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Jabuticaba

Exciting news in the conservatory!  First jabuticaba blossoms starting to push out!  These are the small greenish white “nubs” you can see on the branches below.

 

Jabuticaba

Jabuticaba

Jabuticaba is an unusual tree in that it bears its dark purple grape sized fruits on its trunk and stems.  The tree is native to Brazil and attempts to naturalize it in warmer regions of this country have failed.  It is excellent fresh, and can also be used for wine and jams.  There are even claims of cancer fighting properties in the fruits.  The tree has a graceful shape that can that be trained as bonsai, and the leaves are similar to the olive leaves.

Elsewhere in the conservatory, the orange tree has a few lingering blossoms, but look at what’s next; Gardenia!

Gardenia buds forming

Gardenia buds forming

And while the hibiscus does not have a fragrance like the oranges and the gardenia, it is stunning none-the-less. 

Hibiscus

Hibiscus

Frugal Tip – Plant Tags

When starting seeds trays, it is very important to label the seeds.  This is especially true with plants like cucumbers that have different picking requirements – some need to be picked small or they turn bitter, others can be left to grow long.  A “Paris Pickling” needs to be picked at gherkin size, and a “Bella” at ten inches.  How can you tell this looking at a vine?  Sometimes you can’t.  This is just an example.

Identify your seedlings

Identify your seedlings

You can solve this frugally by reusing your sour cream and cottage cheese containers.  We are very fond of Daisy sour cream and cottage cheese because they use no fillers or stabilizers or anything that you can’t pronounce.   With a large family, we eat a considerable amount of these weekly.  While many of the tubs are used over and over for leftovers and my husband’s lunches, we still end up with stacks of them that I am reluctant to throw away.

So I have found another use for them.  Using sharp scissors, I cut the base off about 1/2 inch up from the base.  This forms a little “dish” that you can use as a tray under small pots.  With the remaining sides, I cut strips just wide enough to write on with a permanent marker.  If you have seen the cost of plant markers in nurseries and gardening catalogs, you will see that your savings can be substantial.  When I am done using them, I put them all in a pot and often reuse them.

Frugal Plant Labels

Frugal Plant Labels

 

Happy Gardening!

Daisy Plants Labels

Daisy Plants Labels

Dear Winchester

Dear Winchester:

You are ruining my view.  Not in the way you’d expect.  I actually can’t see you from where our farm sits, but you affect my view day and night, none-the-less.

You see, it’s your lights.  Years ago when we bought this farm, we choose it for its remote location.  We didn’t want city lights obstructing our view of the stars and the Milky Way at night.  Our view was stunning.  In your artificial light filled nights, you can’t imagine the display of the heavens you are missing, the frequent meteor showers, the mysterious glow of the galaxy.

And then Walmart put in a new store on Route 50 near the Hospital.  This Walmart is open 24 hours a day and they light up that sprawling concrete parking lot all night long.  Since, other business have been built along that area.  Now, to look east at night is reminiscent of seeing the lights coming from Mount Doom in Mordor  in the Lord of the Rings.

During the day, we have a daily reminder of Winchester’s electrical consumption.  Our formerly pristine view is now scarred by enormous power lines that cross the mountain, in response to the increase demands of Winchester and the DC metropolitan area.  You have no idea how many acres of woods and farms were stripped to make way for these lines.  It just hardly seems to be “environmental.”

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There are lots of options for those who wish to conserve energy, and the view for that matter.  Lights for security at night can be switched to motion detector lights that do not have to be constantly on.  Human beings used to live more closely tied to the cycles of daylight, and now many stay up late and start their days even later.  Perhaps living more closely to Benjamin Franklin’s advice:  “Early to bed, early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise,” would apply here, with the added advantage that it might save thousands of miles of electric poles and preserve the views of the stars and night sky.

Dear Winchester, could you please turn off your lights?

Conservatory Status

While we got seven inches of snow yesterday, it still looks and feels like paradise in the conservatory.  The plants have also noticed the lengthening days, and are starting to prepare for the new growing season.

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 The geraniums, while still green, were in a semi dormant state.  Now they have burst into bloom.

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The fig tree is pushing out new leaves, and has already started forming fruits.

