Gardening in a Kilt (Buzz Kidder Canvas)

[Bugbear]

Te he, I went and added that "I still enjoy wearing a kilt," to my post in the sweater thread. Guess I'll watch that thread to see if anyone responds, on the other hand, I might realize that it doesn't sound right and edit it out... again.


I did one round of digging on the bottom of that trench with the mattock to see how it would go. It's working real well. It's a heavy mattock and it cuts right through the organic stuff and digs on passed into the soil. I kind of pull the soil back too. It seems like the shovel has a harder time going through the organic layer. You kind of have to stand on the shovel and work it in.

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Here! I've been holding on to this for over a month now, and I'll put it here just for the record. I dumped a copy in one of Nighthawks threads so he would find it, finnally!
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Nighthawk, in another thread you asked me about micro farming, so if you find your way here, this is a description... kind of...

The term "micro farm" is probably a touchy feelly term, but it refers to using a residential sized property to set up a very small farm. Zoning codes and so on usually put boundaries on what you can do with the space you have. As far as growing vegetables, out here it's a 365 vegetable and fruit growing year if you stick to the right plants for the right seasons. I can grow many more vegetables and fruits than I need. I live alone, so I don't know how well a family micro farm does.

Out here, I don't grow my own meat; I'm just not up for that. I could probably support a rabbit farm for... Well you know. The same goes for chickens and birds and so on.. I know I've joked about the chickens, but I just don't want to have to deal with that. The codes have changed in this area, so chickens and livestock aren't something I could have anyway. I do hear the roosters down the way where there are still farms...

I do have a setup to store rainwater. It isn't much storage capacity, so it doesn't help a lot. If I invested in more storage containers, it would probably become helpful though. I mostly use it for my bonsai when they need flushing out and so on. For the desert crops that I am switching to, I have a passive watering trench grid, and there's a bit of clay in the soil. I count that as storing water in the ground and in the cacti. Grey water is perfect for this kind of system. Luckily, I have a bit of experience with plumbing and can work with all that stuff. (I'm not a plumber..., just worked with it all my life.)

Another part of micro farming is finding native or naturalized plants for crops. I started studying desert plants and crops when I moved out here to the outskirts of the city eight or so years ago. I already had a foundation in desert plants just from growing up in the desert Southwest, but I wanted to find some of the forgotten stuff. Also, I experimented with applying some new horticultural tricks like hydro culture and so on to desert plants. I learned what I learned, but it's my own personal information.

Another thing, your life becomes about making compost on a micro farm; you live and breath the making of compost; it becomes a spiritual thing. It's a little bit like your lifestyle starts to be centered around what can go in the compost which is a whole lot more than standard composting information would lead you to believe. I also have a worm farm back there.

I looked into solar electric power, Nighthawk, but that is big budget stuff, so I am on the electrical grid. I am also on the water and natural gas grid. You don't have to completely withdraw from the world to be a hermit, and not many people could make it that way anyway.

** I should add that this was a personal experiment and I do not have a degree in agroculture or any related field. I do keep records on what I have done, but these are for my own personal use. It isn't much more than regular gardening, and I do not mean to say that any of this was done as a formal scientific experiment. Every thing I know on this subject was learned through personal research and experience, and (NOT) in a university or higher education setting.