10-day-old plants

The baby plants for the winter garden are now 10 days old. So far, things are going pretty well for a first effort, but there are some problems. I’m afraid that some of the plants may already be too leggy. Some of the seeds weren’t deep enough, and some plants fell over, though they were able to send down a root. I had very poor germination with the Wakefield cabbage, for reasons I don’t understand. [See correction: It wasn’t the Wakefield cabbage.]

Lessons learned so far: The grow-light should have been lower to provide more intense light and reduce legginess. I need better forceps to place the seeds at the right depth in the growing media. I’m hoping that the legginess can be corrected when I transfer the plants to potting soil in peat moss cups.

These plants are all for the early garden: cabbage, broccoli, brussels spouts, cauliflower, and celery. I also have lettuce and snow pea seeds, which I will plant directly into the ground. I’m shooting for March 15 for planting things outdoors, depending on the weather. When these plants have been moved outdoors, I’ll start seeds for the summer garden — tomatoes, squash, etc.

Work day

There was an area of garden I would have liked to till last fall, but I didn’t, because there were a couple of small trees in the way that needed to be transplanted first. Ken transplanted those trees today and did the tilling. We’re only about a month away, I hope, from planting the early crops. In the photo above, Ken has dug up one of the trees and put it in the wheelbarrow. Patience has approached to admire Ken’s digging.


Next: Ken with the tiller


With the tilling done, the chickens now cluster around to explore the fresh-dug dirt.


That’s Patience at Ken’s left hand. She has a huge crush on Ken.


The hawk mesh over the entire garden is almost done. I have to pick up more fishing line, though, before Ken can finish the job. He calculates that he has used about 1.6 miles of fishing line so far. We’re confident that the fishing line will keep the hawks away from the chickens. But it remains to be seen how long the fishing line will last. A long time, I hope, because it was a huge amount of work for Ken putting it up.

Spring fever day


Sunday was sunny, and the temperature was above 50F. Everyone, including the cat and the chickens, had spring fever. Even the cabbage and broccoli seeds, planted less than 48 hours ago, had sprouted in their little indoor hothouses (photos later this week when the plants are bigger). The chickens had a nice long day outside under Ken’s watchful eye. But they constantly scan the sky. At one point, when two hawks were circling, the chickens all went back into the chicken house.


The first thing Ken did was to put up a new bluebird house. We now have three bluebird houses.


After much thinking and discussion, we finally decided that the best way to protect the chickens from the hawks is to tie fishing line, spaced about 12 inches apart, along the top of the garden fence. This is a big job and will take some time, but when you become attached to your chickens, you’ll do whatever it takes to protect them. The fishing line isn’t visible in the photo above, but it does show up in the next photo below.


Some of the strands of fishing line can be seen to the left of the bluebird house.


Ken is about 25 percent done with the fishing line project.


We found quite a lot of animal poop in the garden, in the thick patch of winter rye grass. Neither Ken nor I can distinguish rabbit poop from deer poop, but this almost certainly has to be rabbit poop. It’s very doubtful that deer could get over the 8-foot fence. And if deer had been into the garden, there’d be tracks. The poor hungry rabbits need the winter grass, so we’ll wait until spring to try to find and block the places where the rabbits are getting under the fence. And part of the plan for next winter is to plant a stand of winter rye grass near the rabbit patch, particularly to provide winter food for the rabbits.


The winter rye does look delicious, doesn’t it? It has been a great winter salad for the chickens.

Time to start seeds for the early garden

This year, I’m determined to start everything in the garden from seed, using heirloom seeds. If I’m calculating planting dates and starting times correctly, then now’s the time to start seeds indoors for the early garden — cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, brussels sprouts, etc. When those things are in the ground, then I’ll start the seeds for the summer garden — tomatoes, squash, etc. For the early garden, I also bought seeds for lettuce and snow peas, but those don’t need to be started early indoors.

To do this, I bought a seed-starting system from Park Seeds. This includes the growing media, the little greenhouses, fluorescent grow lights, a soil warming mat, etc.

The grow lights are hooked to a timer to turn the lights on and off as appropriate. The warming mat keeps the soil warm while the seeds are germinating.

I ordered my seeds online from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds.

As an experiment, I’m going to try to grow some celery. I doubt that celery will like my soil and climate, but I’m going to see how it goes. And, of course, the reason I’m using heirloom seeds is that I want to learn how to save my own seeds from year to year.

