Field Trip to the western Seirra foot hills

 Road Trip to pottery land-

Mr. Danny Vitali and i recently took a trip to a part of california i fell in love with- the western Seirra Foot hills, near Angels Camp/Jackson/San Andreas. we went to visit a friend Maya who i took RDNA with last year,  and her sculptures she has been working on. Maya has been staying with an awesome guy, Kern. these photos are of his pottery studio, homestead and property. it is beautiful country there, really cool community, beautiful sugar pine, ponderosa, manzenita and rolling golden foot hills out near gold country. his gardens are beautiful, and danny and i work traded and did a little other work for Kern while hanging with his awesome community he is building. some what of a renaissance man, he has built his mother a rad rammed earth house, a sauna, a beautiful pottery studio with solar hot water heat, a house, and a really rad seed bank that he shares with his community. land is available and cheap. Maya has been looking around and tempting me with prospects. 

My ideal scene would be to find some land up there, spend my time here at RDI on the coast for a few years while i visit and slowly improve the land over time turning it into a permie heaven. it was a area of California i had not even imagined to exist, and cant wait to go back and visit. Kern is wanting to install a food forest/orchard this coming winter so if i am not doing that here at RDI and have a moment, i will try and visit again. i was hooked. 

Pottery studio

Maya and her nail sculpture

Kerns Kiln

the gardens

More Gardens

A small shed/greenhouse space off Kerns awesome Terrace garden.

Kerns Pottery studio with solar hot water panels

the amazing farm next door to Kerns place

the house, moving the drum set to prepare for a party

in other news, just a few weeks ago Olivia and i took a walk up the wish creek watershed here on the land and took a magical mystery tour through the two head waters. it was fern covered, oaked and bay tree heaven. here are some photos of the upper water shed here at RDI, as well as the top ridge that we made it up to looking west towards the ocean. Enjoy!

up in the thick of it

beautiful bay

fern gully

looking down the west ridge towards the beach

looking down the valley, this is commonweal- the trees are hiding the property! way off on the horizon is just south of SF city.

Harvest of the Herb

Roman Chamomile

Herbs. they are pretty great plants. and they are at their peak right now in the mid-late summer. A really beatufiul, button like German Chamomile, was ready for harvest. see above.  we love it here for teas, and Commonweal Gardens (where RDI resides) always has its own stash of dried Chamomile. thought it would be good to replenish. Its great before bed, in teas, and the plant responds best for the body steeped in natural spring water brought to just under a boil. we are a little spoiled with our spring water here.

Calendula

 Calendula is one of my favorite flowers, and it was one of the first flowers i ordered from a catalog. it was called Flashback Calendula, and it was a sun burst of yellow pedals that faded at the tips and to the center of the head in a hue mix of pink, yellow, and a red center. here at Commonweal we have stunning varieties of both domesticated and wild Calendula, the later being almost twice as small in flower, and a slender creeping weed; we let it be most of the time to be a filler. yellows, oranges, and a few in between populate almost every nook, edge, and disturbed soil spot that we have. This little flower is edible and great in salads, although it is a strong medicinal. tinctures, teas, fresh and dried, this flower is a great healer, and especially vital in salves for topical application.

drying racks ready

Liam and White Coyote Mint, from Ebbet's Pass

 Liam has been adventuring around with a Medicinal Guru named Tellur Fenner http://www.bluewindbmc.com/bios.php and went up to the Sierra ranges and grabbed some fun plants. Tellur will be teaching a 12 month 200 hour medicinal california native botany class here at RDI starting in October-  http://www.regenerativedesign.org/edible-medicinal-plants-ca

Nicociana (wild tobacco) and Mint

 Yarrow (below) is another one of my favorite plants, revered in medieval times and used in beer and to make bitters before hops. an old world plant, its name Achillea Millefolium is referenced from greek culture because Achillies would carry it for his army as a treatment for wounds. much of it has established its self in most of the northern hemisphere. unsure of how we will use it, but drying it is a main priority.

