When Life Gives You Shards of Glass

Above is my Rototiller I affectionately have named Uruz. This 35 year old monster is capable of ripping a man's arm clear from its socket if he's not careful. Despite this it's my workhorse and the best early birthday present I've ever received! (Thanks mom!)

There begins a two week adventure! As I was tilling away, planning on about 30 minutes of work followed by another 2 hours to prepare the land for a garden bed, I begin to toss rocks up from the ground.

 "Cool." I think to myself. "Maybe I'll find enough to make a nice little border for the garden bed!" 

As soon as the thought left my mind, a fractured piece of stone jammed the tiller at the blade and shut it down.

After about 10 minutes of negotiating the rock out of place thanks to my crowbar and hammer, I return to start Uruz up and it works just fine. I till forward another three or so feet when what do my eyes behold? Shimmering shards are flying left and right like shrapnel from a pineapple grenade! Quickly, I shut down the tiller and assess the situation. 

What appear to be broken pieces of glass litter the earth beneath my feet and I think to myself  "Well fuck, I can't, in good conscience, plant a vegetable garden here, or leave the glass where it is for the sake of my kids if nothing else."

 So I do the responsible thing and I begin to dig! I have been blessed to have a variety of garden tools, some of which were invaluable during this adventure. To the right we see just how much progress I was able to make before being thwarted by the rogue glass.

 

I dug and scraped my way deeper into the ground beneath me, becoming increasingly frustrated as I began to suspect that someone had literally taken a couple dozen mason jars, bottles, gallon jugs, and glasses then smashed them all before burying them next to the shed. For what reason, I am unsure, but I have a hypothesis that it was to both confuse and enrage me. (Mission Accomplished)

   

The further I dug the more curious I became and began to wonder what would compel someone to do this. I was beginning to become lost in thought when a loud *screeap* caught my attention to what was happening below. I stepped forward to discover a large mass of rocks jutting out of the soil. 

These two pictures only really capture about 1/4 of the total mass of rock I removed

So I was left with a gaping maw where once was relatively flat land and I decided that instead of wasting all those rocks and energy spent digging down by filling it over with dirt, I'd use my expended energy to my advantage and construct a pond! First things first, I leveled the bottom and then used some cinderblocks to act as a mold in order for me to tier the pind ans=d tamp the dirt down to form walls.

 After firming up the walls I laid a layer of newspaper underneath to prevent any errant glass from tearing the liner. Then I watered it and let it set overnight. The following day I cut the liner out of one piece of thick plastic sheet and set stones in to keep it in place.

I then left to the front of the house where I loaded up a wheelbarrow of dirt to lay the floor of the pond. As I returned I was greeted by this little character who stopped by for a visit. I sat there and watched for a moment as it gazed into the tote, carefully examining the rainwater for a snack. It was in this moment and I knew what I was doing was not for naught. Here in front of me was tangible evidence that the Landvaettir of this place were thankful for what I was doing and appreciative of my efforts to improve the land and create a habitat for creatures such as this.

Here the pond is lined, has its bed of dirt, and the ring of stones to act as a barrier and weight down the top portion of the liner. I placed down newspaper to act as a weed guard as well as a source of nutrition for the plants as newspaper is high in nitrogen

About 15 barrowfuls later, The stone is set, the pond is complete, garden beds lined and topsoil laid thick!

 Now to sow the seeds! In the upper portion under the white lattice there are Asparagus beans, Cucumbers, and sweet peas

On the lower portion near the walkway are yellow pear tomato, hungarian wax peppers,basil, black beauty eggplant, dill, kohlrabi, red lettuce, spinach, and bull's blood beets. 

In the upper portion by the bush there are summer squash, spaghetti squash, sweet corn, bush beans, canteloupe, bull's blood beets, parsley, oregano, more dill, and winter squash.

After all that hard work I look at what I have done and am extremely proud with myself. Now I just need to get more dirt to tackle the next project. . .The other side of the walkway where a keyhole garden will arise.

Hiatus Complete!

(at least for now)

So I have fallen from the face of Midgard in the face of my finals, life, and other general circumstances. Lucky for me my garden continued without much interraction.  .. Until Now!

 Spicy Raddishes!

 The sweetest sweet peas I've ever tasted!

