The Deliberate Agrarian BlogazineFebruary 2011

Dateline: 28 February 2011

This Writer’s Life
or
“Ain’t No Sunshine....”

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I have heard of some book writers—the more successful ones— who have their own secluded writer’s cabin that they can withdraw to in order to better pursue their craft. And I’ve also heard that there are writers who will take a writing vacation to some beautiful, muse-inspiring place, like the oceanside, where they can better focus their creative energies. Those things sound mighty fine.

After eleven published books, I myself have not yet reached the level of success where I can afford to indulge in such a vacation. I just try to get a book written while otherwise trying to make a living and taking care of the already-busy routines of everyday life, and that is exactly what I have been doing for the last two months.

But this current book project has been a little unusual in that, for the first time ever, my wife, The Lovely Marlene, decided she would take a vacation while I worked on my book. She went to visit her sister in Arizona for eight days.

So, while I sat alone, disheveled and bleary-eyed in front of my computer, for hours, reading, rereading, typing, editing, and composing book pages, with snow storms howling outside the window, Marlene was basking in the sun, socializing, eating out, shopping at all the best thrift stores in Phoenix, and just having a grand time.

It was a first. Thirty years of marriage and she took off on her own vacation. Though I am glad she had a good time, and she certainly deserves a vacation, and she made sure I was well stocked with clean clothes and good meals for the duration, it sure was nice to have her home again. All the time she was gone, that old Bill Withers song, Ain’t No Sunshine When She's Gone,  kept playing in my mind (Oh, it’s so true). 

Here's a picture that isn't of me but I think it is a good representative picture of what I did during my wife's vacation:

A typical book writer at the end of a long day.

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As for the book, which I planned to have done and handed off to the printer by today, the last day of February, it is still undone. I am discouraged about that but, we lonely, struggling writers of the world are well acquainted with discouragement. I  take solace in the fact that discouragement, like pain, builds character, or so I’ve heard.

Now, with March upon me, I must set the book project aside, change gears, and devote the life force within me to another character-building endeavor—income taxes. It’s time for the annual gathering and tallying and recording of numbers which the government demands, with threat of ruination (that's not rumination, mind you, it's ruination) if I do not comply. 

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I will hand my numbers to an accountant who will charge me a lot of money and who will tell me that I have to send the government a lot of  money,  none of which came easily. And they will, of course, waste it like only Behemoth Government can do.  It’s the most dreadful time of the year, and it never fails to leave me in a foul mood. There. That was my annual tax rant. Now I won't bother you with such negativity for another 12 months. Thank you for your indulgence.

Once I have gotten beyond the evilness of tax time it will probably be spring here, with at least a few warm, sunny days, which will be nice. But who wants to sit inside working on a book when the weather gets nice? Not me. There will be maple syrup to boil down (see below) and I fully intend to get peas planted in March. They alone can tolerate very early planting, as long as the ground is no longer frozen.

Perhaps March will have its share of nasty days and I’ll have some more time to attend to my book project. I’ve purchased the domain name www.AgrarianNation.com for the book’s web site. That isn’t the name of the book but it relates to the book's content and www.AgrarianNation.com will be a place where I can post a continuing series of essays that expand upon what the book has to say. That is the plan. Stay tuned for upcoming details.

Here's An Actual Picture...

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Marlene on her 2011 Arizona Vacation.

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Surviving Off Off-Grid

(a book review)

Speaking of books, I have read a prepublication copy of Michael Bunker’s soon-to-be-released new book, Surviving Off Off-Grid: Decolonizing The Industrial Mind. Fact is, I’ve read most of the book twice, and underlined numerous passages. Yes, it’s that good.

I noticed that another blogger has reviewed this book and described it as “profound.” I thought that was an interesting conclusion because it was exactly the descriptive word that came to my mind as I was reading it. My dictionary defines profound as “penetrating beyond what is superficial or obvious,” and that certainly does sum it up.

