Real Life Inspiration

I won't be posting much this week, as we have lots of house guests staying for the week.  I will be enjoying time with family, which is something everyone needs now and again.

However, tonight I am going to leave you with the most inspirational YouTube video I have ever seen. 

It is about a young man from Malawi called William Kamkwamba, who wanted to change his world for the better and achieved more than he could have ever dreamed of.  Watch it for your self.  I guarantee that it will move you as it did me.

William Kamkwamba: How I harnessed the wind

I hope you now feel that anything is possible if we put our mind to it.  Think of what we as a species could achieve if we were all as determined to change our world for the better as William did?  I feel truly moved that I had the privilege to watch him speak.  Lets not take things for granted and treasure everything we have in our lives as a gift.

Gav

Busy Posting At Other Blogs

My turn again over at the Simple, Green, Frugal Co-op with Cheese Making Tips.  It is a compilation of all the lessons I have learnt over the 8 months or so that I have made cheese as my hobby.  Please pop on over and have a read.

I have also been campaigning up a storm over at the Melton Sustainable Living Group Inc website, with a post titled, "An Eye on Climate Change".  It also has a link to the Oxfam Australia site who are running a campaign before the Climate Change negotiations due in December at Copenhagen.  I urge you to sign the petition and send yet another message to our elected officials who one day may listen to the will of the people. The more we send, the more they may understand that we are definately concerned about the number one issue that faces the human race.  Here is a copy of my edited form letter that I sent her.

Dear Senator, the Hon Penny Wong,

I want Australia to take a lead in the international negotiations for a fair global agreement to tackle climate change. I am aware that our Pacific neighbours are already dealing with the impacts of climate change, and so is our own country over the last few years. Today's dust storm across the eastern states is a fine example of the consequences of our inactions so far.

I read the blog reports from the UN climate E-monitors project and believe that Australia could be taking much stronger action to help the people of the Pacific.

I was disappointed to see that the Call to Action issued at the close of the recent Pacific Islands Forum failed to endorse emission reduction targets consistent with what the science tells us: that rich countries must reduce carbon emissions by 40% by 2020 if we are to avert catastrophic climate change.

Climate change is already having an impact on Pacific people through storm surges, more frequent cyclones, coastal erosion and loss of clean water and farmland.

I urge the Australian Government to advocate at the United Nations climate talks for a collective emissions reduction target for rich countries of at least 40% by 2020. Without that scale of commitment, many Pacific communities will face extreme impacts and dislocation.

Given developing countries will also need to reduce their emissions and adapt to climate change, I also urge the Australian Government to support actions within the UN process for wealthy countries to fund the adaptation and emission reduction costs of developing countries, including our Pacific neighbours. In particular I call on the Government to make an immediate public commitment to contributing Australia's fair share of the $180 billion dollars that will be needed from wealthy countries around the world annually to help fund emissions reductions and climate change adaptation in developing countries.

Finally, I ask that the Australian Government take action to help communities in the Pacific displaced by the impacts of climate change to relocate, to ease their anxiety about the future of their children, their livelihoods, and their cultural identity.

I look forward to seeing Australia play a positive leadership role in the UN climate negotiations at the G20 this week, and in Copenhagen in December 2009.

Yours sincerely,
Gavin

Modify it on the Oxfam site as you see fit.  I did!

Enjoy the other posts, and keep up the pressure on your elected officials wherever you may be on this big blue marble of a planet!

Willing Workers, But A Sad Ending

It is with a heavy heart and tears in my eyes that I write this post.  We had a wonderful afternoon, but a very sad evening, and all shall be revealed near the end.

When I got home from work today, we decided to weed the front garden and get rid of all of the golden oxalis before it had a chance to form their new bulbs for next year.  We started off great, and for about 10 minutes, Kim, Amy, Ben, the two dogs and I were working away (well most of us anyway) filling up buckets with weeds. I had to take it easy because of the back and rested every 15 minutes, and did it on my hands and knees so to avoid any back strain.  I then had a great idea, which I read about in the Seed savers book I got for fathers day.  Why not let the chickens help us out, and they can eat and dig out all the weeds with us.  They might even reduce the bug population while they were at it.  Well, it took a little convincing with some sunflower seeds, but we got them all out into the front orchard and away they went.  Have a look at the video to see what they got up to this afternoon.  Please watch the video before reading on further.

Anyway, we worked for two hours, everyone working diligently away.  When complete, the wheelbarrow was full and the orchard looked great.  All the new fruit trees have leaves or buds ready to bust open. 

There was a couple of slackers, namely the dogs, Ben, and something was not quite right with Polly Chicken.  She looked out of sorts, even in the video she wasn't scratching around as ferociously as the rest of the chooks and prefered to be separate from the other three hens.  Kim and I had noticed that since moulting season started in about June, she started to look out of sorts.  We knew that she was at the bottom of the pecking order, because we had seen the other hens peck her quite often and she was always the last one to the food or kitchen scraps.  We also noticed that her comb on top of her head was the smallest out of all of them, and that the most eggs we had each day for months were only three maximum.  Someone was not laying, and hadn't for a quite a while.

So when it was time to go back to the chicken run after the weeding, we managed to get them all back to the run, and then something bad happened.   Polly Chicken collapsed and started to breath funny.  She looked like she was in a lot of pain and I rubbed her crop gently just in case she had something stuck and that seemed to do the trick after a while.  Kim even gave her some natural yoghurt as we had read that it is good for their digestion.  After about an hour of TLC, she looked like she was back to her old self again, and Kim even checked on her just before sunset and noticed that she had gone back into the coop and was eating some seed, then ducked into the hen house to go to bed.

