Tag Archives: global warming

A spring morning in my front yard on Harvest Monday April 8, 2013

Posted on April 9, 2013 | 8 Comments

When last I left you, I was headed up into the mountains, going to Big Bear to look at a “bargain” cabin being offered at $64,000. It was HORRID! The water heater had broken and there was water standing on the floor in the kitchen and bathroom. The carpet, if you could call it that, was filthy and matted with dog hair. Also lumpy, bumpy and crusty from what might have been urine. The walls were flimsy, cheap paneling. The electrical system didn’t work. The appliances looked original to the cabin, circa 1968. The paint on the exterior had peeled with raw wood exposed. The sliding patio door onto the balcony upstairs was broken and boarded up. The sliding door downstairs didn’t work. OMG, did that place ever have issues. It needed to be stripped to the studs, and then who knows what other problems might arise. That one was not for me.

This beat-up gambrel cabin is on the market for $64,000.

This beat-up 3-bedroom gambrel cabin is on the market in Big Bear, CA for $64,000.

I have focused more on home this week, now that my cold is dissipating. I am finally getting my energy back, and am enjoying my spring yard.

This is a post about a harvest. But a harvest from the garden can be more than mere pounds of produce. A garden also produces peace, tranquility and beauty. That is harder to measure, but I hope that you can see it in these photos.

Our front yard is mostly trees, shrubs, flowers, herbs, bird feeders, and a small pond.

Our front yard is mostly trees, shrubs, flowers, and herbs, with a few fruit trees, bird feeders, and a small pond. This is the view from a bench on our front porch.

Yesterday morning, I decided to sit on the porch bench and take photos only from where I was sitting. It was an interesting challenge. My Nikon Coolpix P510 is a great little camera, with 42x zoom. It allowed me to photograph birds and flowers from where I sat.

In addition to the pond, we have a bird bath. The one is back is a used fountain dropped off by our tree guy. Someone was throwing it out because it no longer holds water. I plan to fix it if I can.

In addition to the pond, we have a bird bath. The one in back is a used fountain dropped off by our tree guy. One of his customers was throwing it out because it no longer holds water. He thought I might be able to fix it. My first attempt failed. I will try Plan B some other day.

After having this dwarf Valencia orange for four years, I finally got around to planting it in its permanent pot. It is in full bloom. I'm sure it will do better now that it is finally our of its nursery pot.

I got up off the bench to take this photo. After having this dwarf Valencia orange tree in its original nursery pot for four years, I finally got around to transplanting it into its permanent pot. It is in full bloom. I’m sure it will do better now that it is finally out of its nursery pot.

The Valencia orange tree is loaded with blossoms and it smells so good.

The Valencia orange tree is loaded with blossoms and it smells so good.

The strange looking plastic box to the right of the Valencia tree is one of our four water barrels for collecting rainwater. Our part of Orange County, California gets only about 11-14 inches of rain a year, hardly more than a desert. Any little bit of water that I can collect and use is that much less water that needs to be pumped down from northern California, and then put through water filtration and purification. Saving water saves energy, and therefore helps fight global warming. That’s what we are all about here at Green World.

Pink cobbity daisies

Pink cobbity daisies

Louisiana iris blooming in the pond.

Louisiana iris blooming in the pond.

Light lavender Louisiana iris in pond.

Light lavender Louisiana iris in pond.

Male house finch at feeder.

Male house finch at feeder.

White-crowned sparrow

White-crowned sparrow

White-crowned sparrow

White-crowned sparrow

Pink cobbity daisies

Pink cobbity daisies

Female house sparrow

Female house sparrow

Pink English daisies.

Pink English daisies.

Ack! A slug! I didn't even notice it until I was processing the photos.

Ack! A slug! I didn’t even notice it until I was processing the photos.

Clivia or Kaffir lillies

Clivia or Kaffir lillies

Fressias by the pond with iris and curly rush in the background.

Fressias by the pond with iris and dwarf curly rush and dwarf straight rush in the background.

