Author Archives: Annette Cottrell

Passive Composting and Why I Think That’s Important – a Contrarian Post

Posted on February 21, 2012 | 8 Comments

Joshua shared with you his very aggressive, super fast method of composting and fertilizing. Now it’s my turn to share my method with you and how I feel it differs from his in some pretty important ways.

Fast Compost – Gardening Gold (or Is It?)
In the book, Joshua lays out how he meticulously chops up organic matter and turns his piles frequently – resulting in compost in a matter of weeks. Compare that to my method, which is to pile alternating layers of garden refuse, chicken bedding and cut grass onto a forgotten pile. I occasionally inoculate it with worms and whey or other fermentation scraps and leaf mold but otherwise let it break down on it’s own. If the pile is big enough, it will break down in a matter of months. If it’s not big enough, it may take a full winter. If the pile is my worm bin underneath the rabbits inside the chicken run, it breaks down very quickly. Either way I leave it be and accept the results.

What I’ve noticed over the years is the compost that breaks down faster is not as dark or richly sweet smelling or effective a growth medium as the compost that breaks down slowly. I attribute this to the fact that the fast compost method heats the soil up so that some of the bacteria is destroyed, or more aptly, cooked.

When I make cheese from milk that has been heated above 115 F, it does not have the full flavor profile, the subtle nuances and superior texture of cheese from milk that is heated. This is because those bacteria that impart more subtle characteristics have been destroyed. I am guessing, and I have no evidence to support this other than my own observations, that it is the same with my compost. We do know that the most nutritionally rich compost is the most nutritionally diverse compost – which supports the most diverse soil life. And we know that plants cannot absorb nutrients directly from the soil, but instead rely on soil life to absorb those nutrients and excrete them in a manner that plants can absorb. Therefore, the more diverse your soil life, the more nutrients are available to your plants and therefore to you.

In addition to destroying some of the bacteria in your compost, heating it up is basically burning the nutrients off much more quickly. Those nutrients are escaping into the air and washing out in the water – flooding into water tables and streams. I believe this is a manner of polluting. I also believe it’s wasting those nutrients and creating a short lived dose of nutrients that sets up the cycle of needing to fertilize more often than necessary. And since most of us won’t bother getting our soils tested before fertilizing, we once again are using more fertilizer than necessary (with its high carbon price in it’s creation, packaging and distribution) which once again pollutes the atmosphere.

So what do I do instead?

I use animal manures and passive compost and mulch to both feed the soil life and protect soil structure so that it drains easily.
I test my soil and fertilize or mineralize only when needed.
I plant “wild” or easily reseeding vegetables and perennials as much as possible.
I utilize companion planting, interspersing nutrient accumulators and nitrogen fixers with heavy feeders.

Preparing and amending the soil

Because plants take in air through their roots, the soil should have air pockets and good drainage (so the roots don’t become waterlogged, suffocating the plant). By providing decaying organic you create an environment attractive to worms, pillbugs, centipedes, funghi, and bacteria – the web of life – who will find and aerate your soil for you. As organic matter decomposes and creepy crawly critters move through your soil (depositing nutrient-rich outputs along the way), they create air pockets and soil structure. An initial heavy manuring gets the web of life off to a good start. Cover your soil with mulch (decaying matter like wood chips or straw or living mulch like creeping thyme or beneficial insect flower mixes) to prevent your soil from drying out in the sun or becoming compacted in driving rain.

Thereafter, compost “in place” and mineralize as needed to maintain good soil structure. Once you have good soil structure and decaying organic matter, limit soil amendments other than minerals and isolated nutrients to the top layer of the soil. To compost in place, pull back the top layer of mulch, apply a thin layer of items to be composted and then replace the mulch. The web of life will find your compostable matter and convert it into minerals and nutrients in a form that your plants can absorb.

Testing Your Soil

Before applying minerals and nutrients, get a soil test done. AL Labs West, Logan Labs, and UMass all provide results but SoilMinerals.com will analyze those results and prescribe soil amendments. You can find organic amendments at Black Lake Organic, Walt’s Organic, Peaceful Valley or Concentrates NW. There are probably countless other sources closer to you but I am the most familiar to those sources in the Pacific Northwest.

Why Wild, Self-Sowing and Perennial Vegetables?

In addition to not requiring annual reseeding, wild, self-sowing and perennial plants have stronger root structures and therefore are more efficient at absorbing moisture and nutrients from the soil. You also are not harvesting the plants every season, which means less soil disturbance (which does not disrupt the cycle of soil life).

