a man and his hoe

every day is a good day

Month: June 2014

Nature’s Thought of It Already and Gives It Freely

The tomatoes in the hoop house are tall enough to need supports. I could have gone down to a store and purchased some supports, but nature’s thought of it already, and isn’t charging me a penny. The bamboo are sending up tall shoots and so are the alders. Both of them make excellent tomato supports. Cut them to the length you need, and leave some of the side branches on. These side branches which stick upward, make excellent hooks to support the tomato leaves.

At the end of the season, the supports can be added to the compost or cut up for kindling. Next year, nature will supply a fresh supply of supports so there is no need to try and save them through the winter.

The wonderful thing about nature is that it is prolific. Thank god, it doesn’t have the mindset of the corporations which rule us, otherwise it would be demanding payment every time we take in a breath of air. Before it rained, it would want some coin before it let the raindrops fall. We’d have to pay it for every bee visit. Nature’s way is to give and give and give. Imagine how much we’d have to pay if the likes of AT&T or Comcast owned the sun, or Monsato owned the wind.

June 15, 2014
Out of the Garden Today – June 14, 2014

Every evening, going into the garden is pure delight. Onions, shallots, carrots, mustard and lettuce greens will make a delicious soup tonight. Today, the New York Times had an article Threat Grows From Liver Illness Tied to Obesity today about the growing incidences of fatty liver.

In the past two decades, the prevalence of the disease, known as nonalcoholic fatty liver, has more than doubled in teenagers and adolescents, and climbed at a similar rate in adults. Studies based on federal surveys and diagnostic testing have found that it occurs in about 10 percent of children and at least 20 percent of adults in the United States, eclipsing the rate of any other chronic liver condition.

A more progressive form of nonalcoholic fatty liver is called nonalcoholic steatohepatitis, or NASH. It is estimated that 2 to 3 percent of people in the US, some five million, have NASH. Many of these people will eventually need liver transplants. In 2001, 1 percent of liver transplants were due to NASH, but by 2009 NASH patients accounted for 9 percent of liver transplants.

The increase in NASH is due to poor diets and lack of exercise. Thirty years ago, the condition was so rare, there wasn’t even a name for it.

Some point out that access to fresh vegetables and fruit is limited in many communities, forcing residents to rely on fast and junk food. Yet you can grow a lot of fresh vegetables in a small space. Even a ten by ten foot plot can provide enough greens for a daily salad for a family. Travel through any city and you will find plenty of unused lots which could be used as community gardens to provide fresh produce for the neighborhoods.

City parks could be redesigned to include vegetable gardens and fruit orchards to be used by local residents. These spaces would not only provide delicious, healthy food, they would also provide exercise opportunities and could be used to teach children where food comes from, how it grows, and how important a clean environment is for everyone.

June 14, 2014
Hen on the Dock

When Svenda sees me heading out to the dock to gather duckweed for the chickens, she comes running. She won’t wait on the grass for me to haul in a load of duckweed. She has to watch me scoop it out of the pond. What she and the other hens are after the most are the waterbugs, tadpoles, and other pond bugs that come out with the duckweed.

She almost falls into the pond while scratching through the duckweed, but she catches herself and goes back to looking for good things to eat in the duckweed.

June 14, 2014
Gathering Eggs

It’s easy to get distracted when gathering eggs. There are iris blooming, a hen exploring a stream bed, stewartia and dogwood in bloom. A tucked up pullover works just as well as a basket for collecting eggs.

Gathering eggs is an opportunity to see how the growing chicks are doing. The chicks below are figuring out where to roost for the night. Slowly, they’ll make their way up onto the main roosts where the adult chicks sleep.

These little chicks at four weeks are now on their own. This is their second night without their mother. She’s gone back to roosting with the rest of the chickens. The chicks have found a comfortable spot near where they used to sleep with their mother. They should be roosting soon.

June 13, 2014
Olympia Farmers Market
On a drive home from Vancouver, WA, we stopped in Olympia for a break and visited the Olympia Farmers Market. It wasn’t our intention to go to the Olympia Farmers Market, but when we drove to the bottom of Capitol Way, the main street of Olympia, we discovered the market and had to explore it.

The Olympia Farmers Market is the second largest farmers market in Washington State. From April through October it is open Thursday through Sunday. November through December it is open Saturday and Sunday.

It is housed in a large, wooden building, and has vendors selling produce (really great produce), meat, dairy, condiments, homemade crafts, nurseries, fresh flowers, artisans and restaurants. It’s amazing that a small town like Olympia has such an outstanding farmers market. In 2016 it will be forty years old.

With all the fresh produce we grow, I don’t need to buy vegetables, but I did get some plump kohlrabi which were very sweet and delicious. I also picked up a variety of unusual beans to plant for late summer picking. Hopefully, in the not too distant future, markets such as these will be the norm everywhere.
June 12, 2014