Freesia buds in the oregano bed.

Freesia buds in the oregano bed.

A bushtit after bathing in the pond. A pair has been collecting nesting material from our yard this week.

A bushtit after bathing in the pond. A pair has been collecting nesting material from our yard this week.

A male black-headed grosbeak stopped by on his migration north to fill up on sunflower seeds.

A male black-headed grosbeak stopped by on his migration north to fill up on sunflower seeds.

This is most of our front yard. The "lawn" is Zoysia or Korea Grass. Never needs mowing. No herbicides or pesticides go onto it either, so our yard is safe for birds, bees, grandchildren and other living things. The pavers help reduce the amount of water needed to keep the lawn growing.

This is most of our front yard. The “lawn” is Zoysia or Korea Grass. Never needs mowing. No herbicides or pesticides go onto it either, so our yard is safe for birds, bees, grandchildren and other living things. The pavers help reduce the amount of water needed to keep the lawn healthy.

Hope you enjoyed that little photo essay of a morning in my front yard. I think that there are 25 different species of plants in bloom in front right now, maybe more.

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I can’t believe that we harvested a bell pepper this week, but here is the proof. It set fruit during an unseasonable warm spell last October.

The bell pepper went into a scramble along with red onion, mushrooms, and an avocado (also from the garden). The navel orange is from our tree.

The bell pepper went into a scramble along with red onion, mushrooms, and an avocado (also from the garden). The navel orange is from our tree.

Here is our harvest for the week ending April 7, 2013.

FRUIT

3 lbs 6 oz Limes

VEGETABLES

3 oz Bell Pepper

12 oz Bok Choy

TOTAL PRODUCE 4 lbs 5 oz plus 28 eggs

I am slowly catching up on logging in my harvests to Excel. The total harvest so far this year is 32.3 lbs of fruit and 12.8 lbs of vegetables, plus 194 eggs.

If you had a harvest or to see what others are harvesting, visit Daphne’s Dandelions.

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Peep’s (or Cheep’s) first egg! And a pot roast recipe

Posted on February 1, 2013 | 6 Comments

I went out to check the chickens this morning and found an egg without a shell in the nest. One of our new girls, either Peep or Cheep, has laid her first egg. It is small and there is a membrane, but no calcium shell on it. This is common with very young hens and their first egg. I’m so excited.

One of our new hens laid her first egg--with no shell!

One of our new hens laid her first egg–with no shell!

I touched the membrane to leave a dimple so you could tell that this is membrane, not shell. With two new hens and three old ones, I should get 400 eggs easily this year. That is my goal. Barred Rock hens should lay 250 eggs a year, so I could very well get over 500 eggs this year. Bring it on!

Boneless beef pot roast was on sale this week, and yesterday was sunny, so I made pot roast in our solar oven. I don’t really measure things, but this is my best guess of what I did.

2.5 lbs boneless beef pot roast

1/4 flour for dredging and to thicken gravy

1/2 tsp sea salt

1/4 tsp dry thyme

2 slices applewood smoked bacon, diced

1 large yellow onion

4 small or 2 large cloves of garlic

4 potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks

4-6 carrots, scraped and cut into inch long lengths

6 small to medium tomatoes (mine were frozen whole)

1/2 C good red wine (I used old vine zinfandel that was leftover from the previous night’s dinner)

1/4 C water

2 bay leaves

Peel and cut four potatoes and several carrots.

Peel and cut four potatoes and several carrots.

Slice a yellow onion and mince four cloves of garlic. Dice two slices of applewood smoked bacon and fry, then add onion and garlic. Cook until bacon is done and onions are brown. Set aside.

Dredge pot roast in flour with salt and thyme. and brown in bacon fat.

Dredge pot roast in flour with salt and thyme. and brown in bacon fat.

Thaw six frozen whole tomatoes on the "defrost fish" setting of the microwave. Cut in half and discard tough skins.

Thaw six frozen whole tomatoes on the “defrost fish” setting of the microwave. Cut in half and discard tough skins.