The way it looks to me, there are three categories of people who will appreciate what this book has to say, and who will benefit from it. First would be anyone who is thinking of living off grid. Second would be anyone who has an interest in surviving economic and civilizational collapse. Third would be those people who have an interest in Biblical agrarianism and cultural separation. I suppose I would fall into all three categories, but my primary interest is Biblical agrarianism, so I’m going to focus on that in this review. I should mention that Michael makes the point that readers of his book need not be Christians to benefit from the practical outlook and ideas in the book. That is true.

In the foreword of his book Michael writes:

“it is our intention to offer a philosophy that, whatever may be said of it, stands Contra Mundum (against the world), and against the prevailing foundational philosophy of industrial consumerism, thoughtless consumption, and the dependence on systems that are contrary to our own best interests.”

.Look in the top right corner of this page and you will see that I say this here blog of mine is a "rich resource of contra-industrial thought...” It so happens that Michael Bunker and I are on the same page when it comes to seeing wicked industrialism for what it really is.

Our  disdain for industrialism comes from our scriptural understandings. We believe the Bible calls Christians to separate not only from common forms of worldly immorality, but also the more subtle immorality of worldly dependencies too.

Of course, those who hold to Christian-agrarian beliefs are not just a minority, but a minuscule minority. That fact is probably sufficient to discount the legitimacy of Christian-agrarianism in the minds of the majority. But God has always done his greatest works through a humble minority of faithful followers.

Nevertheless, I must say that I still find it amazing that mainstream evangelical Christianity, with its continual end-times observations and prognostications, doesn't seem to realize (or care) that its followers  support, and draw their sustenance from, a one-world, industrial-beast system, right here and now. They cleave to the system, and they love the system. Hello?

So it is that precious few people who consider themselves to be Christians see the corporate-industrial system as something to separate from. Their minds have been “colonized” along with everyone else’s. After all, no mainline denomination or popular televangelist is espousing separation from the industrial system. It’s not even on their radar screens.

Where Michael and I differ in our Biblical agrarian apologetics is in the ability to formulate a cogent and comprehensive contra-industrial argument. I only scratch the surface in my writings, while Michael Bunker digs deep. His new book makes this abundantly clear.

The other difference is the degree to which each of us has separated from industrial grid dependencies. I feel like I am physically positioned to live off-grid if/when the system crashes—not for a week or a month, but for the rest of my life. That isn’t to say I’m stocked with a good supply of batteries and fuel and survival food, because I’m not. I’m stocked with tools and hands-on experience for living very simply, and providing for my basic life needs apart from the industrial system. To this end, little by slow, I continue to make more progress all the time. I also believe that, by the grace of God, I have the spiritual resources to deal with the transition. But Michael and his family are already living off grid, or beyond off-grid, or, as the book says Off Off-Grid. So he is well qualified to write this book.

Fact is, he is uniquely qualified—no one else I know of is saying, or putting into words, the things Michael Bunker is saying in this book. It is an incredibly thought provoking read. And, as far as I’m concerned, what he is saying is not only contra mundum, it’s right on.

You should know that, regardless of the title,  this book is not so much about surviving the inevitable crash of the industrial nations, it’s about deliberately choosing to live apart from the industrial grid for philosophical and religious reasons, regardless of whether it crashes or not. The subtitle of the book, “Decolonizing the Industrial Mind” is really more to the point. 
 
I was struck by a biblical reference in the book under the heading of “Old Paths.” Much of Michael’s book is about thinking in pre-grid ways and dealing with problems creatively. Michael mentions Jeremiah 6:16. That verse and the idea of returning to the “old paths’ just happens to figure prominently in the book I am currently working on. Coincidence? Hmmm. Here’s what Michael writes:

Looking towards the old paths is not a melancholy dream, or some fantastical wish for a mythical bygone paradise. We don’t look to the past as if it was the perfect, idyllic, pastoral utopia. We know it wasn’t perfect. We look to the past for a few great reasons: Because the Bible tells us to (Jer. 6:16); because there is wisdom and reason in learning these old and valued skills; and because the way the world has chosen. though it seems to be right for a time, has wrought nothing but damage, destruction, intellectual and spiritual entropy, and mental colonization. The product of the modern way of doing things is spiritual emptiness and sadness, is fraught with disappointment and unrealized expectations, and creates a crazed urge to fill the void with consumption and “stuff.”

