some thoughts on neonicotinoids

 I was sitting down to lunch on Friday, and had a rare treat- somebody had left behind a pile of newspapers in the skyway food court where I eat my lunch on the days I don't bring my own.

Though this is downtown St. Paul, in the pile was a copy of Minneapolis' Star-Tribune.  I love the Strib, and in general love reading an analog newspaper, though I've never gotten into the habit of subscribing to one.  Mainly because I'm a cheapskate, but also because they have an army of telemarketers who will harangue you into submission if you ever let your subscription expire. 

So I was eating a burrito and paging through the Star-Trib and found an article on neonicotinoids that, I'm sure most people breezed by, but which nearly made me choke on my lunch. 

You can see the article here (10 articles free a month)
http://www.startribune.com/local/205906531.html

If you'd rather not read the whole thing, here is a synopsis of the article-- The US Department of Agriculture has been pressured by beekeepers into doing a study of the effect of neonicotinoids on bees in the US.  Apparently they found that bees were being significantly harmed by the pesticides, along with varroa mites,  but- here's where it gets dicey- the cost of banning the pesticides may be too great to go through with banning them.  This after an admission that most food crops are dependent on pollinators in a phenominally poorly-written sentence:

"Bees are key to the production of $20 billion to $30 billion worth of food each year, including such crops as alfalfa, strawberries and soybeans. Fully 100 food crops rely on pollination."

Fully 100 crops depend on pollination?  According to who?  How about "fully almost everything we eat depends on pollination?"

How about I rewrite this article.  Here it is:

Researchers have  found that we will likely starve to death en masse if we allow pollinators to continue dying off.  However, banning the pesticides responsible for killing the pollinators will result in reducing the profit margin of several chemical companies.  Therefore, we shall choose to starve to death rather than see the stock prices of  Bayer or Monsanto decline.  For more about your likely mid-to-long-term prospects, please see the obituaries page.

That is very likely more forthright than what  got  printed in the A section of the Strib.

Interestingly, they had a quote from Vera Krischik, an entomologist at the U of M who I respect a lot.  I've talked  to her about beneficial nematodes when preparing a program of nematode distribution for my neighborhood to combat the Japanese Beetles which seem to be getting worse each year.  She struck me as someone with a lot of common sense, but also as someone who is willing to turn to chemicals more often than not to solve insect problems.  Interestingly, she sounded very concerned about neonicotinoids' effect on bees, and had the following quote, “It is clear to me that there is a link" (between neonicotinoids and colony collapse disorder).    The rest was paraphrasing about her concerns regarding the chemicals.

So a conscientious entomologist can admit that there is a problem with neonicotinoids, but spokepersons from the federal government can't?  I suppose that shouldn't be too surprising.

But it's more than just that. 

I had the 'opportunity' to attend a seminar (ok, it was free, and included lunch, so I was grateful for that) about Emerald Ash Borer this winter.  It was billed as an informational session for people involved in the 'green' trades (even landscape architects like me) to learn more about what EAB does to trees, where the infestation is in its life cycle in the Twin Cities, and what can be done about it.

The stories of what EAB has done in other parts of the Midwest were eye-opening and disturbing, and the analysis of where it is in the Twin Cities right now were sobering.  We're going to see a lot of dead ash trees in the next year or two if the presenters were right.  They're pretty much all going to go.

But the most disturbing part of the symposium was the sales pitch for Imidacloprid (a neonicotinoid insecticide) that followed.  The researchers showed  the preventive effects of  several chemicals, and all were effective to some degree.  But all agreed that it was a stop-gap measure, and that treatment for all ash trees forever was not practical, and that this was merely a way to delay having to remove thousands of trees all at once.   And this particular neonicotinoid  that was out of patent was much cheaper to use than the other pesticides.  So we were all urged  to support its use.  And  specifially to oppose any effort by any unit of government  to ban it or any other neonicotinoid, for that matter.  One panelist was very adamant that we (the attendees) had to oppose any effort to ban neonicotinoids here, as was being considered (and has now been done) in Europe.

Now, I've been to a lot of  continuing education courses in my time.  I've had my LA license for a few years now, and have to do a bunch of stuff like this to keep it current- but I haven't seen a sales job like this before- a preventive attack on possible future regulation of  a branded product.  Something really rubbed me the wrong  way about it.
Even the  answers to the questions  were weird.  A woman asked a question about how  honeybees would be affected by the residue in flowers, since the official recommendation  on how to save an ash tree was to apply a soil  drench of Imidacloprid around all ashes targeted for preservation.  And if you are not familiar, a 'soil drench' is just what it sounds like- dumping a whole lot of pesticide, mixed with water, around the roots of a tree.  It's not very target-specific.  And the insecticide suggested is systemic- meaning that it is taken up by the roots, and spread to every part of the plant.

This means that every part of the plant in contact with the soil drench is now  toxic to bees and a variety of other insects.  The presenter said something to the effect- "Now, you gotta choose- do you want your ash tree, or pretty flowers.  I like flowers, but you gotta consider what's more important and plant your flowers somewhere else". 