Assemble pot roast in the solar oven pan, meat first, then carrots and potatoes, then onion mixture, and top with tomatoes.

Assemble pot roast in the solar oven pan, meat first, then carrots and potatoes, then onion mixture, and top with tomatoes. Tuck two bay leaves around the edges.

Add 1/2 C red wine and 1/4 C water to pot and place in solar oven.

Preheat oven in the sun for an hour. Cook pot roast in the sun at over 250 for about 4-5 hours.

Preheat oven in the sun for an hour. Cook pot roast in the sun at over 250 for about 4-5 hours.

This is my Sun Oven brand of solar oven. I just love it. However, I started too late in the morning and didn’t get my roast in until 1 pm. There wasn’t enough sunshine left to cook the roast completely, so I finished it on the stovetop in a larger pan, adding a couple of tablespoons of reserved flour that I used for dredging. This was the best pot roast I’ve ever made.

The tomatoes and bay leaves were from my garden. I have a little bay laurel tree in a pot in the driveway and can pick a leaf whenever I want one as they are evergreen.

The nice thing about the Sun Oven is that you need very little additional liquid and the flavors are concentrated. The food comes out moist and tender. I can’t say enough good things about cooking with solar power. It saves natural resources (gas or electricity), and fights global warming. That’s assuming that you use it enough to offset the greenhouse gases that were generated in the manufacture and shipping of the oven. There is always that tradeoff. They are ridiculously expensive in comparison to a regular gas or electric range, especially given that it is just an insulated box with a glass top and aluminum reflectors.

If you used something from your garden or your stores of preserved food, visit Robin at the Gardener of Eden.

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Baking an apple pie and Harvest Monday October 29, 2012

Posted on October 30, 2012 | 10 Comments

I have the Weather Channel on while writing today’s blog. Hurricane Sandy is bearing down on New York, with the worst to come tonight. I would assume that New England gardeners have put their gardens to bed already for the winter, but maybe not. Norma and Daphne, I’m thinking about you today in this storm.

It’s been a warm autumn here in southern California. I’m still getting fruit set on my tomatoes and bell peppers, and it has been too hot to plant peas and my other fall crops. So I’m now six weeks behind in planting my fall garden and am running out of things to harvest from my summer garden. But there were apples!

This week’s Granny Smith apple harvest provided just enough fruit for one pie.

This was the week that I picked the last of this year’s apple crop from my Granny Smith dwarf tree. We had poor fruit set this year, probably due to wacky spring weather. And that is what global warming is doing to us. Disconnecting and disrupting normal weather patterns and making weather even more unpredictable. The result is often poor crops.

Think about the prolonged drought in the Midwest this summer. The result was a poor corn and soybean crop. This will mean higher prices for those crops, which will translate into higher prices in 2013 for the meat animals that eat those crops. That includes cattle, hogs, lambs, and poultry.

I peeled, cored and sliced the apples and mixed them with grated lemon jest, lemon juice, sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg. That is the filling for the pie. The lemon was fresh-picked from one of my lemon trees. :-)

I put the apples into an unbaked pie crust, topped it with a streusel topping, and baked for 50 minutes. Heavenly!

These are the ingredients for a wonderful pork tenderloin dish. The butternut is from my garden, but was not from this week’s harvest. We will be enjoying stored butternuts through the winter. No, the harvest from my garden is that tiny lump of brown stuff between the apple, butternut and organic brown sugar. That is GINGER!

I browned the pork loin in a skillet, then added it to the chopped apple in my solar oven pan.

I peeled and chopped the butternut and added it along with half of the red onion, sliced. I minced the ginger, about 1.5 tsp, and added it.

I soaked a half cup of raisins in 2/3 C red wine, added 1 T brown sugar, and the juice and zest from the orange. Then I poured that over the pork, apple, and butternut.

Cook the pork dish in a preheated solar oven for at least 3-4 hours at midday. Or you could use a crockpot.

