Chowchilla No-Till Vegetable Garden February 2016

Chowchilla Backyard Garden Project

Feb 2016 

In the heart of the Central Valley, with the Sierra Nevada's off in the distance and Fresno just to the south, the town of Chowchilla rests quietly in orchards and fields.  The discerning eye can find poetry in the long rows of almond trees, the dirt alleyways, the slough, and for the rent signs in the shop windows along the main street.  Like an old and dusty hardbound, there is a story here as rich as the soil.  You have to look...hiding in the fog are Giant Sloths and Saber Tooth Cats.  Cowboys and Indians.  Dustbowl migrations.  Schoolchildren held for ransom and high speed rail systems. They all have chapters here in a land that once supported large ecosystems of native species.  Now its' mostly destroyed and caged by human design.  It smells like cow.

Why Chowchilla?  Because we have family here.  Sisters, Grandmas, cousins, nieces, nephews in a tree that is too broad to mention.  And yet another soul has joined us.  A baby boy, a new brother and son, was born this week.  A new chapter begins.

While here I took time to turn prepare a plot in the backyard for the family garden. Measured 23 feet by 11 feet, the space was overgrown with grasses, mallow and other greens that flourished with the recent rains. After knocking "the weeds" down I seeded the area with Rincon Vitova Habitat Seed Mix.  Then I carted sand up from the slough bed for a snake-like pathway that winds it's way through the garden plot.  To do that I used an old trash bin that some hooligans has pushed into the riverbed. 

After the pathway was installed, I had a six-pack of purple kale left over from last winters gardening, and planted those along the walk.  The nights leave light frost on the lawn in the morning, but I think the kale will fair well in the cold.  I put cut grass around them as insulation.

This is the first effort in what I hope will be a yielding veggie garden for the family table.  I will not be here day to day to work it, so the challenge will be to make it grow.  Using permaculture principles will help.  Ventura Coop is gardening in Chowchilla now.  We'll keep you posted.

  

  

Ventura March Against Monsanto

Monsanto has become synonymous with corporate corruption and ecological destruction as activists all across the globe point to the company's practices as the prime example of negligence and greed.  With their Seminis Seed headquarters located in Oxnard, Ventura is at ground zero for raising awareness of Monsanto's destructive behavior.  

Join us and the world Saturday May 23rd in front of Ventura City Hall for a march through the street and post rally workshops.  From 9am to 2pm you'll be a part of the solution, not the problem.  Seed swaps, Solar Ovens, Compost Tea, Live music and more all throughout the day.  Say "No More GMO's" and keep you, your family friends and the world healthy and chemical free.

Relevant Links:

Top 10 reasons why Monsanto is Corrupt to the Core:
http://www.seattleorganicrestaurants.com/vegan-whole-food/Monsanto-corruption-gmo.php

March Against Monsanto (MAM) Main Page:
http://www.march-against-monsanto.com/events/

Ventura MAM facebook event page:
https://www.facebook.com/events/1542525792702623/1582302602058275/

Sheet Mulching Ventura

Sheet Mulching is the best way to restore vitality and to build health in the soil. While putting to sleep traditional lawn landscapes, this permaculture tactic provides a kickstart to the "Soil Food Web" in which annual and perennial plants can thrive.  The foodweb helps conserve water, saves money, saves time and reconnects us to the living earth.

Paul Herzog and Robert Barnett use the burrito method along the edges of Paul's backyard

To begin, layer soil amendments, compost, mulch, straw, yard clippings and cardboard (see diagram above) on top of the exisiting sod and existing soil and water with compost tea.  The life and the nutrients in these layers decompose into rich soil. The richness leeches down into the lower layers and soon the land is rejuvenated.  The grass and the weeds are smothered by the layers above and become food for microbes and arthropods. Think of sheet mulching as a large horizontal compost bin.  There are many methods of sheet mulching, but the aims are basically the same-soil restoration and water conservation.

One way to keep unwanted plants from growing out along the edges, iis to use the "burrito method" which creates a double layer of material to suppress the weeds.  Paul Herzog and Robert Barnett are sheet mulch superheros using the burrito method in Paul's backyard.  See picture above.

Any time of year is good to sheet mulch, but the best time is in during the rainy season.  The rain soaks through the layers and stays in the yard.  Sheet mulching acts like a sponge, keeping the hydration where it's needed.

Soil restoration is a radical action in our current system of consumer based chemically driven quick fix answers.  Let's get to a deeper solution.  The word radical is derived from the latin word "radicis" meaning root or going to the origin or essential.  We can help you get down to the roots.  The radical roots.  The essential basics of healthy living begin in the soil.

