Today I made / bought / learnt (for a post oil world) 4

[Mehitabel]

Well, I've begun. Over the weekend I contacted the local CSA and have arranged to buy a share and start volunteering there with my 8 year old daughter. The great thing is it's less than 4 miles away so if I had to I could make it on a bike. Unfortunately I live in a suburb and there are only scenic bike paths not practical ones for transportation. Which leads me to the next thing I'm going to do: I'm going to attend a city government meeting and complain about the fact that we live in a community which dropped bus service for school kids to 2 miles out but there is no way for kids to safely ride their bikes to school. So every school day HUNDREDS of cars line up to drop off and pick up their kids. The only way to really ride here is to load your bike onto a car and drive to the freaking bike path. Ridiculous!

I've also started stocking up emergency supplies like an Eton radio and wind-up flashlights. I'm making a shopping list to stock up our pantry and I'm reading up on gardening. I live in a condo so I can't establish my own permaculture but I can plant some tomatoes and peppers!

I was really living under a cloud when I first learned about peak oil and felt so hopeless, but now that I've started acting I'm feeling better. Sure, I regret not starting earlier, but it does no good to bewail it now.

As my namesake would say, "Toujours gai, there's life in the old girl yet!"

[Loki]

Hi Mehitabel. Welcome to the rabbit hole.

I started prepping while living in an urban apartment. Back in 2002 or 2003 I started with a few container plants (cherry tomatoes were my favorite container crop), and gathered blackberries and clover blossoms around town. Then I got a community garden plot. Then I started doing tree work and got a degree in horticulture. Now I'm working on an organic farm and experimenting with all sorts of homesteading kind of stuff (dairy goats are next!). Rabbit hole indeed

The CSA will get you cooking at home more (assuming you don't already), and tune you in to what's in season locally. I love the CSA model, it's good for the farmer and good for the member.

Re. "survival gadgets," I haven't had much luck with the wind-up stuff, Eton radios and the like. I've found it more useful to stock up on AA batteries and good quality radios (Sony), flashlights (Mag-lite), etc. One of my better purchases was a little solar panel that recharges AAs quite quickly when the sun is out.

[SeaGypsy]

For short commutes spend a bit of time looking at DIY electric vehicles on youtube. There's a pile of options for those sort of distances.

[rangerone314]

I mapped out with flags, using laser pointer and 100' tape measure, about half of the boundary lines between the marked surveyor marks from last year. I have enough marked off so I can plant the 110 blue girl & boy holly trees as an understory thorny barrier in the woods. Decided they would be a good choice since they have thorns, are evergreen and can take moderate moisture and shade, after finding a few growing wild in the woods.

There are a few spots where there are multifloral roses, greenbriar and barberry in the woods also, so I am going to try and propagate them in front of and under the holly bushes, and over the couple small streams that dot the woods, so there won't be any gaps in the great barrier.

In the spring, I plan on introducing perhaps two dozen red-spotted newts I will purchase from an aquarium center, since they love muddy areas and puddles and small ponds, which happen to dot the woods. They eat mosquito larvae. I also plan on having a bat house, to attract bats or perhaps see if I can arrange for someone who is getting their attic screened out by an exterminator to prevent the bats from coming back in, would allow a bat house to be put up temporarily so they have somewhere to go, then I could bring the bats home in their house. I'm also going to put out plants that are beneficial for dragonflies. The goal being to have mosquitoes at all ages and times of day being preyed upon.

[JimG]

Seeds from Territorial arrived on Wednesday.
Been scoring some bits of scrap lumber from Craigslist for a week
(w/ poor results) for use in building the greenhouse.
Still unsure as to the size I'll build...but I suspect 15' wide by 16' long.
The 6 mil polysheet is on hand. Still need some gray PVC pipe.
It could be false, but it seems I just cant get steel hoops/ conduit bender quick enough at the $ I want.

[rangerone314]

Dismal cold and moderately windy day, alternating between snow and rain. I did show the boys where the property ends and we crossed a few streams. A poor day for doing sheet mulching by the grapes and kiwis, I opted instead to purchase Federal Premium 2 2/3 12-gauge shotgun shells.

[babystrangeloop]

Today I made a roast. It was post-peak-oil since I didn't drive to a restaurant to get my food.

[rangerone314]

Did about 50-sqFt of sheet mulching in two small spots in the vine area, part of my mop up operation in that area. Not much more to go in that area, and then I can focus on spot weeding along the mulched hedge.

[careinke]

Finished cutting up a bunch of pallets for the rocket stove in the green house (3/4 of a cord stacked tight). Then my son brought a nice size load of 4" x 4" and 4" x 6" beams over. They were headed for a land fill. Soon they will be a wood shed instead.

[PrestonSturges]

I bought a used entry level Jet dust collector for the wood shop, which is similar in strength to a car wash vacuum. It's for my self employment project.

The key difference between this and Chinese knockoff is that the blower is heavy gauge steel quite capable of handling nails and other debris.

[Shaved Monkey]

Just bought a vacuum sealer and heaps of bags.
Allow me to store stuff more efficiently.
Buy in bulk and break down into manageable sizes.

Also bought a solar trickle charger for the car battery
I don't drive much and the battery doesn't get a great opportunity to recharge.
Especially when a very short trip involves aircon and thermatic fan kicking in at both ends.
Should be good to run a little DC water pump or lights off a battery too.

Also learnt with petrol at $1.52 per litre(premium) my quarterly shopping trip cost about $40.

[JimG]

Got 9 broccoli starts onto the seedling heat mat today. Its small. But! It will go into the garden in late March. This is my first garden start of 2012! Who- hoo!

