Bantam Returns

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Animals, Chickens
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Homegrown Neighbor here:

I’ve been busy in the garden and letting the neighbors focus on their book, so I haven’t been blogging in a while. But today something very special happened that I have to share with you, dear readers.
My bantam chicken, Debbie, the lighter colored chicken in the photo, disappeared last week. She simply didn’t come in at chicken bed time. This is very unusual. The chickens usually all line up and go into the coop at night in a very orderly fashion. But last week, little Debbie didn’t come home to the coop. I assumed a hawk ate her or that she jumped the fence and was eaten by one of the many dogs in the neighborhood.

It was sad, but I was at least relieved that I didn’t have to deal with any bloody remains- one of my worst fears with the chickens. Every night this week when I put the chickens in I rather morosely counted six, instead of the previous seven. But I moved on, assuming Debbie was gone for good, being digested in some hawk’s belly.

Then, just in time for an Easter surprise, Debbie came back to me. I went over to my parent’s house for Easter dinner. I returned home to find a note on my door. I was hoping it wasn’t an angry note from a neighbor complaining about my chickens or messy yard. I was elated to see that the note was from a neighbor saying he had a tiny chicken sitting at home watching TV with him and he wondered if she belonged to me. I immediately called him and he brought the bantie back home. Apparently he was weeding in the yard this afternoon and she popped out of the bushes. I’m guessing she made a nest in a wild corner of their yard and was brooding until he disturbed her.

So I am happy to say that the chicken is back home. And of course my neighbor who found her got some eggs for so kindly bringing her back. A happy Easter gift for both of us.

A Redneck Rocket Stove

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Rocket Stove
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From Wes Duncan, the “High Tech Redneck,” a rocket stove made out of cinder blocks. I’ve built one of these too and can confirm that they work great. And you can’t beat the price. Time for some redneck cookin’!

Update: As several readers have pointed out, this design ain’t safe. Cinder blocks can explode and were not meant to be placed next to a heat source–that’s what fire bricks are for. See our post about our backyard rocket stove for a safe design that uses metal pipe.

Garden Edibles

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Miscellaneous
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We’ve pretty much just been growing Italian vegetable varieties for almost ten years now and have never looked back. Which is why we were really excited to hear that Homegrown Evolution pal Craig Ruggless has a new website: www.gardenedibles.com that imports seeds from the Larosa Emanuele Sementi company of Italy. Craig reminded us recently about something we remember from our trip to Italy a few years ago that, for Italians, vegetables are like wine. Wine comes in many varieties, so should vegetables. What a shame it is that when you go to a supermarket here in the US there is often only one variety of any given vegetable even at high-end stores.

So you gotta grow your own. Coming soon (again, as soon as book #2 is done), we’ll list what we grew this winter and what we plan on growing this summer. From Garden Edibles, this summer, we’re planting San Marzano 2 tomatoes and Rosso Dolce Da Appendere peppers. We always have some San Marzanos growing because they are so damn reliable. But we’re particularly excited about the peppers. And the tomato at left? It’s been rescued from extinction by a group of farmers in Puglia. It’s that region’s answer to the San Marzano–Pugliese families use to make their winter tomato sauce.

Ciao! Back to the book . . .

A Humanure Powered Prius!

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Thoughtstylings
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 Photo by Thom Watson

Our days as struggling bloggers are over! This morning Toyoto Motors announced an exciting new partnership between their Prius division and Root Simple. Toyota is forming a task force, that includes Root Simple, to explore the most abundant fuel source on the planet: gassified humanure. Toyota anticipates a hybrid methane/electric Prius vehicle in showrooms as early as 2012. “We’re accelerating the research and design process and we predict that methane/electric hybrids will be a major movement in the automobile industry,” said Toyota president and CEO Akio Toyoda.

As part of the pilot program Root Simple will be saving human waste in five gallon buckets–an ordinary dry toilet! The waste will be added to proprietary inflatable bladders located in the basement.

 Photo by Nic Pepsi

Waste will ferment in the bladders for a three week period. Pressure caused by the expansion of the bladder automatically forces the methane into a storage tank located in the garage. Methane is then pumped into a specially modified Prius during the evening hours using a pump powered by rooftop solar collectors.  “Ed Begley’s people are jealous” said Root Simple blogger Erik Knutzen, adding, “I can finally ditch the bike–it’s dangerous anyways with all that slippery paint the city uses to stripe bike lanes with.”

Jenny Craig has signed on as a project partner to develop microwavable entrees that maximize enzymatic methane production, increase fiber and help us all lose those extra pounds. “We’re looking at integrating our brand into the transportation sector,” said Jenny Craig spokesperson, Leonora Bertwhistle. Jenny Craig is particularly excited about the use of agave syrup to replace sugar in the meals. “Agave syrup has been shown to break down into more highly fermentable compounds that will increase the efficiency of the fuel production process,” adds Bertwhistle.

“If this proves economical we’ll be looking at other human fuel sources,” says Knutzen. “If we can harness one end of the human waste output stream, think about the other. What if we could tap into the energy used for speech, typing, press releases and blogging? We could literally power our transportation sector on hot air.”

I drank a bottle of MiricleGro and then got on my riding lawn mower

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Thoughtstylings
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We’re deep in the middle of the deadline for our next book, coming out in November–more on that soon! Today some links:

Solar hot air collector made out of soda cans. Built-It-Solar Blog.

From the two steps forward and three steps back department. Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa attends a groundbreaking ceremony for a school garden. So far, so good. But it’s sponsored by Scott’s MiracleGro who chipped in some dough in return for having their name and products liberally applied to the garden. A good science lesson for the kids? LAist.

Memo to Scotts MiracleGro: Unprecedented Pesticide Contamination Found in Beehives. Beyond Pesticides Daily Blog.

And speaking of bees: sign a petition to legalize bees in Santa Monica here.

Crop Mob! Volunteers help small farmers. Cricket Bread. Via Joe Linton (thanks Joe!).

Green Roof Growers announce new sub-irrigating pot experiments. Green Roof Growers.

Last but not least: Man arrested driving riding lawn mower down the street while drunk. The Buffalo News Via Garden Rant.