Peat Moss Wars and other environmental gardening issues

Is there a difference between environmental gardening and organic gardening? Apparently peat moss is not PC. It's environmentally unsound. Details are available online at The Garden Rant.

The certified organic replacement I'm using for the Great Wall of Lettuce is called Ligna Peat made from chopped up redwood... new growth I hope. We'll see if it functions as promised without sucking up all the nitrogen.

The Great Wall of Lettuce

Creating the Great Wall of Lettuce has seen me through the dog days of Spring... and it's been a very cold Spring in the Silicon Valley.

The objective:
Use mostly recycled materials to create a very small footprint garden capable of producing enough greens for a family of 5 with low water requirements.

The design:
The space is 2 x 8 feet wide and gets sun from about 10am toabout 1-2 pm depending on the time of year... Hopefully that's just enough sun to keep the lettuce from bolting. Building it took about 3 days including a lot of trial and error. This is my 3rd design. The water flows from drippers into the top row and down to the lower rows. The runoff from the bottom row drains into a piece of vinyl gutter to water the raspberry bushes and peach tree. The vinyl gutter is ugly and truthfully, it wasn't recycled. I hope it doesn't leach plastic poison into the peaches. What do you think? Will the black pots leach BPAs into my lettuce?

The growing medium is based on Mel's mix updated for material availability in our area. The recipe is

• 1/6 vermiculite,
• 1/6 red lava rocks,
• 1/6 chicken manure compost,
• 1/6 worm castings,
• 2/6 linga moss (a faux peat moss that's more environmentally friendly available at our local garden supply)

So far the project start-up cost has been about $75 not including cost of water. Probably more than the produce will be worth if you buy it at the store. If the project lives to see next year, the cost will be significantly less

• $5 Chicken manure
• $6 Linga moss
• $20 Bamboo poles
• $10 Gutter
• $7 Vermiculite
• $15-20 misc. drip system components
• $5-10 seed packets
  

Status Update June 4, 2010
The lettuce seedlings emerge. As of today, 16 pots are planted with a variety of Mesculn, baby Romain, baby bok choy, mint, and rapini. 12 few bush beans planted at the bottom will soak up any water that splashes out of the gutter and provide more shade for the lettuce if they grow. This is all an experiment. It's based on hybred hydroponic gardening priciples with a dash of square foot gardening tossed in for good luck.

Reepee sails away: An Elegy for Childhood

Until this summer, my kids have lived much of their childhood in Animalville, a small rambling town located in the southeast corner of our dining room.

Animalville boasts the usual amenities found in any well appointed town: charming houses, a school, a park and playground. Sometimes there's a cafe. Sometimes a store. Many institutions have come and gone over the years as the town has evolved to meet the changing needs of its residents. The houses are mostly made of wood and each has almost endless rooms. The weather is almost always perfect. The ecomony is based on love.

The citizens here live in loyal, almost tribal, family groups. Over the years their professions have ranged from preschool teacher and shop owner to fashion designer, film makers and international popstars. Many of them are children. Some are kind, a few are occasionally truculant, once in awhile even defiant.

Through the years the town has witnessed all the usual life stories from silly songs and other happy playground antics, to bigger stuff like turf wars, squabbles, reunions, births, adoptions.

And oh have they all traveled... to the beach, to Antarctica. It's all just a wish away from home.

Who wouldn't want to live here?

This is an elegy for Animalville. My kids are now 14, 1o and 9 years old and the time they spend there has dwindled to almost nothing. We'll see. Maybe there's just enough life left to see us through one more long summer.

A long time ago, when Lia as a baby, a wise woman told me that motherhood is the discipline of saying goodbye. Today that goodbye resonates deep as the continental drift.

Fred's Again: Must Be Summer

Thanks to Wikipedia for another Fred's Steak knock-off

1-1/2 cup brewed coffee
1 cup red wine
1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 cup molasses
1/3 cup Balsamic vinegar
1/3 cup Tamari sauce
1/3 cup Worcestershire sauce
2 Tbsp chili powder
6 cloves garlic

Must be summer. But really, don't you think there should be some burbon in there somewhere? maybe some scotch?

tangles
dendrites like pea tendrils
twisted around and around each other
around the stakes
driving through the heart
of my garden growing taller somehow
grasping growing up up up to the sun
while the hollow eyed vampires haunt dark recesses
and suckle themselves in cold of the full moon
mother mother
the female moon just a sliver
peeking through the obscured midnight sky.
tangles of ideas
slivers of memory
sliding over the moon
occluded by time
mother where were you
when I needed your embrace?

Haiku

Count the small blessings
Obviously not O.C.D.
enough for Haiku

Drug Store Flips flops bloom
the hope of beach days beckoning
even in the rain

Restless foaming milk
when leaves of tea float dreamily
on calmer waters

So much more to do
than sit here using my best skill
writing bad haiku

Colleen's Chicken Chili

2-3 onions (med) saute olive oil to translucent
4-5 garlic cloves minced add to saute with onions 1 min.
dump in 4-6 red yellow orange bell peppers seeded and rough chopped
1 t. cumin up to 1.5
1 t. chili powder up to 1.5
1/4 t. red pepper
1/4 r. red pepper flakes (or bump up to 1/2 each)
2-3 t. salt
saute for 1 minute
add
2-3 big cans crushed tomatoes
1/4 c chopped basil
simmer 1/2 hour
add roasted chicken diced
cook 20 minutes
ready to serve.
sour cream and cheese.