The garden catalogs are arriving almost daily. My favorites so far are from Johnny's Selected Seeds and from Southern Exposure Seed Exchange. I haven't committed to any purchases yet, except for ordering 18 sweet potato slips, but every time I look at the catalogs I change my mind about what I want.
Every year I tell myself I'm just going to be patient and buy some started plants from a local store, or direct seed when the time comes, but I can almost never wait. I want to give horseradish a try, since Don likes horseradish mixed with mustard on the frozen pretzels he likes to heat and eat.
How about my readers? What region of the world do YOU live in, and what are your plans for your gardens this year, if any? What are you already doing, or what preparations are you making? Please leave me a comment and let us know!
Showing posts with label gardening. Show all posts
Showing posts with label gardening. Show all posts
Sunday, December 30, 2012
Thursday, August 23, 2012
City Chicks in Chesapeake!
The Planning Commission will review the matter as early as its regular meeting on Wednesday, October 10. On October 9, Patricia "Pat" Foreman, the author of City Chicks: Keeping Micro-flocks of Chickens as Garden Helpers, Compost Makers, Bio-recyclers, and Local Food Producers, will appear at the Chesapeake Central Library as part of her East Coast Book Tour.
Pat graduated from Indiana University with a Masters of Public Administration. She went on to graduate school and received her BSC both from Indiana, and then from Purdue University, where she majored in Animal Science, Genetics and Nutrition. She is both an author and licensed pharmacist. We've been told her lectures are fascinating.
During this lecture, she will explore the role chickens play in the following four subjects:
- Enhancing Backyard Agriculture
- Diverting Food and Yard “Waste” Out of Landfills
- Decreasing Oil Consumption and Lowering Carbon Footprints
- National Defense & Emergency Preparedness
Our group has gotten positive media coverage in the past from the Virginian Pilot, the Chesapeake Clipper, and WTKR News Channel 3. Reporter Marjon Rostami, in a recent article in the Clipper, pointed out that "dozens" of our supporters came to a recent City Council meeting decked in red, the color of the "Little Red Hen."
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| "4 Chesapeake Hens" at City Council |
We've been told that one of our key roles in the community should be to educate the public, and we are doing just that. We have invited our media contacts, the City Council, the Planning Commission, and others to Pat's highly educational, interesting, and well-informed lecture. If you would like to help, please attend our event, distribute flyers, and encourage others to do the same. Books for the book-signing portion of the event must be purchased in advance of the event. Tickets are limited and available for a donation to the Gossamer Foundation but must be acquired in advance through this website: http://citychicksinchesapeake.eventbrite.com/.
If the media took notice of a few dozen supporters, imagine the kind of attention our cause will get at an event of over 200 people that sells out! Please, help us make that happen!
Update: On November 20, Chesapeake City Council voted 6-3 to allow hens with certain restriction in residential areas.
Friday, July 20, 2012
The Chicken Activist Strikes Again!
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| The cameraman liked our asparagus beds |
Reed had learned about "4 Chesapeake Hens," our local grassroots activist group. We are trying to change the zoning laws in Chesapeake, Virginia, so that more residents can have up to six laying hens as household pets. Currently properties must be zoned agricultural or be "Residential Estates" of 3 acres or more to have hens. Our online petition for change has 562 signatures as I type this.
I was happy to tell Reed about my longing for urban chickens, about my garden, and about the benefits of keeping laying hens. I spoke of property rights and of individual rights, and how the current zoning law is an infringement upon both. I expressed appreciation for the support our group has received from City Councilman Robert Ike.
Reed and his team did a great job. What a cute report! It even featured two illegal hens from a Chesapeake neighborhood who are in need of amnesty! We were the leading story on last night's 11 PM news. I was called Mary Beth instead of Mary Lou Burke, but I won't quibble. The title of the news report was, "Could Chickens Flock to Chesapeake?"
Will the news coverage help us get laying hens?
Time will tell!
Monday, July 16, 2012
Dealing With Problems in My Garden
When I write about my garden, I like to take pictures of what looks pretty and to celebrate successes. But my garden has problems, just like any other.
My heritage pole beans, "Lazy Wife Greasy Beans," are supposed to be flavorful, disease resistant, and prolific. They have grown tall and beautiful but have not produced many beans. And the beans I did get did not taste as good as my bush beans. I've read that it is helpful to "go vertical" to increase yields in tight spaces, but it didn't work as far as the beans this year. I am not sure if the pole beans are not getting enough sun or space, or if the soil is too acidic, or what. I pulled several of the plants up to make room and light for the tomatoes and peppers around it. I planted bush beans in their stead. There may still be time to get another harvest. Next year I'll try the pole beans in a different spot and add some extra lime, since beans like alkaline soil.
