Chickens (and rabbits) in the Garden

  

 

            Fact: chickens and rabbits can wreck havoc on gardens. I have seen a chicken gleefully take out an entire row of carefully sprouted carrots in one stroke of the leg. Later in the season, a small flock can much their way through a winter’s worth of kale and collards in just a day. Chickens can dig a dust bath hole so deep that they get lost in it. Rabbits will nibble on anything and dig tunnels under the neighbor’s shed to escape to their dusty driveway. But then, there are the benefits; the fertilizer dropped as they wander around, the bugs eaten, the compost processed….the entertainment factor. I guess we need to practice Defensive Gardening. Here are the tools.

1.       Milk crates: I place milk crates over emerging perennials in the spring. Anything that looks tasty to a chicken or the rabbit is covered. Rhubarb. Angelica. Raspberries. Sorrel. The crate allows air and light through but provides a good cover for growing plants. They are also light, cheap, and easy.

2.       Fencing circles: Using scraps of fence, I circle delicate plants in a bed.

3.       Half high fences: Since the rabbit can hop up into—and across—the raised beds, I surround each with a fence. We bought four foot high welded wire fence in a big roll and cut it in half to wrap around each garden bed. I attach it with a staple gun to the bed so that the plants  in the bed have protection knee high.  It comes off quickly and can be moved easily. Chickens are also deterred by the fencing, although the nibble through the gaps.

4.       Hoops: Hoops and plastic can both warm and dry beds, as well as protect delicate crops. They also help keep birds from pulling up new corn plants.

5.       Garden fences: Using the same welded wire, I surround the entire garden on the chicken run side. Lately, I have been using the raised beds and trellises to attach the fencing so that it is higher. With very lively chickens, I cut a roll in half and merge it with the other, twisting the vertical wires, creating a six foot fence around the main garden.  This is keeping the critters out of the run for the winter, allowing the grass to grow and rest, and will also keep the chickens out of the yard in the summer, cutting down on droppings and munching.

6.       Twigs: Twigs laid in beds can keep the cats from pooping in beds, but that is another story.

If you keep the materials similar, the look is far more coherent than random pieces found of the streets.

Line Drying

When we bought our house, it came with a washer and dryer. The washer was avocado green, from the mid-seventies. The dryer looked like something from 1959. It last for four years and a part burned out. Mark replaced the part, it burnt out again, and we called in the repairmen. It’s gone, they told us.  We gave in and hung the clothes outside all summer. It was not a trial.

The next winter, we considered our options. Buy a new dryer, which was not cheap nor was it energy efficient. Or we could hang the clothes in the basement for free. We hung. After a few years of slow drying in a wet basement, we bought a couple of big, sturdy drying racks and moved the process upstairs. Then I took the dowels from the old rack, laid then across the rafters in what is now the dining room, and hung pants and heavy shirts there, over the woodstove. Our weekly laundry air dries, spread around the house, in about 36 hours.

Sheets and towels are a different story. They pile up in the basement, waiting for a dry spell—we usually get one or two a winter. Some years, the sun breaks never come…so Mark loads up all of the sheets, towels, fleece jackets, and bathrobes into his big duffle bag and hauls them down the street. He spends a couple of hours reading, washing, and drying all of the big laundry in the old-fashioned Laundromat with the murals of rivers and waterfalls above the machines. He enjoys the orderliness of the process and the feeling of accomplishment. Even with the occasional trip to the Laundromat, we are happy with our system.

  We had a bright, cold spell this weekend, so I pushed all of the sheets through n Sunday morning and hung them outside just as the fog broke. They were half dry by night, so I left them on the line until I came home from work this afternoon. They smell great and we are good for another month and a half.  Spring will come before the pile overtakes us again.

Candlemas weekend

Daylilies begin

Finley walk

Candlemas Mantle

primroses

Prep for seed planting

Mark's compost area after pruning

I Praise of the Humble Potluck

In praise of the humble potluck.

My first encounter with a potluck was in college—I made my Aunty Marilyn’s macaroni salad with mayo, tuna, and sweet pickles and proudly carried it up the narrow stairs to a classic Dover N.H. apartment in a converted old house. When I put it down, I noticed….three other macaroni salads!  We all laughed, piled plates high with macaroni and realized that all of our family recipes were both strikingly different and equally tasty. It was a revelation to me.

