I'm in this one...

Me, I'll stick to two wheels on the ground...

Cyclist Danny MacAskill on the streets, rails, fencing, architecture, etc of Edinburgh...

2009 List of Seeds and Plants available & wanted

I've the following available, in various quantities. Lots of unfamiliar species - so see further down the page for information. Seeds unless otherwise specified.
Achoccha (Cyclanthera pedata)
Alexanders (Smyrnium olusatrum)
Apples (I'm saving some from a baker I grow called Annie Elizabeth. I believe, having come across many tasty feral apple trees, that good apples are not so dependent on intensive breeding as breeders may like you to believe - you just have to ensure there's no crab apple pollen involved. I have no crabs, but there is a crab in an adjacent garden.)
Babington Leek (bulbils) (details here)
Balm of Gilead (Cedronella canariensis, sometimes C. triphylla) (amazing scent, but not many seeds)
Chaenomeles speciosa and japonica
Evening Primrose (Oenothera biennis)
Garlic Chives (not many)
Land Cress (American, I think)
Parsnip (unknown variety)
Peas: Ne Plus Ultra and Prew's Special
Perpetual Spinach
Poppy (for seeding bread)
Potato (from Sarpo Mira berries)
Runner Bean (short podded variety)
Salsify
Sweet Cicely
Winter Radish
Just in: Red Kabocha Winter Squash, courtesy of a bought fruit. No guarantees it will breed true; there may be some Green Kabocha pollen involved, or others.

Bistort roots
Potato Bean tubers
Ramsons bulbs
Vietnamese Coriander cuttings
I've posted details of some of these below

Please email me, antthehat, on my hotmail.com address for postage rates: for seeds (other than big seeds, including perpetual spinach) only, this will usually amount to normal posting rates. Otherwise, large letter postage is required for Babington Leek bulbils, legumes and most roots. Some extra consideration would also be welcome!
If you've anything interesting to offer, please say: some I wouldn't mind are:
Seakale,
Tuberous nasturtium,
Solanum sisymbriifolium,
Japanese Yam,
Sagittaria latifolia,
Yacon,
and others I can't think of at the moment!

Found a Slime Mould - Fuligo septica?

This was growing on a long-dead conifer log in our Cheshire garden, appearing a couple of days into a hot spell following a damp and cool English July.

Thursday it was yellow and granular in appearance, but evidently very moist.

Friday it had turned black, with evidence of slugs/snails having foraged overnight.

Environment Friendly

You can be:
Dog Friendly = friendly to dogs
Child Friendly = friendly to children
User Friendly = friendly to users
Customer Friendly = friendly to customers
Environmentally Friendly = Friendly to the Environmentally
Come off it! The phrase is 'Environment Friendly'.

Have a think about it on the loo...

Employment Sought

In order to keep writing the VREN newsletter, I need some income: £55 a week jobseeker's allowance does not go far! Two options:

• Funding for VREN: either core, or per newsletter
• Paid work, full or part time, preferably local and ethical.

What I can offer:
lots of office experience (as a technical clerk);
mastery of MS office programs (Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Access);
knowledge of sustainability issues;
organic gardener;
can speak on sustainability and gardening (have done aphrodisiacs, unusual fruit and veg, and flower evolution);
a game to illustrate how tradable energy quotas would work to reduce personal carbon emissions radically

Please contact me on my hotmail.com address: antthehat. Thanks!

Housing Crisis? What Housing Crisis?