At about 8pm, I had a wierd and funny feeling that something was wrong with Polly Chicken, so I went to check on the chooks just to make sure.  To my dismay, I found Polly limp, but still warm.  I went and got my torch to see if her pupils would dialate to see if she was just sleeping heavily, but no dialation or heart beat,  so I determined that she was dead.  She must have passed away about an hour before hand when she went to sleep.  With a tear in my eye, I told Kim who burst out crying, and so did the Ben and Amy.  We found a carboard box, and I rested her limp body in it, closed the lid up and put it back into the secure coop until morning.  Kim and Amy are going to dig a hole tomorrow and I will wrap her up in a cornstarch shopping bag, and bury her in the garden.  I know she was only a chicken, and that I am a sentimental old fool, but she was a hard worker, laid lots of yummy eggs, and we all enjoyed her company for the year that she was with us.  I am so glad we caught her on video this afternoon and that her last day was a happy one for her.

Rest in peace Polly Chicken.  Be happy, wherever you may be, and may the early bird always catch the worm.

After The Rain

Finally, it has started to rain a bit in our neck of the woods.  It rained so much overnight that the soil is moist down to about 30cm.  It has been so long since we had a decent down pour that it brought joy to my heart and I had to take a movie of what it looked like after the rain and around our house and some of the eco features that you may have only seen in photos.

I don't think the screen ratio is right, but will have to fix it up in the next video that I post.  It was good to use a video camera I picked up for $218, that can do High Def, so you will so a few more tutorials on the blog.  Instead of pictures, there will be video "how to.."

Enjoy.

Veggie Curry and Rice Soup

What a delicious yet cheap meal I just made!  Kim had an inkling for soup for dinner, and I fancied something with curry.  We like those dehydrated Dutch Curry & Rice soups that Continental make, but they are not sustainable, cost too much, have too much packaging, nor probably good for you with all those chemicals that pretend to be food.

So I decided to attempt and make my own version, which, if I may say so, turned out even better than the packet mix.  The taste was fantastic, and we had all the ingredients at hand, so that was a bonus.  I rewrote the basic recipe that I found at Grandpa Pencil.

Gav's Veggie Curry & Rice Soup

Serves 4. 

2 Tablespoons olive oil
2 Brown onions
2 Cloves garlic
1 teaspoon ground Turmeric
3 teaspoons Curry Powder
2 medium carrots, cubed
2 medium potatoes, cubed
1 half cup uncooked white rice
1 quarter teaspoon ground ginger
3 cups vegetable stock
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 teaspoon salt
400ml can coconut milk/cream
Pepper to taste

Halve and thinly slice the onions, and finely chop garlic.  Heat the oil in a heavy pan and gently fry the onions and garlic until soft but not brown.  Add the turmeric, curry powder and ginger to the pan and continue to fry for 1 minute.  Pour in the stock and coconut cream, add vegetables, salt, pepper, and rice and bring to the boil.

Cover and reduced to simmer for 25 minutes, stirring frequently to avoid the rice from sticking to the bottom of the pan.  Simmer until carrots are firm, yet soft to the bite.  Add lemon juice and simmer for a further 2 minutes.

Serve immediately in individual bowls with flat bread or crusty bread rolls.

Bon Appetite

Steering In The Right Direction

After a week of pondering on my last two posts and reflecting upon all the comments, I am back with a more positive frame of mind.  I knew that others felt like I did, but I was amazed at how many, and didn't mean to bring you all down.  However, it was one comment that really resonated with me that was written by Chris from Bushland Project, on the post Cognitive Dissonance, who rightly pointed out that it is better to be at the helm of the Titanic and help steer it away from danger, rather than be paralysed with fear, and give up all hope and smack into the iceberg.  Her comment was a kind of wake up call for me, and I thank her, because I even managed to paralyse myself with my own words hence the lack of posts last week.  The last few posts had been gloomy, and for that I apologise.  I could make some crappy excuses that I have been in a lot of pain, and the pain relief has been doing weird things to my head, but I won't (even though I was).  Doom and gloom never inspired any individual to change the world for the better. 

It is only in positive deeds and actions that we will see the change towards a sustainable future, and whether governments and corporations want to join us on our journey, well, all the better.  After all, both these institutions are made up of people who also want a better world for their kids.  You know, I really should take my own advice.  That is exactly what this blog and my own journey is about;

An Ordinary Australian Man Who Has A Green Epiphany Whilst Watching A Documentary, Gets a Hybrid Car, Plants A Large Organic Vegetable Garden, Goes Totally Solar, Lowers Consumption, Feeds Composts Bins and Worms, Harvests Rainwater. All In The Effort To Reduce Our Family's Carbon Footprint So We Can Start Making A Difference For Our Children & Future Generations To Come.

Just look at the bold text as it was staring me in the face all along.  Of late, I have had a temporary lapse in judgement and maybe have been a negative influence.  This blog was not started to induced fear into peoples minds.  It was and will continue to set an example of what can and has be done on a limited budget so we can make a difference for our children's and future generations to come.  It was and still is built to show that with many little baby steps, a lot can be achieved towards combating climate change and to prepare for peak everything by a determined person.   We can all make the small changes as my family and I have if you choose to.  The choice is yours alone.

We can let our elected officials know what we think about their uninspiring policies and proposals.  In 1936, Franklin D. Roosevelt said that, "A government can be no better than the public opinion which sustains it". I agree and believe this to be true, so our only option is to change our opinion, moving towards the sustainable, and it is, albeit slowly.  We have made so much amazing progress, but we need to force the issue even harder.  Please join me in this effort whenever or wherever you can.

We definitely can show corporations that we will no longer put up with their unsustainable antics.  This possible with the colour of our money by consciously choosing what we consume stuff.  It is our choice alone, and after all, it seems of late, that money is the only thing that has the power to make change, either negatively or positively.  This quote hits the nail on the head squarely;

An ethical person ought to do more than he's required to do and less than he's allowed to do. - Michael Josephson.

So, from now on, I promise a lot less doom and gloom unless I really need to vent badly (but I will warn you in advance that the post will be a rant), and focus on more educational posts about what we can all do to reduce our impact on the planet, keeping it habitable for our descendants and all species, and of course continue with the quirky and sometimes humorous adventures of the Greening of Gavin (and family)!

