Introducing Lora Hall

Avatar photo
Events
4 Comments

Please put your hands together and welcome Homegrown Evolution guest blogger Lora Hall. Lora is a neighbor, owns Los Angeles’ largest hen, Southern California’s largest rhubarb plant and is currently finishing a graduate degree at Cal Poly Pomona. Her master’s work involves the use of vermicomposting to break down a variety of materials (maybe we can get her to explain this!).

You can meet Lora in person and pick up some seedlings and fruit trees at the Highland Park farmer’s market (map) where she runs a booth with Trisha Mazure every Tuesday from 3 to 8 pm. When we visited her at the market last week Lora had a bunch of interesting plants including purslane, tomatoes, tomatillos as well as a selection of fruit trees appropriate for our warm climate.

In the LA area and want some fruit trees for your backyard? Some gardening advice? Contact Lora at [email protected]. Lora will be posting as Homegrown Neighbor.

Bicycles and GPS

Avatar photo
Bikes
6 Comments


So at a time when the whole hipster stripped-down fixed-gear bike phenomenon has just passed its inevitable pop cultural zenith, this post will come across as impossibly nerdy. Yesterday I finally got around to strapping my small handheld GPS unit to the handlebars of my road bike and I can say that this particular combination of 19th century technology and 20th century electronics rocks.

The only sane way to get around Los Angeles and most large American cities on a bike is to find alternate routes: quiet side streets well away from the major arterials. Over the past few years I’ve gotten pretty good at studying a map to find bike friendly streets. I go well out of my way to avoid six lane boulevards, not so much because I think they are more dangerous, but simply because I don’t like getting into altercations with motorists. I’ll zig and zag, hopping from one residential street to another. The problem has been having to print out maps and pull them out of a pocket every few blocks, since I tend to easily forget directions.

My GPS unit (an earlier version of this Garmin handheld with a handlebar mount) and the accompanying software nicely solves this problem. I can use the mapping software to draw a route and load it into the handheld. The GPS unit beeps before I approach a turn and points the way. I generally don’t like anything that distracts from the craziness of our roads, so I’ve never used a cyclometer. I’ve found that the GPS unit actually cuts down on distractions since I don’t have to swivel my head around to figure out where I’m going. I can just pay attention to the road and let those GPS satellites tell me when to make a turn. It’s kinda like the way the military guides in “smart” bombs, except instead of an explosion you get me, a middle-aged eco-blogging dork on a bike.

The next step will be to try the even more incongruous combination of a camel and a GPS, though I’m sure that this high-tech/low-tech combo is being done quite effectively elsewhere in the world. But here in LA, a surly camel might come in handy the next time someone yells, “get off the road!”

Backyard Poultry with the Chicken Whisperer

Avatar photo
Animals, Chickens
3 Comments

Andy Schneider, a.k.a. the “Chicken Whisperer”, explains that his Internet radio show is “fair and balanced” since, “chickens have both a right and left wing.” The Backyard Poultry show covers everything from bantams to the controversial National Animal Identification System. You can listen live on Sandy Springs Radio or download past shows here.

Thanks to Christine Heinrichs, author of How To Raise Chickens
and the Official Poultry Bookstore blog for tipping us off to the Chicken Whisperer. Heinrichs was a guest on the May 9th show.

Now maybe it’s time for Rush to start talkin’ turkey.

Homegrown Evolution in Chicago

Avatar photo
Events
2 Comments
Chicago’s Green Roof Grower Heidi Hough

Homegrown Evolution is heading to Chicago for two events:

MAY 20
How to Make a Sub-Irrigated Planter (SIP) Heidi Hough, Bruce Fields & Erik Knutzen
6-8pm $50
Wicker Park close to Blue Line
Register with: [email protected]

Join Chicago’s Green Roof Growers and LA’s Homegrown Evolution for a fun class on how to make a sub-irrigated planter (SIP) out of two buckets. As a bonus, meet Homegrown Evolution blogger and author Erik Knutzen, who will be co-teaching the class and signing copies of his book The Urban Homestead.

Bring some gloves and learn how to make and plant your own SIP. Leave with everything you need for a summer of fresh heirloom tomatoes–all you add is about 6 hours of good sun per day in your yard, balcony, or roof and enough water to keep the reservoir full. No weeding, no mulching, no worries.

You’ll go home with:
–Plant-ready two-bucket sub-irrigated planter (SIP).
–Enough potting mix, organic fertilizer, and powdered lime to plant your tomato.
–An organic heirloom tomato plant, from the Green Roof Growers seed-starting group
–Comprehensive understanding of how SIPs work and how to plant yours once you get home.

MAY 21
HOMESTEADING 101 with Erik Knutzen
7-9pm $7-10 (sliding scale)
Experimental Station 6100 South Blackstone, Chicago
Register with: [email protected]

Erik will lead an informal presentation on Urban Homesteading in Los Angeles – focusing on his and his wife’s homegrown systems of adventurous experimentation of chickens, growing, greywater, brewing and more – some successful, some not so much!

Copies of The Urban Homestead will be for sale.

Many thanks to Nancy Klehm for arranging these events! See her website Spontaneous Vegetation for more info on other events and workshops.

Stickers for the Organic Gardener

Avatar photo
Gardening, Vegetable Gardening
6 Comments


Via BoingBoing a clever re-purposing:

“Evil Mad Scientist Labs wants you to proudly label your organic garden with these handsome “Now Slower and with More Bugs!” stickers, originally produced to adorn software products. The influence of the Slow Food movement is increasing, and gardening is getting ever more popular. Even the tech bloggers are posting about local pollinators and getting beehives. In this environment, it is fitting that a new use has been found for our Now Slower and with More Bugs stickers, which were first seen in the wild back in December 2007. If you find a good use for them, we’d love to see pictures in the flickr auxiliary!”