Since I'm new

I'm gonna blatantly post about one of my favorite shadow shows on the radio, Maron v Seder.

I'm hoping this will actually post here...

Damn I can't embed here:

http://www.maronvseder.tv/?x=37&y=28

just watch this, maron/seder lovers.

What jerks that I can't embed!

:P

Welcome to my Blog!

Still trying to figure this out, but this is essentially about self sustainability in gardening and in living. Considering this is 2008, and we are in the transition period between Bush and Obama (Yay!), lots of people need to understand some basic things about how to survive in difficult times.

My husband and I have a philosophy about trying to learn, as much as possible, about how to do things ourselves. We live on 32 acres in the Santa Cruz Mountains, we raise Alpacas, and we believe in learning about how to sustain ourselves, as much as possible, from what we grow, and how to make things our selves.

Neither one of us comes from a "farming" background, so we are learning a lot these things ourselves, so forgive us if we seem stupid on some issues.

I've been growing vegetables for years, but always because I just love fresh stuff from the garden, never before because I don't have an alternative source. And though I will still have an alternative source, for a few years I hope, it doesn't mean that I shouldn't learn how to provide myself with such alternative sources. Or share with you what I've learned. That's one of the purposes of this blog. We need to learn how to survive.

And even though we live on thirty-two acres, most of these acres are redwoods and mountains, so effectively we only have 5 acres to work on. And we share that with 7 other families. Our area to garden is only our minimal area around our house and the alpaca corral. So our personal workspace is only about an acre.

We have an apple orchard that is part of this ranch, that I'm grateful that exists. It's been here for about 150 years, so is not anything I did. The only thing we do is put alpaca manure around the roots of the trees every year to help them. We also have some old grape vines, wildish blackberries, walnut trees, and old olive trees on the ranch, but I have no idea how to deal with walnuts and olives. I wish I did. I really do.

I have a greenhouse, and some raised beds to maneuver in. Right now I have a Jurassic era plant growing through my greenhouse floorboards in my greenhouse. LOL! it's that or one of those supposed "mole deterrent" plants. That is so bogus. Just remember that. There is no mole-deterrent plant.

So how should I begin?

I had some ideas, but they seemed a bit large in terms of topics for now.

Let me tell you what I'm doing at this point:

I raise alpacas. Ok, Alpacas are frequently confused with Llamas.




Llamas have banana shaped ears...






They are not llamas. Llamas are a lot bigger.

So maybe it would be better to open it up to everyone in terms of what I've learned. I'm not an expert, by any measure. I'm someone who is trying to learn, and willing to share positive experiences with others in terms of what I've learned.

I would love advice on topics to divide this up into.

Farming - self sustaining
Gardening
Self-Sustainability
How do we do this?
Green Energy
Cooperative Communities
Spirituality and Green Perspectives
Tech and Green Perspectives

There is so much I can say about all these areas, but this is not only MY blog I want you to contribute.