At Home in Nature

The Elbert County Fire Chiefs Association decided to reduce the Elbert County burn restriction to “Stage 2.” The Elbert County Board of Commissioners made Ordinance 06-01 to approve this because conditions have improved with recent moisture levels. The restriction will run through September 30, 2011, when it will likely be renewed.

This does not mean that the threat of wildfire is gone, and caution is still required.But, just in time for summer, Stage 2 returns the ability to use charcoal grills and campfires by approval through your fire department. So make sure to get a permit FIRST or the fines could be hefty.Tell them you heard it from the Herald: if you invite them to your barbeque, you increase your chance of a permit!

Propane grills are legal to use without a permit, but for those loving the taste of wood, coal or other solid fuels, here’s some thing else in the news to think about.BBQ Pizza.

Backyard chefs in Australia are likely to lay claim to inventing this, or at least are the very first to publish their results on the internet and other locations of avant guarde culinary science debate.American chefs have been quick to pick it up, though, and now you can even buy frozen pizzas designed especially to fit on your barbeque.Check out Home Run Inn Pizza – they just developed this June 1, last week.

Beyond the size issue, there is nothing in particular very special about a barbeque pizza.It has all the same ingredients, but the manner of cooking it comes down to several fundamental choices. I’m not about to suggest which one is best for you, this is America, after all, and you are entitled to make bad choices.

Just as with oven pizzas, it is important to cook the dough ahead of the toppings.The key with barbeque pizza is to keep the lid CLOSED to emulate an oven.Flip the dough four times to give the crust beautiful cross-hatched grill marks.Some chefs do not like the char and will leave the pizza on a barbeque safe metal cooking pan or tray or paddle.It would also be appropriate to consider using barbeque safe pottery or baking stones: these make the pizza extra crispy and crusty.Paddles, trays, stones and pottery help cook the pizza more evenly

Removing the crust, apply your cheese and other toppings.While, again, it would be improper of me to suggest toppings, if you are considering putting barbeque chicken or barbeque sauce on your barbeque pizza it is important to stop: you need to seek psychiatric help IMMEDIATELY.

It is important to cook the pizza on very high heat and quickly – this is the magic of barbeque pizza – so make sure you cut all your toppings VERY fine.They’re not going to be in there long.

The use of cattle for beef and dairy is not unusual in Colorado, but the training of oxen for draft and pleasure is.Oxen are typically employed on the Eastern seaboard, while mules have been popular a long time in the South.Here in the west and on the Pacific seaboard, horses and oxen are used.This regionalization of animals is not for any climatic adaptations, but because of the expenses of transporting animals and the native experience of the human inhabitants who trained them.

People keep using the animals they are used to as a rule, but breaking in an oxen market in Colorado is not difficult.Besides being superior in nearly every way to draft horses, which are not as strong, gentle, intelligent or courageous as their cattle counterparts, oxen are hardy in more weather and sure footed in the typically dastardly Colorado mud.

Inexperience with oxen abounds.Oxen are not a special breed of cow.Any breed can be used, but only because of their cheapness, Holsteins are typical in the United States.Bulls are more popular than steers, and steers are more popular than cows.Bulls are so popular because people like to breed good oxen, and it is rather difficult to breed a steer (though with the miracles of modern veterinary medicine, it might be possible soon!).

Training a cow into an ox begins early, and it is best if they begin training before they are off milk.Train them as you would a horse, and don’t be surprised when you don’t have to “despook” them.Cows just don’t spook.Also don’t be surprised if they learn how to do all their work before they are 6 months old: cows are much smarter than horses.

Horses have the advantage of being faster than oxen, able to travel faster and further, plow more per hour and otherwise outperform the ox under ideal conditions, but the ox is better for more conditions and can pull heavier weight.

An ox is not driven from behind like a horse, but is led from in front.Reigns are not used, but a wand (not a hard stick, but a gentle tapping device) is used to communicate left, right, faster and slower.Oxen are very tactile creatures!If you are going to use voice commands, they must be very clear and different from each other.

Sale prices of oxen in Colorado are typically twice that as on the East Coast.A survey of oxen prices found that $5000 for a 3 year old team was not outrageous.Asking $1000 for greenbroke 6 month old calves is not out of line.Considering beef prices these days, it makes better sense to not castrate and train them up for the yoke!