[rangerone314]

Today I made a big push & got about 150 sqFt of the vine area sheetmulched, which is all but maybe 10 sqFt or so of that large area... I mostly worked around the grapes and hops vines at opposite ends of the bed. (the kiwis are in the middle)

I also got 4 eggs from the flock, the first batch of this newest generation of chickens, since the previous flock was wiped out by foxes. (mysteriously after that, all the foxes in the vicinity died )
One tan egg from the Buff Orpingtons, 2 olive-green/turquoise & one green egg from the Easter egg hens.

[careinke]

Today I made a big push & got about 150 sqFt of the vine area sheetmulched, which is all but maybe 10 sqFt or so of that large area... I mostly worked around the grapes and hops vines at opposite ends of the bed. (the kiwis are in the middle)

I also got 4 eggs from the flock, the first batch of this newest generation of chickens, since the previous flock was wiped out by foxes. (mysteriously after that, all the foxes in the vicinity died )
One tan egg from the Buff Orpingtons, 2 olive-green/turquoise & one green egg from the Easter egg hens.

Since you are heavily into sheet mulch, I was wondering if you have seen the Back to Eden film? This guy lives in Sequim Washington and is having amazing success using wood chips as a cover/mulch. A big heads up about the film it is HEAVILY slanted towards religion. The guy actually has conversations with god. But if you can get through all that, his system seems pretty easy, pretty productive, and very earth friendly. I have a high tolerance for people with different beliefs so the religion part did not bother me, and I felt it was worth watching. However, some people just can't sit through it. I may drive up and checkout his place, it looks cool.

You can watch the entire movie for free at the bottom of the web page.

Back to Eden

[rangerone314]

Today I made a big push & got about 150 sqFt of the vine area sheetmulched, which is all but maybe 10 sqFt or so of that large area... I mostly worked around the grapes and hops vines at opposite ends of the bed. (the kiwis are in the middle)

I also got 4 eggs from the flock, the first batch of this newest generation of chickens, since the previous flock was wiped out by foxes. (mysteriously after that, all the foxes in the vicinity died )
One tan egg from the Buff Orpingtons, 2 olive-green/turquoise & one green egg from the Easter egg hens.

Since you are heavily into sheet mulch, I was wondering if you have seen the Back to Eden film? This guy lives in Sequim Washington and is having amazing success using wood chips as a cover/mulch. A big heads up about the film it is HEAVILY slanted towards religion. The guy actually has conversations with god. But if you can get through all that, his system seems pretty easy, pretty productive, and very earth friendly. I have a high tolerance for people with different beliefs so the religion part did not bother me, and I felt it was worth watching. However, some people just can't sit through it. I may drive up and checkout his place, it looks cool.

You can watch the entire movie for free at the bottom of the web page.

Back to Eden

Essentially what I use on top the paper or cardboard is a layer of mulch I get from the county compost place where they grind up branches, etc. They have separate piles for compost. I often get some of both, although usually more wood mulch than compost. I'm pretty fast self-loading, too, I can get about 128 gallons of mulch into cans & bins in my Civic in about 8 minutes.

[RedStateGreen]

Been working a lot on my new business. The last two months have been very good and I've finally got to the break-even point after 15 months. My goal is for this to give our family a second income sufficient to cover our basic expenses should anything happen to my husband's income.

This past weekend my husband and I planted a sweet cherry tree and I put in a row of garlic.

[rangerone314]

Today I sheetmulched a small 30sqFt rectangle in the vine area, behind my hops vines, which basically finishes off sheetmulching in that area. Friday will see spot-weeding and re-mulching of the long southeastern hedge area (consisting of rose bushes & evergreens), mainly clumps of grass.

I also mapped out the southern side of the property from one property marker to the other with flags, in anticipation of the 110 holly trees arriving early March.

[careinke]

Today I sheetmulched a small 30sqFt rectangle in the vine area, behind my hops vines, which basically finishes off sheetmulching in that area. Friday will see spot-weeding and re-mulching of the long southeastern hedge area (consisting of rose bushes & evergreens), mainly clumps of grass.

I also mapped out the southern side of the property from one property marker to the other with flags, in anticipation of the 110 holly trees arriving early March.

I wish you would come and dig up 100 of my Holly trees. What are you going to use yours for?

[rangerone314]

Today I sheetmulched a small 30sqFt rectangle in the vine area, behind my hops vines, which basically finishes off sheetmulching in that area. Friday will see spot-weeding and re-mulching of the long southeastern hedge area (consisting of rose bushes & evergreens), mainly clumps of grass.

I also mapped out the southern side of the property from one property marker to the other with flags, in anticipation of the 110 holly trees arriving early March.

I wish you would come and dig up 100 of my Holly trees. What are you going to use yours for?

As a double-rowed evergreen thorny hedge in shady areas and in the understory. Curiously there are already a few hollies in where I need them.

[careinke]

Today I sheetmulched a small 30sqFt rectangle in the vine area, behind my hops vines, which basically finishes off sheetmulching in that area. Friday will see spot-weeding and re-mulching of the long southeastern hedge area (consisting of rose bushes & evergreens), mainly clumps of grass.

I also mapped out the southern side of the property from one property marker to the other with flags, in anticipation of the 110 holly trees arriving early March.

I wish you would come and dig up 100 of my Holly trees. What are you going to use yours for?

As a double-rowed evergreen thorny hedge in shady areas and in the understory. Curiously there are already a few hollies in where I need them.

Should work great for that. Be aware birds spread Holly seeds very well. Expect them to start popping up around your property.