April 30, 2005 link
War is on. Those construction sons of bit*hes have crossed the line. They can build a wack-ass bunker if they want to. They can throw trash in my yard. They can even drop cinder blocks onto tree limbs and bushes. I didn’t like it, but I could live with it.
But don’t f*ck with the raspberries.
They dumped bucketfuls of slimy white paint all over the raspberry bushes, coating them in nasty goo. Nevermind the fact they they have plenty of space in their own yard; they had to cross the property line to dump their shit. I suppose they didn’t want to track paint into the new house, so they dumped it where nobody would walk: in the thorny raspberry thicket.
I don’t mean they rinsed their brushes; I’m talking about large bucketfuls of gunk. And I have photos to prove it.
To hopefully prevent them from doing it again, I leaned two big pieces of plywood against the property line and painted “No Dumping” on the side. I’ll be keeping an eye on them, and—I swear—if they do it again, I will run out there with my shovel and give them what-for.
April 26, 2005 link
Some people like mountains; some people like the beach. To me, there is nothing more beautiful in nature than a brilliant green field of tall grass.
It must be my Midwestern roots. Mountains feel hard and desolate. Oceans seem vast and lonely. But a waving ocean of prairie grass feels like home.
For the past few months, I’ve been enjoying my own tiny prairie in the patch of winter rye I planted last Fall. The idea behind winter rye is to protect the soil during the tough Winter and Spring months. The roots of this hardy grass hold things together and prevent early weeds from germinating. It worked like a charm—not a weed in sight.
April 22, 2005 link
Call me a sourpuss, but I think Earth Day is kind of lame. It bothers me because I think it could be so much more than it is. Instead, it’s just a blip on the cultural radar, celebrated by grade-school kids and environmentalists, given lip-service by corporations and local governments, but mostly ignored by everybody else.
First of all, it seems ridiculous to have a single day honoring “the Earth”. It is a convenient way to marginalize a wide range of ideas (energy conservation, habitat preservation, global warming, sustainable agriculture, green technologies, etc.) in one fell swoop. In addition, you get plenty of counter-cultural political and religious groups piggybacking on the Earth Day hype, further eroding the credibility of the entire event. The end result is that environmental concerns are labeled a “special interest”.
Secondly, the mainstream media coverage of Earth Day is dull. They just repeat the same “tips and tricks” every year (turn off the lights, recycle your cans, ride your bike). Not that these are bad ideas, but we’ve heard them all before. In part, this is a failure of the green folks to provide more compelling messages that will stimulate an intelligent discourse.
Third, doesn’t it seem like there are too many Earth Day events for kids, and not enough interesting opportunities for adults? Reaching out to kids is a great idea (and a good way to reach their parents), but you run the risk of turning Earth Day into a kids’ holiday.
All right—enough complaining. I don’t like doing it unless I have a worthwhile alternative to offer. In this case, I don’t. Sorry about that. I’m not trying to say that Earth Day is a waste of time, but if it slides too far into lameness, it will do more harm than good.
So what are you doing for Earth Day? Turning down your thermostat? Something else that involves the lowest possible level of commitment? If you really want to make a difference, let me offer a few suggestions that extend beyond feel-good “tips and tricks”.
- Move to the city. That’s right. If you really cared about nature, you would be here in the city where energy efficiency is better. (Unless you are a farmer, ranger or scientist who needs to be in the country.)
- Start something great. Grow a garden. Build a web site. Form an organization. Start a discussion group. Invest yourself in something positive.
- Cancel your healthclub membership. Get some real exercise by doing something productive.
- Learn how to prune your trees. I’m tired of seeing people who refuse to prune their trees properly because they cannot possibly bring themselves to “hurt a tree”. See all those sprouts around the base of your tree? They are shortening your tree’s lifespan. If you want your tree to be healthy, you must prune it regularly.
- Replace your houseplants with something edible. This is so easy. Are you growing something edible in your house or yard? If not, why not? Keep trying until you succeed.
The lecture is over.
April 20, 2005 link
Here’s what I’ve planted so far:
- Collards. Get planted every year. They never fail.
- Radishes. The official vegetable of The Great Growing Experiment. I planted purple ones in honor of my alma mater and baseball-sized ones in honor of the Chicago Cubs.
- Parsnips. An experimental crop for 2005. Parsnips require extreme patience. They take a really long time to germinate, and then need almost an entire year to grow. I’ll (hypothetically) harvest them next Spring.
- New Zealand Spinach. It looks sort of like spinach, but it’s not spinach. Sound confusin? It bears over a longer period than regular spinach.
- Lettuce. What can I say?
- Peas. Growing on one of my homemade trellises. I built a series of these trellises from some old scrap wood.
