Recent Diaries  |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Recent Comments |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mon Aug 04, 2008 at 19:23:19 PM MDT
|
The July honey bonanza was the first of a couple of sweet golden-themed surprises so far this summer. We stumbled upon another the other day. Apricots.
15 pounds of apricots! |
Now, I love fruit of all kinds, and getting a pile of free fruit for making jam or sauce is a bit like finding the gold at the end of the rainbow, in my book. But apricots? Let's just say that "obsession" is not too strong a word. I know the locations of a couple of dozen trees by memory, and most years I hang plastic bottles of flowering branches in various trees around town, in hopes of pollination. It's usually no use, as we are subject to a lot of late frosts that destroy the crop.
This year, I didn't hang any flowering branches.
It mattered not a bit.
|
| There's More...
:: (1
Comments, 407 words in story)
|
|
Fri Jul 18, 2008 at 22:53:50 PM MDT
|
I'm certainly not what you'd call an experienced beekeeper -- although I'd been around them a bit 20 years ago, we just acquired our first hive this Spring. I'd been looking forward to it for months.
After separating the honey from the big chunks of wax with a collander, we ran the honey through a screen sieve before decanting to jars.
Linden honey is considered to be a very fine type of honey. It's light in color, and has a wonderful, almost minty flavor that I'd never tasted before. |
Penny gave me a top bar hive last Christmas, and through the same local beekeeper who sold her the hive, boxed up a swarm of bees in May. The beekeeper had been contacted by another beekeeper in nearby Arvada, who had a vigorous hive that had swarmed, resulting in a big ball of bees on a nearby shrub.
|
| There's More...
:: (0
Comments, 759 words in story)
|
|
Wed Jun 25, 2008 at 23:49:44 PM MDT
|
| I saw this go past on the Denver Post web site the other day. Never got around to bringing it up until now, but it's well worth our attention.
Xcel has filed for a 38% increase in what we pay for electricity.
That's about proportional to the recent increases in gasoline prices.
What's worse is that Xcel says the increase is necessary due to the increase in the cost of natural gas. Hmmm ... what other essential uses are there for natural gas?
Ready to pay a whole lot more for heat next winter, too? How about hot showers?
Insulate, weatherize, change incandescent lights to compact fluorescents, etc. If you need ideas about how to get started, try here, here (pdf) or here (pdf).
We cut our energy bill 25% by doing several things: replacing all the old bulbs with CFLs, turning off lights if we aren't actually using them, putting our ghost loads (e.g. the DSL router) on switch-offable power strips, and adding a fiberglass blanket around the water heater. Next step is using the clothes dryer less by hanging our wash up to dry.
Then solar hot water, then photovoltaics ... |
| Discuss
:: (1
Comments)
|
|
Mon Jun 02, 2008 at 11:30:52 AM MDT
|
| It's been a few really busy weeks since last we posted. Lots going on. The garden is absolutely bursting now that the soil's warming up and days are so long. The bed of roots and greens we started in April is providing more kale, chard, and arugula than we can eat -- so we've already given surplus to about 10 people/families. The beets are just about to the point where they can be thinned for baby beets. Carrots are still a few weeks off. Quinoa is really taking off now, and I can see the tiny flower heads developing at the top of the foot-high plants. The shallots have long since tried to bloom. We picked off the buds to help them produce better bulbs. Onions are moving right along, and I expect good results this year, barring hail. The garlic is huge, though maybe not quite as good as last year (I haven't fish-emulsioned it as frequently as last year) ... it'll be time to dig it up in another 4-6 weeks. Potatoes look good so far, too. Reds, russets, and fingerlings. I don't remember the specific varieties, but I do know I'm going to like all of them with rosemary & butter!
News about our new bees on the other side ...
Our thanks to Karen from BackyardHive.com for help capturing our swarm of bees, and Arvada beekeeper Bob Stone for the swarm itself. Bob has been keeping bees for many years, and said this swarm was from the best hive he'd had. They're a busy, vigorous swarm, but also quite gentle, so we feel very lucky!
|
|
| There's More...
