What We're Eating

My mom asked yesterday what we are eating. With the late spring, we planted late and many things are maturing later than usual. But here's the list:

• The first cucumber -- as always as with the "first," to be sliced plain and appreciated just as is
• Spring beets, with lots of mint and onion chives, and just a splash of olive oil and cider vinegar
• Snow peas (ending) and sugar snaps (coming into their prime), straight off the vines
• Radish seed pods, crunchy with a hint of spice, and a few self-seeded "Green Mountain" (summer) radishes
• The occasional baby pepper and carrot
• Mint pesto
• Basil pesto, with parsley, garlic scapes (the flowering stalk of the garlic plant) and garlic chives

Beet, mint & chive salad

• Goumi berries -- a prolific Siberian native with jewel-red berries; tart, with a hint of sweet
• "Black cap" wild raspberries
• The small bowl of "bird cherries" (Prunus avium) -- brought to the U.S. by early colonists and now growing wild -- that Richard knocked down for dessert
• Lots and lots and lots of greens: beets greens, turnip greens, mustard, kale, orach ("mountain spinach"), amaranth, chard, mizuna and semposi (the last two Asian greens). Stir-friend, sautéed, and braised. 

Peas & Pesto Time

"Blizzard" snow peas

Nothing says summer like appearance of mounds of fresh peas and basil leaves. Long in coming to the northeast U.S. this year, summer does seem like it is finally here. Planted a month later than usual, the snow peas have moved beyond a small handful to enough to occasionally steam and freeze a batch for next winter's soups. The sugar snap peas, on the other hand, remain just a handful, a lesson about the value of spending a few extra dollars to buy fresh seed.

Genovese basil, after shearing for a triple batch of pesto

The basil, on the other, is growing wildly, the photo at left taken after I sheared the plants for a triple batch of pesto. A rainy Saturday made the perfect day to process it. (And yes, mom, there's a batch for you!)

The basil is growing in hoop house, along with the other heat-loving crops: tomatoes, peppers, eggplant and cucumbers. In fact, while I treasure those winter greens, it's with the summer crops that the hoop house is more than paying for itself. With evening temperatures regularly falling into the 50s and low 60s, we've left the doors on this summer, so we can close them up at night, and the plants seem the happier for it.

Pesto is at its best with lots of parmesan cheese, but since I can't digest dairy, I make a vegan version: using 1-2 Tbs of miso instead of the cheese. It provides that needed "tang." A few extra pine nuts, and it's wonderful.




The pesto goes into an old ice-cube tray to freeze, and then the frozen cubes go into freezer bags. Comes winter, I can take out just what I need at the moment, without having to defrost an entire batch.

Thai Basil

For variety, the Thai basil (right) is always much smaller and more delicate. I don't use it for pesto. But its leaves, flavored with a hint of anise, are perfect in stir fries, and its purple flowers stand in lovely contrast to the spring-green leaves. They remind me of a trip to southern California a few years ago, where we saw a four-foot hedge of Thai basil shrubs, perennial in that climate. I recognized it by the flowers, before we got close enough for our noses to confirm the sighting. Before that, I hadn't thought about the potential of our small, unassuming summer guest. I meant to pot up one of the plants last fall and bring it into the house for the winter, but never got around to it. Perhaps this year I'll try to grow it out, like the rosemary, an potted shrub overwintered in the kitchen, a reminder of places closer to the equator where plants (and people) rarely freeze.

The Red, Red Robins

I heard a robin this morning
I'm feeling happy today
Gonna pack my cares in a whistle
And blow them all away ....  

When the red, red robin
comes bob, bobbin'
along, along
They'll be no more sobbing'
when he starts throbbing'
his old sweet song 

Wake up, wake up you sleepy head!
Get up, get out o' bed!
Cheer up, cheer up the sun is red,
Live, love, laugh and be happy!
     -- Harry MacGregor Woods, 1926

It's time for my annual posting on the Robins. With abundant earthworms, insects and a large variety berries (especially the now-ripening prunus avium or "bird cherry"), we regularly have one or more pairs of robins nesting in our yard. And when they are here, that catchy tune inevitably plays repeatedly in my head. (For fun, listen to the original recording by Al Jolson in 1926 (below), or later versions by Bing Crosby, Doris Day, and Louis Armstrong).

