We’re building two kinds of compost here at Apricot Lane…

1) Compost using manure from local farms.  In our town, this means horse manure.  Organic dairy manure would be the most desirable, but 3 days of cold calling led me to a goose egg.  Luckily, horse owners largely treat their animals very well, and we aren’t dealing with lots of hormone & antibiotic usage.

2) Compost using internal waste, including grass clippings, tree mulch, straw and manure.  Our farm currently collects sheep and cow manure for compost.  Since we don’t rely on petroleum fertilizer, our animal manure is like gold to us.

Option #1 is pretty easy.  I coordinate the deliveries of fresh, moist manure & bedding, and once we’ve got our row, the interns measure the internal temperature every 5 feet, every couple days, using a super long thermometer.  Once we’ve reached 150˚ for two weeks, we use a tractor to turn it.  And repeat.  Months later, we’ll have compost.  I’ll let you know how this goes.  (BTW, I’m very aware that I used the words “manure” and “moist” in the same sentence, as though it’s not disgusting.  Since becoming a farmer, I discuss manure and mating more than the sum total of my previous existence.)

Option #2 takes a bit more finesse.  However, it also involves a food reference, which is a sure-fire way to captivate my attention.  Building our internal waste compost is like making a lasagna.   Sigh.  Love.  It’s totally fun, and our hands-on Biodynamic Consultant lead us through the entire process during his last visit.  For many months prior, we’d been dividing our waster into piles of grass, straw (with manure) and mulch.

At go-time, we began by building a 10′ x 100′ bed of mulch, followed by a layer of grass, then straw – repeat.  However to really build it right, our entire team gathered around the long pile with pitchforks to spread each of Raul‘s tractor dumps into a nice, even layer, focused on building up our edges.  We learned to focus on the edges and the middle will take care of itself, which makes sense when you’re actually doing it.  All the while, we took turns soaking each layer with a hose.  Water, oxygen, nitrogen and carbon are needed to start the cooking process, which results in safe, gorgeous compost.  Nourishment for our fall garden… I’m already dreaming of broccoli.

Four hours later, we had a beautiful pile that stood about 5′ tall.  And guess what?  In a matter of days, that pile was only 3′ tall.  It had already cooked down two feet!  I couldn’t stick my hand 5 inches in without pulling it back from the heat.  Nature’s dehydrator – I’m loving it.

Do you have a compost?  What tricks have you learned?

xo

Organic Spark

We learned a bit…

-  Pastured Eggs: Knowing the difference in quality of fully pastured chicken eggs, John and I wanted to figure out a set-up to let our ladies roam free.  Different than free-range, pastured chickens peruse a much larger landscape.  The results from truly pasturing are absolutely magnificent.  The white stands firm and tall, the yolk brilliant orange, the flavor rich.  But, the catch is – how do you keep them safe?  We’ve found a mobile chicken house to do the trick.  A coop built on a trailer bed that’s pulled by a tractor, which we station inside our resting pastures, once the sheep have moved on to greener grass.  The hog-wire fences keep the predators out, and for the most part, the chickens in.  At night, they head back to their movable coop, and we shut it up.  We found that 12 weeks was a good age to start pasturing without the chicken hawks carrying away our hard work.

-  Winter Lull: Hens don’t lay as much in the winter, if at all.  Therefore with our hens heading into winter at the egg producing age of 18 weeks, the wait for the first fried egg seemed never-ending.  To jump start the process, we installed a small solar-powered light into the coop with a timer set to light from 6pm – 10pm.  We got an egg in 2 days.  Possibly coincidence, but we’re getting 4-5 eggs a day now, so I definitely think it helped.  Walking by the coop at night before 10pm is hysterical, those chickens have got things to do – people to see!

-  Soy-Free: Being allergic to and aware of the downsides to soy, a common protein source in feed, I didn’t want to include it in our chicken’s diet. In a natural habitat, chickens eat grass, seeds, bugs, worms, larvae – a pretty high protein diet.  Therefore if soy (high in protein) is taken out of the diet, the chickens need another protein source until they are old enough to safely pasture and find their own.  Protein deficiency can cause chickens to pick at each other and more ugly habits.  Many soy-free feeds replace the protein with other vegetable sources like sesame and peas, but I know from my own body that animal protein would work better.  Plus, I’ve heard farmer’s having a real tough time with it.  Thankfully, a handful of feed companies are making soy-free feeds with fish meal for added protein, like Cascade Feed and Scratch and Peck.  Using this feed, we didn’t have any problems with behavior or weakness.  Plus, we can now confirm that the eggs don’t taste fishy.  These days, we could probably use the vegetarian feed for our pastured hens without any issue, but the fish meal is critical, in my opinion, those first 12 weeks.