One of my three yellow squash plants never produced well, so I also pulled it up. There's no sense in it taking up space and nutrients if it's not producing fruit. What little it has produced has tended to go soft before I can harvest it. My watermelon will need more space soon, anyway. The other two yellow squash plants are a good size and producing enough squash for us, but it is succumbing to powdery mildew, a chronic problem here in the hot, humid South. I should probably have sprayed my vines at the first sign of the mildew earlier in the year. I will probably have to pull the two plants up soon to prevent the spread of the disease, but I am loathe to do it, because the plants are still flowering and producing well, and we like to have the summer squash. My research says the best way to deal with powdery mildew is to plant resistant plants and to plant and to be sure plants get enough air circulation and enough sun. More ideas for next year.
I found squash bug larvae on one of my butternut squashes. I think I squished most or all of them with the palms of my hand. I didn't see any other bugs or eggs on the undersides of the leaves, but I'll continue to keep a look out. I need to find a board to put in the bed. Squash bugs like to hide underneath wood. If you get up early and go out in the cool of the morning, before they get active, you can flip over the board and kill as many as you can.
On a positive note, when I pulled up the pole beans I found a sweet bell pepper, the first of the season. It had been hidden behind the other plants, so I had no idea it was there. I harvested it and scrambled it with some other vegetables and tofu for breakfast. Yum!
My heritage pole beans, "Lazy Wife Greasy Beans," are supposed to be flavorful, disease resistant, and prolific. They have grown tall and beautiful but have not produced many beans. And the beans I did get did not taste as good as my bush beans. I've read that it is helpful to "go vertical" to increase yields in tight spaces, but it didn't work as far as the beans this year. I am not sure if the pole beans are not getting enough sun or space, or if the soil is too acidic, or what. I pulled several of the plants up to make room and light for the tomatoes and peppers around it. I planted bush beans in their stead. There may still be time to get another harvest. Next year I'll try the pole beans in a different spot and add some extra lime, since beans like alkaline soil.
One of my three yellow squash plants never produced well, so I also pulled it up. There's no sense in it taking up space and nutrients if it's not producing fruit. What little it has produced has tended to go soft before I can harvest it. My watermelon will need more space soon, anyway. The other two yellow squash plants are a good size and producing enough squash for us, but it is succumbing to powdery mildew, a chronic problem here in the hot, humid South. I should probably have sprayed my vines at the first sign of the mildew earlier in the year. I will probably have to pull the two plants up soon to prevent the spread of the disease, but I am loathe to do it, because the plants are still flowering and producing well, and we like to have the summer squash. My research says the best way to deal with powdery mildew is to plant resistant plants and to plant and to be sure plants get enough air circulation and enough sun. More ideas for next year.
I found squash bug larvae on one of my butternut squashes. I think I squished most or all of them with the palms of my hand. I didn't see any other bugs or eggs on the undersides of the leaves, but I'll continue to keep a look out. I need to find a board to put in the bed. Squash bugs like to hide underneath wood. If you get up early and go out in the cool of the morning, before they get active, you can flip over the board and kill as many as you can.
On a positive note, when I pulled up the pole beans I found a sweet bell pepper, the first of the season. It had been hidden behind the other plants, so I had no idea it was there. I harvested it and scrambled it with some other vegetables and tofu for breakfast. Yum!
Thursday, June 28, 2012
Letter from a Chicken Activist
I started a Facebook page called "4 Chesapeake Hens." Its fans have been working to change the zoning laws in Chesapeake, Virginia. Currently, property must be zoned agricultural or be a "residential estate" of three acres or more to keep laying hens. Our group wants the city to allow up to six laying hens to be kept in most residential areas. We have even started an online petition that readers can sign.
Our most recent campaign has been "City Council Member of the Week." Each week our group chooses one member of City Council and asks our fan base to make contact to politely explain why we wish to keep hens. I have been emailing our City Council Members and getting no responses at all. So I thought I'd also post my emails here for all to read. Here is my email to our first member, Lonnie Craig:
We respectfully request that Chesapeake change its zoning laws to allow single-family residences to keep two to six laying hens as pets. Our main reasons are laid out in our online petition. Due to the poor economy, health concerns about mass-produced and processed foods, ethical concerns about the treatment of hens in battery cages, environmental awareness, and the increasing popularity of the local foods movement, people nationwide want to produce more of their own food at home. More people are vegetable gardening and preserving their harvests. Laying hens, which convert weeds, insect pests, and garden and kitchen scraps into inexpensive, nutritious protein, are the next logical step for those of us who want to save money and support ourselves.
