I thought my rabbits were goners this week. With highs in the 90s, they were miserable. It started Sunday when I checked on my new doe, Anabelle. She had her head thrown back and her mouth hanging open. She did not look so good. She was actually in the first stage of a heat stroke. I immediately wet her and set up a fan. I’ve read not to direct the air on the rabbit, but it seemed the only thing I could do to immediately cool her down. It worked. She came back to life.

For the next three days, I dunked my rabbits in water, put blocks of ice in the hutches and set fans up. Everyone made it through.

Interestingly, my buck, Virgl, held up on his own. He also has access to shady ground. I would lay ice on that patch of ground to keep it extra cool. At the peak of heat, he’d stretch out on it.

We are building a clay oven in the back. Inspiration started with the book Build Your Own Clay Oven by Kiko Denzer. However, the book is super unclear so we have been slowly trying to understand how to do it. We finally got started. Foundations for clay ovens range in design, material and complexity. There are currently ample examples on You Tube and other inline sources. Dipak decided to plan with a friend that is a structural engineer. This is way overkill but Mr. Gregory Jones has now ensured our oven will not collapse in an earthquake (which was never a concern really).

We used cinder blocks instead of “urbanite.” Thursday and Friday we (I) dug the hole in the compacted clay soil (setting some aside for use in making the “adobe” or “cob”- same thing). Then we leveled the hole, added the all purpose gravel for drainage, and acquired materials. Saturday Dipak did a bang up job stacking the cinder blocks so that there would be a compartment where we can store wood while I took a workshop on making and building with adobe. Sunday, Dipak worked with our engineer friend Gregory to construct the form we’ve used to serve as the base of the oven. I was helper and worked with Gregory to design the green roof that will protect the oven and baker from the elements.

The slideshow included has descriptive notes for each step. I have not included measurements as it would depend on the unique space being utilized. You can also find an excel spreadsheet for the costs, here.

Note: One can totally use salvaged materials for this project. With reuse materials you can keep costs to $200. Less than that would require a vehicle that can schlep stuff and alot more time to gather but if you can its wonderful. In no way do you have to use super exact cinder blocks and fresh concrete! But 1) this was a “together project” for me and D and 2) one has to pick their batttles…so fresh concrete, cinder blocks, and rebar it is.

Next weekend we will build the actual oven.

I’ve been an active chicken keeper in the years I’ve had a flock. I have only one old bird from the original flock. Her name is Odile. I keep her because she has been my flock manager. She was a peacekeeper from the get go. My first flock had a rooster in it, the place I had gotten them guaranteed they were females so when this occurred, I was allowed to swap for a new bird. By then the birds were a few months old and had settled into being a flock. When I brought the new bird home, Odile immediately protected it from the others who were not so kind about the new arrival. This is how I identified her tendency.

Two years later, I introduced a Buff Orpington and an Araucana. This integration consisted of letting everyone run around loose in my backyard during the day. Then when the original flock roosted, the new birds would roost outside unprotected. Once all asleep, I’d lift the new birds from their perches and place them in the coop. At dawn, I’d open the gate again so once awake and active, they could escape to avoid pecking. If locked in the run, they have less space and get attacked by the other birds more. Misfortune fell to the Buff in the form of a raccoon but the Aracaucana took with little effort on my part- well, other than waking at dawn.

However, I have since stopped allowing them full access to the yard. This has changed my methods for flock integration. When I had chickens to integrate I would let the older chicks out in my yard with Odile as she would not attack them. She would show them what to eat and they sought shelter with her. After this bond was formed, when I put them in the coop, Odile mostly protected them from the other birds. I say mostly as the Araucana had become violent in her attacks. This required an intervention that seems to work like a charm. I would hang out in the run with the birds while holding a stick and wait for the Araucana to launch an attack. When she’d attack, I’d peck her as if I were one of the flock. This consisted of quick light jabs between her wings. I also did a dominance display I had heard you could do with brutal roosters. I grabbed hold of her in plain view of the others, pinned her wings gently and pushed her down so she was sitting. Then with the one hand I pushed her neck down to the ground just above her wings. This put her in a vulnerable position and asserted that she is not in fact the alpha, I am. At first this lessened the attacks but soon after she did stop. I have since done this with another bird that took issue with my recent additions. It worked.