I'm not trying to make him sound like a goon.  That's the essence of what he  said.  And it sounded pretty condescending.

And here's the rub.  Most  street trees (because that's what we were discussing) are surrouded by grass- not by flower beds.  And in that grass are a variety of other plants- dandelions, clover, black medic.  All of which bees love- and all of which are taking up synthetic pesticides as quickly as the targeted ash trees.  No homeowner or city worker is going to take the time to remove all of those, and so the bees will be exposed to the pesticide, and weakened  or killed as a result.

I asked a question of one of the panelists about the effects of systemic herbicides on composted leaves, and insects that came into contact with them.  This is pretty relevant for me, since my community garden relies pretty heavily on fall-raked leaves that neighbors dump at the garden for soil  fertility and organic matter.    I asked it the effect might be similar to triclopyr or clopyralid. These two can persist in vegatative matter for years.  If leaves or grasses treated with these chemicals are added to compost, they can kill or inhibit the growth of tomatoes, eggplant, or other solanaceous crops for two years or more.  If you are a gardener, and use compost from off-site, this is no small matter.

Anyway, the panelist I asked the question of, very literally laughed it off, telling me that there were no similarities between triclopyr and the neonicotinoid he was pushing.  That it was silly for me to even mention it.  That my concerns didn't matter.

And maybe they don't.  The concerns that I have, and that lots of conscientious people have don't matter much.  What matters is that we have access to cheap poisons to keep our trees alive long enough for them to be harvested on a rolling schedule by the city crew, and that the chemical companies are able to post quarterly profits.   To hell with the insects that do billions of dollars of pollinating work for us for free.

It's not just honey that bees produce.  They make corn and beans and all sorts of fruit possible.  We mess with them at our own risk. 

It's the narrow focus of the arborists and academics and chemical companies that is endangering all of us.  Add to that the seed companies that coat their seeds in the stuff, and farmers who spray the stuff to keep bugs off of their crops.    It's cheap and convenient in the short term.  The effects in the long term are yet to be felt.


So I applaud the European Union for being brave enough to place a moratorium on this  class of poisons, even though Bayer AG is located in the European Union and will be affected negatively by this.  Thank you for having the cojones that my country lacks, and doing what seems to be the right thing.  Because waiting for absolute, undeniable, incontrovertible proof of harm is not always the right thing when dealing with the precipitous decline of a species that our own species relies upon so heavily.  We don't have the luxury of allowing bees and other pollinators to go the brink of extinction, because by doing so, we risk going  there ourselves.

That's all.

winter to summer in sixty seconds

Our street- April 23rd 

 The picture above is from Tuesday morning.   Fresh snow, broken tree branches, another day of extended winter.  That was April 23rd and we had 4 or 5 fresh inches of heavy, wet slushy snow blanketing the ground. I, along with most of the population of Minnesota was ready to scream.

This has been a long, painful winter.  Not super cold, just super long.  The Arctic Oscillation decided to go negative at just the wrong time and the cold got stuck over us.  The days were getting longer- the light lasts until after eight o'clock now, but outside- snow, grey skies, bare trees, and brown grass when you could see it at all.

That's part of the reason I've been absent here for the last few weeks.  If you can't say something nice- don't say anything at all is the conventional wisdom of the Midwest.  And I didn't have anything nice to say about gardening or the weather or the state of the world.

That changed this weekend.  Suddenly something shifted and the weather turned to mostly sunny and pushing 80 degrees.  The change was so sudden as to catch me and lots of others off guard.  Friday I was wearing jeans to work, and on the way home felt  uncomfortably hot- something that hasn't happened in seven months or so- and went looking for a pair of shorts in the closet- and couldn't remember where they were.  Why would I?  I was shoveling snow off our walk three days before.

So Tuesday I shoveled snow.  Today (Sunday), I got the pool out for the kids and set up the sprinkler for them to play in.

Saturday we had the first work day for the community garden I helped to start.  It was a gorgeous day, the work was exhausting but it was exhilarating seeing almost 100 people out to work the soil and build up a new part of the garden. 

Merriam Station Community Garden work day - April 27th

I have more projects to work on than I know what to do with right now.  I'm raising some plants for the community garden plant sale fundraiser* under a grow light in the basement and in the cold frame I banged together this 'spring' while suffering from spring fever. 

And was it ever frustrating to have a new cold frame in the garden and see it covered with a fresh coating of snow every day.  I was afraid to move the plants I had started in the window out to the cold frame, thinking (probably rightly) that they'd freeze to death overnight, since there was almost no solar gain, what with the snow on the glass and cloudy skies.

And how quickly that changes.  I left the glass on the cold frame Saturday morning when I went to the community garden to run the work day, and came back to find that it was just under 100 degrees in there!  Some leaves had  the telltale tan spots of burning,  but most were fine.  I'll be more careful not to leave the cover on during a hot day in the future.