Nutrients Naturally

Many people rely on isolated vitamins to make up for shortfalls in a nutritionally deficient diet. I’ve never believed that it’s possible for science to fully understand the complete chemical makeup of a living thing, and the fact that we learn about new nutrients, or ways that nutrients work together in whole foods frequently solidifies that belief for me. I don’t see how it could be any different with fertilizer. We know the bare minimum isolated nutrients to keep plants alive (NPK) but how do we know what other nutrients that plant really needs to thrive, and for us to thrive when we eat it’s fruits, leaves or shoots? We know that food is less nutritious today and in part that’s due to variety breeding – but that’s not the whole story. It’s also about the nutrients available in the soil, both through their presence, and through the amount of soil life that makes those nutrients available to the plants. If we aren’t nurturing the soil life, that soil cannot support the most nutrient-dense food no matter how much we are fertilizing it. And then how do we know which nutrients we are missing by using isolated fertilizers?

Greater Plant Diversity

Nature has a perfect system for creating plant nutrition. Diverse organic matter, strong soil life and diverse plant life. How does diversity in plant life matter? Different plant types uptake different nutrients at different rates. By growing large blocks of the same plants in the same soil, those specific nutrients are drained much faster. But by growing diverse plants in the same soil, those nutrients are utilized more evenly.

Nutrient Accumulators
In addition, some plants with deep tap roots reach way down into the soil to draw up those nutrients created by deep dwelling soil life and make those elusive nutrients available to shallow rooted plants.

Nitrogen Fixers
Nitrogen is present in the atmosphere and washes down during rain storms. Certain plants, like legumes and a handful of bushes, have developed a system for capturing and storing that nitrogen in their root nodules. By inter-planting nitrogen fixers (such as a living mulch of clover) with other plants, you help make that stored nitrogen available to your plant groupings. Plants that need nitrogen will reach down and borrow from that nitrogen “bank” as they need it and without polluting watersheds.

By pairing both nitrogen-fixing and nutrient-accumulating plants along with perennials (for example, a legumous cover crop and a deep tap rooted plant like comfrey) you create a near perfect planting combination. The occasional compost application may be all that combination of plants ever needs to thrive.

 

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Posted in Growing Groceries - Plants, Seeds and Growing Tips

Urban Farm Handbook February Challenge Kickoff

Posted on February 9, 2012 | 2 Comments

This is it people! I cannot tell you how excited I am for this challenge! Your enthusiasm is inspiring and wow do I have some amazing hosts signing up as we speak. Willi Galloway and Jessi Bloom have signed on, as have Langdon Cook and Tovar Cerulli. We’ve got some fun prizes lined up but what we are most excited about is seeing this excitement for change.

Yes, yes, urban farming is about vegetables and chickens and putting up but what it’s really about is changing the food stream. It’s about a hunger to connect with what you eat, and what you feed to those you love. It’s about being mindful of the impact you have on this life, both on and off the farm.

We know that not every monthly challenge will work for you but we are hoping that enough of these opportunities for change will speak to you, so that you embrace them wholeheartedly not just for the upcoming year, but for always. Let’s make this the year that food companies finally sit up and take notice that we don’t want to eat what they are serving any longer. We’ll grow, source, and prepare it ourselves thank you very much.

One more thing about these challenges – there are multiple challenges each month. Some are simple and some are…well, more challenging. We want you to try new things but we also want them to be achievable. We don’t expect that everyone will do everything. But if you do we’ll be tickled green.

Without further ado, the next blog post on this blog will be Joshua McNichols, kicking off SOIL BUILDING! If anyone can make soil sexy, it’s Joshua.

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Posted in Urban Farm Challenge

Integrating Small Animals Into the Garden (In Other Words, How to Let Animals Do All the Work)

Posted on February 8, 2012 | 10 Comments

There is one last post that I need to get up before we kick off the soil building challenge. This is based on a workshop I gave ten days ago at the Country Living Expo but it’s been on my mind for about a year now.

It’s All About the Soil
When I first started gardening I put my back into it. I worked my tail off and enjoyed it, but as time went on and I added animals to the system I noticed some big changes. Sometimes that meant the chickens completely took out an entire winter’s worth of seedlings that I had forgotten to cover, or that the ducks got into the hoop house and did the same thing. But as I learned to remember to fence off critical garden areas, my animals and foul have actually decreased the amount of work that I do in the garden.

Because in the end the most important thing in your garden is not the plants – it’s the soil. If your soil is healthy with good structure, you can eke heaps of the most nutritious, flavorful, gorgeous vegetables imaginable. If your soil is not healthy, your plants may be stunted, diseased, bland and minimal. It’s not about your thumb, it’s about your soil.

