Allegedly Squirrel Proof Bird Feeder Not Rat Proof

June 10, 2020

...cilmen! Just kidding. It was rats. This discovery caps off a busy week for urban wildlife in our backyard. A young coyote visited last week and, last night, our indoor cats got in a full on cat fight on either side of a glass door with a visiting outdoor cat. Our new bird (rat?) feeder has a lever that closes when a heavy animal steps on it. This is supposed to deter squirrels. As you can see from the photos, rats easily hacked their way around th...

Read…

Lost from the cradle of connection: the high price of driving

Mrs. Homegrown

September 11, 2015

Nature Awareness, Thoughtstylings, Transportation

20 Comments

...s as we drive? In the same way, we decry shelters which euthanize dogs and cats, we abhor animal testing, but we kill more animals on the roads than we do in the shelters and the labs. But let’s get more anthropocentric. What about human deaths? In 2013, in the U.S. alone: 32,719 people died in car-related accidents (This number is significantly down from past years, but sadly seems to be going back up this year.) 4,735 of these were pedestrians (...

Read…

Gourmet Foraging and Advanced Acorn Processing

Mrs. Homegrown

October 24, 2013

Food, Foraging, How-to, Preparedness

31 Comments

...scal and Mia are high caliber foragers and foodies. Check out their sites, Urban Outdoor Skills and Transitional Gastronomy, and if you live in the Los Angeles area, you’ll definitely want to experience their forages and food workshops. It’s rare to find folks who combine deep food know-how with a love of wild foods. Too often wild foods are considered mere survival foods. Pascal and Mia are using them to develop a uniquely Californian cuisine. On...

Read…

Saturday Tweets: Goodbye 2017

Mr. Homegrown

December 30, 2017

Saturday Linkages

10 Comments

...u pic.twitter.com/oqlHpv0rsd — Peter Flax (@Pflax1) December 27, 2017 "Holypager", an artwork that eavedrops on unecrypted pager messages https://t.co/kZJLZrUT0y — Root Simple (@rootsimple) December 29, 2017 Typeface reviews https://t.co/70pwkf0KLC — Root Simple (@rootsimple) December 26, 2017 this is so great pic.twitter.com/jHiMMmRgqj — Cats (@SpaceCatPics) December 27, 2017 "Hedgehogs are doin it for themselves / Rolling on their prickly backs...

Read…

Chicken of the Woods

Mr. Homegrown

November 22, 2019

Food, Foraging

...The very same mushroom pundits suggest thoroughly cooking all Laetiporus. I can report having consumed a lot of the mushroom we foraged with no ill effects. It was, in fact, one of the most delicious mushrooms I’ve ever consumed. But one should not trust the musings of an aging urban homesteading blogger when foraging for mushrooms. Find yourself a local mushroom nerd or run it past your cats. That said, don’t be too fearful either or you’ll miss...

Read…