Eat the Water Hyacinth

Raw

     If you want to grow your own food, you may have to open up to the idea of eating some fruits and vegetables that are not commonly found at the grocery store. And if you live in Florida, you're going to be working with a whole different plant set and growing season changes than them Yankee gardeners. All this flexibility in diet isn't easy, most people eat the foods that they were raised eating and find trying new foods to be difficult.

     Water hyacinth is my new favorite local food. It's a water plant that grows in warm water, and is well known for how quickly it creates baby plants. In the past it has been used to pull toxins out of water sources, indeed, water purification is one of it's advantages. After I had added it to my pond the water instantly cleared and the fish became visible. Because the pond water is kinda yucky, I feel that water hyacinth should always be cooked, and I handle it like it's contaminated with E.coli (as it may be after the great manure spill of 2016). 

     According to Green Deane, the best way to eat water hyacinth is to stir fry, and I completely agree. With oil and garlic preferably. It has a taste not dissimilar from some good fresh green beans, which are hard to come by nowadays. The texture is decidedly different, as the air bulbs are crunchy and airy, like eating potato chips, and can be a bit chewy. Overall I would say that water hyacinth is quite palatable.

     Water hyacinth is very different from other fruits and vegetables. Because it is so unusual I couldn't get the kids to try it, what a shame! It's so easy to grow in the pond - right plant, right space - that is seems to be ever bearing. Like ever bearing crunchy green beans! Even if the kids never eat it, I know I can eat it and the rabbits do quite enjoy the green bits (they won't eat the roots.)

     This video talks a little bit about how water hyacinth is used at this lake to feed local livestock, including chickens.

 

Manure Brewer

How to ghetto-tastically make a manure brewer. (Say that 5 times fast!)

     The first step: Get your hands on a blue barrel. This is probably the hardest part, but they are out there if you really want them. There are many sources,  I ghetto-tastically just asked someone who wasn't using theirs.
     Then, using a saw, slice in half in the middle. This is the best time to clean the inside out really good.
     If it had a cap or plug on the top, take it off. Get a large piece of old screen to more than cover the cap area.
     In the base, drill a hole and install a spigot. This will need to be glued and caulked very well so there are no leakage problems.
 Then invert the top onto the bottom, so the top acts as a cup for the raw manure. It should be open to the air so rain can come in.

This one isn't so attractive. Yours can be better.

     Then fill the whole top with all the rabbit manure, waste hay, other manure, and small bits of kitchen waste, like eggshells. If you find any worms in your garden, add them as well.
     How to use the manure brewer:
Dump water in the open top
Open the spigot and drain manure water into your watering can or bucket.
Take the watering can or bucket to your hungry plants, water slowly so more nutrition is absorbed.

Can Permaculture sustain us?

     Toby Hemenway is one of the best-known Permaculture advocates available. He is quite knowledgeable on the subject, and gives talks and teaches courses over there on the west coast. An article from his website was probably the best gardening article ever written, which is to say most horticultural information is content-milled. That article really inspired me to find out what is native and useful here, and I can't imagine living anywhere else.

     But can Permaculture really sustain us? Some people think of it as more of a religion rather than an agricultural technique, which is definitely a problem. And the answer, which Mr. Hemenway sidestepped a bit, is that it cannot. Unless we change every aspect of our lives to really coexist with the planet. That would include less future children, and not more. Less fossil fuels, not more. Less air conditioning and heating, and not more. Less can be more with proper design, hence, permaculture.

      It really comes into perspective when you attempt to figure out the acreage it would take for a family to feed itself. More than one acre, for sure. At least one adult working  full-time on that acreage to plant, harvest, and maintain production. Families would be forced to to move to be spread out in order to have that land for use. The surface area of the arable parts of the planet is known and can be calculated. The calculations do not add up to the population numbers that we have now.

     That's sad, right? Not really. I can't even tell you all the people that I've met that never want to have kids. They are a product of our industrial society, and they don't want to give up the luxury they would miss out on  if they had to raise children. Then there is also the fear that this industrial society isn't worth living in, that it would be a shame to bring a child into this. Personally I think that's why zombie flicks are so popular, because people secretly long for a less complicated life where the threats to your welfare are clearly visible. Children are an investment no matter what your ethics and religion, of time, energy, even patience.