Cognitive Dissonance

The main reason I wrote my last post about comparing the Titanic disaster to our looming global problems was because of cognitive dissonance.  I felt a burning desire to explain these events in terms that most people could understand, whether they chose to believe my comparison or not.  For those unfamiliar with the term, Wikipedia describes it as;

Cognitive dissonance is an uncomfortable feeling caused by holding two contradictory ideas simultaneously. The "ideas" or "cognitions" in question may include attitudes and beliefs, the awareness of one's behaviour, and facts. The theory of cognitive dissonance proposes that people have a motivational drive to reduce dissonance by changing their attitudes, beliefs, and behaviours, or by justifying or rationalising their attitudes, beliefs, and behaviours.

So my two contradictory ideas that I hold simultaneously in my head, that is causing me an uncomfortable feeling is;

A.  That we are on the cusp of a global shit storm; hence the Titanic story, and

B.  Everywhere I look around me, everyone is going on with their business as if there is nothing wrong and everything is smelling like roses.  Even the global recession is over, so many commentators are saying (which I don't believe for a second.)

Is it just me with this battle going on in my brain?  Some days I feel like it is going to explode, because everything I believe to be true about climate change, peak oil, resource depletion, environmental destruction, etc, I can see around me in small everyday things, but no one else around me seems to notice anything, except a minority of concerned citizens and politicians, few concerned bloggers and about 500 protesters that stormed the Hazelwood power station.

Do others share my pain?  Please let me know, and put me out of my misery!  Either way, I don't mind, just share, please.

Yet The Band Played On..

Who feels like we are all on the RMS Titanic, sailing full steam ahead, not knowing that the iceberg was about to appear on the horizon?  I do for one.

The passengers and crew of this mighty vessel were unaware of the fate on its maiden voyage, as are most of the 6.7 billion passengers also unaware of the fate that awaits the Mothership Earth.  This post is not meant to offend the memories of the Titanic tragedy, but to offer a simple comparison against the events of that voyage, and the plight of our current civilisation and vessel that holds and nurtures us.

There is a strong connection to the RMS Titanic story within our family.  My wife Kim's Great Grandfather, William James Major, was a fireman on-board this ship, and luckily happened to be off-watch at the time the great ship struck the iceberg. Had he been at his post and in one of the boiler rooms fulfilling his duty, his chances of survival would have been slim indeed.  He was one of the crewmen allocated to lifeboat #13, and out of the 2,227 passengers and crew members who set sail, only 705 Titanic passengers and crew survived, him being one of them.  That is a 31.6% survival rate.  There were many factors that lead to the sinking of the Titanic on her maiden voyage, and I shall attempt to compare some of these events to the apparent chosen path of the passengers of Mothership Earth, if we to continue to maintain our current course and speed.

The Titanic was deemed by many to be 'unsinkable' which instilled a false sense of security amongst the passengers and crew.  The captain,  Edward Smith was a capable seaman and this was planned to be his retirement voyage.  Also on-board were Bruce Ismay, Chairman of the White Star Line.  Mr Ismay had a point to prove, and wanted to be the first trans-atlantic liner to set a new record crossing time.  The bridge crew and the helmsmen were never really in control of this behemoth of a vessel, but mere puppets as you shall read later.  So it was inevitable that the order from Mr Ismay to the Captain upon setting sail from Cherbourg, was to increase power, and therefore speed for the entire voyage.  So with the course set in, and power and speed increased, with no regard of the safety of the vessel. Yet the band played on.

So, image the bridge crew as governments around the world, and liken the Captain, Mr Ismay, and the powerful owner of the White Star line, Mr Ismay's father as the greedy corporations of our current time.  We, my friends are the passengers and crew of this mighty Mothership Earth.  Increased power for the corporations, and relaxation and comfort for all those who choose to sail on her, and everything we would ever need even if we don't know we actually need it yet.

To the unknowing passengers of the Titanic, some of the lifeboats had been removed to make way for a gymnasium for first class passengers.  This left the ship without a full capability of lifeboats should the unthinkable happen to the unsinkable!  I compare this to our current fossil fuel situation.  Very soon or maybe already peak oil and natural gas production will be reached and there will not be enough for every body.  Many on Mothership Earth will start to miss out, and indeed many already do, and panic will prevail, just as it did on the Titanic.  Yet, the band played on.

Many ice warnings were sent to the ship during the voyage, in fact 21 warnings including 7 on the day of the tragedy.  As ordered the Titanic steamed onward at top speed towards the reported pack ice that was drifting down from Greenland.  The two radiomen on-board passed the warnings to the bridge officers throughout the day, and these in turn were passed on to Captain Smith who ignored them, due to the insistence of Mr Ismay.  The radiomen were mostly kept busy during the day sending stock market messages from the wealthy on-board and receiving quotes back from the NYSE.  Even when the radiomen received a signal at 11pm from the steamship Californian, who was 10 miles to the Northwest, to inform the Titanic that she had stopped for the night by ice blocking her way.  One of the radiomen on the ill fated ship sent back a snappy reply, "Shut up old man I'm busy."
So to compare the two, the science community have given us all, including governments, many warnings about climate change and so far have done little to prevent its occurrence.  The media, corporations and economists are infatuated by continued economic growth to the detriment of the resources supplied on loan to us by Mothership Earth.  We are ignoring our own form of ice warnings including melting global ice caps and the worlds glaciers.  Quite an ironic comparison really.  It was an iceberg that sank the Titanic and it will be melting ice that sinks and disrupts the climactic patterns of the Mothership Earth!  We are all so busy trying to get to where we think we should be, we are forgetting about the vessel that carries us on our daily voyage.