Integration Tips:

• 1) Birds of the same age, size and breed tend to be accepted quickly

• 2) If you notice a peacekeeper, preserve her in the flock

• 3) Pair new chicks with the friendly bird and let them bond before adding the new ones to the entire flock

• 4) If birds are all new in a space integration of new birds into one flock is easier as the territory is new

• 5) You can slip new birds in the roost at night but give them plenty of space to escape attack in the morning

• 6) Display dominance with a particularly aggressive bird (may take more than once).

• 7) This I just learned about from Kitty at Havenscourt Homestead: When you want new birds, and you notice you have a broody hen, as soon as she turns broody, slip chicks under her. She’ll care for and protect them against the flock. Kitty said that over time, she has added in 12 birds this way.

With this approach, I’ve been able to integrate several new birds including turkey chicks. I’ve not had a chicken terribly battered. Of course I’ll have to wait and see what happens once the turkeys grow profoundly bigger than the hens but for now these approaches work well.

I know I was going to write about flock integration next but this excellent and timely opportunity for community action just came up!

Santa Clara County passed an ordinance this year prohibiting fast food companies from including toys with unhealthy meals that exceed acceptable levels of fat, sugar and salt. A day after the Santa Clara ordinance was passed, San Francisco Supervisor Eric Mar sponsored a similar ordinance. San Francisco’s proposed goes a step further in that if a toy is to be included with a meal, the mean has to meet stricter nutritional standards such as:

- Meals must include at least a half-cup of fruit and three-quarters of a cup of vegetables.

- A beverage may not have more than 35 percent of its calories fat-based or more than 10 percent of its calories sugar-based.

If passed, this would be a tremendous step forward in reducing the ability of the fast food industry to lure in young customers with predatory marketing.

Help support this ordinance today by:

1) Contacting the San Francisco Board of Supervisors by email and phone.
2) If you are in the San Francisco Bay Area, come to the hearing to support the ordinance.  The hearing will be on Sept. 27th at 1:00 at City Hall, Room 263.

3) After the hearing, send letters to the editor to the San Francisco Chronicle in support of the ordinance to generate good visibility for the measure before the final full board vote (which will happen a week or two after the hearing).

4) Send a letter to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors and Mayor Gavin Newsome to let them know you support this ordinance.

The stakes are high — passage of this law could trigger similar measures in communities around the country and allow millions of children a healthier childhood. If we are to reverse disease rates, a comprehensive approach is needed – one that holds industry accountable so that public health education can genuinely take root.

Thought it’d be interesting to share what the coop looked like in 2006 compared to 2010. It took four years for the plants to fill in but growing takes time. ooh, gotta go and break up a chicken fight. Next topic on Pluck & Feather, flock integration.

I am constantly learning at the Pluck & Feather Farm. This week’s lesson was in flock culling. I have done this before but I did not pay attention to the time of year I did it. Last time it so happened it was midsummer and I was making room for the pullets I had raised from chicks in late spring. This time, I was culling from an old flock I adopted and my own old flock. I discovered Mid-September is not the best time as the birds are beginning to molt. I knew they were just beginning but I did not know what that meant until I had to pluck.

Turns out that before a bird drops her old feathers, the new ones are well on their way. The new shafts contain a tiny feather and are buried under the skin. They are very hard to pluck as they are strongly rooted and under a thin layer of skin. unfortunately, I had to proceed to make room for the layers in the coop. The result is that I will have to remove the skin entirely from at least one bird before I can cook it.

Word to the wise: Don’t cull during molting season.

I just read a lovely article in the Edible East Bay on the power of the cooking fire and a time when “community was a basis for spiritual strength, the properties of plants and herbs were more common knowledge, women took prime responsibility in providing nutrition to their families, and home remedies were recognized as sound preventative care.”