This dish was something I just threw together with what was on hand. It came out so delicious that I plan to make it again this week. And by using a solar oven, I used no fossil fuel to cook it. One more tiny step in my battle against global warming.

Hey, look, my blog visitor counter is going to roll over to 200,000 today. It is at 199,999 here at 9:25 am.

The other dish I wanted to show you is this little lunch. I had a couple of not-so-attractive late fall tomatoes, so I diced them and added them to a can of vegetable beef soup. The crackers are Rosemary-Raisin from Trader Joe’s, along with their English cheddar cheese.

Harvest for week ending October 28, 2012

FRUIT

2.5 lbs Apples, Granny Smith

5.5 oz Lemon, Eureka

VEGETABLES

1 oz Ginger

1 oz Green Onion

TOTAL 3 lbs produce plus 5 eggs

If you had a harvest, visit Daphne’s Dandelions. To see how others are using their harvests, visit Robin at The Gardener of Eden. See the sidebar for links.

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How to make sun tea

Posted on May 11, 2012 | Leave a comment

There are so many different ways to save energy. Making sun tea is just one of them. Frankly, I think it tastes better too.

It couldn’t be easier.

Find a nice lidded quart container, like a glass canning jar. I use antique blue Ball jars that I inherited from my grandmother. I suspect these jars date back to the 1930s.

Place two tea bags normally used to make one cup of hot tea into a quart of water at room temperature..

Fill the jar with room temperature tap water. If you want to take out the organics and chlorine, you can use water that has been through a Brita filter. Not necessary, but again, I think it tastes better. Add two tea bags. Let the jar sit for a couple of hours. It doesn’t have to be in the sun at all. I love the way the afternoon sun filters through the blue jars, so I set mine on the windowsill.

After about two hours, you have tea.

You can pour the iced tea over ice cubes if you want to drink it right away, or chill it in the refrigerator for later.

I like to add a sprig of mint from my garden. I could add a lemon wedge, since I have lemons growing in the garden, but I rarely do. I drink my tea unsweetened, but you can add sugar if that is your preference.

Before I started using this method, I would heat water on the stove (or in the microwave in more recent years) before adding the tea bags. The tea brewed quickly, but then it took a long time to cool down. It takes energy to both heat water and make ice, so the less heat and ice that is used, the more energy saved. Every little bit matters.

Why? Well, dams are silting up and water levels are dropping in the lakes behind Hoover and Glen Canyon dams. If the water levels fall too far, those dams will stop producing electricity. With global climate change and drought, snow levels are decreasing in the Rockies and Eastern Sierras, which means less runoff, which means less energy produced by those dams. Coal-fired plants put pollutants (including carbon dioxide) into the atmosphere. Nuclear powered plants produce hazardous waste and are limited in the number of years that they can operate. I just don’t think that they are safe.

We can’t afford solar panels on our roof, in part because we use so little electricity that we don’t qualify for rebates.  We try to conserve energy and reduce our carbon footprint however we can. Making sun tea is just one tiny bit of what we do in our fight to save Mother Earth.

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Spring flowers and summing up the harvest so far this year

Posted on April 10, 2012 | 18 Comments

Spring has sprung with a vengeance in our yard. Flowers are popping out everywhere it seems. I’m going to show you some of my pretty flowers before getting to the food harvest.

Ida Red is a new color of bearded iris, the reddest of the irises. I got this one from http://www.greenwoodgarden.com. I just love it. When it's ready to divide in the fall, I plan to interplant it with some nice white irises.

Dutch iris are non-native, but this Douglas Iris is native to California. I just love these. I'm thinking that I should get some more to plant around the pond.

This is the purple Pacific or Douglas iris. I also have a white one, but it isn't in bloom at the moment. They are good plants for riparian habitats, areas that are watered to get 32 inches of rain a year. I cluster my riparian plants to conserve water.

My paperwhites stopped blooming long ago. The Tahiti Narcissus just finished. Now it's the turn of these lovelies.

Another view. The first photo showed these narcissus a bit more yellow than they really are.