Why do we need more houses in the UK? Why are house prices sky-high, and unaffordable by essential workers? Why do kids, old enough to move out, stay at home and spend their quite reasonable earnings on booze and cars? Why are more elderly people living on their own, necessitating carers to drive round in cars? Why are cars so necessary?
I'm sure if you add up all the bedrooms in the country, you'd find a surplus.
Surely, if people opted for sharing their homes, or move into shared homes, we could instantly get more accommodation. Young people can share, old people can share, mixed ages can share. Single households generate more waste per head. Single households need more heating energy per head. It's hard work maintaining a house on your own, especially if you need to work, or if you're elderly.
Government specs for new developments aim to cram them in - great for squeezing them onto brownfield sites, but pathetic for gardens, which are breathing spaces, places for drying clothes, composting waste, growing food, appreciating nature.
Shared housing shares burdens and costs, provides company, provides security, provides care when you're down. People in shared housing find they can afford to work part-time; they can downsize on their personal material comforts, upsize on their social and shared comforts.
Divorce is another issue - I blame lack of conversation in this busy-busy-busy lifestyle. The more you have, the more you have to look after - so cut it out. Axe telly-time, talk. And don't dream of winning the lottery - it won't happen, and any charity will benefit more by direct donation. If you've got a dream, work towards it - dreaming won't help!
In a large group, you can have babysitters, granny-sitters, dog-minders, specialists, and hearty entertainment - jam-sessions if you're musically minded! And how many cars do you need? Not many.

MEP HITS OUT AT MEDIA OVER CLIMATE CHANGE DOUBT

Green MEP Caroline Lucas has hit out at the media after a poll revealed that a majority of people in the UK believe that scientists aren’t agreed about the facts of climate change – or that it is being caused by human activity.
According to latest figures by pollsters Ipsos-MORI, some 56 per cent of respondents agreed with the statement: “Many leading experts still question if human activity is contributing to climate change”. Just 22 per cent disagreed.
Dr Lucas, who is a member of the European Parliament’s Environment and Climate Change committees, said: “This is very worrying. Politicians will never take the steps necessary to cut emissions unless voters demand that they do so, and they won’t demand it if they remain sceptical about their role in changing the climate in the first place.
“The media are, at least in part, to blame: their obsession with appearing to be balanced means discussions of climate change tend to have a naysayer arguing either that climate change isn’t happening, or that it isn’t manmade, as though there is a serious ongoing scientific debate about this.
“But the fact is that there is an overwhelming scientific consensus on climate change: almost every scientist in the world agrees that climate change is happening, that it is being fuelled by human activity, and that our best chance of ameliorating its worst impacts lies in dramatically cutting global greenhouse gas emissions.
“By suggesting otherwise the media is, albeit inadvertently, promoting dangerous scepticism about climate change – and undermining our chances of doing anything about it.”
Dr Lucas, who was named Politician of the Year in the recent Observer Ethical Awards 2007, likened climate change scepticism to holocaust denial.
“The media’s attempt to seem balanced is in fact distorting the public’s understanding of perhaps the most pressing issue facing us all today – and it’s tragic. It doesn’t make any sense: would the media insist on having a holocaust-denier to balance any report about the second word war? Of course not - but by insisting on giving so much airtime to climate change deniers, it is doing exactly the same thing.”
July 5th, 2007

And it's definately nothing to do with the Sun! Temperatures have been rising of late, while the Sun's output's been falling. See the Guardian reports at http://environment.guardian.co.uk/climatechange/story/0,,2119695,00.html
http://environment.guardian.co.uk/climatechange/story/0,,2123448,00.html

Freestyle Foods

On land where your tenure is unsecure, you want food that requires a minimum of money/effort. So:
scatter a manky pot of raspberries or strawberries (you can make a herbal tea from the leaves of the former)
toss your applecores (some of the best apples I've tasted have been from such seeds, chucked by the wayside)
...and some hazelnuts
planted ornamental almonds can offer tasty nuts (if too almondy, then too much hydrocyanic acid) - but you may need adjustable spanners to crack them
learn to recognise Ground Elder and know it from poisonous relatives - it's great cooked as spinach, or young leaves in salad. Don't introduce it to your allotment though!
plant roots like carrot and parsnip from the grocer - they'll give cheap seed
plant Jerusalem Artichokes for an excellent crop of tubers, that are wonderfully crunchy scrubbed for salad - but only harvest them when you're ready for them, as they don't store well.
other tasty wild plants: ramsons (wild garlic), common sowthistle (lettuce-like)

Global Warming Swindle? Don't Believe It!

