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All new Posts and updates about our life and crazy animals will now be at http://www.puravidaculture.com.

Puttin On the Ritz

For those of you, my self included, that thought our Grand Prize weekend could turn into a couple of days of us dodging meetings and sales reps determined to stick us with a time share, we were wrong. We had a great time. Thanks to spaweek.com and the Ritz Carlton Marina del Ray we were treated like pampered guests on a 6th floor corner suite overlooking the Marina.

Since Lyndsey had never been to Venice Beach we decided to take the twenty minute walk there before our massages so she take a gander.

We were both pretty unimpressed but had a nice time checking out the legendary spots like the basketball courts in White Man Can't Jump and the dudes pumpin some iron on the beach in there speedos.


The Ritz Carlton lived up to it's name as it was the first time for either of us to stay or eat there. We both had a great time and Lyndsey had a great birthday.

Kick the Tires and Light Some Fires

Well we go back to the doctor on March 16th for some more baby stuff, then on April 9th to find out what we have brewing in there. We are both very excited. Tomorrow we get to go up to Marina del Ray to cash in on the Grand Prize Lyndsey won. All an all things have been moving at a pretty normal pace and going pretty well for us. Having a baby has really got Lyndsey and I thinking about our lives and goals. It has made us evaluate what we have been doing, and where we would like to be heading with our future family.
When Lyndsey and I started dating, almost 9 years ago,we both talked about having the opportunity to be able to live abroad. It has always been a goal of mine since returning home from Central America in my mid twenties to return when I was older and had things more established in my life. My original plan was to return in five years, which really wasn't enough time. At five years we were at the peak of growing our business. We had two retail locations and a warehouse location with a hand full of employees. Instead of freeing up our time to explore our options abroad, I had somehow managed to get us buried knee deep in to sourcing, buying, human resources, manuals, meetings and a first hand experience of working with the new MY-GENERATION. Which I might add was very interesting to say the least.
Needless to say the recession hit, and things changed. Next thing you know our five year planned began to turn into a 10 year plan and we were now working harder than ever for less of a return.
Two years ago we were able to free up our Texas roots which meant moving one company back to San Diego, and selling the other brand we had invested seven years into. That eventually came with it's own pros and cons but mainly due to circumstances that we did not have any control over. Over the past 9 years I have been developing websites and content to establish web search rankings that will bring in a steady supply of customers. Recently we have began setting up contracts with vendors who full fill our wholesale orders. After 5 years of having a warehouse location, now for the first time we do not need one anymore. This had brought up an interesting situation for Lyndsey and I. Do we continue planting our seeds in San Diego, or do we take the opportunity to plant some seeds abroad? As Captain Ron would say, "It's time to kick the tires and light some fires,"or "pull up our anchor and pull up our sails."

Grand Prize

Lyndsey entered us into a contest called the 'Sweet Heart Spa Sweepstakes' at spaweek.com and she one the grand prize which includes and overnight stay at the Ritz Carlton in Marina del Ray, dinner for two, and a 50 minute couples massage. We are going to go on Lyndsey's Birthday weekend in two weeks. We are both totally excited. We normally would never treat ourselves to something like this, but for free.....twist my arm.

The Little Swimmer

So we had an appointment this morning at Scripps. It turns out that there is a little swimmer inside one of us, and its not me.



We are both very excited. We are at 10 weeks right now. To sound cliche "we weren't trying but we weren't not trying." I prefer to say we pulled the goalie last season because of labor disputes. How ever you look at we know that we are both very blessed. With that being said. Looks like we have a little Michael Phelps in there, the Olympic winner Phelps not the bong hitter. I apologize for the poor quality,I took the footage with my cell phone.

Urban Chicken Video

We borrowed a friends video camera for the store and decided to practice filming using the hens as our subject.

Walk Through the Neighborhood

With the ice storms and nasty weather across many parts of the US today we knew that we had something to be thankful for on our walk this beautiful San Diego morning.


This is view from the top of our street looking down to the beach.
This is the view to the north looking over Mission Bay and Mt. Soledad.
This is cool succulent on the way to the beach.
We have all kind of trees in our neighborhood. Ranging from palm trees to pine trees.



This is the names of the different waves at our beach break. I normally surf avalanche when it is good.

There Goes the Salad Mix

DON'T LET THE HENS NEXT TO YOUR GREENS. We knew this but we didn't know how hard they would try to get to them. You see we let the hens in our gardens. They do a great job of eating the worms and bugs, however we have learned that they also like salad mixes.For this reason we have blocked them out of out winter green garden plot, which worked out well until they figured out how to get in. Within 10 minutes are greens were gone. Little buggers.

California Gray Whales

Last Night I joined a friend of mine on one of his dive boats to photograph a whale watching expedition at sunset. Approximately 20,000 gray whales pass San Diego in their 10,000 mile annual migration from the Bering Sea to Baja California this time of year.





We left at around 4pm on the boat Zero Gravity, out of Mission Bay harbor.



The ocean surface was as glassy as it gets, and the views were breathtaking.



















Needless to say the trip was a success.

If you are ever in the San Diego Area Contact Dive Connections to book Your Trip.

Hen & Puppies

I guess that under normal circumstances we would not do a post that did not have anything to do with us, our lives or our hobbies. However lately our lives has been moving along pretty status quot without anything out of the ordinary to post, so this particular story about a hen in China that has reportedly shacked up with a dog to help raise its three newborn puppies, seemed worth mentioning. After all we do have a dog, and we do have some hens.

According the dog's owner Yang, of Anqian village in Fuqing, said the hen moved into the dog's kennel after it gave birth last month, reports Southeast Express.

Since then, the hen refuses to leave the kennel, staying inside all day and only walking out when the dog is nursing its puppies.

Yang says the hen is very protective of the puppies and refuses to allow strangers to come close to the kennel.

"Quite possibly the hen is envious of the dog because it has no offspring of its own, and so it is trying to take over the puppies," he said.

"The dog seems to have given up the idea of driving the stubborn intruder out and has decided to share the space with the hen."

photo & source courtesy of ANOVA

Twelve Makes a Dozen

Now that all three hens are laying eggs we were able to collect a dozen eggs to give some away to our friends.

Twas The Night Before Christmas

Twas the night before Christmas....... and all through the house, Creatures were stirring, swimming, barking and pecking. That would be our Dog, Judah, His new friend Marley, 6 gold fish, three hens, our 1 beta fish Action Jackson, and his two new friends Tupac & Franz.

This Christmas since we decided to stay home, we ended up taking on a few new creatures for friends that were going out of town. Two friends asked us to watch their beta fish, we said OK.

Then Lyndsey found a young couple on craigslist that was looking for a family to take in their dog over the holiday so that he wouldn't have to end up in a kennel. We always hated putting Judah in a kennel, so we decided to see if him and Marley would get along.

It turns out that they did, so Judah has a buddy to hang out with. Marley is three year old chocolate Labrador. He is already 90 lbs, so he is quite a bit bigger than Judah. At least he stands a lot taller. He is a joy to have around, even though he is crazy dog. He actually makes Judah seemed pretty laid back and relaxed, which is odd. The biggest difference is Marley is only three, and a three year old lab still acts very much like a puppy. Where Judah is now 5, so he is a couple of years out of the crazy puppy stage.

We are blessed because Judah is very good around the hens. He acts like they are not even around when they are in the yard together. This is probably due to the fact that Judah watched the hens grow from little chicks. Marley on the hand is all Bird Dog. When he spots the hens he tries to hunt them. You can't blame him, because it's in his blood, it just helps us appreciate the relationship Judah has with them.

Eggs Over Here, Eggs Over There

All three Chickens are laying eggs. Bringing us to about 15 eggs a week. It took us a couple of days to figure this out because Dorothy, the Golden Laced Wyandotte, is not nearly as vocal as the other two hens. So when she started going through the egg laying ritual we didn't quite recognize it. She also decided that she would lay her eggs in her own little nest, right next to garden plot #1, and not in the coop house.