Wonderful Yarrow

sauerkraut

so its been a while. been busy on the farm- visitors, events of 70+ people coming on for the past weekend... weeding... lots of watering, and the orchards are about ready to explode! we are also busy making stuff and things with cabbages!
Melanie, who is a dear, amazing, wonderful friend of mine from Iowa, came and stayed on the farm for a month. Todd, our fisherman farmer in residence in bolinas came with a bunch of cabbages from his garden-  what do you get??

sauerkraut! this process is super awesome easy! chop the cabbages into quarters taking the tough stem core out of the middle. then finely (or coarse its up to you) chop the cabbage into ribbons, shreds, or what have you, and salt! dont be afraid of the salt, you want to massage the cabbages with the salt in a bowl till they create a good liquid and become some what translucent (or at least softened and slightly "gushey")- if the cabbage still has a little bit of that crunch, keep massaging. if it doesnt get to the translucent soft liquid, add a little more salt till you do. then add what ever you want to the mix! ginger, peppers, shredded carrots, sea weed, onions, garlic, what ever is laying around and you think would taste good in your Kraut/kimchi!

a side note- red cabbage is good, and some of it we actually made like a kimchi- spicy and pretty salty. if you want good and proper Kraut, use the white/yellow cabbages- they have a better sugar content that the lactic acid loving bacteria tend to favor that exist naturally on the leaves of the cabbage.  this is what really ferments and gives you that "sauer" taste of sauerkraut. Lactic acid loving bacteria are the core of the fermentation process for kraut, and many people use Whey left over from making cheese to start batches of all kinds of fermented products that favor these bacteria. White Cabbage has it naturally in its skins and leaves, so you get that wonderful, sour, and sweet taste when you massage it into that liquid and bottle it up! the whole process eventually goes through multiple stages of wonderful little bacteria that set the stage for making an acidic final solution that prevents any of the nasty nastys that can cause botulism.

after all is said and done with the mix, put into a jar or container, and make sure all the kraut is below the surface of the liquid- we take a smaller jar and stuff it into the container so it keeps the goodies sunk below the surface. if you dont, the kraut will get moldy. if a natural scum or mold does form on the surface  ITS OK! it happens. and it wont go any further then that. just scrape it off and onward you go!

then let sit for 10 days or so. if you decided to use mason jars and put lids on them REMEMBER TO RELEASE THE PRESSURE!!!! we will tape the smaller jars into the larger jars to hold the solids below the liquids so it does not spoil, but it has room to breath around the taped up jar. you will EXPLODE your jars if you dont release the pressure when you put caps on!

when you open one up after 10 to 14 days at room temp, and try it, its ready when you want it to be. it really shouldnt sit any longer then that. transfer out the kraut/kimchi into a better jar- this is when you can cap it- SO LONG AS YOU REFRIGERATE IT.  if you keep it in a new container at room temp, closed up, it will continue its fermentation, and you run the risk of exploded jars. the process stops at or around fridge temp.

there are hundreds of recipes out there, and traditional kraut and kimchi is done in ceramic fermentation vessels that have small non-reactive stones or ceramic disks to put inside to hold down the goods away from the surface of the salty brine. some of these recipes can call for 10 days to almost 6 months or even a year. what ever you find to build off of, know there is endless process to how this can be done!

Happy Krauting!

Green house doings and the last crab dinner

Yesterday was an actual coastal foggy day here in bolinas. it broke nearly 4 weeks of hot sunny and dry weather. so we spent it in the green house planting seeds and getting the aquaponics planted with basil. hopefully they do well... the water PH is still a little high, and for the moment it is still pretty low on the Nitrite/nitrate levels that are so key for the nutrient cycle... those little craw fish just aren't producing enough waste and growing fast enough!

 the seed trays and starts were mostly perennial herbs and some culinary herbs for planting and possibly to sell as nursery stock. we also have these great seeds from Turkey that Penny had brought back- assorted cow/painted beans, 2 types of wheat, herbs, sun flowers and a 1000 year old ancient heirloom wheat.  we started onions and wheat grass as well. if all goes accordingly, we can get 4-6 seed trays started a week and plant out every couple of weeks straight up to the fall and get some sort of production out of the late start... so i hope. 