 I have loved potlucks ever since. Yes, I have attended lazy post-college potlucks, where everyone brought chips and dip, except for me. I have even hosted one badly planned potluck, where everyone brought desert—although there are worse fates than a table full of cake and cookies. Once or twice, I have gone home from a potluck to supplement dinner with a piece of peanut butter toast, it is true. But, generally, the potluck is a glorious thing. Potlucks are the epitome of community.  Everyone brings a special skill—the fruit salad, the bread, the cake—to the table. People show up at your house carrying dishes full of yummy food, big smiles on their faces. We spread it out, welcome the over-stressed, empty-handed person with open arms, and dig in. There is that sacred moment when everyone has a full plate and all you can hear is the clink of silverware on dishes and then -- someone sighs deeply and the conversation begins. Eating together brings people together, changes your perspectives, and makes you a happier person.

                We had a potluck on Friday night a few weeks ago. Winter comfort foods and cheerful voices.  When we were done, I thought, we need to do more of these.

Date Orange Cake, from the Moosewood book of Deserts

3 c flour

1 t salt

1 t BS

1c butter, at room temp

1.5 c white sugar

3 eggs

1 c buttermilk

2T grated orange peel

1 t vanilla

2/3 c of chopped pecans and dates

Beat sugar and butter together. Add dry and wet ingredients, alternating. Add pecans and dates. Pour into 9 by 13 inch cake pan and bake  350 degree  oven.

While it is baking, heat the juice of the oranges with about ½ cup of sugar until sugar is dissolved. Pour over the warm cake.

Serve with whipped cream.

                 

Safe Streets

A few weeks ago, I bought a couple of small, blinking lights – the ones Oregonians buy for their dog’s collars—to clip onto my raincoat and bag. I’d nearly been taken out in three crosswalks, crossing with the light, after looking both ways, in one dark and rainy week.  I know it is dorky. I am hoping that it is so dorky that it becomes cool, but I doubt it. I will say that it has been effective; three cars stopped for me while I have been waiting to cross the street last week. I feel just a little bit more visible now.

In town, we have had a series of accidents—fatal and not—involving cars and cyclists or walkers, those of us with no metal amour around our bodies. We hear tales constantly about near-misses: the college student dressed in a black OSU sweatshirt on Monroe, the cyclist who was cut off IN THE GREEN PAINT by a driver who did not understand the significance of the signage, the car turning into the path of a city bus.  On a rainy winter evening, it is just hard to see out there.

For the last one hundred years, we have been involved in an experiment in urban design. Rather than designing (and just evolving) our built environment around people walking, using mass transit, or driving carts, we have been designing for single occupancy cars. Entire departments at every level of government have been created for the express purpose of moving cars, each carrying one or two people, from place to place as smoothly and efficiently as possible. When we talk about intersections, a failing intersection holds cars up too long. When we design streets, we curve the corners so that cars can move more easily around them.  We have longer blocks, arterial and collector streets, cul-de-sacs  all designed to make driving easier and to separate people from cars. We have streets that say “Drive fast” cutting through neighborhoods, with schools, churches, stores, and the gym along them. Even our houses and shopping centers are now designed to be viewed from a moving car, not a slower walk.

In many areas of the country, if you wanted to walk somewhere, there is, literally, nowhere to walk. There is the road and the drainage ditch. No shoulder. In other places, you have to fight with five or six lanes of traffic to cross the street to the grocery store, sitting in a huge parking lot. If there is a sidewalk or a bike lane, it just may disappear when the road is narrowed by an old bridge or a merge. Because of rural sprawl, encouraged by cars and cheap gas, many people live ten or fifteen miles away from basic services and jobs. They have to drive. There is no other option.

We are beginning to see the failures of this concept. As climate change worsens, and peak oil, which was put off by fracking, finally becomes a reality, this settlement and design pattern will collapse. Our task—my task, here in Corvallis—is to work to lessen the impact of this crisis on our daily lives. I don’t know what to do about the rural sprawl, but I can imagine what a shift in perspective might do locally, in my own built environment. We need to start with a basic, radical principle.

Everyone has the right to be safe on our streets.  Trucks moving goods, cars, bikes, scooters, and walkers. No one user should be valued above all others.

Yule Gratitude

Jack Kerouac, Beat poet, wrote a list of rules for Modern Prose which I work into my Honors Ninth grade curriculum every year.  The one I really emphasize is Be in Love with Yr Life (being the beginning of the atomic era, the underlying idea was "because we could all die tomorrow."). What do you love about your life? 