We let our hens free range around our yard during the day, so we started to notice that they have began laying eggs in odd places, other than their coop. If they are locked up during the day they will lay their eggs in their boxes. However if they are out all day they will lay them wherever they see fit. For Dorothy that is a little next she made by the garden. Rose on the other hand, started to lay eggs in a shelving unit that holds our water purifier unit.

This random egg laying does add a little excitement when we get home from work, because each day we get to have our own little egg hunt.

Fish Tank Water Is Good For Plants

We have had our Gold Fish tank going for about 9 months now. The tank sits directly outside our living room window. So that we can enjoy our fish from inside the house as well in our outdoor over hang area. Now if you don't know much about fish than you probably didn't know that gold fish are cold water fish. That means that they actually do well outside in the winter time. The only thing that we have to be careful of is their water getting to warm in the summer months. To avoid this we drop big frozen jugs of water into their tank to stabilize the water temp when it gets to warm. Gold fish are also dirty fish. Which means that they go the bathroom allot, making the tank conditions livable only for gold fish. One thing that you need to do to maintain a safe environment is to clean out the tank every 10 days or so. The good thing is that Fish tank water is a great natural fertilizer. It's loaded with fish droppings and plants love the mix. I have heard it said before, " Gold fish water is Gold for plants."
So now a couple of times a months when we clean out the tank, we poor the water straight into our garden. We generally fill a 5 gallon bucket twice, replacing next to 40% of the water. So that is enough water for the entire garden, all the house plants, and what is left of our lawn.

Hello Dear

I am so excited! It turns out that some rich lady named Mrs. Victoria Van Dijk wants to give me $17.800.000.00. It's obviously totally legitimate because unlike the other internet email scams, this one is not from Africa, it's from the Netherlands. I'm sure nothing bad comes out of their. And you'll notice that I was referred to as "Dear" and everyone knows that only a nice old lady would refer to someone as ,Dear, which is the exact reason that she is willing me all this money. Because she is such a nice lady. You can see for yourself.


"Hello Dear

My name is Mrs. Victoria Van Dijk; I am a dying woman who has decided to donate what I have to you and the charity organization around your community. I am 64 years old and I was diagnosed for cancer for about 3 years ago immediately after the death of my husband who has left me everything he worked for and because the doctors told me I will not live longer than some weeks because of my health i decided to WILL/donate the sum of $17.800.000.00 to you.

Here is the Contact information of my Attorney below:
Barr: Karo Brown Advocaten
ADDRESS: 35 Group Middle Levees 8712 Emirates NETHERLANDS AMSTERDAM.
Email :( rozzk2006@aim.com)

and tell him that I have WILLED ($17.800,000.00) seventeen Million Eight Hundred Thousand Dollars to you I know I don’t know you but I have been directed to do this.

Best Regards,

From Mrs. Victoria Van Dijk."


Now I'm not sure how this will play out. I'll probably call this guy and he will probably need me to clear some bank charges, lets say a few hundred bucks. I go and clear these charges and then maybe they'll need some account numbers. We exchange some more info. A little of this, a little of that, Oh boy, I am so excited.

Balance

The chickens often watch us through the window perched on our outdoor rocker. It's as if we are now on display while they watch us in our cage.

Holiday Gathering

We decided to have some friends over Saturday night to celebrate Christmas early. Lyndsey made some snacks and some desserts for the festivity. The weather held up, although it was a little cool for Southern California standards. Which means it may have been in the 50's.
It was nice to visit with everyone, exchange some gifts and play some games. One of the games we played was a name game that Lyndsey's Dad taught us. Basically you write down a bunch of random names on blank sheets of paper. The names have to be recognizable like Oprah, Mr. T or Super Man. Then each person gets a name taped to their back. For the next 5 minutes - an hour, depending on how good you are at it, you go around asking people Yes and No questions about the name on your back until you can guess who it is. Now normally I am not too much into playing games, but one like this was actually allot of fun. Everyone wished that we had more names so they could keep playing on even after they guessed theirs.

The Egg Laying Ritual

Rose, the Rhode Island Red, has been consistently laying eggs now for about two weeks. So far she has been laying around 6 eggs a week, nearly one a day. We have enjoyed the eggs and have even passed some on to friends to enjoy. Up to yesterday the other two chickens were still watching her in wonder until Blanch, the Plymouth Rock, started to act a little peculiar. You see before the hen lays an egg it goes through a little ritual. After a couple of weeks, like all rituals, you sub-continuously learn the shortcuts and how to speed up the process to get right to the point. But like any ritual, before you learn it, it takes a little bit longer to work out the kinks. When Blanch started acting weird we new that she was just beginning to learn the ritual. We were excited because we knew what to expect when she was done.

The steps to the egg laying ritual go a little like this.
1.Separate yourself from the other birds.
2.Let your independence be known by walking around and clucking so people around notice that you are on your own.
3.Find an area to nest.
3.Scratch the area to make sure it is secure (on their first egg this could take a couple of hours)
4.Go back outside of the coop and let everyone know that you are independent and on your own.
5.Go back in the nest area and scratch some more.
6.Start putting wood shavings on your self to hide yourself from predators
7.Give a couple of loud clucks to let everyone know that you are still alone. (If you are new at this you may repeat steps 1-7 up two five times before preceding to step 8)
8.Lay egg.
9.Go outside and give a few loud clicks to let the other chickens know that you are done, and don't want to be alone.

Blanche's first egg was about the same size as Rose's first egg. It was a little lighter shade of brown that Rose's egg, which will help in telling them apart.

Dorothy, the Golden Wyndott, has yet to start the egg laying ritual, but we are confident that she will soon now that the other two are fast becoming old pros at it.

Under Water Nativity Scene

Christmas time in San Diego. We are going to stay home this year for Christmas and spend it on the boat. We would love to visit family, but we figured this year traveling during the holidays may not be the most economical. So Lyndsey wasted no time decorating the house with all kinds of Christmas decor. Trees, lights, stockings, lights, garnish, lights, quilts, cups, towels, music on the stereo you name it. Yes, trees is plural. We have a real tree for inside the house, and a fake tree for the chickens outside. So it should not be a surprise to note that even the fish got a nativity scene to spread a little holiday cheer into their environment. This actually set up an interesting scenario for us when we were watching the fish the other night. One of the fish, Ginger, the big white one, was turned away from the scene and her fan fins opened up resembling something that looked like wings. Around the same time the Christmas carol, "Angels we have heard on high, something..something... " was playing on the stereo. I mentioned it to Lyndsey and now we both got a kick out of watching the fish swim around the Nativity scene.

We've Got Eggs

We are proud to announce that our Rhode Island Red, Rose, has become a Hen. Yesterday morning, right after we got our dog back, we noticed that Rose was acting a little more peculiar than what is normal for her. The other two chicks were free ranging around the yard, while she scratched and yelped from inside the coop house. I went to check on her, and low and behold there before me sat our first brown egg. We were so excited, as we have been waiting nearly 6 months for this day to come. We don't know if she laid the egg the day before, with all the commotion of the missing dog, we didn't even check, but about 30 minutes later Rose started acting up again and bam, out came egg number two. Both the eggs are pretty small, which is to be expected with the first eggs, the good thing is that the shells are nice and hard. Most farmers will tell you that the Hen's first eggs could have very soft shells that could break easy. We have been feeding them crushed oyster shells fora about a month, with their normal grit in hopes to harden up their shells. So far it has worked well.

We decided to fry our eggs, and eat them with vegetables from the garden.

The Green pepper, the tomato, Green onion, and Serrano pepper came from the gardens. The toast & the banana came from the market.

