It's not un-Yuzu-al

This Yuzu tree has survived a few winters and a move from our last place to here.  Now that it is in the ground, it is much happier than it was in a container. Finally we have a decent number of ripening fruits. Yuzu is a Japanese citrus and you don't eat it, but you can yuze it to make ponzu, which we have with nabe, a hot pot dinner which is great during winter.

I have my eye on our cocktail grapefruit which has a bunch of nice sized green fruits on it.

It is hanging out under plastic sheeting to keep it safe from frost.  The chickens are also under there, next to an orange tree, to keep out of the rain.  Sometime we will build a more permanent structure for rain and frost because I don't like using the plastic (I am re-using it though).

Avocado Drama

As I mentioned in a previous post, I planted a couple of Mexican Avocado trees in the corner of the garden.

The pieces of concrete are there to keep the chickens from digging up the roots and to maybe provide a touch of thermal mass for frost protection.  We did just have a 28 degree killing frost the other night that finally did in a few squash, potato and tomato plants that were still hanging around but the avocado trees did fine with no additional protection. I will be covering them after the rain passes just in case.

Anyhow, after I planted them, I was googling something about avocados and stumbles upon frightening warnings of toxicity. I read that avocado leaves, stems, skin and pits were toxic to dogs, birds and other pets. Yikes! Fortunately the dog cannot get into the chicken/fruit tree area but chickens are birds, right? I looked and looked specifically for information about chickens and found speculation on chicken keeping websites, but no hard evidence. Then I found this farm blog where they are using chickens to control grass and weeds between rows of avocados.  If you read the comments section of that post, you can see my question and the farmer's answer. She has never seen any evidence of toxicity and all kinds of other birds hang out in the trees. That made me feel better.  The other thing that has made me calm down about it was some nice folks at the California Rare Fruit Growers, which I just joined. Specifically, Julie Frink (avocado expert) wrote:

    "Mexican avocado leaves can be used as tea or flavoring when roasting meats. They can be eaten skin and all.  It is the Guatemalan varieties that have toxic leaves and seeds.  One of my friends tried to feed her chickens avocados but they wouldn't eat them.  Later she found out that birds should not eat avocados.  Our neighbors dogs eat avocados all the time.  Some cats love avocado and I've never heard of it hurting them.  I wouldn't think a chicken would be tempted to eat an avocado leaf and certainly not a seed.  As to pecking on a fruit.... We have birds in our fields some of whom make nests and raise families but I've never seen birds eat avocados and we have ripe ones on the ground all the time.  Our coyotes are beautiful with healthy coats from a diet of rabbits, squirrels, rats and avocados.  The squirrels, possums, raccoons, rats and mice like to visit us to fill their tummys with avocado.  I suspect you have nothing to worry about but you could check bird and chicken fanciers.  I'll ask my two friends who have chickens what experiences they've had."




I am guessing the chickens will be uninterested in the leaves, since they are kind of tough, although that doesn't stop them from eating fig leaves. I have decided to leave the avocado trees where they are. If it becomes a problem, I can always build a fence around them.

Red-Winged Blackbird Swarm

The other day at the Ellis Creek Water Recycling facility and park in Petaluma, CA we saw these swarming birds and someone said they were red-winged blackbirds
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red-winged_Blackbird

Watch the whole thing, even though it is long. It is better than fireworks.


I had never seen anything like that before. Red-winged blackbirds are very common across the US.

Lessons Learned

The plum tree broke right at the graft where the canker was when I tried to pull it out.  The roots of both the cherry and the plum trees were very deep already after less than a year in the ground.  It took a lot of patience and energy to get them back out of the ground but it had to be done.  In a way, it was a good opportunity to check out the soil and how the amendments to the clay were doing. I mixed it up better this time.

We decided to plant a pair of Mexicola avocados in the north west corner of the yard where the plum was.  According to things I read, including the  California Rare Fruit Growers Association page about avocados, you can plant two or three in one hole to save space and increase pollination. They also hate poor drainage

The person at the nursery suggested these two Mexicola type avocados, Stuart and Grande. These are pretty much the only Avocados I would try here as they are supposedly hardy to 18-24 degrees. I read on wikipedia that the record low of 16 degrees here was only recorded twice in the past century.  It has been regularly frosting here but temperatures are still in the 30s at night and 60s by day. Both avocado trees are labeled as being self-fertile, but you are generally supposed to get an A flower ype and a B flower type.  A little searching on the internets and I have found Mexicola Stuart and Grande listed as both A type, as both B type and as self fertile, so we shall see. For more on this, so I don't have to explain, see here.

 Still unsure about what to replace the cherry tree with.

Next time: Avocados and Satsuma Mandarins in the ground.

Prunus Problems

I didn't realize it had gotten so bad.  I noticed a little sap a while back, but did not realize I should be alarmed.  We have 2 trees in the prunus family, a cherry and a plum.  They both seem to have a pretty severe case of bacterial canker. I thought it was a borer at first, but they tend to make a mess down at the crown (just above the roots).  This starts at the graft and peels and oozes its way up the trunk.

It is really sad because the trees seem healthy otherwise but I am afraid their trunks are too small to withstand it.  Our friend Eva said we will probably need to destroy the trees and we read all kinds of scary things that lead us to believe we won't be able to plant any stone fruit.  No peaches, no apricots, no plums, no cherries.... I have found some resources that suggest copper spray may control it and that is spread by bacteria on the green leaves, not the cankers, but others say not so much and that the bacteria can live in the bark and become systemic.

If anyone has any suggestions, let me know.  Should I try to nurse these trees along or cut my losses and yank them out.  Should I risk planting again?  Maybe in the front yard?  My neighbors behind the back yard have plums.  I have not gotten a chance to look at their trees.

My Brain Hurts!

I was walking the dog and came upon this crushed can.

Bud Light and Clamato together at last!

Time Sure Flies!

It has been almost a month since I wrote anything.  First I got sick with something flu like (maybe swine flu, who knows?).  Then we also built a bathroom upstairs.  The old one was a disaster area when we bought this place and had to be gutted just to get rid of the mold under the floor and shower.  Then I went to the Association of Moving Image Archivists in St. Louis, MO. Then we continued with the bathroom.  Then we finished painting the house and now it is raining.

Now I know this is not a home improvement blog, or at least I don't want it to be, but we tried to be on the eco-side by getting a watersense certified toilet.  This is an EPA related program that requires toilets to use 1.28 gallons per flush or less and clear out a certain amount of solid waste at the same time. I have seen estimates of 3-5 gallons per flush on older toilets and 1.6 gallons on newer ones.  A lot of those 1.6 gallon toilets were not very good and required multiple flushes to do the job.  Our new toilet is made by Toto and is very very good. One quick small quiet flush.

We also used a low flow shower head that uses 1.5 gallons per minute.  So far I am not totally thrilled with it.  Several months ago I went to the water department and they gave me a free cheapo shower head that uses 2 gallons per minute and has a "massage" setting.  It was free and even put less steam on the mirror than the head we got with our original faucet (theoretically you could save electricity if  you use an exhaust fan in the bathroom).  According to energysavers.gov shower heads from before 1992 shower heads used about 5.5 gpm and now Federal regulations require them to use no more than 2.5 gpm. I guess 1.5 is below average and that is what I am all about.

We are very happy to be able to do the same tasks with less water. Not only will it help reduce demand on a scarce resource, it will save money on our water bill.  We didn't realize it when we got the toilet, but you can get rebates toward a new toilet in many municipalities. We did manage to get a rebate when we bought a washing machine, for selecting an efficient model.

Next step is to start collecting rainwater.