The Hawk

This hawk was overlooking Southerly Park off of South Woodlawn the other day.

Looking for lunch, and taking in the day.  What a sight.  What a presence. 

Last Summer's Elixir Social

Possibilitarian Garden Full Sensory Elixir booth entrance table pictured top right.

I just recently came across this posting on "tinySPLASH bigVIEW" blog written by Kristen Baumlier about the Beautiful Possibility Elixir Social at West Side Market (look back through our archives to one of our very first posts to see photos of our booth) in June of 2012.  She includes a nice write up about Possibilitarian Garden's presence there (as well as several of our other farmer friends!).

Here is the link below to her blog:
http://kristenbaumlier.com/2012/06/27/beautiful-possibility-elixir-social-at-the-west-side-market/#!prettyPhoto/0/

Wind in the Willows

woven curly willow wall

Wandering around the exhibit table room in the school gymnasium at the OEFFA Conference I noticed a bouquet of curly willow cuttings in a vase.  When I inquired about them, I met this woman from the Earthship at Blue Rock Station with big thick glasses that made her eyes look like those of a character in Harry Potter.  She told me about the willow and said she was selling them $1 for a cutting.

I ran off to retrieve my money, and when I came back, she decided to give me a whole bouquet of the cuttings all for $2.  She said I could stick some of the right in the ground when it's all muddy like it has been, and I could also put some in water- and they'll just start growing roots.  That way I could plant them with two different methods.

Since returning home, I have learned more about them.  I remembered how Willow, with the latin name Salix, has such a strong rooting hormone that you can even use the water that new cuttings begin to grow roots in (this is not to be taken as a recipe- I'd find out a more clear recommendation to use it properly to help other plants root) to create a rooting hormone compound for other cuttings that need rooting hormone support!
I also remembered that they like wet soils, and do well along river banks for this reason.  Also, I learned that because they are such vigorous growers, they make for great mulch, and coppices that can be used to generate tool handles, or other craft projects because of their beautiful and strong branch curve.

Since acquiring these cuttings, Daniel has also learned about Willow, and that is: "Don't plant them near your house or they will tear your house down!"  Hearing about how vigorous their roots can be, Daniel insists I don't plant them too close to the house, which includes the tree lawn in front of our house.  Which is fair enough.  We don't need any questionable growth around our pipelines.

an interesting & decorative use for a
classroom at the "Willow Farm" in CA

In spite of that fact, I feel I have found the tree I've been searching for- thanks to Anne from Blue Rock Station!  These beautiful, fast-growing trees, make for great windbreaks, and are almost nearly indestructible (a valuable characteristic in my open community garden situation).  Therefore, I plan to plant two of them, one on each half, of the tree lawn in the empty lot next door that it where the new community garden beds are looking to go.  I have been wanting to put a windbreak here for awhile, because it is the most open spot where all that Southerly wind comes blasting through the lots, and this seems to be the perfect beautiful fit.

curly willow wall with wild top 

So, there we have it, one of these I'm going to walk right out there and stick these curly willow cuttings in the ground, and watch as they grow several feet in this first year.  How things can and do change around here!  Here goes to learning some more and taking chances on a tree! 

We hope they will help to keep the wind in willows.

Urban Farmer Friends!

If OEFFA wasn't great for anything else but for meeting other like-minded folks who are doing things! One person I met doing awesome things is Farmer Joseph Swain in Clintonville, OH, just outside of Columbus.  He is a full-time urban farmer living off of a 1/3 of an acre and selling mushrooms, microgreens, seedlings, herbs and other fresh produce- all that he grows on his urban lot, in a hoop house, and even inside his house- where he has transformed parts of his house into mushroom growing chambers.

It is inspiring to see the ways in which farmers are continuing to adapt and create new systems of farming that can grow a lot of nutrient dense food in very small space in a place where it doesn't take gasoline to get the food to the people.  I feel assured we will see more of this type of farming in the future, and we be thankful for lessons that I am sure Farmer Joseph is learning now and so willing to share with the community so more people can grow some of their own food, too!

Cheers to urban farmers!
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You can read more about Swainway Urban Farm and keep up with what Farmer Joseph is doing through their website: http://swainway.com/
and through Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/swainway?ref=ts&fref=ts.

Lastly, I leave you with a nice article about Swainway Urban Farm (and you can find more on their webpage, if you want):

An article in This Week News about Farmer Joseph & Swainway Farm in Clintonville.

The writing is on the wall....

So, today is a monumental day of sorts-

because today, four men came from the City, pulled up in four separate cars, and walked up to the abandoned house next door that has cloud filled skies painted on the boarded up windows, and knocked hard.  I heard them knocking, and went to look out the window, and saw them there, and there was a white note posted on the front porch pillar.  I went downstairs to see if I could catch a word with them.

Speaking from the front door out to them on the street, I asked them what was happening, was the building being condemned, were they going to tear it down, who they were, etc.

They said, they've started the process of condemning it so it can be bull-dozed.  The process can take up to 6 months - a year.  The one man said they were going to see if they could move it along a little faster though (maybe because there's barely a roof, and lots of holes in the facade- pretty destroyed looking).

I yelled to my neighbor Reg as he walked by what was happening- and he said -as brightly as ever- it's going to take that long?  We can do it faster than that!  I know, I said, I've got some hammers and crowbars in the basement!  It is a strange thing to feel like we all have just been sitting around and waiting for the City to do something about it- mostly because none of us have the capital that it requires to deal with this asbestos loaded and fragile structure properly.  It is dis-empowering.  That being said, (and I have not chronicled at all the many many many stories that surrounded that house in the first year and a half after we first moved here) this has been quite a journey, and we have taken a lot of action with that house- as much as we maybe possibly could have without being in jail for arson, trespassing, and the list goes on!

When Danny came home he went and read the notice, and it was a Search Warrant.  I guess it's for Robert Whiteside, the owner of that tax-delinquent and dilapidated property.  The four men said they were just starting the process to get it condemned and taken down- so I guess this is how it starts.

Maybe there's a chance we can get the foundation saved, so we can make a Bio-cellar out of it.....
I have some work to do to find out the possibilities of that.  Some people to talk with....

For now, I need to document this house as much as I can.  Take photos of it- in all it's decomposing glory, because soon it will only be a memory.  A big big memory in our lives, the lives of the kids on this street, their families, and the families that lived before all of us here.

Ashes to ashes dust to dust.