Surviving Off Off-Grid touches on many different specific subjects: debt slavery, acquiring land, off-grid heat, light & refrigeration, water, food, housing, and much more.

If you are a thinking person, if you don’t mind having your ingrained industrial-world suppositions challenged, if you are desiring to live a more genuine and satisfying life, if you are a person concerned about the coming collapse of western civilization, if you are looking for some rock-solid nuggets of real wisdom in the midst of a world that is blinded by fools gold, this book is for you.

In the final analysis, I’m not sure what category Surviving Off Off-Grid would fall  into. It is full of philosophy, psychology, sociology, religion (Christianity), history and (to a small degree) there is some general how-to. Perhaps it would best fit in the just-plain-down-to-earth-good-sense category. Contra mundum, of course.

Surviving Off Off-Grid has a real nice web site (Click HERE to go to the web site). If you decide to buy a copy of the book, please do so by Ordering Here on the official Book Bomb date of March 4th (Michael explains the book bomb on his web site). 

Even though I have a copy of this book, I’ll be ordering two more on the 4th. They aren’t for me. I have a couple of contrarian-minded friends who haven’t drank too deeply of the industrial-world Kool-Aid, and I’m sure they will be blessed by this book.
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My New Birthday Present

It will arrive in a big box, but I don't think it will be THAT big.

Last month I told you about getting another year older. And I told  you about buying myself a banjo a few years ago as a birthday present. As I explained, I am a failure as a musician. It's not an easy thing for me to deal with but I'll get through it. 
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In the meantime, to help assuage my humiliation and sorrow, I decided that I needed to buy myself another birthday present. No, I didn’t get a tamborine, as Marlene so wittily suggested. I bought a tool.  I have a much better track record learning to use tools than I do learning to make music.

I bought this tool on Ebay. The seller said it was a tool from the 1700s, and that it was therefore over 300 years old. I asked how they came to that conclusion and where the tool came from. I was told that the age was ascertained by the patina of the wood, which the seller believes is walnut. The tool was found hanging on the wall of an old barn in Connecticut.

Though it could be that old, I doubt it. More than likely, the tool is from the 1800s. It looks to be in usable condition and that is important because I intend to use it. Most people would think this thing should be in a museum, but I'm going to put it to work, just like people three hundred years ago (or whenever) did.

You are probably wondering what this tool is. Well, I bought it a few days ago (a belated birthday present) and don’t even have it yet, so I’m going to wait until next month to tell (and show) you. I think you need a good reason to come back here for next month’s blogazine installment and this is the reason...

Next month I will reveal to you what the 300-year-old walnut mystery tool birthday present is.

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 Cereal Revolutions

You may recall that there were food riots in poorer nations of the world in 2008. The situation is worse this time.

Last month I told you that the current Mideast turmoil was being sparked by food price increases and shortages. That is now something that’s being recognized more and more in the mainstream media. In a February 22nd article by Bill Bonner at The Daily Reckoning he coined the phrase, “Cereal Revolutions,” to describe what is happening. The word “cereal” meaning cereal grains, like wheat, corn, oats and so forth, not cereal breakfast foods, like Cocoa Puffs, Lucky Charms, Cap’n Crunch, and so forth.

The American press hallucinates that the people of North Africa and the Middle East have suddenly woken up...as if from 1,000 years of sleep. Stretching their arms and rubbing their eyes, they yearn for 'liberty' as though it were a cup of coffee. The Herald Tribune refers to "winds of freedom" supposedly blowing across the hot sand.