I highly recommend the read. I’ve included it below:

Evolutionary then and now?
BY SUZANNE SAUCY

It’s midsummer and I’m tending a campfire under a clear, star-filled sky at an elevation of 7,500 feet. As I watch the red-orange embers and listen to the crackle of burning logs, I find myself pondering the meaning of fire to our early human ancestors. For them fire meant more than an opportunity for soulful reverie; it was an evolutionary boon that provided protection from cold, security from predatory animals, and improved nutrition resulting from adding heat to their raw diet of wild game and foraged plants.

Richard Wrangham, a professor of biological anthropology at Harvard and the author of Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human (Basic Books, 2009), points to cooking as a key factor in our evolution from ape to human. “[Our] human digestive system is two thirds the size of a chimpanzee’s or great ape’s.  We have somehow adapted to having a small gut, small teeth and small mouths.  This adaptation of our species results from not having to put large amounts [of raw food] through our gut and retain them and ferment them for many hours. It seems very clear that cooking is responsible for increasing the quality of our diet.” Wrangham posits that this change took place 1.8 million years ago with the evolution of Homo erectus, the earliest example of Homo sapiens. Aside from making food safer, adding delicious tastes, and reducing spoilage, cooking increases the amount of energy our bodies obtain from food.

Bauman College— eating for health and well-being

Whatever the style, “cooking is a chemical process where the application of heat alters the structure and flavor of the food, making the digestive process more efficient and nutrition more absorbable by the body,” says Ed Bauman, founder of Bauman College, a nutrition and cooking school with classes in the Bay Area.  By the 1990s, when Bauman realized his calling to teach principles of eating for health, the role of women as custodians of the proverbial “cooking fires” had been supplanted by their desire to pursue a work life outside the home. Bauman acknowledges that his school’s approach is a bit of a throwback to times when community was a basis for spiritual strength, the properties of plants and herbs were more common knowledge, women took prime responsibility in providing nutrition to their families, and home remedies were recognized as sound preventative care.

In promoting an understanding of why people eat and how they can create more-conscious eating habits, Bauman describes four levels of behavior: eating for pleasure, eating for energy, eating for recovery, and eating for health. As we expand our awareness of our motivations, we can learn to make choices that are not based only on pleasure or the need for energy, but that also take into consideration longer-term goals for health and well-being. At Bauman College, students are first introduced to the biology and physiology of human digestion. The teaching emphasizes that the assimilation of food depends on many factors, including frame of mind while cooking and eating, lifestyle, social and spiritual environment, and mediation of stress. The food we eat becomes us and when digested efficiently has the ability to restore immune competency and resilience.

It’s plainly obvious that despite the availability of scientific knowledge, most of us make our food choices based on factors other than health and sustainability.  When we reach for that steak in the supermarket, we don’t really consider the fact that animal protein requires a far greater quantity of resources to produce and more bodily energy to digest than do vegetable proteins. This is not an argument against eating meat, rather an argument for examining our habits and evaluating our lifestyle choices for the sake of our own health and that of the planet.

As we continue to witness the commercially motivated denaturing of food and the corresponding disintegration of health in our population, there is still reason to take heart. According to Bauman, “We are in the midst of a renaissance that is happening from the grass roots. We are seeing a resurgence of home gardens, home schooling, and a genuine heart-based culture.”

Self-care and family care are a part of this awakening, as we realize that we can no longer live with an attitude that says, “I can indulge in eating whatever foods I want, and when I need a stent for my heart, I’ll get it.” We are recognizing that animals have rights when it comes to their treatment as food sources. Food is a common denominator as we reevaluate how we can sustain ourselves and the planet. The consciousness that each person brings to the task will make a difference.

Bauman acknowledges that no diet is right for everyone, and encourages experimentation to learn what foods are digestible and nourishing for an individual’s constitution. This way of thinking echoes principles from the science of Ayurveda, a system that Indian sages developed thousands of years ago and which is still used by millions of people in India today. Ayurveda defines three doshas, or energetic make-ups, of both the individual constitution and the qualities of food, and teaches how to balance them in order to create a diet for optimal health.

VEDIKA – IGNITING DESIRE FOR HEALTH

“Empty foods are not nourishing and do nothing to sustain our health and immunity.