The “big new thing” this year is that I am trying to grow as much as possible in containers on the front stoop. This location receives full sunlight all day, which is key. I’ve estimated I can fit about 10 medium size pots out there.
- Bush Cucumbers. They don’t need as much space as normal vining cucumber plants.
- Lettuce. One small pot of lettuce, to compare to the main ground-planted crop in the backyard.
- Basil, Dill. Miniature varieties, suitable for containers.
- Dwarf Blueberries. It’s time to up the ante. I paid big money for two dwarf blueberry bushes. The upside of planting in containers is that I can carry them with me when I move. Blueberries don’t enter their prime fruit-bearing phase until a few years after planting.
- Columnar Apples. They grow straight up for about six feet with no side branches. Like the blueberries, they need a few years to develop before they start bearing fruit. Also, it’s worth mentioning that even though the plants are dwarfed, the fruit is full size.
These are already growing, from previous plantings:
- Raspberries. They’ve been growing here for years, and are spreading nicely. The area where they live is partially shaded, so I’m encouraged by the fact that the raspberries don’t mind too much, and are spreading to fill the shaded areas. The more raspberry coverage, the better.
- Garlic. I planted it last Fall, and it looks good. I appreciate the fact that it is one of the first things to come up in the Spring. You get rewarded by the work you did several months ago.
- Chives, Rosemary, Sage, Thyme, Parsley. I don’t often use these for cooking, but I like knowing I have them if needed. Once established, they are very undemanding plants.
- Perennial Onions. I got tired of trying to grow normal bulbing onions, so I planted these permanent spreaders.
- Compost. Obviously it’s not a plant, but in many ways it is a living organism. The pile is producing nice black dirt, although it is being quickly depleted as I grab handfuls of it for mulch. It’s really amazing to think that the old sticks and leaves you gathered last year have transformed into something resembling soil.
That sounds like a lot, but I’ve still got a few more plantings to make once the weather warms a bit more. You might have noticed I haven’t mentioned tomatoes yet. They are just waiting in the wings.
April 19, 2005 link
I have a confession to make. Yesterday, I had murderous thoughts. I wanted to kill a squirrel.
I was inside my house, conducting business on the cordless phone (I work from home), and I wandered to the rear window and peered out at the garden. I noticed some vigorous movement down by my newly-planted beds. It was a bushy red squirrel, and he was going to town—having a great time digging up my seeds and rolling around in the dirt.
I was fuming, but I couldn’t do anything until I finished by business on the phone. I desparately wanted to slam down the phone and run outside with a kitchen knife, but I decided to act like a civilized human being instead.
After the call ended I bounded outside in my socks, waving my hands and yelling bloody murder. The squirrel—who henceforth shall be referred to as “Bert”—froze for a few seconds, then bolted to the nearest tree. He was clearly annoyed at being interrupted from his feast, and even more disgruntled by trying to race up a tree on a full stomach. He was so full that he couldn’t even make it all the way up the tree. He paused about 6 feet up and barked at me like a dachsund.
I surveyed the damage. Bert had sampled a few seeds from each row like it was a buffet. He left behind little holes as evidence of his work. Meanwhile, he continued chattering and started creeping back towards me, as if he could somehow sneak back for dessert without me noticing.
My “solution” was to sprinkle hot pepper powder all over the seed beds. If Bert returns, he may get a noseful of something he won’t enjoy.
Anyway, I suppose this story is a roundabout way of announcing that I’ve begun the Spring planting. More details in another post…
April 15, 2005 link
Breaking from my usual practice, I decided not to start any seedlings indoors this year. The whole purpose of doing it is to give plants a longer growing season, so they can mature and produce fruit sooner. But in my case, my indoor seedlings were generally less healthy and took longer to mature, even though they were started sooner. That’s wack.
For some reason, I could never get it to work. I followed all the instructions: place the trays under flourescent lights for 18 hours a day, keep them moist, keep them warm, etc. The indoor seedlings grew, but they were just sucky.
So I didn’t bother this year. To be honest, I haven’t totally abandoned the basic principle. I’m going to start some container-based plantings (tomatoes, peppers, basil) in their final containers. These will sit outside during the day and come inside at night if they need to. This way, I can start them anytime without waiting for the weather to warm up.
Of course, if I don’t start them soon, the hypothetical extra growing time won’t exist.
April 14, 2005 link
Great news for Chicago. I’ve been saying all along that we need to find ways to bring the fundamental experience of agriculture into the cities. I even suggested that Chicago should transform parts of their lakefront park system into mini-farms.
Chicago is now taking a positive step in this direction by establishing a 12,000 square foot food garden directly in the center of the city’s lakefront park system. The location, near the intersection of Columbus and Congress Avenues, is heavily frequented during the summer months due to its proximity to the Museum Campus and the Taste of Chicago summer festival.
