If only...

I've pretty much given up on grad school at the moment (no time to study for that damned GRE) and would love to find myself living here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/16/world/americas/16gaviotas.html?_r=2&pagewanted=all

Who's with me? If Colombia doesn't interest you I am also looking for Farming Cooperatives here on the west coast, let me know if you have any leads.

Chicken Update

Hey All,
Today we had the first chicken task force meeting and it went REALLY well. We are definitely on our way to chickendom. We have outlined the report we are making for risk management (who I have e-mailed to set up a meeting) and are making progress for our deadline on Friday. We still have plans to use Annika's coop design with possibly a few alterations, including 1/4 inch wire instead of chicken wire to keep out pesky and harmful animals, and possibly a piece of wood on the bottom to keep out rats and make the area easier to clean. We estimate that the coop will cost about $200 (based on a design and estimate we found online)- which we can apply for from the Sustainability Fund. Before we can really decide how many and what kind of chickens we should get, we really need to get the go-ahead from Risk Management and Facilities, but we went ahead and looked anyways. We thought, in terms of egg production, that we would initially get 5 chickens which would produce about 5 eggs/week -- we thought that was a pretty reasonable number of eggs to start with. In terms of types of chickens, we are looking at Araucana (blue and green eggs, quiet, docile, etc.), Barred Rocks (black and white speckled and reliable) and possibly some New Hampshire Reds (we have kind of ruled these out for the moment, but please let us know how you feel about them). We were going to order them online, but again, if anyone knows any local hatcheries let us know! Joellen Anderson suggested that we "adopt" abused chickens from bad mean farms, but we decided that initally it would be pretty difficult as it will be the first time for some of us working with chickens. We really want to look to this in the future, but we want to make sure that we can actually give the chickens everything they need before we any that have already been abused. If you are interested in being on the taskforce e-mail us at feastoxy@gmail.com. Just wanted to update people on the progress we are making. Get excited for this week, it's about to be jam-packed with fun activities!

-Giulia

Garden Wrap-Up and Big Week Ahead

Hi Everyone,
Great day in the garden yesterday (as usual). Giulia brought a delicious homemade pumpkin pie that we devoured.
We also cleared some more of the summer beds and planted to new crops. I'm not sure if it was a good idea but we planted one bed with carrots and chard in the shape of a double-helix-- one strand with carrots and one with chard. It should look pretty rad (I'm not so sure about maximum efficiency on that one).
We also turned the pile and made a new one. All in under an hour and a half. We are rock stars.
IMPORTANT: We want to show alum and parents the garden tomorrow from 1-2. If anyone wants to join me in the quad from 12-1 to pass out fliers that tell where the garden is and then hang with me from 1-2 in the garden to host parents that would be AMAAZING! I will send out an email about this.
Also e are still putting on the haunted house on Thursday and hosting a booth at a Taste of Oxy. We are meeting on Sunday at 3 to assemble materials for the haunted house and again on Thursday at 3 to put it all together. Please meet us outside Johnson 200 for both of these meetings.
In terms of pumpkin pies for the Taste of Oxy booth we are going to meet at UEP on Friday morning at nine. We will have people baking there all day in "shifts"-- please drop by if you have the time!
See you soon,
e

Pictures from the gaaarden

Planting the odds-and-ends herb bed
Butter lettuce peeking through the radishes

Bruce didn't love the trellis we made but we do...
Who wouldn't want to come to the garden?

Food and Urban Planning

So, as an aspiring urban planning and farmer, I have been collecting a few articles about the nexus of food and planning.

Here is a really interesting video about feeding cities, and the ever growing distance between where we live and where we get our food. It also talks about the impact of living in a city on the natural food landscape.

http://blog.ted.com/2009/10/how_food_shapes.php#

This next article is actually pretty exciting because it is linked to a project I am working on (as an unpaid intern). Basically, Councilwoman Jan Perry has proposed a moratorium on convenience stores and provides incentives for real grocery stores with fresh fruits and vegetables. The ban is based on a more comprehensive initiative for land-use reform in South Los Angeles, promoting sustainable neighborhoods which includes eating healthier.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-stores12-2009oct12,0,2469583.story?track=rss

Finally, here is an article about the food desert issue (which UEP students have been tackling in their comps) about who has access to fresh food and the disparities between high and low-income communities in terms of food access:

http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/1010/p02s05-usgn.html

I know it's a lot of information, but it's all relevant if you're interested in either planning or food or both!

