It was a little bit of a shock to see the date of my last post to this blog, nearly one year ago. It’s not that I haven’t been living the urban homesteading dream—in fact, I just got a food dehydrator for my birthday and have produced jars and jars of dried apples and pears. Next up will be the grey dove oyster mushrooms coming in in a few weeks. The chickens are cackling and laying, I canned tomatoes, green beans, pickles, five different kinds of jams, blackberries in bourbon, and applesauce this summer. John has been brewing lots of delicious IPAs and red ales, and we cured duck prosciutto and pancetta in the basement last winter.
I’ve been knitting like crazy, too. It’s been busy and productive around here.
But I have spent most of my time in the past year in a different kind of garden. A garden nonetheless, but one with recording equipment, computers, instruments, and musicians. Finally and at last, I have grown a second CD of my original music.
There is a direct line of inspiration from my little Southern Urban Homestead to the songs on this collection. It winds through the vegetable patch and around my laundry line, and it even pauses for a visit with the chickens. And there’s food–oh, yes, there’s food. And love. Here’s a little sampler:
If you’d like to own the entire CD, they are available by mail order right here:
I work as a writer and editor at a large university. My office is on the top floor of a six-story building, which sports a generous, sun-drenched rooftop patio overlooking our forested back campus and the city skyline in the distance. Recently some of my colleagues and I began to notice a lot of scurrying in and out of a vacant room near the patio. It was actually two members of the building’s maintenance crew. Curiosity finally got the better of us, so we inquired. It turned out that they had an arboretum going in the room’s large, light-filled windows — orchids and houseplants of all sorts being rooted and nurtured.
My colleague and I got to thinking. Surely these two green-thumb types wouldn’t mind if we added a few growing things to the rooftop patio, would they? So she casually asked them one day — would we get in trouble if we just put a few pots out there? One look gave us our answer: in fact, she would be the person we would get in trouble with.
Then she promised to water things while we were away. That was all we needed to hear.
First, we brought in a bush tomato plant. Then we scrounged a few more big pots and added a pepper plant and a Thai basil. The basil was a little tender for that windy rooftop, so I let it hang out in my office for a couple of weeks before moving it to the patio.
Not a week after we had put the first two pots out, a heavy nighttime hailstorm broke the main stem of the tomato in two, and the largest leaves on the pepper were severely damaged. I took the top half of the broken tomato plant home and rooted it, and it’s now growing at home in a container. But in the full sun of the patio, both plants recovered, in spite of a little July heat scorching. The basil did well, too.
So what the heck. we added an eggplant and a summer squash vine. Then one day, a cabbage plant mysteriously appeared in a pot next to the pepper. I suspect the building maintenance crew.
It’s not easy to casually drag giant pots full of soil and plants through the lobby of a tall building, onto an elevator, and across a common area to a patio. So my colleague and I have an arrangement. I call her from my car as I am approaching the building with the plants. She meets me out front with the office hand truck. We unload the goods, and she takes them up on the lift while I park. In spite of our best efforts, we always seem to attract attention and a few laughs.
Other people on our floor have watched our little guerrilla garden with curiosity, then later with delight as some tomatoes popped out, followed by peppers and eggplant. Everyone wants to try the basil. The squash isn’t thriving, but to my surprise, the cabbage is looking quite happy.
I think we will set up a crock pot and make soup for lunch one day in the next few weeks. Either that or a pop-up produce stand in front of the building.
The tomato plants pushed out the top of the hoop house. Next year I will plant compact bush varieties.
The early spring heat wave fried my sugar snap pea vines before they had even bloomed. The mid-spring freeze weakened my beans. I had a good run of cucumbers and early on—until a rat (or rats!) chewed through the netting on my new hoop houses and ate the rest, plus the early crop of squash I had not yet harvested.
This makes me cry.
I set high hopes on the many fat, beautiful green tomatoes growing in the hoop houses—until last weekend. The variety I grew inside them was too large, and the plants have pushed out the top, creating easy access for the squirrels, who decimated my crop.
It has not been a happy growing season for me.
The squirrel proof net tent is showing signs of wear and tear.
