Chicken Coop Deconstructed

...n. Dust and spiderwebs flew everywhere. They practically had to be dragged back to the classroom at the end of the period because they were having so much fun they didn’t want to stop. The old chicken coop is now stripped down to the studs. As soon as we can get the supplies, we will start rebuilding. The students will get some real hands on construction lessons and get to build it themselves. Once the paint drys the school will be ready for a big...

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SUSTAINABLE LA @ Farmlab/Under Spring

...rmlab.org On the program will be Homegrown Revolution’s short about how to build a self-watering container as well as comrade Elon Schoenholz’s “You Can’t Compost Concrete” and a little something from the Wolfpack Hustle kids. From the announcement: Sustainable LA is a celebration of Angelinos engaged in the green revolution. The one-hour program consists of short films on a variety of topics including urban gardening, environmental awareness and...

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Satan’s Easter Basket is Filled with Plastic Easter Grass

...round this morning, especially because Echo Park surrounds a lovely little urban lake full of birds. Read on to find out why. 4 Excellent Reasons to Avoid Plastic Easter Grass and use all of your influence to make sure other people avoid it, too: Domestic cats and dogs eat Easter grass and it can cause intestinal obstruction. Cats are particularly attracted to its stringy texture, but dogs might also gobble it up when they raid a kid’s Easter stas...

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Coffee Grounds in the Garden

...ton State University, Coffee grounds will buzz your garden. Coffee grounds build humus, boost nitrogen, phosphorus and zinc, bind pesticides and toxins, prevent bacterial and fungal infections and feed earthworms. Authored by Dr. Linda Chalker-Scott, Extension Urban Horticulturist and Associate Professor, this peer-reviewed pamphlet also provides a set of suggestions for using coffee grounds in the garden: Coffee grounds should be composted before...

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Problems Part I

The road to urban homesteading ain’t smooth and involves more than a few potholes along the way. Some of those potholes will swallow a bike tire while others are big enough for a Hummer. But with persistence it becomes easier to deal with the occasional bump, lessons can be learned and future mistakes avoided. With the popularity of our earlier blunders post, I’d like to begin regularly sharing problems as they develop. Here’s problem #1 for this...

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