In another sign of a new age of business management theory, the Italians have independently rediscovered a principle of American and Japanese management theory, namely that managers should not be higher ranking positions than laborers.Management is a separate trade than any other labor, and requires skill sets in statistics and human sciences.

Doctors Alessandro Pluchinoa, Andrea Rapisardaa, and Cesare Garofaloc in their The Peter principle revisited: A computational study (Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Volume 389, Issue 3, 1 February 2010, Pages 467-472) describe new evidence to support this theory of management:

“In the late sixties the Canadian psychologist Laurence J. Peter advanced an apparently paradoxical principle, named since then after him, which can be summarized as follows: ‘Every new member in a hierarchical organization climbs the hierarchy until he/she reaches his/her level of maximum incompetence’. Despite its apparent unreasonableness, such a principle would realistically act in any organization where the mechanism of promotion rewards the best members and where the competence at their new level in the hierarchical structure does not depend on the competence they had at the previous level, usually because the tasks of the levels are very different to each other. Here we show, by means of agent based simulations, that if the latter two features actually hold in a given model of an organization with a hierarchical structure, then not only is the Peter principle unavoidable, but also it yields in turn a significant reduction of the global efficiency of the organization. Within a game theory-like approach, we explore different promotion strategies and we find, counterintuitively, that in order to avoid such an effect the best ways for improving the efficiency of a given organization are either to promote each time an agent at random or to promote randomly the best and the worst members in terms of competence.”

The American / Japanese system requires that managers be hired separate from laborers, and that instead of promoting a person out of a job in which they excel, to increase their pay.Or better, the pay of their team: no one is truly great without the help of their friends.Punishment by decreasing pay is to be avoided, and managers are held responsible for maintaining productive efficiency and productive quality, not total output.Total output is a function of labor and machinery and to increase total output requires more labor and more machines.

Under the new system, if a team or individual is discovered to be performing outside of statistically sound expectations, the management studies the matter and discovers why.If they are performing for the worse, the causes of that performance is determined and corrected through assistance to the employee: firing employees is a last resort in the new management because, statistically, you are not going to be finding a better qualified or motivated employee, and when the fear of being fired is removed, performance increases.If they are performing better than expected, they are rewarded and, if especially good at their job, employed to teach others how to do their jobs better.

Can't stand any more greens?  You can make paper out of the vegetables in your garden. Here’s how, from ehow.com:

1.Thinly slice the vegetables. The slices can be 0.5 cm to 0.2 inch thick. You can choose from a variety of vegetables like carrot, cucumber, squash, ginger root, potato, radish, turnip or beet.

2.Arrange the slices to form a thin layer between two sheets of tissue paper. Overlap the slices so that there are no open spaces.

3.Place the sheets of vegetable and tissue in a microwave. They should lie flat on the base of the microwave.

4.Put some microwave safe heavy object like a glass baking dish on the sheets. This will prevent the vegetable parchment paper from curling.

5.Heat on high for 1 minute. This will leave the tissue paper wet. Thicker slices of vegetable will need more heat.

6.Remove the sheets from the microwave, and let the vegetable layer breathe for a minute. Replace the wet tissue paper with fresh paper.

7.Repeat steps 3 to 6 until the tissue paper is almost dry.

8.Replace the tissue paper once more. Place the sheets between layers of old newspaper. Let the whole thing stand for a few days on a flat surface with some weight on it.

9.Replace both the tissue paper and newspaper once daily until the vegetable parchment paper is completely dry.

Most people look at grain bins as excellent places to store grain.Not architect Richard Gillies.In his The Adaptation of a Thunder Bay Grain Elevator (2011, Dalhousie University, Nova Scotia) he undertook to understand how best to convert a grain bin into a home.“Informed by research into the history, function, and construction of grain elevators, this investigation develops an approach to adaptation that would inhabit the interior spaces while preserving the sense of wonder and intrigue inherent in these structures. Using a program defined only as the most basic requirements for habitation, spatial possibilities are investigated to augment the aesthetic, monumental, and mysterious qualities of the structure, without domesticating it.”