As the Titanic sailed through the night, the wealthy upper class dine in opulence before retiring for the night, and the steerage class passed time, reassured by the noise of the engines and flow of seawater upon the steel hull.  A new country and life awaited many of them, all hoping for better opportunities.  Little were any of them aware that the ship was not unsinkable and there was a design flaw in the watertight compartments.  If a certain number of the watertight compartments flooded, there was a good chance that the ship would sink.  What does that mean in our current time period?  We drive our cars, thinking that petroleum products will be available at the service station, that there will be food in the supermarket shelves, and water will run when we turn on the tap.  We live in a disposable culture, only recently discovering the value of recycling in the western world.  Opulence in the west, and dreams of a western way of life in developing nations reminds me of the different classes on-board the ship.  The Mothership Earth also has a design flaw of sorts.  A limited carrying capacity and not enough lifeboats!  We have way overshot the planets carrying capacity due to the abundance of cheap oil to grow massive amounts of food, and and now are confronted by limited natural resources.  Both issues are similar to the capacity of the ship and the limited lifeboat capacity of the Titanic on that dreadful night.

At 11:40pm in calm weather and on a clear night, the mighty vessel struck an iceberg that ripped a hole in the ships side that was long enough to fill many of the watertight compartments, thus forcing the 'unsinkable' to indeed become sinkable.  The crew of the ship attempted to avoid a head on collision, however due to the vessels speed and a flaw in rudder design, the ship still scraped the side of the massive iceberg.  Yet the band played on.

The passengers and crew were not aware of the impending danger that awaited them, in fact it wasn't until at least 30 minutes later that the crew were aware that she was taking on water.  Many of the passengers slept through the entire incident and had to be woken up to begin abandoning the ship.  From 12:15 am, the radiomen began sending their first distress signal, only to get a reply 10 minutes later from the Carpathia.  Within two hours the Titanic was sinking bow first, with the watertight compartments flooding one after the other, and the radio failing due to lack of power from the flooding engine rooms.  The crew, who were totally unprepared for this type of event struggled to launch what lifeboats they had, and struggled to convince many bewildered passengers that this was necessary for their safety.  Many passengers must have thought that if the ship were so unsinkable, why where they being forced onto the lifeboats.  Many would drown, especially from third class and steerage, simply because there were not enough lifeboats and the ones that were launched were not filled to capacity.  The radio message sent at 1:45 am was the last message and it read, "Come as quickly as possible".  It was sent in hope, as the last of the lifeboats pulled away from the sinking ship.  Still the band played on until the deck was so tilted that they couldn't sit and play.  Those not safely on a lifeboat stood little hope of more than a few minutes of survival due to the freezing temperature of the water.  The Captain went down with the ship, as did the first officer, however Mr Bruce Ismay was one of the first onto a lifeboat. 

So, with all the scientific warnings, and with many dire new discoveries of approaching tipping points regarding climate change, with our population having gone from 1.6 billion in 1900 to 6.7 billion in 2009 due to the abundance of cheap oil, and with our resources dwindling whether they be fossil fuels (stoking climate change and overpopulation) or precious minerals and natural resources including land and mass species extinction, are we about to hit the same proverbial iceberg?  It paints a pretty grim picture when compared to a real life event that could have been avoided.  As with the Titanic, instead of steaming ahead at top speed, we need to reassess, and slow to avoid the impending disaster that soon await the fate of all who are passengers on Mothership Earth.  Is our rudder too small, and that we may not be able to turn away soon enough, with the speed of progress, growth at all costs, resource depletion, and increasing carbon emissions hold back our inability to act in time.  As for the crew, who resemble current day governments, are failing to act decisively, because of the pressure exerted upon them by the corporations like Mr Ismay and the board of the White Star Line.  Will this pressure be too great, with vested interest lobbying our poor, misguided crew at every chance?  What will happen the the passengers of Mothership Earth?  Will there be enough lifeboats, or will there be a mass die-off as in the case of the Titanic with the lower classes bearing the brunt of disaster?  These questions go unanswered as yet, but there are signs that we may be approaching the "iceberg", with the majority of the passengers of Mothership Earth blissfully unaware, and still dressed in their finest clothes dinning, or in this case, consuming until they drop, egged on by governments and corporations.  As with the Titanic, there will be survivors, how many are unknown as yet, but there have been estimates that our carrying capacity may be reduced to as little as 500 million to 1 billion passengers.  I am not saying that the disaster is inevitable, we just need to slow or steer away, by reducing consumption, reducing emissions, and stabilising or reducing population growth. 

As the passengers of Mothership Earth are loaded onto what ever form of lifeboat is available, will they still be wondering "Why?  I thought we were unsinkable!"

Electricity Stats 2009 So Far....

Everyone knows that I love a good graph, so it was about time I posted some energy statistics.

The first graph (click to enlarge), shows our total electricity usage average per day each month.  In August it reached an all time low (for this year) of 10.76 kWh per day which is pretty good.  I am expecting the next few months to be a little bit higher because of all the guests we will be accommodating in late September and early October.

This next graph shows how the electricity that we used was generated.  Brown for dirty coal, Green for Solar PV, and blue as the total usage for the household.  We also noticed on our power bill the other day that for whatever reason the 100% GreenPower tariff has been removed and it was replaced by 25% Green wind power.  I better enquire about that post haste.  Maybe the energy retailer can't keep up with GreenPower demand in this state?  Because they removed this, I am responsible for GHG emissions over the last billing period.  Not good, for someone who is supposed and reports to be uber green.  That equals 496.8 kg of CO2e attributed to my household.  Not good enough, so it will be fixed lickety split with Origin Energy.  I may have offset that carbon already by planting the 10 fruit trees in the front orchard over the same period, so I don't feel too guilty :-)

Anyway, everything looking good, and with longer sunny days nearly upon us, there will be more Solar PV than grid electricity used anyway.  I am hoping to get a negative power bill over the spring season, but we will just have to wait and see.  I am glad that the purchase of the cheese cave has not made a material impact on our energy usage, so I can still have a big smile on my face when stuffed with cheese and crackers!

