Wild blackberries from the garden

In the back, I've got a native wild blackberry bush that's quite prolific, even when you cut it down to the ground every autumn. In the trail across from me, I've seen these same blackberry bushes in the wild as well as some wild raspberry bushes.

This is the first picking, probably with two or three left to go.

[ update: a few days later, another bowl ]

Ants in the garden: looking beyond the obvious and why not to kill them

This morning, I was sitting under the shade of a burdock plant that I've let grow far beyond what a lot of people would tolerate (these start out as small rhubarb-like "weeds" but will grow to human-height very quickly if allowed, and throw out huge umbrella-like leaves that are quite nice to sit under in the absence of other shade. Also, you can eat the roots.

I noticed ants crawling up and down the stem, onto each leaf, and around the perimeter of the top and underside of each leaf, as if they were on a racing circuit. They didn't seem to be eating the leaves at all, more like doing some kind of security surveillance. When I looked a bit further, I noticed a gathering near the top of the plant attacking (eating, presumably) what looked like a group of small black eggs that some other parasite had laid near the top of the plant. They were slowly eliminating this parasite.

In another spot in my garden, ants show up in large quantities. Whenever you walk nearby and just slightly disturb the soil, swams of them are apparent. It's actually quite worrying at first because the sight of so many in one place can be surprising. Since these ants tunnel into the soil and make mounds of decompacted soil that develop over time as the ants come and go from the surface, they had pretty much buried an entire rock border in my garden. Rocks that used to be on top of the soil were now underneath it. When I set about correcting this situation by levering the rocks up to re-seat them, underneath I noticed that the ants were voraciosly devouring what looked like maggot larvae. In the centre of the small garden surrounded by the rocks is an old tree stump on which a whiskey barrel planter sits. My guess is that the maggots are attracted to the decaying wood from the old tree under the soil, and that the ants are attacking the maggots.

I have no idea what type of maggots they are, but I know that some maggots can eat the roots of plants, but ants generally don't. They must have been in "attack" mode when I disturbed them because a bunch of them tried to eat my legs. My legs do look a bit like maggots, colour-wise.

In both cases, the ants are doing a good and positive job. and they are a symptom of a deeper problem and aren't a problem in themselves. When their job is done, they'll move on to something else. True to their reputation as hard and organized workers, it seems like they only really stay around as long as necessary and then move onto something else.

Children getting the work done

In the June/July 2009 edition of Mother Earth News was a photo of the process of slaughtering your own chickens, should you decide to keep some of your own in your backyard or on your farm. I was surprised by the photo, just because I so rarely see children doing such gritty work these days. Here's the photo:


It reminded me of a photo from Jamie Oliver's book of recipes associated with his travels around Italy -- "Jamie's Italy". In the excellent TV series that accompanied this theme (which was more culture than cooking), he went quite hands-on with the meat, including an occasion when he quite uncomfortably slaughtered his own sheep. But the book contains the image below, where they are draining what looks like a pig using what looks like the young Italian girls' paddling pool:

New Tori Amos album finally grows on me

After giving it a rest for a couple of weeks, I listened to it on the train again yesterday and liked almost every track. After awhile, you start to hear what's underneath the surface and get into the flow and now I rather like it!

One side effect is that I have caught myself singing one of the more catchy lines under my breath in public. Unfortunately, that line is:

That guy
At night makes me scream

Let's hope I can keep this under control.

Another leftovers recipe using remnants of canned tomatoes, green pepper, onion, and garlic

Another experiment that turned out well.

The leftovers:

• 1/4 of a green pepper (sweet)
• 1/2 can of tomatoes

The rest (there are all things that any self-respecting kitchen has in stock at all times)

• 2 tbsp. olive oil
• 1 handful dry farfale
• 1 small yellow onion
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1 tbsp. balsamic vinegar
• 1.5 cups water
• pinch of dried Italian herbs
• ground black pepper to taste
• parmesan cheese for dressing

Most of the leftovers recipes I've come up with lately have been the all-in-one-pan type. Cleanup is a lot easier! So, this time I tried cooking the dry pasta directly in the ingredients rather than preparing it separately in water, and it worked pretty well.