 String beans

 Our horns charging in the might of Thor as the Lightning cracked, Thunder roared, and Rain poured all that energy into our vessels. The water collected was blessed then thrown to the garden to continue the fertility and prolific production already observed.

Here we have the beans, peas, and raspberries (hidden)

 Turnips that got too big for their britches!

The season is about half over and I'm terribly far behind. What with flight school, summer courses, raising a kid, and finals have left me hurting, exhausted, or too frazzled to find time. Today I am blessed for a day off and thankful that I'm able to return outside and get some serious work done! More pictures to follow!

A Viking We Will Go!

A Viking we shall go, A Viking we shall go! Pillage, burn and kill the lot A Viking we Shall go!

 Cinder blocks acquired from abandoned lots

 Skids picked up from a piping supply company, and flooring from a rennovation.

And here is the coup de grace! A 1970(ish) John Deere rototiller, two trellis, chicken wire, posts, 54 raspberry canes, an antique chicken trough, tomato cages, heavy mil HPDE cloth for pond liners, and assorted garden tools.

Here we have the monster of a tiller waiting to eat up about 30' of unsuspecting grass and weeds!

And here we have the 54 raspberry canes safely transplanted and awaiting their companion plants. Turnips, Yarrow, Tansy, and Garlic all do well with the raspberry and each help one another grow.

No One Works Alone in Nature

My dear Annie: This one's for you.

 Observation is key! Especially when gardening! As caregivers for our own food we must observe many things throughout the process; how much water our plants need, the Ph of the soil, the amount of sun our plants are receiving, whether or not there are harmful insects slowly (or rapidly) munching away on our precious caloric investment, or eve disease/blight is present in any of our photosynthesising friends. Those are all examples of daily observations we must make to ensure the correct care is given and our time isn't wasted.
    
  More importantly, we must also observe the subtleties of nature, wherein we begin to see connections of the food web (or ecosystem) and start to realize that, in the wild, many plant species are found together repeatedly throughout. This is where a technique called "Companion Planting" or "Guild Planting" come into play. The Iroquois Amerinds had the perfect example of this in the "Three Sister's Guild" Below is an excerpt from Toby Hemenway's book "Gaia's Garden: A Guide To Homescale Permaculture"

(An excerpt from Gaia’s Garden)

Let’s begin our exploration of guilds (communities of plants for the garden) with a very simple example that illustrates some essential principles. Then we can proceed to more complex guilds—ones that go beyond vegetables.

Familiar to many gardeners is the Native American triad of corn, beans, and squash, a combination often called the Three Sisters. The trio qualifies as a guild because each of these plants supports and benefits the others. The cornstalks form a trellis for the bean vines to climb. The beans, in turn, draw nitrogen from the air, and via symbiotic bacteria convert the nitrogen to plant-available form. These nitrogen-fixing bacteria, scientists have recently learned, are fed by special sugars that ooze from the corn roots. The rambling squash, with its broad leaves, forms a living parasol that densely covers the ground, inhibiting weeds and keeping the soil cool and moist. Together the Three Sisters produce more food, with less water and fertilizer, than a similar area planted to any one of these three crops in isolation. Jane Mt. Pleasant, an agronomist at Cornell University who has blended her Iroquois heritage with her research, has shown that yields of this guild, measured in calories, are about 20 percent higher than corn grown alone in an equal-sized plot.

Look at how many interconnections this guild bears. Beans furnish nitrogenous fertility for themselves, corn, and squash; squash shades soil for the benefit of all three; corn feeds the bean-hugging bacterial nodules and creates a trellis for the beans. Three plants, weaving at least eight connections. The Three Sisters guild is a perfect place to begin creating a richly connected garden.

In the Southwest, a fourth “sister” is found in this guild: Rocky Mountain bee plant (Cleome serrulata). Often growing near former Anasazi settlements—it’s virtually an indicator plant for ancient ruins—this 2- to 5-foot tall, pink-flowered cleome is a powerful attractant for beneficial insects that pollinate beans and squash. The young leaves, flowers, and seed pods of bee plant are edible, and native people boiled and ate them, or made a paste from the plant for later use. Bee plant also accumulates iron, and thus is the source of a deep-hued paint used to create the characteristic black designs on Anasazi pottery. Songs and blessings of New Mexico’s Tewa people mention corn, beans, squash, and bee plant, indicating that this multi-functional flower is an integral member of a sacred plant pantheon.