Understanding Plant Needs
Healthy plants need water, air and minerals, which are all absorbed by the plant through its root system. Adding decayed (or decaying) organic matter to the soil creates a perforated structure that absorbs water without becoming waterlogged, and creates good airflow. This soil structure not only allows plants to develop healthy root systems, but provides decomposers like fungi, bacteria, earthworms and other critters (the web of soil life) with their favorite food. It’s the waste product of this web of life that feeds the plants. So the goal of the organic gardener is to create a soil structure that feeds the web of life.

A good way to create organic matter is to compost both brown (carbon) and green (nitrogen) things, keeping them aerated and moist. A great way to compost is to let small livestock do it for you.

Good = you scrounging for things to compost and doing all the work
Better = animals providing you with valuable inputs and you doing all the work
Best = animals providing you with inputs and doing all the work

 

Browns
Small animals like chickens or ducks will require some amount of bedding in coops or runs. If you have dairy goats, multiply that amount by fifty. The beauty of bedding is that it already contains valuable manure and urine and counts as a “brown”. “Browns” are hard to come by unless it’s autumn and your neighbors are lining up sacks of raked leaves, or you just shucked an entire garden bed full of corn and have the cobs and papery outer leaves to dispose of.

Greens
To keep the ratios right, however, you need equal parts brown to green. Where do you get those greens? Just mowed grass is perfect. But what do you do in the winter when yours and your neighbor’s lawns stop growing? Garden and kitchen scraps are great. And how do you generate enough to match your brown volume?

The Magic Begins
You could find a grocery store that throws away past-prime vegetables and add that directly to your compost. Or you could take those greens, feed them to your chickens, get eggs and then compost the parts the chickens don’t eat. You could also do this with your lawn trimmings. And then your chickens can scratch through to turn the pile (aka their bedding, unwanted food scraps and manure) into compost for you. Are you starting to see the magic?

A Shortcut
If you aren’t a composter (or even if you are) you might instead use green manure. This is where you plant cover crops directly in your garden beds, then before the cover crop goes to seed you “chop and drop” or hoe it in. Some manures that winterkill, like oats, will naturally die when the first frosts hit and then decompose on their own requiring no work on your part. Taking this idea one step farther you could plant cover crops that your chickens love to eat, like wheat, barley, oats, kales, lettuce. Build a “tractor” or cover that protects the chickens from wandering dogs or overhead predators and keeps them in the exact garden bed you need worked. The chickens will eat some of the cover crop, scratch (think till) it in for you and leave their valuable manure behind. And all you had to do was scatter some cover crop seeds!

More Magic
Now imagine an elevated rabbit hutch above a compost pile. The ideal rabbit diet is alfalfa (a green chock-full of nutrients and organic matter), hay (a brown), black oil sunflower seeds (essential fats), some form of protein like cracked peas, and oats or barley. Rabbits tend to spill a fair bit of food. Alone, that food would simply go to waste and possibly attract rodents. However, with chickens, that spilled alfalfa moistened by a waiting compost pile suddenly becomes a green – something difficult for chickens to come by in the winter.

Alfalfa, as a plant, is a nitrogen fixer with long tap roots that allow it to draw deep nutrients from soils. For this reason it’s highly sought after as a garden amendment. In your compost, it imparts great fertility. In your eggs, it imparts dark orange yolks.

Another thing that imparts dark orange yolks? Worms, centipedes and pill bugs that are also attracted to that compost pile. Thanks to the decaying matter but also thanks to the rabbit and chicken manure that essentially predigests the plant matter and makes it especially attractive to decomposers – which are what your chickens really want to eat, and what makes their eggs particularly healthful compared to purely grain fed eggs.

Other things your rabbits spill are hay (a brown which you frequently must add to a compost pile that is constantly “moistened” by rabbits), seeds and grains. Instead of attracting rodents, the seeds and grains will attract your chickens which will happily clean up what would otherwise become a rodent-attracting mess and they will pick through the rabbit manure for any fly larvae.

Now we are turning liabilities (wasted, rat-enticing food and fly larvae, soiled animal bedding, yard waste) into assets (compost, healthy chickens and eggs). This is the beauty of a guild – a combination of things that work better together than they do their own. Sometimes guilds are groupings of plants. In this case it’s a grouping of small animals and compost that helps you feed the web of life. And in return for that (if you so choose), you get the occasional meat and eggs (and dairy if you have mini goats) and valuable compost for your garden.