I have posted my own reaction to the memorandum that Andrea Ball Margrave recently received in response to our request at the Chesapeake Town Meeting. You may read it, if you'd like, on my blog: http://mlcsgarden.blogspot.com/2012/06/city-chicks-revisited.html. Since yesterday 114 people have read this post. I am starting to publish public reaction and comments on another post: http://mlcsgarden.blogspot.com/2012/06/responses-to-city-chicks-revisited.html with more to come.
Other information about keeping chickens is available in "Longing for Urban Chickens" http://mlcsgarden.blogspot.com/2011/12/longing-for-urban-chickens.html and in "How Much Space Do Laying Hens Need?" http://mlcsgarden.blogspot.com/2012/03/how-much-space-do-laying-hens-need.html. I will save space by not repeating these words here, but you may read them at your leisure should you care to.
My understanding is that you are open to public input about this issue. Please use the links above as well as other resources at your disposal if you feel the need to learn more about laying hens or what this grassroots movement is about. I highly recommend a book, City Chicks, which explains how laying hens can save the city money by reducing the amount of food waste heading to the landfill: http://www.amazon.com/City-Chicks-Micro-flocks-Bio-reyclers-Producers/dp/0962464856/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1339948210&sr=8-1&keywords=City+Chicks. It's also an entertaining and good read.
City Council members such as you, who take the time to inform themselves on this issue, will view the planning department's memorandum as ludicrous, just as other well-informed chicken enthusiasts do. Our group intends to regularly send representatives to City Council meetings, and we would like to see a well-informed public debate by all parties concerned.
Respectfully,
Mary Lou Burke
I sent this letter on Sunday, June 17, 2012 at 12:08 PM. To date I have received no reply.
Update: on 6/29/12, I sent this letter to Lonnie Craig at City Hall by certified mail. According to the www.usps.com website, it was received at City Hall on July 02, 2012, at 12:32 pm.
Our most recent campaign has been "City Council Member of the Week." Each week our group chooses one member of City Council and asks our fan base to make contact to politely explain why we wish to keep hens. I have been emailing our City Council Members and getting no responses at all. So I thought I'd also post my emails here for all to read. Here is my email to our first member, Lonnie Craig:
Dear Lonnie Craig,
I
am a resident and newly-registered voter in Chesapeake. I teach Latin
at Deep Creek High School. I am also an avid gardener and local-foods
enthusiast. I founded a Facebook page called "4 Chesapeake Hens," an
online group that has 99 "fans" as I type this: https://www.facebook.com/4ChesapeakeHens. Our group also has an online petition with over 370 signatures from Chesapeake and from all over the U.S. and the world: http://www.change.org/petitions/4chesapeakehens#. We are also collecting other signatures out in the community to present to City Council sometime after July 20.
We respectfully request that Chesapeake change its zoning laws to allow single-family residences to keep two to six laying hens as pets. Our main reasons are laid out in our online petition. Due to the poor economy, health concerns about mass-produced and processed foods, ethical concerns about the treatment of hens in battery cages, environmental awareness, and the increasing popularity of the local foods movement, people nationwide want to produce more of their own food at home. More people are vegetable gardening and preserving their harvests. Laying hens, which convert weeds, insect pests, and garden and kitchen scraps into inexpensive, nutritious protein, are the next logical step for those of us who want to save money and support ourselves.
I have posted my own reaction to the memorandum that Andrea Ball Margrave recently received in response to our request at the Chesapeake Town Meeting. You may read it, if you'd like, on my blog: http://mlcsgarden.blogspot.com/2012/06/city-chicks-revisited.html. Since yesterday 114 people have read this post. I am starting to publish public reaction and comments on another post: http://mlcsgarden.blogspot.com/2012/06/responses-to-city-chicks-revisited.html with more to come.
Other information about keeping chickens is available in "Longing for Urban Chickens" http://mlcsgarden.blogspot.com/2011/12/longing-for-urban-chickens.html and in "How Much Space Do Laying Hens Need?" http://mlcsgarden.blogspot.com/2012/03/how-much-space-do-laying-hens-need.html. I will save space by not repeating these words here, but you may read them at your leisure should you care to.