After beginning with an understanding of the history and purpose of grain bins, Gilles understands their essential aspects, reaching nearly poetic qualities in his thesis: “The history of grain elevators can be traced back to Buffalo, New York in 1842, when entrepreneur Joseph Dart and engineer Robert Dunbar constructed the first grain elevator. This was a wooden structure which housed the elevator and a series of bins.The heart of the new invention – a looped or ‘never ending’ conveyor belt, made out of canvas, upon which large buckets made out of iron had been attached at regular intervals; the whole thing enclosed within a long, straight rectangular box made out of wood and iron… (Brown 2009, 109) It was not until 1883 that the Canadian Pacific Railway constructed the first grain elevator in Thunder Bay (Vervoort 1982, 30), known as the King’s Elevator. This marked the first time that grain from the prairies could take an all-Canadian route to the eastern ports. Prior to 1883 grain was moved south through American routes (Vervoort 1990, 404). The Lakehead grain trade rapidly expanded in the following decades.”

He discovered other adaptations of grain bins, including the transformation of them into a giant musical organ, as a projection screen for outdoor art and movies, and also the transformation of them into residential lofts.The transformation of the former Quaker Oats bin in Akron, Ohio, into Quaker Square inspired him.There, the essential nature of the bin was kept, while allowing for new use.The challenge of transforming storage areas and mechanical areas into habitable areas is no small task!

He begins by opening up the interior with light through slits in the metal siding, and carving out the interior of the storage bins to create a cathedral atmosphere, literally enshrining the essence of the original bin.“Through a process of first subtraction (demolition) and then addition (construction), I have modified the existing concrete structure to include new interior spaces that enhance the sense of scale and add qualities of light…by emphasizing the qualities of space, introducing minimal program, then exploring and representing adaptations that augment the monumental and mysterious. Hopefully this thesis has revealed new spatial experiences that inspire further program options for abandoned grain elevators beyond the usual condominiums and hotels.”

I am so proud to announce that the agricultural and nature newspaper which I assist in editing has now an online edition!  You ought to check it out... www.themeadowlarkherald.com 

Besides covering agriculture, nature science, art and the latest academic news, local politics and news is covered too.  Farming and gardening is made easier with information and news! 

Let me know what you think?

Read this book!  Combining natural farming and traditional agriculture with the latest in scientific research may seem like a difficult thing, but farming and gardening hasn't ever been easier.  Less work, less cost, more production!  This book has great lessons for the non-gardener, too: from labor management to marketing, from physics and chemistry to training draft horses and oxen, there's something on the farm for every interest.

http://www.amazon.com/Hoeing-Husbandry-Jethro-Brachfeld-ebook/dp/B0041OSBPW

The best book to learn about farming and gardening (or to learn a few new tricks if you're a life long farmer or gardener) is to go to the source: Jethro Tull's Horse Hoeing Husbandry, the first, and still the best, book on modern scientific agriculture, updated with modern learning and combined with the important lessons of Fukuoka.  It's available on Kindle for just under $2.  Just follow the link!

The book teaches you how to farm and garden better - and the science behind why. 

Covering everything from labor management, soil science to harvesting and marketing, from training draft animals to training better roosters, the most basic algae to the most complex agroecology, the history of agriculture gains new relevance when updated with modern science.

NEWS FROM THE FARM AND RECIPES

While out on wild harvests we saw lark buntings again playing in the warm eveningtime.  The weather has finally warmed up (maybe because we finally built shelters for our plants?) and the birds (domestic and wild) are staying up late making up for lost time. 

Our ducklings met our chicks for the first time, and are simply terrified of them!  The chicks, oblivious to the terror they inspire, attempt to be friendly with the ducks with a fun chase game!  They are doing better together now that they've known each other for a few days.

The lambsquarter season is winding up, so make sure you get some before we're out! We've got domestic spinach now, but that's just not the same.  Flax flowers are not to be missed, and neither are the summertime willow leaves.  Beans are sprouting, so expect bean greens soon!  Yum!

If you've not yet, try our pine tea and our tea mixes!  Great with an ice cube for hot summer days, or steaming hot in the cool summer nights.

LOOK FOR:

>>>> New items

> Old items 

Give us a call or an email if you want samples!  Let us do the cooking...Prepared meals available.

-- GOODIES --

> Eggs (Duck) - LIMITED AVAILABILITY ORDER EARLY!

