First processing of home grown coffee berries Coffee processing at home takes a little practice. I ventured into the old ‘food forest’ this morning. It’s a little way from the house so I’ve only now got far enough down the list of to-dos to consider cleaning it up. There’s a lot of weeds to clear up and a good amount of tree maintenance. It was good timing, though, because the coffee is just beginning to ripen. There are a few coffee trees, but the best ones are growing under a…
Read MoreCategory: Sustainability
Bamboo
We are lucky to have two stands of bamboo; a huge one with thick canes, and a more modest one. Here’s a photo of some of the canes I cut from the big one, with the stand in the distance. I’m no judge of height but some of the canes are taller than many trees, and that’s actually a problem as the big stand is now shading an old ‘fruit forest’, with the result that the fruit trees are tall and spindly instead of pick-able. So I don’t feel at…
Read MoreNew veggie patch.
We have fenced the veggie garden. It became a priority because the broad beans I had sown in a rough bed came through earlier than expected, and the sprouts were being eaten by chickens and possibly night -time visitors. Fortunately my parents arrived on Thursday, and they have more experience than I with fencing, so they helped get a chicken wire fence round the developing veggie patch. It’s not your classic patch, as there is no level ground of any size, so the far corner of the rectangle goes way…
Read MoreChickens
The previous owner left us eight chickens, housed in an old coop. They’ve been nice company round the yard, and have bonded quickly after a bit of feeding, so now they follow me to the coop in the evenings, which is handy. They had been used to free ranging and some used to roost on the roof of the coop at night, so it’s good to have them locked into the hen house away from danger. They weren’t laying at first, I think they are old and out of training,…
Read MoreNative bees
There are usually bees around whatever is flowering on the balconies, and I had never had a close look until the other day, when a conspicuous large brown and hairy bee was hanging around the rosemary. A quick search got me to the excellent Aussie Bee website and I found it was probably a brown carpenter bee. Then I realized that the rest of the bees that feed from the rosemary weren’t plain old honey bees, but blue barred bees. Right here in the middle of Sydney! It’s good to…
Read MoreIs the end still nigh?
Lately I’ve been given three separate scenarios for our imminent demise. The problem is, these forecasts aren’t usually given like opinions, they carry much more implied moral weight, as if I’m supposed to take them as seriously as the speaker, or woe betide. But are we in for three separate catastrophes? To slightly mangle the German saying; things only have one end, and only the sausage has two. Two of the anticipated endings have vague timelines; ecological catastrophe due to global warming, and global economic collapse due to contagion from…
Read MorePhotoperiodism
This plane tree is on my daily circuit. In mid Winter (July 14th) these branches still hold their leaves because the day length is artificially extended by the street light. The rest of the tree is bare. I reckon in a colder climate the cold nights would tip the balance.
Read MoreIntro
What I’d like to offer with these posts is some of our experience of living on the land, on a small holding. Our house is off-grid, so all our own power and water, which I hope may be an example of how a lot more people will live in the future. We are having fun building a garden, trying unusual vegetables, and building a stock of productive animals.
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