down to earth

After much thought and help from family and my friends here, I proudly announce the names of our new chooks. We have golden Campine - Beatrice - above, and Faverolles - Heather - below. Look at her blue eyes, she is so pretty.

The other two babies are buff Orpington - Martha - and golden Hamburg - Jewels (yes, for our friend). The older girls are Australorps - Mary and Kylie, buff Sussex - Margaret (Olley), New Hampshire - Anne Shirley, and silver Hamburgs - Lotte and Stella Gladys, my grandma's name.

The littlest chicks were put into a safe area in the vegetable garden yesterday and scratched for the first time. They also jumped onto the top of their box, stood in their water dish and ate - boy can those girls eat!

The older girls are fenced off from the three large chooks but kept flying out of their secure area. Cocobelle, our last remaining black chook, ran off into the jungle down by the creek and sulked all day. The two Rhode Island Reds - May and Nell - are unconcerned by the new arrivals except if there is grain thrown for scratching, then they peck any little chook who comes near. Late yesterday afternoon I found a bush turkey sitting, watching, in the grass and later it came into the chook pen. There are many wild bush turkeys around here so I had Alice gently chase it off as they can devastate a garden (by scratching) in a very short time.

Overall, the new chicks have settled in well and have been accepted by the older ladies. Thanks to everyone who submitted names for my list. I have several Wyandotte bantam chicks coming soon, they are currently under Margaret's broody, and I'll choose more names from the list when they arrive. What a colourful and varied clutch of chooks we'll have in a few months when they've all developed their distinctive plumage and features. They'll be wonderful backyard entertainment.

It seems to me that chickens are in their rightful place in a backyard. They provide eggs and manure and will clean the bugs right out of a vegetable garden better than any human worker. Today I'm going to suggest we make a new garden bed just for chicken food so we always have enough greens for our feathered friends. Feeding spinach, Chinese cabbage and silverbeet to chooks guarantees deep golden yolks and the tastiest of eggs. I also have some open pollinated oats, barley and rye seeds here, so I might try those as well. I would like to supply as much of their food as I can. Not only would that cut our costs but it would also help us close that chicken feeding system, where we would supply everything they needed from our own land and not have to rely on bringing in food from outside. We aim at closing a lot of our systems to become as self sufficient as possible but we often have gaps. Maybe, with these chooks, we'll be able to do it.

Thank you all for your care and concern after my post yesterday. The nurturing power of family and friends really helped me get over the previous day and after an outing with Hanno yesterday, I feel on top of it all again. It's the little things that make the greatest difference. Hanno giving me a little kiss and saying: 'I'm glad you're here.', my sister Trisha gently reminding me of our mother when she wrote in an email yesterday (after reading the blog) to 'take care of yourself', my other sister Kathleen telling me 'I feel like I haven’t seen you for years.' Then all your kind comments and emails expressing concern and love. I am a lucky woman.

And I'm feeling fine this morning.

After writing in my previous post that I would be shutting the gates and cocooning myself inside, this sentence in the same post might give you a hint about what Hanno and I actually did yesterday. 'I might also look around for some pullets or young hens - we are down to three chooks and need more to supply our eggs.'

Yes, we have more chooks!!!

I looked on the poultry breeders' site, found a breeder about 90 minutes away and after talking with her, Hanno suggested we have a day out. I packed a lunch of pumpernickel and Camembert sandwiches, two pears, water and black tea and 30 minutes later we were on the road.

We stopped on the side of the road, at a small picnic spot, for lunch. The photo above is looking out over the plains of the Brisbane Valley, just north of the little town of Esk. We shared our sandwiches there with a family of Magpies - mum, dad and baby. (Clicking on the photos will enlarge them.)

Then it was onwards to our destination - a lovely little property set up as a Landcare refuge for wildlife. The lady there - also a Rhonda - was looking after her baby grandson who came with us in his stroller while we looked first at the older girls, then into the hatchery where we saw younger chooks. We chose 10! Two black Australorps, one buff Sussex, one New Hampshire, two silver Hamburgs, one golden Hamburg, one buff Orpington, one golden Campine and one Faverolles. I can't believe our luck to find all these different pure breeds in one place.

On the way home, we stopped at the Wivenhoe Dam. This is the dam that supplies most of the water for the city of Brisbane. We had a cup of tea here, and had another visit with a mother and baby Magpie.

Driving back into Esk, we stopped here to buy some chick starter and grain.

This is the view from the farm supply store door - out to the ranges and the Esk Post Office.

Then we whisked past pretty little cottages that have been turned into restaurants, on to a farm where we picked up a bale of hay for $2, and made the promise to come back soon for more. Our straw, hay and sugar cane mulch prices here have been sky high because of the drought and we haven't been able to buy our usual 10 bales for the year. When we got home, we made arrangements with my step-son, Jens, to drive out in his tray-back soon to collect as much as we can fit in - both for us and him.

But here they are. Drum roll please!

These are the six larger girls. The two black Australorps and the buff Sussex (centre with black necklace) are the oldest, then the New Hampshire (red girl on the right); the two little silver Hamburgs are the youngest of the older girls.

