You Know.

milk.

Since I unintentionally went on and on about chickens and how eggs are produced in this country, I figured it would be as good a time as any to talk about milk.

The dairy industry faces a similar type of controversy in America as the chicken/egg industry. Cows are typically confined to lots with entirely too many other cows on them. Manure builds up and up and pollutes local streams when rainwater runs off. Because of the nitrogen in the poop, algae blooms in these local rivers and ponds and blocks out sunlight, essential for aquatic plant life. The plants die and thus the water becomes anoxic - deprived of oxygen - which means that other forms of life start dying. The Chester River, near where I went to school, was chronically anoxic due to surrounding farms. 

There are more problems with the dairy industry. In order to keep cows producing milk, farmers have to keep them pregnant, because mammals only produce milk when there is a baby to feed. Cows are constantly being artificially inseminated, which, as you can imagine, really stresses out their bodies. The babies are often taken away not too long after birth, which stresses the mothers further. Sometimes they are slaughtered, sometimes they are confined in tiny cages for veal production, and sometimes they are just left for dead somewhere. The cows, like the chickens, are fed lots of grain which is not a natural part of their diets. Cows are used to eating grass, so all that grain contributes to digestive troubles and excess flatulence (methane which is doing collective damage to the ozone). Since the cows are stressed from poor diets, overexertion, and overcrowding, they are prone to disease. Farmers combat this by administering antibiotics even when their cows are not sick. This means that, when you drink conventional milk, you are probably taking in antibiotics. 

Now, if you had a bacterial infection, drinking conventional milk isn't going to help you. What it will do, however, is teach the bacteria in your system how to survive low levels of antibiotics. This is one factor contributing to antibiotic resistance among bacteria, from what I have read and come to understand. On top of that, farmers have discovered that giving cows growth hormones will help them produce even more milk. So not only are you getting antibiotics in your milk, but you're getting growth hormones. Yes, that's right - in your milk, there are growth hormones. Many people believe this is a contributing factor to kids going through puberty earlier and earlier nowadays, because it's also in the beef you're eating.

Many companies now have started labeling their milk cartons as being "rbgh free" (rbgh = bovine growth hormone), but there are no standards for whether or not antibiotics are used. We have a local dairy here that labels their cartons in that way, but when I started reading and understanding this dairy situation in America, I made the conscious choice to never buy conventional milk again. The cows are not allowed to range in fields or eat grass naturally, they don't get enough exercise, and they are pumped full of chemicals because they're unhealthy. It makes no sense to me. Many organic companies give their cows at least some free-ranging opportunities and some feed grass. 

A local company here in Central Oregon does just this - during the summer, the cows are free range and grass fed. In the winter there is no grass of course, so they are fed hay. The distributor does not heat pasteurize, either. Pasteurizing is the act of heating up the milk to kill bacteria, but studies have shown that this process is not necessary for safe human consumption. In fact, some studies have shown that the natural enzymes in raw milk are strong enough to kill E.coli before it ever reaches your guts. The problem with pasteurizing is that it is indiscriminate: it kills the bad stuff AND the good stuff, so pasteurized milk is not as healthy, in some respects, as raw milk. This has led many people to believe that there is a federal effort to make people fear raw milk, since (it is my understanding, and I may be wrong) dairy farmers are government-subsidized. I personally know of a woman who told me that she's been drinking (and giving to her children) raw milk for two or three years with no trouble. E.coli and other bacteria become a problem with sanitary conditions are poor - fecal matter not being cleaned up (or being so abundant that there's no where for it to all go), which results from overcrowding. A few cows in a field that are grass-fed and healthy are much less likely to produce milk that will be infected with dangerous bacteria.

So check it out for yourself. And understand that beef is produced in the same way - overcrowding, chemical-injections, not nearly enough access to grass (if any). One book that helped me to understand the situation better is "The Way We Eat: Why Our Food Choices Matter" by Peter Singer and Jim Mason. The book has a decidedly vegetarian standpoint, but if you are open-minded enough to get around that, the book is full of shocking information that is kept hush-hush from the average American. It's my job and your job to know where our food comes from. 

