Urban Hayseedprojects | Urban Hayseed

Sweet!: A Month Without Sweeteners

Rian — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 00:19:10 +0000

How about that for a change of pace?

OK, I admit it. I’ve been gone a while. I have received, what I guess you couldn’t really describe as ‘hate mail’ but neither was it ‘fan mail’, messages to the effect that I suck for disappearing. I apologize.

However, it has been an interesting [...]

All Is Not Lost

Rian — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 09:05:40 +0000

Just for the sake of trying to see the good among the rubble of my particularly challenging gardening year, I present the following series of photos of stuff that does not suck about my garden right now. Please enjoy, and if possible, go out and look for things that don’t suck in your [...]

Transplanting Carrots and Garbage Planters

Rian — Thu, 07 May 2009 06:54:25 +0000

Nearly anyone you ask will tell you: “Sow carrot seeds directly into the garden. You can’t transplant them.” Nearly anyone, but not everyone. For example, in John Jeavons’ book, How to Grow More Vegetables…, he encourages the reader to plant carrot seed indoors and transplant them outdoors some weeks later. He comments in [...]

Seriously, Ixnay on the Ainray.

Rian — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 08:37:06 +0000

I don’t have the heart to do the big pestilence post that I’d planned, so I’ll just say that if this weather does not shape up soon, I’m going to just jackhammer a hole into the floor of my greenhouse and plan on growing everything in there… under artificial lighting…

I could barely [...]

Mythology in Gardening: Compost Tea

Rian — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 18:17:30 +0000

Today, I happened across an article about how to make aerated compost tea. You get a bucket, an air pump, some compost, water… blah blah blah, and pretty soon you’ve got this lovely bucket of disease-preventing, nutrient-rich foliar spray! That’s awesome, I thought! I’ll do that!

As is my style, though, I thought [...]

Portland Backyard Farmers Group

Rian — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 05:32:05 +0000

I just created a Yahoo group called “Portland Backyard Farmers” as a sister/brother/estranged-step-cousin group to “Portland Backyard Chickens“. It seemed like a good idea to have a separate place to share sources, tips, questions, etc. about raising fruits and veggies, pollinators (my personal favorite), and preparing and preserving the goodies.

It’s a big [...]

Mason Bee Block Design 2009

Rian — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 04:47:02 +0000

OK, I decided. I’m going to go with two routes: drilled through blocks and a big, ol’ piece of PVC stuffed with straws. Why two? Erm… cuz… three would be too many!

OK, today I’ll show you how my patented drill-through-rolled-liner (DTRL) idea works. Last year, I tried a similar thing, but for [...]

Mason Bees, Part… oh, I don’t know… 65?

Rian — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 22:22:41 +0000

Happy Valentine’s Day, if you’re into that kind of thing.

As my three faithful readers may know, I am obsessed with mason bees (Osmia lignaria). Honey bees and bumble bees are also quite awesome, but the mason bee I find particularly interesting because:

It’s native. Whoo-hoo! There’s something native to somewhere still! They [...]

Here we go again…

Rian — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 22:40:09 +0000

I have a sunburn. From the sun. In Portland.

It’s that time of year again. February in Portland is when the sun torments us with days of t-shirt weather followed by a week of freezing rain, hot afternoons, hail, lightning bolts, locusts, piña coladas, bikini teams, and armies of zombie slugs.

It’s also [...]

Happy Birthday to Me.

Rian — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 08:35:07 +0000

One more trip around the sun.

You might imagine that I don’t have any pictures of that.

As for the topic of this blog… I haven’t posted much this summer because it’s been oddly unsatisfying out there this year. It is August 15th, and I have yet to harvest a ripe tomato– with [...]