Full Harvest Moon

Sowing Seeds of Community is the title of an article that appeared in the September 27th edition of the Martinez Gazette. Thank you Jennifer for acting as our spokesperson. Jennifer set this up in a noble attempt to inform more local people and perhaps engender greater participation. Thanks also to Greta Mart for writing such a great article.

Jim has also done a great job at getting the word out with his Common Ground Blog. He always has current updates posted and I just wish I could keep up with him in my blogging!
We have a lot of Kale at CACG and you might like to take a look at Karen's Baked Kale Chips on the Sept. 28th post.

In the garden this coming Friday Oct. 5th

Please join us at the Center Ave. Community Garden for a Family Bon Fire to welcome the fall season, to embrace the principles of Earth Care, People Care, and Fair Share in a spirit of support, enthusiasm, compassion and sharing. All are welcome.

 

Friday October 5th 2012 6:30 pm to 9:30 pm

333 Center Ave., Pacheco

 

Please bring your own chair, coffee mug and musical instruments

 

Cookies and Hot coco will be provided. Donations are welcome

Today we harvested the remainder of the potatoes in the potato towers. Not a huge harvest, perhaps 10 lbs and certainly more than we put in as seed.
We also finished off the sunflower harvest.
 Some stalks have been left standing in the hope of growing peas in the same area and using the old sunflower stalks as support.

Karen topping the sunflowers in the "Thanks" bed

The new, previously loved, wagon that appeared in the garden was used by the big kids to collect sunflower heads.

We have saved some for seed and will have a surplus to share as edible sunflower seeds later in the year.


A better view of the Garden Wagon

Sand Box
Also a new arrival in the garden is the Sand Box.
This somewhat temporary and inexpensively constructed feature was initially conceived to make use of the surplus sand remaining from the brick entrance work. Soon after it was in place, perhaps two days, the lid was lifted to revel that someone had beautifully crafted the words "THANKS" out of twigs.

Gratitude meets Art

Next we found ...

The latest is ...

Garden Elevation
Thanks to Eric and his Smart Phone we now know the elevation of the garden. It runs from 50 feet at the lower end to 64 feet at the parking lot end.

Water Bill
Our water bill was $273 for the past 2 months, about $136 per month. The previous 2 months averaged $100 per month. I expect we will see a decrease in the next billing as we have cut back watering to every other day in some areas.

General Election
Decisions, decisions! More taxes or more education? What will new jobs look like? How can I apply Permaculture Principals to my decision making process?

This verse from an old Joni Mitchell song keeps coming to mind:

Land of snap decisions
Land of short attention spans
Nothing is savored
Long enough to really understand

And especially this second part of the verse .....

In every culture in decline
The watchful ones among the slaves
Know all that is genuine will be
Scorned and conned and cast away

Dog Eat Dog

Permaculture Convergence
The 2012 NorCal Permaculture Convergence: Building Bioregional Resiliency is being held at Green Friend Farm in Castro Valley. This looks very interesting ... and it is local this year. Certainly an entertaining and educational event well worth checking out. And Jeff Lawton speaking! We have screened a couple of Jeff Lawton's vidoes at our movie nights. You might like to click Here and go to the "Greening the Desert 11" tab.

Martinez Permaculture Center News



Front garden at 2421 Center Avenue

In this photograph of the front garden taken in mid September we can see Sunflowers, Collards, Corn, Tomato and Amaranth growing together.

Here is a peek at the back garden in July

Here is a view of a green pumpkin supported by a Maple tree in July.

And another of the same Pumpkin ripe in late September.

These are Golden Delicious apples from our tree going into storage for a couple of months.

Golden Delicious harvested on Sept 12th

The chickens and bees are fine and I will have more news on them in the next post.

The six chicks hatched on May 4th are now 21 weeks and soon to begin laying.

The honey harvest has been slow this year. More next time with photos.

Thank you for taking the time to check in and read this.

David