The Australorps - these are an Australian breed of chicken.

My favourite so far - the buff Sussex.

Two of the four babies - at front is the buff Orphington with the little peach Faverolles. Behind them, in the shadows of evening are the golden Campine and the golden Hamburg.

And one last photo. I had to include this because it shows the true nature of the New Hampshire - the red girl on the left. Since we put her onto the ground that freshly mown grass had been added to, she's been busily looking for worms, eating little blades of grass and scratching around like she's been doing it for years. It's an amazing testament to the instinct of chooks to scratch and look for bugs - they know how to do these things that are good for them and keep them alive, they don't have to be shown it. So here she is, a chook on a mission, walking with purpose and determination wanting to get off that concrete and back to real earth.

Everyone is awake now, we've taken the dogs outside and checked on the new flock. They're all fine and happily eating the first of many breakfasts they'll have here at their new home. It feels good, and right, to have a good sized flock again. When we get the little chicks from Margaret we have around 20 chooks - enough for our needs and for eggs to sell.

Hanno will have a busy day or two extending the chook coop to accommodate the larger flock. I will be researching the food needs of the smaller chicks and making sure the babies are put into the sun today and onto the ground where they will scratch for the first time. These are the kind of chores that make living this life such a pleasure. We want to make sure our new girls live good lives and that they produce healthy eggs. If I were a 'real' poultry farmer, I might not worry too much beyond the care and health of my poultry but I want our chooks to enjoy their lives with us, I want to share the abundance our land can provide and I want to be mindful each day of the joy I will find in doing that.

This is the beginning of another chapter in our simple book. Today will be a good day.

So now I want your help naming our little ladies. There will be a Martha and Nora, and Kathleen wants to name two, so I've given her the golden Campine and Faverolles to name. I'm going to name the two Australorps after our two Australian princesses - Kylie and Mary. That leaves four other names. What will they be? You tell me. : - )

For all those ladies who asked about the tote bag swap deadline: The deadline for posting your shopping tote is Wednesday, April 2, 2008. Less than two weeks. Happy sewing, ladies.

I have a mad secret - I like folding and sorting. Of all the crazy things to develop a liking for!

I'm always looking for low tech ways to do my house work and folding clothes and household linens is just about the lowest of low tech. It's just me and the item - no irons, no machines of any kind, all I need is a firm and steady surface. I came to this fork in the road when I realised how much I disliked ironing. Folding seemed to be my best option. Folding gave me close to wrinkle-free clothes without the involvement of an appliance.

There are tricks to effective folding and it starts with the way you hang wet clothes on the line. The clothes must be hung out well, after being shaken to have creases and folds removed. Then they need to be pegged securely in areas that are not noticed - so for skirts and jeans, this is on the waistband, for dresses, jumpers and T shirts I peg under the sleeve. Sometimes I hang shirts and dresses on clothes hangers. When the item is hanging, I smooth it out and make sure there are no areas that have been caught up or tucked in. I want everything to dry without too many creases and hanging in the same way they'll be used when dry.

I need to fold as soon as I take the clothes from the line - leaving them in a basket for a few hours (or days) is not an option. When I leave them, they need ironing. My routine now is to take the clothes, towels, pillow slips, dishcloths, sheets etc from the line and put them into the basket which is taken inside to the kitchen table. Piece by piece I place an item on the table, lay it flat, spread it out with my hands and make sure there are no folds, smoothing out creases. Then they are folded as well as I can manage, with each fold in the process being smoothed out with my flat hands, so if there are four folds in one item, it has been smoothed out four times. I try to fold edge to edge, corner to corner. If your corners are out, the clothes won't hang well.

The only things I'm ironing now are Hanno's cotton shirts, some trousers, some of my linen tops and skirts and some pillowslips (because I like them ironed). If I hang and fold well, I don't have to iron jeans. I take each piece as it comes, if it looks creased because I haven't shaken it before hanging on the line or I've missed a sleeve twist, I iron it. It's not rocket science - it's judgement by eye.

This has been an easy way to simplify my laundry routines. I've given up the need to have perfectly pressed clothes and am happy with the result I get with this method. It's much easier and less time consuming than ironing everything, no matter what. Best of all though it's a gentle and simple routine that is quite enjoyable.

I've been spending a lot of time in my community lately, and therefore spending a lot of time thinking about my place within it. I used to believe that I was an island and the life that Hanno and I made for ourselves was apart from everything else. Now I know that's a naive view and that what we do affects our community and what happens around us affects us.

I believe strongly in my own individual responsibility. This is paramount to me. I am responsible for my life, I make deliberate decisions to ensure I live the way I want to live and I don't leave much to chance. I know that if I want to eat fresh backyard vegetables and eggs, Hanno or I must make a plan, save seeds or have the money to buy them, do a lot of hard physical work, tend plants, water, fertilise and watch. It's pretty much the same with the eggs, although having responsibility for living creatures adds another dimension of stewardship that I take very seriously.