I’ll post more photos when I have some baby plants.


Park’s “Bio Dome” seed-starting system


A thermostat controls the soil-warming mat.


A timer controls the grow lights.

I flunk the Creole test


This platter gets an F.

In my ongoing efforts to break out of the same-old-breakfast routine, this morning I attempted baked grits with cheese, blackened beans, and fried apples. The beans were terrible. I had never attempted that sort of seasoning before, and I don’t think I was quite clear on the concept. And though the grits were good, I went too far in my effort to make them a comfort food. Less cheese and less butter would have been better. I’d give myself a B+ for the concept and an F for the execution.

The Anglican choral tradition


YouTube: King’s College Choir

An article in a recent New Yorker magazine made me even more appreciative of the choral tradition of the Anglican church, not to mention more glad that I had the opportunity to sing in the choir at an Episcopalian Christmas service last month. The article is in the Jan. 10, 2011, issue: “Many Voices: Blue Heron brings a hint of the Baroque to Renaissance polyphony.” The article is available on the New Yorker web site, but a subscription is required.

The article is about some newer choral groups who have been exploring the same historical terrain as the Tallis Scholars, who have been around since the 1970s. The article contains this rather intriguing line: “Likewise, the austere allure of the Tallis Scholars is inseparable from the Anglican choral tradition, which owes much to Victorian values.” This reference to Victorian values is left unexplained, but I assume it means that, even though the roots of Anglican music lie deep in the past, in the Medieval monastic tradition and in the Golden Age that occurred during the reigns of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I, Anglican music nevertheless was affected by the theological — and musical — emphasis on the more personal forms of salvation that marked the 19th Century.

I was raised in the Southern Baptist Church, the music of which largely comes from this 19th Century tradition. My first organ teacher was a Moravian and organist at a small Moravian church. I sometimes substituted for her when she was on vacation. Though not as ancient as the Anglican musical tradition, Moravian music reaches back a century or two earlier than the Baptist tradition, to the time of J.S. Bach.

It is strange that, though I’ve been singing since I was a child, and though I used to accompany small congregations, I had never been in a choir until last month. I’m thinking that I’d like to do it again at Easter. The YouTube videos to which I’ve linked here capture some of the thrill of singing in a choir, especially the many YouTube videos of King’s College Cambridge. Practicing the organ was always such lonely work, usually done in dark, underheated churches. But practicing with a choir is a very different thing.

When rehearsals started in November for St. Paul’s Christmas program, I almost convinced myself that I’d never learn the bass parts for 45 or so pages of music. I wasn’t alone, though. Everyone in the choir, including the professional section leaders, had lots of work to do. But then something stunning happens at the final performance. Not only did the members of the choir know the music, they’d even memorized most of the words. At last they could take their eyes off the score and watch the director. And no longer is the director playing the role of the kindly tyrant. With the director’s back to the congregation (which was packed for the Christmas service), they can’t see that he is smiling at us, winking at us, gesticulating when his hands and arms are insufficient to communicate with us. Suddenly we are totally under his control, attentive and obedient. Every voice starts precisely on the beat. When he requests a crescendo or a ritardando, he gets it. We hold the last note, forte, nearly out of breath, the power of the organ supporting us, but not until the director makes a little chopping gesture with his hands do we stop, all precisely together. The sound reverberates through the church. I dare to shift my eyes off the director now and see that members of the congregation are smiling. We almost had them on the edge of their seats. Choral music does that to people. Sometimes, listening to an organ, especially an infectiously complex fugue by J.S. Bach, I find myself hyperventilating in sympathy with the organ and the huge amount of breath it is expending. Choral music, too, pulls us in somehow. It makes us want to sing with other people. When the choir comes up for air, so does the congregation.

Recently, after watching the movie Winter’s Bone, I was trying to explain to a friend the distinction between the music of the high church (the Anglicans) and the low church (pretty much everybody else). Despite the differences, these musical traditions have much in common, and both are wonderful. Part of the appeal of Winter’s Bone was the soundtrack, with a completely unexpected and beautiful performance of the very low church “Farther Along.” I sang along with it, in harmony. I’m linking to that as well.

Low church and high church — both are rich, beautiful, and deep. Even a pagan must pay his respects.