I hope the project is successful. It is being run by Milwaukee-based Growing Power, which specializes in teaching local teenagers about food production. The garden is completely open to the public, which is a key feature in attracting curious urbanites who would shy away from fences and gates.
It’s still a far cry from my vision of orchards and farmstands in every urban neighborhood, but it seems like a step in the right direction. I believe that everyday agricultural experiences need to be a part of daily life—and that needs to happen in the residential areas, not the bustling downtown. Nonetheless, if you want 10-year old kids (or 45-year old kids, for that matter) to see exactly what a strawberry plant looks like, you can’t choose a more visible location than Grant Park.
I’m proud that Chicago is taking a leadership role in urban agriculture, and I hope the powers-that-be continue to try bold ideas.
March 29, 2005 link
My negativity disappeared once I started browsing the seed catalogs. Looking at all the colorful photos and descriptions, anything seems possible.
Rather than mourning the loss of sunlight in the backyard, I started noticing all the little patches of ground where the sun does shine. My front stairway gets full sun all day. So does the 4x6 foot patch of concrete between my house and the neighbor’s building. Or how about the airspace over here? The sun doesn’t touch the ground, but it shines into an imaginary cube of air about 6 feet from the ground. What if I elevate the plants into the light?
This is challenging territory. Rather than planting in the ground, I would need to fill large containers with soil and find a stable way to raise them.
The most promising area is the front stairs. I think I can grow about 10-15 large potted plants out there. Maybe tomatoes, peppers, bush cucumbers, herbs, and dwarf fruit bushes. They will receive full sunlight all day.
Then I can try lettuce, radishes and other lightweight plants in the elevated containers. Maybe I can just put a big shelving unit out there. I’ll just need to tie it down to protect it from Chicago’s gusty winds.
Even with the confined space, I somehow ended up ordering more seeds this year than in any previous year. I also ordered some live plants. The coolest thing is the columnar apple trees. They grow straight up, with no side branches, to a height of six feet. I am going to try them in large pots. I also ordered two dwarf blueberry bushes, which will also grow in containers.
I finally compromised on my idea of growing only edible plants. It just wasn’t going to work in the shaded areas of the backyard. So I bought some shade-tolerant wildflowers and grasses. Hopefully, these will create a self-sustaining woodland meadow effect in the backyard.
So I went from bitching and moaning about the shady conditions to excited and hopeful about my new strategy. Now I just need lots of containers, lots of dirt, lots of sweat and lots of luck to make it work.
January 31, 2005 link
Ummmmm…I found something strange in my backyard.
January 28, 2005 link
So…what really happened to the 2004 garden? It’s time for a long-overdue summary of the results of 2004’s Growing Experiment.
The year started with great promise. After a strong start in 2003, I expected 2004 to kick major butt. I planned to double the growing space, and fill it with heavy producers such as corn and pumpkins. It was going to be dope.
Then they started building a three-story condo building in the formerly-vacant next door lot, effectively cutting off the majority of sunlight to my yard. What was formerly a hot sunny zone became partially shaded.
Vowing not to be setback, I continued with my plans. I planted sun-loving corn, pumpkins, beans, okra, cucumbers and tomatoes. My sheer willpower would make the garden grow.
And it grew. The corn shot skyward, and the pumpkin vines clambered everywhere. I scoffed at the conventional wisdom that says vegetables need full sunlight. “Old wives’ tales”, I thought to myself.
As summer went on, I realized my mistake. Yes—the veggies were growing, but they were falling behind schedule. They weren’t reaching the levels of maturity that they should. By early August, I still did’t have much harvest to show for it.
In the end, neither the pumpkins nor corn bore fruit. They spent all their stored energy just to reach upward toward the light.
It wasn’t a total failure. The tomatoes did okay—along with the cucumbers, green beans and collards. I had plenty of garden-fresh meals. And I still had plenty to write about—the whole experience was a comedic goldmine.
In September, my web server crashed and I lost my photos and stats about the garden harvests and costs. It was discouraging. I asked myself why I was spending so much time writing about a shady vegetable garden. I felt like a dope.
Recently, I decided to keep writing no matter what happens to the garden. I remind myself that it is a Great Growing Experiment, not a Great Growing Guaranteed Success.
Eventually, I will find a new growing space. It will have plenty of light. Until then, I will experiment with growing in containers or finding ways to maximize the available sunlight. My front porch is sunny all day long—how much food can I grow out there?
The backyard space is still usable, but requires a paradigm shift. Maybe the focus will be aesthetics, rather than maximum food production. I can scatter shade-tolerant fruits and vegetables among flowers and shrubs. I will not be so arrogant to assume that it is suitable for pumpkins, but I can experiment with other ideas.
I’m still trying to formulate a new gameplan. I better think fast so I can start placing my seed orders.