The whole back yard that isn't in raised beds is covered in nasturtiums. I feed the leaves to the chickens. They don't seem to care much for the flowers. I tried making nasturtium vinegar one year by soaking the flowers in white vinegar for several days, but I didn't really care much for the flavor. Tasted like nasturtiums!

The first rose of summer is about to open. Summer? It's APRIL!

I bought two new cymbidium orchids, the yellow and the rust-colored ones, to add to my existing white and pink one. They look nice in a set of three.

Pink cobbity daisies in the front yard. I want more, but haven't found them at the nursery when I've looked.

My two early season camellias have finished blooming. Now it is the turn of this late season one.

This is the largest bud on my orchid cactus. When they open, they're spectacular, as large as my fully opened and wide-stretched hand. I have two color varieties, a pinky peach and a salmon.

OK, none of those were edible, except for the nasturtiums. I put them in for beauty alone. Here are some flowers which promise fruit in the future.

My Granny Smith dwarf apple tree is in full bloom. It normally sets about 30 full-size apples. The Gala and Fuji apples are still dormant, as are my two Asian pear trees. However, we had a warm winter, and they might not have received enough chilling to set fruit. Darn global warming!

Our Santa Rosa plum is blooming poorly, as usual. We'll be lucky to get a dozen plums. However, that is more than we usually get since the night critters usually get all the fruit. This year I'm live-trapping them relentlessly. We've relocated seven possums already this year.

These are lime blossoms from my Bearrs lime tree. Note the tiny limes on the right. That's what they look like after the petals fall off. Most of the flowers don't result in fruit, but we get plenty of limes from the tree anyway. The navel orange and Meyer lemon trees are also in exuberant bloom.

These itsy, bitsy little green flower buds are the ones that are exciting me the most. They are the first ever flowers on my Red Flame Seedless grape vines. I planted the vines four years ago (or was it three, can't remember) and they are now showing signs of producing fruit. We have eight clusters of flowers so far, and more may open as the grape vines are just now getting going for the summer. I hope we get actual grapes but a lot of things can happen between now and harvest. Mold, mites, birds, night critters, etc. I have my fingers crossed.

My Mammoth snow peas are up. They sure aren't mammoth at this stage. This is the second planting of 2012.

My red cabbages are coming along. In general, my cole crops did poorly this winter. I think it was too warm for them. But I have three remaining red cabbages and all have made heads. They're too small to harvest yet though. I hope they make it to harvest time.

We've harvested and eaten three artichokes so far, with more coming along. I had four artichoke plants that came back from the roots this year. They are a short-lived perennial. I may have to replant this fall. Or maybe I'll get another year out of the existing plants. Time will tell.

Our Florida Prince Peach tree is loaded with fruit, about 250 peaches. Last year, they were very small peaches. I hope that they're bigger this year and worth canning. I thinned out the peaches a bit, hoping that the remaining ones would get large, but I probably didn't thin enough. I just can't bear to pick them off as tiny babies. I want them ALL to grow big.

This is another view of the Florida Prince Peach. The Babcock Improved Peach is nearly finished blooming, and it looks like it might set 100 fruit this year. The August Pride Peach, which is probably a mis-labeled May Pride, has only three peaches on it. Our Panamint nectarine has set about 30-40 nectarines. The Snow Queen nectarine is just now blooming, but fruit set isn't likely to exceed a dozen. Our poor little Katy Apricot set only three apricots this year. The critters usually get all of the apricots anyway. I keep hoping to get some for myself.

It isn't a plant, but I wanted to show you that I'm still using my new solar oven. I've baked 6 loaves of bread in it so far, plus lamb and lentil curry, beef stew, pot roast, chicken, etc. Amazing thing, it cooks with just the heat of the sun. I'm fighting global warming every way I can.

I’ve done a pretty good job of keeping up with the Excel spreadsheet of my harvests this year, if not getting around to blogging as often as I’d like.

Here is a summary of what my garden has produced so far this year. Note that this is the production for my first quarter, not for the week.  The harvest for this week was 1 oz green onions, 12 oz artichokes, and 8.5 oz of yams.