 

garden pirates Meghan, Liam, and Michelle. notice those nice new seed tables to the left Liam and i built...

Crab boil

 on another note, Todd a very talented fisherman and wood worker who built the front gate,  brought the last of the Dungeness crab harvest from his crab pots. it was a feast! we barely finished them, and James took the prize for most crab comsumed (Todd warned he has seen no other man consume crab as james does) it was a glorious feast, and even for someone as my self who is not a big crab fan, i loved every bit of them. after all as Todd and i agreed on, the ocean is sacred, and we gave thanks for their offering and the respect around the closing of the crab season. I spoke to Todd about the salmon run coming up in July and august, and he said i might be able to come along as deck hand in exchange for salmon catch... that would be amazing...

Todd showing off a crab

the crab pile.

the crab process begin

it was a crab funeral apparently....every one was in mourning.

bee swarm # 5?!

swarming bees

cutting branches out. im watching with curiosity about stings... 

the orchard looking west along the west ridge

final cut to the branch that held the swarm

box-o-bees (queen included) Liam and I moving the bees on up!

well another planned day at RDI was 

interrupted by our 7th(?) swarm of the season.

all three of us (Liam, Meghan and i) were in the kitchen garden getting ready to plant some veggies and herbs, when the hum of a swarm filled the air. 

Brock's voice about following the party ringed in our ears and we watched as the air filled with bees, eventually landing in a pear tree near the food forest just behind Penny and James house. 

(you can almost see the house roof in the picture at right.)

we proceeded to have the next top bar hive ready (these hives are one long hive with honey comb bars at the full length) and suited up for our adventure of cutting out all the bees amassed around the queen on the branches of the pear tree. 

its the pirate hives....

Liam dumping bees... in shorts... crazy man

the hive- that's a lot of bees

adding boards... in shorts...

after cutting out some branches we made the final cut (at left) and dropped all the bees and their hive mates into a box.

we moved amongst the swarming bees and their newly claimed branch in-a-box, very calmly mind you, up hill to the hives at the top of the food forest with no stings or anger from the bees at all.

Finally arrived up at their new home amongst our other hives- we are now up to 8 for the season, only starting with 3 out of 5 from last year... its been 4 weeks of constant new swarms. this means our current hives are busy at work expanding, or we are not doing enough to control the amount of queens that are being born. many bee keepers open and manage their hives choosing not to allow the the birth or creation of queen cells- the queen cells look a little bit like peanut shells worked into the side walls of the normal hive cells that birth drones and workers.





















if we find one without melting it down for bees wax i will post it... its been too exciting to save the cells and document.

Meghan took all the photos of Liam and i in our funny suits, and it was a job well done... and it was our first bee capture on our own for all of us- it being the first bee interaction for Meghan ever.

almost finished- some excited bees about their new home.

swarming a pear tree

we did have one closing thought- after checking on a previous swarm that happened a week ago, we noticed one of our newly swarmed boxes abandoned... the hive had comb and chambers, along with some unhatched bees, propolis, and filled honey comb... 

why was it empty? what happened to the unhatched bees? 

a few were still moving.

 we were curious and left with many more questions about exactly what we had seen today....

did this hive come from one of our previous swarms who didnt like their new home?

or was it a hive that out grew its space??

questions upon questions.

the universe is not personal.