:: (0
Comments, 542 words in story)
|
|
Sun May 04, 2008 at 07:59:10 AM MDT
|
| I've heard all these facts about food sustainability such as: most of the food on our plates has traveled 1500 miles; the average age of farmers is 55; we use 17% of our petroleum to transport food. But I don't have ready references. These people do -- read their blog entry "Welcome to Colorado Local Sustainability" at http://www.localsustainability... |
| Discuss
:: (0
Comments)
|
|
Thu May 01, 2008 at 22:44:27 PM MDT
|
| Yesterday's NYT front pages an issue that's bound to come up more and more, in parallel with climbing energy prices: high fertilizer prices.
Sure, food's more expensive, and that's an inconvenience for a lot of us. But for the poor, particularly in developing countries, it's a matter of life and death. Perhaps you've read about food riots overseas, or the fact that Brazil has suspended rice exports to make sure it's got enough food at home.
Toss onto all that the fact that most of our nitrogen fertilizer both takes a huge amount of energy to produce and uses vast quantities of natural gas as a feedstock. It's bad enough if you don't have the money to buy the additional food your family needs. It's even worse if you live in a country where few have the resources to buy the fertilizer needed to grow that food.
Bottom line is that energy is getting more expensive because demand is growing while supply is not. While we figure out how to deal with the sunset of the fossil fuel era, we can do our neighbors in other countries a huge favor by getting much more efficient here at home. It even saves us money. Win-win. |
| Discuss
:: (1
Comments)
|
|
Tue Apr 29, 2008 at 19:19:16 PM MDT
|
| More about electric cars -- there have been half a dozen or so successful American cars, mostly as a result of CA legislation: the Chevy S-10 EV, the Ford Ranger EV, the GM EV1, the Toyota RAV4 (well, it might have been made here). They look great and their owners (or 'leasers' because the automakers would seldom allow their sale) loved them. Why we can't buy them now is a mystery to me. And possibly a moral crime ... Here is a great site with a great rolling photo marque of all these neat cars: http://www.pluginamerica.com/ |
| Discuss
:: (0
Comments)
|
|
Mon Apr 14, 2008 at 00:00:00 AM MDT
|
| Friends in Kansas think we're being pansy environmentalist by living in Boulder - how hard is that? To really live the life one believes in, when there is hardly any infrastructure to support it, now that takes a real environmentalist :).
I think though that the Kansans are distracted by the Christian fundamentalists. I know one Kansan blog in which this challenge is a main theme - http://realkansas.blogspot.com/ |
| Discuss
:: (0
Comments)
|
|
|
|
Sun Oct 21, 2007 at 08:45:38 AM MDT
|
(Now's the time of the year to join a CSA - many are filling. Red Wagon, Abbondanza, Cure, Father Earth Organic Farm, Jay Hill Road, Windsor Dairy Farm (just dairy) are some of the places to try. - promoted by Penelope)
There is something really exciting happening in the local food scene in Boulder, CO:
You've heard of Community Supported Agriculture ... well, recently I met a grower who's taken it a step further.
| Local production, sometimes meaning the next yard over
Knowing the farmer, who is a neighbor you see and greet from the sidewalk
A variety of fresh vegetables each week of the growing season, and you get to see them growing every day
Opportunities to volunteer on a farm by walking a few steps out the door with your cup of morning coffee in hand |
Make the leap for more photos and details! |
| There's More...
:: (5
Comments, 761 words in story)
|
|
Sat Apr 12, 2008 at 17:00:00 PM MDT
|
This is why I'd rather shop at a local farmers market than at Industrio-Synthofoods, Inc.*:
Gum Technology is introducing a new line of hydrocolloid and stabilizer blends to replace eggs in custards, doughs and baked goods, in an effort to help manufacturers reduce the impact of high egg prices.
(emphasis mine ... hat tip to Mark Menagh at Boulder County Farmers Markets for a note on this in the weekly email)
*Notice to legal department: That's satire. I'm well aware that not everything sold in a modern major-chain corporate grocery store is synthesized. |
| Discuss
:: (0
Comments)
|
|
Sat Apr 12, 2008 at 09:18:16 AM MDT
|
| I've heard that the 2 best things a individual can do for the environment is to replace their gas car with an electric car and plant trees. I'm not so sure about putting trees in the prairie but the ZAP and Zenn electric cars are available.