Now we are really strengthening the relationships between the garden [growing food for] you [and] chickens [and] rabbits, [who work and amend] the compost [which feeds] the soil structure [while increasing] nutrients [which improve health in] the crops, you, and the animals.

The Voodoo of Doo Doo
The compost this guild provides is truly magical but you can take it one step further with the addition of a vermicompost tea brewer. You can make one yourself using a drill, two matching rubber storage tubs, and a piece of hardware cloth.

To make a vermicompost tea brewer:

  • Take one rubber storage bin.
  • Place some bricks or overturned pots inside it to act as spacers.
  • Take the other matching rubber storage bin and drill holes in the bottom and the lower third of the sides.
  • Line the bottom of the bin you just drilled holes into with hardware cloth.
  • Add six inches of well-moistened leaves or well-moistened, shredded junk mail (no shiny paper please).
  • Add several inches of garden soil or compost.
  • Add red wiggler worms. (You can obtain these online or through the Seattle Farm Coop, www.NorthwestWigglers.com in Lake Stevens, Seattle Tilth, www.YelmWorms.com or www.WormLady.com in Chehalis.)
  • Add kitchen scraps and top with a final few inches of moistened junk mail or leaves to discourage fruit flies and trap any odors and snap on the lid.
  • Nestle the filled and drilled rubber storage bin into the one with spacers.
  • Continue adding kitchen scraps by burying them below the top layer and be sure the bedding remains really moist. This will encourage your vermicompost tea to brew (as moisture drips down through the vermicompost and into the waiting container below).

To harvest the vermicompost tea, simply lift out the top bin and pour or ladle the brew into a recycled glass bottle with a lid (like a vinegar bottle).
It will be as thick and dark as motor oil and so strong that using more than a few drops in a pint of water may burn your plants. Diluted in this fashion, however, it’s pure plant voodoo. You can spray it directly on plant leaves as a foliar or use it to water starts or potted plants. I would never consider starting tomato plants from seed without this voodoo.

Ducks Work Hard (So You Don’t Have To)
Ducks are yet another type of garden helper that love worms and pill bugs. But what ducks love even more than worms are slugs (those dastardly composters that desecrate your garden through spring and summer.) Keeping a few ducks on hand to roam the garden is my favorite form of slug-prevention. So long as there are slugs and bugs for ducks to eat, they ignore your plantings. But once the slugs and bugs are gone they will start helping themselves to your vegetables so keep a watchful eye on them! Ducks produce rich, large eggs prized for baking but unsupervised, they can be more hindrance than help in the garden. Use with caution.

Another Guild
This last magic guild requires substantially more fussing and planning to pull off.
In nature, tilapia eat a wide variety of food including plankton, green leaves, fish larvae and decaying organic matter. You can mimic that in your backyard using rabbit poop (recall that it’s really partially digested, nutrient-dense green matter?)

Tilapia need temperatures near 80 degrees F to grow well. You can achieve this by building a sun porch or small green house attached to the south side of your house to take advantage of escaped heat and sunlight. If you build your winter rabbit housing above the tilapia pool (which could be as simple as 55 gallon drums with aeraters and filters painted black to help absorb as much of the sun’s warmth as possible), the rabbits will feed the tilapia and help to warm the structure with their body heat. In the summertime when temperatures inside get above 80 degrees F, you’ll want to remove the rabbits since they do best with slightly cooler temperatures. You might even position your rabbit housing so that it’s only partially above the tilapia tanks, then add a compost pile under the remaining section of rabbit housing.

The combination of composting organic matter, rabbits, escaping heat from your house and sunlight may be enough to heat the tilapia water. If that’s not sufficient, a small space heater on a low setting overnight may be all you need.

You may even consider keeping your laying hens (or new chicks) in this greenhouse to benefit from the increased light, warmth, and to speed up the composting process which will generate more heat. More light and warmth will increase winter egg yields. You can use the top of the rabbit housing as a place for early spring starts (so long as the chickens cannot fly up and eat them). The starts will also benefit from the warmth and increased light. If your greenhouse is large enough, you could add some heat loving plants.

Selling backyard eggs, spring salad greens and heirloom tomatoes fresh off the vine (and perhaps grown directly in the compost?) in January might generate enough income to pay for your space heater and then some, thereby subsidizing your tilapia operation.
It’s also possible to add a hydroponic garden into a tilapia setup, and to combine tilapia with a duck pond but the setup becomes much more expensive and complicated as you need to prevent the ducks from eating the fish and the plants as well as filter the fish and duck waste safely (the duck waste presents a problem for the fish and for leafy green edibles).