I used a sautee pan. I think it's essential for this because the large surface area lets you reduce the liquid very quickly, so that you can cook the pasta properly but without having too much water left in the sauce once the pasta is cooked. You could probably try with a smaller pan and less water, but then the surface area is also useful for the sauteeing part.

First, dice the onion, mince the garlic, and roughly chop the green pepper.

Heat a sautee pan over medium-high heat. Add 2 tbsp. olive oil right away and when it starts to smoke, add the onion, garlic, and green pepper. Sautee for about 3 minutes, shuffling with a spatula periodically.

Add a pinch of dried Italian herbs. This is usually cheap and in the dried herbs section labelled as "Italian seasoning" or something like that. I wanted to use basil, but there's none in the garden yet and I didn't have any. Don't over-do this "pinch". If in doubt, under-do it. Mix in and sautee for another 1 minute.

Add the Balsamic vinegar and stir it in right away. It will probably sizzle quite violently. Sautee for another minute or so.

Add the canned tomatoes and stir. Bring to a fast simmer.

Add the water and return to a fast simmer.

Now, add the farfale and stir it in so that it's submerged in the liquid.

Reduce the heat to medium-low and it should come down to a simmer. Let it simmer for about 12 minutes, stirring periodically. If it becomes too dry, add more water a small amount at a time and half-put the lid on the pan if it seems necessary (this will slow the evaporation of liquid).

It should have thickened up at this point. Season to taste with ground black pepper. Let stand in the pan for about 2-3 minutes, and then serve with grated parmesan on top.

Note that I didn't add any salt at all because canned tomatoes are usually high in salt, and parmesan has salt in it, too. If yours aren't, you will probably want to add salt.

Technorati: leftovers, recipe

Rain barrels and mosquitoes... and goldfish, all in or near Georgetown

I was surprised to read in today's Georgetown Independent that the town's rain barrel sale created havoc on town roads due to the incredibly high demand for the at-cost pricing of some rain barrels that the town had set up an event to sell. Apparently, they came stocked with 300 barrels and were sold out within 30 minutes.

That is a very nice thing to hear, though I wonder why there is so much interest. Clearly the town was not expecting it. But you can't water your lawn with a rain barrel and you can't drink the water, so what are the intentions, I wonder? Are vegetable gardens really making that much of a comeback?

On the topic of rain barrels... obviously, mosquitoes are a concern because rain barrels are a body of water that sits still for quite awhile -- until you use some water or it rains and starts to fill up again. You can get closed barrels and install screens, but did you know... that you can put a goldfish in your rain barrel and it will eat mosquito larvae? As long as there's oxygen going in and out of the barrel and you don't completely drain it and run the poor goldfish dry, you can do this, apparently.

In other news... the house next door to me hosts drug dealers and the house across from me has now been condemned. 2 down, 1 to go... maybe the fact that they just busted a $1 million grow-op just outside of town will keep things at bay for awhile. Honestly, I would not be surprised if half the rural area was hosting grow ops. It is happening in BC.

Technorati: rain barrel, Georgetown, mosquitoes, goldfish

Garden update : May 2009

Baby salad greens poking through. Putting these in a barrel, surrounded by gravel and sand seems to be a very good slug deterrent. That's well-suited to salad greens, too, because you cut them early and the others fill in the gaps left behind. So, you don't need a lot of space unless you eat way too much salad.


I've uncovered last year's attempt at soil rehabilitation (sheet mulching) and planted vegetable seeds here. I posted last year around the same time of year when I started that sheet mulching experiment.


I put a number of different tomato varieties here last year (I wrote about it back then) and it's a very good sun trap. This year, I'm going to interleave pole beans and peas. In all of my planting, I try to avoid too much of the same crop in one spot. Just as banks collect money in one spot for bank robbers to steal, putting a crop all in one place seems like it'd just attract more and more pests that like that crop.

New forsythia: one more step toward the evisceration of grass. Mint in the barrel is on the way back.