what a difference 7 years makes

I was having fun going through some old photos the other day and ran across one of the main garden area from early 2006.

Here is the one I took yesterday from about the same place.

What a difference a few years makes!

growin tool handles or an implement tree

  All homestead have implements of destruction  with broken handles. More  often than  not it is easier and as cheap to simply buy a new one  which leaves us all with a pile of  perfectly usable if they had a handle implements. We are no different and found ourselves with this nice assortment which we burned the old handles out of.

  Many years ago we ran across a web page  that showed an ol feller growing his own tool handles and we thought how cool, one day we are gonna do that.  Finally this year, the trees we had coppiced, for another  experiment, were ready to fit  the implements on and attempt to grow our own handles.   Who knows if it will actually work, how long it will take, or if the handles will be straight enough to   use. In the mean time, they implement trees will look   neat and be a conversation piece.

water features

Most permaculture experts recommend 15% of land mass be in water features. Given we have 15 acres of mountain terrain we will never be able to accomplish this, but we have been  consciously increasing  water features over the last couple years. In the few permaculture classes I have taken, the instructors say it does not matter how big or small the features are as they all enhance the biodiversity and any increase in  biodiversity is beneficial.   

A couple years ago when we scrapped the trailer I used the sink, tub, and toilet as  container gardens. All homes need rearranging from time to time so  the last couple  weeks we have turned the sink and tub into water features around the gardens.

The sink is  a bird  bath. As soon as we move more rocks  around the property I will surround it  and cover up some of the plastic ugly.

 This is down in the bowl  area where there is quite a bit of run off when it rains heavy so we made an overflow down to  a swale that is also on a slope. Once  the flowers grow this summer it should  all look quite nice.   I will continue to expand the garden there and we will likely work toward a few more swales and  possibly another small water feature.

garden updates

A quick walk through some of the gardens yesterday. Things are growing pretty well with few bugs except the squash bugs. After getting very dry for a spell,last week we had about 14 inches of rain.As you can see in the video, the weeds and grass are growing very well. Life here is busy with it just the two of us keeping up, my school work, and manthing working.

be independent

grow your food

simple supper-deep dish skillet pizza

Last night manthing wanted pizza or pancakes for dinner. After some  internet bantering it was decided that pizza  was going to be it. Since I was not going to fire up the oven for a single pizza and my regular cookie sheet was dirty, I had to figure out just how I was going to make said pizza. After a minute or two of thought, it hit me!  Why not make a deep dish  pizza pie in the cast iron skillet.  It came out quite splendid though it was more like a pizza pot pie than a pizza since I went a little bit crazy on the dough making. 

 I made it just as I would make any other pizza: dough, sauce, and toppings. The only difference was what it was cooked in and how it was cooked. After making the dough, I rolled it and put it in the skillet, just as one would make a pie with the edges hanging over the pan. Then I threw the sauce and toppings on ( a garlic sauce with oregano, onion, tomato, chicken, shrooms, broccoli n cheeses) and  rolled the edges of the crust down  around the edges.  

To cook, I simply set the pan on the stove top with a few chunks of broken brick under it. This is to keep the bottom from burning and to allow the  toppings to  heat  properly and cook. I then placed a lid over the top  of the pan to keep the heat in and do its job.  I do  flat pan pizzas in the same manner but  I cook  all the toppings(but the cheese) prior to adding them on the crust since it cooks much quicker. 

 It  took about 25-30 minutes of cooking time. The last 10 or so was ensuring the crust  was cooked through. Like I said, the crust was a bit too much turning it into a pot pie looking creation rather than a pizza but it was still quite good.  The bottom picture is what it turned into though it was not a greenish yellow. The lighting just made it look that way.

Total cost to make was approximately  3 dollars (though a rather expensive meal for us  it is way cheaper than going to a pizza place or buying all of the ingredients to make one) and would easily feed four people. Had I made it on cookie sheets it would have made two pizzas rather than a single. Most of the toppings were from our own produce and leftovers from other meals.  Total time to prepare and cook was under an hour and that was having to chop all the ingredients, make the dough and sauce, and cook.

tobacco time...

After getting the majority of the gardens in for the summer, it came time to begin planting the tobacco down in the holler.  We loaded up Azulita with plants, the tiny tiller, wood ash, fertilizer and chainsaw then  headed down the hill for a day of "fun."