EGGS, 144 (Yeah, hens! Way to go.)

FRUIT, 43 lbs

Avocados, 111 ounces

Lemons, 110 ounces

Limes, 10.5 ounces

Oranges, 453 ounces

VEGETABLES, 33 lbs

Artichokes, 22 oz

Beets, 160 oz = 10 lbs

Broccoli, 46 oz

Cabbage, 85 oz

Carrots, 50 oz

Cauliflower, 15 oz

Chard, 28 oz

Eggplant, 2.5 oz

Herbs, 2.5 oz

Kale, 4.5 oz

Komatsuna, 6 oz

Lettuce, 4 oz

Mizuna, 5 oz

Onions, green, 2.5 oz

Peas, Snow, 72 oz

Spinach, 1 oz

Tomatoes, 8 oz

Yams, 8.5 oz

TOTAL PRODUCE, 76 lbs

To see what others are harvesting, visit Daphne’s Dandelions.

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A rant about global warming

Posted on November 16, 2011 | 8 Comments

I grow a garden. I buy locally grown produce, organic whenever possible. I compost our food scraps and garden waste, keep chickens for eggs, and save rainwater in barrels to supplement tap water for yard yuse. But

I should be doing more. I should have a hybrid car. I should have solar panels on my roof. I am not doing enough.

I can’t do enough by myself. Not when China is building new coal-fired plants at breakneck speed. Not when the world has 7 billion people and more on the way every second. We’re gonna go to hell in a hand-basket and it’s gong to be an increasingly hot trip. How can we fight global warming if people don’t believe that it’s real? How can we fight global warming if people are more concerned about the economy or whether or not OJ did it, or whether or not Dr. Murray killed Michael Jackson, or what Kim Kardashian or Paris Hilton or Lindsay Lohan are up to. Wh Who the hell cares about them? Not me. But apparently millions of other do.

Jeez, people, wake up. The planet is going to burn. We’re headed for more severe storms, more severe droughts, and food and water shortages.

To keep the planet from heating up another 2 degrees C, we need to keep carbon dioxide levels below 450 ppm. Some say 350 is better. We’re at 390 ppm now. Every day, more power plants are going online, burning more fossil fuel. The International Energy Agency says that we have only five more years in which to get things under control. After that, it will be too late. Those new plants will go online and they will be producing all the carbon dioxide that the atmosphere can hold without cooking us.

But I may be preaching to the choir. Where do you stand on the issue of global warming? Do you believe that the planet is getting hotter and the climate is changing? Do you believe that it is manmade? Do you think we can do anything about it?

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Record heat in LA, global weirding!

Posted on November 6, 2010 | 2 Comments

Pink magnolia tree in bloom in October-November instead of January as usual.

What a crazy year this has been weather-wise. We didn’t get enough heat this summer for my summer or winter squash to produce any fruit. At least I guess that was the problem. Now we’re getting the heat. The thermometer broke records in LA yesterday and the day before, 96 F and 98 F respectively.

Some of my jade plants are blooming. They normally bloom in January. My pink magnolia tree is in full bloom before it has shed its leaves. It normally blooms in January. My Thanksgiving cactus bloomed in Sept/Oct and is finished already. It normally blooms Nov/Dec. Some of my snow drops and paperwhites have bloomed. Others are just now breaking through the ground. Nature has gone haywire.

Black beauty eggplant flower

My Black Beauty eggplants, which didn’t produce a thing all summer, are just now coming into bloom. Some of my tomatoes are still blooming. Ditto the bell peppers. Crazy.

Brandywine tomatoes

The Brandywine tomatoes, which were the last of my varieties to bloom and set fruit, are still producing.

Newly transplanted strawberries wilting in the heat.