I was pleased to learn of this fourth sister, as it connects the web of this guild’s beneficial interactions with the insect realm. Part of the strength of corn/beans/squash comes from its tie-in with a non-vegetable domain: that of the symbiotic nitrogen-fixing bacteria carried by the beans. And now, by adding a fourth plant to the guild, the web’s pattern strengthens further, drawing insects into the network. Lured by bee plant, these nectar-slurpers will pollinate the squash and beans (corn is wind pollinated), ensuring good fruit set. By extending the three sisters, we’ve moved into three kingdoms: animal, plant, and bacterial. Creating this connectedness allows us to draw upon three billion years of life’s wisdom for aid. A typical apple-centered guild. Below the apple tree, a ring of attractive and grass-suppressing bulbs encloses flowering and food-producing plants that also provide mulch and habitat for beneficial insects. The apple tree is nurtured by this community of multifunctional plants making less work—and more food and flowers—for the gardener.

The lesson here is that by hooking into the cyclical rhythms of many-kingdomed nature, a guild can capitalize on enormous sources of energy and experience. Focusing only on food plants sucks fertility from the soil while giving little in return. In contrast, offering a little something extra—a habitat for bees, a home for soil organisms—ties the small cycles of our garden into the generous and large cycles of nature. Growing a few early-blooming flowers encourages bees and other beneficial insects to stick around when the fruit trees need pollination and the aphids begin to swarm. Leaving last fall’s leaves to compost on a flower bed nurtures a healthy crop of worms to till and aerate soil and to shed nutrient-rich worm castings down among the roots. Our small offerings bring large rewards. In effect, if we buy the first round of drinks, nature picks up the tab for dinner and a show. We can leverage our assets into a not-so-small fortune by piggy-backing onto the pooled resources of the natural economy. By making nature our partner, our yields multiply, and risk of failure declines.

The addition of bee plant boosts the three sisters into a more powerful foursome. This illustrates a useful rule for guild design: Start with something known and basic, and gradually add connections. We now have a hint about creating our own guilds. Let’s see how a more complex guild is constructed, and then we can develop more guidelines for building our own.

Copyright © 2001 by Toby Hemenway

Just like in human life, success with the plant Kingdom is all about who you know and who you associate with. Now onto answer Annie's question  "Do you have a plan for what to do when other critters want the fruits of your labor? when bugs starts eating all your tomatoes, or strawberries, for example?"

The answer lay withing the concept discussed above. In planting specific plants to attract beneficial insects. you ensure solidarity and diversity within the garden. The most important principle of sustainable agriculture is that our end goal is not food. Our end goal is a strong, multi-faceted, artificial ecosystem (artificial in that we put the pieces together instead of waiting for nature to do it herself.) with boundless connections throughout every Kingdom in the natural world. If you plant vegetables which attract aphids, also plant those flowers and herbs which will attract Ladybugs and Lacewings (two extremely efficient killers) Nature will then take its course and the predator population will increase until the food is exhausted then it will dissipate until the next explosion of pests comes around. 

And for active intervention I would recommend most of the natural pest control remedies such as a couple teaspoons canola oil, some ivory soap and a quart of water in  a spray bottle. The oil coats the bugs, suffocating them and the ivory dries them out once the solution is applied. The issue with this and other projectile remedies is that the effects are indiscriminate and will affect those beneficial insects as well if any are present.

I hope that answered your question Annie, sorry to keep you waiting!

DIRT! Glorious Dirt!

Contained within the sturdy walls of this utility trailer is black gold! I am blessed and full of luck to 1) live in a city which composts the vast majority of it's denizens organic waste and 2) have the ability to take as much humus (in varying degrees of decomposition) as I can physically load and haul on this beast.

 In about 40 minutes my good friend Greg and I were able to load up about a cubic yard of still cookin' deep black soil and get it back to the house.

 Here is the South side of our home and where our first raised beds are going to be planned. To the left you can see a tower of bricks which will serve as the retainers for the garden.