Manthing tilled up the rows right quick while I  followed behind with the bucket of ash, fertilizer, and my handy dandy little trowel. After he tilled, I sprinkled some ash in each hole, threw a bit of  grow juice in  and set the plants in.  We do use commercial fertilizer twice a year for the tobacco. It is a very heaver feeder  on the soil and though we do not use chemical fertilizer on anything else we grow, we cannot keep up with amounts needed for the tobacco too.

 

  

The plants were a  tiny bit smaller than I would have liked but they did  have an excellent root system for a change.   Once manthing got my rows done he went off and collected  cook wood from dead fall while I planted and planted and planted.  About 200  plants were put in the ground and we still have about that many to go in yet.  Depending on the weather we may get them in this weekend. Tobacco needs to stay moist just after transplantation or they tend to die off to the ground. Planting just before a rain  or watering them in is needed.  As a side note, once tobacco has established   good roots it is very difficult to kill  off. It more often than not, will grow back  from  what looks to be a dead plant so  wait a week or two before replanting if you think you have killed the babies.

  

traumatizing the mushroom logs

      Time to make the mushrooms fruit.  We are past last frost and the logs have been inoculated for a little over a year. To get them to begin fruiting they will be soaked  for 24 hours or so. It is also supposed to rain so maybe we can get by without having to flip them.  Once they come out of the water they will go back to their hidey-hole and be watered well a couple times a week (if it doesn't rain) so they can begin  fruiting.  In a couple few weeks we should begin harvesting from them and then we can  start the whole process again for the remainder of the summer.

dehydrating herbs

The  solar dehydrating  season is in full swing.  The herbs are growing like crazy this  year so I am having to give many of them hair cuts early in the season. Today I  took an entire five gallon  pail of   trimmings off of two  small clumps of  parsley.  After washing and taking the stems out I was able to fill all three trays with  the herbs.

Up until this year all of our dehydrating has been  solar. Recently, a high school class mate offered me an electric one that she no longer uses. I could not resist as it will come in handy for when it gets too humid to use this one or on those days when we get our regular afternoon showers.  I will start the process in the solar  then transfer  it to the  electric reducing waste.   Here is  a previous post  on the dehydrator  as well as  some links to plans.

the hugulkultur experiment-part 2

With the success of the hot tub hugulkultur bed we decided to try it out in a normal garden bed. For this experiment, we are using use an already established bed (of weeds) that we double dug when the manthing was laid off and we were on a bed building spree. This bed has not successfully grown anything (except weeds) since we dug it and began throwing amendments on it. It was also convenient because we had some piles of brush nearby, making our job (manthing's job) much easier.

The basic principle of hugulkultur is digging out a hole or spot and then filling it back up with things n stuff that will break down over time into a nice soil while having the benefits of water retention and a raised garden area. Our main reason for doing this is building healthier soil, since we try to maintain a closed homestead and purchase no outside fertilizers, soils, mulches, etc. We get over 70 inches of precipitation a year, so, water retention is not too big of a deal for us most of the time.
The process is pretty easy although it is a good work out if you don't have a mechanized earth moving contraption and live in mountainous terrain. This bed is about 14x5 and was a 2 (half day) job for one person. A young, in shape, person could probably do one in a day and live to tell of the experience. Us older folks have learned not to beat ourselves up when time is not of the essence so we tend to take things a little bit easier when we can.

Our observations thus far...

The dirt that comes out of the hole is very likely not going to be enough to cover it back up, especially if you mound it like most reference sites suggest. Be prepared to have extra dirt somewhere nearby that is accessible and easy to get to the new location.

It is a great way to use downed trees and/or brush and limbs from cutting firewood. But,it takes a whole lotta material to fill that big hole back up. Have plenty (more than you could ever imagine) of filler nearby or in a place that is easily accessible. For those that heat and/or cook with wood or live in an area where wood is sparse, this could be an issue and should be weighed before you decide to do digging massive holes in your lawn.

the hugulkultur experiment-part 1

A few years ago we found ourselves with a hot tub that no longer functioned. Rather than hauling it off to the dump we decided to make a garden out of it. Because we were completely unemployed at the time, an economical way had to be found to use little soil yet fill the tub up so it could grow veggies. After some research, we decided to try an experiment with hugulkultur in a controlled environment. We filled that sucker up with brush, leaves, and dead wood, tossed a layer of compost over the top, then waited and waited and waited, all the while growing veggies in it. Our hope was that the experiment would be successful enough that we could use the hot tub to build soil that was good quality for adding to already established beds or for making new ones since true soil here is nonexistent.