Tonight I was out working on another project- planting some bare root trees I ordered, and which arrived 3 weeks ago.  Normally early April would have been a good time to plant- but this year, they ended up in the garage with shredded paper and peat moss over  the roots.  I went into the garage this afternoon and saw that the buds on the peach tree were swelling and almost ready to open.  Time to plant!   And soon!

So after the kids were in bed, I put the trees in the back of the car and drove to the rental place, and planted a Garnet Beauty peach, Wolf River apple, and a Liberty apple in the back yard.  We have good tenants, so I think they'll take good care of them.  We'll hopefully get some peaches and apples down the road too.

The sun was setting as I planted them, and a gentle, cool breeze blew up, moving a few wispy clouds in the sky.  A few birds were still singing, and I looked up to see the last of the sunset in far horizon.  I had to stop and appreciate just what a quiet and beautiful evening it was.   I had been cursing the fact that I lived in Minnesota a few days before, and now I was in love with it again.

the new cold frame with plants.  The glazing is an old window I found in the attic.

* Shameless plant sale solicitation---  If you are in the Twin Cities, and more particularly, in great city of St. Paul, please come purchase some plants at the community garden fundraiser next Saturday.  You can say hi to me, and buy some of the little green things I raised in the cold frame.  The sale will be at the Merriam Park Rec Center at 2000 St. Anthony Ave. in St. Paul on Saturday May 4th, from 9 AM to 3 PM. 
From my stock, we'll have heirloom tomato seedlings, hot peppers, long beans, some peas and mini-seedlings of kale, kohlrabi, bok choi and more.  Others have grown other more interesting stuff.  Fresh home-made baked goods and hot coffee available too!

See you there!

raising kids in a time of uncertainty

Gita and our two kids- the three people I love most

I'll call it a time of uncertainty- though every time is a time of uncertainty.  Nobody knows for sure what's coming from one day to the next.  You can have a pretty good idea, but you never really know  for sure.

What is fairly certain, is that the next generation is probably not going to live as well as the current one- the one I'm a member of.  And the next will probably have it even harder.

The reasons would be the usual suspects.  Oil is getting harder to find and extract- despite all the hoo-hah from the fracking industry.  The climate is warming up, and will continue to do so for decades even if we stopped burning fossil fuels right this minute.   The North American empire within which we live is slowly coming apart in a process that may take generations to be fully realized.

As a dad, I want to know that I'm leaving my kids a legacy, and I want it to be a positive one, but the aggregate legacy that my fellow Americans and I am leaving is one of a degraded environment, degraded culture and degraded standard of living.  It's unfortunate, but it's true.

Someone (Hepp) suggested in the comments section a few posts ago that the subject of choosing to have children while being peak oil aware would be a good read. 

To be honest, I really don't know that it was always my choice to have kids.  Gita knew she wanted kids for sure.  There was no way around that.  I wasn't sure that I wanted any, but she convinced me.

Part of it was that I was scared.  Of not being a good dad.  Of not being able to cope with a noisy, poopy, pukey baby and all the sleep deprivation that comes with it.  Of not having the option of going back if I found out I didn't like being a dad.

Then my daughter was born and I held her for the first time and I understood.

Of course I wanted to have kids.  I had known about all the crap that comes with having kids- being the oldest of five- but I didn't know about the love.   I had no idea how much I would love this little blue-eyed girl and the little brown-eyed boy that showed up a little over a year later.

Life has been hectic since they were born- yes- but I can't imagine life without these two little people now.  It's a cliche- I know- but it's so true.

So now that we have these two little lives to take care of, how can we be sure that we're giving them a good future?

One thing to do is teaching them real skills.

Setting up a college fund is one of those difficult things we haven't done just yet.   If a year of college costs 40K now, and is appreciating at three or four times inflation, how much will it cost in 12 years?  And would it make them ineligible for grants or loans?  And where would we put this college money?  In a fund that's going to dump it in the stock market? That's a laugh.  Better to put in on a table in Vegas.  At least you might get a free drink out of it.

While Gita and I both want to put something aside for their education, the unknowns  are so huge that it makes it difficult to even start, though everyone seems to agree that it's the right thing to do.  Really- where do you put money right now that will guarantee that it will still be there in 12 years, with interest no less? 

Of course, that's assuming that the education that colleges are providing is even worthwhile.  The assumption that ruled when I was an undergraduate was that you would follow a course of study that you found interesting, and there would be some sort of job for you when you graduated, if you just got good enough grades.

That's not working out so well for a whole lot of Political Science majors, as well as Journalism and recent Architecture grads, many of whom were my friends at the U of
M. 

There are other skills to be learned though.  My two little scholars learned a lot in the last week about growing plants from seeds while watching the boxes on the windowsill.

They've also learned about making compost from watching me toss dead stuff into the box that magically produces dirt.  They've learned about how to build things from stone and brick in the backyard, and that you don't need to buy a playhouse from the store if you have a few old pallets in the backyard.