Moving Forward

When times are tough, it is sometimes hard to get motivated.  I enjoy writing so this blog doesn't seem to me like a task, but more like a healthy therapy.   So does writing over at the Simple, Green, Frugal Co-op.  It gives me a chance to reach a wonderful audience with about 10 times the readership of my own blog, which is weird really, because we all write about the same sort of stuff and experiences.

Today's post at the Co-op was written by yours truly, and is a bit of a weird one.  It starts off low and ends on a high.  Partly because I wrote the first part whilst in a fair bit of pain and before I took my pain medication, and the second half is a call to alms to help fight climate change after the pain settled down!  Go figure, however I have proof read it twice now and wouldn't change a world (except for the spelling mistakes because the spellchecker seems to have gone missing on the new blogger editor).

So, please take the time to have a read of the post and let me know your thoughts about "Moving Forward When Times Are Tough".

Hoping all are well with you and yours

Gavin

Seed Raising Mix For 1st Spring Planting

I had a day off last Wednesday, so looked up the moon planting calendar, and it was a good time to plant most above ground seeds. But alas, I had no seed raising mix, so like last year I decided to make my own. Not one single ingredient was purchased from a store for which I am very proud to say.

Here is my very basic recipe. You need a garden sieve, a couple of 10 litre buckets, and a big tub to mix it all up in.

I used the following ingredients.

• 2 buckets of sieved compost (which once sieved equated to about 1 bucket in the tub)
• 1 bucket of fine coconut coir
• quarter of a bucket of sheep manure, crushed finely (in sack with lump of wood) and sieved
• 5 big double handfuls of worm castings.

This is a big handful of the end result in my big tub.  The mixture filled the top when I started!

All ingredients mixed well with gloved hands for about a good 10 minutes for even distribution. Then wet down with only a little water mixed with seaweed solution so that it was moist but not damp. If I squeezed it, no water would come out. I did a quite pH test with a tool I bought long ago and forgot I had, and it was about neutral, so no need to add anything else to balance it. The mix this year is about the same as last year, but instead of sheep manure, I used horse manure and a lot of grass sprouted as well, which confused me for a while as to what was the deliberate seed and what was the weed! However, if you don't have these ingredients around your home, just buy some good quality seed raising mix at your local nursery. It shouldn't cost you very much, but not half as satisfying as making your own!

Then I went searching for all of the seed trays and punnets I have been saving and filled them all with my special seed raising mix. I ended up with quite a few filled and even a few little pots for some bigger seeds.

This is what I ended up planting:

Spacemaster Cucumbers, and Greenskin Zucchini (to the right), Tomatoes to the left. Purple Russian Tomato, Tigerella tomato, Broad yellow current tomato, Tommy Toe tomato, Mortgage Lifter tomato, Purple Tomarillo, and Eggplants.

Warragal Greens and some basil (saved seed)

Baby corn (popping corn) to the right, and a complete tray of salad greens, all different types. You might be able to tell from the photo if it enlarges.  Things like Goldrush, Mizuna, Mesculan mix, Freckles bunte, Italian lollo mix to name a few.

I want to save lots of seed this year and have already grown some lettuce seedlings from seed I saved last year, as I mentioned in this mornings post.. They are doing well in big pots and should be ready for harvest in about 3 weeks time. All the seeds I planted were purchased from Diggers club a few years ago, but like I said, I want free seeds, and be able to keep the varieties I grow true to type and hopefully varieties that are acclimatised to our dry weather.

I am hoping that the weather stays warm enough in my little green house. It has no roof at the moment, but Kim and I will be rectifying that over the next few days. The plastic walls are enough to keep the heat in during the day, and I tested the soil temp which in each tray was between 18-20C. Just right for most of them. Time will tell, and some of the seeds are about 3 years old so I am not sure that most will germinate. I planted way too many, but that is always a good thing in an organic garden. Knowing my luck, all will sprout, and there will be many presents for friends and neighbours.

Also, on Saturday, Kim and I mulched the Garlic, leek and onion beds, as they were drying out to quickly.  the mulch is well dried chicken coop litter, and is full of chook poo as well.  I gave the entire bed a sprinkle of blood and bone before laying down the mulch and watered in very well.

We also gave the broad bean patch the once over as well, as it to was drying out too quickly now that the weather is warming up.

Here is a shot of the black mulberry tree that Adam got me for Fathers Day.  It is a little hard to make out, but because I don't have photo editing software on this PC, it is the best I could do.  The tree even has berries on it already.

Now that we have a bit of room next to the garage and fence line, we decided to put a small bed where the compost bins were for a while.  It should be full of nutrients, and will be where the pop corn gets planted out.  It will receive full sun from the end of Sept to about the middle of March, so and ideal summer plot.  I did the bricks and Kim turned it over a little to get rid of some of the roots from next doors' small tree.

It is a funny shape, but then again nature works in the same sort of way!  It should be about a month before we plant out here.  It get plenty of water when it rains as you can see as well.
So, happy spring planting to all in the Southern Hemisphere, and if it is not too cold happy Autumn planting in the Northern Hemisphere.  Well, happy planting where ever you may be.

Seed Saving By Chance

I am kind of new to this fun occupation of seed saving, so I needed to find out more information. Whilst we were visiting St Erth on Saturday, Kim said that Ben wanted to buy me a book for Fathers day. We looked through the selection, of which I had read many, by borrowing from the library, but this one book kind of jumped out at me, because it was something I just absolutely needed to learn. Ben gave me the book, early on Sunday morning.

Seed saving is a skill that will most certainly help us survive in whatever the future may bring. Anyway, the book is the "Seed Savers' Handbook" by Michel and Jude Fanton.

