Aluminium Can Recycling

I thought I would give a Planet Ark campaign a bit of a plug.  Being a recycling advocate, I fully support this cause, and you can also win an iPad as well (Australian residents only)!  Read for the details below.

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Recycle aluminium cans for the chance to win an iPad and surf classic tickets 


After cooling off with a soft drink at the beach this summer, consumers have the chance to win an iPad and tickets to Commonwealth Bank Beachley Classic by recycling their aluminium cans and taking a photo of the recycling bin.

To enter the competition, people can simply recycle their cans in the public bins provided and send a photo of the recycling bin to Planet Ark.

Australians are good at recycling aluminium cans at home, but Planet Ark and campaign ambassador, eight‐time world surfing champion Layne Beachley, want to see more aluminium cans recycled at beaches, parks, workplaces, schools and other public spaces.

“Over the last few years many councils and local authorities have installed public place recycling bins on the streets and in parks,” says Planet Ark’s Head of Campaigns, Brad Gray. “Also, lots of shopping centres and food courts have set up bins.  All of this makes recycling aluminium cans easier.”

Over this party season, anyone who goes to outdoor events like concerts in the park, music festivals, open‐air cinemas and markets are likely to notice a range of different recycling bins.

“It’s great that organisers are embracing public place recycling,”  says Gray. “It’s important for everyone to  follow the instructions on the bins.  The more people that recycle properly the greater the environmental benefits, such as cutting both carbon emissions and waste.”

Making an aluminium can from recycled material uses just  5% of the energy needed to make one  from virgin  material.  Aluminium doesn't degrade during the recycling process so cans are endlessly recyclable ‐ saving precious resources for years to come.

According to RMIT (Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology) by recycling six aluminium cans you can offset a 25‐kilometre train journey, a 17‐kilometre bus ride or a ten‐kilometre trip in an average size car.

“Every year, over $22 million dollars’ worth of aluminium is lost because cans are thrown into landfill,  so  any chance to reclaim them is important,”  says Gray.  “If your school or work doesn't already have a system set up, why not make a resolution to organise one in 2012?”

Since Australians first started drinking out of aluminium in the 1970s more than 75 billion cans have  been  recycled.  Recycling these cans has not only contributed to environmental savings but also returned over $1.05 billion to the Australian economy.

“To show Australians there are recycling bins all over the country, Planet Ark is urging people to
take a photo of a recycling bin and send it to us for the chance to win an iPad 2 to the value of
$600 and four VIP tickets to the Commonwealth Bank Beachley Classic surfing event,” says Gray.

For more information and to enter the competition, visit Cans.PlanetArk.org.  

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I am always amazed at the lack of recycling bins around the city of Melbourne, especially in food courts and public places.  So many wasted resources that could be reused like the cans mentioned above.

I will be printing this off and posting it at work, so that folk who are too lazy to take those extra 5 steps to the recycling bin to dispose of their aluminium cans have a reason to change their behaviours.  I am forever fishing out cans from the landfill bin!  Here is a FAQ if you want to learn more about Aluminium recycling.

So please get onboard, where ever you may be.  This stuff is just common sense.

Home-made Liquid Fertiliser

This is a little gardening tip that I learnt from watching Vasili's Garden a few months back.  Vasili was filming in the garden of an old guy of Italian decent and he asked him how his vegetables grew so vigorously.  The old bloke took him behind his shed and showed him this brew in an old 44 gallon drum that stunk to high heaven.  So I decided to make some myself!

Back in November 2011, I found a bucket of sheep poo that I had forgotten about.  I divided it into two equal amounts into two 20 litre buckets, added about 2kg of chicken manure then topped it with water and stirred it for about 10 minutes so that it was all nice and mushy.  Then I popped on the lids and left them in the sun.

Fast forward to January 2012.  This is what it looks like now.

It stinks really bad, but I know it is full of goodness for the garden.  I usually give it a stir to mix it all up.

I use it like this.  I pour about 1 litre (1 qt) into a 9 litre watering can.

Then I top it up with water from one of my rainwater barrels.

I mainly use this for my fruit trees, and over the last month they have a renewed vigour.  After I have watered them or it has rained, I make up a few of these and pour on half a watering can for each tree.

Maintenance is easy.  You just top up the stinky bucket with more water,

Then give is a good stir and pop the lid back on until you next need it.  What could be any simpler?  I have been using it since the beginning of the month, and my plants have gone ballistic!  Their growth has amazed me.

The other form of home made liquid fertiliser is from my worm farm.  Here is a picture of it below.

To gross you out even more, here is a close up of the little bugger having a feed on some avocado.  They just love them.

So as a husbandry measure, each month I pour about half a watering can of water through the worm farm to keep it moist.  Then I collect the valuable liquid in a 2 litre ice cream container.

I then add 1 litre to the watering can, and then.....

you guessed it, top it up with water.

I use this on vegetables after I have already watered them.  As with all liquid fertilisers you have to be careful because if you only give the dry soil fertiliser, then the plant has no choice than to suck up all the nutrients.  Plants prefer to take it up at their own rate, not in one big hit.  So hence the watering before adding this brew.

Both fertilisers are so easy to make and not only help the plants, but add life back into the soil in the form of microbes.  So if you have a particularly poor soil, don't just use this type of liquid gold.  Make sure you add lots of organic matter (some dig it in, some don't), and mulch, mulch, mulch.  It won't be long before you have healthy soil, and the plants will thank you for it in the form of an abundant crop.

Liquid gold was never so easy to make.  I makes me wonder why I ever bought that organic liquid stuff when it is so easy to make your own!

Does anyone have a different method?

Wise Words Wednesday?

