This is the perennial relative of kenaf that Josh Jamison gave me cuttings of at Andy's event in Arcadia that I had obsessed understanding then obtaining after learning about it this summer. Cracks me up though to see that it IS the "manihot" I saw and tasted at the New Orleans Botanic Gardens in 1998 when I gave a talk that year to the New Orleans Old Roses Society! To think that it took me from then to now to get my mind around it. Comparing this to my 'Everglades 41' kenaf next summer will be fun I am sure. Thanks again Josh!

http://www.hibiscus.org/species/amanihot.php

Are humans herbivore, omnivore or carnivore?

As an ex-vegan and vegetarian for health reasons aware of how the other primates eat, I've long felt that, like them, we are by nature omnivores.


http://rense.com/general20/meant.htm

I would LOVE it if someone could identify for me the lovely, low growing roadside wildflower I never see in Tampa but saw once again in the meridians in Arcadia on the way to Andy's. It is abundant in Okeechobee and Ft. Pierce. It makes a wide mat maybe 2 inches tall and 3 feet wide, packed with many hundreds of pale lavender bell-shaped flowers maybe 3/8 inch long. The blooms remind me of a mini-campanula. I tried to spot some in Andy's neighborhood but did not. I first noticed it a little over a year ago when I started making frequent trips to Okeechobee and Ft. Pierce and West Palm when Dad would fall ill. I wish I would have stopped and taken a pic on this trip! I looked up two suggestions by Green Dean and Mycol Stevens....species of Richardii and Campanula but not even close. I can just imagine it in hanging baskets or as a lawn substitute. It is not a salvia, penstemmon or a composite. Fingers crossed...thanks!!

Mycol Stevens gave a very pragmatic yet funny at times outdoor presentation about edible and toxic mushrooms, then later gave a very informative power point presentation in Andy's living room to help us visualize what he'd told us. The only edible mushroom I've ever felt comfortable gathering and eating is the puffball....I loved his visual cue of slicing one open....if it looks like tofu inside it IS a puffball...if you see gills inside it in an immature button stage of something else.

The last Muscovy duck in my center garden area, a male, escaped a few nights ago when Sandy's winds arrived....I'd assumed all those months of feeding and tending for duck meat were all for naught and it had flown far away...."kay sarah sarah". Well, today as Mary Jo and I chatted by the street, my new neighbor Kelsey drove up, walked over, said she and her BF were gone all weekend, came back today and saw a duck in their back yard! Mary Jo and I went back there and it was FRANTICALLY trying to get back into my yard by pushing against the chain link fence. So we cornered it, I caught it, and Mary Jo clipped its flight feathers with these mega-scissors I have (their feathers are TOUGH) as I held the wings (BOY are they a strong bird!) then I put it over the fence into my east bed to join one male and two females that share three ponds. This means that after about a year of a whole flock in my huge center bed out back rendering it weed free and loaded with duck poop, I can now deep mulch in there with paper mulberry and Cassia alata branches, plant the two Raja Puri bananas that Mary Jo gave me in what used to be my Apple Snail pond now evolving into a giant Water Wise Container Garden based on hugel kultur, dig another much smaller pit and line it with a scavenged above ground pool liner to plant my guava in, set up a small above ground pool with living plant filters for me and friends to enjoy in summer, then sow all over the remaining open areas seeds of winter crops for me, friends and Wimauma restaurant to use and enjoy.

I had a wonderful time there at Andy Firk's permaculture event and seeds/plants swap in Arcadia, learned and laughed and ate a lot, slept lousily in the back seat of the Honda so am scoring a cheap tent, got to meet several people from FaceBook for the first time and see others again ( I LOVE FaceBook for making new gardening friends!), got to share some seeds and plants I knew that folks wanted, and in turn was blessed with wonderful things that people knew I wanted, I guess from my FaceBook postings and my blog like: That Perennial Edible Hibiscus I obsessed on a few months ago!!!! Josh (whom I'd brought African Yam tubers after Andy said he was lusting after as a yam obsesser and collector) walked up and put in my hand about 5 VERY nice cuttings! Then he put in my hands about 5 cuttings of "Longevity Spinach", that trailing green leaf edible and medicinal relative of Okinawa Spinach!!!!! Vicki brought me a big zip lock bag with two ripe seed heads of that giant Amaranth "Calalloo"! So now I have plenty of seeds to share. I met someone else who echoed her, Mike Urban and another woman.....easily 12 feet tall in summer, cut it back hard and it regrows, VERY large mild and tender bright green leaves good cooked or in smoothies and salads. Low in oxalic acid. Jim Kovaleski brought me from Maine a bulb of the Racombole garlic I grew for 13 years in Denver plus an entire aerial cluster of its bulblets, plus a bulb of a white soft neck garlic that he thinks MIGHT bulb up here. He's been breaking up the racombole bulblets and planting and selling the young plants as a garlicy "scallions". Josh gave me a true yam that has white flesh and a thin layer of purple right beneath the skin. People jumped on the "Clay" cow pea seeds I brought, plus the Chinese Celery seed that Pat gave me so much of. I gave Mary Jo this morning a cutting each of the Edible Perennial Hibiscus and the "Longevity Spinach" to root in her newly completed greenhouse. All say that established Calalloo does okay in winter, self sows like CRAZY, but that the most vigorous growth is in summer when mild greens are rare. Last week I scattered some in beds just to see what happens. The rest of the seeds I will sift out of the flower plume heads and put in envelopes to share with friends

Young people like her are giving me hope for a better future!

http://www.permaculture.co.uk/articles/meet-inventor-electricity-free-fridge-powered-dirty-water