We are using fossil fuel at a phenomenal rate.
Millions of years ago Earth had an unbreathable atmosphere, with no oxygen and rampant ‘greenhouse effect’. Life, especially plants, evolved to cope with that; take CO2 out of the air and replace it with oxygen. Over time they evolved into the plants we have now, able to manage on low concentrations of CO2 and in cooler weather.
Now, within decades, we’re ploughing through millions of years’ worth of buried carbon. Natural systems can’t absorb it all. (They currently produce 150 GT/y CO2, while man produces 7; but they absorb 154, leaving 3 in the air. So small tips to the 150 or 154 figures will make big differences to the atmosphere.)
The Earth's temperature is rising fast, and its blamed on our CO2. Past evidence shows that when the climate warms, nature releases CO2: that could mean that if we push our luck to far with man-made CO2, nature will take over and no amount of back-pedalling by mankind will pull us out of climate chaos.
The new climate is expected to be bad for us, with floods, gales and crop failures, but worse for those in poorer countries. Their desire to acquire the trappings of the west is mistaken. Poverty was caused by unfair trade; left alone communities can manage on local resources. Poverty could be alleviated if we in the west stopped paying slave wages for imported goods, and threw less in our bins.
And then there are the problems relating to running out of fuel, increasing numbers of people chasing decreasing amounts of fuel - the poor suffer again. And the way energy is currently used endures we eat through our resources and dump them into landfills, or incinerators.
We’ll also suffer the side-effects of world-wide strife. Cutting our emissions is an easy option – avoiding flying, minimising travel, buying local, conserving energy, avoiding wasted industrial effort, renewable energy and eating less meat. No sweat!

YOUR CARBON EMISSIONS IN A FLASH

Your Carbon Tally
We each produce too much Carbon Dioxide in this country – about 11 tons each per year. The only safe way not to upset the balance of nature is to reduce that – drastically, and now! Could we manage on 1 ton each by 2050? See how you and your household scores now: enter figures for your whole household then divide by the number of people therein –

One Ton of CO2 is about:
Domestic Fuels
Coal - 8 sacks
Gas - 5000 kWh
Oil - 350 litres, 80 gallons
Electricity - 2000 kWh
Wood - 2/3 ton (unless sustainable/rescued from waste)
LPG - 2/3 cubic metre, 670 litres

Travel (1000 miles = 4 miles per day commute)
Car miles
Small Car (37mpg) - 3600 miles
Medium Car (29mpg) - 2800 miles
Large Car (24mpg) - 2300 miles
Small Diesel (64mpg) - 5300 miles
Large Diesel (53mpg) - 4300 miles

Passenger miles (these are per person: a family of 4 holidaying in Spain would incur 4 tonnes in total)
Train - 10,000 miles
Bus - 6,000 miles
Coach - 10,000 miles
Air - 1600 miles (ie Spain and back)
(UK – Miami return = 5 tons; to East Australia return 11 tons)
--------------------------------------------------------------
Grand Total
--------------------------------------------------------------
Number of household members
--------------------------------------------------------------
Therefore tons CO2 per person per year:
===========================================
Notes
This is a rough and ready reckoner, we suggest you enter CO2 no closer than to ½ ton. With 31% of UK energy used in the home, and 26% in transport, the general public has a lot under its control. (2001 figures.) It neglects contributions from industry, services, farming and landfill gas.
For mainland distances see http://www.viamichelin.com/
Air flights: www.futureforests.com/calculators/newflight4.asp, gives CO2 emissions without a factor for radiative forcing. For that see http://www.chooseclimate.org/
References: See "How We Can Save the Planet", by Mayer Hallman with Tina Fawcett, Penguin, ISBN 0141016922.
There are plenty of more detailed exercises available on the internet. Try www.earthday.net/Footprint/index.asp, www.bestfootforward.com/carbonlife.htm, www.carboncalculator.com/newaccount.php, www.resurgence.org/carboncalculator/

For an excel spreadsheet, visit http://www.vren.btik.com/documents/1518611134.ikml
For the above calculator on an A4 sheet, see http://www.vren.btik.com/documents/1518613816.ikml