But here at the Daily Reckoning, we see the picture differently. These are 'Cereal Revolutions,' we say. The idea came to us from our old friend, Jim Davidson. He believes the real cause of the uprisings in the Arab world is the rise of cost of food....

For a more in-depth perspective on the worldwide food supply, here is a quote from a February 17 Bloomburg Businessweek article:

The hunger that has roiled the Middle East was not caused by the whims of autocrats and cops. It began last year with crippling drought in Russia and later Argentina, and torrential rains in Australia and Canada. The deluges in Saskatchewan were so sustained and intense that farmers couldn't plant some 10 million acres of wheat, according to the Canadian Wheat Board. "What is typically the driest province was never wetter," said the governmental agency Environment Canada. Shrunken wheat harvests in those countries, along with cool, wet summer weather in the American Midwest that delayed the U.S. harvest, helped drive wheat prices at the Chicago Board of Trade up by 74 percent in the past year. Corn traded in Chicago rose by 87 percent during the same period. More recently, grain prices have spiked even higher because of yet another drought, this one threatening China's wheat crop, the world's largest. In that country's eight major wheat-producing provinces, some 42 percent of winter wheat cropland has been hurt by a dry spell, according to Agriculture Minister Han Changfu.

So, there is a significant worldwide food crisis happening right now and it may get much more significant...

Whether the world tips into agricultural catastrophe this year depends on the fate of the wheat on the North China Plain. "You need two perfect harvests through the summer of 2012 to get stockpiles back to an acceptable level," says Jason Lejonvarn, a commodities strategist at Hermes Fund Managers in London. Unless sufficient moisture reaches the parched seedlings, a net exporter of wheat could become a net importer of wheat, further stressing world markets. Short of that, a Chinese ban on wheat exports would also send prices higher, meaning that global grain shortages—once thought to be a disaster of the past—could return. Even American commodities buyers are feeling the pinch. "There is not one crop you can point to that is without supply problems," says Steve Nicholson, a commodity procurement specialist for International Food Products in St. Louis. "Production is not keeping up with demand."

Two perfect harvests, eh? What do you think the chances of that are?

At the most basic level, the crisis is a test of mankind's ability to feed itself. Industrial agricultural techniques have boosted crop yields and kept food prices low for decades, but the era of predictable abundance that fueled the world's population growth to almost 7 billion people may be over. Relief agencies, already lashed by hurricanes, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and government budget cuts, are ill-equipped to handle severe food shortages.

In yet another article I read that there is currently only an 18-day supply of corn on the planet.  That doesn’t sound like much to me. To Bonner’s new term of Cereal Revolutions we might add another term....The Perfect Storm.  
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On a related note, a recent NPR news story about farming in Nebraska reported that farming there is very profitable right now. If I heard right, the average farm in that state is 3,600 acres, and to make a go of it, a farm there needs to be at least 800 to 1,000 acres. Good farmland in that state is now selling for more than $8,000 an acre. The same news program also reported that 150 bushels of corn an acre was once considered a very good yield, but with advancements in technology it is now possible to get over 200 bushels an acre, and they believed that 300 bushels an acre was only a matter of time.

Yes, indeed, industrial agriculture has wrung remarkable yields out of the earth over the past 50 years or so. However, this kind of farming is totally dependent on a plentiful supply of cheap oil. As Mideast stability disintegrates, plentiful and cheap oil will fade into history even quicker than it already was. One wonders if the first dominoes of a significant industrial-system collapse are starting to tumble?

As for the Cereal Revolutions, with all these people rising up and over throwing their governments in the Middle East, their fundamental problems of poverty and lack of food will not be solved by such uprisings. These nations will still be unable to feed themselves. They will still be nations of dependent people—dependent on the industrial providers.

