Daily observations of my simple life.

Earthlings

Yesterday I watched a video called Earthlings on Youtube. What a change of heart I had. Oh ,it's been simmering down deep , gentle proddings that the way commercial meat animals are raised is not right, not acceptable to me, but I have not responded to those proddings. Yesterday I made the decision to become a vegitarian.  If I do eat meat at all it will be range fed, humanely handled animals or wild life. I just could not stomach the thought that animals are treated with so little concern just to feed us on demand. Shzzzz. Who do we think we are, anyway? 

This morning I had a nice bowl of potato salad made with ample amounts of my happy hens eggs. They are free range and have lives, social lives. They enjoy hanging out together and scratching here and there and they have good shelter in the chicken houses.

The last two nights I have slept out on the back porch through the night. Very pleasant and I wake up from time to time and there are the stars just so beautiful. This morning I got some more rows planted and now I'm in thinking I should get my middle of the month bills together and get them paid or mailed off., in a few.

When I went to Texas a while back I stopped in Tucson to hear Brad Lancaster lecture on rainwater harvesting. I purchased his book and since then have been trying to implement some of the technics I learned from his class. One thing he spoke of was earthworks so I am making a series of berms to better catch and hold rain when it comes. This is what I do.

1. I rake up weeds and debri around the property and get a wheel barrow full. Then I take it to where I want the berm and dump it.

2. In a plastic bin I soak old newspapers and junk mail in water, then I put them evenly on the debri that I have dumped.

3. Then I go to the horse corral or chicken yard and rake up old horse manure or chicken manure. I just shovel up a lot of the loose dirt in the pens as well because it is very rich and I dump a load of that on the newspapers. I rake this out smooth and then start another cycle right next to it.

When they are done they leave an elevated section of ground that is full of mulch type materials to soak up water. The height is about  2 ft by 3 ft wide.  This leaves a depressed area right next to it where I plant. In desert gardening you plant in the depressions. When it rains the water will hit the high area and soak in staying on your property instead of running off because everything is so flat. 

So this morning I completed another section of berm, I try to do one section a day and the berms are coming along. I also planted beans and cucumbers beside the berm and covered the planting with baskets to keep the rabbits and quail from eating the seedlings. I started two new holes for a mesquite and fig tree I have. I hope they are planted by the end of this  weekend . It really does work to do everything in small amounts daily.

The air is cooler this morning and there is a breeze. It said on the news last night we have not arrived at the monsoon as the dew point went down to 44 on the third day.  It has to have a dew point of 55 for three days in a row. It's not so humid but sounds like we'll have another week of hot dry weather. Is it raining yet? 

Posted by: cactusandquail at 16:19 | link | comments (5)

Comments:

#1  14 July 2007 - 16:13

 

Amazing, isn't it, the energy that comes in with slightly lower temps and a breeze? Good to have your fresh perspective back here on Motime.

InMyLife

#2  16 July 2007 - 00:33

 

Yes, the breezes are a blessing. Nice to be here again, hope they don't close the door again.

cactusandquail

#3  16 July 2007 - 08:38

 

We're getting just enough thunderstorms with a little rain to make it sticky and start fires.

It does my heart good to read about your decision to become a veggie, i've been one over 20 yrs and those are exactly my reasons. It was our last big election in AZ I think we voted on a law that gave pregnant factory farmed pigs enough room to stretch their legs out when lying down and maybe turn around. Their cages are too small for that now. It passed but the dirtbags have 6 years to follow it. They need to be locked up for a while.

Glad you're making a motime comeback, i've been looking at your photos on the others. Love the bird boys.

rustymadgal

#4  16 July 2007 - 13:30

 

yes it's great to see you back here again!

limine

#5  20 July 2007 - 00:54

 

I went back to read your first entry. It was fun! Ah how far we all have come since those first motime startup years...

psmartin

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