We just got back from spending a week roasting ourselves in the high desert country in Central Oregon. The area around Bend, Oregon, is a popular vacation destination in the northwest in summer and winter, in part due to it’s high elevation and dry conditions. Fly fishing, hiking and cycling are all popular summer activities. Wintertime brings excellent powdery snow on Mount Bachelor and plenty
Friends in the Right Places
In addition to friends in low places, I am also fortunate to have friends in all the right places when it comes to growing food. I recently spent an afternoon at the Courthouse Garden here in Eugene, which is a re-entry program for ex-cons and also a class on urban farming through the University of Oregon. They were blessed with a huge donation of tomato
Mendocino Woodlands Design
Spring term of my graduate program is not officially over, but it’s 95% over for me. Yesterday was my final review for my spring design studio and it went really well. The project this term was the Mendocino Woodlands, which is a historic camp in northern California. The camp was built in the 1930’s and early 40’s as part of FDR’s New Deal. It is
Garden of Plenty
We visited our house in Portland this past weekend, which we are renting out while I finish my grad program. We planned on spending all day there working on weeding and pruning. The garden is in such beautiful shape though that we spent the morning doing light pruning and admiring what a healthy, lush garden it has become. It’s amazing how a few years of
Chartreuse and Purple Garden
Everyone has their favorite color combination and mine is blooming around town this spring: chartreuse and purple. For me, chartreuse is a beautiful hint of spring – something new, young and vibrant. Purples feel soothing to me, calming and tranquil. When it comes to my backyard haven, I would love to lounge around in a place that feels fresh and calm. It’s funny that I
Poultry-Proof Garden
We love having our chickens free-range in our backyard. They eat a wider range of food, which saves us some money on chicken feed and also makes their eggs taste ten times better. But they can be really destructive in the garden beds – trampling seedlings in search for the next great worm. It’s even more important for backyard ducks to have some free-range access,
2011 Vegetable Garden Plan
We are working with a small space for our garden this year, which is always a fun challenge. I have plans to plant potatoes, summer and winter squash, onions and more in flower beds next to the house. The garden beds are reserved for everything else and I felt like we needed a plan to make sure we maximized that space. I did an inventory
Garden Design
I have been carefully prepping our garden bed in anticipation of the growing season for months now. Back in the fall, I sheeting mulched an area of lawn at the rental house we are in. Over the last couple weeks I started finishing the prep for spring planting. The sheet mulch layers consisted of dried leaves, used bedding/chicken manure from our hens and some compost.
Fall Term Design Studio
As winter term of my landscape architecture program kicks in, I realized I should do a decent job recapping my project last term! I got to explore beneficial insect-attracting plants, plant species that do well in swales, and other fun ecological issues. I had the pleasure of working with a couple architecture students on the project, which was a challenging but fun learning experience. The
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