I have only read the first two chapters, and is makes a lot of sense to save the seed that your own garden provides you for free. There are many reasons why you should, but I won't rant on about them in this post. The company Monsanto come to mind, but like I just said, I shall not rant on in this post. I will continue to read the rest of the book to learn more, but now I will tell you about my successes and failures of seed saving so far, which occured mainly by chance.

During my first year of vegetable gardening, I planted some purple podded peas that I purchased from the Diggers club. Every year since that first harvest, I have always left some pods on the vine to go hard and have collected the seeds. Every year, I have replanted those seeds with outstanding success, and have a massive crop of these wonderful and sweet tasting, but weird looking peas each winter. This first success made me think that there must be ways to collect the other seeds from all plants, but back then, I was not much of an experimenter in the garden, I just wanted to be able to grow stuff, because apart from watching my Dad many moons ago, and reading lots of books, I had bugger all practical gardening experience. I was making it up as I went along! Back in year one (2007), I did quite well, but have come so far since then.

Last year, in my second year of vegetable gardening in about August, I noticed that in two of the citrus tree pots, there were many tomato seedlings coming up all by themselves. These as I now know are called 'volunteers', and I had to remember back to the season before to think about what variety of tomato grew closest to these pots. I had volunteer tomatoes coming up in two separate citrus tree pots which were over 2 metres apart. Surely they were not the same variety, as I had planted many types of tomatoes in that first summer. I figured that in the Mandarin pot, the volunteers most probably would be Tommy toe, and in the Lemon pot, they could be Tigerella's. So treasuring these volunteers, I made up some potting mix, and carefully replanted as many seedlings as I could and labeled them accordingly. In the end, I had so many volunteers that I managed to plant out two entire beds with them, and I even gave a few away as gifts. I was mainly right in my assumptions, and even ended up with a few Purple Russians for my troubles! What a bonus.

I also noticed that I was getting volunteer lettuce and cucumbers from compost that I mixed into each bed, but with the cucumber being commercial hybrids I had read somewhere that they would not grow true to type, so I wisely pulled them out. The lettuce on the other hand, I let grow, and they were delicious. This got me thinking. I did let a lettuce go to flower in that first year, mainly because I was not watering them enough, that most lettuces became bitter quickly and bolted to seed soon after. The flowers were pretty enough so I pulled them after the flowers died and composted the lot.

So, at the end of the second year, I let a lettuce and a daikon radish go to seed. Both on purpose, mainly because I wanted to see what the complete cycle of the plant looked like, and to see if I could indeed collect the seed consciously and without nature helping spread it all over the place for me. I managed to collect the lettuce seed from a gold rush lettuce, planted them this year and they have grown true to type. Success. I also planted some daikon and it grew as well. Double success.

Summer came along and now I was feeling a little more adventurous, so I saved some seed from a commercially grown Kent pumpkin. I planted them out, and guess what? Only one pumpkin grew to about 3cm then turned yellow and fell off. I planted four of these seedlings, and all they had were male flowers. Not a female in sight. I had fallen victim to the hybrid seed once again. I should have remembered from the second year. I was so angry at the end of the season, that I roasted the seeds I collected and ate them all! It was the only useful thing I could have probably done with them in the first place.

So at the end of last summer, I collected Basil, Parsley, Dill, Gold rush lettuce, and purple podded peas. The lettuce seedlings are growing strong, and I planted the basil and parsley last week, and am eager to see what happens. Now that I have the seed savers' handbook, I am going to try and collect many more seeds purposely this year. Sounds like it could be very good fun, and a very cheap way to keep your garden producing for virtually no further cost.

Here's to a great season of seed saving. Live long, and prosper all my pretty plants!

St Erth Garden - Part 1

Saturday was a great day for a morning trip, and both Kim and I had been looking forward to getting out of the house all week. I was in the mind that I didn't really care how long it took to get there and how many stops we needed to make, we were going to make it with minimal fuss and pain.


The trip was a lot shorter than we thought, and was only about 30 km from home. Blackwood, where the St Erth Garden is situated, is in the centre of the Wombat State Forest, and is in a very beautiful part of the country. The forest had been burnt out about 5-6 years ago, but even though the tree trunks were black, most had grown back, but what amazed us the most was that there was not many ferns or undergrowth that had grown back. Maybe that is a good thing?


Anyway, when we arrived, we pulled up next to an elderly couple who asked us if we were going on the hike. We looked at each other, and I replied that we were just going to have a look at the garden. Apparently, there was a group hike organised for the John Chan track into the forest. I don't think that Kim, Ben and I would have made it to the first kilometre, let alone the entire hike. We all walked away from the car park and this is the first thing we saw (other than the hikers).

Absolutely beautiful. All that waste to the bottom left was picked up about 10 minutes later by one of the gardeners. As we proceeded to the entrance, we passed some plant tables that Kim whisked me past.

There were about 5 rows of seedling tables from ornamental, natives, to fruit and vegetables. I could have spent just an hour looking at all that stuff before we even went into the garden!

We entered via the little miners cottage that serves as the store and main entrance to the rest of the garden. The staff were friendly and I showed my Diggers members card and coughed up the $10 for Kim. Ben got in for free. We received a map to the grounds, and departed via this lovely doorway.

Down the path and around to the right, at the bottom of the steps to the espalier fruit tree garden we spied this sundial.

It was about half an hour fast, but how can you change it. Ha.

Up more steps and this is what we saw. Fruit trees by the dozen, all espaliered to fit in as many as possible in a small space.

This one is a Cox Orange Pippin. I have one of these in my front yard orchard. Here is a shot of me attempting to suck in my belly in front of a pear tree!

After walking up each row, and trying to avoid all the kangaroo poo, we got to the veggie patches that were all covered with netting. I think the native wildlife might like to have a nibble on their greens, so they have to protect them. But on the way there were moss covered trees.

There were daffodils,

and other flowers that Kim just had to stop and take pictures of. I don't blame her, they were nice.