-  Aggression: Roosters of the same strength, meaning two about the same size, age and health… will FIGHT.  With John out of town, I carried a bleeding rooster up to the barn after a brawl between the two that lived together in our mobile unit.  Rooster #2 now permanently resides with the goats.  A few days after the separation, the mobile unit was parked close enough to the goat pasture for Rooster #1 and #2 to catch a visual, sparking a heated “cock-a-doodle-doo-off.” In my mind, Rooster #1 was totally taunting Rooster #2, because #1 gets all the ladies.  Poor #2 just gets a mama goat and her slightly horny son – Beavis.  Sad to say, but I’m certain Beavis is eying up the new addition.

That’s all for today.  If you have chickens, I’d love to hear what you’ve learned!

xo

Organic Spark

Who am I kidding, she’s not little at all!  These cows are huge.  Huge.  And we’re going to have three of them.  Today, my eyes are staring at my screen just a little wider than usual.

Here’s a video of our bull taking first place at the National Highland Show.  Yay!  Watch how the judge very subtly shakes the winners hand – so exciting.  You can hear John’s nervous chuckle mid-way through.  He really wanted this guy to win.

I feign shock at the approaching cattle addition, but honestly, I’m totally jazzed.  The farming lifestyle is suiting John and I just fine.  For example, if we ever have a kid, I wouldn’t mind it one bit if this was in his or her future.  John’s candid shot from the Show…

Goodnight from Apricot Lane Farms.

xo –

Organic Spark

One unassuming woman named Dr. Mary Newport recently used unrefined coconut oil to significantly reverse her husband’s full-on case of Alzheimer’s.  I first heard this unbelievably powerful story at the 2010 Weston A. Price Foundation Conference.  You can purchase the 2010 conference recordings – HERE.  However, here is a recent news piece that summarizes Dr. Newport’s discovery.

This story stuck out as extremely profound to both my mom and I, and recently, mom shared this story with a dear friend of hers who is battling the disease with her husband.  Friends – it’s working.  Check out snippets from Betty’s emails to my mom these past few weeks:

After 1 week on coconut oil -
“Sandy, Ed’s cognitive impairment is now severe.  He cannot even get started in drawing a clock.  However, I swear I can already tell a  subtle difference in his focus, alertness, and personal interactions.  Last evening before going up to bed, he purposely came over to me with the old love light in his eyes and gave me a goodnight kiss.  Talk about positive feedback!”

After 1 week and 5 days on coconut oil -
“The visiting nurse could not get over the positive difference in Ed today…his looks, interactions with her, etc.  Ed was able to shakily half-print his name (could not two days ago) and start a clock by drawing a perfect circle with the  number 12 written after it when asked to show it was 12:00!!!!  Unquestionably progress compared to two days ago!” 

After 2 weeks on coconut oil -
“Ed has had 3 days of unmistakeable improvement!  More later!”

I thought the initial story was pretty incredible, but after seeing this happen to a person I know, I’m a little bit stunned.  I don’t know if this will work for everyone, but I know it seems to be working for Ed.

In honor of Ed and all those out there struggling with this horrible disease, I’d like to share a recipe for Coconut Almond Fudge, which is a truly delicious way to get a bit more coconut oil into our diets.

Coconut Almond Fudge

Click HERE for the Coconut Almond Fudge recipe…

And I thought baby chickens were cute…

Little bitty bills combined with whittle tiny webbed feet was nearly too much for my heart to handle.

Here’s what we learned – 100 ducks is a whole lot of ducks.  The weak ones can get trampled, and two were dead on arrival.  We had their heat lamps set up in the barn, but being winter, they crowd under the lamps something fierce, making it even harder for the weak ones.  We added a third heat lamp, but it still became obvious that a few of them needed extra care.  Enter the Duck ICU.

On a foyer counter, a little too close to the kitchen, a revolving door of ducks healed in a cardboard box under a heat lamp before returning to their flock.  When they arrive, they look a bit rough,  like the guy in the upper right-hand side of the picture above.  When they leave, they look like “Spunky” in the front.  He was originally found with his flock upside down in his water, hanging on by a thread.  After about 2 hours in the ICU, he burst back on the duck scene with a pizazz that earned that name and then some.

It took us a couple of days to realize something obvious.  Ducks need water.  Unlike chickens, ducks bathe themselves constantly, and without access to water, they get covered in food and who knows what else.  Their feathers sticks together and eventually get pulled out, as they preen each other.  Water fixes all of this.  However, they splash around without a bit of concern, so we eventually lined the ICU box with bubble-wrap.

