Search Results for: label/native plants/page/3/2011/04/making-it/2010/06/the-urban-homestead

783 results

Back to the Ranch

Mr. Homegrown
Events
7 Comments
Ranch photo from the Huntington’s Ranch blog. I’ve never had so much fun at a symposium as I did at the Huntington’s urban agriculture blow-out this weekend. The two day event launched the Huntington’s new experimental urban agricultural station known as the “Ranch” and featured a diverse bunch of speakers. The Ranch will provide much needed information on edible landscapes and food forestry, particul...

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Urban Permaculture Survey/Interview

Mr. Homegrown
Permaculture
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Attention urban/suburban permaculturists. I’m writing an article for Urban Farm Magazine on “urban permaculture” and I need your help. I’ve created a survey/interview for the article: click here to take the Urban Farm permaculture article survey. Please forward this link/survey to all your permaculture friends–send it out far and wide–work that Facebook! If you’re critical of permaculture you are also w...

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2011 in Review: The Garden

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Vegetable Gardening
20 Comments
It’s was a difficult year in the garden. A lead and zinc issue screwed up my winter vegetables garden plans. At least we managed to find some river rocks and put in a path. I found this photo from December 2010. I was certainly a lot more organized that year. For 2012, I’m putting in raised beds to deal with the heavy metal issue and we’ve already planted more native plants. But most importantly one of my New Years resolution...

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Making Salves, Lip Balms & etc.: Close of the Calendula Series

Mrs. Homegrown
Body Care, Calendula series, Domesticus, Herbal Medicine, Herbs, How-to
21 Comments
My calendula after-bath salve. The camera refuses to capture the deep butter yellow color On Saturday, as a part of this long series on Calendula (here, here and here), I posted about infusing oil with herbs. If you’ve got some herb infused oil, you can make that into a medicinal salve or balm. Salve is nothing but oil thickened by the addition of wax. I prefer beeswax salves, though there are vegan alternatives, like candelil...

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How to Homestead

Mr. Homegrown
Self Watering Containers
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Homegrown Evolution’s Self Watering Container video is up on the brand new site How to Homestead, described by its creators as: “the only site on the web providing you with a collection of how to homestead videos to stream or download. No longer relegated to the rural sphere, homesteading can be done anywhere and we are here to show you how.” With many homesteading activities, from chicken slaughtering to tortellini making, int...

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Press

e and Erik Knutzen grow food, keep chickens, brew, bike, bake, and plot revolution from their 1/12-acre farm in the heart of Los Angeles. They are the keepers of the popular DIY blog, Root Simple, and the authors of The Urban Homestead (2008), which the New York Times calls “…the contemporary bible on the subject” and Making It (2011) a project book for post-consumer society. In addition to their writing and blogging, Kelly and Erik teach a...

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Countdown

Mrs. Homegrown
Events
24 Comments
Our new book comes out just about a month–April 26th–and today two super-advance copies came to us by mail. Believe me, it’s awfully strange to see something that has existed only as computer files suddenly materialize on your porch! We realize we haven’t given our new book a formal introduction yet, so here goes.  Making It: Radical Home-Ec for a Post Consumer World is our follow up to The Urban Homestead . The...

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Salvia Means Salvation: White Sage

Mrs. Homegrown
Gardening, Herbs, Native Plants
21 Comments
Salvia apiana, photo by Stan Shebs Mrs. Homegrown here: Today I was lucky enough to be able to take part one of a two part class taught by Cecilia Garcia and James Adams, Jr., authors of Healing with Western Plants at the Theodore Payne Foundation. I’ve blogged about their book before, and was thrilled to be able to see them in person. Cecilia is a Chumash healer. James is a professor of pharmacology and a botanist. In both the...

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Rain Barrels

Mr. Homegrown
rainwater harvesting
1 Comment
Constructing a cistern large enough to supply potable indoor water is an ambitious project involving pumps, filters, UV purifiers, and very large and expensive tanks. We don’t want to discourage anyone from making an attempt at it, but for most urban homesteaders it won’t be economical or practical given the space requirements and weight of thousands of gallons of stored water. Thankfully, there are simpler strategies for harvesting...

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What We’re Going To Do About That Lead

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Lead
17 Comments
White sage, yarrow, rosemary and aloe vera–the kind of plants we’ll be planting more of. Let’s assume that we have a lead problem in our backyard. That’s a big assumption at this point because we now have two very conflicting test results. But, for the sake of an argument, let’s say the first alarming test is true, what are we going to do about it? These are the options: Radical remediation: Remove all t...

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