 

And then there are the songs of the robins themselves. For a month now, we've been listening to the male sing his heart out in nearby trees, especially around dusk. A pair had already begun to build a nest on the rafter supporting the grape vines near the deck. We're not sure whether he lost his mate and was trying to attract another, or was singing to assert claim to his territory. In any event, the nest-building eventually resumed, and last week ago, I noticed the hungry chirr-chirr-chirr of hatchlings in the nest.

June 26, 2015

The dense foliage of the grape leaves was likely an asset to the robins seeking to shelter their young from predators. But it made it more challenging to take photographs than when they use one of the nest boxes. Still, two are quite visible, and if you look carefully there's a third beak in the lower left. The female has also decorated the nest with blue plastic strips from one of our more-tattered tarps. (She scrounged these from a left-over nest in one of the nest boxes.)

Three hatchlings, June 26, 2015

Yesterday, the first of brood fledged, on a wet, chilly day that left it shivering. It caught my attention when it grabbed onto the living room screen door on the way down, then landed safely on the deck. Its mom soon returned, with first a large cherry in her beak, and then a still-wriggling worm for its siblings.

The first to fledge, June 27, 2015

This morning, the other robins had fledged as well. Unfortunately, one of them wound up partially dismembered outside our front door, a gift left for us by one of the cats. But as my friend Beth says, the survival rate for robin fledglings is notoriously low -- the reason robin pairs have 2-3 broods each breeding season. According to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, only 40% of robin nests successfully produce young, and only 25% of those that fledge survive through November.

A few other fun notes from the "Lab of O" site: Robins eat different kinds of food depending on the time of day -- more earthworms in the morning and more fruit in the afternoon. And when robins eat exclusively honeysuckle berries, they can be become intoxicated.

I wonder what an intoxicated robin looks like? But with the great diversity of Juneberry, cherry, chokecherry, dogwood and other berries in yard, I may never find out.

Food, and Roses Too

These highly fragrant roses are transplants from Richard's mom's garden. 

The roses have come into bloom, and with them these thoughts ...

Humans need food and beauty too. All humans, not just those who can afford them. This sentiment was perhaps best captured by early in the 19th century in a speech by the Jewish feminist socialist labor activist, Rose Schneiderman (1882-1972).  She wrote:

"What the woman who labors wants is the right to live, not simply exist — the right to life as the rich woman has the right to life, and the sun and music and art. You have nothing that the humblest worker has not a right to have also. The worker must have bread, but she must have roses, too. Help, you women of privilege, give her the ballot to fight with."

It was subsequently published as a poem several times between 1911 and 1915 and set to music decades later:

.... Our lives shall not be sweated from birth until life closes;Hearts starve as well as bodies; give us bread, but give us roses! ...
.... No more the drudge and idler -- ten that toil where one reposes,But a sharing of life's glories: Bread and roses! Bread and roses! .... 

A passionate, talented labor organizer, Schneiderman ran for the U.S. Senate in 1920 as a candidate of the New York State Labor Party on a platform that called for state-funded health insurance, adequate food markets in poor neighborhoods, publicly-owned power utilities, high-quality neighborhood schools and nonprofit housing for workers. She was a founding member of the American Civil Liberties Union, the only woman to be appointed to then-President Roosevelt's Labor Advisory Board and later, the NYS Secretary of Labor. 

Over the past decade, we have converted much of the landscape around our home to growing food for humans and animals, along with a rich diversity of flowering plants that support the many pollinators and predators that sustain a healthy ecosystem. They are beautiful in their own right, and feed our hearts as well as our bodies. But I still provide space to roses and peonies, species that feed only our senses. 

The last peonies of the season

The urgency for organizing continues -- even just to reach the goals on Schneiderman's 1920 platform. But today, as the peonies fade and the roses bloom, I offer this tribute to the ongoing work of ensuring that all share life's glories: food and roses too! 