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Posted in Chickens, Compost, Dairy Goats, Ducks, Growing Groceries - Plants, Seeds and Growing Tips, Meat Rabbits

Will You Take The 2012 Urban Farm Handbook Challenge?

Posted on February 5, 2012 | 14 Comments

You’ve read Michael Pollan and Barbara Kingsolver. You’ve watched Jamie Oliver and vowed to eat healthier, organic and local food. You want to make some changes, but where do you start? The Urban Farm Handbook Challenge, of course!

Twelve months, eleven challenges and one reflection month, all on your schedule and at your level of ease.

How can you say no? Throughout the Urban Farm Handbook we walk you through a year’s worth of change from grains to dairy to vegetables to protein. We offer you both simple and crazy ways to get you on the bus. But now it’s time to get real. That bus is coming for you. Will you get on it?

To help convince you, we’re rounding up other inspiring bloggers to host monthly challenges. And I’ve got to say – I’m super excited about these hosts and challenges and I think you will be too. Let’s check them out:

February: Soil building. It’s too early to garden outdoors in most parts of the country but we can ready our soil. We’ll learn about worm bins, green manures, composting, biochar and amendments with some fun prizes thrown in for random winners.

March: Home Dairy. You don’t need goats or a cow to get started with home dairy. We’ll be learning about simple cheeses, yogurt, buttermilk and creme fraiche.

April: Gardening. It’s time to start sowing seeds indoors, outdoors, and in containers. Wherever you are you have room for something! Erica with NW Edible Life will share all the dirt.

May: Foraging. Hank Shaw from Hunter, Angler, Gardener, Cook will be challenging you to find food on the fly.

June: Botanicals. We’ll look at herbal oils, teas and tinctures to keep you glowing and healthy, both inside and out.

July: Seed Saving. Learn to save your own seeds from the garden or farmer’s market.

August: Preserving. From eating seasonally and cellaring to fermenting and canning, there will be something for everyone this month.

September: Bartering. Kate Payne, the queen of food swaps and author of Hip Girl’s Guide to Homemaking” will walk you through the process.

October: Protein. Choose your own challenge, from hunting to backyard meat to purchasing a whole animal to growing your own beans or making your own tofu. Find out how to make responsibly-sourced protein affordable.

November: Grains. With temperatures dropping and holidays on the way, it’s time to put on a few pounds with baked goods and homebrew. We’ll be baking with whole grains and brewing with all grain mash. No processed flours and malt syrups here!

December: Handcrafted holidays. Drop out of the ultimate commercial machine. We’ll look at home crafting gifts and simplifying the holidays. Slow down and celebrate the reason for the season.

January: Reflections and wrap ups. We’ll share our triumphs and failures in a highlight format. This will be your chance to shine or come clean and develop your personal 2013 goals.

This challenge will be what you make of it – the ultimate in crazy or just dipping your toe in. So join me, won’t you and take the pledge now? Add a little more urban farm to your life in 2012 by taking the challenge.

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Posted in Urban Farm Challenge

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Ruminations on Ruminants

Posted on February 3, 2012 | 5 Comments

Hide and Seek from Mary

For a farm named after goats, I don’t post very many goat pictures.  In part that’s because it’s nearly impossible to take pictures of goats.  If you’ve have children you’ll notice you have lots of pictures up until the time they start crawling and then suddenly they start trying to take the camera out of your hands so you stop taking pictures for awhile.  It’s like that with goats.  As soon as you get the camera out, they all want to taste it.

That adorable expression they were sporting seconds before the camera appeared?  Gone.  I seriously need to work on my goat photographing skills before the kids come.

Valerian

And then there are those goats that just don’t look cute at first glance.

Little Bells

But they quietly follow you around, strategically getting in your way and gazing stoically with big, soulful eyes until you have to stop mucking and pet them.   When you stoop to refill a water bucket they take advantage of your position and suddenly there is a warm, fuzzy nose on your shoulder.  They are happy to sit and nuzzle as long as you have time, or until the moment is broken by a loud, alfalfa smelling belch.

King of the Stump

I know some goats are pushy and stand offish.  I don’t own those goats.  My goal here is to breed heart melting bundles of backyard milk.  My plan was to get one pair of goats yet suddenly, just a few months after moving here, I accidentally have five bred does.

Bessie's Mira, 2011

That means ten to fifteen babies coming this spring.  I have no idea how much milk I’m in for but I’m guessing a lot since one goat provides us enough milk to drink.  I see a whole lot of cheese in my future.

Pav's "Annette" Cheese

 

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Posted in Dairy Goats