The other two chicks will most likely start getting motivated to lay eggs of their own. These yard birds have been interesting pets and good garden helpers, but now that they are laying eggs they are definitely earning their keep.

Missing White Labrador With Yellow Ears

Monday morning I started to unload the van, after the Turkey Trot weekend, of all the camping gear and leftover food. It was pretty early in the morning so Judah didn't have his collar on, which is normally not a big deal. However this particular morning Judah decided that while I unloaded the van, he would sneak out and see if he could find some free food or handouts in the alley. As I was unloading the van, Lyndsey woke up, so I spent a little time visiting with her since I had been gone all weekend. After a cup of coffee or two I asked Lyndsey if she new where Judah was. She had no idea, and that is when it set in, he's out.
Normally this isn't that big of a deal, a neighbor finds him, reads his collar and returns him home. This has happened twice since our San Diego House, and a handful of times at other places. This time he didn't have his collar on, so we were unsure of what could happen.
We assumed that a neighbor had to of picked him up, because no one else in the area had seen him. However, we still spent all day devastated as we searched the neighborhood calling out his name and putting out signs. We even called the local vets, making sure that he hadn't been hit by a car or dropped off, as well as the local pound. No one had any idea of his whereabouts but they all took our information just in case he showed up. Now Judah has a microchip, so we hoped that whoever had him would at least turn him in where they could scan him and see who is owners were. Our big fear was that whoever found him, would find out how sweet he is and claim him as their own. Believe it or not this apparently happens quite a bit.
We hoped that whoever picked him up would either take him to be scanned or see our signs and give us a call, but when no one called that day or night we silently began to expect the worst. Monday night was a long night, as Judah had still not returned and we had no idea where he was. We wanted to believe that he was alright, but deep down inside we didn't know what to think.
I was up around 4 am Tuesday morning and began my search again for him, as well as posting up more fliers. Lyndsey resumed the search again at 7am and began posting large poster type fliers on the busy intersections next to our house.
I finally called my dad to let him know that Judah was gone and to see if he could say something that might make me feel better, then all of the sudden Lyndsey's phone rang around 8:30 am. She was still out putting up signs so I took the call. It was a neighbor about 5 houses down the alley that found Judah cruising the alley the day before. The neighbor noticed that he had no collar on, and that it was morning rush hour, so he and his wife took Judah in so he wouldn't wander into the street. They had three male dogs of their own that befriended Judah. So while we were at home worrying about where he was, he was off playing at puppy daycare. That night apparently Judah cried all night, and the neighbors knew he had to be close to home. The next morning they saw are signs and called.
We are so glad to have him back. It is amazes me how attached we can become to our pets. We have learned allot from this incident and hope to take the necessary precautions so that this doesn't happen again. One thing we are going to do is make sure that he gets a permanent collar that does not come off anymore. If he insists on leaving the house in search of snacks, at least we can rest assured that whoever finds him will know where to bring him back to.

Turkey Trot Weekend

This past weekend I took off for our annual Turkey Trot Weekend. It is a surf trip that some friends put together over 10 years ago. Kind of like of guy's hunting or fishing trip, except the only thing we are hunting is good waves.

The Turkey Trot always happens the weekend before Thanks Giving. It has been at a few different locations, however the four years that I have attended have been at Jalama Beach. Jalama Beach is a beautiful State beach located between Santa Barbara County & San Louis Obispo County, about 3 hours north of Los Angeles.

The beach is located pretty much right on the Point at Point Conception. This is the point that separates Southern California and Central California.

The waves can be three times bigger on the Northern side of Point Conception then they are on the Southern Side. This means COLD WATER, Heavy Winds & Great White Sharks.

A group of guys from San Clemente, Orange County & San Diego all try to make it each year. This year was a small trip due to allot of the crew getting married and having their first round of kids.

There is railroad trestle that is very picturesque right next to the camp ground.

We scored some pretty solid waves this trip. It wasn't the best trip we have had, as far as waves go, but it certainly wasn't the worst.

Garage Sale Weekend

Lyndsey assured me that it was time to start getting rid of some of the extra junk we have been accumulating and moving around with us. For example three window AC units that we brought out from Texas. We are in San Diego, by the beach, we do not need the those any more. Plus we had allot of extra junk we have collected from our stores and offices over the past 8 years.

We decided to ask our front neighbor if we could have the sale in his yard because we live in an alley house. We knew that we would get more traffic if we were on a street. He was fine with that so we got an early start. Lyndsey had everything ready to go at around 6:30 am. This is important because you get allot of your migrant shoppers first thing in the morning. At around 8 am you start to get some neighbor shoppers then around 10 am you start to get some younger family shoppers. We wrapped up the event at around noon, and afterward continued on with the rest our Saturday chores ie. going to the beach and relaxing.

Overall it was a success as we got to unload some of our junk to our neighbors around our community and south of the border. It was pretty funny to us that we actually got a couple of complaints from our patrons. People would actually complain about what you had and didn't have to sale to them. It reminded us of an old quote that we read in a retail book about people called "Why We Buy" by Paco Underhill. It said that 1 out of 5 people are natural complainers. They will complain about everything, even when there is no reason to complain. The book went on to say that if you are not getting one out of five patrons complaining about your prices then your prices are to low. In retail that is good to know, during a garage sale you just have to laugh quietly to yourself . Having worked in the service industry for a number of years I can agree with this statement. Spoiled kids grow into spoiled adolescents that grow into spoiled adults. I remember seeing grown men in their 30's act like un-diciplined 5 year olds for no other reason then to get their way. This reminds me of the truth found in an Hebrew Proverb, "Spare the Rod, Spoil the Child." Our Garage Sale complainers were not so bad, just a couple of old dudes in cars so full of junk that you couldn't tell where the vehicle ended and the junk began. They informed Lyndsey that this was a girly garage sell, one even called it a foo foo sell. They probably felt that way because of all the old books and jewelry she was selling and lack of tools and hardware I was holding onto. She told them AC units were pretty manly and so were our old
computer cords and accessories. I think that they were taken away by her determination because she actually managed to sell something to both of them.

Some Fun Little Waves

We finally got some fun little waves a week ago so Lyndsey & Judah decided to come down to the cliffs and snap some shots of me trying to surf.

It was pretty small but I manged to get in a couple of turns. Lyndsey caught this sequence on small chest high wave.

Now it will be easier to pay rent next month knowing that we had some fun
surf.

Hanging Out

We added a few extra perches in the chicken coop so that the chickens could get off of the ground if they wanted.

Every morning we catch them hanging out on their new perches. They like to sit up as high as they can and cluck away at each other. So far they have been quite a treat. We are expecting our first set of eggs in the next month or so. Can't wait.

Big Fat Stinker

So our dog likes to eat. Well that might be an understatement. Our dog, likes to eat allot. He likes to eat so much that if he finds food he will eat as much of it that he can until he gets sick. Then he mopes around and wines for a couple of days until his body digests and passes everything he just devoured. We have learned to add locks/latches to all of our cabinets because Fatso, aka. Judah, will wait until he is home alone and then help himself to anything he can get his paws on. In one week he devoured, three loaves of bread, a couple of packs of tortillas and two bags of chips. We finally agreed we were losing this battle so we figured out how to latch the cabinets shut with a loose nail. Once he couldn't get into our pantry anymore he started to look for new options. We keep some extra kibble on hand, just in case we run out of raw food for him, and he found out how to get to that. This was a little more complicated because not only did he figure out how to open the bottom cabinet, but he also figured out how to undo two latches on the Tupperware container to get his food out. All this from a dog that doesn't know the command STAY for longer than 10 seconds. So that's all cute and annoying, especially when you have to hear him moan and groan as he embarks upon a night of having to empty his bowls twice an hour for the next 12 hours.