Have a great fall break guys, and get ready to eat a ton of radishes!

-Giulia

Thomas Jefferson and Agriculture

In light of the fact that I am taking a course on the founding of the American presidency I thought I would share some quotes from one of our all time favorite Presidents, Thomas Jefferson, about agriculture:

c. 1781. "Those who labour in the earth are the chosen people of God, if ever he had a chosen people, whose breasts he has made his peculiar deposit for substantial and genuine virtue. It is the focus in which he keeps alive that sacred fire, which otherwise might escape from the face of the earth."

"Cultivators of the earth are the most virtuous and independant citizens." (Notes on the State of Virginia, Writings.290, 301)

1785 Aug. 23. "Cultivators of the earth are the most valuable citizens. They are the most vigorous, the most independant, the most virtuous, and they are tied to their country and wedded to it's liberty and interests by the most lasting bands." (TJ to John Jay, B.8.426)

1785 Oct. 28. "It is not too soon to provide by every possible means that as few as possible shall be without a little portion of land. The small landholders are the most precious part of a state." (TJ to James Madison, B.8.682)

1787 Dec. 20. "I think our governments will remain virtuous for many centuries; as long as they are chiefly agricultural." (TJ to James Madison, B.12.442)

1793 June 28. "Good husbandry with us consists in abandoning Indian corn and tobacco, tending small grain, some red clover following, and endeavoring to have, while the lands are at rest, a spontaneous cover of white clover. I do not present this as a culture judicious in itself, but as good in comparison with what most people there pursue. (TJ to George Washington, GB191)

1795 Apr. 29. "It [agriculture] is at the same time the most tranquil, healthy, and independent [occupation]." (TJ to J. N. Démeunier, Writings.1028)

1795 Sep. 8. "I am become the most industrious and ardent farmer of the canton . . . ." (TJ to Madame de Tessé, DLC)

1803 Nov. 14. "The class principally defective is that of agriculture. It is the first in utility, and ought to be the first in respect. The same artificial means which have been used to produce a competition in learning, may be equally successful in restoring agriculture to its primary dignity in the eyes of men. It is a science of the very first order. It counts among it handmaids of the most respectable sciences, such as Chemistry, Natural Philosophy, Mechanics, Mathematics generally, Natural History, Botany. In every College and University, a professorship of agriculture, and the class of its students, might be honored as the first. Young men closing their academical education with this, as the crown of all other sciences, fascinated with its solid charms, and at a time when they are to choose an occupation, instead of crowding the other classes, would return to the farms of their fathers, their own, or those of others, and replenish and invigorate a calling, now languishing under contempt and oppression. The charitable schools, instead of storing their pupils with a lore which the present state of society does not call for, converted into schools of agriculture, might restore them to that branch qualified to enrich and honor themselves, and to increase the productions of the nation instead of consuming them." (TJ to David Williams, L&B.10.429-30)

1810 June 27. "I think it the duty of farmers who are wealthier than others to give those less so the benefit of any improvements they can introduce, gratis." (TJ to Joseph Dougherty, FB134)

1817 May 10. "The pamphlet you were so kind as to send me manifests a zeal, which cannot be too much praised, for the interests of agriculture, the employment of our first parents in Eden, the happiest we can follow, and the most important to our country." (TJ to William Johnson, GB572)

1821 July 30. "With respect to the boys I never till lately doubted but that I should be able to give them a competence as comfortable farmers, and no station is more honorable or happy than that." (TJ to Thomas Mann Randolph, DLC)

--Lucia C. Stanton, Monticello Research Department, May 1994

Funding for Haunted House

Just got back from ASOC funding meeting with the good news that we have been allotted $169.50 for our haunted house pre and post Food Inc. screening. So far we have money for a fog machine, strobe light, paper mache materials and misc. sheets and cords. Please email feastoxy@gmail if you have more ideas for this event (that will be held on Oct. 28).
Goodnight.