The Duck ICU got dismantled this morning.  Everyone’s healthy and back with the flock.  Our team swore I’d never let go of Spunky.  They kidded me about needing to wear a sling to carry him around.  For a minute, I wondered if we would have a pet duck.  There was really only one reason we don’t – they stink.  But one last time, here’s Spunky in all his adorable glory.

xo – Organic Spark

At first, I searched high & low for a local source for this stuff.  For anyone who is looking for a good business venture, I would suggest an organic and soy-free feed operation in Southern California.  No lie.  It is impossible to find good feed around here, and the market for it just keeps growing and growing.  I will be your very first customer.

Well finally, my search led me to a nice guy out of Colorado who suggested I just make my own!  Boy, was he right.  It is super simple to make, and the sheep love it way more than the non-organic stuff that was leftover by the previous owners, which is interesting because my version is very low in molasses.  Guess the sheep know what real food tastes like.  Around here, the treat is actually nicknamed “Molly’s Crack,” because the sheep appear to have developed a bit of an addiction.  If you’ve got animals yourself, give it a try.

Organic Sweet Feed
for Sheep

The ratio of molasses to grain in this recipe is low in order to preserve the health of the animals.  High-molasses feeds can cause diabetes in sheep, just like a high-sugar diet can in humans.  I make only a few buckets of this treat at a time, so that I’ve used it all within a month.  It will be a bit tacky, just use a spoon to break it up before scooping into the bucket.

Ingredients:
6 cups pearled barley
6 cups whole wheat berries
6 cups green split peas
2 tbsp molasses

Instructions:
In a large bowl, combine the barley, wheat berries and split peas.  To the mixture, add the molasses.  Using a large spatula, fold the molasses into the mixture, making sure to coat all dry ingredients.  When the feed is ready, it will have a slightly dark and sticky appearance.

May your livestock enjoy!

xo – Organic Spark

Three-thirty four in the middle of a night spent sleeping by the light of a full moon, we received another call about a mama in labor.  Things were different this time, and they were different again 7 hours later when another mama gave birth.  The energies of the moon were pulling strong, as was John in order to get these lambs out of the clutches of first time mamas.  We have two new blessings on the farm.  Two females – both nursing strong.  I wanted to share these pictures with you.  They are so cute it hurts!

And one last video… stay patient.  She hops out from under mama eventually.

xo – Organic Spark

So I did what any 21st century lost soul would do – I googled.  Our start was rocky, as I tried, failed and tried again, but after time smoothed the jagged edges of my excitement, a permanent appreciation and respect developed between me and my now favorite skillet. We’re virtually monogamous; I even travel with him, much to the dismay of my husband as I pay over-weight baggage fees.  After years of developing a seasoning, he cooks anything from eggs to steak with relative ease.  There’s still occasionally a bit of sticking with thick sauces or scrambled eggs, but once I learned how to properly clean him, any residual bits can be fixed with ease, allowing me to continue onward with my non-stick building ways.

A few months back, we talked about How to Season a Cast Iron Skillet, but this week, let’s discuss cleaning.

Click HERE to learn How to Clean a Cast Iron Skillet…

One of my favorite ways to begin a homemade dinner with friends is to offer up a vibrant dish of super chunky salsa. In the photo above, I am serving a version of this salsa on a large chip that our Apricot Lane Farms landscaper, Fernando, brought back to us from Mexico; however, I typically serve this dish in a pretty bowl with a side of organic blue corn tortillas or homemade seed crackers.  I use the term “salsa” loosely, as this type of dish could technically be considered a side or even a salad. But the vibe is simply too generous and abundant to be buried within a meal, instead serving to welcome friends front-and-center with a laid-back, yet plugged-in gesture – like a big ‘ole bear hug. 

Two of the main ingredients, sweet cherry tomatoes and creamy mango, work so darn well together.  Think the lovely texture of peach salsa with the extra punch and over-the-top decadence of a mango. Attempt to find local, wild shrimp, if you can.  Fresh is flavor. And though purchasing pre-peeled and deveined shrimp makes it easier, if you have the time, peeling them at home enhances the dimension and love of the final dish.  The extra effort really pays off.

Click HERE for the Roasted Shrimp with Mango Salsa recipe…

This dish was also shared on Mango.org.

Ira glass said it well…

For example, I’m trying to learn how to whistle loudly.  Sounds like a strange goal, but farm animals listen to whistles, and I’d like them to one day listen to me.  I’m also aware that whistling isn’t often categorized under the “art” which Ira was referring to above.  But, I actually believe that pretty much everything falls under “art” when one is surrendering to the process of mastering it.

I’ll keep you updated regarding project whistle.

xo – Organic Spark