Giving them the chance, and the necessity to figure things out on their own at times has made them more self-confident, and I hope, self-reliant when they need to be.

Trying to set a good example by walking my talk is also important, but not always easy.

I try to do what I tell them I'm going to do, even when it's not convenient or  fun.  I sit down to play a game of Candyland, even though I'm tired.  I buy the thing from the vending machine for them because I promised that I would, even though I since I promised I realized that they're going to choose sugary crap that will make them hyper and I know I'll later regret it. 

I suppose that could be called teaching integrity.  But that's something that would be important at any time, not just now.

In a time of uncertianty, though- when being a shyster is the norm, not the exception, is it silly to try to install a sense of responsibility or integrity into kids?

Or will it be more important than ever, when formal networks of exchange break down (from being exploited by shysters, perhaps) and people have to rely on networks of family, friends and acquaintances to get their necessities?  In situations like that, trusting others and being trustworthy can make a huge difference.

There was a time (or so I hear) when a man's (or woman's) word was his bond, and a good reputation was worth its weight in gold.  I think that time might return within my lifetime.  If the gold standard were to return, in whatever form that may, having a golden reputation will be a real asset.

Being physically healthy and able to entertain themselves are also important things for living in  the world after cheap energy. 

Every kid wants to watch TV, and every parent loves plopping them in front of it, and enjoying the peace and quiet that comes as a result.  But at a high cost.  I admit that I do it sometimes.  We have an old TV and a couple of computers, and there are days that I use it to babysit the kids when I'm alone with them and just don't have the energy to entertain them myself.  And the result, after an hour or two of movies or videos- almost always- is a whiny, floppy meltdown.

And we don't even do that much screen time.  A couple of times a week for an hour or two at a time.   Supposedly the average American kid spends more time in front of the tube than they do at school.  What does that do to a kid's brain?  Build brand loyalty and programmability maybe?  Make them more passive, but with a shorter, more irritable attention span?  These are not qualities that build resilience in an uncertain world.

Getting them outside seems to do the opposite.  It's hard to get them out the door at first, but there are always things to do and things that fascinate them- sometimes things I wouldn't have noticed at all.  My son picked something up from the ground today and asked me to guess what it was.  It kind of looked like an old handlebar mustache, so I joked that he was growing a mustache, and put it under his nose.  He laughed and pushed it away, and said "No daddy, this is the bark, the inside bark from the maple tree."  Which it was.  And I don't remember telling him this.

So there's lots of little surprises.

Bringing them in from the outdoors- even if it's just from our little city yard- is usually hard too.  They resist going out, then resist as much or more going back in.  Which I don't mind.  They even help in the garden sometimes, which I try not to push too hard, but am glad when they volunteer to help.

I'm looking forward to this spring and being outside with the kids.  They've made leaps in development and understanding in just the six months since the last growing season and I'm looking forward to showing them more of the world, and of the tiny world of plants and insects and soil life contained within our tiny backyard.  And I'm looking forward to the uniquely kidlike insights that they give me on a regular basis. 

searching for a cure (to cabin fever)

light starved seedlings- just recently moved to the south-facing window

So the St. Louis winter in St. Paul is less cold, but is clearly still a real winter.  The couple of inches of snow I cleared off the sidewalk this morning is now blowing back onto the sidewalk in a 30 to 40 mile per hour wind.  I walked to the bus stop after shoveling, slipping on the thin layer of powdery snow on top of a layer of glare ice every few steps.  I almost fell on my butt, and a car slowed down as if to ask if I needed help, but I looked away, not wanting to let go of the little bit of pride I still had.  I do know how to walk in snow, thanks.

The spring equinox is only a few days away- teasing me and everyone else in Minnesota with the promise of warmth and green.  But winter clearly isn't leaving any time soon and it's starting to make me nuts.

I started a bunch of seedlings March 8th.  It may be too early, but I don't care.   If we have an early spring again (which is seeming increasingly unlikely) then I can plant them outside.  If not, I'll have to be creative.  Maybe I'll build a temporary hoop house, or repot them and put them under a fluorescent light.

Starting the seedlings was more of an emotional decision than a rational one anyway.  I really want to see something growing and green, and the ultimate outcome of the seed starts will be dealt with when the time comes.   I'm tired of looking out the window and seeing nothing but shades of white, gray and blue.

some of the rose cuttings are starting to take off

Fortunately our hose has an old-fashioned hot water heating system, and that means that we have big, old radiators with a flat space on top that fits two or three flats of seedlings, or a bunch of plant pots.  And windows right nearby.  Our dining room has pretty limited light, with some east-facing windows and a neighbor's house blocking some of the morning sun, but the radiator space is huge, and I put our flats of seedlings there to start.  I covered them up with the little plastic terrarium top that came with the kit, and the combined heat and humidity had most of the seeds up in a few days.

This created a bit of a problem- I started the seeds too early, and now they're coming up ahead of time.  How do I slow this process down now that it's started?