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We have started the geranium cuttings for the summer window boxes.

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Seeds are off to a good start, at least the ones spared by the mouse.

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I wish this photo were “scratch and sniff.”  The orange blossoms have released a heavenly scent that fills the entire conservatory.

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A yellow pear tomato hiding in the foliage.

I have received some questions about our conservatory.  It was built by my husband.  His company builds these and new homes in the Northern Virginia and West Virginia Panhandle.  You can see some of his work here!

Seeds

I mentioned in a post last week that this was the time to start ordering seeds for Spring planting.  I tried a new company this year, looking to support local sustainable suppliers.  The company I tried was the Sustainable Seed Company, and I am rather disappointed.   Here are the things I noticed, and I will be comparing them with GourmetSeed.com, whose quality I am always pleased with.

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Take a look at this first photo for comparison.  Both are parsnip seeds, a vegetable we have recently fallen in love with.  The package on the left was from Gourmet Seed, and the one on the right from Sustainable Seed.  Observe the packaging.  One is in a protective sealed mylar that will preserve the seeds for years without exposing them to gains or loss of moisture.  The other is in printed paper, which has practically no protective qualities. 

Now, the obvious difference is size!  The packet from Gourmet Seed contains 25 grams of seeds and the other 2 grams.  While this packet from Gourmet Seeds cost $6.95, it contains over EIGHT TIMES more seeds than the other.  The other cost $2.75, (as of today’s blog it is on sale) and you can see that for the extra $3.00 the Gourmet Seed cost is the winner.   Even if I don’t use all the seeds one year, I can still reseal it with the built-in zip seal and these will keep.

Which brings me to the next issue.  I also ordered a pound of winter wheat seed from Sustainable Seeds, and look at the date!

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These were packaged for 2013, which means they were grown the year before.  Winter wheat is planted in the fall and harvested the following spring in July in the North or as early as May in the South.  Since these are dated March, it means they were harvested the year before.  These are two-year old seeds!  Another of the seed packets I received from them is also stamped “packed for 2013.” 

When ordering seeds, it is important to watch for companies that offer quality and back up that committment consistently. 

 

2014 Gardening Goals, High Intensity Gardening

I think practically every gardener spends January (in the northern hemisphere at least) pouring over seed catalogs and planning their spring and summer gardens, and I am no exception.  As soon as the New Year’s celebrations are over, seed catalogs start pouring in the mail enticing us with their bright pictures and promises of high yields.

Over the years, though, modern growing methods have left most of us feeling disappointed.  On our farm, we have been trying new methods of organic techniques, incorporating permaculture, and avoiding quick solutions such as pesticides and herbicides.  So, I was thrilled to come across a new method of gardening called High Intensity Gardening which can literally help the plants to express their full genetic potential, while improving the condition of the soil and the nutritional content of food.  For example, a tomato plant has the genetic potential to produce 400-500 POUNDS of tomatoes, but due to our growing methods, toxins, nutritional deficiencies,etc., we fall short of its potential.

John Kempf is one of the greatest advocates and educators of High Intensity Agriculture.  He has formed an organization called Advancing Eco Agriculture.  You can listen to him here in an interview with Dr. Mercola offering a brief explanation of the methods and outcomes. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQDbkSn9rpo#t=1533

Last year, I demonstrated in an article called “Compost” the amazing results of using compost in the garden.  Mr. Kempf discusses the benefits of compost “tea,” a liquid made by fermenting compost in water, generating an enzyme and beneficial bacteria-rich liquid for the soil.  Kempf draws the similarity with Dr. Mercola, that just as humans’ digestion benefits from beneficial organisms, the soil is the plants digestion and benefits from pro-biotics as well.  Here are two videos showing Kempf’s Plant Health Pyramid.

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As I consider my seed choices, I will also be researching recipes for compost tea.  And with a few exceptions, I will not be ordering from most of the major seed catalogs, who provide overpriced packets with scarcely any seeds.  Ever since starting this blog, we have provided a link to Gourmetseed.com where we buy our seeds.  The majority of the seeds come from Europe where cross-pollination with GMO crops is not as great an issue.  The packets are reasonably priced and usually contain hundreds of seeds in each.  I am awed by the quality and quantity. 