> Olive Oil (imported from California - olives don't grow in Colorado, silly! We make sure there is no chemicals used, just like on our farm. It is very buttery oil, very sweet)

 > Sprouts - Greenhouse is being used to shelter tomatoes and peppers, so please order one week in advance

> Meat shares - from the Rev. Ronald Taylor's ranch.  These meats are from a neighbor of ours, he uses no hormones, and both grains and pastures the cows on natural feeds.  He raises holsteins.  In the hard economic times, he is adjusting his prices to allow microshares.  If there is more beef than expected, you can either pay the difference or return to him what you did not pay for! 

     * 1/2 Beef Share: $800 down, $4 per pound, plus share of processing

     * 1/4 Beef Share: $400 down, $4.50 per pound, plus share of processing

     * 1/8 Beef Share:  $200 down, $5 per pound, plus share of processing

      * 1/16 Beef Share: $100 down, $5.25 per pound, plus share of processing

       * 1/32 Beef Share: $50 down, $5.50 per pound, plus share of processing

-- VEGETABLES --

> Dandelion (also a blood cleanser herb)

> Fava greens (eat like chard, beet greens or pea greens)

> Lambsquarter

>>>> Lettuce

> Linden (leaves) (very sweet, sugar substitute)

>>>> Spinach

>>>> Salsify (leaves and roots and flowers)

> Sprouts (pea, bean, sunflower)

> Thistle (also a liver support herb)

-- BEANS --

  > Black

  > Fava

  > Jacob’s Cattle

  > Pinto

  > Trout

-- GRAIN --

  > Barley

  > Oats

  > Sanfoin

  > Safflower

  > Sunflower (SEED)

  > Rye

  > Wheat

-- HERBS --

  > Juniper (BERRIES)

  > Catmint

  > Garlic (BABY)

  > Garlic (GREENS)

  > Garlic (WILD)

  > Wild Onion (limited availability)

-- MEDICINE AND TEA --

  > Aspen (LEAVES, BARK) (antiinflamatory, pain relief, fever treatment)

 >>>> Flax (FLOWERS) (great tea!)

  > Poplar (BUDS, ROOTS) (antiinflamatory, pain relief, fever treatment)

  >>>> Pine (REALLY great tea!) (high in vitamin C and other vitamins and minerals - drink your vegetables per day!)

  > Willow (BUDS, ROOTS) (antiinflamatory, pain relief, fever treatment)

  >>>> Yarrow

  > Yucca (ROOT)

-- ANIMAL FEEDS --

  > Two legs

  > Four legs

  > Six legs

  > Eight legs (?!)  :::: )

Though the names of Roosevelt, Mills, Muir, Thoreau are known in the United States as advocates for conservation of natural resources, the first time natural resources were conserved by a government was during the reign of the Emperor Ashoka I of what is today the Indian subcontinent.While the first efforts at conservation were religiously motivated and our modern conservation is motivated for economic and political reasons, the result was surprisingly the same.

Emperor Ashoka reigned in 269 BC, and converted to Buddhism 5 years later after conquering all of what is today known as India, Pakistan, some of Iran, Burma and Tibet.One of the first human rulers to write autobiographical information, and express not only his laws but the reason behind his laws in writing, we have an intense understanding of his mind.In one such account, he wrote “I conquered the Kalingas eight years after my coronation. One hundred and fifty thousand were deported, one hundred thousand were killed and many more died (from other causes). After the Kalingas had been conquered, I came to feel a strong inclination towards the Dhamma, a love for the Dhamma and for instruction in Dhamma. Now I feel deep remorse for having conquered the Kalingas.”

In penance, he freed his people, but they remained loyal to him because of his strong dedication to the Buddhist faith, his fair laws, and humanitarian principles.Under his reign, we also saw the first acceptance of religious freedom (other religions were tolerated and Buddhists were not given special privileges, he commanded “All religions should reside everywhere, for all of them desire self-control and purity of heart” and “Contact (between religions) is good. One should listen to and respect the doctrines professed by others. I desire that all should be well-learned in the good doctrines of other religions”), but monks sent to convert the Greeks, Chinese, Tibetans, Egyptians and Africans, and numerous Buddhist laws were proclaimed, ranging from protecting animals from cruelty and in some cases from hunting, to the protection of flora, fauna and the land itself.