     But that's just one aspect of how lives must be changed to have a future for our race. Toby Hemenway  forsees a potential future for us that he describes well in this video. What do you forsee?

Composting in Place

     Here in the deep south we are blessed by a good deal of rainfall in the wet season and humidity almost every day the rest of the year. This natural abundance of moisture promotes vigorous microbial activity even in the dry season. The activities of insects should not be overlooked either. The much vilified ants and roaches break down larger pieces of organic matter into smaller pieces the bacteria can handle.
     Traditional gardeners in the more temperate climates north of us frequently create compost piles, which not only cleans up the garden area but also concentrates all that microbial activity in one spot to rapidly decompose plant matter. I can say that I have not really seen a compost pile here ever, because organic matter breaks down so quickly it kind of seems pointless. We get to practice what northern gardeners cannot, composting in place.
     Any waste plant matter an be used to create compost, which people around here frequently call mulch. The two terms are used almost interchangeably because even the big woody store-bought mulch will break down within one rainy season to produce the humusy compost that northerners recognize. That humus becomes washed into the sand, providing nutrition for even more beneficial microorgnisms like worms.
     Most cleared land here in west Florida quickly loses its topsoil. Many a new homeowner has been perturbed by the ide that the builders laid sod down on straight sand and they now need to constantly water and fertilize in order to grow the easiest of plants, grass. In the time between the land was cleared and the builders finished they house was all the rain and wind needed to remove that layer of humus from that property. In the older neighborhoods where grass has been cultured for years, simply lift the roots and see for yourself. The grass will pull out easily if the ground is dry and you will find the bare, pale sand.
     Small particles break down more easily. This is why cedar mulch decays faster than pine bark nuggets. If you want the soil to quickly make compost then chopping, slicing, and shredding are your friends. That being said, I did throw last year's pumpkins outside and in a month all that was left was a thin, waxy, papery shell. Coffee grounds will be invisible after one good rain. Orange peels and vegetable remains also disappear quickly as long as they are cut into small pieces.
     Leaves break down fairly quickly, but you may be better served by using them as an easy mulch. In the fall sometimes I rake under the oak tree in the front yard to get up some of the leaves so the place looks good. Once the trash barrel is full its placed out on the curb on yard waste collection day. From there the leaves and twigs are taken to a municipal collection site, what I like to call, The Dump. All yard waste is collected, shredded, then placed into huge piles for people to collect for their gardens. The mulch is part humus and part small sticks. It will blow away in the wind if you let it. Bring that home and put at least a two or three inch layer underneath every plant. It will block weeds and give all the benefits of mulch, while releasing humus into your soil. And its free.
     Another item I compost in place is all the waste from the parrot cages. The mulch from the dump lines the cages, and every week I go in and scrub the bars and collect the droppings and food bits. Used mulch is then placed directly on the plants. It is said that bird waste should never be placed directly on plants because of the high ammonium concentration burning the plants roots. However, I have never experienced that. Perhaps it is because the pooped-up mulch is exposed to the sun and elements before the ammonias ever reach the roots. It does seem wise to forego putting bird waste in containers for plants.
     Someone might ask me what I would do with dog doo, and here it is... Flush it. Collect it up frequently and flush it down the toilet if you have many dogs on a small piece of property. It would be the safest way to remove any pathogens or medications if that applies to you. Another thing I might try if I had one or two dogs is to collect it into a pile away from the house and mix the waste with mulch or shredded leaves. Allow to decompose and spread onto plant beds that you will not be eating the leaves from, like the obligatory hibiscus or crepe myrtle every house seems to have. Make sure it is well buried with even more mulch to keep flies and smell down. If you did that twice a year you would have no problems. Another thing might be to try spraying the doo into the grass while its still fresh. I would probably not do that since it would be so much work.
     We compost in place coffee grounds, contents from tea bags, banana peels, egg shells, fruit skins or cores, vegetable pieces, pineapple rind and cores, and more. Stale bread or leftover meat gets run through the birds or cats.