To avoid confusion, I am not advocating against animal products or for them. What I am doing is trying to express that there are honorable ways to go about producing and eating animal products, and dishonorable ways to do so. The trend in this country has been "I don't want to know", so the abusive treatment of animals has gone unnoticed. It is time to know where our food comes from, so that we can support local, humane farmers instead of federally-subsidized farmers whose practices are questionable for human health and the health of the environment.

I wish a little star would fly across your screen right now. The More You Know.

EDITOR'S EDIT: I realize that when I wrote this post, I did not point out that not ALL farms behave in the manner I've described - so please recognize that this is not the rule for every farm, just what's happening behind the scenes in many factory farms.

community.

This year I had the privilege of meeting two very wonderful women, named Beki and Tina, who live no more than a 20-minute walk west of us in a pretty neighborhood. They have an enormous backyard and a couple weeks ago at an open-mic night, Tina said the magical words, "I want to have a communal garden in my backyard." My heart melted with joy. Even though I am planning a garden, it is another part of my dream to have a community of other growers in alliance with me - to share with, to trade with, to learn with. 

When I lived in Maryland, I was fortunate enough to have a boss at the state park who was a small-scale farmer. She let us help her (ok, she paid us, but she really didn't have to because we all jumped at the chance to help her) create raised beds on her sloping backyard, concoct a fertile mixture of composts and soil in said boxes, and reap the benefits of her harvest: her wife cooked us amazing meals using their own vegetables (and some wineberry pie that could make them millionaires were they to start selling it). My boss started her seeds indoors as well and had a coldframe, which helped to extend her season.

Besides that I had a sweet summer gig working part-time for another organic farmer. She had a mere five acres and supplemented with produce from a neighboring, bigger farm, but the woman made a bloody killing at the farmer's market. I helped her both in the fields and at the market and was bitten by the organic gardening bug. 

If you have never experienced this phenomena, please, PLEASE go to your local farmers market this summer and try fresh produce. Having been brought up strictly in the grocery stores with their weeks' old produce from foreign countries, I had no idea that a store-bought pepper could taste any different than one fresh from the fields. I could not have been more wrong. I was hooked. I was also introduced to fresh strawberries, which was a new concept. I thought all strawberries were behemoths that were almost crunchy and had tasteless white insides. When I tasted my first strawberry right out of the dirt, I could have wept. Soft, red on the inside, and sweet, sweet, sweet - I ate so many that summer that I was sick of strawberries by August.

Working with Tina will be my first experience as a fellow farmer sharing in, well, whatever it is we'll share in. My main focus at the moment is that she's interested and willing to develop a chicken coop in her backyard and maintain a flock of egg-producers. If you have never had farm-fresh eggs, I encourage you to try those as well (along with fresh strawberries). I told her we'll go in for all the chicken whatnot because I am a diehard fan of fresh organic eggs and it's a step closer to self-sufficiency and independence from grocery stores.

The chicken situation in America is the focus of a great deal of controversy right now. An average grocery store has those eggs for at least two or three weeks before you even get to them, so they're already 'old'. Most eggs that are cheap come from factory-farms where chickens are contained in a 12x12 inch cage. They are kept in daylight-like conditions most if not all of the year to encourage them to keep producing. This not only strains their bodies, but the confinement and constant sunlight is stressful to their brains. They are also fed a steady diet of grain, which is not natural - so they are actually producing eggs that have fewer vitamins and less health benefits. The chickens are not healthy, and they are certainly not happy, if you care about that sort of thing (which I do). They cannot exercise or forage, and when they naturally stop producing eggs, they are starved by the "farmers" until their bodies go into emergency mode and produce more eggs. 

Now, the tricky part is that there's very little standard for what you can put on an egg carton, except for the "organic" labe. Organic means that they are fed organic grain, not that they are necessarily allowed to roam and forage on their own. Many eggs cartons will say, "Free-range" or "Cage-free," but even this is misleading - because there are no federal standards for what these terms really mean, it is likely that the chickens are foraging on the floor of a warehouse. They may not be caged, but they are not allowed access outside - where sunlight gives them access to valuable Vitamin D and access to grass allows them to forage for protein-rich insects.

