the plan is to show the dvd: getting started in beekeeping with the tophive beehive real soon-i will keep you'll informed as to when and where... blurb says: our primary focus is on improving bee ecology and beekeeping methods that respect the honeybee-our hope is that by introducing new hobby beekeepers to the rewards of beekeeping that there will eventually be backyard beekeepers world wide that will help bring back athe feral bee population aldn improbe the genetic diversity of the honeybee.

garden day-david's art brings color,movement;the powderpuff girls moved in,one had a humpty dumpty moment but back together again by susan;chris started a new isolceles bed and caged stuff with green vinyl ;charles got a super for beehive,its 4 stories now ,very urban and what a story inside;we dug up a 8 foot weed we were ignoring and created a new patch of sunlight;messina planted the little apple tree near the front fence;we kicked around the possibility of new name for the garden something combining laid back and kick ass(more later);aisha brought christopher and azaria by and they planted some seeds and hung out;leah came by and gave us stuff from their house which will sadly soon be history;we took eggs from under the chicken who stubbornly refuses on being broody..oh,ponderous life.

Kick Fard Harm

Happy Mother's Day! What a great gardening day, the Ashby Community Garden was bustling with activity and inspiration. I pulled weeds, "potted-up" (transplanted into bigger pots) some tomato and tomatillo starts in the green house, expanded the small triangular plot by the bench, then made some tomato cages out of plastic fencing to support the tomatoes planted in the new bigger plot (see below). Star, Nora, David, and I, in a moment of exhaustion and delirium, also came up with some ideas for a new garden name (an example of one of the more confusing ones inspired the title of this post).

Star and Nora dug up what we all thought was a giant Swiss Chard, but turned out to look more like a radioactive mutant beet. We were all quite awe-stricken by the huge root which tasted and bled like a conventional red beet.


There's still so much work to do to ensure a bountiful Summer and Fall harvest, but the energy of the garden/ers is so high right now I have no doubt we can all pull it off! For a constantly updated album of Ashby Garden pictures, see my photo album on Flickr.

Exciting New Book!

Found my new favorite DIY reference guide at my new favorite magazine store, Issues, in Oakland. The handwritten and drawn 124 page book is divided into 3 sections, first aid, home and body beautification, and basic gardening. It contains the simplest, most nonjudgmental recipes for all manner of physical, emotional wellness and wellbeing, using easy to access or grow ingredients. The newish niche market for non-toxic cleaning agents can be expensive, confusing, not to mention deceptive, but the simple recipes in this book (most with cheap, friendly, and familiar products like castile soap, baking soda, and tea tree oil) will put the intention of a non-toxic body and home back in your own dirty finger-nailed (but naturally moisturized) hands.

what's up at the garden

so this is what's up..we are going to build a topbar hive and start a new hive at the garden..perhaps as soon as sunday, thanks to a donation from a local communal house....we planted a bigger variety of stuff than we usually do this year and hope to share the harvest with the neighborhood...the chicken coop has new art suited to their temperments...