The other day our folks were in town visiting from Oklahoma. Now Judah and his Gammy (Lyndsey's mom) have a special relationship. He likes her so much that whenever she is in town he manages to forget everything that he has learned and turn into a Anarchist puppy, complete with wagging tale and mad slobber. It is when Gammy is in town that his skill level as an Anarchist dog goes up a couple of notches. In the past he has taken drugs by helping himself to her meds, learned the art of opening a refrigerator without a thumb, and also learned how to unpack Gammy's bag that just might have some food, treats or more drugs in it. As soon as he hears her voice his ears perk and he goes into overdrive, so needless to say it wasn't too much of a surprise that he figured out how to brake into the cabinet and managed to eat over 5 lbs of his dog food the day she got in.

Now, believe it or not, but this post isn't even really about our Anarchist dog and his neurotic relationship with his Gammy. This post is about what happened the night we had to leave the back door open so he could use the bathroom without having to wake us up. We said goodnight to the folks and then went to lay down ourselves around 10pm. At about 12am we start to hear dog crying form outside. We got up to see what it was and Judah decided to hop the gate and climb up to the roof, even though he had no way of getting down. A little adventurous for a sick dog, but whatever, we have yet to mistake him for being too smart or anything like that. After lying down for another hour we start to hear him barking around 1am. Lyndsey jumped up to see what it was then all of the sudden I heard the back door slam. He got sprayed by a skunk, and everything was starting to smell. This wasn't the first time this happened so we knew not to let him into the house. Now it was tough luck for the Puppy, he was going to spend the rest of the night outside.

Later on that night, or early the next morning, we decided to check on him. He had spent a good portion of the night trying to rub the oil off of his face, so his face was covered in Mud. He looked kind of cute but more pathetic. We walked him around the house to the hose and started washing him. Now we learned last time that tomato juice just doesn't work. So don't use it it is a waist of time. The only thing that it does is cover the smell to you. You may feel after a few hours that the skunk smell is gone, but if a friend comes over they can assure you that not only does your house reek like skunk, but it also reeks like tomato juice as well. The best thing to use we have found is a home made concoction of 1 Quart of 3% Hydrogen Peroxide (fresh and unopened). 1/4 cup of Baking Soda. 1 teaspoon of Liquid Soap. We wash him while mixture is still bubbling. Then we rinse him water and repeat if necessary. This mixture is good for around 20 minutes before the chemicals start loosing their power. We gave him a couple of baths around 10 minutes apart and the smell pretty mush dissipated that morning. Unfortunately for us he managed to find where the skunk sprayed in the yard and rubbed in it again later that afternoon, but that wasn't nearly as bad as the actual spray itself.

Sunset at the Cliffs

The waves have been pretty small for the most part with the exception of a a few days of chest to head high sets.

Whenever we have time it is nice for us to take a quick trip down to the Sunset Cliffs to check out the sunset while we let the wild animal run around. The Sunset Cliffs is a state park that is a couple of mile from our house. It extends for a few mile stretch south of Ocean Beach and dead ends into the Point Loma Nazarene University. Lyndsey likes to run from our house to the end of the road which is around a 5 mile trek there and back. The park has a number of beaches and reef's to hang out at or explore. When the tide is super low, which happens a couple of days a month, we like to explore the beaches with Judah. You can walk for miles down the beach until you start to get nervous about being stranded on a beach if the tide decides to turn and come up to fast.

When the North West swells come in a few weeks the cliffs will start to light up with some fun waves. The set up at the Sunset Cliff's is ideal for surfing. The point blocks allot of the wind, and the kelp bed about a 1/2 mile off the beach keeps down the wind chop. This leaves the conditions glassy, which is ideal for surfing, while many of the other spots are blown out. The Sunset Cliff's got its name for the fact that this is where the cliffs dump into the sea. There a few scattered beaches but for the most part it is just cliff and reef. This makes getting in and out of the water a little tricky with options changing with the tides. Entry into some some of waves consists of jumping off of a cliff into the water. This can get a little harry if you do not know what you are doing. Timing and wave knowledge can make it a fun easy entry, lack there of can get a little messy. Getting in is the easy part, getting out is a whole another monster. I've had to paddle 1/2 mile up or down the beach at times to find a place to get out. Needless to say many of the spots are not for beginners which assists with crowd control on big days.

Garden Chronicles :: Chapter 8

Garden Warfare

Every thing was pretty standard, or so we thought, in our yard and garden for the past month. All of the vegetables and animals seemed to be living and growing in harmony with each other. The western garden plot continued to thrive with tomatoes, peppers & eggplants while the newer civilized eastern plot was doing well with larger plants like corn, pumpkin and some artichokes. Everything was growing and budding at what seemed to be an accelerated rate until the day our garden was infiltrated by a foreign substance.

A few weeks ago one of the pumpkin plants decided to take a different path and surpass all of the other plants. Not only did it take over most of garden plot number 2, but it expanded outside of the garden territory and began taking over parts of the yard and walkway as well. We got excited thinking about all the pumpkin pie we could make in November if it continued to prosper, so we gave it more attention and began arming it with every thing it needed. Two large pumpkins started to develop near our walkway, we call them the survivors, and we watched their every move. Shortly after three other baseball size pumpkin buds started to appear on the opposite side of the plot.

We let the pumpkin take over the garden, arming it as it invaded and at times even demolished other plants and their plots. With the help of the crazy hens and their daily invasions of clearing out insects or any other foreign invaders, the pumpkin continued to grow at such an accelerated rate that we didn't even notice the trouble developing in one of its new regions. Some of the smaller, younger leaves started allowing mold, like a new ideology grow on their leaves. The mold became aggressive and shortly after, some of the older leaves were under attack. Within a few days the mold started to take over the entire plant. Not knowing what it was, we thought the leaves were drying out due to a lack of nutrition and did exactly what we should have not done. We began arming it with more nutrients and supplies by watering it more. Unfortunately for the plant the mold was able to ambush much of the nutrients, making it stronger and more aggressive, while the plant got weaker. With its supplies cut off it was nearly impossible for the plant to fight off its new friend turned foe.

It took about two weeks before every melon origin plant in both plots had taken to the mold. This included the cantaloup region, the cucumber, of coarse the squash and zucchini, even some of the younger tomatoes got involved. Once the mold takes over it pretty much cuts the life supply to the fruit. All of the new buds on the pumpkin plant with the exception of the survivors fell in battle. We continued to let the pumpkins grow for another week before admitting that the mold had changed the rules of garden warfare. Soon both plots looked like a war zone and our once beautiful edible landscaping started to look like Baghdad 2003. Finally after coming to the realization that the mold had won, we decided to pull the plug and harvest what we could.

This wasn't a total disaster, all of our peppers, corn, artichokes and greens seemed to survive the attack. Some of the stronger older tomatoes did as well. I think they have more acid in their leaves which helps fight it off. Our egg plants survived the mold also, but their leaves look like Swiss cheese after an entirely different attack from a swarm of terrorist bugs of an unknown region. They seem to be strong and grounded so they continue to put out fruit. We will continue to keep supplying them aid on a close watch.

After spending time educating myself on the habits and nature of our new enemy I have learned that mold is pretty common adversary to the Pumpkin plants. Since this happened we are taking steps to avoid it coming back. One of the first things we are going to do is start watering our garden from the ground and not from above with sprinkler. Not only will this help conserve water by reducing run-off, but it will help the leaves stay dry, and not give the enemy the ideal environment it needs to spread. If we see any signs of the mold returning in the future, which we most likely will, we will remove it as soon as possible. They also have organic sprays that claim to kill the mold if we can catch it in time. I don't know if they work but I will find out next season.

Garden Chronicles :: Chapter 7

Garden Plot Numero dos is taking off.

The pumpkin plant has gotten ridiculously huge, it has moved on past taking over the garden and now it taking over the yard. That is just fine with Blanch as she loves to get out of her pen and go to work looking for bugs or worms.