Babington Leeks

Babington Leeks (Allium ampeloprasum var babingtonii)
Babington Leeks are a perennial, rare UK native, found on south-western coasts, with the following life-cycle:
Ripe bulbils fall from September on, to root and develop on the moist winter soil. They are unlikely to reach full size in their first season, especially if you mistake them for grass. Planting in September gives them the longest growing season. I’ve not done experiments, but suggest planting 6-8” (15-20cm) apart, and ½”(2cm) deep.
Around June, the foliage dies back to the underground bulb. (You may like to mark the position to avoid damaging them/overplanting.)
In September, growth resumes. If big enough, they’ll produce a flowering stalk. The flowers are sterile, but the ball of bulbils at their base can be used for propagation.
In June, the foliage dies back, but the stalk remains and releases the bulbils by breaking up in autumn.
Uses:
The leaves can be used like leeks, or to add a garlic flavour to meats, stews, whatever.
The bulbils can be distributed on pizzas (remove husks).
The bulbs can be used as giant garlic – you’ll find them in ones and twos, not clusters as traditional garlic. I’ve just pickled some for the first time – yet to open. To get bulbs, not bulbils, break off the young flower heads (use them in cooking), so that the stalk dies back early. Lift in July/August - if your ground is solid, baked in the summer sun, try watering it to minimise bulb damage when digging them out.
You may try bunching the stalks to make insect homes.
Our mediaeval ancestors, and their predecessors, probably found these leeks and used them in their pots, part of the essential spring greens. As the plant’s only means of reproduction is by bulbils and division, this is the very same variety. It can’t be improved upon – for the same reason; and cannot breed itself out of disease susceptibility, so should not be grown in bulk, just isolated gardens.
If you fancy growing them, I can send some bulbils to UK addresses on receipt of a suitably stamped, addressed envelope: email me, antthehat at my hotmail.com address for information. Fresh stock is available in September, also the best planting time. If you've got any interesting edibles to offer in exchange, that would be great, but not essential.

Other plants on Offer

Oca (Oxalis tuberosa). Store the pink tubers in a cool, airy place, and plant out in early May. It will form a low bushy plant. Frost will kill the tops in autumn: I mulch at this stage, to allow the succulent stems to continue feeding the tubers, which start developing late in the season. I've realised that leaving the mulch on for any length of time allows slugs and other pests to eat the tubers: I've yet to determine the optimum lifting date. I eat the tubers in salad, and later, the sprouts growing from them. The green shoots are also tasty. However, all parts contain oxalic acid, which clamps onto iron and other minerals, making them unavailable to the gut: so eat in moderation.

Potato Bean (Apios americana): has brown tubers that gradually desiccate in open storage, making them slow to sprout – so store in pots of compost, unwatered, until about April. (Clean ones also seem to store well in plastic bags in the fridge, but check for the occasional mouldy one.) Then, insert a small cane (avoiding the tuber) and provide water and warmth. Plant out after danger of frost and grow alongside your runner beans. Water in dry spells - in the US, they're a pest in Blueberry fields, that's how much they appreciate moisture! Also indicates how the tubers get lost in the blueberry roots. It also means its a good idea to plant in a dug veg bed, well away from perennials, shrubs and lawn. Harvest the strings of tubers in winter. Boiled, they taste like baked potatoes. They were once considered an alternative to potatoes during the Irish famine. Hang on to the 'mummy' tuber - it gets bigger year after year, producing a stronger plant each time! Here's a picture of a real oldie weighing about 850g ->

Achoccha (Cyclanthera pedata): black seeds looking like witch’s teeth. Sow in spring, as other members of the squash family, and plant out in rich soil after danger of frost. Water if necessary. It can monopolise a bean pyramid. Crop the fruits for salad when no longer than 2” (5cm), otherwise they get ‘chewy’. Don’t worry if you miss any – they’ll form seed for next year, and don’t appear to hinder the formation of further fruits.

Sweet Cicely (Myrrhis odorata): long thin seeds that grow into a perennial, aniseed-smelling, herb. Sow the seeds when they happen in autumn, or perhaps spring, where they are to grow. Use the leaves or scrubbed roots in cooking; the young seeds are good raw.