I might just put them outside for a while if it gets above freezing soon.  With the terrarium covers, they'd be fine most likely.  And I could trim back some that already have multiple leaves- like the peas.  Pea greens are good eating, so those could go in a salad and we'd have zero waste from the process.  Actually, I ought to start some more peas- I could really go for some fresh greens right now.

no luck yet with the tropicals

Not doing so well are the tropical tubers and corms I'm trying to force by potting them up and keeping them watered and at room temperature.  In mid-February I went to Dragon Star- possibly the best Asian supermarket- or any supermarket for that matter- in the Upper Midwest.  The place has everything: live lobsters, ceramic Mexican wrestler figurines, fresh galanga root and super-heavy Chinese blankets.  It's the size of a SuperValu, but way, way more interesting to shop in.  I'm kind of fascinated by the place. 

So I went there and bought some taro root (the plant is typically known as 'Colocasia' in the snottier parts of the nursery trade, and can cost a bunch of money there, but is the exact same plant that people eat all over the tropical world).  Taro, sometimes called 'Yuca' in Latin America, is a tasty root vegetable, and people also eat the leaves (but only when cooked) in Nepal.  And it looks pretty cool when it's growing.  I bought three taro corms the size of coconuts for just under six dollars and potted them up and waited for them to grow.  I also bought sixty cents worth of ginger root and turmeric root and gave them their own pots too.

I've been waiting over a month now, and nothing yet.  I'm not sure if it's too cool in the house, or maybe just not moist enough- or what?  I'm hoping that the folks at Dragon Star didn't spray them with growth retardants like some conventional supermarkets do.  I often assume that Asian markets won't take the chemical shortcuts that the American markets do- but that may not always be the case.  I'll give the roots some more time just in case- but I'm starting to think that I wasn't quite as clever as I had originally thought.

The rose cuttings that I wrote about a couple of posts ago are starting to green up.  A few already have sent out shoots and have leaves.  This is my first year rooting roses, so I have no idea what to expect.  The dry winter air has pinched off some of the early, blanched  shoots that shot up while they were still wrapped in wet newspaper.  I didn't think those would make it, but misted them with a sprayer every morning anyway.  I potted up some Bali cherry cuttings as well,  and those seem to be rooting- though it's hard to tell from the top growth.

One thing I haven't tried rooting yet this year- currants.  I love the currants we have growing in our yard so far and want to propagate some of the red and white ones and plant them in our derelict perennial bed- the last prime planting spot in the yard that doesn't have much of anything in it that was put there intentionally. 

I was going to put raspberries there- but they don't cooperate when you try to keep them out of the beds next door- so I think it'll be more currants.  Not as good eating off the bush- but productive- and they make really good jelly and syrup.  Last year we made a batch of currant syrup  as well as some stir-fry from the quart or so of red and  white currants- and it was delicious.  We ate the syrup on pancakes.  It didn't last long.  The kids preferred it even to maple syrup and that's saying a lot.

I'm curious to hear what others are doing to cure cabin fever right now.  If you've started plants indoors too early- or, better yet, are taking a vacation in a place where tropical plants are actually growing, let me know.  I always enjoy reading your comments, so feel free to leave them. 

Cheers,

Jeff

another St. Louis winter in St. Paul

This year's low temperature: -13F on February 1st.  Image courtesy of wunderground.com

Now, thirteen degrees below zero may sound awfully cold, and it sure feels that way when you have to get up early in the morning, go out into the dark and catch a bus in the blowing wind.  Thirteen below is no picnic.  But it's not the historical norm for the Twin Cities.

 -13F was where our temperature  bottomed out on February 1st this year, and I'm going to be the first one to call it the low for the winter, as we're pretty unlikely to get that cold again at this  point in March.  The 10 day forecast is calling for highs above freezing, so I think that's about it for old man winter.

The reason that -13F is  significant, is that  it puts this winter, in the Twin Cities, in the zone 5b category.  That is, a winter where  the minimum temperature is between -10 and -15F.  If we were still using the 1990 USDA zone map which was the standard until recently, we would expect a yearly minimum temperature between -25 and -30 to hit us some night in late January or early February.  The fact that this hasn't happened in most of the last 15 years is significant.

I've always found maps fascinating, and when I was starting to become interested in gardening and horticulture and later landscape architecture, I pored over the 1990 USDA zone map, finding the growing zones of places I had been and thinking through what plants I had seen and what color the soil was and making a mental map of what grew where, and what could be expected in a similar place. 

People talked about global warming, but it was just a theory, and nobody was really sure if it would really affect us, say nothing about whether it was really real.

And now- a decade or two later, in the Twin Cities, we are on a regular basis having the kind of winter that  was formerly expected in St. Louis or Kansas City  or Indianapolis.

detail of the 1990 USDA zone hardiness map

Take a look at the graphic above.  It's from the 1990 zone map.  Yes, the new and improved map has put the Twin Cities in 4B, with some tiny urban pockets in 5A.  But I don't think that goes  far enough.  Zone 5b is the greenish-yellow band running through the middle of Missouri and Illinois and Indiana.  That is now here.  That used to be 500 miles south of here.  It leapfrogged Iowa in two decades and is now is making itself at home in our yards in St. Paul and Minneapolis on a pretty regular basis.