So, back to the veggie patches. Here they are finally. Well composted with a rich home made compost and well mulched beds, and paths ready for the soon to be warmer weather.

Garlic in the first bed (mine are bigger!),

curly kale in the second bed (I think),

broad beans in the third, both crimson and aquadulce.

Then a nice patch of garlic chives, which I sampled. Very garlicy! The last row had salad greens, lettuce, mustard greens, mizuna and some rainbow chard.

That was the end of the well protected veggie patch. Up the hill now to the berry patch.

Raspberry canes, still dormant,

juniper berries,

There were many others, but right at the very end was the rhubarb. Kim and I both started to think of apple and rhubarb crumble, and will plant some next chance we get.

That was basically the end of the edible garden, except for some herbs, but because these photos are taking forever to upload on this slow collection, I will show two more photos, and do a part 2 tomorrow.

This massive tree dominated the edible section of the garden with its delicate pink blossom. It was captivating.

And, alas, we stumbled upon Bill and Ben's final resting place among the succulents. It looked like a nasty accident. I do hope it was painless.

I will finish off part two tomorrow evening. Thanks to Kim for the wonderful photos. Stay tuned!

Father's Day 2009

Fathers Day for another year, it only seemed like it was yesterday!

I was awoken by Ben (9) and Amy (20, who slept over) and received some nice gifts. A seed savers book from Ben that I will do a separate post about, and a toolbox, pj bottoms and the yearly faithful pair of Grosby old blokes slippers. With big kisses and hugs, they went off to do something together as they are best mates!

The back was hurting like hell, so had to take some meds and Kim cooked me a wonderful full English breakfast. Scrambled eggs from the girls (thanks chookie ladies), baked beans, toast with butter, fried mushrooms, 3 rashers of bacon and a cup of hot English Breakfast Tea. Very nice indeed. I am not sure if the kids helped out, but it was very yummy. Amy had to leave early to go back to Ballarat where she lives, so more hugs and kisses (I like those) and she was off.

The meds took over after about 30 minutes, and I slept until 1pm, then managed to get out of bed when son Adam (22) arrived from his home in CBD Melbourne. He gave Kim $50 last week, with which we bought a black mulberry tree and large pot with yesterday. We had some good laughs, watched a very funny episode of Family Guy, in which Stewy kidnaps the entire cast of Star Trek - The Next Generation with the blue prints of the transporter he bought at a Star Trek Convention. Being a Star Trek fan, I laughed very, very hard, and it was just the medicine I really needed. Adam showed us some recent photos of his last few weeks, and we showed him the fantastic photos that Kim took at St Erth yesterday (separated post on that one as well). Then Megan (17) arrived home at about 3pm, gave me one of my favourite flannelette shirts as a present and we had a good chat. I had to lay down again for a little while on my heat pack to ease more bloody pain.

Before dinner which Kim and Megan were preparing, Adam helped me clean out the hen house and he distributed the manure throughout their scratching bed for them to do the hard work to turn some more clay into loam for me. The girls are such good little workers. He also swept the back veranda for me, to earn his dinner. Dinner was sausage with rossini, which is a rice shaped pasta. It kind of tasted like a big risotto but better. Then for desert, we had microwave sponge with homemade jam and walnuts. I was officially full of yummy food, and gave Kim a hug for putting on such a great day, because behind every great Fathers day is someone usually working hard in the background. The great payback is Mothers day, where I reciprocate the gesture. A pretty cool arrangement if I do say so myself. I gave my own Father a call to say gidday, who had a similar type of day in bed due to an inner ear disorder. We chatted for about 10 minutes, and I am so glad he and Norma are coming down for a visit in a few weeks. I miss the old bloke! We are going to have a home made cheese fest which I believe they are looking forward to. Kim's mum Pam also turns up about the same time, so it should be a great gathering.

I felt like a King for a day, surrounded by my loving offspring and showered with gifts. What more could a bloke ask for besides world peace, the end of poverty, and swift action on climate change!

I hope all you dads out there had a fantastic day as well.

Good Weather for Ducks

Well you have all heard the saying, so what a surprise we got this afternoon when these two flew in. It was a lovely day to spend swimming around the pool in the spring sunshine.

I am not quite sure why they chose our pool, but they hung around for most of the day.

Maybe they thought that if it was good enough for the chooks on the other side of the fence, that it was good enough for them. No sooner did they leave, then the rain came. We received more rain in about 3 hours than we have in the last three months and we only got about 4mm! Maybe our feathered friends were a good omen. Come back tomorrow team, please.

And after the rain, everything was soaked of course. The garden has had such a good drink only because I have raised beds, but as every gardener would say, I wish it would have rained all day. There are still strict water restrictions in Melton and the ground is bone dry. Dig down a couple of centimetres and it is hard as rock, and I don't see the situation changing during Spring either. Well at least the water tank is full for Summer, and I have plenty of shade cloth now to shade the tomatoes during the very hot weather. No cooked tomatoes for us on the vine this year thank you very much. I would rather do my cooking in the kitchen or on the BBQ! I believe it is called "adapting to Climate Change", which is something I wish we didn't have to do, and shouldn't have to if we all got off our collective bums and did something about it. That means the entire developed and growing developing nations in the world! Get on with it, please. Only a few months to Copenhagen, so do the right thing, please world leaders and leave the bullshit behind.

We are all off to St Erth, in Blackwood tomorrow to buy some veggie seeds and to look at the spring bulb exhibition. We missed it by a month last year and went to early. Hopefully we will catch it just at the right time of the year tomorrow.

I have already planted out lots of seeds for spring and made my own seed raising mix on Wednesday afternoon, but I will write about that tomorrow and about our little trip. It may take some time to get there as I can only sit for about 20 minutes before I get sore and the trip is about and hour each way, but I promised Kim that I would stick it out. We haven't been out for what seems like ages. Should be good fun.

Wind Turbine Syndrome?