Alexanders (Smyrnium olusatrum): black seeds in ‘foetal’ position, with peppery smell. Sow the seeds when they happen in autumn, or perhaps spring, where they are to grow. Use the leaves or young shoots in cooking – parsley-like flavour, or the peppery seeds (I've got some in a peppermill!).

Quince (flowering) - Chaenomeles japonica, C. speciosa. A common garden flowering bush. The smaller fruits of the former smell distinctly marmalady in autumn and are brilliant flavouring; they have a short shelf life. The larger fruits of C. speciosa are easier to strip the fruit from and last longer. They're a great lemon substitute (though don't try squeezing!). I use them in apple sauce, or in flapjack. Such flapjack is lifted by a small sprig of rosemary.

Poppy - Papaver somniferum. Beautiful flowers, forget the resin - when the seed capsules start to open their vents at the top, it's time to gather them. Let them dry out fully, put them into a jar and SHAKE! Pour the contents through a kitchen sieve - it should let the seeds through without the gubbins. Bread-making time! As for growing it - just scatter and let it do it's weedy thing.

Wild Chamomile - Matricaria recutita. Another weed (no seeds available). Collect the flower heads, lay on a tray and give gentle heat to dry. I have known little caterpillars amongst them, so check. 3 flowers in a cup (maybe more, maybe less), boiling water, delicious tea. Fair trade, local, organic, the lot. This one's an annual - proper chamomile is perennial.

Jerusalem Artichoke - Helianthus tuberosus. I don't offer this - too expensive to post, and you can get them easily enough from veg shops and gardening mates. Plant in winter or spring, leave to grow (young shoots may need protection from slugs) and harvest the tubers as required in winter. If you're planning planting something else there, be ready to grub up any artichokes you left in: I've not yet succeeded in getting them all out! You can plant for next season simultaneously. Tubers deteriorate, losing water, in storage. Plenty of recipes for cooking; my favourite is just to scrub and eat raw!

Butternut Squash - Cucurbita moschata. I get my seeds from bought fruit, or plants I've grown from same. They don't seem to hybridise with other cucurbits (unlike a vegetable spaghetti I kept from year to year, gradually getting more marrow-like.) Start in spring indoors, as any cucurbit, and plant out in fertile soil. May need watering in dry weather. Allow to trail, or they can be encouraged to grow up canes. Cut ripe fruits off through the stalk. Young late fruits are delicious raw. I have spare seeds originating from bought butternuts.

Winter Radish - sow late summer, reap in winter. The last one we dug up weighed 2lb (pic). While slugs were devastating our little salad radish, these were untouched. Probably because they're hot! One thin slice needs plenty of other salad on your plate! And if they go to seed, do as the Chinese would - harvest the flower stalks. Very young, they'll do for salad (pretty flowers), they're also great in stir fries, etc. A bit further gone, and you can eat the young pods. After that, you're harvesting the seeds. I've seen radish seedlings for sale in our local supermarket, and have tried growing them on a windowsill - they don't believe in synchronisation. Take the ripe, dry pods and give a bit more drying indoors, then rub briskly between your hands to release the seeds, dropping everything into a dry washing-up bowl. Take it outside, shake everything to the bottom, and blow the chaff off the seeds, which being heavy and round, will keep to the bottom. Remove the chaff as it gathers at the top, and repeat. Then shake the chaff out of your hair!

Burdock: a native biennial, Arctium minor. Left to go to seed, you may attract goldfinches: you'll certainly get their hooked seeds attached to your clothes. But then you'll eventually come across self-sown seedlings: you want to transplant these in winter, and providing they're weedy little roots as thick as a biro's inside, no fatter, you stand a chance of them using their subsequent year just growing. That's what happened to the one pictured, along with five of its kin. It was dug up after frost had killed its leaves - the top of the root is some way down, and the bottom is still further! We'll be peeling it and soaking in water for 10 minutes to diminish the earthy flavour, then boiling it. We've come across a recipe for potato and burdock cakes - bit like potato cakes. They're also good roasted - you don't need to peel them for that. No seeds available - ours were gathered from country trousers! But there are some expected this autumn

Tomatillo. This you grow like a pepper, and it's tough enough to survive outside in summer. Like a pepper, it branches each time it flowers. The flowers are attractive yellow things, held face down beneath the branches attracting bees. But pollination is very occasional, so I've been using a paint brush - you have to do this before late afternoon, otherwise the flowers close. The pollen is fine, and seems to be released explosively onto the brush by all too few flowers. When you succeed, you get a golfball sized fruit (ours is green) within a husk. The fruits have sticky waxy coatings that enable them to stay good for months indoors.

