Some Garden Maneuvers

Plangarden and Gimp are handy tools for moving things around in the garden without too much back ache. This is a preliminary map for the Spring 2010 Garden – not the veggies yet, but at least the structures.

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  1. The hoop house will be moved from its present position (light blue) over beds 8, 9 (still to be dug), 11 and 12 as soon as the cold weather veggies in those beds can do without it. If need be I’ll put cold frames over those beds.
  2. The hoop house will move over beds 2, 3, 4 and 5, destined for hot house tomatoes, peppers and eggplants, so the soil there can start warming up early.
  3. I framed in pale green those beds that still need to be dug.
  4. I am still debating on whether to create raised beds or field rows in the south-western part of the garden (bright green). I will use the soil from last year’s potato towers there – these beds will hold lettuce and shade crops, so no fear of blight.
  5. The old potato towers will become a large compost system.
  6. I’m not sure if the north-west corner will become home to a small shed yet. It might be a good place for either the chicken coop (opening into the fenced off garden to the north, not to the veg garden, of course) or the beehive (would that be too close to human activity?).
  7. The bright blue circles indicate rain barrels. The two barrels up front will overflow into pipes (blue lines) leading down to a  brook/wetland that will drain into a fish pond at the bottom of the front garden.


Outside: Dust Mites and Animals Tracks

While the dust mites in the bedding were freezing (to death, hopefully)…

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We warmed up this cold but sunny morning by splitting and sorting firewood, playing with a neighbor’s dog, and scouting out some animal tracks. Here are some tiny bird tracks next to my fingerprint:

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And these are some huge bird prints next to my footprints:

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And these claw marks are interesting:

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Then back inside for a steaming cup of tea and some reading of (library) books on bees, and chickens.

The Big Plans for 2010

After two weeks of virtually no blogging, it’s lists like these that can get me going again. Yesterday I listed this week’s goals, today I’m looking at the Big Homesteading Plans for 2010. There is some sort of order here, but don’t ask me which.

  1. Chicken coop (cob? attached to greenhouse? moat?) and 6 (?) chickens
  2. Bee school and beehive
  3. New patio and garden path, and small lawn in the back
  4. Remove asbestos tiles in basement and create root cellar there
  5. Plant bushes and small fruit and nut trees
  6. Better fence around veg garden, and gates
  7. Better, bigger compost system
  8. Small garden/storage shed in veg garden
  9. Start on permaculture flower garden up front
  10. Front drainage and filtration “creek” ending in wetland/pond
  11. Solar thermal collector/glass greenhouse (attached to front balcony)
  12. Woodworking shop/pottery studio: this is a big one because it means demolishing our rotting shed, pouring concrete over a larger footprint, and putting up a frame. In our town we are not allowed to do those things ourselves. Also, it would cost a lot of money (this problem could possibly be solved by no. 17)
  13. Earth oven for baking bread, pizza and drying firewood
  14. Pottery wheel from the engine of our old dryer
  15. Double our food self-sufficiency
  16. Get serious about our emergency supplies
  17. Finish novel, find agent, get published
  18. Get serious about Transition in my town


Snow Shoveling

Having a 1500+ sq.f. driveway, having decided not to use a snow blower and not to hire someone with a truck to plow it for us, we purchased one of these:

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It’s a snow float (a Suncast) and it does miracles. A chore that used to take the two of us at least two hours, now gets done in half an hour. Good, because over the last two days we had loads of snow.

Back into the Fray

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To do this week:

  1. plan Spring and Summer garden
  2. inventorize left-over and saved seeds
  3. read all the gorgeous seed catalogs that arrived while we were gone
  4. order new seeds
  5. figure out a better seedling “hotbox” – buy seed mats?
  6. enroll in bee school, chicken class, and pottery

The plants under row cover in the hoop house have stopped growing, but they are all alive and well, just waiting it out. I am planning to get some fresh horse manure from my neighbor and creating a small “hotbed” in the hoop house for some early spinach. It would be interesting to compare the growth of those plants to the ones under the row cover, and to what extent the decomposing horse manure heats up the hoop house.

I am out there twice a day to clear the snow off and away from the hoop house so light can penetrate and the structure isn’t too stressed. I am happy to report that the hoop house has withstood heaps of snow and  gusts of wind, so our reinforcement of the top connectors seems to be working.

I managed to finish both volumes of Edible Forest Gardens when I was in Belgium and my first project will be to thoroughly re-assess our property. Digging holes and staking out areas will have to wait until the two-foot-thick blanket of snow has gone, but I will have to eyeball some of it and decide on some bushes and small trees.

It’s great to see the juncos play in the fluffy snow and vie for a place at the feeder with the cardinals and the passerines.


Riot for Austerity – Month 14

Riot for Austerity fist with Thermometer

We’re back and Rioting again. I’ll again keep last year’s averages (calculated here) visible as a baseline. I use this calculator.

Gasoline. Well, there’s no way around it: Amie and I flew to Belgium – our first visit in 3 years – and I’m counting it as driving there, and back. I’m using our own cars’ consumption as a guide to how many gallons that is.

8.83 gallons per person (pp) in cars + 115.5 gallons pp on airplanes + 20 miles pp on public transport

=  302 % of the US National Average

(Last year’s yearly average: 24.8%)

Electricity. We’re still holding steady on this one.

354 KWH (all wind) = 10 % of the US National Average

(Last year’s early average: 18.2%)

Heating Oil and Warm Water. It’s finally winter and it shows in the numbers. The oil burner warms our place to 58F at night, and during the day we use the woodstove to keep it around 60F (I’m still not counting because we still haven’t used up that cord). On some days this month, however, it went down to 10 F and it took the stove and the oil burner to keep the house warm. We keep the Annex, which is not in use, at 45F with the oil burner. Our warm water too is heated with oil.

67.15 gallons = 109 % of the US National Average

(Last year’s yearly average: 77%)

Trash. We’re doing well on this one too.

5 lbs pp = 4 % of the US National Average

(Last year’s yearly average: 7.3%)

Water. This went down but of course two of the inhabitants we missing for half of the month. We’re keen on bringing this down to 10% and it should be possible. Toilet flushing, however “selective”, and showers, however short, are the weak points to address in the Spring (rain water holds the answer).

406 gallons of water pp = 14 % of the US National Average

(Last year’s yearly average: 16.5%)

Consumer Goods. Our main purchases in December were a camera and an aquarium (with accouterments) for Amie – I’m curious to see how much electricity the water heater and the filter consume.

$250 = 30 % of the US National Average

(Last year’s yearly average: 27.2%)


And Off We Go

Amie and I will be traveling over the next two weeks, so posting will be sporadic, if I post at all. We have a 9-hour plane ride ahead of us (BANG goes the Riot), and my main concern right now is which book to take. That, and getting a letter notarized in which DH gives his consent for me to take our daughter out of the country.

I’ve whittled it down to three:

Death, Sex by Tyler Volk and Dorion Sagan

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In the Loyal Mountains by Rick Bass

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Wolf Willow by Wallace Stegner

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I’ve read about 1/3 of each of these and still can’t decide. Of course I would take The Book if only it weren’t so voluminous – both volumes will come along in my suitcase, though, along with Holmgren’s Permaculture.  Amie will read Charlotte’s Web. But hopefully we’ll both sleep on the plane.