After growing successfully for near two years, in the tub, we decided to see how the soil was coming along. It was still looking a little rough looking and had pieces of twigs and branches throughout so we threw some straw over the top and grew potatoes in it and later a crop of tomatoes.
This spring when we began digging to see how things were going Lo and behold, everything had decomposed and we had three feet of beautiful,wormy, healthy, happy soil.
I am currently in the process of moving the soil to where I need it and only saving enough of it to begin the process again. It worked well enough that we are now working on a couple actual beds using the same methods. It will be interesting to see how they turn out. Though hugulkultur is a great method of building soil it does have a couple of downfalls that I will post about in the next installment of our hugulkultur experiment.

marble crate-garden bed

We have had a marble crate hanging around here for a couple years and after having a FAIL with it last season, I decided I was going to turn it into a raised bed. I decided our outdoor shower area was in need of a makeover to make it more appealing and make better use of the semi shaded area with a ready made trellis.

I dragged the tub out of its corner, pulled the crate to where I wanted it, and set about figuring how I was going to fill in all the gaps between slats of wood,and keep the soil (growing medium) in as I was turning it to the side. While cleaning the area up I dropped a soda can and it fit nicely between the slats of wood. One issue solved! While putzing about I remembered we had the cabinet doors from the trailer we dismantled, low and behold, they fit! I now had a plan. I would line the slats with soda cans from the last visitors we had, then throw in all the old clothes they left scattered about and the front would be sealed by the doors. I would then fill the remainder up with leaves, then top the last couple inches with soil.

It worked a charm except for breaking one door (they are glass) and it took a tremendous amount of leaves that I had to stuff in through the slats on top. It certainly aint the prettiest looking planter but if all grows according to plan, it should provide a nice little bounty of food. I planted beans along the back and side by the shack so they can climb the lattice. Then have a section of lettuce, a row of basil, a row of rapini, a couple cucumbers and two tomato plants. As the leaves and soil settle I will add additional soil/mulch

The pallet garden is next on the project list as planting and weather permit.

apple cider vinegar-so easy even a hillbilly can do it

vinegar

mother

Today I finally strained off our apple cider vinegar that I made after we made jam and sauce from the apples last fall. It looks lovely and we got a bit over five gallons of healthy for you, raw, unpasteurized, product.

To make all that is needed is a container of some sort to hold the peelings, water and a piece of cheese cloth. After peeling and coring your apples set them out to get air for a day or two to brown and then toss them into your container. Add water enough to cover all peels but leave enough room that the vessel does not overflow. I like to weigh the peelings down so that they remain under water. Cover with a piece of cheesecloth to keep bugs and junk from entering and sit in a cool dark place. Let ferment.

The mixture will get a funky covering over it which is a whitish gray mass, this is the mother so leave her be. You will smell vinegar as the process occurs and after 4-6 weeks you can taste test it and see if it is strong enough for your liking. I let mine go 12 weeks with this batch and it is quite strong. When it is to your liking strain and bottle. It will likely be cloudy and sediment will drop to the bottom. This is fine, however, if it is bothersome, strain it through a coffee filter to remove the majority of it.

seeds of the month

My year of Seeds Of The Month has ended. Yes, I am an adult but everyone loves to have a package delivered and for a gardener, seeds are the ultimate gift. I have really enjoyed the SOTM and not just opening the pack to see what is inside but actually growing the veggies and herbs. All seeds are non-gmo, open pollinated, heirloom varieties that have been tested for a germination rate of 90% and higher. Everything I have received has grown and produced well for me even though I have used many for experimental purposes and treated them harshly. The cost of the seed club is very economical and well worth it, especially if one is able to catch a web special. For those new to gardening or for children, it is an excellent way to pique interest and give a gift that will give forever more. Overall, the seed club is very well worth the money and offers quite a nice variety of seed.