It's a tricky situation. At the very least, purchasing "organic" eggs with "free range" markings on the carton is a better bet than the regular grocery-store eggs. Not only are you purchasing healthier eggs but you are telling the grocery store (and therefore the market as a whole) that you do not accept the abusive practices of most egg-producing "farms." These eggs are often three or four times the price of the cheapest ones in the grocery store, but as a test, I encourage you to buy one of each. Take them home and in two separate bowls, open an egg from each. The organic and potentially uncaged chickens will produce an egg with a thick albumen (clear part) and an orange-golden yolk. The factory farm eggs will be dull and limp because they come from unhealthy chickens. It is truly worth the money. 

And if you're adventurous, you can look up local farms in your area to see who sells eggs. Then you can visit the farm and ask to see the chickens. Here in Bend, Jim Fields runs a farm and he'll gladly show you his beautiful ladies - they have their own penthouse and a protected area for picking at the ground. He tosses them kitchen scraps which they eat up with great relish as most livestock will do. Jim's chickens' eggs are some of the best I have ever tasted - he sells them just a day or so after collecting them from what I understand, so you're getting them right out of the henhouse.

These are just some of the reasons I'm peeing my pants with excitement to help Tina raise chickens. Besides that, it will just be so damn fun to bike over to their house and visit our collective hens and bike back home with a dozen fresh eggs for breakfast.

spinach and lettuce.

Like radishes, spinach and lettuce prefer cooler temperatures (like around 60-65 degrees) which makes them perfect window-sill plants for the fall or winter. They're great plants for people who are antsy to start growing something long before spring rolls around. 

January 29: Erin and I score at the thrift store once again and find a long, rectangular container. It's metal, so we glue down plastic on the inside (hopefully the glue does not impart toxic chemicals through the plastic) and fill it with basic indoor/outdoor potting soil. We stuck some spinach lettuce seeds in, watered, and set on a windowsill that doesn't get nearly as much sun as I'd prefer.

Feb 3: A mere five days later, the lettuces have produced the first, tiniest or sprouts (the image currently on the blog page is them). On the 4th, the spinaches sprouted as well.

Feb 9: First sight of first set of true leaves (actually the second set of leaves when a plant starts growing). We water when dry and rotate the container. Today we also ordered our seeds from two Oregon companies: Nichols Garden Nursery, and Territorial Seed Company. Besides what we grow ourselves, I know we'll purchase other seeds and plants along the way, because once you start gardening you develop an obsessive habit to collect as many plants as will fit in your living space.

Feb 17: We had to thin the lettuces a few days ago as they are already too crowded. The first true leaves are getting bigger already and are showing the typical jagged shape of lettuce. 

When it's time to really start gardening, it is wise to make plantings of spinach and lettuces every few weeks so that you have a steady stream throughout the season. They don't do well in hot summers, so it's probably a good time for us to start figuring out where they'll go. I'm considering the front yard gardens, which get very little sunlight (shade in Central Oregon is whole degrees cooler than direct sunlight, a concept that my humidity-soaked brain could never have conceived of in Maryland). 

post one.

So for those of you who don't know, my ultimate dream in life is to be a small-scale farmer. That is, I want to own some land and farm it for vegetables, herbs, fruits, and flowers both to sustain myself and as a way to contribute to my income (either with money or trade). I want to learn to preserve my own foods so that I can drastically cut back on my grocery-store dependence. Lined up on the agenda is also raising and slaughtering my own chickens and learning how to produce some cheese (probably just the easy ones). I also hope to have rain barrels installed at this dream place to collect rainwater for my farm to reduce my overuse of water. Aside from gardening, I plan to have a centrally-located woodstove and chop my own timber for heat. I'll also one day have some solar panels. 

I have a very strong belief that one day this society will start failing (more than it already has) - that there will be food shortages and people who do not know someone that farms or know how to farm themselves will starve to death. This dependence on just about everything but ourselves is terrifying to me, and I'd like to be as self-sustaining as possible, pretty much as soon as possible. 

