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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. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| NEWSLETTERS Modern Homesteading Movement
1) Trees and Critters in the Garden?
2) Retraction of the Week: Chickens...Onions...Life...
3) Carla Visits Midwest and South in June / July
4) Frugality News: REAL Estate
5) Sustainability News
6) Self-reliance News: More Bad Laws
7) Health News: Talk Therapy Works Better than Drugs to Treat Mental Illness!
8) Letters from Readers
1) Trees and Critters in the Garden
Seven years ago, I stepped out of my van in the redwood forest of coastal central California and gasped in amazement. There was an indescribable feeling, standing amongst those forest giants. The tallest living things on earth towered over me. Trees that were babies when Christ was born. What humbling company for a mere human being to keep. There was a coolness, a quietness, a vigor, a subtle emanating health in the air of that grove. I hated to leave. I'll never forget my moments there.
Five years ago, I married Don and came to live in the deadly desert of southeastern Arizona. On the south side of this aging single-wide trailer (with a homemade add-on to expand it into the size of a triple-wide), there were two sickly mesquite trees and a lot of desert sand, interrupted by an occasional stunted weed. I began to regularly water, dig out weeds, and plant vegetables and fruits. I bought and "planted" earthworm casings under my three compost piles. Rabbits and poultry joined the homestead family and enriched the soil by their manure. Now the desert is literally blooming. But both plants and critters do best near a tree or heavy vine. The best place to keep rabbits alive in our 100+ degree, rainless days (day after day after day)is under the shade of a mesquite tree.
The mesquite is just a big shrub by regular tree standards. But it's native to Arizona, the nearest thing to a tree that grows wild around here, and a well-watered one can get 15 feet high and dense. Mesquite is also a legume. That means it is a nitrogen-fixer and enriches the soil in its vicinity. It is the last tree in the garden to put on leaves in the spring and the first to shed them in the fall. That makes it a perfect choice to snuggle strawberries, carrots, and other sun-haters under. In the cooler months, they get plenty of sun under the mesquite. In the boiling summer months, they are shaded from all but the gentler early morning and late afternoon sun.
The first rabbit died of heat stroke because I carelessly left it inside the porch room, but near enough the door that direct sun could hit it. Just that was fatal. I tried putting rabbit hutches on the south side of the house, on the north side, and on the north side. I lost another New Zealand white and then a sable doe, and then another sable doe (just a week from kindling). The discovery of each dead bunny, stiff with glazed eyes trapped in its cage, was a heart-breaker. I grimly buried her and tried to figure out what different I could do. Don said we should give up trying to raise rabbits.
The image came into my mind of rabbit hutches between the mesquite trees, nestled under the dense (thorny) branches. The little red hen, a Rhode Island Red who won't stay cooped up, spent hot hours of the day right there. Maybe she knew something. It always felt wonderful to me, also in that spot between the mesquites. They were growing close enough to provide a single over-arching shade through mid-day, but far enough to walk between them, to fit some hutches between them. One by one, I moved all the rabbit hutches into the mesquite shade. I put adults into the deepest shade. I've learned they're most vulnerable to heat. The cage of little does and the hutch for little bucks is in a less protected area, but still under the mesquites. So far, no more losses. I keep the soil moist around there; this area is also dense vegetable garden.
I used to kill upstart mesquite seedlings like weeds. I'm wiser now. When I find a baby mesquite volunteer, I carefully dig it up and move it to some treeless part of my garden. Some day, my whole garden will be under and between mesquite trees.
2) Retraction of the Week
It was a week when blood ran in the poultry flock. Not so long ago, I was bragging in this newsletter about chickens that never pecked each other because of my superior care. Ah, pride goeth before a fall. Now I have cannibals. And I have egg-eaters. I realized that my gorgeous fayumi rooster (an Egyptian breed, smart, strong flyer) had bloody comb and wattles, blood-stains on his white neck feathers, and was in a never-ending run trying to escape my single guinea.
I raised the fayumi and the guinea in the garden together. We called them "the odd couple," so devoted were they to each other. The fayumi didn't look like a guinea, but it could fly like one, and they chummed around together until just recently when the fayumi's maturing sex drive shifted his interest to all the lovely hens in the chicken yard. The single guinea, unfortunately, was a male. Arrival of summer's high heat stimulated his gonads, and he couldn't understand why his dear fayumi wouldn't stand still and be mated by him.