To add to my woes, the famous Squirrel Proof Net Tent is now three years old, and it’s beginning to show signs of wear. Holes have opened in the net here and there, allowing for squirrel incursions.
So a few nights ago, I set a couple of traps. I caught a squirrel and a rat. I re-set them and caught another of each. I re-set them again, but then some varmint figured out how to steal the bait without springing the trap.
Damn.
What I didn’t realize at the time, however, was that someone was watching my struggles, learning and absorbing, and working out a strategy. I finally understood this last evening, right around sundown.
I was in my big kitchen chair working at my laptop, when my Australian shepherd, Caleb, came over andsaid, “Woof.” He nudged my elbow with his muzzle. Thinking he just wanted attention, I scritched his head and went back to work. But he was insistent: “Woof!” Another nudge, this time more urgent.
Squirrel warrior
“Caleb, I can’t play with you right now. I’m working.”
“Frrrf! Arr! Arrrrarrrarr!” Another nudge. Then he ran to the back door, looked out, and looked back at me. “WOOF!”
I grumbled, relented, and hauled myself out of my comfy chair to open the door into the backyard for him. That’s when I saw what he was trying to tell me.
There was a squirrel inside the Squirrel Proof Net Tent, casually munching on the last of my green tomatoes. Caleb dashed out and proceeded to chase it around and around the perimeter of the tent. Inside the tent, the squirrel ran, dodged, turned. Outside the tent, Caleb ran, turned and followed. After several minutes of frantic circles, the panicked squirrel began to run headlong into the net, blindly trying to shove its way out.
Caleb caught on. After a few misses, he pounced on the squirrel as it hit the net. I heard a short squeak, then silence.
Caleb’s prey
Caleb stood panting at the edge of the tent and looked at the dead creature at his feet, still wrapped in the sagging net. Then we looked at each other in utter surprise.
“Caleb, you killed a squirrel!”
He looked back at the squirrel and then back at me. Still panting, he trotted over to the 12-foot diameter inflatable pool I have installed in my driveway for the summer (that’s a whole nother story), hopped in, and cooled himself off with a victory lap.
Victory lap
I went into the house for a pair of gloves and a sack for the squirrel. Seeing me head for his kill, Caleb hopped out of the pool and ran to it. I picked it up by a forepaw. He grabbed the hindquarters through the net with his mouth.
“That’s mine.”
I let go of the squirrel for a moment. “I know, buddy, but we can’t leave it here. It will stink.”
He let go, too. I picked it up again. Then he grabbed on again. “It’s mine.”
“Caleb, leave it.”
He’s a good boy. He dropped his prey, and I bagged it and disposed of it.
Afterwards, Caleb got a big thank-you treat for
figuring out that squirrels in the garden = bad
giving himself the job of squirrel-proof net tent watcher,
insisting that I pay attention, and
actually catching a squirrel.
And from now on, I will listen to what my dog is trying to tell me.
Postscript
Thank you to my friend and marvelous musician Tom Godfrey for sharing this little clip, and to Wes Funderburk, Atlanta trombonist extraordinaire, for using his powers for good.
We are in the meantime, it seems. The beets are gone, I’ve pulled my next-to-last carrot, and the kale bolted two weeks ago. The summer garden hasn’t quite gotten to the point of explosion quite yet. I am awaiting the day the tomatoes and figs ripen, the cucumbers reach pickle size, and the green beans start to pile up in my refrigerator.
In the meantime, here is what happens. The Georgia peaches are early and plentiful and delicious this year, so I bought about ten pounds of “dent and scratch” fruit at the Decatur farmer’s market a few weeks ago and made peach rosemary jam. I just made regular ol’ peach jam and simmered a few sprigs of rosemary with it, then took out the sprigs before filling the jars. It goes on the shelf next to the strawberry basil jam I made last month.
With the mild spring and early summer weather, I have switched to knitting cotton–easier on the hands and lap. I found some organic cotton on sale and bought a bunch of it, and my first project was this pair of vests for some friends who had twins a few months ago.