The corn is also going off in the second plot. Looking at this picture I now understand why the straight edgers and skins called me and my surfer/skater buddies 'corn heads' when we were younger.

Horse Trough Hot Tub

It was time to put a soaking tub in the back yard. This way we can enjoy ourselves, the yard and the sun all while soaking in a tub of warm water.

We picked up a 160 gallon horse trough at the feed store last week when we picked up more food for the hens. This size is just big enough to fit two people comfortably, which is perfect since there are no dogs aloud in the tub. Once we got it home we decided that it would go best right outside of our office nook, next to the chicken coop. We then raised it off of the ground a little and added a few extra touches like bamboo fence and a step to make it look nicer. This is just the start, we want to do a little more, we will just wait for pieces to start showing up in the alleys.

To heat the water and make this a hot tub we added a pump that will push the water from the hot tub up to the roof. On the roof we have about a 30 gallon 8" PVC pipe that is 6ft long. It was an extra piece that came with the boat. We painted it black with Rustoleam to help it soak up the sun and heat the water. The pump pushes cold water from the bottom of the tub up to the roof and into one side of the tube, then gravity pulls down hot water from the the other side of the tube. To keep the water clean we use a mixture of 35% Hydrogen Peroxide. This is a h220 combination that releases an extra oxygen molecule once it mixes with he water. This kills any algae that wants to grow in the tub. We have yet to get a thermometer for the tub, but our ghetto solar heating actually makes it quite pleasant, especially after a morning of surfing in the cold California water.

Garden Chronicles: Chapter 6

Casualty, Men Down! I have been watching my two celebrities coming in for two months now. They have even been featured in two posts with their magnificent girth and beauty. Apparently I wasn't the only one keeping an eye on their slow maturity. Four days ago they started to turn orange. No Bugs, No Worms, No cracks. Three days ago they started to get rosy cheeks as the orange began to slowly change to a red. Two days ago they began to turn almost all red, with another day left of maturity. I watered the plot with worm tea, brewed from worm castings, just to give the roots another boost of energy to focus pushing nutrients on to their fruit. Then yesterday we went to pull them and STOP.



What was the mysterious creature? Did it just happen into them at the perfect time? I doubt it. That means that this was premeditated. Which would most likely mean it will come back.

Was it skunk? I didn't smell anything out of the ordinary.
Was it a Possum? Chickens didn't make as sound
Was it a raccoon? Chickens didn't make as sound
Was it gofer? No trace of gofer holes anywhere.
Was it a chupacabra? Hmmmmm

Captains Log :4: Sail Repair

We have been taking the boat out, checking on its performance a couple of times a week until we had our first incident. It actually wasn't to big a problem, but it did remind us that we are operating an old vessel that will have it's own issues. We were sailing as close as we could to the wind, seeing how far the boat would keel before losing speed and all of the sudden we started to hear a ripping sound, then in the matter of seconds the boom came crashing down with the bottom half of the main sail attached to it, and the top half of the sail flapping in the wind. The front halyard sail was still full of wind so we did not lose any speed until we turned out of the wind to access our damage. Sure enough the main sail had ripped on seam, and we were stuck with our first sail repair.



After doing a little research on the internet, we came up with the best approach for repairing the seam. We learned that there are a number of different ways to attack the job, fortunately for us we have a production room with cutting tables and heavy duty sewing machines at our warehouse, so we decided to take the main off of the boom and take into our shop. The next steps were taken as follows:

1. Insure cloth is salt-free and dry. Treat with alcohol to displace moisture, if necessary. Remove old thread pieces.

2. Pin out seam in original shape. Use needle holes, wear pattern, etc. to re-establish the original relationship of cloth edges. If the seam is not split yet, but is in danger of coming apart, FIX IT NOW! To do so, run pencil along seam edge, draw strike-off marks, then pull the seam apart and remove the broken threads.

3. Pin the seam out and put double stick tape on the bottom layer of cloth, pull off paper backer, and lay top cloth in place. When you are sure it is lined up correctly (no ripples in one layer, even tension on both pieces, ends of seams are same lengths as original), press top cloth down firmly smoothing cloth into place.

4. If sewing by hand, sew / / / / /, then back in opposite direction, using original holes, to form a zigzag stitch. This allows the stitch line to stretch with the cloth. If necessary, punch holes through thick areas of cloth with an awl. Use the awl to mark off holes at regular intervals of 1/4" or 3/8" for even stitching. Use appropriately strong thread, doubled if necessary. Pull tension on each stitch as you sew. If sewing by machine, sew seam, using original stitch holes if possible.

5. Cover repairs with adhesive-backed cloth tape if seam is in a high chafe area.

Once we finished the repairs, we brought the sail back to the boat, put it back on the boom and off we were chasing the wind around the bay again.

Garden Chronicles :: Chapter 5

So far all of our garden plots are doing great. The celebrity tomatoes in our first plot are getting huge.

Our second (new) garden plot is taking off as well. It is hard to believe that we planted it only two weeks ago. We have a pumpkin plant that is taking over the entire South West wing of the garden plot.

Because we decided that we wanted to do an organic garden, we have yet to use any insecticides or growth hormones on our plants. Nor have they needed them. We just open up the chicken coop and let the girls do their thing.

They know how to climb in and out of their coop when the door is open to make their way into the garden.

Once they are in the garden the start foraging around for worms and insects.

When they are all done gardening they will make there way back their coop, climb back in and relax.

 

Captains Log :3: First Mate

We have been going into work earlier the past couple of days, so we can get can get off early and go sailing. The waves have been flat, but the wind has been blowing. Today we sailed down wind to Coronado Bridge, and then tacked back to our marina. It was an amazing and beautiful afternoon out on the water.

Word apparently is out that we are looking for a first mate, the competition is looking pretty fierce.

Captains Log :2: First Voyage

Yesterday was the day we moved our boat to its new home. It was still at Driscoll Boat yard and we needed to sail it out of Mission bay, around Point Loma, and into it's slip at Marina Cortez in San Diego Harbor. Everything worked fine, which was quite a relief.

The red line plots the course of our first voyage together as a family. We left the dock in Mission Bay around 9am and got to our new slip around 2pm. The winds were a light SE 10k wind. Which made for smooth sailing. The sky was overcast with a coastal Eddie till around 12pm. The total voyage took around 5 hours. It was just Lyndsey and I and we had a very nice time.

This is a view from the ocean of the beach town we live in, Ocean Beach. That is OB Pier and Point Loma in the back ground. Notice the seals on the buoy. This is pretty common. I like to think of them as the marina guardians, but most probably think of them as the harbor scavengers. If you leave a boat sitting to long by itself in the harbor. They might take it over.

This is a view of the Pinnacle, where Cabrillo National Monument and the Light House are on Point Loma.

And this is where the boats new home is at slip H49 in Marna Cortez.

OB Parrots

So we live by an airport, and planes fly by. You actually get use to it, the loud sound of the planes and all. You just learn to stop your conversations, or turn up the volume on your ipod and wait for it to pass. We have another loud shrieking sound that we hear as well, but this is not from a plane or a man made 747. These screeches come from what the locals call the OB Parrots.

Rumor has it many years ago someone released five parrot's into the wild. Well, years went by and they advanced their kind, now there is well over 100 of them. They, like many other creatures have made Ocean Beach San Diego their home.

They are pretty birds, with distinct green and red feathers, but most people can't stand them. That is when they post up on the telephone wires outside your house at 6:30 AM and like a military regiment call start screeching away at full boar. I personally get a kick out of it because I am already up and running or working, but I get the feeling that most of the laid back neighbors may not.

They always travel in pairs or groups. This guy and his gal were hitting up the sunflowers early.