Here we will have a rain catchment/filtration system in place of the downspout, in addition to cold frames built against the walls.

And here is (in my opinion) the shot for my before photo. This patch of yard is full of potential and will look so drastically different by the time we're done with it no one will believe it was once yellowed and nitrogen starved grass and weeds.





The first action taken after collecting the black gold was to liberally distribute it to the compost bins. There are a few reasons for this, the first being the city compost is much further than mine and therefore contains mature (and bountiful) microorganisms which aid in the decomposition of organic matter.

Above is the larger bin already churned, oxygenated, and layered with the humus

Why is this important in an already started compost? Well it seems to me that everything in nature thrives off of diversity and it is through this diversity (of everything from colors, to scents, to genes, to species of the same plant) that strength is built. Have you ever wondered why BigAg *has* to use myriad chemicals just to keep bugs, disease, pestilence, rot, and other unsavory happenings from happening? The answer is simple; Monoculture.  Having miles and miles of fields full to the brim with ears of corn or chest deep soy is saying to pests and problems the same thing as neon sign displaying "FREE SURPLUS" at a methadone clinic is to junkies. Through the systematic approach of modern agriculture businesses and corporate farmers have found it necessary to poison, over fertilize  and drop tons of chemicals on food which humans are supposed to ingest. I find this appalling and realize I have ranted my way into a subject for an entirely different time. Diversity! Diversity in everything you do! For example, with the compost, there are microbes from my garden busily working their hardest to convert all that plant matter into thick, rich humus. Adding microbes from another source of composting materiel will increase the diversity of life within the compost bin. What this does is create an environment where the immigrating microbes (being further along in the composting process) will help the native microbes out by strengthening their tolerances, and increasing overall performance.

Here is the technique I used for both bins;

Dig your way to the bottom to ensure you remove the matter being compacted then spread a thin layer of top layer compost over the floor of the bin followed by a layer of humus.

Next you repeat the process of lightly layering more material

And then once more you add more humus, much like microbial lasagna, before dowsing the whole pile and letting it set overnight.











In our society we look upon soil with no respect, as if it were a static, inanimate lump of dirt. We even apply the word dirt(y) to parts of society which are viewed through slanted eyes (pornography, gambling, strip clubs, etc etc) so its no wonder that BigAg works as it does. It treats the soil as a means to an end and not as the foundation for the entire journey. Real diversity and therefor real success starts in the soil and there is no way around that. I'm not going to get into the different soil types, ph levels, or what works for which plants but I am going to say that no matter what the situation, any soil (see dirt) can be improved from wasteland to sustainability to the point of surplus. If you want to succeed in providing quality food for your family, provide quality soil for your worms, microbes, insects, fungus, plants, and everyone else involved in the food growing process.

A Post For Thanks

Today I reflect upon the work put forth  and the luck I have received in my endeavors. First I need to thank Melissa Mondegreen of Rockamour Herbs (facebook) for the many organic strawberry plants she gifted to us! I also need to thank my sister Kim over at Life With a Possum for giving me a shameless plug on her page. Both of these women are doing great things for themselves, their families, and the environment around us. I highly recommend anyone with an interest in gardening, sustainability, or snark to read Life with a Possum.

Right then, on to business!

Last night was spent transplanting the final strawberries into their new home followed by a thorough dowsing to quench their dried little roots.

This particular specimen caught my eye simply by its shape. The picture doesn't do it justice for when I held it in my hand its roots were alive and anxiously awaiting soil to protect and harbor it.

This morning I got right down to work as soon as I was able.

First up was churning the compost bins. Here I have two separate bins I viked from a local municipal piping supplier. No chemicals here! So I don't have to worry about anything leaching into our fresh humus. Every morning I turn, lift, separate, stab, dredge, and otherwise discombobulate the mixture so each bin gets proper aeration before throwing piles from one into the other and vice versa. The theory behind this is that all the activity, all the aeration will lead to the most materiel being exposed to as many microbial helpers as possible.

 Speaking of microbial helpers! Above is my super ingenious compost tea catchment system! Really it's just a  trough ending in a hole lined with a tarp I butchered a deer over, but hey it works! Every time I churn the compost viscous brown liquid pours out of the bottom. Once it's full enough, I'll start scooping it out and throwing it back into the pile. Kind of like pouring coffee back into the pot to fortify the brew.
 Here is the center of the pile in all its decomposing glory! there's already scratches of humus building up so hopefully soon we'll be able to apply this to the beds and continue on.

