Autumn morning

aturday Morning. Brisk, snappy cold Autumn morning. House is chilled, and I have on extra layer plus the wrist and neck warmer I crocheted for when I'm sitting at my laptop and not moving around too much. As the morning beckons, the light shines through with the promise of another sunshine filled day, I look forward to doing some work outside to clean up the garden beds. Where we live, with rain a more frequent visitor than sunshine, we have to capitalize on the sun-filled days to our advantage. There are more than enough outside activities to fill those less frequen sunny days and perhaps not quite enough inside activities to fill up all thos rainy days.

As usual, though, once I sit down to the computer, one project leads to another to another and too much time elapses. It's like a sinkhole, me and my computer, and as time ticks by when I finally look up, I have once again sunk into the morass.

Adding a few items to this blog, but more of the morning and afternoon was used in converting online documents. Off I go now to put the container garden beds to rest for the winter...well except for the root crops, like carrots, beets, parsnips, maybe a turnip or two grew before the cold snap.

Read more

Buffalo Bird Woman's Garden

nk; Buffalo Bird Woman's Garden

"Most of the tribes in the eastern area of what is now the United States practiced agriculture. It is well known that maize, potatoes, pumpkins, squashes, beans, sweet potatoes, cotton, tobacco, and other
familiar plants were cultivated by Indians centuries before Columbus. Early white settlers learned the value of the new food plants, but have left us
meager accounts of the native methods of tillage; and the Indians, driven from the fields of their fathers, became roving hunters; or adopting iron
tools, forgot their primitive implements and methods."

The University of Minnesota
Buffalo Bird Woman's Garden
As Recounted by Maxi'diwiac (Buffalo Bird Woman) (ca.1839-1932) of the
Hidatsa Indian Tribe

Originally published as
Agriculture of the Hidatsa Indians: An Indian Interpretation
by Gilbert Livingstone Wilson, Ph.D.
(1868-1930)

See the very detailed and clickable contents here 


(hat tip to yahoo group; Old Ways Living)

Read more

My wee garden, fighting the slugs and snails

I haven't tried this yet - hmmm, we'll see. Pacific Northwest and slugs are native, I think, so it has become a losing battle for me. My gardening started with no slugs or none that I could see the first couple of years. And in the last three years they have become 'progressive' slugs. So does that mean they are democratic slugs? I don't know, but I do know they can consume in one night more than I can nurture and grow all season. I don't like to kill them, but dang, I am not growing my kitchen produce garden to feed the slugs.



Another good riddance to slugs remedy;

I was told -- and it worked like a charm -- to save my egg shells, dry them out (I throw them in my dehydrator, of if in a bigger hurry, my oven for a few minutes), and run through the food processor. Then scatter them on the yard or garden. The snails and slugs eat them and die as it acts like eating glass on them.

During the 11 years I lived in that home, I did it like clock work
every month and we never had problem again.


Oh, and here's a different take on the egg shell remedy;

Keep your egg shells and fragment them. Don't crush them too fine; each
piece of shell should be about the size of a coin, no smaller than a dime.
Scatter the shells around your vegetable plants. Snails and slugs will
scratch themselves on the shells and die.

(I already do this and my slugs - you know the progressive ones - must be egg shell resistant!)


And my neighbor insists on the beer remedy;

Place containers of beer around perimeter of garden and/or plants. Slugs will be drawn to the beer, fall in and drown.


A complete list of supposedly 'proven' methods to control (or get rid of) slugs

No, I'm not going to put the whole list here - how about a link to Garden Advice though, and go read for yourself.

Read more

2006 pix of yard progress since Nov 2002.

We bought this house in Nov 2002. Now in 2006, I have an acquisition of photos that show changes in the yard. Photos below are from 2006. I will need to backtrack to add slideshow photos from previous years.


| View | Add Favorite



We bought this house in Nov 2002. In Spring 2003, began work in the yard, very modest beginning, mostly adding a few annuals, some containers, cutting back rhodies and some other overgrown mature specimens. For vegetable garden, I used split-bag topsoil, planting seeds directly into the split bags.

In Spring 2004, work in earnest began to shape up the yard, retaining the flavor of the original owners vision. Also did not want to take out, prune, remove plants until we knew what they were - using that axiom to wait a year and see what's what.

In Spring 2005, more work in earnest, serious pruning, removing, and began actually rearranging, creating and starting to claim yard more to our vision, rather than preserving integrity of original owners vision. Learned original owners stopped living in the house, using on occasional weekends, so yard upkeep had lost it's shaping over the years.

In Spring 2006, we are now engaged in claiming the yard as our own. We have been one-income family since May 2003 when I left my career employment. It has put a serious damper on spending so working the yard has been on extremely frugal budget.
Patience and bit by bit, plant by plant, back-breaking labor, we are very gradually getting somewhere towards our yet unrealized vision for the yard and house.


| View | Add Favorite

Read more