Greenleaf Farms

This article from Martha is in June/July 2019 Martha Stewart Living magazine.  She no longer seems to have Ameraucana, and no roosters in her Bedford, New York house (she sold the place in Litchfield) but lots of hens for a multi-coloured basket.

Found this old article from 1920 in the New York Times archives about using hollyhock seeds (rose of sharon) for poultry.  Hollyhocks put out alot of seeds during the bloom, shake those stamens, and you can safely give it to the chickens.  Of course as a winter food is problably a lot more than anything you can reasonably harvest, but who knows?  Maybe you have a lotta Rose of Sharons and few hens and it may work as a treat.

If you let your grass clippings on the soil, eventually the grass will trun to thatch.  This article, at the end, and most who advocate that practice, ignore that problem.  Instead, bag it, and compost it and everyone will be happier. 

How to Prepare and Use Compost

Remove grass and sod cover from the area where you construct your compost pile to allow direct contact of the materials with the soil's microorganisms. This recipe works well.

• 1st layer: 3-4 inches of chopped brush or other coarse material on the very bottom, touching  the soil surface. 

• 2nd layer: 6-8 inches of mixed scraps, leaves, grass clippings, etc. 

• 3rd layer: 1 inch of soil serves as an inoculant by adding microorganisms to the heap.

• 4th layer: (optional) 2-3 inches of manure or coffee grounds, to provide the nitrogen needed by microorganisms.

• 5th layer: Repeat steps 1-4 until the bin is full. Put a tarp on it, to help heat up the process and keep water out.

The USDA released a report July 21 submitted to the Agricultural Marketing Service National Organics Standard Board regarding whether or not products cultivated via hydroponic or aquaponic farming qualify as organic.

According to the National Organics Standards Board Hydroponic and Aquaponic Task Force, both hydroponic and aquaponic farming should not qualify as organic because they do not improve soil quality, which is a mainstay of organic farming..  Read more here.

President Obama signed into law, a bill requiring a Federal labeling standard for foods containing genetically modified ingredients (commonly called GMOs) 

Two weeks ago, Congress passed the legislation which would require food packages to display an electronic code, text label, or some sort of symbol signifying whether or not they contain GMOs, according to The Associated Press.

The exact details will need to be worked out by the Department of Agriculture, which will have two years to write the rules. Read more here.

In June 1938, the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act (“FDCA”) repealed much of the former Pure Food Act and created a more detailed regulatory scheme. It carried forward the 1906 Act’s emphasis on outlawing adulteration and misbranding of food. The operative paradigm of the FDCA is to provide consumers with food content information and let them decide whether the food is appropriate for them to eat.

When the FDCA was enacted in 1938, it too did not define what constitutes “natural” or “organic” food. It defines the word “food” as “(1) articles used for food or drink for man or other animals, (2) chewing gum, and (3) articles use for the components of any such article.”[21] “Processed food,” in turn, “means any food other than a raw agricultural commodity and includes any raw agricultural commodity that has been subject to processing, such as canning, cooking, freezing, dehydration, or milling.”

The FDCA distinguishes food from drugs. A drug includes “articles intended for use in the diagnoses, cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease in man or other animals” as well as “articles (other than food) intended to affect the structure or any function of the body of man or other animals.”[23] When food producers make unsubstantiated health claims to promote their food products, they risk having their food categorized as an unapproved, hence an unlawful new “drug.”

I turned to chooks when the town we live in wouldn't allow bees, but I still remain a member of the local bee club because I love bees so.  This one from the New Scientist Aperture page, really caught my eye.  It is a tropical bee,  and belongs the Euglossini  family(Orchid Bees). 

The Exaerete are, without a doubt, the most spectacular of the Neotropical bees. They are characterized by their large size, metallic green coloration and very long tongues, which they use to extract nectar from flowers with long corollas (particularly orchids) and by their cleptoparasitic habits.

 There are five genera of Euglossini bees and while three of those genera (Euglossa, Eulaema, and Eufriesea) collect pollen and construct nests, the other two genera (Exaerete and Aglae) have evolved as cleptoparasites of Eulaema and Eufriesea. These cleptoparasites act as cuckoos, destroying the eggs of their preferred host and replacing them with their own eggs. 

Not a domesticated bird by any means, but one of my all time favorites.  They are only in the Northern Hemisphere just like Penguins are only in the Southern.  I think we got the better deal.tlantic puffins have penguin-like coloring but they sport a colorful beak that has led some to dub them the "sea parrot." The beak fades to a drab gray during the winter and blooms with color again in the spring—suggesting that it may be attractive to potential mates.

These birds live most of their lives at sea, resting on the waves when not swimming. They are excellent swimmers that use their wings to stroke underwater with a flying motion. They steer with rudderlike webbed feet and can dive to depths of 200 feet (61 meters), though they usually stay underwater for only 20 or 30 seconds. Puffins typically hunt small fish like herring or sand eels.

In the air, puffins are surprisingly fleet flyers. By flapping their wings up to 400 times per minute they can reach speeds of 55 miles an hour.

from the Farmers' Almanac APRIL 2016
21st-23rd Start seedbeds. First day is a favorable day for planting above ground crops, especially cabbage, cauliflower, lettuce, kale, celery, and other leafy vegetables. Last two days are good days for transplanting. Last two days are also good days for planting beets, carrots, radishes, turnips, peanuts, and other root crops. Also good for Leafy vegetables.

24th-25th Neither plant nor sow on these barren days.