It is increasingly necessary for small farmers to embrace these natural growing methods and seeds.   Top soils across this country are microbiogically dead, and can only produce if given chemicals, yielding nutrient deficient food.1  Since Big Ag has not responded to the call for better farming,  small farms are leading the way.  Please support your local farmers!

1. http://www.soilandhealth.org/02/0203cat/royal.lee.lets.live.articles.htm

 

 

We’re back!

Good Morning Friends and welcome back, I mean me! My sincerest apologies for the absence but we have literally been without internet for 31 days! What didn’t help was lots of snow and icy road conditions, making going out difficult, too. In this rural location, we rely on the cell tower for our businesses’  communications, internet, weather, news, etc.  (In one conversation with an AT&T representative, “Paul” remarked that he was looking at a computer map that shows cell strength.  He said that around us it was completely white.  I asked, “What does that mean?”  “It means nothing, it means you have nothing,” was his reply.)

As you know, we had already been having AT&T tower problems for the last few months. The entire tower crashed, however, exactly two weeks before Christmas. I had several Christmas blogs in mind that will have to wait for next year, such as how to make Christmas Stollen, a German holiday bread studded with candied fruits and filled with almond paste. 

So time to catch up on some other news, as well as four weeks of Emily Estrada’s Fibretown Podcast :)

Meduseld is thrilled to be an advertiser inWild Fibers Magazine’s Tenth Anniversary Issue. I have been reading this magazine since before we even started up making yarn, and it is like traveling overseas without leaving the comfort of your living room. It covers diverse natural fibers all over the globe. My only complaint is that they don’t cover the wonderful domestic farms very often, but hopefully there will be more attention given to our own country’s fantastic (albeit struggling) fiber industry in the future.   Look for our ad in this issue, which contains a link to our free Icicle Shawl Pattern. 

We were not idle while the net was down. I started some seed trays for a friend who is firing up her own “high tunnel” or hoop house. While most of the seedlings are coming up fine, I have had the most frustrating time keeping a mouse out of the cucumber and squash trays, having to replant each time some four legged creature makes a feast of my seeds. I even put the four legs of the table in buckets of water and the little varmint still gets to them. BTW, sprinkling hot red pepper over the dirt doesn’t stop the mice either. I have now planted those trays for the fourth time. Please keep your fingers crossed for me!

Coming up: Maple syrup making, new yarn I am expecting from the mill, gardening plans for 2014, and some recipes I have been testing while things were “quiet.”

AT&T Travails

We are sorry for our radio silence!  While we have had to work with a “downgraded” tower for the last several months, for the last three weeks we have had NO cell coverage at all – no internet, no cell phone, no news, NOTHING!  In order to get cell I have to drive 25 miles to the nearest town.  Today I am using my friend Kate’s computer:) Please forgive the inconvenience, and if you have any influence with AT&T please ask them to fix the Cooper Mountain, WV tower!

In the meantime, best wishes for an excellent 2014!  I hope to be back online very soon with photos, recipes and new wools.  We also expect lambing to start before long!  Bundle up and keep warm!

Alpaca Romney Bulky – Back in Stock!

I am thrilled to announce that Meduseld’s Bulky Alpaca Romney is back in stock!  Whew!  This is a highly popular natural brown blend that flies off our shelves.  We have limited production of this yarn since I use the same two fleeces each year to make it – one a natural brown alpaca and the other a natural grey brown Romney ewe.  Their blend yields a luxurious, shiny yarn.

Meduseld's Alpaca Romney Yarn

Meduseld’s Alpaca Romney Yarn

This yarn is so squeezably soft, wonderful for warm winter knits, and perfect for this time of year.  This yarn has no itch factor and is sutable for garments that touch your skin.  For some reason I cannot explain, it is darker this year than last, looking more like a rich dark chocolate.

This year's blend is darker, on left

This year’s blend is darker, on left

 We only have five pounds of this yarn, so supply is again very limited.  Each 250 yard skein weighs approximately 8.7 ounces – over half a pound!  They are $30.00 each, the same price as last year.  You can find them in our store here!

Gratefully,

Patricia