Meanwhile, if that’s not crisis enough for you to wrap your mind around, we’ve got super serious problems of our own right here in the U.S. of A. Did you hear that well-paid, well-fed, public employees across the nation are facing the horrible reality of a decrease in their employment benefits!  It’s hard to sympathize with those Middle Eastern people when we have such hardships of our own to deal with.
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The Year of The Garden

I like this picture a lot. Prints are available at this link

I’ve said it before in the past but it bears repeating every so often: In the final analysis, there is nothing you or I can do to “solve” the major problems of the world. All we can do is try to understand how major and minor events will affect us. Then we can respond wisely by taking positive steps to adapt to emerging new realities. Personal agrarianism, in all it’s manifestations is, to my way of thinking, a tremendous positive step, and at the heart of personal agrarianism is the task of growing food.

If there was ever a time to have a garden, this is it. I mean a big garden—one that gives you lots of good food to stock the larder. My favorite larder-stocking foods are potatoes, onions and squash. Those foods require little in the way of processing to store them for many months. You simply dig, pull, or pick the food and put it away. It’s a real good feeling to have a few bushels of all three of those foods on hand through the winter.

Right here is a good place to recommend the best gardening book I’ve ever read: Gardening When it Counts: How to Grow Food in Hard Times, by Steve Solomon.

There are some people who don’t like Steve Solomon’s book because it is contrarian. One of his contrarian approaches to gardening is to discourage intensive (close together) plantings. Solomon takes a more “old fashioned” approach to planting and spacing his garden crops. He does this because such plantings require much less in the way of additional watering.

Solomon says that in “hard times” people may not have access to municipal water supplies and without that, intensive garden plantings will suffer. The old-timers didn’t have automatic drip irrigation systems and sprinkler systems and all that. Yet, they managed to grow very productive gardens. Gardening When it Counts tells just how they did it, and how you can do it too.

When I first read Steve Solomon's book, and his recommendations contrary to intensive gardening, I thought of the Dervaes family out in Pasadena, California. They have a 1/5-acre “Urban Homestead” on which they grow remarkably lush gardens and harvest admirable quantities of food. They have been looked upon as a shining example of “urban homesteading.” But their way of gardening, which is so dependent on the public utility water supply, doesn’t impress me.

Their web site says that they spend $600 a year on water. Take away the public water supply and their “square inch” gardening methods will fail.

Urban “homesteading” and urban “farming” is a great concept. It’s fun to see and I applaud those who are involved in such efforts. But these imitations of the real thing may not be sustainable in the years ahead.

By the way, if you have not yet read about the recent internet tumult regarding the Devraes' trademarking of the popular term “Urban Homestead” (so that other online folks can't use it) stop on over to Granny Miller’s blog and read her essay titled, St. Jules and Our Ladies of Pasadena
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A Seasonal Plug For My Planet Whizbang Wheel Hoe

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A homemade Planet Whizbang wheel hoe with an 8" oscillating stirrup blade. It's an incredibly efficient weed destroyer.

Some bloggers sell advertising space on their blog. I don’t do that. But I  do let it be known from time to time that I sell books and chicken plucker parts and other down-to-earth products.

That said, a couple years ago I introduced the Planet Whizbang wheel hoe that I developed, and I posted a step-by-step-build-your-own-wheel-hoe tutorial to the internet. 
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To make the job of building your own wheel hoe as easy as possible, I started selling 1.) parts specifications packages, or 2.) precut, bolt-together wheel hoe kits, or 3.) fully assembled and ready-to-go wheel hoes. Since then, I’ve sold just about 250 wheel hoes or parts kits  (You Can Read Some Really Nice Feedback Here).

The Planet Whizbang wheel hoe offers a low-tech, highly efficient way of keeping weeds under control in a traditional-style garden. THIS LINK tells how to use the wheel hoe. THIS LINK reveals the secret to easy weed control (with either a wheel hoe or a hand hoe).

I’ve decided to stop selling assembled wheel hoes this year and to sell only the kits and plans. I have only a few of the assembled units left in stock. The reason I’m not making the assembled units any more is that I need to cut back on some aspect of my Planet Whizbang business in order to have more time to work in my own garden. Making the painted-and-assembled hoes is the most time consuming thing I do. 