National Pollinator Week

According to an email from the Plantsmen, a wonderful native plants nursery around the corner from us, it's National Pollinator Week. I celebrate pollinators every day (including in my May 10 and June 3 posts), but it seemed appropriate to do so again, even briefly.

One of the seemingly indefatigable bumblebees on a columbine flower.

Butterflies are the "preferred" pollinators that so many homeowners seek, and nurseries cater to this bias by labeling plants as "butterfly attractors."  More accurately however, those nectar-filled flowers are "pollinator attractors," and it is the huge diversity of native bees, small predatory wasps, innumerable beetles and other insects that do the bulk of the work.

That said, I too enjoy watching the large, graceful swallowtails flutter-by, while summoning the patience to wait for them to alight long enough to snap a decent photo. And I realize that it will be easier to engage people in creating habitat for butterflies than for bees.

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail on Dame's Rocket

We'll continue to do our part in supporting the pollinators who support us. The more our yard resembles a meadow with a great diversity of native flowering plants throughout the spring, summer and fall, the more pollinators we see. After all, they (and we) can't eat grass!

Chives Will Never Look the Same Again

Chives are an extremely useful and unfussy garden plant. They are among the earliest plants to emerge in spring; offer a ready supply of green onions through the first mild frosts with almost no tending; self-seed readily but not too aggressively; and put forth these lovely purple flowers in late May and early June. There is also some evidence that they may provide anti-fungal benefits to the surrounding plants.

In short, I like them and have several large plants scattered throughout the garden. And we're now experimenting with moving some of smaller "volunteers" near the apple tees in the orchard.

Still, they might not have gotten their own posting. But after work today, I took a cup of cold mint tea out to a chair in one of the only late afternoon sunny spots in the garden. It's right next to the chives. And my attention was immediately caught by all the movement and buzzing to my right. There were almost a dozen different kinds of bees, wasps, butterflies, beetles and other pollinators concentrated in just a few cubic feet. So I went back for the camera.

Keeping up with the Asparagus

Too much of a good thing can be ... Asparagus. Richard took me out for dinner for my birthday on Thursday, and then we got dinner at the Ithaca Festival on Friday. So the asparagus got away from us. Last night, we made up for it. With all the various recipes available, our favorite is still pan-roasted in a little clarified butter. When it's fresh, why bother with anything more? 

And no, we didn't finish it, so off to eat the rest for brunch. 

Before the Fruit Comes the Flowers

A yard full of fruit trees and shrubs is particularly spectacular in May with its profusion of flowers. It's a spring tonic that is especially welcome after a long winter that seemed disinclined to yield to spring. While the timing of each species' flowering is usually spread out over several weeks, many came into bloom at the same time this year, as though the trees simply couldn't wait any longer either. 

Amelanchier (Serviceberry, Juneberry)

The native Serviceberry (Juneberry, Amelanchier) always comes first. On May 6, The Japanese plum burst into bloom overnight, along with the Honeyberry, a Siberian native with small tart dark blue fruit.

Japanese Santa Rosa Plum

Honeyberry

Within a few days, the pear, apple, prune plum, plumcot (an apricot-plum cross) and the first of the peach trees were in bloom as well. So too were the quince and clove current shrubs. 

Flowering Quince

Seckel Pear 

Coral Star Peach

Clove Current

Immediately, our yard was abuzz with pollinators. Although the collapse of the (non-native) honeybee hives threatens the large-scale industrial-agriculture food system and is a disturbing harbinger of the more widespread damage to our environment and ourselves), native bees, wasps and other insects continue to ensure pollination for smaller scale farming. According to Fedco Seeds  (a fantastic source of information about both the work and politics of food growing, as well as a fantastic source of seeds),  it takes 10,000 or more honeybees to do the same amount of pollinating as 250 native mason bees. The native bees fly earlier and later in the day, in colder and wetter conditions, and carry pollen all over their bodies (not just in "pollen baskets" on their hind legs). On the other hand, unlike the social honeybees, it's impossible to corral these solitary dwellers into hives and transport them thousands of miles from farm to farm to pollinate single-species crops. Instead, it's necessary to offer attract them to come and stay with nesting sites (holes in wood or the ground) and a sequential diet of varying food sources spring through fall. (More info from Fedco about attracting native pollinators). 

