A Plea to End Daylight Savings Time

...keeps chickens knows that this time change nonsense has nothing to do with farming. The hens look to the sun as their cue to start their working day. The same goes for the cats who are, as I write this, staging a loud protest in the kitchen to let us know that breakfast is an hour late. It’s bad enough that our clocks are an abstraction of solar time. Why do we need to add another layer of abstraction by changing our clocks rather than adjusting o...

Read…

Hops in Southern California

...g attached to the east side of the building. Homegrown Evolution’s own hop farming experiment ended in the spring of last year after we accidentally plopped some home built scaffolding on top of the tiny vine while undertaking the heinous task of scraping and painting the front of the house. Planting it in terrible soil doomed it to failure anyways. We’re experimenting with growing both Cascade and Nugget hops in a big self irrigating planter with...

Read…

Roundup

...ntly used in agricultural application. An epidemiological study of Ontario farming populations showed that exposure to glyphosate, the key ingredient in Roundup, nearly doubled the risk of late miscarriages. Seralini and his team decided to research the effects of the herbicide on human placenta cells. Their study confirmed the toxicity of glyphosate, as after eighteen hours of exposure at low concentrations, large proportions of human placenta be...

Read…

Bitter Greens

...a, a green that America has suddenly discovered after last month’s factory farming spinach nightmare. We also added a tough and bitter leaf chicory from our friends at Grow Italian. Hopefully, by succession planting we should have a winter and spring full of green, if somewhat bitter vegetables. How do we prepare these bitter greens around the compound? Very simply — in a pan with garlic, olive oil, salt, and pepper. Sometimes we add some Parmigia...

Read…

Permaculture Design Course at the Ecology Center in San Juan Capistrano

...APRIL 26 / FOOD – Tour of South Coast Farms, discussion of common organic farming practices, agroecology, fruit tree care, planting, guild assembly, home garden design/consideration, fruit trees and food forests, orchard design workshop APRIL 27 / FOOD OFF-SITE – Guided tour of various farms in Vista, Tour of permaculture plant nursery, build plant lists MAY 10 / WASTE – Composting methods, nutrient cycle overview (nitrogen, carbon cycles), soil...

Read…