They came tearing by again, fayumi racing desperately across the garden, guinea yanking tail feathers behind him, a race punctuated by fayumi squawks. Then guinea got fayumi helplessly cornered, and they both stopped long enough for me to catch up. I grabbed the guinea from behind the cowering rooster. Two minutes later, guinea was headless and en route to the deep freeze. (I put a board over his neck, put my two feet on the board, one on each side of his neck, gave a yank, and the body became headless.)
I also have young white turkeys (unfortunately unable to breed naturally because of being double-breasted, so they're all destined for the deep freeze) and turkens (a hardy meat / egg combo chicken variety, good choice for a hot climate). Those two are amongst the gentlest, most people-friendly critters of the poultry kingdom. I needed to move the half-dozen white turkeys and the equal number of naked-necked turkens into the hen house because a new batch of baby birds had arrived.
These odd-looking newcomers, however, being also younger than the preceding big house occupants, immediately became hazing victims. Certain sharp-beaked slashers cruelly gashed those poor turkens, making long, deep cuts on their featherless, exposed necks. After a few days, I gave up hoping that the pecking would end and gathered up the young turkeys, who were also getting cruelly persecuted, and the poor, bloody turkens. I gave them the run of the garden.
Now I have an eager little entourage wherever I go in the garden. They're taking a toll of lettuce and peas, but they're so obviously happy there, that a price in produce is worth it to me--this week. Next week, before I leave on tour, I'll do a major thinning of the big house flock. Surplus roosters, egg-eaters, and cannibals are all destined for the deep freeze. Then I'll move another batch of teenage birds that's coming up on the conveyer belt into the big house--plus the turkeys and turkens, and see what happens.
I'm not eager to butcher anything. I do it when it needs to be done, because it needs to be done. I know what I'm doing. I do it quickly, mercifully, and the meat is never wasted. Some butcher jobs I dislike even more than others. I hated doing in the guinea. I was fond of him. I hated even worse doing the necessary thing this week with two surplus buck rabbits. They weren't needed for breeding, and they were fully grown, meat-sized. I was fond of them, too. I tried to sell them at the farmers market--first at $20 each, then at $15, then at $10. No buyers appeared.
They're both in the deep freeze now, four pounds dressed weight each. That's $10 worth of rabbit meat per carcass at the going rate of $2.50 per pound, if I could legally sell them to the folks who beg me for rabbit meat, something you can't find in the store.
If you're going to keep critters, you have to keep a firm grip on the realities. Once I visited a lady who had grown up in Europe, then moved to the U.S. and bought 100 acres near Asheville, North Carolina. She was a vegetarian, but she bought a pair of Scottish Highland cows because she liked the look of them. Highlands have long, shaggy hair coats and big, dangerous-looking horns. She never castrated a bull calf. She never killed a cow or bull. By the time I got there, she had a herd of more than forty Highlands. Half of them, of course, were bulls. Her many neighbors, some of whom had Jersey or Holstein milk cows and Angus beef cows, were extremely frustrated. They didn't want half-Highland offspring. But when their cows came into heat, they had lots of excited Highland bulls visiting. Fences don't hold a bull who wants to wander.
I also had an onion crisis this week. Had ordered a bushel of red onion sets. I guess I didn't read all the fine print. Thought I was getting big globe onions. But the hot weather hit and a zillion leek-type red onions all started to go to seed simultaneously. I was frantically pulling onions to take to market. Fortunately, buyers are intrigued by the idea of red "green" onions, even ones that are getting a bit of a tough center because of going to seed.
Does somebody want to follow us around with a camera--do a homestead reality show? Don and I talked it over. We're willing if you are. There's so much to teach... And no point in trying to hide our many imperfections...
3) Carla Visits Midwest and South in June / July
2005 Summer Tour June 2, Thur. TX, Hockley. 6 pm potluck dinner. Carla speaks, 7 pm. "Principles of the Modern Homesteading Movement." Host: Christine Martin, christine@hockleyhomesteadfarms.com.
