queer-crip-grows - Tumblr blog

[queer-crip-grows]

If you are in the UK and can take care of chickens, please consider offering a chance at an actual life to ex-battery hens who will otherwise be killed at their first moult at about six months old because it slightly reduces their egg production.

Industrial farming is a fucking dystopian nightmare. Please do your best to help the survivors.

https://www.bhwt.org.uk/hen-adoption/?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR3LD4wrazUwVJBQEIkeZs_PLoZRNwgm3J5pWdDOaIo27ebb7f7IvA5-oUM_aem_AcUiXo1Rk8o8af-NRxXlCB0XjKjLcdGoMqx9_eAMgl5tEVR0rGhBxOWS8NIzFe1YYWkOYFILaVLyvBX33wmcRXb6

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If I can get out of bed imma plant my beans today because they’re climbing out of their pots

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This actually made me laugh so hard I inhaled tea

fire doesn't start with an M, colonel. colonel.

[queer-crip-grows]

source

[queer-crip-grows]

I thought green onions/Alliums were nitrogen fixers, but google is telling me no, is this true?

Unfortunately, Google is right in this case - onions/Alliums aren’t nitrogen fixers. In fact, planting them near nitrogen fixers can actually keep the nitrogen fixers from putting nitrogen back into the soil. That’s because the nitrogen-fixing process relies on a bacteria that can pull nitrogen out of a plant’s roots and into the soil, and Alliums’ mild antibacterial/antimicrobial properties kill off those bacteria. They also require a lot of nutrients in general to grow (although the root/bulb-based Alliums more so than green onions), so they’re actually likely to deplete nitrogen in the soil.

If you’re interested in learning more about nitrogen fixers, this article has a big list of nitrogen-fixing plants, and this article talks more about the science behind nitrogen fixing in general. I hope this helps!

- Mod J

[queer-crip-grows]

A dinosaur obsessed 12 year old studied fossils and found a 69 million year old hadrosaur skeleton embedded in rock while hiking. A fisherman in Australia noticed tiny shrimp in his net that looked slightly different from the others and he sent a few specimens to biologists for testing. Turned out to be a never before described species, going unnoticed in a popular lake. I posted a pic ~here on tumblr~ of a weird parasite on a dead fish and a parasitologist found it and asked to report it as the species has never been seen in my area before.

There is so, so much out there we literally don’t even know. And the best way to find that stuff out is to be intensely curious about everything you see. You might not discover a new species but you absolutely will gain a deeper appreciation for the world around you.

[queer-crip-grows]

Family very kindly sent me flowers for my 40th birthday.

I don’t really buy flowers because it’s hard to get ethically-grown ones and I usually just pick wildflowers in the summer, so my vases include milk bottles and old vodka liqueur bottles. They look v pretty tho.

[queer-crip-grows]

There is no need

to rake

the brown corpses of leaves

from your winter grass

or cut away

the pale bleached skeletons

of summer flowers

from your garden

once the pulse of life has fled them.

Beneath those slow-vanishing heaps

and within those bleaching, drying stalks

pollinators dream away

the chill and harsh winds of winter

or pupate

snugly tucked away into new becoming.

And the stuff that *was* life

leaches from those fading piles and natomies

into the sleeping chill

of the winter earth

as they cover it;

and amidst the continuous chemical threads

of the mycelium networks endless communication

germinates a new note in that great slow symphony

ready to burst forth

into the glad new notes

of spring’s green.

[queer-crip-grows]

Tasty homegrown barley microgreens over my Quorn stir fry 😋

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Made my first ever festive wreath this afternoon, using greenery from my parents’ garden.

I’m really quite proud of how it has turned out.

I made one for my folks at the same time; I mean to make another couple for my Gran and my OH’s mum later in the week.

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OMG my blue-grey oyster mushroom spawn has fully colonised my straw substrate!

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My barley microgreens are getting out of their little greenhouse lid now because they’re pushing it off!

Lookit my little green babies!

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Dandelion was *exactly* the one that I was thinking of! My garden is rewilded so we have lots that aren’t too close to the road.

Oooh the barley microgreens are doing great!

If this works out and they’re tasty, I’ll set up some more in mushroom tubs; probably some legumes like peas, peanuts or lentils; some brassicas like broccoli or Brussels Sprouts, maybe some quinoa, and I’ve seen interesting things about wild flowers that are very suitable for this.

I’m always interested in expanding the range of things that we eat, given how limited our modern diet is compared to the range of things humans have eaten across past cultures.

[queer-crip-grows]

I wanted to share my setup for growing blue-grey oyster mushrooms too.

I’ve set up two containers; one in a flat mushroom punnet and one in a plastic milk bottle with holes punched in the side for the fruiting bodies to grow through.

The (recyclable) doggie bag is over the punnet so the straw substrate doesn’t dry out. They are living in my bedroom cupboard inside a pillowcase with a mason jar of hot water to keep them warm as well as moist; I spray them with tepid water daily.

This will take longer than the microgreens; hopefully the spawn is colonising the substrate rn but it’ll be at a microscopic level as yet. Darkness, moisture and warmth help!

I’ve had problems trying this in the past where I put them under my bed and let them dry out too much (plus there’s a very curious husky who might decide to rip stuff up for fun who still goes under there if she’s bored at night occasionally!), hence all the precautions to preserve moisture.

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Oooh the barley microgreens are doing great!

If this works out and they’re tasty, I’ll set up some more in mushroom tubs; probably some legumes like peas, peanuts or lentils; some brassicas like broccoli or Brussels Sprouts, maybe some quinoa, and I’ve seen interesting things about wild flowers that are very suitable for this.

I’m always interested in expanding the range of things that we eat, given how limited our modern diet is compared to the range of things humans have eaten across past cultures.

[queer-crip-grows]

Set up little barley micro greens on my bedroom windowsill along with the cupboard full of straw mushroom substrate.

Because growing stuff makes me feel that little bit better.

[queer-crip-grows]

Finally managed to get my straw substrate sterilised in the microwave and innoculated with blue-grey oyster mushroom spawn.

Hopefully this method is effective, because it was pleasantly quick and simple compared to every other sterilisation method I’ve tried!

I’ve used two different containers to see which is more effective - one plastic mushroom container (thoroughly washed ofc) in a compostable doggy bag to help keep the substrate moist, and one (thoroughly washed) plastic milk bottle with holes punched in the side for fruiting bodies to grow through.

They’re in my bedroom cupboard atm which is dark and warm, and I will be spritzing with warm water regularly to keep them moist. Fingers crossed!