 And now Ladies and Germs, It is the moment you've all been waiting for! It's time to play what random shit can we find in the garden today!!! *the crowd goes wild, inciting a riot in which several windows are smashed, some vehicles set ablaze, and no one was seriously injured, save for one errant hedgehog who just wasn't fast enough.*

First up we have a bottle cap! Now if this were, say, a Nuka Cola cap I'd be ecstatic! But alas, it's only crap non-alcoholic beer.

Secondly we have this uber creepy baby doll resting next to the tool shed. I'm sure its been there for ages judging by its appearance but this is the first I've noticed it and it made me to a double take.

Lastly and most heinous of all:

FRACKING SHINGLES! Shingles! You know, the covering which adorns the tops of our homes! 

What's that? You ask *Why* there are shingles in my garden? Well dear friend, let me tell you why!

We are renting this home, and our landlord bought this place from a man who lived here for many many years. He, apparently, was a homesteader as well and had a large garden, chickens, ducks, goats, and even a pig in addition to all of his plants. Long story short, the space which is now my garden was once a  fully insulated and wired chicken coop. The previous owner made it implode and buried everything under a thin layer of dirt. His reasoning (according to the neighbors) was that he didn't feel anyone would want to buy the house with a structure such as that on the property, not knowing that we would be moving in. No worries though! That's just another project on the table for later this season.

Enough griping and distractions! Here is what the freshly planted section of the bed looks like:

Here we have the strawberries as the most visible and what you cannot see (yet) are two types of bush beans, spinach, and brussels sprouts all planted and eagerly awaiting their time to germinate and join the rest of us in this amazing world we live in.

Here is the first home I've put together for the Huldufolk at the base of the tree nearest to our porch. Strawberries, flowers, and herbs are planted all around so there will always be lush, green abundance surrounding them. Which, ultimately, is what I am working towards; being surrounded by abundance.

The Huldufolk are happy

Surrounding our home is enough grass to feed a small herd of sheep or goat. I aim to change this! I am determined to transform our property from suburban cookie cutter lawn to an edible landscape which incorporates millions of years worth of knowledge and trial and error. The end goal is to have a self sufficient (to the point of surplus) homestead on just under a quarter of an acre. This will entail many hours of work, exponentially more hours of planning, the help and cooperation of not only my friends and family but also of the environment itself. A million variables need to fall into place in order for us to succeed and I am armed with the knowledge needed to at least increase the odds in my favor. This blog is going to be (more than anything else) a way to hold myself accountable. If people are watching, I must continue work and cannot let myself be lazy or slip on planning.

  On to business! So far we have quite the stock built including over 1000 bricks and cinder blocks for various projects but also a slew of wood, skids, and pallets which will be turned into coops, hutch, raised beds, and retaining walls. We have been gifted with almost 100 organic strawberry plants, as well as mature raspberry canes which will become our edible border hedge. In addition to all that there are currently 80 different varieties of vegetables stored safely in seed packets waiting to be born back into the soil.

Already started are the compost bins

 The path for our first keyhole garden

 and a quarter of the strawberry transplants

In the coming months there will be many more posts, each as a record of our efforts as well as information helping me along the way. This endeavor is one of love. Not only for the love of nature and fostering a healthy relationship with the land which sustains us but also for my family, their health, and our Gods. Now it is here that I need to say that I am the only adult living Asatru in our household. My wife is Christian, but respectable about it. Neither of us try to convert one another (though I do call her a good heathen woman occasionally) and we respect the belief system of our spouse. That being said my limited time spent with this land has already proven to be spiritual. From listening to the birds as I turn the compost in the morning, hearing their tales and songs, to sitting out back and planning the garden and being hit with inspiration for powerfully efficient designs out of nowhere, I have come to realize that I am not alone in this journey. Nor am I doing this just for my family, but also for the animals, the Huldofolk, the Landvaettir, and the Wights of this land. It is my job to groom this space and, in so doing, create a haven and secure home for all of this place's inhabitants.