As usual, there are also a large number of bumblebees, which do form social colonies and like the honeybees are in decline more generally due to habitat loss, climate change and pesticides. But with the abundance of these early sources of nectar (and no pesticides), the bumble bees are the first (or at least, the most apparent) of the pollinators at work in our yard. The honey berry (below) seems to be today's favorite. Watching them enter flower after flower after flower, there's clearly a reason for the saying "busy as a bee". 

Honeyberry with bumblebee

A Walk in Woods

Richard and I took a walk this afternoon to see what was happening in the forest. Over the years, we have sought to reintroduce a number of native species, some of them gifts from the land of family and friends where they were growing in abundance. 

Bloodroot

Bloodroot, with its bright, daisy-like flowers, is one of my favorite early signs of spring. A low-growing, native woodland flower, it takes advantage of the sunlight reaching the forest floor before the trees leaf out. This patch began with transplants from an extensive swath growing along our neighbors' stream, and I'm happy to see it beginning to spread. It's not edible, but it certainly feeds the spirit.

Wild onion

Richard transplanted these wild onions from a patch growing near the stream at his parents former home (now his sister's home), placing them on the banks of our stream.  One of many members of that allium family that naturalize, they are small, but tasty. They can be dug for use like a scallions (below), but more frequently, we simply nibble on the greens as we pass by.

Wild onions (2010 photo)

Wild leeks, or ramps, are another naturalizing member of the allium family native to eastern North America. A slow-growing, "gourmet" treat, formerly abundant colonies have been over-harvested in many places. But Richard's uncle still has a hillside full, where these came from. In Perennial Vegetables, Eric Toensmeier describes ramps as one of the few shade-loving vegetables "really worth growing." It will be still be another few years before we can begin to harvest more than a leaf or two, but we were glad to see that some of the bulbs had doubled in the last year. 

Wild Leeks (Ramps)

More Survivors

"North Pole" Lettuce

This "North Pole" lettuce (from Fedco Seeds) certainly lived up to its name. I planted this batch last fall, and they overwintered in the hoophouse (with its below zero temperatures),  protected only by an additional cloth row cover. We lost the oldest frozen leaves, but the roots remained strong, and the new growth has accelerated with the longer spring days.

Bitter herbs

Here it is early April, and we still have widespread snow cover. So I went digging for the horseradish. What I found was a determination for spring as fierce and fiery as my own.

Survivors!

Hoophouse (Feb. 16)

The tenacity of life is astounding.

While the rest of the planet was experiencing warmer than average temperatures, the northeast U.S. had one of its coldest winters ever. Outside Ithaca, NY, where we live, we had multiple nights with temperatures falling below 0 degrees F, even multiple nights with temperatures falling into the negative teens. We recorded a low of -2.7 degrees in the high tunnel (unheated hoophouse).


Fortunately, the deep snow cover and consistently below freezing temperatures helped prevent repeated freezing and thawing. But it was still a "zone 4" winter in a place that is typically "zone 5." And we didn't get around to providing extra mulch, doubling the row covers, or doing anything except waiting to see what survived. And while our March crops were nothing like the previous years, here is some of what we found:

High Tunnel Spinach (March 9)

Carrots and radishes dug from the hoophouse (March 9)

Low tunnels protected only by a single row cover (March 29)

Low Tunnel Tatsoi (March 29)

Low Tunnel Mache  (March 29)

Low Tunnel Spinach (March 29)

The challenge will be how to farm in face of climate chaos. For years, the conventional wisdom has been to look to and learn from those farming one zone warmer. But our frigid winter resulted from the changes in the shape of the arctic air front -- a wave pattern with now greater amplitude (the high and low points of the wave) as a result of global warming. As warmer air pushes into the arctic, some of the colder air mass is pushed further south. But where it descends will vary unpredictably from year to year. So while we will have many zone 6 winters (and summers), requiring crops that withstand warmer temperatures, we will also apparently have zone 4 winters (and summers) with colder temperatures and shorter growing seasons as well. And so the experimentation with sustaining life continues.