The Practical Side of Philosophy

...theological self-study. Now, before you think I’ve gone way off topic on a homesteading blog, let me counter with a few examples of how philosophy can help navigate thorny DIY questions: How should one evaluate arguments for or against compost tea, organic gardening, or Hugelkultur beds? Is it ethical to drive/fly/buy stuff in plastic bottles given our ongoing ecological crisis? Do the humanities or arts have anything meaningful to contribute to o...

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December Homegrown Evolution Events

...ur book and on our website here). Come at 11:30 a.m. and catch our organic gardening pals at Silver Lake Farms do a talk on winter vegetable crops. Stick around for puppets! Good Magazine is located at: 6824 Melrose Ave. Los Angeles, 90038 More info on Good Magazine’s December events page. General Partying On Thursday December 11th at 7 p.m. our publishers Process Media and Feral House are putting on a Winter Solstice Celebration at La Luz de Jesu...

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How To Stop Powdery Mildew

...begin with some condensed advice from UC Davis’ Integrated Pest Management page: Preventative measures: grow resistant varieties find a sunnier spot for the vegetable garden back off on nitrogen Non-chemical approaches sprinkle plants with water mid morning–add soap for more effectiveness remove infected leaves promptly and dispose of them Fungicides: apply horticultural oil, neem oil or jojoba oil if the temperature is under 90° F. Do not apply a...

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2013 in Review Part II

...and, other than harvesting tomatoes, summer here is not the best time for gardening. Time to contemplate closed vs. open floor plans and catch a crappy Hollywood movie. “Crappy Hollywood” is a redundancy, of course, as all Hollywood movies are crappy. September Mrs. Homegrown complained about my flour storage mess. I just bought a Komo mill and so this mess should diminish in the next few months. In the further interest of cleanliness, I blogged...

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Steve Solomon’s Soil and Health e-Library

...ntains books on “holistic agriculture, holistic health and self-sufficient homestead living” You can download the books for free, but Solomon requests a modest $13 donation. You can find this amazing resource at: www.soilandhealth.org. The “Radical Agriculture” part of the archive contains many early organic ag classics by authors such as Sir Albert Howard, J.I. Rodale and Ehrenfried Pfeiffer. The “Homesteading” part of the library contains tomes...

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