Cheese part II

 So we made cheese yesterday. went for cheve, a simple goats cheese. 

let it drain. 

never really made cheese before....

most of what we got was a really a mild and great mozzarella goat cheese.

we have a lot of great cheese making equipment here, a cheese press, molds, everything but a bunch of starters- got to get some of them enzymes! we are all about the good bacteria! after all, its mostly because of those millions of little guys that give us all our favorite foods... wine, beer, yogurt, cheese, kimche, sauerkraut... even the plants like good holistic bacteria to help fight all the nasty blights and bad fungus... more on the compost and lactose loving teas for plants later...

i decided to press the curds into wheels, and then salted them and added tarragon and thyme (dried).

added some more salt, and now flipping the wheels on the cheese tray to dry out and see what we get... adding salt as i need to dry them out.

the pink on the larger thin wheel is some Hawaiian red sea salt from dear friend Cat. 

oh yeah-what am i going for here?

 hopefully a kind of aged dried, herbed, goat mozzarella, cottage cheddar?? 

or something like that..

stay tuned....

Quail train

on guard Mr. Burns!

The baby quail have hatched! and papa quail (Mr. Burns, yes pop culture has invaded our naming of the quail couple) is on guard and doing his job very well...

this family of around 15 little ones has been spotted up and down the trails here at commonweal; father keeping guard, mom (Mrs. burns... obviously) and babies scurrying around eating anything that looks good... including some of our newly planted seeds. 

that's allowed... so its ok..

babies.... fox?! what??! where!??

here is a close up of mom and baby, the little ones being no more then maybe a size of a slightly larger golf ball.

mom, dad on guard, and a few little ones up front through the onions

Although there are lots of bachelor quail, and a good handful of couples, these are the only babies spotted yet- they tend to stay concentrated on the west side of wish creek, and WE THINK they live up around the garden pirate villas (again that is our nick name for the interns thanks to the last course that joined us for a two week permaculture intensive.) 

the villas are all nestled in the north west corner of the fence line where there is great habitat for the quail, birds, lots of mystery rustling at night and also foxes... hmmm watch out  for that fox is a quick one...

mrs. burns and babies

but so far so good, its close to the first week and it seems Mr. and Mrs. Burns are doing a great job.

  and the course that just joined us was excited to see the baby quail, and they all just missed them... so here are some shots for you guys.

till soon, we will keep the posts for how the quail are growing up, and hopefully nature takes its course not too brutally... we shall see though.. there are theories on how many of around the 14 or so will survive.

Cheese?!

Last night, for the first time we made cheese. 3 gallons of goats milk.... and we still had maybe 3 gallons to use for yogurt and to have in the morning... without any enzyme starter, i just used Rennet, to separate the fats and whey. on the left is the cheese hanging to drain and cure, and the right is the whey and cheese- the cheese having formed into a semi solid. below is the cheese in the cloth ready to be wrapped up and hung. to follow will be salting, pressing to cure, and adding dried herbs to make a herb goat cheese cheve... thank you GOATS.

also started today was some kimche, and Komboocha, (or booch as we like to call it)  by the wonderful and recently arrived new farm pirate (that's our new slang for intern) Meghan. also will attempt some whey soda with all our strawberries, and dehydrate them as well. lots going on. lots to do. lots to post... 

patients... 
and a quote that has been floating around here

"the universe is not personal"

chickens

happy old hens! speculation is they are around 8 years old.

the "bunkers" as the converted worm bins are named.

 This is the chicken coop. the whole fenced in area is very luxurious, complete with several (in my opinion) of the best apples at RDI. they have a good run, an old truck top, and even two giant worm bins that are built out of old cast iron tubs... although they cant get into the said tubs... the worm bins are cumbersome but are a great design none the less. we have the old grey water sludge that had millions of worms sitting in the worm bins as we speak- but penny and i both agree that they are almost too heavy to lift the tops and use, and we may retire them... im thinking of converting them to raised beds for carrots and beets... hmmm

our hens are down in numbers though, a bunch have been culled, mostly due to their old age, and they are laying at around 5 eggs a week if we are lucky. there is 6 hens left. hopefully we shall be getting some young guns soon!