Portland's Weather

    Few Clouds
    Temperature: 37°F
    Humidity: 93.1%
    Wind: ESE at 7 mph
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    Clouds: Few Clouds

 

March 2010
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Portland Backyard Farmers Group

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 topic, but I [...]

Mason Bee Block Design 2009

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 some odd reason [...]

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

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 don’t sting.  I don’t know, [...]

Here we go again…

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 the time that I [...]

Happy Birthday to Me.

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 the exception of some [...]