Saturdays & Sundays

 

Friends have asked what I do on weekends.  When I'm not in Albany visiting Mike, I'm usually attending one of the various workshops that are offered by The Pfeiffer Center.  The course fees are waived for the garden interns so I try to take advantage of as many of the offerings as possible.  Yesterday, there was a day-long workshop on beekeeping.  The 30+ attendees visited the garden apiary with Beekeeper/Development Director Bill Day and Beekeeper/Head Gardener Megan Durney.  That's Bill in the olive green coat on the left and Megan in the red vest on the right.  While Megan's headwear appears to be a tribute to the beehives of old, it's actually how she keeps her waist-long dreadlocks from falling into the hive.  Megan has been my principal instructor in the art of beekeeping; she's a very gentle soul and the bees seem to know this.

Bill keeps hives at a nearby farm.  He has a dry sense of humor and often travels about on his beloved BMW motorcycle.  He and Megan complement each other with their teaching styles.  The weekend workshops really help to round out the hands-on learning that takes place during the week.  

There are also some regular chores that must be done on the weekend.  I mentioned watering the plants in the greenhouse in an earlier post.  Today, I was on horse duty.  Weekdays, spring through fall, the horses are walked up to the pasture where they graze for several hours.  On the weekends, they stay in their paddock so they need to be given hay for their morning and evening meals. 

You reach the horses by walking across the field that's in the background in this photo.  When they see you at the field's edge, one of them typically lets out a loud whinny.  Then they come over to the paddock gate to check you over for treats.  That's Captain and his older sister Eva waiting for me to give them the apple halves I brought.

After throwing a small bunch of decoy hay over the fence to get them away from the gate, I gather as much hay as I can carry and place it in their stall (this is the same hay that I helped to gather from the pasture and rode on top of in a wagon back in May).

Then I put some salt crystals on the ledges in the stall for them.

Next, I get the hose in place and climb up a steep slope to the barn above and turn on the water to fill the horses' drinking bucket.  I wait up top until I get the signal to turn off the water.

Fortunately, we save mucking out the stall and paddock for the weekdays so that a few people can tackle collecting the manure and dumping it in the compost pile located nearby.

Glad to have a few shots of me in my LL Bean Wellies as I've now cracked a second pair and won't be ordering another; new Sorel boots are on their way.  The Carhartt flannel-lined, canvas shirt jacket is proving to be a more durable purchase.  Thank you to visiting Waldorf teacher Kimberly who accompanied me this morning because she was missing her horses back in Kansas.  

As for the rest of the weekend, I spend it cooking, reading, catching up on correspondence, and of course, blogging.  Thanks for keeping up with me.  It's much appreciated.

Soul of the Soil

To forget how to dig the earth and tend the soil is to forget ourselves.

-Gandhi

The concept of nutrition has taken on new meaning since I've been working in the garden.  Whereas at Food & Friends  I was concerned about the clients getting enough calories, protein, vitamins, and minerals to nourish their bodies while living with HIV or cancer, now I think about the microbes in the soil and whether or not they are getting the nourishment they need to support the growth and nutrient uptake of the plants.  There can be up to 6 billion microbial life-forms in a quarter-sized chunk of compost.  By attaching themselves to the root hairs of plants and creating large networks of tiny absorptive fibers, the fungi in the soil allow plants to take up more nutrients while using the sugars from the plants to feed themselves, a true symbiotic relationship.

Compost in garden = nourished microbes = healthy soil = healthy plants = more nutritious vegetables

This is why composting is so fascinating to me, besides appealing to my practical nature.  Every week I watch pounds and pounds of food scraps from the dorm, the cafe, the school, and the food co-op kitchen being layered with leaves and cut grass from the lawns then being transformed into a rich food for microbes and worms.  In biodynamic agriculture, this process is aided by special preparations made from dandelions, chamomile, oak bark, nettles, yarrow, and valerian which are added to the compost piles in small amounts.  Combining this "kitchen" compost with compost made from horse manure and some sand to improve drainage yields the potting soil that is used in the greenhouse where the plants start their lives.   The kitchen compost will also be used to fortify the soil in the beds where those greenhouse plants will be transplanted when they are large enough to withstand the elements.  Later, the vegetables from those plants will be harvested and eaten by the interns and the customers in the cafe and the scraps will go to the compost piles and the cycle keeps going.  I love this closed loop!

October gave me additional opportunities to ponder closed loop systems with a workshop on permaculture and biodynamics.  Permaculture is a contraction of the words "permanent" and "agriculture".  It was coined by Bill Mollison, an Australian who developed this form of sustainable agricultural design, along with David Holmgren, in the 1970's.  Permaculture's guiding principles are based on ways of working with the natural world that indigenous peoples have practiced for thousands of years.  It challenges "scarcity thinking" by looking at the world through a lens of sustainable abundance, which translates to planting perennial vegetables instead of the typical annual varieties, creating edible forest gardens, building soil on barren land through composting, and developing closed loop systems for homesteads and larger scale land use with thoughtful landscaping practices.  Are you getting all this?  Click here for a clearer explanation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permaculture#Sustainable_designs

You can imagine that my mind was racing after this workshop.  Fortunately, 6 inches of snow arrived to clear my head later that afternoon.  This unseasonable weather allowed me to get out my cross-country skis ahead of schedule which I didn't mind one bit.  However, the 5-day power outage caused by the heavy, wet snow falling on the still leafy trees leading to branches falling onto the power lines was not quite as much fun as the skiing, especially when the hot water ran out in the dorm.  The candlelit evenings in the kitchens with my dormmates were rather nice though.  An unexpected bonus from the storm was learning how to use a chain saw.  Program Director Mac Mead took us through the inner workings of these intimidating machines before giving each intern some one-on-one time with the large oak branch that was blocking part of a driveway in the garden.  I'm not too keen on the vibration and the fumes from the saw, and OK, the possibility of cutting off a limb is a bit daunting, but I'm glad to have a basic working knowledge of the machine.

Also new on my growing list of skills, how to play a wizard with a long, fluffy beard, pointed hat, and oversized robe surrounded by smoking wood fires and torches while handling dry ice and standing in mud on a cold Halloween night.  This made my parading through the hot and humid streets of DC dressed as a bunch of grapes for the Pride parade seem like a relaxing walk in the park despite the fact that no one was trying to rip my costume off on Halloween.  I really need to get a job handing out fliers on a city street while dressed as a banana or a gorilla or something to get this penchant for costumes, which I'm certain is linked to my Hungarian heritage, out of my system.

BEE UPDATE- Several hundred pounds of sugar have been used to produce bee tea over the past several weeks.  The bees are lapping it up and turning it into honey to be stored for winter use, though not as quickly as expected.  Honey from one of the stronger hives was transferred to a weaker one to give it a boost.  Unused portions of the hives are being removed to reduce the risk of the bees freezing over the winter.  I received my 3rd sting of the season, a nice "kiss" on the cheek which has left my face looking a bit swollen and distorted.  Intern MaryAnn comforted me by noting all the money we're saving on Botox with these stings...

My roasted rutabaga dish is calling me, so I'll say so long for now.  Thanks for reading.