 

Captains Log :1: Free Boat

It is hard for me to believe that ten years ago I was working on sail boats in a what use to be a small fishing village in Costa Rica. The plan at the time was to get a 6 pack captains license and work on boats for the rest of my life. Then I changed my mind and changed directions for a few years. I moved to Texas and opened a Vintage Clothing Store. The idea was that instead of working on other peoples boats, maybe one day I could have one of my own. Fast forward ten years. Fall in love, get married, move back and forth from San Diego to Dallas, ups and downs with business, a dog, fish, chickens, back in the waves with home grown salad mixes. And this week we got a boat.

A 25ft 73 American Sail boat. The manufacturer is a company named American. They are no longer in business but the were known for making good boats. They have a fancy step down into the keel in the cabin adding another 6 inches of head room, if you need it, when you are standing in the cabin.

We picked it up from Driscol boat yard because the price was right. The previous owner pulled it out of the water to paint the bottom. While it was out of the water it ran up quite a bill at the boat yard so the old owner skipped town and left the yard his boat. Two years later the owners of the yard want to use the space and needed to get rid of the boat. They would of like to of sold it for more that then we got it for.

The motor is a Mercury Force 50 Power out board. It is a little bit of an overkill for a sailboat this size so we are up in the air about what to do with it. I could hook it up and be able to motor anywhere I wanted. Or I could try to sale it for on Craigs List, buy a smaller motor and invest the rest into the boat. Seeing how it is a sailboat we most likely will just sale the motor.

We splashed it on Friday, and started cleaning it out. There was a lot of junk from the previous owner.

It is on a pier at the boat yard still. We have till Tuesday to move it. We are going to take over slip at Marina Cortez in San Diego Harbor on the first of the month.

We have enough work to keep us busy for quite some time, but she could be ready to sail by next weekend. It will depend on if I want to sand and paint the mast now or later.

The cabin has all the essentials for cruising or a live aboard. It has a burner, a spot for a fridge, a sink, a head, a bed and more. We are so excited about doing day trips and weekend cruises on this boat. We know that it will be a lot of time and work, however it will also be rewarding to have a boat in San Diego. We sit an watch the ocean every day from our balcony, it will be nice for us to get back out there.

Chicken Wing

The chickens are coming along just fine so far.

We finally finished their coop and opened up the coop house for them to start exploring.

Blanch, the Plymouth Rock, so far is still the friendliest and most adventurous of the three.

She will eat straight from your hands. She actually got the other two to come around to eating from our hands as well. Kind of like the trend setter for the group.

Rose, the Rhode Island Red, is the second friendliest. She is also the sneakiest when it comes to snaking food from you hands. She pals around with Dorothy, the Golden Laced Wyndot. Dorothy appears to be the leader of the crew, however she is the most timid and afraid when it comes to being held.

This is a view of Rose leaving the Coop house, down to the run.

All three of the little ladies practicing laying eggs in their house.

 

Garden Chronicles :: Chapter 4

Well allot of growing up has been taking place over here at casa de Coburn, or at least we tend to think so. Things have been growing fast. Every day we are having meals from our garden. Sometimes it might just be some greens for a burrito, other times we will have a entire meal.

Everything is coming in just perfect.

I think that one of the funniest things about our edible landscaping, is that we actually do not have that much room work with. I mean our yard is half the size of other yards that we have had in the past, but for some reason it just works out so fine. So fine that after enjoying the first rounds of the fruits of our labor, we decided to set up another garden plot.

The new garden spot we put where our wild flower mix was growing. All of the wild flowers ran their coarse, so when they started to fade out we began making plans for what we would do next. We decided to extend the planter into the yard almost doubling the original size of the planter for another garden. Then we worked the soil. Worked the soil some more, and then added the compost to the soil. We worked the compost about 6-10 inches into the original soil, and then toped it off with 4 inches of straight compost.

We ended up enclosing our entire garden with a 16" chicken wire fence to keep out the predators. We also added a brick around the entire garden for eye candy.

This is a view from our roof deck looking down into the yard at the two garden plots. In another month and a half it will be time to start turning over the first garden plot. At that time the second plot will begin yielding its veggies. We are hoping to work both plots simultaneously giving us a continual supply of vegetables throughout each season.

This is what the view from our front door looks like.

We also cleaned out a plot across our yard that has some nice succulents and palms. This spot gets minimal sunlight however these plants do well in the shade and need only a little water to survive. Leaving most of our watering for the edible plants.

We decided to use the scraps from one of our palms to finish off a hanging basket in our hanging garden. Then we planted basil in it. Yummy.

 

To Have Or Have Not

One of my friends asked me the other day if I noticed any changes in my life not having a television set around. You see 6 months ago Lyndsey and I got rid of our TV, or opted out of getting a new one since our old one kicked the bucket. To be 100% honest, we still have a small television set hidden away in our guest bedroom to watch movies on. It might actually get reception on 1 or 2 of the channels on a clear day, but besides that we are TV free. I thought about the question and then was slightly amazed myself when I began to answer it.

I remember a few years back I had an old business partner that told me now that I was married I needed to get cable, and go ahead and get the premium package with all the movie channels, because that is what you do when you get married, you watch TV. Prior to that I had pretty much avoided having cable television for about 5 years. I fell for it like most young newlyweds do, assuming that is how you spend time hanging out with your spouse. I mean when I was younger that is how I spent time hanging out with my siblings when I was aloud to, why not my wife. At least when I was a child I had a mother that limited the amount of television we watched and made sure that we got outside during the day to burn some much needed child energy. Now that I was an adult, I needed to draw my own lines and be aware of my own limitations. I needed to ask myself how much TV I should or shouldn't allow myself to watch. Like many mindless habits, days go by, months go by and then years go by before you stop to realize how consumed you actually have become. The pushers in this case (Networks/Advertisers) don't want the consumers (you & I) to break our habits (addictions) and stop using their product (Television). Once we do, we might all start thinking for ourselves.

"According to Veronis Suhler Stevenson's Communications Industry Forecast and Report, quoted by the U.S. Census Bureau, in 2003, the average American spent 1,745 hours watching television, which works out to 145 hours a month. That's more than six complete days in front of the TV. each month." I am sure that as much as I would like to think that I was not one of those mindless drones, I am as guilty as the next person. I use the term Mindless Drone, because that is actually what happens to a person when they watch TV.

"The longer a person watches television, the more likely they are to be put into a trans-like state and the more likely that their minds will slip into alpha mode. Alpha is the term used by scientist who study brainwave activity for a noncognitive, passive, receptive mode. While in alpha the mind is open for information to be placed into it. One of the reasons that the mind slips into alpha mode while watching television is due to the lack of eye movement while watching television. Because most television screens are relatively small, very little eye movement is required to absorb all of the images on the screen. There is a direct correlation between eye movement and thought stimulation. While one’s mind is in alpha mode, it is being taken advantage of by advertisers who are using the mind’s receptive mode to instill a desire for their product in the viewer. The only reason that television programs exist is to sell them to advertisers who want to show their advertisements to the mass of people watching television. The average American sees approximately 21,000 commercials per year. That’s 21,000 carefully planned and thought out messages repeating their message to you, buy something now! "

The results of giving up something that has such an effect on ones mind and time can be overwhelming. At first we didn't notice any big differences, only subtle changes when we stopped using TV. I started to find myself reading and writing more, as well as playing more of my guitar. After a while I subconsciously started new projects around my house. The first ones were minor like fixing up some of the surf boards in my quiver. I hadn't done my own ding repair in years because I didn't think I had the time. Next we got a fish tank up and going. It seams that watching the fish can put us in the same mindless alpha mode, but so far only one of the fish is trying to control our thought process. Since we had to start changing out the fish water weekly we started a garden and that is when then things started really piling up. After a couple of months, with 6 extra days a month of free time, we really began to see some obvious changes. Organic garden plots, composters, rideable surfboards, new songs, chicken coops, backyard hens, good books, aquaponic gardens are just a few of the changes.