Relevant links:
Surfrider Ocean Friendly Gardens
Urban Soil Summit
Soil Food Web

People's Climate March Ventura

Sunday, September 21, people of all ages will march in solidarity with the March in NYC calling on world leaders to take action against global warming. 

Schedule (Subject to Change)
8:00 AM Breakfast at Ventura City Corps
8:30 AM Live Telecast of NYC People's Climate March 
10:00 AM Rally at Ventura City Hall
11:00 AM March to ventura pier
1:00 PM March Back to Ventura City Corps for lunch
2:00 PM Free Film Screening: "Disruption"
3:00 Climate Workshop
5:00 Open Mic
6:00 Dinner
7:00 March to 101 overpass for Overpass Light Brigade

facebook event page
https://www.facebook.com/events/262543147278483/

350.org event page:
http://act.350.org/event/peoples_climate_attend/8107

Grow Your Own! A Wicking Bed Tutorial

Recently our friend Kate needed some worms for a worm farm she helped start with Todd at the Binkley Healing Center.  She messaged Ventura Cooperative on facebook, we connected, and we set up a time for her to come pick up a box of red wrigglers.  While she was with us, she talked about her project with Todd growing food on the balcony.  Sweet news!  More folks growing their own!  Even better....is the news about how they're doing it.  They built and planted three wicking beds.

Wicking beds are a great way to save water and grow your own food! Check out the video above from activists feeding their community with food and knowledge.

Kate then invited us to a presentation Todd was doing the next day for his custom designed, handmade, water saving new raised beds.  Of course I went and was pleasantly surprised to see how intensely involved Kate and Todd are with growing their own food-- with sustainable and organic means.  They did a great job documenting the process.  The presentation was informative and inspiring.  Plus I like the color purple!  (they painted the beds purple ;-)

Our friend Jim Mangis came to the meet-up as well.  Come to find out, he helped Kate and Todd get started with plants and soil from his local business Good Tilth Organic Nursery.  Jim makes his own excellent compost mix.  He spoke about soil, I got the chance to practice a 30sec pitch for our Actively Aerated Compost Tea, and Todd talked about wicking beds.  Win-win-win!

So thanks to Kate and Todd for stepping up and implementing a program to grow their own food in a way that fits their needs and lifestyle.  Anybody can do it, and at Ventura Cooperative, we're here to help you out!

Related Links:

Binkley Healing Center

Good Tilth Organic Nursery

Food is Free  

Add Purslane to Your Edible Landscape

One of the best gifts of gardening is discovering that a plant you once thought was a weed, is really a integral part of your edible landscape.  Purslane is at the top of this list when it come to garden uses, nutritional value and culinary versatility. 

Purslane's growing habit makes it a good alternative to lawns or other ground covers.  A study conducted by the University of Connecticut concluded that the plant is effective at organically controlling weeds.  Purslane acts as a "living mulch." In the category of nutrition, the University of Texas at San Antonio finds Purslane contains 10 to 20 times more melatonin, an antioxidant, than any other fruit or vegetable they tested. more omega 3 fatty acids than any other plant source in the solar system, and an extraordinary amount for a plant, some 8.5 mg for every gram of weight.  Purslane also contians:

• vitamin A, B, C 
• six times more E than spinach
• beta carotene, seven times more of that than carrots
• magnesium, calcium, potassium, folate, lithium, and iron 
• and has 2.5% protein per serving.

What about flavor?  Purslanes's taste has a subtle green flair of vitality, so it’s a great addition to many recipes.  We've been eating it raw with Green Zebra tomatoes, goat cheese in pita bread!  Tossed in salads with a cucumber yogurt dressing, it's a crowd pleaser.  Really, it's difficult to understate Purslane's attributes.

This fantastic “weed” is virtually underfoot everywhere, from Ventura to NYC, but most US residents don't know it's there.  So keep an eye out for it.  We're cultivating in our gardens from volunteers we found, and from a few cuttings Ron at Rincon Vitova gave us.  By this time next year, we'll have a living mulch cover crop that sustains many levels of the Soil Food Web, humans included! 

DHiT Guerrilla Gardening Flashmob Video

With this video, get some inspiration from the guerrilla gardeners in the Hague, The Netherlands.  Of course we have our own version of GG'ing in Ventucky--We have The Green Action Group .  It's always nice however, to get some perspective and some solidarity from our fellow Green Resisters.  Keep Growing!

Green Action Group Facebook Page

Heads Up!  Want to be in the Green Action text loop?  Text @greenactiongroup to 23559 and sign up.  Then you'll get and be able to send on the ground green action updates.  Show up with a shovel and some bananas.