My understanding is that you are open to public input about this issue. Please use the links above as well as other resources at your disposal if you feel the need to learn more about laying hens or what this grassroots movement is about. I highly recommend a book, City Chicks, which explains how laying hens can save the city money by reducing the amount of food waste heading to the landfill: http://www.amazon.com/City-Chicks-Micro-flocks-Bio-reyclers-Producers/dp/0962464856/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1339948210&sr=8-1&keywords=City+Chicks. It's also an entertaining and good read.
City Council members such as you, who take the time to inform themselves on this issue, will view the planning department's memorandum as ludicrous, just as other well-informed chicken enthusiasts do. Our group intends to regularly send representatives to City Council meetings, and we would like to see a well-informed public debate by all parties concerned.
Respectfully,
I sent this letter on Sunday, June 17, 2012 at 12:08 PM. To date I have received no reply.
Update: on 6/29/12, I sent this letter to Lonnie Craig at City Hall by certified mail. According to the www.usps.com website, it was received at City Hall on July 02, 2012, at 12:32 pm.
Sunday, June 3, 2012
Early June Garden Efforts
This has been a beautiful weekend for puttering around in my garden. Most plants seem to be thriving, perhaps due to the weather, perhaps due to the top-dressing with compost and mulching with leaves as I mentioned in my previous post. I had a few garlic bulbs tucked in a small flower garden in front of the house. I had nowhere else to plant them last fall, since Don hadn't yet built our raised beds. Yesterday I harvested the bulbs, cut off the tops, cut back the roots to 1/4 inches, and let them rest in a lawn chair on our shady front porch to dry for a couple of days. Then they'll need to cure for a couple of weeks in a dry, dark place to develop full flavor for eating.
Then they won't last long. Don LOVES garlic, and he's developed his own system for peeling the garlic and then roasting it. After that, he eats it fast.
This is too bad, because I like to cook with it, and the flavor of this home-grown garlic is better than anything we can buy in the supermarket. I figure I will order cloves of different types in late August to plant in the fall in our raised beds. I am beginning to think we can't raise too much garlic.
The beer traps I have set out for the slugs have claimed some victims, so that effort has been a success. I've harvested most of my radishes, but I've been spraying what's left with Neem oil because something (caterpillars? I don't see any) have been chewing on them pretty badly. The spinach is looking OK, but something has started to attack it, so I sprayed it, too, just in case.
My Romaine lettuce is the perfect size for picking. We need to be eating some salads this week. I planted more lettuce where I've been pulling up Romaine and where the radishes have been pulled up.
Something, I suspect a rabbit, has eaten all the leaves off my precious young eggplant and a young "healthy pepper" plant. We have three dogs, so I gathered up all the dog hair I could find and spread some around that bed. I've read that rabbits don't like the smell of dog hair. Time will tell.
**Update: we later learned that the eggplant-eating culprit might have been a crayfish or "land lobster," as I called it. I can't prove it, but the damage to the garden stopped after Don found and killed the crayfish.
Then they won't last long. Don LOVES garlic, and he's developed his own system for peeling the garlic and then roasting it. After that, he eats it fast.
This is too bad, because I like to cook with it, and the flavor of this home-grown garlic is better than anything we can buy in the supermarket. I figure I will order cloves of different types in late August to plant in the fall in our raised beds. I am beginning to think we can't raise too much garlic.
The beer traps I have set out for the slugs have claimed some victims, so that effort has been a success. I've harvested most of my radishes, but I've been spraying what's left with Neem oil because something (caterpillars? I don't see any) have been chewing on them pretty badly. The spinach is looking OK, but something has started to attack it, so I sprayed it, too, just in case.
My Romaine lettuce is the perfect size for picking. We need to be eating some salads this week. I planted more lettuce where I've been pulling up Romaine and where the radishes have been pulled up.
Something, I suspect a rabbit, has eaten all the leaves off my precious young eggplant and a young "healthy pepper" plant. We have three dogs, so I gathered up all the dog hair I could find and spread some around that bed. I've read that rabbits don't like the smell of dog hair. Time will tell.
**Update: we later learned that the eggplant-eating culprit might have been a crayfish or "land lobster," as I called it. I can't prove it, but the damage to the garden stopped after Don found and killed the crayfish.
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
More Reasons to Grow Your Own
Some states have greatly tightened the noose on illegal immigration. The result is that crops are left to rot in the fields for a lack of skilled workers:
http://www.takepart.com/article/2012/05/15/farm-labor-shortages
Growers are moving toward more mass-commodity crops that can be harvested mechanically and away from organic, sustainable methods.