June 3, Fri. OK, Boynton, Elece's Farm: 11555 N. 350 Road. Tree-grafting demo by Elece's husband. Then Carla speaks, 6 pm, "How to Grow the Greatest Garden of Your Life," 918-733-2832, cehollis@familynet.net. Co-host Jackie: jackiepallison@hotmail.com. June 4, Sat. June 5, Sun. June 6, Mon. MO, Willow Springs. First General Baptist of Willow Springs, Fellowship area: 2507 Highway 63. Potluck at 5:30 pm, followed by talk: "Back to the Basics." (Frugality; Food Storage; Family Food Production, Self-sufficiency) Host: Jill Dabney. 417-457-6703, sjdabney@pcis.net . June 7, Tue. TN, Manchester. Farm Bureau Building meeting room, 225 East Main St. 7 pm. Carla speaks on "History and Principles of the Modern Homesteading Movement." Steve and Donna Willis. 931-728-9588 Aleson@Cafes.Net . June 9, Thur. FL, Royal Palm Beach. Program, "It's All about the Food," begins at 6:30. Kenneth Koleos, an amazing networker in America's organic food / slow food movement, speaks on "Organic vs. Conventional Produce." Carla speaks on "Fossil Fuel Depletion." Co-Hosts: Kenneth Koleos and Mom, Jackie. After the program, all attendees are invited by Kenneth, a gourmet professional chef of 20 years experience, and Jackie to a "Reception in Carla's Honor" at 119 Heron Parkway, Royal Palm Beach, FL: KKOLEOS@hotmail.com, 561-798-3364. June 11, Sat. FL, Gainesville (Gainesville area). Florida Dairy Goat Association 27th Annual Goat Production Conference. University of Florida, College of Veterinary Medicine. From I-75, take exit #384 (old exit #75) at the Archer Road Intersection. Heading NE, continue on Archer Road until it forks at SW 16th Avenue. At the traffic light (becomes SW 16th Avenue), bear right. Turn right at the next traffic light (Shealy Drive). The College of Veterinary Medicine will be to your left: www.fdga.org. Carla's keynote address for the Conference happens at 9 am: "History of the Modern Homesteading Movement (including a fossil fuel depletion chronology)." She also speaks at 1 pm on Saturday: "Five Basic Principles of Modern Homesteading," and at 10 am on Sunday: Modern Homesteading: Self-reliance and Sustainability." Hosts: Jan Brewer jan_tnubians@alltel.net; Dr. Mara Ricci. glenmythos@aol.com .June 12 Sun. FL, Gainesville. Dairy Goat Conference workshops continue. June 13, Mon. GA, Atlanta. Co-hosts are Sevananda Natural Foods Market and Georgia Organics. Event takes place at Sevananda, 467 Moreland Ave NE, 404-681-2831. It's located in the middle of historic Little 5 Points in June 14, Tue. TN, Dunlap. At Citizens Tri-County Bank, 37 Rankin Ave., 6 central / 7 eastern, Carla speaks on the "History and Principles of the Modern Homesteading Movement." Host: Aileen Dunnaway kdunnaway@bledsoe.net..June 15, Wed. Available.June 17, Fri. through June 19, Sun. WI, Custer. Midwest Renewable Energy Association "Renewable Energy and Sustainable Living Fair" is from June 17-19 at the ReNew the Earth Institute in Custer, just 7 miles east of Stevens Point. It's the world's largest energy fair--workshops, exhibits, and demonstrations, all focused on renewable energy, energy efficiency, and sustainable living. Fun for the whole family. Tickets are available for:- General Fair Admission July 12, Tue. OK, Norman. Co-hosts: Cindy and Pam. Healingherb2001@aol.com. 4) Frugality News
I was listening to an oil supply expert do a recent radio interview. He gives us three years before the boat starts shaking and ten before it rocks. That's a feasible timeline in which to accomplish something real about getting yourself situated to grow food. Is your real estate, well, REAL? Alan Greenspan, chairman of the Federal Reserve, suggested on Friday that the red-hot housing market is becoming a little too exuberant for its own good. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/21/business/21fed.html?th&emc=th That's especially true in California. For example, a $1 million house in Santa Monica will only cost $134,000 in Knoxville, Tenn.; $187,000 in Austin, Tex.; $193,000 in Provo, Utah; $197,000 in Tucson, Ariz.; $203,000 in Athens, Ga.; $246,000 in Fort Collins, Colo.; and $280,000 in Charlottesville, VA. If you're in an over-priced home, and/or if you're in a big house on a little lot, I suggest that you get rid of it! Sell while house prices are high, because they might not stay up there. Then buy a little house on a big lot! And pay cash for it, if you can. REAL estate is property that can make money for you. Most houses, nowadays, are just a place for people to sleep, eat, whatever. Back in the 1800's, you could measure wealth by land ownership; the more productive land could be, the more valuable it was. That's REAL estate. So when you're shopping for a new home, the one that will replace your big-house-on-tiny-lot that can't produce anything, look for land. You want land that can grow trees (firewood, timber, building materials), or grass (feed for cows, goats, geese), or cultivated plants (orchard, vegetable garden), or energy (15 feet of falling water can generate electricity!, as can sun or wind). That's REAL estate. 