This Sustainable House

One of the major tasks on my plate at the moment is to clear a section of scrubby land for use as paddocks for cattle, and perhaps free-range chickens. When I say I need to clear the land, I’m not talking about wholesale tree removal, rather I’m looking at clearing the area of debris to allow the natural grasses to establish.

A decision that had to be made in this instance was to burn or not to burn….

Traditionally a farmer would get all this scrappy stuff together and set it on fire. This would turn most of the wood to gas (releasing it to the atmosphere) and the remaining ash would be scattered over the paddock area. Doing this has the advantage of dealing with this debris rapidly, leaving a nice clear paddock.

However I feel it has two important disadvantages, the carbon that has been locked up by the plants is lost to the atmosphere (rather than being broken down for inclusion in the soil) and this material offers some very useful ‘stuff’ to form a mulch layer.

So at TSH the majority of this debris has been put to use as a mulch in the tree corridors between the paddocks.

The video below explains the concepts involved, and provides a sneak peek into how these paddocks will be managed. Enjoy!

…but thankfully it didn’t the cow!

One of the things I love about having cows is their curious nature. Whenever you are doing anything around their enclsures it is almost guaranteed that they’ll be there trying to work out what you are upto. And no-one epitomised this more than little Fryderyk this morning.

The pictures below are of little Freddy after I gave his mother, Dalila, her bail feed. Each of my cows get a twice weekly bail feed in which I place a mineral supplement mix, some apple cider vinegar, and a few other bits and bobs. The mix is carried up in a large yellow bucket, and then feed out into a ‘tyre feeder’. Of course little Freddy couldn’t help but check out this strange yellow bucket…

He’s so cute!

Note: For more information on the bail feed my Dexters receive, head over to Stadnina Dexters.

Freddy: "Is he looking?"

Freddy: "I guess not... I'll just have a bit of a look."

Tree down over the driveway

Since moving to the ‘country’ I have heard the rural life described in many different ways… peaceful, relaxing, satisfying, etc. However no phrase or concept sums it up better for me than, “No rest for the wicked!”

As some of you may be aware, over the past couple of days Canberrra and surrounds have been innudated with a steady drizzling rain combined with high winds. In fact, wind speeds approaching 70km an hour have been recorded. However when you combine such high speed winds, and a sodden ground, you are bound to get trees coming down… and unfortunately that is exactly what has happend.

Overnight I have had 2 large trees and 1 large branch down in the surrounds of the house. One feel across the driveway, not causing any damage, but the other tree ‘collected’ the shed. Fortunately it didn’t do any significant damage to the structure. Read the rest of this entry »

Recently I have been reading a number of books around transgenic foods (also known as genetically modified foods), and the dangers/benefits they produce. Whilst this topic is highly decisive, it did highlight for me another area of concern… the twindling number of species grown in our agricultural systems.

For example, over the 20th century, the US Department of Agriculture’s seed storage bank reduced the varieties of fruits and vegetables held. For example 544 varieties of cabbage became just 28; 287 varieties of carrot was reduced to 21; and most staggeringly of all, 2,683 varieties of pear was reduced to approx 300.

Of course the practical upshot of these losses is the fact that the majority of our food crops, both in agriculture & the home garden, are genetically narrow.

What is the risk of sameness??

Read the rest of this entry »

One of my favourite plants to grow is the good ‘ol humble spud. I think it is because the potato is such a staple of our western culture, much like bread or wheat. I often feel a similar ‘satisfaction’ when baking bread or making yoghurt.

So today I planted my potatoes, utilising Peter Cundall’s ‘Potatoes under Straw” method.

The basis of the method is to lay some newspaper/cardboard down over the ground, place the seed potatoes on the newspaper, and then cover with a thick layer of straw. As the potatoes grow through the straw, you keep applying more staw leaving approx 30cm, or 12 inches, of the plant exposed. The potatoes grow in the straw producing a terrific crop. The key to this method is keeping the light off the potatoes so that they don’t go green. NEVER eat green potatoes.

You can see the method on YouTube here.

Into the beds today went approximately 70 tubers, which should produce 5-600 tubers at the end of the season, more than enough for a good part of the year to come. Varieties planted included Desiree, King Edward, Pink-eye, Dutch Cream and Cranberry Red.

I’ll post some updates as they grow and, of course, when I harvest!

Potatoes Under Straw (~9m2)

In ‘You Can Farm’ Joel Salatin debunks the urban, or would it be rural, legend that there is no money to be made farming. That is is a dead-end job.

In order to support this, he outlines the principles and philosophies that he feels are integral to making a living on a farm, and should be considered by any aspiring farmer. He discusses the principal mistakes that new farmers make, as well as possible solutions to those mistakes.

All of this is done in a distinctly ‘no-nonsense’ style indicating that the author is most definitely a farmer, not just talking about farming. That’s not to say that what he says is simple, but rather he is ridiculously direct in his statements. Clearly cutting to the chase rather than prevaricating around the bushes.

The concept that struck me most audibly was the need for the new farmer to develop a clear purpose and value proposition for the farm. Of course this isn’t anything new, successful business has been doing this for quite a while, but in Joel’s experience (and mine if I am honest) it isn’t be widely practiced in agriculture. How then do we know if we are successful if we have had no plan against which to measure success?

I have to admit that this book was something of a wake up call for me as I had, along the way, lost something of the vision I had for TSH. Actually, I’d say that this vision hasn’t so much been lost as evolved into something else which I haven’t yet been able to pin down. As a result, I have often felt as though I have been immersed in ‘creative inertia’… lots of activity but no actual achievement.

Of course this is about to change as I re-work the original goals for TSH into a form that more closely matches the current focus. This should give me a better overall vision, and assist me to build TSH into all it can be.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone considering a farming life, or those who are there but don’t know quite where they are going. I am sure that with Joel’s hard-hitting advice you will be able to stimulate a few thoughts encouraging you to build your own vision of a glorious future in farming.

Last night nature did it’s best to remind me just how incredible it is… a calf was born.

Fryderyk was born a little after 9.30pm on the 23rd August to Dalila (Dam) and Eminance T Baxter (Sire). Baxter is a bull owned by Eminance Dexter’s, and Dalila was ‘covered’ prior to joining me at TSH. Little Freddy, he is still in ‘short trousers’, is a beautiful black calf who seems to be quite happy to be out and about, exploring a new world.

In fact, he might be a little too adventurous, managing to squeeze out of the original paddock in the dead of the night leaving a very frantic Mum behind. I was awoken, about 12.30ish, to a bellowing that could only foretell doom. When I arrived at the paddock Dalila was beside herself, and there was no sign of Freddy at all. I later found him in another paddock quite scared and confused. As a result he spent the evening inside where I could keep an eye on him.

However this morning I lined a paddock with some 40mm chicken wire, about 100m worth, and popped both Fryderyk and Dalila in there. When I left for work Fryderyk was ‘dead to the world’ after filling his belly with milk, and Dalila was contentedly chewing the cud.

I think he’ll be a fantastic addition to the household.

Fryderyk - at approx 2 weeks old.