I can't complain about the less-cold winter.  I kind of like it really.  It's the summers and the uncertainty about the future that's disconcerting.  My zone 5 sweet cherry tree is thriving and I'm expecting a good harvest  of  apricots  from my backyard tree this year.   I'll probably plant a peach tree at our rental place.  But will I be able to grow blueberries any more?  While it's not an edible, I've noticed that the once reliable Astilbe now dies to the ground in our intense summer heat the last few years, and  it usually doesn't come back.  Is this a taste of what's coming?

The new pests that the warming trend is encouraging are pretty disturbing too.  The new invader, Spotted-wing drosophila shouldn't be able to thrive here, but it is.  An old-school Minnesota winter might have set the Emerald Ash borer population back a bit, but this one won't. 

If you've followed this blog for any time, you know that I'm a skeptic when it comes to the future availability of cheap oil.  So I'll forgive you if you are about to say that the coming of peak oil will offset climate change and everything will be fantastic. 

Yes, growing peaches in Minnesota is fantastic, and we may someday be growing mangoes here if current trends continue and water supplies stay relatively intact.  Because peak oil doesn't mean that there are no more hydrocarbons available.  Alcoholics don't usually decide to go cold turkey when their  favorite brand of sauce isn't available.  They switch to Listerine or Lysol or Sterno or whatever else fills the bill.  So too with hydrocarbons.  There's still a lot of coal and peat and firewood in the world and it'll all get burned in short order by oil addicts needing a fix.

Add that to the inertia of the warming trend that would continue for decades even if we did somehow go cold turkey, and it's clear that we need to learn to adapt.  The alternative isn't something to consider.

There clearly isn't going to be any sort of voluntary consensus to reduce the greenhouse gases by us or any other county or combination thereof.  'Our Way of Life is Non-Negotiable' as one charming former Vice President said it.  So it is being negotiated for us, by the atmosphere, at terms that are less than advantageous to the human species.  Can't say we didn't ask for it.  

propagating roses in the winter

winnipeg parks and morden blush roses- in july.  not now.

So of course I live in Minnesota and of course the winters are long and cold here.  That is not a surprise.  It's expected, and what is a surprise is the brevity and warmth of recent winters.  This one is fairly true to what the historic record shows, though not as harsh as the USDA plant hardiness zone map would indicate.

One very good thing about long and cold winters is that people who love gardening have time to do eccentric stuff like propagate roses from hardwood cuttings.  For fun.  Because there isn't much else to do, unless you like to ice fish or watch TV.  Which I don't.

 And I wanted to get an early start on raising something to sell at our community garden's spring plant sale.  I was fishing around and found some interesting articles on propagating roses from hardwood rose cuttings.  This video illustrates it pretty well and these two linked sources are what I used to figure out how to make a whole bunch of new rose plants from cuttings I'd normally end up composting.

I'll post some info on the plant sale later, by the way.  If you are in the Twin Cities, feel free to stop by Merriam Park on May 4th.  I'll elaborate on another day.

freshly cut stems- still had some leaves in january!

For my cuttings, I took a bunch of  one to two foot trimmings off of my Winnipeg Parks, Morden Blush and Bonica roses in the yard.  These are some cold-hardy and mostly disease-resistant roses that I've had in my yard for four seasons now, and which I feel fairly comfortable with.  I've never sprayed them with anything, and have never fed them fertilizer, except for once on the day that I planted them.  They're the only thing in my yard  (besides the  rescued azaleas) that I've ever given chemical fertilizer to.

They've all done pretty well, if you take into consideration the advice that's usually given when you raise roses (spray, spray, spray, feed, feed, feed).  I even get some pretty decent rose hips from them (which taste pretty good when they're not full of fungicide).

Not all roses have done so well.  I planted a 'hardy' variety of tea rose at the same time as these- 'Lily Pons' was the name if I recall  correctly.  It didn't make it through a single Minnesota winter.  That was my first and last attempt at planting high-maintenance roses.  If it can't survive winter on its own and summer without chemicals, then it's not worthy of a place in the limited space of the eighth acre farm.

stems after cleaning-

I did a little research, and found that all three varieties- which were once patented- are no longer.  Morden Blush just went out of patent last year, in fact.  And it's a gorgeous rose.

This is not to say I am a great believer in plant patents.  I'm not.  But I want to give some respect (and revenue) to breeding programs like that at the Morden Research Center in Manitoba that brought us a whole slew of roses fit to the difficult conditions of an Upper Midwestern (and Canadian prairie state) winter.

Unfortunately, the Morden rose breeding program has been discontinued, and even more unfortunately, some of their roses are already becoming harder to find.  Winnepeg Parks is now out of most catalogs, which is a sad thing because it's a fantastic rose for organic gardeners. 

So I'll do my small part in continuing the spread of some good and out-of-patent roses. 