Thus begins my adventure in suburban gardening in Bend, Oregon. For those of you not local, I will explain why this area is a particularly large challenge. Bend is situated on the east side of the Cascade Mountains, in what's known as a rain shadow. This means that the other side of the mountains get all the rain - when the air comes up over the mountains, it drops the moisture on the west side and by the time it gets to us, it's dry as hell. What this means is less than twelve inches of rain annually. During the summer, it is possible to go an entire month with no rain. Added to that, our high elevation means that AT ANY TIME, during ANY SEASON, we can experience a plant-killing frost at night. The last 'frost-free date' (the time when you can plant things outside without worrying about them dying) is in June - at least a month or two later than other temperate areas. I was told by the Extension service that Bend essentially does not have a frost-free date because we're likely to get a frost in July or August at some point.

So what we have is no water and the potential for summer frost. At first I was pretty bummed about the odds here, but if I can successfully manage a harvest here, than I'll be fine wherever I end up next. (Kind of like learning how to mountain bike at Susquehanna - now I'm set.)

Erin and I will be developing our arsenal over the next few months: first, a seedling table that we created for free by dumpster diving and utilizing scrap wood. We'll start our seeds months ahead of time in some cases and transplant them outside in June. Next, we'll be constructing a coldframe from some windows we found at a dumpster. A coldframe is a box with a heat-conducting surface (like glass) that keeps the inside of said box many degrees warmer than the outside air temperatures. A coldframe can be used to transplant your plants early, or placed over them in the event of a frost to keep them from freezing. We'll also use row-covers, cloches, and whatever other means necessary to keep our plants safe to the best of our ability. Next, we are building raised beds for the vegetables. This will help the soil to stay warmer and give the plants more room to grow. It will also allow us to construct our own soil mix, rather than relying on what's currently on the ground. Finally, we have collected from thrift stores four huge containers (for an impressive collective price of $9) which will each hold multiple vegetable plants and can be brought inside in the event of a frost.

I also spent a few hours collecting close to 40 gallons of rainwater the last time it rained. This amounts to like one week of watering, but it's one week that we'll not have to use a garden hose. I have to find a cistern or big garbage can to hold it all so I can continue to collect snowmelt as well. 

That's the basic plan. We are planning to grow:

> 3-4 types of tomatoes, all of which are considered more "cold-hardy" species and two of which hail from cold-ass Eastern Europe or Russia

> a cold-hardy strain of broccoli

> swiss chard, a hearty green

> spinach and lettuce

> red-meat radishes, which are red on the inside and white on the outside

> 2-3 types of potatoes

> 3 types of onions

> an heirloom parsnip (which I'm looking forward to, as exposure to frost actually improves the flavor... take THAT Central Oregon)

> 2 types of "stress-tolerant" corn - we've been told corn is an impossibility in Bend, which has made us that much more determined to grow it, and if we get one bloody ear, we will be satisfied

> carrots

> 2 types of beans, potentially, one of which is 'cold-hardier' than others

> sweet peppers, one of my personal favorites

> winter and summer squash

On top of these, we'll grow insect-repelling flowers like nasturtiums and coreopsis to aid in the fight against pests. I also plan to have some flower gardens, but that's a later post.

As you can see, the biggest things to consider in your climate are: soil temperature (in Bend, nights are cold so plants will not grow at night like they will in, say, Maryland), frost possibilities, length of season (we're about a whopping 80 days or so), water, and disease-resistance of your plants. Of course you also have to consider carefully your soil composition, location of gardens for available sunlight, and be prepared to fight pests.

I'll be back in a few - I am cooking up a batch of my grandmother's Sicilian pasta sauce. I make a ton at once and freeze most of it for easy future meals. 

new directions.

I'm switching the focus of my blog from random personal ramblings that no one really reads to a log of gardening activities. This will be a good way for me to look back and see what happened and when, so I can better plan for future years.

Unfortunately I'm too tired to start tonight.