Of course, any program has its faults and here are the few that I found. Some of the seed packs did not contain enough seed for my liking, though it was only with a couple of seed types. The bantam corn, for example, only had 16 kernels in the pack hardly making it worth the effort and pollination became a concern. There was a little repetition in the types of seed sent over the course of the year. I do not mind this as seed saves quite well and can be used at another time but I would have liked to have seen a bit more variety in what was sent.

Overall, I was very happy with the SOTM and would recommend anyone interested in an economical and fun way to collect seed to join the club. Members receive 8 packs of seeds their first month and then 4 packs of non GMO seeds every month thereafter for as little as $0.06 per day. You can join at http://seedsclub.averagepersongardening.com/ or join them on facebook

turnip coffee-Blech!

Folks that have followed my ramblings for any length of time know that one of my hobbies is finding a suitable alternative to coffee. This time around, the adventure was using turnips. For hundreds of years turnips were animal fodder rather than people food but during the early 1900s in Germany, they became a staple food item. They were used as a coffee substitute, flour substitute and became a primary ingredient of many dishes including war bread.
Since we have had virtually no winter this year, turnips have grown very well and out of curiosity, boredom, and the need to know I decided to make me some turnip coffee. After slicing and dicing, drying and roasting, and grinding it all up I finally got to make me a fine cuppa turnip java.

BLECH!!!!

Maybe it is an acquired taste, that comes from necessity? Hopefully it is a necessity I will never have to acquire a taste for. Of all my experiments, it is the worst tasting and smelling. After all the hard work, it still smells and has the flavor of a turnip. Perhaps not being a huge fan of turnips to begin with plays a part but liquid turnips is simply not appealing. Maybe it will be better used as a flour replacement though I doubt it.

ETA... I should have added that turnips have many other uses beside fodder for man and beast. They have medicinal as well as other uses around a homestead. Rather than write it all up here is a link ....

sowing of the seeds

With the weird winter we are having this year, planning and planting of the gardens has been quite a challenge. We have had next to no winter weather and nice warm days with few cold nights which makes it very hard to hold back from planting early crops.

Over the last couple weeks I have decided to not hold back any longer since it is just seed and why waste what could be a perfectly good cold crop growing season. Of course, now that I have planted several thousand square feet of gardens, winter is going to arrive. Even if it all gets killed it is just seed and I will have wasted approximately five dollars. If I did not plant until the calendar tells me to I may miss the window and not get any of the cool weather crops.

Thus far, we have carrots, onions, peas, greens of all sorts, beets, turnips, sprouting broccoli, broccoli, brussel sprouts and cabbage of several varieties planted in the GH and outdoors. Since none have sprouted yet, I am hoping that the cold streak coming in for the weekend will not harm them in any way. Though, if it does, I will just plant again.

It is the perfect time to get some of our other seeds started. The tobacco was seeded the other day as were some tomatoes, paprika peppers, cabbage, and brussel sprouts. Now I can relax a bit while all the little darlings germinate and work on outdoor beds as time permits.

Speaking of time, only four more weeks until I am done with school! It will be awesome to have a three month break before I begin again but more importantly, it falls the 6- 8 weeks before our summer planting, leaving me with plenty of time to get gardens ready.

Lastly, after searching for a tobacco growing group on the lovely FB and not finding any, I made one. For anyone wishing to join in on the fun we now have frugal homesteads, homesteading, and hobby tobacco growers group on there .

the BIG table

We now have a super BIG work table in the project/living room. It measures about 4 foot wide by 8 foot long and is about 4 foot in height. This will give me plenty of room to sort seeds for saving, plenty of room for making stuff, and a great place for collecting clutter. It also fits in quite well with our other decor and was very budget friendly to build.

Manthing ran across a couple of large things (wall sections perhaps) at the warehouse that were being tossed out. We do not know exactly what they originally were but when he saw them he saw tabletops. He also snagged up a few wood pallets that were being tossed out as he saw legs! Yes, yes, our table is completely made of someone elses garbage and cost nothing but a couple hours of time, mostly spent rearranging the room, and moving the pieces and parts in since it had to be assembled inside. The only monetary cost was for the screws and nails holding it together and to make hangers on one side for pots and pans. To assemble, all he did was cut a few inches off of each of the pallets so that it wouldn't be quite so tall then attached a piece of plywood on the underside of the table top where the 2x8's stuck out to make hidey holes on the underside. We then brought it all in, stood the pallets up and slid the top over the pallet tops and attached. He then added a couple braces for support.