My Sweetie had a birthday recently, and with shameless self-interest at heart, I got him a beer-making kit. I’m hoping this will become a long-term skill and passion. Today he started his first batch of IPA. We have talked about setting up a little brewery area in the basement (which is already equipped with sink and stove), so this will become a weekend project after this first batch is finished.
Here in the meantime, whilst we await the garden bounty and the brew, my meager flower garden has been generous. Here is what is on my kitchen table today: Coneflowers, zinnias, butterfly bush, hydrangeas, gardenias, marigolds. Glorious eye candy.
In the meantime, there’s nothing to do but weed, water, and wait. Fortunately, there is an inflatable pool here that makes waiting just about my favorite thing to do . . .
Many years ago I picked up a little green book called Noah’s Garden, by Sara Stein. I have written here before about how that book transformed my relationship with my garden. Before reading it, I thought I had to attack the soil with my rototiller, then defend the conquered earth against the onslaught of weeds the tilling then cultivated, only to have to repeat the entire battle over again the next year after my labors had tamped the earth into a hard pack. After reading Noah’s Garden, I traded the sword and the ploughshare. Instead, I mulch deeply with layers of organic matter and let the worms do all the work. My soil stays more microbially rich and aerated as a result.
I thought I’d share a few more of the most beloved titles from the collection that guides and inspires me. Some are very practical how-to’s, some are philosophical manifestos, some are just damn fine stories.
Pragmatics
Artisan Bread in Five Minutes A Day, by Zoe Francois and Jeff Hertzberg. I heard a segment on The Splendid Table about this book in 2010, and I don’t think I have bought bread in a store (except for when we were in Italy, duh!) since. It is the easiest, quickest thing in the world to make bread with this method, and the variations are endless. I have made pita loaves, hamburger buns, olive bread, pizza crust, ciabatta, plain white loaves, wheat loaves. I have loved this book to pieces — literally. The spine has cracked in three places.
The Backyard Goat: An Introductory Guide to Keeping and Enjoying Pet Goats, from Feeding and Housing to Making Your Own Cheese, by Sue Weaver. A very practical and detailed guide to acquiring, caring for, breeding, and benefitting from goats on a very small scale. It was just the thing I needed to show me that this is, perhaps, a project for my retirement, when I have lots more time.
Keep Chickens! Tending Small Flocks in Cities, Suburbs, and Other Small Spaces, by Barbara Kilarski. When the idea first hatched in my head in 2004 that I wanted to keep a few chickens in my backyard, this is the first book I acquired. It was a great and accessible introduction to the ins-and-outs of flockkeeping, and I have loaned it out and referred to it time and again over the years.
Living with Chickens: Everything You Need to Know to Raise Your Own Backyard Flock, by Jay Rossier and Geoff Hansen, was my next acquisition in the chicken care library. Also very practical and accessible, and offers much more detail than the Kilarski book, including butchering advice. For 200-level flockkeeping studies.
Chicken Coops: 45 Building Plans for Housing Your Flock, by Judy Pangman. I own a copy of this book because I helped the author with one of the designs. She uses the coop at the Oakhurst Community Garden (now the Wylde Center) in Decatur as one of her plans. So I connected her with some information, and my neighbor Bill contributed some photos. It’s an excellent resource — another that I have loaned out several times.
Clark Howard’s Living Large in Lean Times: 250+ Ways to Buy Smarter, Spend Smarter, and Save Money. Okay, I know he isn’t exactly Mr. Back-To-Nature Homesteading Make-Your-Own-Granola Man, but I am a total Clarkhead. He is the ultimate penny-pincher, and if you have read any of this blog, you know how I love me some frugality. This is the man who will make one disposable razor last an entire year by drying it off after every use (it turns out that it’s moisture more than use that dulls a razor). And yes, I now dry off my razor.
Manifestos
Small Wonder: Essays by Barbara Kingsolver. This marvelous little 2002 volume predates her better known Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, but for me, it was the more important book. It’s an unflinching but loving and holistic look at the earth in all its glory and woe, from the Grand Canyon to Kingsolver’s vegetable patch. One essay in particular, titled “Lily’s Chickens,” was especially inspirational for me, and it helped me understand and articulate the reasons large and small I wound up helping to start a chicken revolution in Decatur.