YouTube: The Tallis Scholars sing Thomas Tallis


My new Episcopal hymnals, ordered from Amazon


YouTube: Farther Along, from the soundtrack of Winter’s Bone

Rehabilitating the rabbit patch


Ken piles debris onto the brush pile. We hope the rabbits like it.

If I myself had to do the work of tidying up the grounds around Acorn Abbey, it probably never would get done. Ken has been plugging away at this work for a month now. The area most in need of cleanup is a band of thicket on the lower side of the abbey, between the house and the woods. This area had all its pine trees removed in the spring of 2008. The stumps are still there. The soil has not been disturbed. All the limbs and debris were still on the ground. It was a rather unsightly area, difficult to walk through because of the briars and debris. But it’s potentially a beautiful area, and it’s excellent rabbit habitat.

Ken and I negotiated on what would go and what would stay. Ken has a soft spot for the young pine trees, for example, whereas I wanted the pine trees gone to leave space and sunlight for the young hardwoods that are eager to get a start. The pines, we finally agreed, would go. Ken also removed all the briars and vines that were choking some of the young trees. He left the blackberry bushes. All the debris he put into brush piles, which we think will make excellent refuges for rabbits.

Part of the process, also, was identifying and marking the young persimmon trees — fruit bearers. There were three. Ken cleared especially carefully around the persimmon trees to give them room to grow, and to make room for collecting the fruit in the fall.

All of this is winter work. The plan is to get it all done before all the spring gardening and yard work have to be done.

One of the nice discoveries was that there are several small stands of mountain laurel — one of the symbols of the Appalachian range. We’ll mulch around the laurel to encourage it to grow. The area is moist. There also is some fern and moss.

All in all, it’s an ecologically interesting and diverse area. The plan is to let the area return to its default state: hardwood woodland. The woods at present are about 75 feet below the abbey. When this area returns to woodland, the woods will come right up to the edge of the abbey’s yard, 25 and 30 feet below the house.

All the signs of the fact that the abbey was a construction project two years ago are rapidly disappearing. The established, timeless look that I want is beginning to emerge. It’s going to be a beautiful spring.


The red tape marks a persimmon tree.


Mountain laurel


The grassy slope to the left is the edge of the abbey’s lower yard.


Moss


A bird’s nest from last year


This will soon be green.

His own private Idaho

Have I mentioned that Ken is weird? It’s not enough that he’s immersed in the quiet and solitude of Acorn Abbey, where there hasn’t been a car on the road in a week and where the only sound on a winter afternoon is the quiet hum of the heating system and the occasional patter of cat feet on the stairs. When he writes, he has the habit of surrounding himself with a shroud to further close out the world. I’ll keep this short, so that the click of the keyboard upstairs doesn’t disturb him too much.

The ground is too soft from the melting snow to do much work outside right now. Ken knows how finicky I am about excess traffic that could wear paths or kill grass. Yards are very vulnerable this time of year. Very soon, though, we’ve got to order seeds for the early garden. Spring is not that far off. The daffodil shoots will start popping up in another six weeks or so.

A country-style no-egg breakfast

Here’s a serious attempt at making a low-cost, country-style, no-egg, no-meat breakfast with a little excitement to it. The beans are homemade baked beans, made in a crock pot using organic white beans bought in bulk at Whole Foods. The sausage is my homemade vegan sausage based on mashed soybeans and wheat gluten.

The yellow grits were bought in bulk at Whole Foods. Southerners eat white grits, but I’ve been experimenting with yellow grits. They have a bit more flavor than white grits, and a creamier texture. They’re even a fairly satisfying egg substitute if you put a nice dab of butter on them. Don’t use butter when you’re cooking them, though. You want only 1 portion of grits to about 4 portions of water, with some salt. Boil them for at least 20 minutes, or until they’re properly thick, then let them sit for a few minutes before serving.

The biscuits are my usual vegan biscuits, made with about half unbleached white flour and half whole wheat flour. In the biscuits I use olive oil or refined palm oil as the shortening, and I make vegan buttermilk by clabbering some soy milk with a teaspoon of cider vinegar.

One of the commenters here, Brother Doc, suggested fried apples for breakfast. That was an excellent suggestion.

This is a vegan breakfast except for the butter on the grits. I also used butter to fry the apples.