5) Sustainability News a) Bee Books For books on bees, beekeeping, beeswax crafting, etc., and an e-mail list for regular updates on available bee books, write: ebeebooks@aol.com, or phone or fax Larry Connor at 203-397-5091, or write Wicwas Press, 175 Alden Ave, New Haven, CT 06510. b) Sea Level Rising Even the most conservative climate and hydrological models suggest that the average sea level will rise by about a foot by 2050, regardless of what new actions we take to reduce greenhouse gases. This sea level rise will cause some island nations to disappear under water. The government of Tuvalu has asked Australia and New Zealand to accept its citizens as environmental refugees as the sea covers their island. c) Hybrids: the Good, the Okay, and the Ugly Union of Concerned Scientists--Center
"Mild" hybrids such as Honda's Insight and Civic Hybrid employ the first three technologies above. "Full" hybrids, including the Toyota Prius and Ford Escape Hybrid, go one step further and feature electric-only drive. "Plug-in" hybrids that utilize all five technologies are not currently available as passenger vehicles.Hybrid technology is also being used to increase power and performance rather than fuel economy. The resulting "muscle" hybrids, such as the Toyota Highlander Hybrid and Lexus RX 400h, provide only a fraction of the potential fuel economy and environmental benefits. The Honda Accord Hybrid falls between mild and muscle hybrids."Hollow" HybridsSome automakers are trying to create a "green" image by putting one or two of these technologies into their conventional vehicles and calling them hybrids. The Chevrolet Silverado Hybrid and GMC Sierra Hybrid, for example, have idle-off capability but improve fuel economy by only one or two miles per gallon. Such improvements might be lauded if they were made standard options in every Silverado and Sierra, but producing a limited quantity and marketing them as hybrids will only dilute the term's meaning and soften demand for hybrid technologies.When evaluating hybrids, keep in mind that the environmental performance of specific models can vary. For example, Honda Civic Hybrids sold in California rate an exemplary 9.5 out of 10 on the EPA's smog-forming emissions scale, while others currently rate just a 2. For a customized, side-by-side comparison of hybrid models-along with useful tips from technology experts and hybrid drivers-visit the Union of Concerned Scientists' website: http://www.hybridcenter.org d) Oil Peaks in Late 2005? That's what this expert says: http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0517/p15s01-bogn.html?s=hns Good article on peak oil from U.K. newspaper: http://www.guardian.co.uk/oil/story/0,11319,1464119,00.html As North American natural gas supplies rapidly deplete, companies desperately scramble to build infrastructure to import the stuff like we do oil. http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/041305A.shtml
f) Want to Discuss Composting Toilets? Hi Carla: Thanks for your efforts to promote composting toilets and ecological sanitation. There are many variations on the theme, united by the common goal of recycling rather than disposal of human excreta. I monitor and participate in 3 discussion groups: http://www.jenkinspublishing.com/messages/ http://groups.yahoo.com/group/compost-toilet/ http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ecosanres/ Larry 6) Self-reliance News: More on Butchering Laws
In 2002, Washington homesteaders had the right to raise poultry, butcher them at home, and sell them to their neighbors. Then their state legislature took away that right completely. Next session, the legislature threw a bone to the small poultry producers, allowing them to sell birds, IF they bought a state license ($50), butchered in the government-approved, government-provided processing unit, paid $2 a bird for that butchering, and brought a minimum number of 100 birds to be butchered. Flocks smaller than 100 flocks must wait to be combined with enough other small flocks to total 100; in the meantime the birds could be getting old and tough. Alas...
