Acquisitions and Harvests

Still blooming.

Well, things around the homestead have settled down nicely in the time since I've last blogged.

We measured and saw that we now have 100 feet of standing water above our well pump, which in a time of drought is a very good thing and gives us confidence of good water for years to come. 

Partial autumn harvest. and gorgeous corn

The pumpkin harvest came in in fits and starts, but we probably got at least 50 pounds worth of orange-y goodness, which will keep us in pies, soups and bread this year.  And my "glass gem" corn is ready to harvest and is prettier than I ever imagined it would be. Really, it is amazing! I am saving enough to plant next year, and giving a lot away to friends who are suitably impressed when I show it to them (amazing how I can work the phrase, "would you like to see my rare corn?" into so many conversations.)

"Have you seen my rare corn?"

My other news is a great boon for us...we are now in escrow for the 2 1/2 acres of property which lies directly to the west of ours. It's a large, unimproved west-facing slope that allows the entire hill to belong to one owner -- us. It's great for two reasons: First, because it guarantees our view into perpetuity -- no one can ever build on it and obstruct our views of the Coast Range, which from our back porch runs from San Luis Obispo all the way up to Cone and Serra Peaks in Big Sur (truly, we have one of the best views in the county but up until this moment, it could have vanished if the lot next door to us sold to someone who wanted to build at the top of the hill). 

The other boon for us is that our septic leach field is located on this other property, which could cause huge problems if it was ever owned by someone other than us!  This is something we did not realize until after we moved in, and so it's been a little tense figuring out just how to deal with it.

And both those things will make our place a better real estate value, always a good thing to know in uncertain financial times, which I think we've basically been living in since 2008 or even 2001, depending on where you sit on the Pessimism Scale.

I'm on the Optimism Scale and enjoying it!

Our view is too large to fit. Graphic design folk, turn your head.

Good soil by the cup

So I've known for years that using coffee grounds to help improve the texture of soil was a good thing. After all, when we describe good soil, we usually use the term, "texture of coffee grounds" to describe the crumbly-but-dense growing medium plants love most.

But whenever I'd try and save my grounds, I ran into problems with mold...ugly, smelly mold, sitting atop the grounds after they'd been in the tabletop composter for a few days. Perhaps the mold would make a great inoculant against all sorts of bad garden diseases, but then again perhaps not. And I'm not the kind of person who has enough time to run the used grounds outside to the big composter every morning. 

So for awhile, I just stopped saving them, but felt guilty every time I threw them away. (Believe me, the combination of Jewish/Eco-Green guilt is massive and never sleeps.) 

So I finally opened up some space in the freezer for a one gallon freezer bag's worth of coffee grounds. Every day I plop the used grounds into the bag and stick it back in before anything has the chance to get mold on it. Once the bag is about half-full, I do take it outdoors to the composter and add it to the chicken waste and shavings already fermenting in it. It adds moisture plus contributes to that so-sought-after coffee ground texture that good soil amendments have.

No matter how many years I work in farming/gardening, I'm amazed that I can still sometimes come up with new solutions to old problems.

In somewhat related news, I bought these crazy corn kernels off the internet. They are like tiny, multicolored gems, and produce the most amazing colored corn I've ever seen. I can't wait to get them planted and see what they do! I'm a little late to the party regarding correct planting dates for corn, but being late for stuff has never stopped me from having fun and probably never will. 

Crisis or Opportunity?

Interesting story off the Associated Press this morning, about the "crisis" of large feedlots closing due to a lack of cattle:

Too Few Cattle Left To Feed

This crisis has been brewing for some time, as the price of corn skyrocketed (due to its use as a fuel component), followed by a midwest drought, which depleted much of the corn produced for all purposes.  Because of this, many ranchers sold their herds for pennies on the dollar and stopped breeding the cattle they had left, because it had simply become too expensive and difficult to feed them. The article reminds everyone that less cattle in the surviving feedlots will mean higher prices for beef at the grocery store and in restaurants.

And they make it sound like it's a bad thing.

It's just my opinion, but I firmly believe if most Americans ate less industrially-produced beef, it would not harm their health at all.  In fact, it might even improve it.

Humans do not need beef, especially not fattened up, corn-fed beef.  Corn-fed beef tastes better in the way a Twinkie tastes better than a chewy piece of homemade bread with butter and jam.  It's more bland, easier to digest, and filled with a lot more chemicals and unnecessary ingredients that make it easy on the palate.  Maybe we like that better because it's easier to forget that a living creature died in order for us to have it on our plate.  We are uncomfortable thinking about things like that.

Grass-fed beef can taste "gamey" (or perhaps "beefy" would be a better word).  You can't mass-produce grass-fed beef like you can corn-fed, feedlot beef, because grazing requirements are high.  Because 100% grass-fed beef is more difficult to produce, it's more expensive, meaning you will probably eat less of it than other things, like pork or chicken.

We had steak last night, the first we've had in several months.  It was really good -- grass-fed, locally raised and processed beef -- but it is expensive and, because of that, is an occasional treat for us.  Ditto for hamburger meat.  
Perhaps one unforeseen up-side to climate change ruining our vast fields of mono-crops is that we'll all be healthier, eating more home-grown and home-raised vegetables, or even small livestock that could be raised and butchered in a backyard.  Maybe more people would even choose to become vegetarian, once they were faced with the prospect of butchering their own backyard farm animals and meeting their meat on an up close and personal basis.

Perhaps there's a bright side to these harrowing times...if we choose to change how we do things.  We're two generations (at least) out from where most Americans did some farming, which means it's not too late yet to get back to a more agrarian lifestyle, even in urban backyards and vacant lots.  

Our grandparents and great-grandparents can light the way for us, if we'll let them.  And we'd better let them, before those micro-farming skills die with them and are gone forever.