Monthly Archives: September 2009

Backyard Harvest

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tomato-harvest

I keep taking photos of the beautiful tomatoes I’ve been getting from my garden. I said taking photos, not posting photos. Argh. I’m so behind on sorting through my photos!! I was lucky not to have the tomato blight that wiped out so many people’s crops. I bought a 6-pack of heirloom tomato seedlings this spring, but the names weren’t identified, so I don’t know what they are. I know the ones on the right are green zebra tomatoes, but the beautiful persimmon-colored ones are a mystery. I want to find out because they were absolutely sweet and delicious. The little cherry ones were so sweet, it was like candy from nature.

We’ve been getting shorter days (sob) and cooler nights, so the days of tomatoes are coming to an end. I have basil that needs to be cut and turned into pesto and lemon verbena that I have some ideas for. I planted some salad greens (a mesclun mix, mache and spinach), which are already coming up, so I don’t feel as though my garden has come to an end. I love the weather at this time of year, but it always brings a bit of melancholy with the shortening days and the approach of the winter cold.

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Urban Bee Gardens

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bee

I just stumbled upon a nice site that gives information about planting gardens to specifically attract bees (native bees as well as honey bees) and offer them a habitat in which they can live. It is fairly specific to California, but a lot of the plants (with an emphasis on natives) grow well in other parts of the country.

The site is called Urban Bee Gardens and is out of Berkeley. And the photo has absolutely nothing to do with their site, but everything to do with my warped sense of humor.

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Sunday Spinning

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spinning_group_03

This past Sunday I had some spinning and knitting friends over at the house. Neil very sweetly took Lindsay to Central Park so I could have uninterrupted time with my friends. It was a perfect day, so we were able to sit outside in the garden. This wheel belongs to Shannon. She just got a drum carder, so she’s been dying and carding her own fiber.
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Here’s Shannon knitting after taking a little break from spinning.
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Here’s Sara on the left wearing her February Lady sweater and knitting a pretty cashmere lace scarf. Laura is on the right knitting a purple Coraline sweater designed by Ysolda Teague.
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Here’s Eve spinning some gorgeous autumnal-colored wool. Please note her cute silver toes that match her silver Birks. What’s so nice about these meet ups is that besides catching up with friends we don’t see every day and dusting off our (my) wheel and remembering why we love to spin, we also get to eat the most delicious goodies that we all bring. We had bruschetta w/ chopped tomatoes and white bean toppings, chips with guacamole and piquant salsa, pistachio tea cakes and scones. Yum!
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I pulled out a merino/tencel blend that I bought from Misty Mountain Farm at a wool festival several years ago. I thought it would make a pretty lace shawl, so I spun it very fine. It’s a little over-spun in places (the parts that look like a telephone cord), but I think that will work itself out when I ply it in the other direction.

Spinning is very relaxing and it’s rewarding to be able to turn fleece into yarn. Some of my friends buy their fleece unprocessed directly from the farm and even get to meet the sheep. I think there’s something really sweet about that.

I’ve been spinning every night since then and have filled my bobbin. Last night while I was spinning I watched 2 more episodes of The Good Life and they were both about spinning!

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Chicken Meet up at the Waterpod

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waterpod11

Last Saturday after going to the Greenpoint Food Market, we drove to the Bronx to go to a chicken meet up group being held on the Waterpod. KayCee Wimbush of Awesome Farm in Tivoli, NY came to talk about basic chicken keeping. Her farm pasture-raises chickens and lambs and are committed to taking care of both their animals and the land. While I knew most of the basic information, she did talk about alternatives to chicken feed.

In an attempt to reduce their feed costs and do some recycling, they gathered food scraps from local restaurants. Chickens are omnivores, or miniature goats as I like to call them, so they eat practically everything. Her solution was a win-win in that her chickens were getting high-quality food, she was saving money and the food wasn’t going to a landfill. I guess that’s a win-win-win. Anyway, these things always turn out too good to be true and they found out that what they were doing was illegal. Turns out there’s a law against feeding post-consumer food to agricultural animals. I’m sure I’m not quoting the law correctly, but it’s a way to prevent farmers from feeding ground up animals to their livestock, which can lead to many nasty diseases such as mad cow. Anyway, while it was a great idea, they had to stop.

waterpod2

If you are in NYC in the next 2 weeks, you should try and visit the Waterpod project. They are a self-sufficient floating farm. They incorporate many interesting ideas for farming, such as vertical farming, mobile farming, recycling graywater, etc. They are showcasing a new type of farming in a time of global warming and overpopulation. If land is too scarce, you can farm on a big barge. They are open to the public for tours and host performances and discussions. They were a great venue for our meeting and even have a few hens onboard.

waterpod3

We had our meet up under one of their domes. All of the materials have been gathered from salvaged parts. The dome was covered with billboard material (is it fabric, paper??). You can see a watch ad behind Owen, who’s the organizer of our meet up group. If you can’t visit the waterpod, check out their website at the link above. It’s a very interesting project and definitely applies to urban gardening.

chickentalk

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PARK(ing) Day NYC

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Sustainable Flatbush's space from 2008. photo © Sustainable Flatbush

Sustainable Flatbush's space from 2008. photo © Sustainable Flatbush

Tomorrow is the 3rd annual Park(ing) Day in NYC. It’s a day when people take over parking spots in creative ways to raise awareness to the extra public space that is normally hogged by cars. People play music, lay down sod, have kid’s activities, hold environmental workshops, etc.

Sustainable Flatbush will have a space on Cortelyou & Argyle this year with a puppet show, worm composting demo, a solar-powered cell phone charging station, etc. To find a Park(ing) Day space near you, visit the Park(ing) Day NYC site and look at their map.

