A New Take On Green Manures and Compost

Most people I know (and myself until this spring) grew green manures to either :

1. till back into the soil to add organic matter
2. make compost of the tops, and till the roots back in (especially legumes)
3. prevent erosion

But now I grow them for a different reason. Phytoremediation. (Cleaning the soil with plants)

Around here, all compost piles have become bio-accumulators of cesium. 

Everyone knows that your compost pile shrinks up to 60%. Well it came to me over the winter, that means that the compost I made has 3x as much radiation contamination as the original leaves and stems did! And I harvest weeds and grasses to compost from all over the acre or so that I mow. If I spread this back on my garden, it would greatly increase the concentration in the garden beds! Thank goodness I realized that over the winter, and not after I spread it! The goat's manure is also a no-no, since they only eat local grasses. But the cow manure I bought should be relatively clean, since cows here eat mostly imported hay and feed from the US. No grazing for the poor things. 

So now I am reverse green manuring. I take the plants and roots out, and trench compost them in a clay lined trench in the corner of my property, and don't return the compost.

This strip mining will probably wreak havoc on my soil. Only time will tell. 

By trench composting, I can cover it with thirty centimeters of soil- which will cut 90% of the gamma rays. And cesium binds to the clay lining, which should keep it from penetrating further. 

But it looks like I will have to use imported organic fertilizer, or chemical fertilizer for at least a few years. Sigh. I draw the line at pesticides/herbicides/fungicides though.

Ice Sculpture

The ice from the goat's water bucket. Just thought it looked pretty.

Planting Fava Beans the Japanese Way

This year, I thought I would try planting some things the way they say to do it on the seed packets here in Japan. Minus the chemical fertilizers of course.

It started like this after pulling all the weeds and making a compost pile in the corner of the garden.

And with a generous helping of this

donated by them,

I double dug a row one meter wide and six meters long. 

I used a stake and some string to mark the edge, and with my Japanese hoe, or kuwa, I piled the soil from the sides into the middle to make the une, or raised bed. The seed packet called for it to be 60cm across the top.

Ok, what next?

Next, with my helper,

We smoothed out the top with a section of pipe,

And voila! A prepared bed for planting.

(I made another one next to it just after this picture)

After we let the beds rest for a week and let the lime mellow out, I planted two fava beans each, 50 cm. apart.

When you plant the beans, make sure to put the black ends down, and push the seed down until it is just hidden in the soil. 

Here we plant them in late October-Mid November. The packet recommends putting some bamboo branches along the north sides of the bed to provide some protection from frigid North winds. 

I'll keep you updated.

How did they do that?

Well, it isn't art, but you get the picture

Well, those of you with goats probably have dealt with this problem.
They are idiots.

What do you do when your wife calls you at work, out of breath, saying "Help! I don't know what to do! The goats are making funny "EEEHHHHhoooOOO" sounds, and they are collapsed on the ground!"

Well, I tell you what I did- I canceled my class, had my wife pick me up (since it takes 45 min on a bike, but only 15 by car) and I turned my handy dandy 500W halogen lamp on the problem. Oh, nothing too special. One of the goats, Yo, just got HIS RIGHT FRONT LEG WEDGED INTO SATO'S LEFT HORN! How the heck do they do that? I mean, really, it is just weird. The leg folded up and was caught in the curl. Sato was freaking out about the pressure and having his giant goat brother pushing his head into the dirt, and Yo was freaking out that Sato was busy trying to dislocate his front leg.

I finally managed to push down on Sato's head while pushing up on Yo's knee, after arranging the hoof so it wouldn't catch on the other horn. Then it slid free, and both goats assumed their urination positions and peed for about 5 minutes straight. Afterward, Yo was able to walk freely, and Sato... well we love Sato.

There was a small good thing about all this. I could see I need to trim Yo's hooves.

Goats. Whatcha gonna do?

24 Hour Hay

I made some hay from yesterday. Man it was easy. Just cut the weeds, spread them on the hot driveway, and load it up 24 hours later.

Of course, this is not a way to make hay for a lot of stock, but if you just want some snacks for your two goats...

Spring Blues

Kind of a love-hate relationship with spring.
Want to garden- can't garden because the 20 degree (celsius that is) days were all back in winter, we are lucky this past week if it gets up to 4-5 degrees.
Everywhere I look I see fresh green- but it is only about 2cm tall... Cutting more bamboo for goat fodder.
Warm enough for the winter cabbages and other brassica to bolt, too cold for new transplants to grow.

At least it will be over soon and I can get planting and transplanting.

Yep. I love to hate spring.

Dessert first

Goats are possibly the most wasteful critters I've ever seen. In the winter here, when it is too wet for them to go out to pasture, they stay in their pen and I feed them there. Or at least I try to. Some days I go to the mountain and pick "Aoki" (lit. "Green tree" in Japanese, Acuba in English). The goats go nuts over the pretty little berries. So much that they throw the branches to the floor of the pen, and urinate on them in excitement. And of course, they then wait for me to bring them more leaves to eat, since they have soiled the first batch. They sure love dessert first... Hmmmph.

It is not only acuba leaves, but oat hay as well. They love the milk oats in the hay. So would I, if I was a goat. But when they throw out all the stems to get to the oats, and refuse to eat what they spilled..... Hmmph. When I was a young'un, we had to eat our meal before the dessert by gum!...

Oh well, at least they are cute, and when they eat the oats, they make the sweetest little grunting noises, like a couple of pigs. I just wish they could understand why I look so exasperated when they throw the meal on the floor to get dessert first.

Goats Have No Reverse

Goats have no reverse. Seriously. I have two of them here on my homestead, neutered bucks named Sato and Yo, and while they are geniuses at escaping any type of enclosure, they are total morons when it comes to their leads. In the morning, they are excited and happy to be out of their pen (Actually, I am pretty sure they spend most of the night out carousing, just slipping back in at daybreak, like a certain teenager I once was). They are so excited and happy that they immediately wrap their leads around my legs, and continue to spiral ever tighter. And the dog doesn't help, alternately jumping over and ducking under their ropes. So I have to push their heads in a vain attempt to make them back up. Nope. That won't happen. They are bigger than Great Danes with a heck of a lot more traction. So I have to unwind the leads, wondering how goats managed to tie a clove hitch around my knees. Now I am able to move another ten or twenty meters before they find a nice cane of bamboo. Sato goes clockwise, the Yo counterclockwise. Round and round like a flipping maypole. The dog jumps up and down like some sort of spring loaded mud caked pogo stick. I am tempted to just leave them there, but again I untangle their leads and finally get them to their tether in the meadow. Finally the dog and I can get the walk done. Whew.