The conservation of nature began first with a protection for particular species and kinds of animals from the Emperor’s own plate and hunting.Then, as Ashoka’s faith grew, he ceased hunting and limited the number of animals that others could hunt in a year through a system of licenses (much like we have today).Rare animals were especially protected, but so were new mothers and animals that were young (just like today).Integrating animal cruelty with preservation efforts, Ashoka commanded (among other laws) “cocks are not to be caponized, husks hiding living beings are not to be burnt and forests are not to be burnt either without reason or to kill creatures. One animal is not to be fed to another.”

Like today, large and small animals were protected.Even queen ants were protected by Ashoka.Also, like today, animals (and people) were guaranteed rights to health care and shelter.Free roadside rest stops were provided much as trailheads and trail services are provided in some of our parks, with food, water and shelter for people and animals.He wrote, “I made provision for two types of medical treatment: medical treatment for humans and medical treatment for animals. Wherever medical herbs suitable for humans or animals are not available, I have had them imported and grown. Wherever medical roots or fruits are not available I have had them imported and grown. Along roads I have had wells dug and trees planted for the benefit of humans and animals.”

The result of a conservation system being the same whether religiously or secularly motivated is not astonishing when it is understood that, as Thoreau wrote, “In wildness is the preservation of man.”

Look to the skies just before sunrise and you’ll see something interesting: the planets Mercury, Venus, Mars and Jupiter appear to be in a line!Though not actually in alignment, our perspective from Earth makes them appear so, but it is a good time to consider that in ancient times, people would look to the stars for an understanding of what to do in their agriculture.It came naturally, as farmers used the light of the moon to get a few more hours of work done at night.

Though more recently, religious groups have claimed that stars and planets exert influences on our crops here on earth through their “energies,” in ancient times, the farmers would watch the stars to get a better idea of what time of year it actually was.You see, the modern calendar and all its conveniences was not available then, and sometimes June would be in the middle of the winter, and November would be in the warmest part of the year.It took the ancients a long time to perfect a solar calendar that actually worked.Until they did, they relied on the stars to know the season.

The Dog Star, Sirius, was a good indicator that summertime was at its peak.With the rising of Sirius, farmers would prepare to harvest potatoes and other heat sensitive crops, cease tilling, bring water to their fields, and otherwise bunker down for extreme heat.By counting the moons, they knew when it was likely to be safe from frost to plant.Each star and planet had its season.

The farmer LJ Columella was the first to describe an agrarian calendar based on stars and planets.His work, On Agriculture, is still used by many farmers today even though we now have a reliable solar calendar to tell us the months and seasons.

As superstition was gained after the age of reason, people began to become confused: did the stars cause the seasons, or did they simply mark the changes of the seasons?The mythology associated with the stars and planets began to influence people, and new religions based on the ancient worship of the numerous deities that the ancients worshiped arose.Permaculture is one such modern system that advocates utilizing planetary energies to improve harvests, but even Columella, who worshiped Mars thousands of years before Permaculture was ever considered, would tell you that the stars don’t tell you what to do: your knowledge that the stars are regular in their rising and setting against the passage of the seasons lets you anticipate seasonal trends in weather.

Today, farmers still work late by the light of the moon and still enjoy star watching, but now farmers enjoy starwatching for the joy of it, because they can look at a calendar to know what needs done at any given time.But one of the greatest parts of that joy is remembering the days before the solar calendar and using the stars and moons to help in your farming.

We use the words daily without thinking of them.But we have to remember that units of measurement have becoming increasingly standardized and based on units of ten.Long before meter / foot debate began, long before we were using dollars made of 100 cents, long before we were using only hours, minutes and seconds to define our day, units of time were also of various unstandardized lengths.Most of these are leftovers from lunar or stellar calendars when years were divided by 360 days and each week was 6 days (look in the Bible for references to when the 7^th day was invented during a transition from the Paleolithic stellar to the lunar calendar, long before the solar calendar was invented).They just don’t mean much of anything any more.For example, a moment is a medieval unit of time equal to 1.5 minutes or 1/40 of an hour.This seems arbitrary, except that it was 1/4 of a minute, which before mechanical clocks, used to be measured at 1/10 of an hour.A jiffy (while redefined as 1/60 of a second in modern times) used to mean as fast as lightning flashed.So, next time someone asks you to wait a moment, start your watch and count down!