I guess you could say that we started to notice that instead of being major consumers we were slowly becoming more sustainable. Instead of purchasing food that was being advertised to us, we started growing some of our own. Instead of watching adventures on TV, we go out and have adventures of our own. It has now been six months without a television set and we have a whole house and business full of fun projects that keep us looking forward to long summer nights and the weekend. It is almost safe to say that for us, giving up the TV has brought our family back to where things might have been for our grandparents. Before everyone had a television set in their homes, or each room in their home. To answer my friends question, not having a TV around has made both my wife and I less dependent and more independent, less lethargic and more creative, less clouded and more clear.

Bird On A Wire

Since the chicks have been outside in their coop they have been attracting all kinds of new friends

We got these photos the other morning from a line in our yard.

A Night Out On the Town

The chicken coop is almost done, or at least 95.76% of the way there. Last week we built the doors and secured down the latches. The chicks are getting so big we decided to go ahead and move them into the coop. Last night was their first night out on their own. The only thing we have left to do with the coop is to finish off the coop house. Since the chicks will not be able to reach the coop house for another couple of weeks we decided to build them a make shift shanty with a hodge podge ceiling and card board walls. It slightly resembles some of the places the Indians lived in in Baja when I was a child. This way they can get out of the weather elements and stay warm under the light.

We didn't think that they were going to get much sleep became of the insects attracted to the light. It was actually quite entertaining for us last night watching them hunt down files, June bugs and anything else that dared enter their layer. We have learned that they are all very good hunters as they can catch a fly in mid flight. So needless to say clumsy flying beetles stand a slim chance of survival. Once one catches an insect, the games begin. They don't just sit there and eat it quietly, but actually quite the opposite. The one who catches it will start chirping and running around the coop trying to play keep away from the others. We think that they learned this game from our dog Judah, we know he likes to fancy himself as the 'King' when it comes to the game of keep away.

We checked on them a couple time last night just to make sure nothing else found it's way in the coop with them. I had read one of the most upsetting things about owning a pet chicken is if something gets to them in their coop. Owners get so attached to their hens that it becomes difficult to raise them again after finding what a cat or raccoon does to them if they get in the coop. I took every precaution I could to make sure that they are in good and safe. Since this is our first coop, I can only hope that I took it a little overboard.

I was glad to see that they were all fine the next morning.

So was Judah.

 

Backyard Chicken Coop

It was time to get serious about building the chicken coop. Either we built in time for the chicks, or the chicks would need it before we had time. Finding a place to put the chicken coop was our first obstacle. We have a great yard but not a whole lot of space to work with. We decided to go with a semi built storage shelf by our office nook where we kept our composters. Coming up with the plans was easy once we started jotting down our ideas.

Keeping with the simple logic, we decided to build our coop in two parts. A good poultry house protects the birds from the elements (weather), predators, injury and theft. Poultry require a dry, draft-free house. This can be accomplished by building a relatively draft free house with windows and/or doors which can be opened for ventilation when necessary. It is also necessary to build the coop on high, well-drained areas. This prevents prolonged dampness and water saturation of the floor of the coop and outside runs. Allowing an adequate level of space per bird also helps keep the humidity level in the coop to a minimum. The first part would be the actual coop house, where we would keep the nests for our future eggs. This section we would put in an elevated area. The next part would be a chicken run. This is the area that the hens will be able to cruise around and play in the dirt.

We started out by cleaning out the designated area, and building a frame to get an idea of what we would be working with. We wanted to keep as much as a natural element to the coop as we could, so we worked around existing branches and structures already available.

Once we got the frame up, we started to add the chicken wire. We built the chicken run area large enough for us to stand in. This will help with cleaning out the area in the future. The wire mesh we are using has a 1" wholes. This is the recommended size for chickens. We also learned that it is much cheaper to by the wire mesh that they use for roofing. It is the same stuff that they sell for chickens. It is just marketed for a different use, and comes in a larger roll. The wire mesh we purchased is 20 gauge, 36" wide and 150' long. We will most likely only use half of what we purchased, but can use the rest in the future around our garden.

When building the actual coop house, we needed to make sure that the hen's will have adequate space for movement and exercise as well as areas to nest and roost. It is recommended for egg laying hens to have 1.5 ft of space inside the coop, and 8ft of space in the run. We will also add perches for them to hang out on. With these chickens, we will provide 6 to 10 inches of perch space per bird. We will also provide them a nest. You should always provide at least one nest for every 4-5 females in the flock.

This is what the view looks like from inside the coop house, looking out to the run.

Slowly but surely it all starts to come together.We still need to add a pen door, as well as make sure everything is tight and secure from predators. Once we are done it will be important to remove any loose or ragged wire, nails, or other sharp-edged objects from the coop. We will also eliminate all areas other than perches where the birds could perch more than 4 feet above the floor. These extra measures could eliminate any injury to our birds and may prevent damage to the coop, as well.

Once the coop house is done, we will retrieve our eggs from this door. We decided to leave the existing wood structure for the back wall to their house. This way they can enjoy some old old ivy vines for natural decor.

We built a raised floor in the coop area to assist in the ventilation as well as the cleaning and the collection of their waist for composting. The floor is built with the 1" chicken mesh, raised about 4 inches off of the floor. We will place a large tray down below for easy collection of their waist before they move in.

This is a view from inside the chicken run area, up to the coop house. We are about 90% percent done with the coop. We should be finished with it by next week, giving us a few days of tweaking it out before the chicks will be ready to move in.

 

Garden Chronicles : Chapter 3

A Stroll Through The Garden

We started letting the chicks spend some time in our garden. We want them to get familiar being around us, as well as the plants and the insects. Up to this point each time they saw us we were lording over their box like some type of greek god having fun controlling the outcome of their day. We did not want them to get the wrong impression of us so we started hanging out with them both in the house and in the garden a few minutes a day.

In the garden they feel right at home, foraging for food or pecking at the plants.

Blanch here, The Plymouth Rock, is the most animated out of the threesome, she also gets out and explores more than the other two.

Judah continues to try to convince us that he can help keep the chicks in line while they are in the garden, here he is trying to get under the fence to assist. The first day we let them out we learned the importance of staying close by while they are so small. It's bad enough that our land shark can't seem to leave them alone, but other birds of prey can't as well. Lyndsey was sitting with Rose about a week ago in the yard, and a large bird swooped down and perched on a branch directly above her and the chick. When I say directly, I mean like three feet away. Rose stopped chirping immediately and ducked down into Lyndsey's hands. Fortunately everything was all right, but it did open our eyes as to how vulnerable they are at this age, and how important their coop will be when they get older.

Garden Chronicles : Chapter 2

Watch it Grow

Well it has been about three weeks on the garden and two weeks with the chicks. We keep feeding everything, and it keeps growing.

We had to move the chicks a couple of times now into a larger habitat. The recommendation for chicks is that they have square foot per chick. At first this seemed like a bit much but after a few days of watching how much they ate and grew it made allot of sense. They now have a 45 gallon container they call home. Next move will be to the chicken coop. We are going to start building that this week.

Everything is coming in fine, some of the peppers and greens are ready to go.

We had a great salad for dinner last night with the spicy mescaline mix, spinach and red leaf lettuce. It was tasty.

He'll Have His Rare

About a month ago we decided to change around our dog Judah's diet for a number of reasons. The most pending reason was due to the fact that he was having major skin issues mainly due to allergies and flea bites. It turns out that we aren't the only ones attracted to the beaches and great weather in Southern California, but fleas as well. San Diego is supposedly the Flea Capitol of the U.S. We give Judah his flea treatment once a month with some occasional salt water swims, but this barely does anything to help. Recently he started developing hot spots from some sensitive areas he couldn't keep himself from licking and scratching. Our vet said that it a common thing for dogs, especially labs, to have skin issues. They also gave us some medicated shampoo for the hot spots. I new there had to be more we could do, so I started researching for more options.

