Black Widow or False Black Widow?

...e kind of dangerous, either. This is not reassuring. But then on the handy page Frequently Encountered Spiders in California, I learned about the False black widow. Another European invasive, this spider seems to be displacing our native black widows in urban areas. This spider is roughly the same size and shape as a black widow, but is brown with a faint purple sheen. I like this false black widow option a lot. The false widows don’t have a dange...

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A Purple Dragon Carrot

...ets. John clearly has more important things to do than updating a Facebook page. My dragon carrots grew without a hitch in our “guerrilla” parkway garden. As you can see from the photo, the carrot has a deep purple color reminiscent of the domesticated carrot’s wild ancestors, which were probably tamed in what is now Afghanistan. Wikipedia identifies the purple hue of these carrots as anthocyanin a possible source of antioxidants and a common pigm...

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Perennial Vegetables

...t in edible perennials and the power of the internet has brought many of these species into our backyards. See the Mother Earth News Seed Search Engine on the right side of this page to hunt down some of the more rare items. Now, time to fertilize those goji berries and ponder the controversial air potato....

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Saturday Tweets: RIP Mary Oliver

...) January 16, 2019 Southern California // Big Crops, Big Money. Rare front page of the Los Angeles Times Annual Midwinter, from January 1915@KCET @JDevis @ginapollack @LAFarmGirl @RachelSurls #LAFoodways pic.twitter.com/Q3EyWeUWJo — ADSAUSAGE (@adsausage) January 17, 2019 Russian company wants to put giant ads in low-Earth orbit; they could display corporate logos “and other brand emblems, as well as allow governments to flash urgent notifications...

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Make a Rain Barrel

...nstorms. I put this rain barrel together as a test and because I was tired of looking a blue drum that sat in the backyard for a year giving our patio a methamphetamine lab vibe. Again, for complete instructions and a list of parts visit Chenkin’s ehow page or, if you’re not adept at perusing the isles of the local hardware store, buy a kit from him through Aquabarrel. [Editors note: due to spamming (are rain barrel enthusiasts really that excited...

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