I have heard a few clangers in my time, but now I have heard them all.  A book is about to be released by Dr Nina Pierpont from NY, USA, titled (you guessed it) Wind Turbine Syndrome.  Here is a quote from her website;

"Wind Turbine Syndrome is the clinical name I have given to the constellation of symptoms experienced by many (though not all) people who find themselves living near industrial wind turbines: sleep problems (insomnia), headaches, dizziness, unsteadiness, nausea, exhaustion, anxiety, anger, irritability, depression, memory loss, eye problems, problems with concentration and learning, tinnitus (ringing in the ears). As industrial windplants proliferate close to people’s homes and anywhere else people regularly congregate (schools, nursing homes, places of business, etc.), Wind Turbine Syndrome likely will become an industrial plague."

Have a look at this report from an extremely credible source (not) on YouTube if you don't believe me.

Hey, I could be proved wrong, and the good Doctor Nina may have stumbled upon something with her research, but I think I would rather live next to a wind turbine farm, rather than a coal, gas or nuclear power plant, wouldn't you?  I have a feeling in my water that this research may be subsidised by some vested interest in keeping the fossil fuel industry alive and kicking.  Make up your own mind, I have already!

Change Works In Mysterious Ways

I have been reflecting today, and without trying to big note myself or getting big headed, I believe that I have a special talent to help people through changes with a couple of simple methods. 

Change in peoples lives, especially the few about to hit mankind in a few years, can cause all sorts of emotions manifest themselves.  From terror, to guilt, to a sense of excitement, anticipation and opportunity.  There are many people who resist change, and would rather continue on with the status quo, however there are some people who relish change and create opportunities to bring others along for the journey, but in a special sort of way.  Everyone who reads this blog or stumbles across it knows what my goal or mission in life is by simply reading the left hand side bar which is about who I am and the basic things I have done, but it is the reason of the how and why I have these goals that is the important thing.


One of my ways to promote change is to lead by example.  This is something that I learnt whilst in the Royal Australian Navy.  I learnt that you cannot ask someone to do something, being a task, behaviour, or change a personal value, if you don't show that you practice that task, behaviour or have that value yourself.  Sure, in the military they most probably do it because of the command structure and discipline, however they won't do it willingly and morale suffers.  On the other hand, if they see the person leading by practising what he/she is preaching, then they follow willingly and with enthusiasm.  I attempt to live up to this "lead by example value" in all aspects of my life. That was one of the reasons that I didn't begin writing this blog until at least 6 months after our family began our journey towards a sustainable lifestyle.  Well, that and everyone urged me to write a book about what I had done, but I thought a blog was a better idea due to the interaction you receive via comments.  I wanted to explain the how and why I turned green and what my motivation was.  You can probably tell by the way I write that I am enthusiastic and passionate about all things green and sustainable, but you probably didn't know that one of my personal values is that I do what I say I am going to do.  Another of my core values is to try and not let people down when I make a promise. I believe that it is these simple values that rub off on people, who either know me in person or read about my exploits via my writings.  It inspires people to act in a positive way, towards a common goal. 

The second special way of helping people change is to do things in such a way that they think it was their own idea in the first place.  This can be in the form of a simple suggestion, a comment during a TV ad, or leaving a magazine or book conspicuously open to a certain page at work or at home.  It can be in the form of harmless propaganda, like a poster showing benefits of a certain way of doing things.  People may think that this is a deceitful way of getting things done, but that is exactly how marketing and advertising works all around us as well.  I believe that if you have a message to give, you might as well utilise the best known way to do so. 

Let me give you a simple example.  We used to spend lots of money on cleaning products, but now we use only two or three main items for cleaning bathrooms and the like.  Vinegar and Bicarbonate of Soda are about all we use, the cleaning products that our grandparents used to use.  Now to begin with my wife Kim detested the smell of Vinegar and didn't believe that bicarb would do as good a job as the shiny, new, advertised chemical petrolium based products.  I had to sutlely convince her so it sounded like her idea.  I must say that I was slightly deceitful in both examples.  The first was we ran out of Windex (a blue liquid window cleaner that stinks and makes me sneeze) kind of on purpose (my bad!).  I then suggested that we try vinegar and newspaper to clean the shower glass.  After a quick demonstration on how easy the vinegar got rid of soap scum and cleaned the glass, Kim was hooked.  That is all we use now, and I only had to make it seem that it was her idea.  Another example was with bicarb soda.  Once again we accidentally ran out of dishwasher tablets (you know, the ones that cost a fortune and are toxic).  I suggested a few tablespoons of bicarb in the bottom of the machine and some vinegar as rinse aid.  Guess what, as I expected it worked well and the dishes were wonderfully clean.  It even got rid of the smell in the machine!  Once it clicked, Kim thought that we should use it to clean the shower recesses as well which works very well to remove soap scum.  I even showed her my very cool method of making a stinky sink drain smell fresh and clean by pouring quarter of a cup of bicarb down the drain and then 5 minutes later tip the same amount of vinegar, and watch the fizzy show and the smell goes away and unblocks the drain.  Much better than highly caustic Draino!  As you can see, all it took was a comment or spark and it then became that other persons idea.  No fights, no arguments, no right or wrongs, just change for the better.  Now she tells all her friends about the miracle of vinegar and bicarb. She is a clever lady, my Kim!  Love her to bits.  Oh, BTW.  Now I have been requested to plant two orange trees in pots by you know who as well.  She loves the citrus we have so much, that more are required. I told you it works!

So, I suppose that the moral of the story and my method/talent that I have learnt through experiance is that if you tell some one to change they won't and will resist like a stubborn toddler or teenager, but if you lead by example and help them with and along the journey, change is not only inevitable, but fun as well.  This is how I find making changes to my sustainable lifestyle, easy, painless and fun.

If any readers have other subtle ways to promote change and convince others towards a more sustainable way of living (other than screaming at them), please add them via a comment.  This could turn into quite a little toolbox of tips!