Having spent so much time working in my community and seeing its strengths and weakness, I now know that I have a responsibility to do what I can to work towards making our region a healthy, safe and caring place that nurtures its people and its natural environment. It sounds like a big task, and maybe it is but I will work on my small part of it so I can add what I believe is valuable, essential and appropriate. I know my ideas for the community are different to what is there now - I want to teach life skills, because I know they're in short supply, I want to show that it's possible to live well without buying convenience and fashion, I want to show that downsizing, decluttering and destressing is not only possible, it's life changing. Others will work on different projects they think are needed, we will all add our own piece to the puzzle. Each generation that lives in my community shapes it and adds to its history.

No one can be an island unto themselves. Living in a community will mean that you use the roads, shops, the library, medical facilities, schools, parks and whatever else there is. All those facilities are there because some one, or a group of people, made a past commitment to your community. I know that unless I make my own contribution, I will be poorer for it. I want to be a part of the process that makes my community sustainable - and I mean that in every sense of the word. If we turn our backs on our community we are letting others - like politicians, bureaucrats, town planners and local councils - make all the decisions about how our communities are shaped, and what is important to us.

I don't believe they will make the decisions that will help our region thrive. Oh sure, they'll put in the roads, dams and schools, but they won't add a soul to our community. That, my friends, is our responsibility.

A new season of growing has begun. We're late with it, all the beds are not ready, but there are plants in the ground. This has been transformed ...

into this ....

Hanno puts a lot of thought into enriching the soil before planting. The dry, summer-depleted garden beds need help if they were to produce consistent high quality crops for us over the coming nine months. The beds have a healthy blend of composted cow manure, old chook poo, lots of compost, worm castings, blood and bone and sulphate of potash (all organic additives). After the first of the greens were planted - sugarloaf cabbage and kale - they were watered in with seaweed and comfrey tea, the tomatoes, cucumbers and squash were watered in with plain seaweed tea.

It's wise to give your plants some help just after planting out. Seaweed tea helps the little seedlings recover from transplant shock and gets them on the road to healthy growth. We give all our seedlings seaweed tea after planting out. Then we divide seedlings into two separate groups - greens and fruiting plants. Greens are obviously plants with lots of green leaves and no fruit - lettuce, cabbage, kale, spinach etc. Fruiting plants are tomatoes, capsicums (peppers), cucumbers, cauliflower, eggplant, squash, pumpkins etc. I put root vegetables under fruiting plants too, because although they don't produce an edible "fruit" they are grown to eat the root, not the leaves. (Although usually you can eat both.) Root vegies are potatoes, carrots, radishes, turnips, parsnips etc.

We divide these vegetables into two groups because they require different fertiliser. They all need to be planted into well draining soil that's been enriched with manures and organic matter - although with the root vegies, you must be sure the manures are old and well broken down or they will make the roots fork out. Then we give the greens frequent weak feeds of comfrey tea or some other organic nitrogen rich fertiliser; the fruiting plants don't get nitrogen fertiliser as this would encourage the growth of green leaves at the expense of the fruit. Feeding a tomatoes plant (or any fruiting plant) with lots of nitrogen fertiliser will give you a large, lush, green tomato bush with very few tomatoes. The fruiting plants will get enough nitrogen from the manures and organic matter already added to the soil. The additive they need is sulphate of potash. This is an organic compound that will help build up the cell walls in your plants, will encourage flowering and improve the taste.

The photo above is the result of a big pile of wet grass clippings that have decomposed for a year, along with occasional waterings with comfrey tea - to speed up decomposition. Half of this was added to the garden beds after being crumbled up and added to worm castings, the other half was dissolved in water for a few days then poured onto the gardens.

Enriching the soil is the most important thing you can do to give your plants the best chance of producing abundant crops. If you plant your seeds and seedlings into good organic soil, you'll be rewarded for the extra work you do. There is nothing more important you can do than enrich the soil before planting.

We always dig our beds because we get better results when we turn over the soil. It improves soil aeration and allows us to mix in the additives well. Some gardeners develop no dig gardens. If you're new to gardening, you should test both methods to see what works best for you.

The capsicum (pepper) above is one of three we planted last spring. All three are still producing well and all three will probably last another two seasons. They have been given our potash treatment and are planted ingood organically enriched soil.

There are still a couple of garden beds that need weeding and digging over, and that will be done today and tomorrow. Then we'll put up some trellises and climbing frames and plant beans and peas. We're also waiting on seeds planted in the bush house to mature enough for planting out. There are lettuces, coloured silverbeet, parsley, bok choi and more tomatoes - Moneymaker. We still need to buy seed potatoes that I'll pick up from Green Harvest tomorrow.

Slowly but surely the vegetable garden comes together for another season. Growing vegetables is never a fast process - this is slow food in every way; slow, organic and local. There are many benefits in growing your own food, it's not just the final product that is the prize. You will enrich your life by connecting with nature and getting your hands in soil, you'll be healthier for it because you'll get some exercise in the open air, you'll built your independence because you'll be able to feed yourself without going to the shops and you'll develop your life skills - skills that can be shared and passed on to your children. There is nothing better than the taste of your own backyard produce and when you finally get it on your plate, I bet you can't eat it without smiling like a Cheshire cat.