015 Worm Composting and Skunks

...Pro (how I discovered that my skunk proofing did not work. Our skunk proof vegetable bed. Our late dog’s skunk hunting adventures. What are we reading Worms Eat My Garbage by Mary Appelhof. Bread: A Global History By William Rubel. Kelly mentions Werner Herzog’s Happy People: A Year in the Taiga. If you want to leave a question for the Root Simple Podcast please call (213) 537-2591 or send an email to [email protected]. You can subscribe to our...

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Mutant Squash

...excellent results–producing some of the best tomatoes we’ve ever eaten, with no work whatsoever on our part. But this summer they seem to have hybridized again and now yield less flavorful fruit. More information on the botany of pollination and advice on saving vegetable seeds can be found in this excellent article. Also of note, the new issue of Make Magazine, the Popular Mechanics of the geeky hipster art school crowd has a story on “hacking y...

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Essential System #9 – Hydration

...ll use this water for irrigating plants in the front yard. While, admittedly, we don’t have room for much rainwater storage to make a big difference, we plan on filling these drums with municipal water after the rainwater runs out. That way we will always have a few days worth of water for our vegetable garden should there be a service interruption in the warm summer months. The barrels will be hooked up to a drip irritation system designed for lo...

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Favorite Plants- New Zealand Spinach

...can be used as a living mulch since it so effectively covers the soil in a vegetable bed. This green keeps on growing and seems to be unaffected by the bugs and problems that affect other greens. I have seen it growing wild among the rocks right along the ocean, so it can handle saline soils. This is a very robust plant. It tolerates drought, bugs, salt and poor soil. And it does much better in heat than true spinach which just bolts in Southern C...

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My Apologies to the Skunk Community

...ps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCQBA58VoGQ For years I’ve blamed the nightly vegetable carnage that takes place in our raised beds on skunks. The other night, our CritterCam (a Wingscapes BirdCam Pro ), revealed the culprit: raccoons. And they work in trios! No wonder it’s been so difficult to secure the beds! Given the strength and agility of Racoons, I’m surprised that bird netting has worked at all (though, I’ll note, only when that netting is fi...

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