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Carla Emery • P.O. Box 133 • San Simon, AZ 85632 Further
information about these topics can be found in Copyright 2004 by Carla Emery. All rights reserved. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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NEWSLETTERS Modern Homesteading Movement
Description of codes for previous years
b) Public Health Requirements Differ Hi: I am a lawyer, and I concentrate on helping people in the three industries I know best: food, farm and publishing. Great points about health inspectors and farmers markets. I wrote an Legal Guide for Illinois Direct Food Marketers. Illinois has 102 counties which means there are about 102 different ways to read the public health requirements. Rich c) Gardening Thank you for another great letter, Carla. You thought-provoking articles give us the incentive to continue on in our quest to become more self-sufficient. Around my place, I try to plant only items that will produce food. I plant trees, nuts, and bushes that give us nuts, berries and fruits. Recently I have started along the woodsline trying to recreate the old-fashioned fence row. I remember as a child, berries grew in abundance along these old fence rows. These days people brush hog right up to the trees! No berries, no habitat for birds and small animals, no place for seedlings to take root and grow. My goal is to plant blackberries and black raspberries along a 300 foot long stretch of tree line. It may take me a few years, but I think it will be time well-spent. I was out in the garden beds a few nights ago when one of my neighbors stopped by wanting suggestions on how to get rid of the black raspberries growing along her fields. She wants to dump gasoline on them and burn them out! We tried to talk her our of this idea, don't know if we suceeded or not... <sigh> I often wonder about people! Thanks again! Melissa from Homesteading Today (www.homesteadingtoday.com) Hi, I know that the row gardening method is not very efficient etc... What do you reccomend as the best method instead? We have done some Sq. Ft. gardening and like it, but to do a huge garden like that is very time consuming and on the expensive side. Thanks so much! Aileen Answer: It's not expensive when you don't use a rototiller, don't buy or build boxes, and don't buy soil and chemicals! Feed the soil. Plant, weed, water, and harvest. That's my system. Hi, Carla. Thanks for the newsletter. In regards to the Limits article, what most people don't realize is that if they can grow a flower or shrub for looks, they can replace it with a plant that will provide food and still have something to look at. I love the raised beds and semi-square foot gardening method because I can cram so much more in a small space. We currently have tomatoes and squash growing upside down in hanging flower baskets. We lost the cucumbers, and some of the tomatoes took hits in recent hail storms, but for the most part, things are growing well. We are litterally raising our little acre one square foot at a time. When everyone else gets one-tenth of an inch of rain, it drains to our mudhole to stand at 6 inches deep. Before we started planting, the yard looked a lot like a cemetary after a plague had hit town with all the empty raised beds. Now we have okra, peppers, squash, cucumbers, onions, peas, broccoli, and spinach growing. We also have peach, persimmon, orange and pecan trees as well as grape vines. It will take a while, but one square at a time will eventually give us all the garden space we need. You give good advise when you say practice gardening. Anyone could start with one square foot, it just about equals a hanging flower planter. Robin d) Home-formula Chicken Feed Gives Hens More Healthy Years Carla: With regard to chicken feed, most of the pellets and mash being mixtures probably do have additives in them. I have been feeding my hens for years using straight cracked corn and C/O/B/ (corn, oats and barley) plain grains only and they free range all day. I even had my feed store call the mill in another state where they get their grains and had them asked about genetically modified corn and other grains. THe mill flat out stated they will not contract with any farmer who uses the genetically modified grains, that their grains are the real, original stuff. My hens are now 5, 6, and 7 years old and still laying an egg every 24 hours--mostly jumbos! Just a thought for others to consider concerning feed for laying hens. Best, Norma e) Tanner Addresses and Info Carla, I am not finding anyone who does rabbit skins, and some have stopped doing sheep skins. I sent some to Sterns this winter. I heard they do a washable, garment-quality tan. I am waiting to see how it turns out. Here's a site that lists a few others: http://hem.bredband.net/ronpar/pelttanning.html Fran Hi, Fran. Animal rights people drove many U.S. tanners out of business. The Chinese moved into the gap and now they're flooding the U.S. with so many Chinese grown and tanned furs that it's even harder for a U.S. tanner to stay in business. The ideal tan, from my point of view, is a traditional buckskin tan. The national experts on that are Matt and Michelle Richards. Go to www.Braintan.com where they sell books, tanning supplies, tools, and info on making buckskin, leather, and furs: 10398 Takilma Rd., Cave Junction, OR 97523; 541-592-3693; matt@braintan.com. Their amazing website contains 250+ pages of articles, tutorials, an online, ongoing forum, sources for tools, books, videos, finished skins, and more traditional tanning info than you knew existed. f) Spinach! Hi Carla, My wife read me your latest newsletter. A couple of questions first. Is there seed corn that will produce six ears on a stalk? Was that a typo? We are in south Georgia eight months of the year and northern Vermont four months of the year. Our soil where we are in Georgia is very similar to your soil. A lot of sand content mixed with some clay. It leeches nutrients at an unbelievable rate. We top dress with compost and we grow a beautiful garden all winter long. We have a very impressive spinach crop that we harvest every day, and like you, we pick just the larger mature leaves. It takes fifteen minutes to pick a gallon bag stuffed with spinach, and then it needs to be cleaned, and that takes another ten minutes. That spinach when steamed down is two large servings for me. I'm 6'3" and over 200 