A fellow gardener gave me some strawberry plants and irises that she was throwing away due to lack of space in her garden. I had to transplant the strawberries immediately, despite the record heat. The result was wilted plants. The rate of evapotranspiration was greater that the ability of the traumatized roots to take up moisture. I’m trusting that they will recover as the plants were sturdy and healthy. I’m postponing planting the iris for another day or two until the weather cools back down to normal for this season.

white bearded iris

And that’s the way the planet warms. Not with a bang, but a whimper. A few record hot days here and there, and fewer record lows. It isn’t even and it isn’t consistent. But it sure messes up the plants.

Aphid-infested artichokes

The plants are less able to ward off disease and insects. I’ve sprayed my artichokes three days in a row with a heavy stream from the hose, and yet the aphids persist. I’m going to use NEEM next and hope that I can save them.

With global weirding, fruit trees bloom off-schedule. Then they can get caught in a cold snap and fruit set is lowered. My navel orange tree set very little fruit. Then the crazy thing bloomed again in late summer, something I haven’t seen before. Only a few of those blossoms set fruit.

My strategy to combat global weirding is to plant a wide variety of crops and stagger my plantings as best as I can in my tiny garden. I also do whatever I can to reduce use of fossil fuel. Keep those carbon emissions down. And I’ve planted as many trees as I can fit into my yard, as well as in restoration projects around the county in my work with the Orange County Conservation Corps.

The first nine months of this year were the hottest since 1998, which holds the current record for hottest year. The planet is warming, slowly and irregularly, but it’s still warming. The Arctic is warming more than the temperate zone, and for reasons that I don’t understand, that makes weather colder in the winter for places like New England and the upper Midwest. It isn’t just global warming, it’s global weirding.

For all of you out there making your own compost, growing your own food as much as possible, eating vegetarian meals at least some of the time, installing solar electric panels, and driving a hybrid car or riding a bicycle, thanks.

We all need to do whatever we can to reverse the accumulation of carbon dioxide and methane in the atmosphere while there is still time. Once the feedback mechanisms kick in, like melting of the permafrost and release of clathrates from the deep ocean, we’re done for as far as having the kind of stable climate that allowed civilization to develop over the past 10,000 years. I hope that there is still time to reverse what we’ve done.

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Long Beach Aquarium of the Pacific

Posted on September 24, 2010 | 3 Comments

I visited the Long Beach Aquarium of the Pacific today, hoping to get some nice photos of fish. Once again, I found photographing the fish in tanks a daunting task. I enjoyed the visit, and loved watching the fish and invertebrates, but I wasn’t really happy with the photos.

They have a great new exhibit on human population growth, population densities around the globe, energy usage around the globe, global warming, and overfishing of the oceans. Gee, do you think those things might be related? The larger the human population grows, the more impact we have on the natural environment.

Global warming is causing acidification of the oceans as well as temperature changes. Coral reefs are dying off, sharks are being fished out, and the Atlantic bluefin tuna is probably doomed.

People love petting sharks and rays. I hope that we can stop the slaughter of sharks for their fins.

black-tipped reef shark

These rays were probably four feet across. The diver was hand-feeding them, putting the food directly into their mouths.

Awesome creatures

Male sea horses carry their offspring in abdominal pouches until they're ready to swim off on their own.

Leafy sea dragons rely on camoflage to avoid predators.

There are too many fish species for me to be able to name them all.

Don't know the name of this species either.

Clownfish are immune to the stinging cells of anemones.

Visit the website of the Monterey Bay Aquarium to get their seafood watch list, and eat only sustainably harvested or farmed fish.

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WordPress Weirdness

Posted on August 15, 2010 | 3 Comments

I don’t know what happened, but almost all of my sidebar content disappeared a couple of days ago. I didn’t do anything or make any changes that would have precipitated this. All of a sudden, I got a new look and I didn’t like it.

What distressed me the most was losing the widget that shows a map of the world with red dots showing the locations of visitors to my blog. By clicking on the map, you can see a list of all of the countries where my visitors live. The number had grown to an impressive count and I didn’t want to start all over again.