Zap electric cars are sold in the states by at least one dealer in Davis, CA and are made in China. They can reach 40 mph, and they cost about $12,000 : http://www.investorideas.com/F... Take a look at Zap's current sedan and the solar-powered(!) version of their truck:
 
Zap is bringing a ZAP-X, 4 seater that can reach highway speeds in, they predict, 2011, for a lot more money. Seems like it was just 2005 yesterday, so in my mind, this car will be out next weekend :).
You can buy 4-wheel, ZENN electric car for about the same price as a 3-wheel ZAP but its top speed is about 25 mph. There's a dealer in Denver: http://www.mysmartwheels.com/
Will it be hard to get a license plate for the car if it can't go highway speeds?
I'm so proud and amazed by American engineering and manufacturing capability and American willingness to accept change. And we're such a giving people. I know with the right leadership all of these positive qualities would be supported and we'd be seen in this light. There was a Detroit Electric Car in 1915 that could go over 200 miles on a charge with a max speed of 20 mph. So why isn't American building and exporting an American-made electric car???? A documentary asks that question http://www.whokilledtheelectri... and GM has a retort
http://www.chevrolet.com/elect... |
| Discuss
:: (2
Comments)
|
|
Fri Apr 11, 2008 at 21:01:18 PM MDT
|
| Very cool economic phenomenon - the new org Kiva is facilitating microlending from average Joe's like you and me, from all over the world, to people in need, from all over the world. I helped fund this woman, who's loan is still in the fundraising stage:
http://www.kiva.org/app.php?pa...
Kiva has about ~300 loans in the fundraising stage daily and the site says that it only takes 20.1 hrs on average to fund them. Awesome. More than 300 small businesses assisted per day. Wow. And it's a loan, not a give-away, so when one loan is repaid, it can be loaned to another person. Totally cool -- recyclable, micro-foreign policy. |
| Discuss
:: (0
Comments)
|
|
Wed Apr 02, 2008 at 22:13:17 PM MDT
|
(... - promoted by Penelope)
Our Lafayette house is built by McStain was built with energy efficiency in mind. Still, we had an energy audit ($150 to CRC http://www.conservationcenter.... , subsidized in many towns in Boulder County) to solve the mystery of an eternally cold front bedroom.
We had a great auditor, Charlie Richardson, who brought his FLIR SYSTEMS infrared camera. He captured ir pictures of our doors/vents/ducts/ceilings/walls. Here's one of the ceiling of the cold bedroom (left image):
 
When we investigated in the attic we found that McStain had missed blowing insulation into the entire 40' x 2' x 2' cavity above the blue part of the ceiling in the picture. Wow, what a huge area that allows our heat to escape right up into the heavens! It's not as if you can see the missing insulation in this area when you are just standing under the roof. This area is accessed through a 2' x 2' entry, like a cave. However, McStain has built hundreds of houses just like this one in this suburb and others. You'd think they know to check in there! Man, I'd hate to see what a company builds if they don't even tout green building!
And McStain also sent the heat duct for this room up an exterior wall between a bay window and the front door (right image).
It's not as if this will be easy to fix either. We'll have to get someone with an insulation blower hose to come by this summer. And what to do about that duct?
I wonder how many other McStain houses have the same problem? And what about houses that are worse? What a pity -- we've been burning all that natural gas just to warm up the Lafayette sky.
If you are looking at the new Indian Peaks South neighborhood: http://www.mcstain.com/default...
make sure your inspector checks for things like this. |
| Discuss
:: (2
Comments)
|
|
Sat Mar 29, 2008 at 07:18:17 AM MDT
|
|
Here's a nod to my friend Dorthy's non-profit organization, The Carrot Project. In their own words: The Carrot Project creates small farm financing solutions. We address financing gaps for small- and mid-sized ecologically-friendly and financially viable farm enterprises by making loans and guarantees available and by exploring equity solutions. We are working to increase the amount of financing available and increase access to financing. http://www.thecarrotproject.org |
| Discuss
:: (0
Comments)
|
|
|
|
|
| About |
|
What's Peak Soil?
|
News and conversation about relocalization around Colorado's Front Range
|
|