Big news in the bird world this week: ducklings are now being seen in parks across the front range! How do ducks stay dry in water? Ducks and other waterfowl have an oil gland at the top of their tails, from which they spread oil around all their feathers.Ducklings, however, are not born with a functional oil gland.The mother duck will spread her own oil on her ducklings so that they can safely swim right away without getting waterlogged.

If you are raising ducklings without a mother duck, they will not have their own oils at first and will be unable to swim safely.Even a shallow dish of water can be fatal to a baby duck.Whenever they get wet and have no oils, they will get cold and maybe even die if they are not kept warm enough and helped to dry off.

But when is it safe to give your ducklings water to play in?They love to play in water even when they are too young for it, and it is tempting to give them some even right away.There is no standard age that has been agreed upon for when it is safe.Some people say at 4 weeks old they have a functional oil gland.Some people say wait until 8-12 weeks old, because their oil gland does not function well until they have their adult feathers mostly or fully grown in.One duck farmer even says to give them supervised water play time every day from the time they are 3 days old, and then put them under a heat lamp and help them dry off until they can do it themselves: this farmer claims that the regular early exposure to water encourages early and healthy oil gland development.

In my own professional opinion, it is first of all very difficult to keep the ducklings from playing in their drinking water – even if you get or make a special water container to keep them out.They will get wet.It is safest to monitor their drinking time for the first few days to a week, and give them water at regular intervals through the day, taking it away after they’ve all had a good drink.That way, they don’t get all wet and cold while you’re not watching, and they have a chance to dry off in between drinking times.

Second, you will know just by watching your ducklings when they start to repel water from their feathers.Before they can stay dry, they will look and feel very wet whenever they’ve been playing in the water.After a certain age they will not look soggy.For my ducklings, this was at around 3 or 4 weeks of age.At this point, I let them have drinking water without supervision.However, to be safe, I would not let them swim until they began to get their adult feathers significantly growing in, at around 8 weeks.

In their examination of communication within lobster populations (Chemical Communication in Crustaceans 2011, Part 3, 239-256), Doctors Juan Aggio and Charles D. Derby found that chemical communication through both urine and blood emissions plays a large role in lobster social behavior.“Lobsters are fascinating animals that use chemicals as messages regarding their sexual status, their standing in a social hierarchy, and whether they affiliate with or avoid conspecifics. This, plus their economic importance, makes them important models for the study of intraspecific chemical communication. Our chapter is an overview of these processes, including the types of interactions between lobsters influenced by chemicals, how those interactions are affected by chemicals, and how these chemicals are detected. Since “lobster” refers to a common body plan rather than a taxonomic group and thus includes animals of differing phylogenetic relatedness and lifestyles – most notably clawed lobsters, spiny lobsters, and slipper lobsters, their use of chemicals in intraspecific interactions is diverse. Whenever possible, we compare the different groups of lobsters, though the amount of data available for relevant behaviors varies with the lifestyle of lobsters. Clawed lobsters use urinary chemicals processed by the olfactory pathway to identify previous opponents and maintain a stable social order, which is important because only the most dominant males will mate. After a hierarchy has been established by fighting, subsequent rematches are shorter and less violent, with urinary chemicals playing a key role in this process. Mate choice and mating behavior are also mediated by urinary olfactory cues. These behaviors are disrupted when one of the animals either has a compromised olfactory sense or is not allowed to release urine. Although there is less available data, the picture seems similar in spiny lobsters, with females using urinary chemicals from males as one of the cues in mate selection. Both spiny and slipper lobsters form dominance hierarchies, but little is known about how they are influenced by chemical signals. Conversely, spiny lobsters have been extensively studied regarding the mechanisms of aggregation and avoidance. Aggregation is mediated by urine-borne chemicals and avoidance is mediated by blood-borne chemicals, both processed by the olfactory system. Molecular identification of these compounds will be critical in allowing researchers to study the neural processing of intraspecific chemicals.”

Among the numerous ways that animals communicate, chemical communication is the most species – specific.Unlike touch, sight and sound, taste and smell can send a signal that is directed specifically at members of the same species.Because these signals are very easily intercepted by predators and other enemies, the chemicals are usually disguised and the actual communicator chemical present among all the chemical camouflage can be very difficult to detect.Insights into lobster communication will lead to better understandings of our own reactions to smell and taste, both physiologically and emotionally.