The first thing we did was change his diet to a raw food diet. Also known as the B.A.R.F Diet. The acronym in BARF Diet stands for Biologically Appropriate Raw Food, or Bones And Raw Food. The ideology behind it is that each animal has specialized dietary requirements and if they don't receive their biologically appropriate diet the end result will be detrimental to their health. After I learned a little more about dogs and their eating habits I would almost go as far as calling this a 'common sense diet'. "The food your animal eats should provide all of the nutritional components which are necessary for all organs and systems of a healthy body to perform in harmonious unison. A properly functioning body does an amazing job at preventing disease and healing itself, and to do this it requires the energies and nutrients of a well-balanced diet." You see, since the first dogs placed their paws on this earth they have been carnivores. Hunting, scavenging and eating raw meet, not commercial pet food. Many of the commercial dog food companies would have us believe that they actually use human grade meat in the production of their food, when in fact the sources of this "meat" are not even fit for animal consumption. I learned that the most common and most visible symptoms of nutritionally caused deficiencies are allergies of one kind or another. Because many commercial foods are woefully deficient in key nutrients, the long term effect of feeding such foods makes the dog hypersensitive to its environment. I soon learned that Carnivores cannot maintain long term production of the quantity of amylase enzyme necessary to properly digest and utilize the carbohydrates. In addition, the proteins in grains are less digestive than animal proteins. As a result, the immune system becomes irritated and weakened by the invasion of foreign, non-nutritive protein and carbohydrate particles. When this happens allergies and other chronic immune problems may develop.

So for the past month instead of getting his usual kibble, we started feeding him raw meat. Now he eats fish, beef and chicken; bones and all. Bones are full of nutrients good for dogs. They also slow down their eating and clean out their teeth. The important thing is that the bones are not cooked. Poultry bones especially are dangerous cooked because they can splinter and cause internal damage to you your pup. However if they are raw they are still soft, and can be digested.

The results so far have been quite noticeable and worth mentioning. 1. He has lost weight, which is a good thing because he has had issues with his knees since he was a pup. 3 lbs on a dog makes a big difference. 2. His coat is more shiny and he is itching a lot less. 3. His Hot spots began to heal and new hair began to grow in. 4. His stinky dog odder and breath disappeared. We washed him a month ago, and he still smells clean. 5. Cleaning up after him has never been so easy as his droppings are solid and gamey. I know that is a bit gross, but if you own a dog you understand that something like that is a big change.

We will obviously keep a close eye on him and continue to moniter his eating, but so far things are looking pretty good.

The Pecking Order

We expanded our family the other day by adding three hens to the pack. Now we officially have 1 crazy dog, 6 fish (this keeps changing due to our fish elimination rounds) & three little chicks. These chicks are one day going to be our breakfast making hens. "Rose" the first light colored chick is a Rhode Island Red, she so far is the most docile, as she likes to be held. "Blanch" right next to Rose is a Plymouth Rock and the chick in back is "Dorothy" she is a Gold Laced Wyandotte. All three breeds are suppose to be good for backyard coops, as they are all good egg layers as well as docile birds.

We are looking forward to their eggs, however that will not be for another 5 months. In the meantime we can use their droppings as manure for our garden. Poultry manure (chicken in particular) is the richest animal manure in N-P-K. (nitrogen (N), phosphoric acid (P) and potash (K) ) Chicken manure is considered "hot" and must be composted before adding it to the garden. Otherwise, it will burn any plants it comes in contact with. We will also let them range free around are garden to help out with the insects and slugs. We will start building their chicken coop in our back yard here in the next couple of weeks as they will be ready to move into it in about 4-5 weeks.

Garden Chronicles : Chapter 1

This year we got out garden going a little late in the season, fortunately in San Diego, Ca you can get away with that. This was our first year in our house so the fist thing we needed to do was pick out our plot. TIP: Choosing a Location -- Select a plot of good, well-drained soil near a water supply. It should be close to the home for convenience, but should not be shaded by tall buildings or trees. Enclosing the garden spot with a fence is usually profitable.We chose a spot next our south west fence that gets the most sunlight, and acts as a natural barricade against critters. After we chose a spot, we spent the first week tearing up the soil and getting it ready for a garden. It s a little back breaking work, especially if your use to being on a computer all week, however the reward of yard work is always beneficial.

We decided to do an Organic Garden for a number of reasons. Organic gardening differs from "conventional" gardening mainly in the areas of fertilization and pest control. The organic gardener prefers to use natural and organic materials and methods, and avoids using practices and synthetic chemicals that may be detrimental to his health or environment. In order to this much attention is put on the soil you use, to maximize the most nutrients getting to your plants from the soil alone. A major basis for organic gardening is the use of abundant quantities of organic material applied to the soil. Usually, it is in the form of animal manures, plant manures, cover crops, compost, or mixed organic fertilizer. We purchased a composter at our Neighborhood Gardening Store to start our composting. The model we purchased is great for making compost as well as making compost tea. This batch will not be ready for another 3-6 months, just in time for our winter garden.

We also started a Vermiposter with worms. Worm composting is a method for recycling food waste into a rich, dark, earth-smelling soil conditioner. The great advantage of worm composting is that this can be done indoors and outdoors, thus allowing year round composting. It also provides apartment dwellers with a means of composting. In a nutshell, worm compost is made in a container filled with moistened bedding and redworms. Add your food waste for a period of time, and the worms and micro-organisms will eventually convert the entire contents into rich compost. We got our started and then were able to go by a friends house and pick up some worms. This will kick start our batch in time for next season.

Because we needed something a little sooner we went to out local Land Fill and picked some of the good stuff up there. Fortunately for us, residents of San Diego get can get their compost for free at the Miramar Land Fill, as long as you are willing to scoop it up for themselves. We undershot our first load, so we had to make an extra trip to make sure that we had enough for both of our plots. We even had enough after our second trip to stoke out one of our neighbors with some our extras. TIP: Compost can actually get rather expensive if you are purchasing it at a Garden Store. We estimated that we saved around $400 right from the start picking ours up at the land fill.

The Garden Design -- Many gardeners find it helpful to draw out on paper the location of each row and the crop or succession of crops to be planted. We did this as well. We separated our garden into four separate plots and grew plants that are good companions together. TIP: There are two types of companion plants: those that compliment the nutrient needs of other plants, and those that insects do not like. Plants that insects do not like, make great companions to other plants in your organic garden. Planting onions and garlic amid your organic vegetables, will repel a variety of insects. In addition to providing insect protection, you can harvest the onions and garlic, too. Marigolds are another great companion plant. A companion plant can also be one that insects like. In South America, coffee growers plant banana trees around the coffee crops. Insects like the sweet, banana plants and fruit, much more than coffee plants.

To avoid walking on the soil and compacting it down which can be damaging to plant roots, we laid planks across our garden to act as a natural barrier between plots, as well as give us access to all areas of our growing plants.

As an extra bonus for our garden we water it with our house plants and garden with our dirty fish tank water. We keep a basic gold fish tank that sits in a window seal between our patio and living room. Each week we need to clean out the tank and replace 1/3 of the water. That dirty water is full of amino acids and nitrogen that plants thrive on.

one week later.

Keeping out the Predators can be basic or extreme depending upon your situation. To keep out our land shark we put a basic garden fence. This way he can't roam around the garden covering our garden with his markings, and eating our ripe harvest. We are hoping the combination of the fence and land shark will keep out the raccoons and skunks. We also built a simple frame to lead our vine vegetables, and added an old disco ball that helps keep out the birds.

We started growing natural wildflowers about a month before we planted our garden to deter predators of the vegetables.

our onions are kicking in as to be expected.

Some nice spots that we found to grow herbs are in hanging baskets.