It’s too late to register for this year, but I’m dying to make a park next year!!

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Saturday at the Greenpoint Food Market

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megan1

Right around lunch time we headed over to the Greenpoint Food Market in Brooklyn. The market is inspired by all foods fresh and local, artisanal and homemade and encourages community involvement and DIY methods of food production. Sounded great, plus our friend Megan of Brooklyn Honey was going to be there and we hadn’t tasted her honey yet. Megan keeps bees on her roof in Brooklyn. She gardens and recently got chickens. Plus, who can look as cute as she does in overalls!?!

Our timing was great, because we were getting hungry and the food looked amazing. Our first stop was, of course, to see Megan. She sells honey that is still in the wax comb. It’s a totally different honey eating experience because once you taste the honey, you can chew on the wax like gum. She had other products made with her honey including nuts and the most delicious granola ever! I’ve tried making granola a couple of times and it is always the same recipe. “Bake the granola until it’s dark brown, then throw it in the trash and try not to think about how wasteful that was”

Soup from The Soup Spoon

Soup from The Soup Spoon

We got soup from the very sweet ladies at The Soup Spoon. We shared a delicious gazpacho and a curried cauliflower puree. It was a drizzly day, so there was nothing better! I usually make gazpacho a few times during the summer, which is Neil’s favorite soup. Neil got cheated out of it this summer as I never got around to making it. Theirs was chunky and tangy and delicious, so Neil was very happy. They are looking to get a food truck, so keep an eye out for them.

We also had yummy kimchi pancakes, cookies and cinnamony mandelbrot. There was so much more to try – like the most beautifully decorated cookies from Sugarbuilt. Take a peek at their website to see what I mean. You need to scroll to see the different designs. Their Day of the Dead faces are amazing. I also love the architectural details they incorporate into their designs.

If you live in the area, I recommend going. It is going to be held every Saturday from 12-6. You can get more info on their site.

angel

Seriously, where else are you going to get delicious food from fabulous Brooklynites? She’s selling angel food cupcakes and deviled eggs.

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The Good Life

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We’ve become addicts to a British tv series called The Good Life. (When it was brought to the US they changed the name to Good Neighbors). You can watch it instantly on Netflix, or you can piece the episodes together on YouTube.

The premise of the show is: There’s a couple that lives in a fancy suburb of London. He is a designer for a plastic company, who wants more meaning from life after he turns 40. He and his wife decide to try to become self-sufficient, but don’t want to leave their home. So they embark on adventures in urban farming – complete with chickens, a goat, etc.

What’s so amazing about the show is that it was made in 1975 and yet is so relevant to what is going on today. It’s well written and hilariously funny. Get past the first episode where they are setting up the premise of the show and I think you will become addicted too.

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Rubble for soil

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A couple of months ago I took a class at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden on making a rain garden. You can see my post here. The teacher told us about different soil types (sandy, clay, etc.) and said that in Brooklyn you often have “rubble”. What the??? Well, they build and tear down a lot of buildings here and that leads to a lot of rubble. And if you’ve seen some of the construction here, you won’t be surprised that a lot of it isn’t disposed of properly.

Turns out I have sandy rubble soil. Every time it rains, and often even when it doesn’t I have big pieces of glass or pottery come to the surface of my yard. If it wasn’t so annoying with a kid and chickens, it would be kind of interesting archaelogically. I found a soda pull tab this summer. When did they stop making those? I’ve found a coin for a porno booth (at least that is what I think it is because it had pretty racy imagery on it). But the latest thing to erupt to the surface of my yard was this:

teeth-web

Holy guacamole! I totally freaked out. I saw this on the way to the chicken coop right before it was time to leave for the Berkshires last week. I asked Neil to come to the garden and tried to get Lindsay inside, but she didn’t want to go. I didn’t really want to alert her to the teeth (that I thought were human) sticking out of the ground. We ended up going away and hoping that our neighbor, who was chicken sitting wouldn’t find them and call the police. “Yes, I think my neighbors are burying bodies in their back garden.” Actually, a Gotti supposedly lived in this building, but I think mafia dons are like dogs and don’t want to dirty their own dens. He would probably bury his enemies in someone else’s yard I’m guessing.

So when we got back I decided to do a little excavation. Fortunately there was nothing other than the teeth. And fortunately the teeth didn’t turn out to be human. My guess is that they are from a dog. Any thoughts? It’s still pretty gross to find teeth in your garden. It’s kind of amazing how much the soil moves that after living here 15 years new things are surfacing. I blame the worms.

big-teeth-web

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Can you spot the $300 egg?

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Each of my 3 hens lay eggs that are a different color from one another. It’s a handy way for me to know who has laid an egg and who hasn’t. And most recently I’ve been on the look-out for an Edie egg during her egg-bound episode. She very considerately laid her egg the morning we were to leave to go out of town. I didn’t know what I was going to do with her if she hadn’t to be quite honest.

So, can you spot the egg that was stuck inside my hen for over a week?

3-eggs-web

The big one on the left you say? Nope, it’s the blue one on the right. Looking for all the world like a normal, smallish egg. So this puppy cost $300 in vet bills and is so full of antibiotics and anti-inflammatories that I just have to chuck it. I’m having a hard time doing that though…

So who layed this 4th egg today?

4-eggs-web

I’m a bit stumped. I think I’ll have to wait to see what else is in the nest box today.

So after all of the egg drama, Edie is now molting. She looks like hell with little feather spikes coming out all over her. It’s filling in the bare patches from when she was chomped on by mites. This poor gal has been through a lot over the past couple of months. I think she’ll look beautiful again when the feathers fill in. Phoenix rising out of the fire and all that.

edie-moult

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