Climate Change and Personal Responsibility

...en so much positive change on this front, even just in the last few years. Urban homesteading, slow food, organics, bikes, car share, DIY, all of it — it’s blossoming. It’s very hopeful. I’m going to put the next part in italics because it’s so important: The pleasure and satisfaction that we all receive from living this way is the positive counterspell to the dark enchantment of consumer culture. When we live this way, we become positive examples...

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Row Cover as an Insect Barrier

...eds carries Agribon row cover in lengths as short as 50 feet–plenty for an urban or suburban garden. I’ve used both PVC pipe and chain link fence tension wire as support. I secure the row cover down with pieces of rebar and bricks to keep out skunks. What cabbage worms become. It’s not a plug and play solution, however. If it gets hot I have to remember to pull the row cover off. And the added humidity can cause outbreaks of aphids. But overall, i...

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Plymouth Rock Monthly

...ive sight in our garden. While the internet is an amazing resource for the urban homesteader, there are a few holes in this electronic web of knowledge. In short, would someone out there please get around to scanning and putting online the Plymouth Rock Monthly? All I can find are images of two covers lifted off of ebay. The February 1925 issue, at right, promises articles on, “Selecting and Packing Eggs for Hatching”, a poetically titled essay, “...

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Friday Afternoon Linkages–Some Fun, Some Scary

...pictured on the left. Meanwhile, in a busy month of blogging, the intrepid urban homesteaders over at Ramshackle Solid show you how to make depression style candles, sweet potato and yam chips, and acorn flour. All great projects for our world’s ongoing “deleveraging”. And, speaking of deleveraging, on the oooooh, scary we’re all going to die side of the equation: David Khan of Edendale Farms has a video from peak oil partisan Matthew Simmons on a...

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