Work Party Wed.11/30 and Meeting Sat. 11/3

WORK PARTY
Wed. 11/29
1:00-4:00 PM
We'll be building a back fence as well as harvesting


GENERAL MEETING
Sat 12/3
3-5PM

at Maria and Thure Meyer's

411 Apodaca hill (off Upper Canyon Rd)

Notes from Sat.Nov.19 meeting

 

Intentions for the Garden

Changing the way we live

Eating the freshest food

Sustainability

Healing

Being part of the Earth

Teaching skills (construction, horticulture, compost, greenhouse)

Larger community survival

Learning

Creating beauty-art

Dreaming together

Accommodating teenagers and younger kids

Bees, birds and butterflies sanctuary

Sacred food more than volume food

Prototype garden to expand across more neighborhoods

Ideas

Shrine

Greenhouse

Cozy gathering space (table, chairs, fire pit, gazebo)

Inclusive community building and strengthening

Sculptures and art

Chaulkboard for tasks

Rain water catchment system and/or gray water recycling

Needs

Honoring the garden hosts' residence

Ethical behavior

Non-violent communication

Sacred/medicinal herbs for healing and rituals

Monthly potlucks

Forum for dialogue

Heart-centered community

Skills offered

Bodywork

Seedlings

Music

Teaching

Consensus process

Psychotherapy

Construction

Facilitation

Horticulture

Composting

Social networking

WORKING GROUPS

Event-Networking –Socializing   Joan, Michelle, Nicholas

Construction  Dominique, Gary, Poki, Alegria

Social Space  Thure

Garden and Sub-Garden (Native crop, Medicinal herb garden)  Gary, Joan, john, Dan, Thure, Dominique, Poki, Juaquin

Animals  Dan

Design-Master Plan   Gary, Dan, Poki, Giselle

Outreach-Growth  Dan

Compost  Michele, Poki, Giselle

Research (specialty crops (shitake, tea) and other subjects)  Thure, John

Art  Dominique, Joan, Gary, Michael, Nicholas

Youth Products  John, Giselle, Dominique

Blog - Idea forum. Bryan, Poki

Finances  Thure, Poki, Giselle

Causes (delivering food to persons in healing crisis)  Poki

If you wish to be part of a working group, please send me a note with your phone #

Follow-up meeting

Sat. Dec. 3  

3-5PM

Meeting Agenda for Sat. Nov 19, 3:00-5:00pm

Taetyn and Ivy harvesting lettuce


Some of the items on the meeting agenda:

• Setting up a weekly harvest during the next few months
• How to help pay for the set-up of the garden
• What to do with all the compost we are getting, especially the coffee ground
• Researching on crops that we could grow in arroyo (tea, shitake)
• Chickens and eggs
• Finishing the new chicken pen
• Building an outdoor kitchen and toilet behind yurt
• Building a fence in back area to create more privacy
• Finishing hoop houses with UV resistant plastic
• Planning next year's crop and ordering seeds

Some of you are not able to attend the meeting so please feel free to send your ideas, requests and feedback so we can weave them in the discussion. 

Please RSVP if you plan to attend.  Email here

Tia bringing coffee grounds from Ohori's Coffee Shops

Juaquin introducing our different varieties of lettuce and how to harvest them

Our plants in one of the hoop houses

John and Dominique planting Jerusalem Artichokes

Eating Jujube fruits

Planning Meeting Sat. 11/19 - 3:00-5:00PM

Now that winter is here, we can go inside and start reflecting on our next steps for Dandelion Ranch.

Planning Meeting (instead of Garden Party)
Sat. Nov. 19
3:00-5:00pm
at Dandelion Ranch

Bring cookies as usual...

Celebration Potluck Wed Nov. 9 @ 5:30pm

Time to celebrate and dream our next steps.

Potluck dinner at Dandelion Ranch.

We will provide salads and cooked greens.  You bring the rest.

5:30pm at Dan and Giselle's house (1212 1/2 Don Gaspar)

RSVP appreciated  poki@nodilus.com

Caring for our Winter Crop

 So glad we were prepared for the cold!

All our plants did well under cover.  Each bed was covered with Remay (white ground cover) under the plastic hoop house.

In order to keep the plastic taut/secure over the end of the hoop house, two things are done:
1) grommets are installed on the end of the plastic cover, and nylon twine is passed through the grommets.  The twine is attached to the galvanized conduit (see pic below)  

















2) on the long side, the plastic cover is attached to metal conduit with special aluminum clips.  A piece of 3/8" rebar is inserted inside the conduit to provide weight.  The plastic cover is held taut by the weight of the conduit/rebar on each side of the hoop house, making anchoring the plastic to the ground unnecessary.  The strong winds we had this morning did not disturb any of our hoop houses.

The end cover of the hoop house is made with 2 pieces of plastic overlapping 18" to prevent cold air from entering tunnel when closed at night.

















Plastic on the end is held in place with homemade clips made from 4" pieces of black irrigation pipe that have been cut to fit over the PVC pipes.

Grommets are reinforced with a piece of bicycle inner tube.

Voila!

















My interest is in refining a hoop house design that greatly helps extend the growing season until Jan. or later.  The combination of tight, snow and wind proof hoophouses, remay and black bottles as heat sink will do the trick.   For black bottles (mild jugs courtesy of Ohori's), we use Rit dye (available at Albertson, Hobby Lobby and on sale at Joann Fabrics).

Taetyn and Ivy inspected the compost pile to see how the worms we put in a few weeks ago were doing.









































Our garden parties will continue through the winter.  Once all of our hoop houses are finished, we'll begin building an outdoor kitchen, outhouse and tool shed, all part of the design of this mini urban farm.  We may also begin the installation of a drip irrigation system and will need to dig a trench to bring water and power to the back of the property.  

Please keep your eyes open for recycled construction material such as 2X4, 2X6, plywood, OSB, gutters and metal roofing. 

Next Garden Party
Wed. Nov 9
2-5PM  (new winter schedule)