Blog: Musings on the Earth, Mindful Living, and our Connections
Oh Deer, What Can the Matter Be?
… Growing food most closely informs my relationship with the earth so that is where I go to source these writings. Each year there are crops that grow well and others that disappoint. One crop, however, enthused and simultaneously disappointed beyond all: the grapes.
Pruning grapes is critical for a good crop. This year I discovered that April is the right time to prune, but still convinced I had no idea what I was doing, I feared that I
The Worm and the Beanstalk
I think I have a worm. Or maybe it is a canny, selective squirrel. The bush beans (beans can grow two ways – on a bushy plant that is low to the ground, or as runner beans or pole beans, on lengthy vines that need to be trellised) are ripe and ready to be picked. And eaten. Yum. This is one of my favorite times of the season. All that hard work of cultivating the soil with compost, organic fertilizer and other amendments, of planting the beans and laying and testing the water system, of keeping away critters and pests, of…