Even with the high unemployment rates, Americans are not stepping up to take these jobs:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44981872/ns/us_news-life/#.T7OOEFKqa25
They cannot make decent money at it, they do not have the skills, and they are not physically fit enough to work like a skilled farmhand.
These farmhands have skills because many have been toughened by farm work since they were seven or eight years old.
That's right!
Children have been working in the fields with their parents to provide income for their families. While most of us in the U.S. have children who go to school most of the year, the migrants' children are in the fields, harvesting our produce, making less than minimum wage, and facing pesticide exposure and other dangers we wouldn't THINK of exposing children to. Farm work is one of the most dangerous jobs in the United States. An estimated 400,000 children in the United States face these abuses, and it's perfectly legal due to an outdated law from 1939.
A new documentary, "The Harvest/La Cosecha," is bringing these abuses before the public's eye.
These are yet more reasons to eat locally, seasonally, and to grow as much of our own food as we can. One of the foods left to rot for lack of workers was asparagus. Well, let's grow asparagus in our own back yards and take control over our food supply and the conditions under which we grow it!
http://www.takepart.com/article/2012/05/15/farm-labor-shortages
Growers are moving toward more mass-commodity crops that can be harvested mechanically and away from organic, sustainable methods.
Even with the high unemployment rates, Americans are not stepping up to take these jobs:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44981872/ns/us_news-life/#.T7OOEFKqa25
They cannot make decent money at it, they do not have the skills, and they are not physically fit enough to work like a skilled farmhand.
These farmhands have skills because many have been toughened by farm work since they were seven or eight years old.
That's right!
Children have been working in the fields with their parents to provide income for their families. While most of us in the U.S. have children who go to school most of the year, the migrants' children are in the fields, harvesting our produce, making less than minimum wage, and facing pesticide exposure and other dangers we wouldn't THINK of exposing children to. Farm work is one of the most dangerous jobs in the United States. An estimated 400,000 children in the United States face these abuses, and it's perfectly legal due to an outdated law from 1939.
A new documentary, "The Harvest/La Cosecha," is bringing these abuses before the public's eye.
These are yet more reasons to eat locally, seasonally, and to grow as much of our own food as we can. One of the foods left to rot for lack of workers was asparagus. Well, let's grow asparagus in our own back yards and take control over our food supply and the conditions under which we grow it!
Sunday, May 6, 2012
Wool "Natural Growers Pack" for Container Gardens
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| Portulacas thrive in hot, dry conditions (source) |
I bought another impulse item from my online local-foods coop this week.
My understanding husband has taken in stride my purchase of red wrigglers for vermicomposting and wool dryer balls to replace fabric softeners in our dryer. But this week he actually raised his eyebrows and looked askance at me. There's a first time for everything, I guess.
The $8.00 purchase was a "Natural Growers Pack," a "sheep manure compost fertilizer and water retention system" from Breeze Hill Farm of Powhatan, VA. What arrives is a gallon zip-lock bag filled with unwashed, untreated sheep's wool and a small packet of composted sheep manure to use as fertilizer. It is meant to be used in container gardens. According to the packet:
Our product reduces the need to water the plant
and provides one of the best all natural organic fertilizers
available to feed your plants for the entire growing season.
I always have trouble keeping outdoor potted plants sufficiently watered in our hot, dry Virginia summers, so I am hoping the sheep's wool will help. And anyone who reads my blog knows I'm a big fan of composted manure! The directions are to line the bottom of the container with the wool, mix the sheep compost in with the potting soil, add the soil on top of the wool, then add the plant.
That's what I did, except I sprinkled some seeds on top of the soil in my flower box instead of transplanting plants. The seeds are for dwarf phlox plants and portulacas, also called moss rose. Both are hardy, and I am hoping they will grow in the same container. The sheep's wool took up so much room that I wonder if there's actually enough soil in there for the plants. I'll provide an update on how the system works after my flowers are established.
Update on 7/21/12: The wool does seem to keep the planter moist for more time than I would expect, especially in our unbelievably hot summer weather, but my plants have failed to thrive. the phlox has all died. I am not sure if it is something I am doing wrong that is unrelated to the wool "growers pack" or not. If others have any experience with this growing system, I would appreciate the feedback.
Update on 8/25/12: I moved the flower box into full sun, and the portulacas are thriving and blooming beautifully. I wish I'd planted more of them. And the soil does stay moist longer than I expect. I'm not sure what happened to the phlox, but the moss rose seems to be making up for it. Overall I'd say the experiment has been a success. I'd try it again.
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| Phlox (source) |
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