So once I had taken all of my trimmings in early January, I trimmed them down to about 5 to 8 inches long, removing the bottom few buds, and leaving two or three at the top.  I scored the bottom inch of the cutting with a paring knife, and dipped each cutting in water, shook it off, then dipped it in some rooting hormone.

Rooting hormone is something I've never used before and was a bit apprehensive about getting.  I've heard that agar works in much the same way, but didn't know if it would get moldy over such a long time, and besides didn't know where to find it.  So I took the easy way out and used IBA, which as it turns out, was not as much of an all-synthetic thing as I had assumed.

I had to look around  a fair bit to find it in midwinter.  I went to a suburban garden center and waded through the kitsch and leftover Xmas schwag and unusable purple birdhouses to find it on a sad looking shelf in the back of the store.  It cost about six bucks and the bottle said it could make a thousand cuttings or so.  Good enough for me. 

So I dipped all the cuttings in it, and wrapped them in damp (not wet) newspaper, then put the newspaper in three plastic bags from local stores.

and seven weeks later

And by golly it worked!

The original cuttings went into the bags on January 6th, and I unwrapped them today, 7 weeks later, to find roots and/or callouses on about 3/4ths of the cuttings.  That was way better than I had expected. 

I potted them up in some old #1 containers that I washed in the laundry room sink, and put them in a large clear plastic container that will be a temporary greenhouse for the  new rose plants.  If all goes well, I should have a nice little crop of roses for the plant sale. 

That is, assuming that I don't accidentally cook them all by leaving the lid on the greenhouse on a hot day, or forget to water them.  I'd probably do that in the summer, but right now my plant deficit disorder is making that unlikely.  Bringing anything to life right now is so deeply satisfying that I will go far, far out of my way to make it happen.  So I'm more likely to water these little things to death before I let them cook.



I ordered seeds last night too.  So many things to do to prepare for the growing season.  I'll be trying long beans  again this year, as well as WHD's rattlesnake beans.   And even though I've had lousy results with hot peppers most years, I've ordered Anaheim peppers to start from seed too.  And more parsnips again even though they make me itchy.

a banyan tree in hong kong

And in a total non-sequitur, I have a couple of travel pictures.  These are from Hong Kong, when we were there almost three and a half years ago on our way to visit Gita's family in Nepal. 

I was looking through travel pictures tonight- and appreciating the green- the life- and the remembering of what it's like relaxing outside next to the water in a short-sleeved shirt.

The picture above is a banyan tree- one of many we saw.  This one was on one of the smaller islands that make up Hong Kong.  It's a fishing village mostly, but a really densely packed one, made up of four-story apartment building and tiny little winding alleys.  The banyan had it's own little stoop among the concrete, and I think it was some sort of shrine, though I'm not completely sure.  

Even if it wasn't a shrine, it said a lot for the Chinese appreciation for nature.  Maybe due to the lack of actual natural space in a place like Hong Kong.

And below- that's us at a noodle house by the boat dock, within smelling distance of the fish market on the same island.  The little guy couldn't get enough of the noodles, even though he hadn't been eating solid food for very long at that point.   Maybe we shouldn't have given him the local street food- but then again, what other choices did we have?

He was perfectly fine by the way.  And is still an adventurous eater for a kid.

noodle shop on the street.  little man demolished the noodle soup at 16 months.

I love looking at pictures of warm places in the winter. 

There's not a lot of it left.  Three cheers for that.

february blue

me.  enjoying the snow.

Oh, to be a kid again.  Not so much because it's fun being bossed around by grownups, or being made to eat food you don't like.  No, because today was a day made for kids, not for grownups.

When you get four or five inches of really wet, heavy snow, a grownup looks at it and sees a lot of work, and a potential car accident.  Kids see potential snowmen and snowballs and snow forts.

I got out with my shovel and dug paths through the snow, flinging it onto the roots of my fruit trees wherever I could- a little extra moisture in case we have a dry spring again.  I stopped to commiserate with the neighbors who were also not happy to be digging out yet again. 

But the kids didn't notice.  They were having a blast.  When I was done with my work, we went to the mini-sledding hill at a nearby church and sledded down a 5-foot slope a bunch of times- making a game out of who could make it to the bottom first.

our kids and the neighbor kid making a snow fort

The neighbor girl came over later and they all worked together to make a snow fort, with a kid-sized snow shovel, a hockey stick, a broken shovel handle and a snow-block maker.  It turned out pretty well, I have to say.

And as much as I complained about having to shovel show once again, I have to admit that I need the exercise and need to get out of the house.  I need to spend a bit less time in front of a computer screen, and a bit more time in nature, even if that nature is my front yard in the city, and I am communing with it by means of a snow shovel.  

I am ready, very ready, for winter to be over.  I am tired of looking out the window and seeing shades of white and grey and blue.  I am tired of smelling nothing but snow and diesel fumes when I walk down the street.  I'm in need of spring.