There is plenty of storage area underneath the table and the legs (between pallet slats) can hold small things like cookie sheets. A few hooks will be added to hang pans from and chop blocks will be set atop for butchering and such. It will be sooooo much nicer than the teeny tiny 3x2 foot table that I have had to work on!

chicken of the woods

It is the fall mushroom season and this is one of the finest that can be found. Commonly called chicken mushroom or chicken of the woods, Laetipous sulfureus can be used in any recipe that calls for chicken or in traditional mushroom dishes. Rather than rewrite what has been written many times before here is a link to read more on it. When we had a chicken the other night, I made an Argentinian recipe called pollo el verdeo with it. It was quite tasty and very easy to make.

3 cups sliced mushroom or chicken
1/2 cup cream (plain yogurt works well)
6 green onions, finely chopped
3 cloves garlic
1 cup vegetable stock or chicken stock
1.2 cup white wine
2 tablespoons cornstarch
salt and pepper to taste
2 tbsp butter

Cook "chicken" and garlic in skillet with butter til done. Add wine and green onion to skillet. In a bowl, mix cornstarch with cold broth and stir until completely dissolved and no lumps then add broth to prepared chicken. Reduce heat and cook 5 minutes. Add cream and mix thoroughly and cook until desired consistency. Serve over rice or pasta.

tobacco-storing and cutting

I realize there are 2700 ways and everyone says their way is what works when it comes to the storage and curing of tobacco. This is how we do it on a very small budget and while I will not say it is the best way, it does give us a nice smooth tobacco that didn't cost 500 bucks to set up. We have tried it a few different ways over the last few years and we finally think we got it figured out. Again, this is just our way, our experience and our story. What works for you may be a little different or a lot different depending on your situation.
Sure, hanging tobacco for a year or two is a good idea in theory. Unfortunately, for most of us, hanging anything for two years would create all sorts of issues with space, cob webs, wildlife and other nastiness that I would prefer not to have on my tobacco. For us, the issue is room, mold and critters. A good pack rat will hoard away a months worth of tobacco in a single night. And, quite frankly, I am not going to continue buying tobacco for a year or two while waiting for what I worked so hard to grow to cure and smoke.

Anywho, once the tobacco is hung to dry it will require a couple of months to turn to a uniform brown color. This is where some folks think it should sit for a couple years. We don't! Once it is dry we pick a morning where the humidity is high and the leaves are flexible and strip the veins from the leaves. We are not overly picky in this process and only work on the center vein, the others will chop up later on in the process. Once the veins are removed we just throw it in a box, any box, so long as the top can be closed to keep the dust off. That's it! It can be just that simple.
We have played with this method the last couple of years in an attempt to get a better flavor out of the tobacco. We have figured out that it cures and develops a nice flavor once it has been cut and then stored. For storage we like to recycle coffee cans as they seal in the flavors and aroma while keeping yucky stuff out. It makes storage much easier since they do not take up near the space and we also know exactly how much tobacco we have.

Since most of us do not have the money to spend a few hundred dollars on fancy schmancy tobacco choppers and I know we didn't and still don't, we also experiment with different ways of cutting the tobacco. The first year we simply threw it into the food processor. It works but is very difficult to get the shredded tobacco a uniform size. A couple seconds too long and you end up with a powder and a couple seconds too short and you have tobacco that's three inches long that is difficult to roll and near impossible to smoke.

What we have begun to do is make a roll of leaves and place it between two blocks of wood, then take a C clamp and close it down to make a small brick. Once compacted, release from the clamp, take a sharp knife and slice it thinly. I have not tried it but have read of people using old school paper cutters to cut it after making the bricks. From there, a quick whirl in the food processor or a small herb/ tobacco grinder will bring the tobacco to a usable size. There are a couple advantages to using the food processor. Larger amounts can be chopped at once and it is easy to add any flavorings(honey in a bit of everclear or vodka). It is a good way to evenly distribute it through the tobacco without making a mess of things.


Once the tobacco is cut and chopped to the size you wish, stuff it into coffee cans or other container and let it cure and develop the flavors. The longer it cures the better the flavor that develops. I would like to say that we have let some of our tobacco age a couple of years and then tried it, but we have not. We always need to use it within a few months time. Maybe one day we will get to the point that we have tobacco enough to store some for a year or two before trying.