I have been harping on about all things sustainable living for a long time.  Over that time I have come to realise that there are many good number of readers out there who have just so much to share in abundance.  So I would like to tap into that vast knowledge base.

As one of my goals this year is "More Maintenance, Less Projects", I need to focus on servicing the many needs that my urban farm demands.  To do this I also need to blog less, and stop replying to the constant stream of requests for help via email.  I don't really want to do this so I have come up with a plan.

My plan is to turn over the blog to all my readers each week for the 'Wise Words Wednesday' post.  Sounds exciting doesn't it?  Well I think it is.  Here is how I see it playing out.  I post one of requests for help that I receive during the week (with the senders permission of course), and I will request that you, the reader, have a crack at answering it via a comment.  You can leave links to posts of your own if you like as well as long as it is pertinent to the question.  I don't mind.  Take the time to promote yourselves while you are at it.  We could all do with a little self promotion in this lifestyle, that's for sure.

So now you know the plan, here is the first question from L.

Hi Gav, 

I'm hoping you will be able to help me - I'm really new to this.

I bought an old Fowlers Vacola electric unit second-hand, similar to the one that you use.

I've been reading very carefully about the latest guidelines for water bath canning tomatoes, and they state that they should be processed for 85 minutes with 1/4 tsp of citric acid added (per pint jar).

Anyway, I had all my jars in the Fowlers unit and started adding the water, only to find that the water spews out the thermometer hole when the water level reaches that point. It seems it is impossible to submerge my #20 size jars completely, and it would be even worse for really large sizes.

Now I know that these Fowlers units were manufactured a long time ago and food safety knowledge wasn't what it is today, but am I missing something? Surely the water should completely submerge the jars?

Is it impossible to water bath preserve tomatoes safely using the unit I have?

I've also posted my question on Rhonda's Down to Earth forum, but I think you are my best bet because you have the same type of unit.

I'd really appreciate your thoughts if you have the time. Thanks so much!

L.

I will pass it over to you.  How do you get the most out of your Fowlers Vacola preserving system, and does anyone have the answer to L's specific questions?


Thanks everyone!

The Ultimate Clay Cob Oven Video

It has been 3 days in production, and with the aid of my new super computer, finally the most magical video that I have ever created is now live for the viewing.

Now if you are not a fan of my videos, please take the time to watch this one.  It is something very special.  I took over 9 hours of video footage and compressed it into 8 minutes 45 seconds.  I look like I am Superman, and Kim said that I have never worked so fast in my life!




As this is the Ultimate Cob Clay Oven video post, I thought it would be a great idea to list all of the posts in chronological order just in case new readers are after the details of how I built it.

1. Cob Oven Base Part 1
2. Cob Oven Base Part 2
3. Clay Cob Oven Top
4. Clay Cob Oven Flue
5. Clay Oven First Layer
6. Clay Cob Oven Progress
7. The First Pizza!
8. Clay Cob Oven Progress - Part 2
9. Clay Cob Oven Mosaics
10. Clay Cob Oven Mosaics Complete
11. Learning To Cook In The Cob Oven

I must admit that it has been idle for a couple of months until the heat and the corresponding total fire bans die down here in Victoria.  Then in Autumn it will be full steam ahead (pardon the pun).  I am looking forward to putting on some front doors for the wood storage area and to firing it up again for some yummy pizza, bread and roasted vegetables!

Bon Appetite!

Chili and Chicken. A Match Made in Heaven

You may think that this post is going to be a recipe.  On the contrary, it is a recipe for disaster!

Now if you or I ate about 25 green jalapeno chillies, we would be sore for a month.  Not only would it burn your lips, throat, stomach, and the nether regions, it would burn if you rubbed your eyes, nose, and any other sensitive area of skin.  You would think that this would be the same for most animals.  But I did not take into account the remarkable consitiution of the humble backyard chicken!

You see, up until about 3 hours ago, I was the proud owner of two heavily laden jalapeno bushes, with chilies just about to go from green to black, then to firey red.  This is what they look like now.

As you can see, picked clean.  No chilies or leaves for that matter, only a few flowers up high!  If it was not Teddy (in the background), then who was it?

Here is one of the culprits.

Esther the chili chomper!  Her and her flock were helping me keep the cooch grass at bay, but decided on a more tasty morsel, being my chili bushes.

So how do they get away with eating a plant that would have us swollen and sore?  I searched the interwebs and stumbled on this fact from New Scientist.

"Research reported in July 2001 suggests that the chilli's fiery taste deters creatures who are poor at dispersing the plant's seeds. Fortunately for the poultry industry, this does not include birds. Birds appear not to have the receptors to the hot pungent part of the peppers. It appears not to affect them in any way."

Not only does it not hurt them as I had first feared, it also kills some of the notorious food-poisoning bacterium Salmonella in their intestines.

Then I found this from The Straight Dope;

"The reason chilies incorporate capsaicin in their fruits (and red/green peppers of course are fruits in a botanical sense, not vegetables) seems to be to ensure that their seeds are dispersed properly. When small birds consume the fruits of wild peppers the seeds pass through the gut undigested and, due to the birds' flight range, are deposited in distant places where they can grow with less competition. If the fruits were consumed by larger mammals the seeds would either be digested, or deposited much closer to the parent plant. Studies have shown that the seeds of wild peppers are in fact dispersed almost exclusively by birds."

Natures way of ensuring the survival of the chili gene!

So the moral of the story is that if you have any prize winning chilies, then keep your beady eyed little hens away from them at all costs, or end up with a couple of twigs like I did.  Talk about being peeved or what.  I was going to make another batch of my hot chili chutney with those chilies.  Now I can forget it completely. 

Naughty chickens.  At least they laid me four eggs before they destroyed the bush.

One of sustainable living's humorous moments.  I am glad there are so many of them.