December 18th: I love curling up in bed under all of the blankets while cold night air blows over me head and moonlight shines down.

December 19th: Papers are recorded in the gradebook, Bean credit has been noted, chairs are up, dishes washed, and plants watered. And I ate five Christmas cookies during class. I think Yule can begin.

December 20th: Prepped for Solstice: clean out the fireplace, find the bulbs and pots for planting, grind the corn for cornbread and make some soup, fill the lanterns. Shut off the internet, the radio, and the lights. Tomorrow-- no lights, a long walk in the rain, and home to fire, dinner, and a Christmas Carol.

December 21st: Oak trees, like from Middle Earth, sketched against a rainy sky. Elk in the field. Mist covered hills.

December 22nd: Waking up the morning after Solstice, turning on the lights and making waffles for breakfast. 

December 23rd: Latkes for dinner!

December 24th: A long walk in the dark, cool forest, through the clouds, then the Indian Buffet for lunch. 

December 25th: Fish pie in front of the fire.

December 26th: Long walks and grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch. 

December 27th: Portland has done some very cool things for bicycle infrastructure!

December 28th: Ok, there's a lot of food being eaten over Yule. Today, we went to Roman Russian grocery in NE Portland, bought perogies, pickles, black bread, and pastries with poppy seeds and ate it all for lunch. It's like traveling to a new country without leaving  the state.

December 29th: The public library on a rainy afternoon-- warm, well lit, quiet, and full of books.

December 30th: Small cities are the best. I was to meet someone for lunch, but the place was closed. I looked across the street, saw her bike at the co-op. While hunting for her, I ran into three other people I knew. I love the web of threads that connect us all. 

December 31st: When Mark and I first started taking long walks through town, basically commuting by foot, the China Buffet (about 2 miles) seemed like a long dark trek through Ranchland. Tonight, it barely registered. Shrinking Corvallis, one walk at a time.

January 1st: A double rainbow arched over the valley this morning as we began our New Year's Walk. A little while later, after  a downpour, the sun shown through the trees and rain sodden air like a cathedral. It was a beautiful start to the decade.

January 2nd: I was walking home from a meeting when I saw a woman photographing the ground. As I passed, she smiled. "I have a friend who makes a cake for the first person who spots violets every year, " she told me. And there they were-- deep purple violets are her feet. 

January 3rd: Potlucks. People show up at your house with hot dishes of good food, ready for conversation. Is there anything better on a dark winter night?

January 4th: A clean house! Where did all of that dirt come from?!

January 5th: Hundreds of snowdrops blooming.

Bell's Seasoning

 Usually, on the day after Thanksgiving, I am happy to eat the salad that we traditionally bring to our feast that no one else ate along with whatever leftover soup that is in the fridge and a stray sliver of pie. I love the big mid-day meal, but no longer crave the piles of leftovers. This year, though, I am missing my mother’s hot turkey sandwiches.

 It started with the stuffing, which was the best. Finely chopped onions and celery, cooked with some pungent sausage meat, then mixed with two bags of stuffing bread croutons, already softened with water. Once everything was in the Big Bowl—we made a lot of stuffing—we would mix it by hand, one person mixing while the other sprinkled in the Bell’s Seasoning, a mixture of herbs that smelled strongly of sage. “Enough?” she would ask. We would both pause, sniff the bowl, and shake our heads. “More.”  The stuffing rested, mellowing, on the cold back porch overnight.

                In the morning, we stuffed the bird, letting the fragrant cubes spill out between the legs. More Bell’s Seasoning went over the skin and it was tucked into the oven. The stuffing and turkey baked together, flavoring one another. When the turkey was hauled out of the pan, we piled the stuffing into her best casserole dish, white with flowers, carved the bird, and made gravy with the drippings.  The entire meal smelled of sage and onions.

                The next evening, she would scoop gravy into a frying pan, add slices of turkey, and heat them up, hot. This was poured over toasted bread and barely warm stuffing that had retained all of its crunch from the day before. Some people might add cranberry sauce from the can, but I never did. We would bring our plates into the living room and watch T.V. while we ate. It was heaven.

                I know that I could make my own stuffing and turkey, my own Hot Turkey sandwiches, but a turkey is not a small endeavor and I no longer eat sausage. I’m not even sure where to find her specific brand, or the Bell’s Seasoning,  if I wanted to.  But I missed that pungent New England aroma this afternoon, as we eat our salad and cake leftovers.