Why should we not eat food that will nourish some aspect of our being?” asks Shunya Pratichi Mathur, Ayurveda practitioner and founder of Vedika Gurukula, an Emeryville-based school offering immersion in the ancient self-healing discipline. When we try to answer this question, Mathur reminds us, “We hold an unconscious belief that we cannot be more healthy than we are, creating a lack of personal responsibility for our own health and happiness.” Vedika’s mission is to ignite a desire for health and realize the truth of the mantra “Ahum aarogyam,” translated as “my inner self is in perfect health.”

As a preventative approach, Ayurveda addresses several levels of human experience: physical, mental, spiritual, and social. To enhance the functioning of mind and spirit the science recommends yoga, meditation, and mantra recitation to support greater mental clarity and stability.  The Ayurvedic system of anatomy and physiology defines and explains the interconnectedness of bodily functions, how food supports a chain of regenerative activity, and how immunity is at the core of a fully functioning human body. It posits that when we have health at the physical, mental, and spiritual levels, the human instinct for doing good in society is naturally awakened, and we experience more of our true nature by serving humanity. The most basic building blocks for this evolution of human nature are the food we eat and the vitality of our digestive system.

By 5000 B.C., when Ayurveda emerged as a science, humans had made great strides in strengthening their digestion by using fire to break down food before it was eaten. The rishi (seers or saints) of ancient India revealed the nature of fire and its role in providing nourishment to the body. They describe the inner digestive fire or “agni” that is responsible for overall health via the digestion and distribution of nutrition to every cell.

According to Abhijit Jinde, a visiting teacher at Vedika, “Biological health depends on honoring the central role of the digestive fire, feeding it food with balanced qualities, cooking with ghee and spices to regulate food qualities and potencies, and attending to environmental factors such as seasonal variation, lifestyle choices, and mental stress.” He adds, “In Indian philosophy the inner biological fire is a reflection of the divine fire that also has a hunger to be satiated with great respect.  Conscious feeding of the body becomes an act of devotion that fulfills the psycho-spiritual practice of acknowledging the divine consciousness that underlies all creation.” With this in mind, eating is not merely a chance to fill your stomach but a ritual that is tied to nourishment at many levels of human existence.

Looking at the images and messages expressed in our popular culture, we can see a contorted view of what food is all about. We make choices based on calorie count, fad dieting, expedience, and flavorings that blind us to natural tastes, and then we add food supplements to compensate for nutrition that we are not getting. Our pre-human ancestors evolved despite their apparent lack of insight into the rational of what they ate. Is it possible that with our access to scientific reasoning, we have a greater responsibility for our own species’ evolution?

We’re in the midst of a food movement that urges us to slow down and change our relationship to food: how we grow it, where we source it, how we transport it, what foods we eat and how we cook them, and what environment we create surrounding the experience of eating. We may be reaching a turning point in the evolution of our bodies, minds, and souls that requires us to make choices that are more conscious about food and health. Are we up to the task? Vedika Gurukula and Bauman College seem to think we are.

I’v got a bone to pick. It is in regard to the cost of sustainability and appropriate technology. This was touched upon by a farmer friend in a recent post about the cost of homesteading classes being too high. Yes, way too high. My own philosophy was to move away from the consumer world and practice food independence and frugality while preserving my food heritage. Preservation of food knowledge is an oral tradition for most of us. It is without a doubt experiential. We learn by listening and doing. Charging through the nose to pass on this vital knowledge seems a crime.

When it comes to purchasing food, my Mexican heritage and family are present in my thoughts. When I see a $50 chicken slaughter demonstration or a $30 dressed chicken in the market, me and my ancestors laugh in scorn. These overblown Slow Food prices is some bullshit. Food is for everyone. Having access to fresh healthy food is a right not a privilege. Food practices are not sustainable until food is affordable and accessible to everyone in the community.

When I hear the argument that the cost of healthy well raised/grown food is so costly because it is ecologically sustainable and therefore we have to pay more now to make is accessible and heal the earth, I cringe. My mother loves the earth. My family has a strong tradition in working with the soil and honoring the food that comes from it. My culture still worships agricultural deities. Its not just the earth that needs repair but our food system. Remember? Its all connected.

