Tips for “no-work” garden
Greg Seaman of Eartheasy.com writes that he and his wife experimented with several techniques to make working in their garden easier. For example, his family uses the no-till method of gardening, spreads mulch liberally, plants cover crops in between seasons, plants only in raised beds, and uses an irrigation system for watering. “It took over 20 years of gardening to realize that I didn’t have to work so hard to achieve a fruitful harvest. As the limitless energy of my youth gradually gave way to the physical realities of mid-life, the slow accretion of experience eventually led to an awareness that less work can result in greater crop yields,” Seaman writes.
Garden photo of the day
Aaron & I are swimming in tomatoes right now from our backyard vegetable garden.
Aaron & I enjoy walking around on evenings after work, checking on new developments in our backyard vegetable garden. In the background of the photo, you see the chicken coop Aaron made from recycled materials.
Homemade bacon dog treats
The treats bake 40 min.; re-glaze halfway through bake time
I made a huge batch of homemade bacon-flavored dog treats recently for my three pups, Binx, Zoe and Lily. They love them, and I can rest easy because I know exactly what went into their treats. These cracker-like dog cookies are fun to make and they stay good for as long as it takes for my dogs to eat them up. Not to mention: they’re so much cheaper than buying pre-made treats from the store! I adapted my dog treats from this Allrecipes.com Bacon-flavored dog biscuits recipe.
Ingredients
- 2 eggs
- 1 c. milk
- 1/2 c. water
- 1 tsp. salt
- 10 tbsp. bacon fat
- 5 c. wheat flour
- 1 egg (for glaze)
- 1 tsp. sugar (for glaze)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees; grease a cookie sheet
- Beat the eggs & mix in the wet ingredients
- Add the salt and stir in the flour 1 c. at a time
- Pour the stiff dough onto a floured surface and knead for one minute
- Roll the dough with a rolling pin to 1/4 inch thickness
- Cut the dough into 1×1 inch squares
- Gently lift the squares and arrange them on the cookie sheet
- Beat the last egg and mix in the sugar
- Brush the glaze on the tops of the dog treats
- Bake the dog treats for 20 min.
- Remove the treats from the oven and coat the tops with glaze again
- Bake another 20 min.
- Cool the treats on a newspaper-covered countertop
Photos
Glazing dog treats
Glazing the dog treats makes them shiny and golden brown
Our chicks are growing fast
Aaron and I bought nine baby chickens a couple of weeks ago, and two turkey chicks. Our six adult chickens in February 2012 will reach their one-year anniversaries of laying eggs, which means their egg production could begin to decline. We bought the chicks now to begin growing them so they will be ready to lay by the time our adult chickens are decreasing their production. We bought the turkeys to eat at Thanksgiving and Christmas. Because it’s so hot in Texas in the summertime, it’s a good time to raise chicks. Otherwise you must keep them under a heat lamp so they don’t get too cold. The chicks are growing so quickly! Here are some delightful photos.
Curious turkey and chicks
Americana chick
Americana chick
Hawk, our adult Americana chicken
Barred Rock chick
Booker, our adult Barred Rock chicken
Sleeping chicks
Rhode Island Red (left)
Cuckoo Maran chicks
Turkey chick
Turkey chicks
Another homemade mosquito remedy
Photo credit: http://morguefile.com/creative/mrooczek262
Since it’s the middle of the summer in Austin, every time I go outside I immediately get 2-3 mosquito bites. And because of drought, it’s not even a bad mosquito season here! These little buggers are on my mind right now. So it’s not surprising that I’m tuned in to noticing articles about how to kill the pests. A couple of weeks ago I wrote about how you can plant mosquito-repelling plants in your outdoor areas. Yesterday I read an article in BackHome magazine with a recipe to make a homemade mosquito spray. It uses natural essential oils mixed with rubbing alcohol. I’m going to try this recipe ASAP!
Homemade mosquito spray recipe:
- 1/2 oz. citronella oil
- 1/4 oz. lavender oil
- 1/8 oz. pennyroyal oil
- 1/8 oz. tea tree oil
- 1/8 oz. jojoba oil
- 18 oz. rubbing alcohol
Instructions: Mix all the essential oils together. Do not use undiluted on your skin! Put 18 oz. of rubbing alcohol in a spray bottle and mix in the essential oils. Spray on your skin before you go outside to repel mosquitoes. You may have to apply the mixture more frequently than store-bought, chemical mosquito repellants.
Warning: “Just because a product is natural does not mean it is completely safe. For example, pennyroyal is toxic when ingested and shouldn’t be used by pregnant women. Also, some people may be allergic to the various active ingredients,” the BackHome article says.
I’ll update with another post after I’ve tried the recipe.
Dole agrees to settle with workers made sterile by pesticide
This is one of the reasons Aaron & I have an organic garden. Pesticides are nasty business.
Dole Food Co. Inc. has agreed to settle with workers who claim in a lawsuit the company’s “use of a pesticide called dibromochloropropane, or DBCP, on banana plantations during the 1970s and ’80s caused the workers to become sterile,” reports The National Law Journal. The people worked for Dole in Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Honduras. The law firm working on behalf of the injured farmworkers “still has pending DBCP cases against Dow Chemical Co. and other defendants on behalf of banana workers in Guatemala and Panama,” according to the article.