Hi Carla: Oklahoma is going thru the same "chicken butchering" rules that you talked about in Washington! Many small producers were selling their wonderful fresh chicken thru our food co-op. The state shut them down, said they could sell quail but not chicken. It's supposed to be for the public's health. Cindy Sterling, Norman, OK Cindy tells us it's going to be illegal for a small producer to sell quail in Oklahoma, but not chicken. Is that because quail meat is less subject to deterioration? Easier to keep healthy? No, sorry. It's because the (lobbying, lawyering) corporation isn't interested in selling quail meat--only chicken. This type of law is NOT about health. It's about corporate profit. And that's wrong. Being able to grow food, process it, AND sell it is, in my opinion, a fundamental human right that has been so savagely under attack throughout these United States that most people have forgotten food production once was and could again be a free marketplace. Homesteaders now accept the black market in the finest food this country produces with little protest. Consumers accept, with only feeble objection, the impossibility of obtaining, for example, local fresh goat milk for their baby with allergies. (There is no fresh goat milk in stores because the store goat milk market is a TOTAL MONOPOLY under the control, nationwide of just ONE company. This is why any store goat milk is probably at least three weeks old and that's why that store goat milk tastes "goaty" instead of sweet and milk the way it is, when served fresh.) As a result of restraining laws, the opportunity for food producers to earn a living is limited and the opportunity for their friends and neighbors to buy the most sustainable, sensible, affordable, and healthy food is equally limited. To me, this is a HUGE issue. In the name of "public health," government agencies, arm in arm with agriculture and food-processing corporations, have taken away God-given food-production and food selling rights from family food producers. This enlarges the regulatory role of those agencies (and their budgets, authority, and self-importance). Corporations play ball with government people because they have already used or plan to use their own deep pockets, lobbyists, and lawyers to obtain targeted legislation that will create ever more absolute monopoly for their own products and processing.
Article on D.C. lobby industry: http://www.publicintegrity.org/lobby/report.aspx?aid=675&sid=200
Government could keep people alive in the coming hard times by starting right now to distribute basic start-up stocks of rabbits, poultry, and garden seeds to any willing persons or families. They could be advertising that these start-up supplies are available. They could offer training in the care of critters and plants. But, above all, they need to start stripping away the stifling layers of legislation that prevent people from growing food. ("Horses, okay; poultry, not okay" is a typical rule that needs to be dumped). 7) Health News a) Talk Works Better More and more psychiatric drugs are getting pushed onto patients, but a new study shows that old-fashioned talk therapy works way, way better to help them! A research study published in the AMA's Archives of General Psychiatry reports that talk therapy worked just as well as chemical therapy in the short run and, in the long run, it was much superior--because of the much higher relapse rate of patients who had been drugged for their problems (and then taken off the drug). Even patients who stayed on their drug didn't do as well as those who got no drug / talk therapy treatment. So why do psychiatrists respond with a drug? Because it's so much quicker and easier than actually listening to and counseling a client? http://archpsyc.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/62/4/417 http://www.economist.com/science/displayStory.cfm?story_id=3860433 8) Letters from Readers Dear Carla, I am really blushing. I wrote to you and bragged about my blackberries that I'd pruned and how abundantly they were blooming-well, guess what. The ones I didn't get around to pruning are also abundantly blooming. All I have accomplished is that the berries may be bigger on the pruned bushes-and I'll be able to get to more berries because of the paths I cut into the brambles. However, the black raspeberries that I pruned have exploded with blooms, far more than their usual amount, so I'm guessing that pruning them does help. God bless!
Marie(the lady out in her field pruning blackberries...) Carla,I don't know about making soap from chicken fat, but it is great for baking - especially for spicy things. Gingerbread or molasses cookies are my favorites.It's also good for removing paint off skin - just rub it in to soften and take it off. Great issue of your newsletter by the way! Thanks, Marcy Hi Carla,
I'm writing to help Dan Robinson's quest for making soap with chicken fat. I am assuming he has rendered the oil from the chicken fat before attempting to make soap. (If not, we have a pictorial on rendering suet into tallow on our website http://www.mullerslanefarm.com/render.html Chicken oil has a NaOH SAP value of .1389 so he could use the beef tallow slot in many lye calculators to figure out how much lye to use. He will want to combine chicken oil with an oil (such as that deer, goat or elk tallow) that will create a harder soap since chicken oil only will create a soft soap. I highly recommend using an accurate scale for measuring oils and lye in soap making. Dan can contact me via our website if he has any soaping questions. Cyndi "As for me and my family, we will serve the Lord" Joshua 24:15. Muller's Lane Farm; http://www.mullerslanefarm.com Hi there Carla, Thanks so much for coming to our area. Your talk forced me to throw away all processed foods in our house. We have been making everything from scratch. I feel SO much better! I already was doing alot towards our self sufficiancy goals, but now we are more determined than ever. Our garden is doing wonderful. I am squeezing in as many plants as possible. Again, thanks so much Carla. You truly are a wonderful person. Becca Mott Hi Carla, Thank you, Ginnee
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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. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