Mesembryanthemum. The Livingstone Daisy of flower borders, whose bright blossoms enlighten sunny days. The leaves are good in salad - crunchy and very mild, certainly in autumn. Mine are growing in a hanging basket, away from slug interference, and with a hippo buried in the compost. No seeds available.

Epiphyllum. Let the berries develop on your Epiphyllum/Orchid Cactus: the taste, when they eventually ripen, is out of this world! (Cuttings available, random varieties)

Sweet Potato. I tried again! This time, under a cloche, we manage to get something thicker than a pencil. Variety is from New Zealand via our local shops, called Kumara (a Maori name for Sweet Potato!) I'm not bothering in 2009.

Dahlia. I've a hunch this is edible; Ive always been tempted by those fat roots! Said to be bitter though. Petals are said to be OK in salads. No seeds.

Hazel. I love this - it's definately got permaculture's requirement of at least 3 purposes. In February, out come the catkins: the plant is covered in yellow lamb's tails, telling you spring is on it's way. Take a branch indoors and put in a vase of water: a week later, with no wind blowing it, the catkins will be loaded with pollen, so a flick will produce a cloud of it. In autumn, there's the nut crop. Finally, there's a need to trim it, removing long, straight, useful canes. That's 3: if you're up to the trouble of extracting them and enjoy the taste, you might try planting one inoculated with truffle spores.

Juneberry - small suckering tree, very pretty with its white spring flowers. These are followed by berries, the size of small currants, that are ripe when they turn a dark, bluey red and pull off easily in your hand. They're well spaced apart, and ripen sequentially, so although tasty, they're inconvenient to pick. And blackbirds love them. So enjoy the flowers, and let the fruit distract the birds from your strawberries!

Ribes odoratum, Buffalo Currant. This shrub has long, weak shoots; by good fortune mine's planted beneath a Rowan, whose lower branches support it. It's blessed with gorgeous yellow flowers in spring, with a delicious perfume. These are followed by small black currants, tasting rather like blackcurrants. You'll know they're ripe from the attentions of blackbirds. You can pick whole bunches as long as some are ripe, but you may prefer to pick your other fruits and leave these for the birds.

Potato. It's not hard to grow these from seeds, though the results are unpredicatable - but you retain fewer pests and diseases that if you save your own tubers. Collect ripe berries fallen from favoured plants, and split out the seeds - you can spread these on paper, or use the technique used for tomatoes if you prefer. I sowed mine in early spring indoors, transplanted and planted out. Gathering in the first crop, I found a mixture of sizes, shapes and colours, despite them all coming from the same mother. I've replanted, and they're growing for their second season.

For more information on these plants (and many others), see the Plants for a Future website, http://www.pfaf.org/

The Chayote

Chayote - Sechium edule.
I got a job lot of these fruits for a song, so I thought I'd try growing them. A search on the internet suggested that the single seed inside this cucurbit's fruit might sprout if carefully cut out: I had no joy. They tried in their pots, but whether they didn't like the north facing windowsill in winter (the best place for me to keep my eye on them), or just didn't like being removed from the fruit, I don't know. But one fruit remained in its little plastic bag for some time, and started rooting and shooting. So I put it in a plantpot. As I write in mid April, it still looks reluctant. See the picture with the rotten fruit - taken before I removed the fruit and planted it up without - it had some roots trying to grow into the fruit, but rotting; there were still some healthy root starts waiting though. For some good pics of young chayotes, see http://www.greenculturesg.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=9734 Ultimately, I hope it will go romping up a bean frame, and if not produce fruits, then we'll gorge on shoots. I've none to offer, of course - just thought you may be interested.

PS - It died. It wasn't healthy when I removed the fruit, and just went downhill...

Happy Christmas!