Homesteading Disasters: The Skunk Menace

October 12, 2012

...holes, overturned seedlings and scattered seeds. And each year I swear off vegetable gardening entirely. Actual photo of absent-minded conquistadors. So what’s the science behind this? Why do skunks dig? Skunks dig for doubloons dropped by absent-minded conquistadors many generations ago here in California. Our gardens in Los Angeles are thick in doubloons. In fact, if it weren’t for my metal detector I’d never be able to pay our inflated mortgage...

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Polyculture

Mr. Homegrown

December 7, 2006

Permaculture

14 Comments

...an the tidy rows of carrots and cabbages one sees … well, one does not see vegetable gardens anywhere if one lives in LA. One remembers them from illustrations in Peter Rabbit. Okay, you want specifics? Here is an example of a professional polyculture bed out of Gaia’s Garden, one which creates salads, cabbages, and beans. It is written for people who live places with cold winters (as are most gardening books, alas). So Angelinos wanting to follow...

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Plant Vegetables!

Mr. Homegrown

March 16, 2020

Gardening, Vegetable Gardening

16 Comments

...alk back on one of my worst blog posts, “Homesteading Heresy: On Giving Up Vegetable Gardening,” in which I announced that I was no longer planting vegetables. While we have plenty of avocados and eggs it would be nice to have some greens other than volunteer nasturtium and nettles. I had two seasons of failed vegetable gardening but that should have prompted a redoubled effort rather than the defeatism that I offered. I’ve taken the step of delet...

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Digital Farming- What’s The Deal?

Homegrown Neighbor

October 31, 2009

Gardening, Thoughtstylings, Vegetable Gardening

29 Comments

...ngs can get pretty busy. We can become so preoccupied with work, chickens, vegetable gardening, cooking, cleaning, blogging duties and email that we can miss some of the things going on in the world. I do like to occasionally check in with the world at large by reading the newspaper. I just read an article that I have to comment on. A recent New York Times article titled, ‘To Harvest Squash, Click Here,‘ introduced me to the world on online farmin...

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What’s Your Everyday Carry?

Mr. Homegrown

May 9, 2017

Preparedness

11 Comments

One of the more fetishistic subcultures in the urban homesteading activity playpen is an obsession with “everyday carry,” abbreviated by hip insiders as “EDC.” EDCers peacock their carefully curated sets of survival tools in photos called “pocket dumps.” The internet’s Mecca of pocket dumps is everydaycarry.com. On that site you’ll see color and texture coordinated EDCs reminiscent of the leather and wood appointments of the luxury yachts of Russ...

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