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It’s not a good thing when the guy who “invented” the Planet Whizbang wheel hoe has a garden full of weeds because he’s so busy making wheel hoes for other people that he doesn’t have time to use his own. No, that’s not good at all.

Wing Road Farm

Aaren Hatalsky of Wing Road Farm
with Planet Whizbang wheel hoe #119
(picture from the Wing Road Farm blog)

Every so often, while browsing the internet, I happen upon a farm that really strikes my fancy—a farm the likes of which I think would suite me just fine. Wing Road Farm is such a place. It is in Greenfield, New York. You can read about this small-scale, diversified farmstead at their web site, but I'm going to give you a link here that will take you to their Photo Gallery, where you will be treated to one of the most pleasant farm photo slideshows you'll ever see (I love the old house!). Click this link to get to the automatic slideshow: Wing Road Farm Photo Gallery.

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The Planet Jr. Mystery is Solved!
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Samuel Leeds Allen
(1841—1918)
Founder of the Planet Jr. company

While you’re over at the Planet Whizbang wheel hoe web site, check out my story about Samuel Leeds Allen, the man who made the Planet Jr. wheel hoe and so many other agricultural implements back in the 1800s. In my story about Allen, I say that I would like to know more about him, and I’d really like to know how in the world he came up with the “Planet Jr.” name.

Well, a couple weeks ago I got an e-mail from Leslie McManus, the editor of Farm Collector magazine, with the following information.

A Planet drill was developed by S.L. Allen from two washtubs riveted together, rim to rim, with a wooden tire and handles added in subsequent iterations. Allen, an amateur stargazer, noticed the device’s resemblance to the planet Saturn, hence the name of the implement. Later he developed a smaller version of that seed drill, and called it the “Planet Junior.”

For those who may not know, a “drill” is a tool for planting seeds, in the ground, in a row. Mr. McManus also told me the following...

Allen’s daughter, Elizabeth R. Allen, wrote a book about her father; the book (“Samuel L. Allen — Intimate Recollections and Letters”) published by Franklin Printing Co., Philadelphia, in 1920. Obviously small run and out of print but perhaps an eBay search will prove fruitful.

I checked and print-on-demand versions of that book are available at www.abe.com (you can get just about any used book you need there).

All of that was great to know but the story gets even better because four hours later, I got an e-mail from S.L. Allen’s great granddaughter:

Great grandfather invented a fertilizer drill for spreading guano.  He named it the "Planet Drill" because of its resemblance to the planet Saturn and its rings.  The seed drill that immediately followed was called "Planet Jr". These were the first of the Planet Jr. family.  This occurred in 1866.  Hope this helps your desire for information concerning the naming of the farm implement line.

Well, isn’t the internet just an amazing thing! I asked Mr. Allen’s great granddaughter a couple questions and she wrote back...

Great Grandfather had the first mail order company in the US.  The Brandywine Museum in Delaware has an exhibit which is interesting.  At one point, the farm implements were being pulled by water buffalo and camels as well as horses and mules--in other words--all over the world.

Elizabeth was never married.  Charles Jackson, the son, was my Gramp.  The book, which is on line amazingly, is a collection of letters and Elizabeth's recollections as well as others who knew him.  Hope you enjoy it.  I didn't know that copies were still available as it was a private printing by Franklin Press.  The book ends with tributes offered after Samuel's death.  I particularly like the Goethe quote at the end.  I also carry it with me.

So the book was online? I went looking for it, and FOUND IT HERE.

I have not read far into the book yet, but right in the beginning I discovered.... 

Precepts of Samuel L. Allen
(found among his earliest papers)
[slightly edited]

Acquire the Habits of : 

Punctuality in everything. Attention. Observation. Patience. Doing things systematically. Finishing everything undertaken. Untiring industry.