pounds, and I admit I eat more than my share, but that's the healthiest food that I can get. Anybody that would talk to me about a wholesale price for my spinach would start my blood pressure rising, because you cannot buy, at any price, spinach like we get out of our garden. It is sweet and tender, and extremely digestible. It is so dark green and curly. Besides being a healthy, delicious, nutritious food, it is a beautiful crop. Restaurant owners, like the rest of us, are all trying to get everything at the best price, and I don't blame somebody for that, but it's a real insult to a Mercedes salesman to be offered a Volkswagen price. Restaurant owners know that farmstead products taste better, and are more nutritious and safer food. I'd be happy to give somebody a one or two line education on the difference between home grown spinach and commercially, chemically produced spinach. It's time for people to wake up. What they don't realize is I don't need their money, but if I'm going to sell what I have, I'm going to get paid a fair price, or I'll eat it myself. We grow organic yellow granex onions and collards and broccoli. If you can't taste the difference between what you can buy in the store and what you get out of our garden, then there probably isn't any difference. A lot of people say they grow organic produce, but it doesn't have the sweet flavor and the tender fiber. I think you need to put a price on your time. Don't give away your spinach! Don't try and compete in price. They get paid well in the restaurant industry, and they all know that if their food tastes good, they'll have repeat customers, and without repeat customers they don't have a business. You can name your price. Today there are people who eat all their meals out, and they can afford to eat all their meals out, and they can afford your spinach. Hope to meet you at Common Ground. Walt Hi, Walt! Thanks for the wonderful e-mail. A lady in Saskatchewan wrote me that she grew 6 ears of corn per stalk, so I assumed she was a better gardener and had way better soil than I did. I don't know what kind of seed she used. Thanks for the encouraging words about spinach! g) E-Bay and the IRS Hello Carla , I live in a very depressed area of the country. More jobs are lost than found. One way that folks here do make a little money is selling on the auction site eBay. I have tried it and with good results. If you have (like me) a collection you no longer want, then think about listing it on ebay and turn your unwanted items into cash. I call myself a "recycler". I am not an antique dealer of any sort. Just passing on good useable goods to new owners. It is easy and fun and I recommend it if you are out of work, have too much "stuff" or are just looking for a great hobby. Ann Harper Hi, Ann. Thanks for your kind words. I know several people who supplement their income with e-bay trading. You're right. It can certainly be a blessing to country folks. A word to the wise: the IRS is looking into folks who are taking in a lot of money at E-bay to see if they're paying tax on that income. Gratefully, Carla Good Morning Carla, Our accountant told us that we do not have to declare ebay sales as income IF the items we sell are ours. If we purchase items with the intent to resell, then the sale must be reported as income. Anyone selling on ebay should keep good records. If you are buying to resell, you can deduct the expense of "finding and selling" the items. I recommend talking to an accountant who can provide information on just what is a tax deductible expense. Cheers, Ann Harper h) Food Laws Protect Health? Or Corporate Monopoly and Profits? Carla, I had to admit, I got a kick out of the bit about the food venders who were selling real food hiding from the food inspectors. The health departments are becoming a real problem, in that they have nothing to do with health, just protecting the 'food industry,' which, of course, is anti-health. Some people go underground, but there is a real fear of their power! Keep sharing your wisdom, real education is the only hope. I see signs up all over the area of your upcoming visits to Kettle Falls and Chewelah! And many people in the Barter Faire family have asked me when you will be back!! Hugs to you, Fran Answer: Thanks, Fran, for your input. How sad it is when the healthiest food around is illegal. All over this country I have encountered illegal food producers, bread makers who grind organic grain the morning they bake and deliver that afternoon, home dairy folks who sell real cow's milk with cream that rises to the top that you can make homemade butter from or whip, or goat dairies. The president of an unnamed state dairy goat association said to me, "Carla, there are some ninety owners of dairy goat herds in my association and every one of them is an illegal milk dealer because the laws make it impossible to be legal." I've learned that the commercial goat milk market nationwide (in supermarkets) is controlled by ONE company and that's why store goat milk is typically three weeks old when you get it and tastes so strong, so totally unlike the real (fresh) thing. I've seen garden growers who were threatened with a $5,000 fine for calling their produce "organic" since the federal government took over the ownership and defining of that word. I've seen grass-fed meat growers who were selling clandestinely because their buyers wanted to do their own butchering for religious reasons or to save money. I've seen homestead egg growers shut down because their state health department insisted that they take their eggs 150 miles every day to be inspected (no matter how small the number of eggs). On and on, the sad stories go. Many years ago, government rules truly protected the public health. Now, however, big food corporations have discovered the advantages of a deep pocket combined with lawyers and lobbyists. They have used that devastating attack trio to obtain "health" laws which actually have the effect of creating monopolies that shut out their competition, even little guys (with the truly healthy food). i) MHM Newsletter Reader Builds Renewable Energy Website http://12vman.com/links.php Back to Newsletters |
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Write:
Carla Emery • P.O. Box 133 • San Simon, AZ 85632 Further
information about these topics can be found in Copyright 2004 by Carla Emery. All rights reserved. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