(I also count the aforementioned Noah’s Garden amongst my favorite manifestos . . . manifesti?)
Damn Good Stories
A Mess of Greens: Southern Gender and Southern Food, by Elizabeth Englehardt. Read this book not just for the damn fine stories but also for some serious scholarly illumination on the complex issues that weave together women, food, health, power, class, race, and region. There’s moonshine, cornbread, biscuits, and more. I especially love the chapter on tomato clubs. In fact, I want to start a tomato club. Who’s in?
Farm City: The Education of an Urban Farmer, by Novella Carpenter. I have written here before about this delightful tale of how Carpenter took over a vacant lot in a sketchy part of Oakland, California, planted an insane overabundance of fruits and vegetables, and started keeping chickens, bees, ducks, turkeys, rabbits, goats, and pigs. I think of her when I need to remember why I want goats — and why I should never, ever want pigs.
After I mentioned a few weeks back that I have been putting my overabundance of kale into smoothies the past several months, a few readers asked for a recipe for this concoction. There are myriad wonderful and healthful ways of making “green” smoothies, and I wouldn’t say mine is the most authentically “green.” But it is a straightforward affair and quite tasty to boot, so here I present
The Kale Smoothie, Illustrated
Makes two smoothies
Ingredients
1 small handful of fresh kale (I prefer the tenderest “baby” leaves that are no more than about 3 inches wide)
2 bananas
1 1/2 cup kefir* or plain Greek yogurt
1/3 cup walnuts
2/3 cup orange juice
*I have typically used Greek yogurt, but recently a neighbor gave me a kefir culture. There is now a bottomless pitcher of kefir in my fridge, most of which has gone into smoothies.
Steps
Divide all the ingredients between two large glasses, or put them together in a small pitcher or blender.
Using either the full blender or an immersion blender in the pitcher or the glasses (my preference), puree all the ingredients.
Lately I have been adding a handful of strawberries because they are ripening in my garden. They turn the smoothie a lovely pink.
Well, y’all, I did it! I installed a solar-powered rain barrel pump, my second wish on my wish list. It was surprisingly simple. Just plug in the battery, cut the hose to the proper length, connect a few wires, drop the hose and pump into the barrel, position the panel. Within two minutes I was pressing a button to see what would happen and I squirted myself with 13 psi of stinky rain barrel water. I laughed out loud with happy happy joy joy! What a wonderful way to celebrate Earth Day, don’t you think?
I have the solar panel anchored in the ground in a spot I think will get about 8 hours of sun in the morning through mid-afternoon, but I can move it if it doesn’t work. But here’s how it’s working now.
Now I start saving for beekeeping equipment. In the meantime, if you live near me, cover up your seedlings, because it’s supposed to get down in the thirties in the next few nights!
It isn’t like I don’t have enough to do, between a full-time job, a house, several gardens, ten chickens, a hyperactive Australian shepherd, a rather demanding and expressive calico cat, and a whole nother life as a musician. But I catch myself daydreaming about the same “I wants” over and over again. Some of them will come sooner and some in far-off futureland, but they all will become, at one point or another, part of my little claim in the homestead realm.
Honeybees: This one may come sooner than later. I’m still getting educated and will have to make some investments in equipment and bees, but I’d like to install a hive at my house, especially for the pollinators, and another one at my parents’ house up in the mountains where I grew up, so that I can have my sourwood honey. No, I haven’t discussed this with them. (Hi, Daddy! What do you think about some bees in the orchard?)
A solar-powered pump for my rain barrels: I love my 220 gallons of the wet, which I run into my garden via soaker hoses. But sometimes I’d like those hoses to flow with a little more oomph. And in my never-ending quest for energy independence, I want my oomph off the grid. Here’s the little gadget I long for. Look for it on a rain barrel near me before this growing season ends!
Angora Rabbits: You can hold them and snuggle them and comb and brush out their long, beautiful fur, which can then be spun into the softest yarn you’ve ever touched, which the can be knitted into the softest garments you have ever worn. Also, did you know that bunny poo can go straight from the bunny into the garden as an excellent fertilizer without risk of it being too “hot” for the vegetation? Bonus! I’m still doing my homework and research, and plus I probably should learn to spin.