After spending a bit of time in the WordPress forums, I learned that there is an “inactive widget” section on my “dashboard” where unused widgets are saved. I hoped that my sidebar content had inexplicably landed there. I looked, and sure enough, all of the missing sidebar content had moved there. It took me a short while to rebuild my sidebar. So now the archives are back, the tag cloud is back, the links are sorted again, and most importantly to me, the countries where my visitors live is back.

I decided to check the “country count” of where my visitors live, and was shocked to see that the number has grown to 149 countries. I didn’t know that there were that many countries, but my husband says that there are about 175 recognized countries. So I have a way to go before the whole world has seen my blog. Or at least a representative sample of the whole world.

Some of the surprises (to me) are that I’ve had 102 hits from Iran and only one hit from Iraq. What’s up with that? I’ve had as many hits from Turkey as from France. The number of hits from Croatia and Malaysia (92 and 87 respectively) doesn’t surprise me, as I have readers from those countries. Naturally, most of the hits are from English speaking countries.

I’ve had only four hits from the Maldives, which disappoints me. One of the reasons why I battle global warming is to keep that island nation and other low-lying areas from going under water. This past decade has been the warmest ever recorded. It may be cool this summer in Huntington Beach, but that’s weather, not climate. The climate is definitely warming. Yes, a few glaciers and ice sheets are growing, but the vast majority are melting. When you look at the global picture, it’s a scary one. So let me close this post by thanking all of you who are eating what is in season, eating locally grown food, and growing your own food, at least some of it. That reduces use of fossil fuel in transporting food from 1500 miles away. SAVE THE MALDIVES! And the rest of the world while you’re at it. Peace out.

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Earthquakes, volcanos and food security

Posted on April 20, 2010 | 6 Comments

Oh bother, we just had another earthquake. This one was 2.7, but we were right on top of it. The epicenter was only a couple of miles away, so we definitely heard and felt it. A quick jolt, lots of rattling, no damage. We always wonder if that was all there was, or was that just a precursor to the “big one.” 

Earthquake map for California and Nevada, 4-19-2010

 That little red square off by itself on the coast of southern California is the quake that just happened.

 We can go years without feeling an earthquake, but the earth seems very active these days with big quakes in Chile, Baja, and China. Earthquake activity in Baja is continuing after the Easter quake (see map above), but we don’t feel them. Living in earthquake (or hurricane, or tornado, etc.) country means that we should always be prepared to get by for a week or two on our own before help arrives. We keep a water supply plus dried and canned food for emergencies.

This is a photo by Lucas Jackson for Reuters of the volcanic eruption in Iceland.

And how about that volcano in Iceland causing the worst disruption of air travel in history? I’m supposed to fly to Europe with my camera group soon, so I’m following that news anxiously. Hard to say whether we’ll actually be going or not. (Vic isn’t going because his class schedule conflicted with the dates of our trip. )

Satellite image of Iceland and volcanic eruption 4-19-2010

I suppose a silver lining to this ash cloud is that it will cool off the planet a bit and help offset global warming. This will buy us a couple more years time. But if we don’t reduce carbon dioxide and methane emissions, the cooling will be temporary.

The volcanic dust will block some of the sunlight that would normally reach Europe and possibly Russia this spring. If the eruption continues, we may experience less sunlight here in the U.S. as well. I wonder if crops will be affected. If they are, then the cost of food will go up.

Life is uncertain. That is just one more reason why I garden and keep hens. I want at least the illusion of food security. I try to grow a wide variety of things that are planted at different times to hedge my bets. If one crop fails, perhaps a different variety or the same one planted at a different time will produce.

Wax beans, patty pan squash, eggplant and chard promise a good harvest.

The tiny bit of fruit and veggies that I’m able to grow won’t keep us from starving to death if a global crisis occurs, but it brings me comfort to know that I have at least some food in my yard. Our garden is a form of insurance, a hedge against natural (or unnatural) disasters and the vagaries of weather and climate.

For some fabulous photos of the Icelandic volcano and its affect on the surrounding countryside, visit http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/04/more_from_eyjafjallajokull.html.

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