Gita is getting edgy too.  I've noticed and this doesn't make for a great deal of domestic tranquility.   She pointed out the obvious the other day- that I'm sitting on my butt in front of the computer too much these days- and of course I didn't like hearing it.  But she's right.  

I'm not really interested in joining a gym and working out.  I've done that before, and my feeling is that, now, I want to work hard, but I want it to serve some sort of a purpose.  Turning the wheel on an orbital machine or lifting a stack of metal plates a foot and a half again and again doesn't count.  I want to have a good honest tired at the end of the day.  But that's not easy to come by this time of year.  

In April or May, yes.  There are beds to dig up, stuff to plant, weeds to pull, things that need painting, stuff to move around the yard.  But in February?  Not much.  I pruned all of our fruit trees last weekend and pulled a bunch of dead Virginia creeper off of the garage.  Not much left to do now in the winter maintenance department.

the back yard today

So I shoveled the walk, and shoveled the roof with my 20-foot 'roof rake'.  Played with the kids some.   Made a batch of cookies with them and hand-printed some valentines for our son's preschool.  Tonight I feel tired.

And I sat down to write, as I try to do most Sunday nights, and set a beer- the first one of the night and last one in the house- and spilled it all over the floor when I turned on the light. 

Being a nice housebroken domestic husband and all, I kept my expletives to a loud whisper, since Gita was putting the kids to bed upstairs, and went to get a paper towel to take care of the mess.  And made a note to keep more beer on hand in the future.    I understand why they drink so much of the stuff in Canada by the way.  This time of year, it feels like the water of life. 

swelling buds on the blueberry bush

 My relationship with winter is more of a love-hate relationship than one of pure dislike though.  I've spent a couple of winters in warm climates and it felt all wrong.  Like I was cheating on winter.  Like I was supposed to be suffering in one way, but was suffering instead in a totally different and unfamiliar way- from the guilt of not facing the winter I was supposed to face.  For not paying the price of the really truly beautiful Minnesota summer I  had just enjoyed, or some such thing.

My first winter in a warm climate was in Puerto Rico.  I was an exchange student at a small college in the southwestern part of the island.  The climate, by most measures, is just about perfect.  It was hot when I got there in August, but the fall and winter months are sunny and mild, with fruit growing on the trees, and the smell of flowers always in the air.  There would be a light rain shower every day in the late afternoon, then sunshine again.  Perfect weather for being outside

After a few months I absolutely hated it.

Part of it was the unfamiliar culture-  but that wasn't all of it.  I had to get out of there by Christmas, and back home to the cold.  I was never so happy to shiver.

I chalked that one up mostly to culture shock- but when I spent a winter, years later, in Austin, Texas, I had the same experience.  I should have been happy to be away from the  cold, but in a perverse way- I missed it.  I had intended to stay there longer but only lasted four months.

In between both of those times, I had gone traveling- to see the world on a shoestring after college- and, through a series of coincidences, ended up spending most of the winter on a kibbutz in Israel.  At least there, they had thunderstorms, so it felt a little bit like winter, but still, I missed the cold.  After all my complaining about it- I missed the cold and misery of a Minnesota winter.

view from the front door

So here I stay.  I don't think I'll make the mistake of trying to cheat on winter again- at least not for longer than a week or two.  That much I can still get away with. 

At least we didn't get two feet of snow, or three  or whatever ungodly amount they got in some of New England this weekend.  At least it's only a few inches.  

Actually- I probably would have enjoyed it to be honest.  Two feet of snow gives you street cred.  Four inches is just a backache.

Now I need to get into my seed catalogs.  Where the hell did I put those? 

koyaanisqatsi

There are only a few films that I can say that I've enjoyed watching more than once and fewer that I'd watch again.  This is one of them.  Maybe the only one.

Yes, the music is nice and all- that's what most people focus on when discussing it.  But there's a lot more than that.  It's remarkably current in it's illustration of the situation that we, as a species have put ourselves in, despite the fact it was released 31 years ago.

the great indoors

This is the time of year for turning inward.  At least in our part of the world- the center of the North American continent.  At the 45th parallel- exactly halfway between the equator and the North Pole.

This is the coldest time of year, and the weather feels much more like that of the North Pole than the equator.  

exhaustion

I've been a full-time single dad for the last 12 days, and it's cutting into my ability to just about anything else.

This is not an appeal for sympathy, rather it's an explanation of why I'm not putting together a more thorough or well-researched post this week.  I resolved back in November that I would post something every Sunday night in the coming year, managed to do it through the month of December, and really enjoyed it in the process.

But Gita left for Nepal on Xmas day to see family and friends and take care of some family business.  She planned for a three-week stay, as that's more or less the minimum reasonable stay given the cost of the ticket and the 36 hours of combined flight and layover time it takes to get there.  Not to mention the jet lag.

When she  was going through chemo and radiation the thought of going back to Nepal again sustained her through some of the difficult weeks, so I couldn't hold taking the trip against her.  But I wasn't looking forward to being alone with the kids for three weeks.  What would I do?