We won’t pay exorbitantly high prices for food and contrary to what Alice Waters says, we don’t even wear Nikes. Even if, no, especially if, I stopped using a cell phone entirely and wore homemade huaraches, I would not may $30 for a damn chicken.

Heidi and the fairy rabbit, Julio.

I had the fortune to meet Heidi Kooy of Itty Bitty Farm the other day. I meant to ask her way more questions about urban farming but got very side tracked into other conversations. When I meet kindred spirits I have a tendency to get scattered in my questions and suddenly I am in the woods. Pretty pretty woods.  Heidi was a gracious host and after a warm cup of tea, she gave me le grand tour of her set up. This includes a very well constructed green house. Well, it’s actually in mid-construction but you can tell it will be very solid. Again, the carpentry skills of the homesteaders I have been meeting are stellar. Granted, Heidi’s husband is a contractor but for instance at Dog Island Farm, Rachel and Tom are building gorgeous animal housing.

Kooy’s home is in the outer Mission of San Francisco. Other than the edible gardens created at schools, I had not yet seen an urban farm in my fair city (mine by birth). SF is a tough place to grow food due to the cold climate and coastal winds. Its much easier to grow a variety of food in the East Bay which is why is was an agricultural jewel at one point.

However, Kooy has managed to keep a steady flow of kales, lettuce and artichoke. Apparently, her family have been able to eat from the same kale plants for the last seven months! Once the greenhouse is completed, she expects more variety to their diets.

What seems even more impressive is Heidi and family’s little barnyard. They’ve made a clever use of space for two female Nigerian Dwarf goats and the two kids recently birthed. The space, narrow and long, provides the animals with 175 square feet of run.

The goats house with the chickens but have separate sleeping quarters.

You can just see the igloo under the stairs for the goats. Because we spoke more about genealogy instead of farming and swapped yucky rat stories, I forgot to ask Heidi how long she’s had her goats. Its seems by her blog, Itty Bitty Farm in the City, she’s had them for at least a couple of years. She is quite knowledgeable and still learning about the goat keeping world. Check out Heidi’s blog. It is well written and has lots of helpful information on it.

Beer Making #2: The Really Slow Way: I planted hops in a spring over two years ago thinking that by that September, we’d have enough hops for at least one batch of beer. Between chickens tearing the rhizomes out and poor placement, we never saw those vines. However, last October I found a source of healthy rhizomes grown in California. The Cascade variety is growing vigorously and producing. So much so, our resident beer maker, Dipak, recently harvested our first hops!

I think this may be the first time Dipak harvested anything on his own.

He explained the development of aromatic crystals in the buds with great enthusiasm. Its nice to see him excited about the farm…well, ok, about beer but also about hops we grew!

Bees: Marcel, Dipak and I harvested honey! We got freakin 50lbs. Lessons learned- 1) do not rest your hive tool on top of the exposed frames. It can fall in and end up on the very bottom of your hive. It really can. 2) If you, like me, leave your emptied frames out for a couple of days so my bees can clan up the remaining honey, before storing them in the freezer, they can attract robbers.

For a second I thought my colony was going to swarm but at closer inspection I thought I saw bees that weren’t the same species as mine. I also thought I saw them fighting. After a chat with Stefani, Queen Beekeeper, I realized the frames had attracted robbing bees. This is no good as it can encourage robbing of the hive.

Rabbits: Well hell, Marcel and I thought we had the special nurturing touch with the rabbits as we kept seven of seven orphaned kits alive and growing. Yesterday morning brought a sickly seeming little one. By night fall, it had fallen asleep for an eternal nap. It was a classic example of gastrointestinal failure for the little guy. Could have been overfeeding. Could have been blockage for a number of reasons. Either way, bottle feeding baby rabbits is high risk.

Birds: Rachel at Dog Island Farm traded an older flock of three laying hens for a young doe (provided one survives from my littler). In addition, I just picked up two turkey poults from the Thode Family Farm. Amazingly, all birds have adjusted to a shared living space. We are getting eggs here and there and the poults have stopped their alarm chirp. I dare say everyone is content.