Nigerian dwarf dairy goats: This one may be a longer-term project, like after I retire and therefore have plenty of time to care for and milk dairy goats every day. There are some definite challenges with goats, but then there is milk, cheese, more excellent poo, and general adorableness. They aren’t going to get scratched off my list any time soon.
The mild winter this year has meant a winter greens bonanza in my garden. Back in August I started kale, swiss chard, salad mixes, beets, arugula, and cilantro. Everything came up and thrived through the winter. The parsley just re-seeded itself.
I’m a big believer in late-summer plantings of cool season vegetables. Allowing them to winter over—to get a start in the early fall warmth and then kind of stop growing with colder weather and go into hibernation—brings them back with a vigor you don’t see in crops seeded in the spring. It’s something we southern gardeners can do more easily than the northern ones, and we should take full advantage. This year, the growing didn’t really stop, however. Everything just got hardier and more persistent through the cool weather.
Then as made that early turn into spring, things started to go a little crazy. Really, it started with the cilantro.
The parsley saw what was going on and decided to get in on the act.
I really have no idea what to do with that much parsley. And that’s just one of the many mounds that have volunteered.
I have been harvesting baby kale all winter long and eating it mostly fresh in smoothies, but the warm weather has instigated a sudden growth spurt.
I have been picking pounds and pounds of Swiss chard—I think my best crop ever. Here’s what I came inside with last Saturday.
And the salad greens.
The arugula thrived through the winter but bolted when the warm temps hit. The chickens, however, have chowed down on arugula blossoms, not to mention all the weeds I have been pulling up. It has made their egg yolks richly yellow, almost orange. We have all feasted on the greens of this season!
Longtime readers of this blog may recall my unfortunate run-in with a rat in my potting shed a couple of years ago. Ultimately, it was Rat: 1, Me: 0. The damn critter dug up and ate all my tender seedlings under the grow lights. I tried protecting what was left with duct-taped plastic covers, but the sauna that created was too much for them.
Until I can varmint-proof my potting shed (and I’m working on that!), I have had to move my seedling production center indoors. And this year, so far, so good, though I realized a little too late that the flats were too far away from the light, so my seedlings are a little leggy, but they will be ok. Here is my set-up.
I outfitted an old plastic parson’s bench that was in my attic (thank you, grandparents!) with heating mats and grow lights. Each flat goes on a mat, under a light. The flats stay covered with the clear plastic lids and the lights stay off and the mats on all the time until we achieve sproutage, at which point the covers come off and the lights and mats go onto a timer. On for 12 hours, off for 12 hours.
At that point, I also set up a small fan to blow a gentle breeze onto the seedlings. Air circulation helps them become hardy. No hothouse vegetables tolerated in my rough-and-tumble garden!
As the second set of leaves appears on the seedlings, I move them to the garden window in my kitchen, where they receive direct sunlight. An open window on nice days encourages them to get more comfortable with outdoor environments. And I constantly check the soil for moisture—too much leads to dampening off; too little turns them into microscopic twigs.
And as they mature, I move them into my Growcamp, my little greenhouse/covered garden. There they will harden off—that means they will gradually become accustomed to outdoor life—and hang out until all danger of frost has passed and they can go into the ground.
All content on the Southern Urban Homestead Blog copyrighted by Allison Adams. All rights reserved. Not to be reproduced in any form without express written permission.
It was a little bit of a shock to see the date of my last post to this blog, nearly one year ago. It’s not that I haven’t been living the urban homesteading dream—in fact, I just got a food dehydrator for my birthday and have produced jars and jars of dried apples and pears. Next up will be the grey dove oyster mushrooms coming in in a few weeks. The chickens are cackling and laying, I canned tomatoes, green beans, pickles, five different kinds of jams, blackberries in bourbon, and applesauce this summer. John has been brewing lots of delicious IPAs and red ales, and we cured duck prosciutto and pancetta in the basement last winter.
It is titled, of course,
The Southern Urban Homestead 