Cultivate the Habits of : 

Thoroughness in every study. Doing everything well. Learning something from everyone. Thinking deeply, powerfully, and comprehensively. Reviewing — remembering that next to perseverance it is the great secret of success as a student.

Cultivate the Habits of a Gentleman: 

Politeness. Cheerfulness. Good humor. The memory, by observation, reading, conversation and  reflection. Command over my temper. The conscience.

Cultivate the Habits of: 

Daily prayer. Self-control of the tongue. Self-control of the feelings. Self-control of the thoughts. Self-control of the heart. Soundness of judgment. Humility and liberality of heart.

Beware of: Temptations: 

Light reading (which enfeebles the mind and corrupts the heart). Silly speeches. Silly acting. Fault finding. Bad company. The first step in sin. Secret sins. Bad books. Indulging in reveries of imagination. Contracting the habit of procrastination. Levity upon sacred subjects.

Do not refuse to walk in a difficult path of duty.  Never neglect any opportunity of self-improvement. Strive to improve thoughts when alone. Have a plan laid beforehand for every day. Have regard to the position of the body. Be simple and neat in personal habits. Treat properly my parents, friends and companions. Seek to " know thyself." Form fixed principles on which to think and act. Faithfully review my conduct at stated intervals. LiveNever neglect any opportunity of self-improvement. Strive to improve thoughts when alone. Have a plan laid beforehand for every day. Have regard to the position of the body. Be simple and neat in personal habits. Treat properly my parents, friends and companions. Seek to " know thyself." Form fixed principles on which to think and act. Faithfully review my conduct at stated intervals. Live to do good and make this my aim in company and conversation. Do not waste the company's time or my own by talking trifles. Do not endeavor to be a wit or punster. Do not view words in an unnatural light for the sake of smart sayings. Beware of severe speaking. Be careful in introducing topics of conversation. Say as little as possible about myself, friends, deeds, etc.

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Those precepts remind me of George Washington’s Rules of Civility & Decent Behavior In Company and Conversation, which he transcribed when he was a teenager. I’m thinking it may have once been popular for young men to put into writing some personal guidelines for how to best conduct themselves in life. What a fine idea. 

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Jennifer Needs Chicken Feathers...
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Do you know how many feathers are on a chicken?
Well, you're about to find out.

If you need yet another proof of how amazing the internet is, consider this question posted at the Yahoo discussion group, WhizbangChickenPluckers (2,888 members, and growing):

Hi!— I'm am with the University of Alabama, and we are doing a production of Big River. One of the characters needs to be tar and feathered. And I am looking for chicken feathers. Does anyone have any extra feathers? We're really hoping to get natural coloring.

Thank you!
Jennifer

A response...

How many do you need? Where should I send to? I can send you some once the feathers dry out after plucking.

And Jennifer from the University writes again...

I'm not sure how many I need... I need enough to cover a person. I'm using about 2 feather per square inch. And the body is about 2160 square inches, so that's roughly 9,000 feathers. According to the internet, a chicken has about 8,000 feathers. Does that sound accurate to you?

It would be awesome if you could send the feathers though! I can send you money for shipping, and if you want, I can send some photos of the costume when it's completed!

Our address is
University of Alabama
Jennifer Bronsted
Box 870239
Rowand- Johnson
Tuscaloosa, AL 35487-023

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Maple Time

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That's me and the late, great Annie collecting maple sap in back of our house a few years ago.

It is just about time around here to be making maple syrup. Last year was a poor maple syrup season here and our backyard syrup operation didn’t yield enough. We bought a gallon from our neighbor and it cost fifty bucks. So we’re very motivated to make our own syrup this spring. If you would like to read a series of how-to essays (with pictures) about our home-scale maple syrup system, you can do so AT THIS LINK.

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That's it for another edition of The Deliberate Agrarian monthly blogazine. Let's do this again next month. All the best to you and yours..... Herrick Kimball

The Deliberate Agrarian BlogazineJanuary 2011

Dateline: 31 January 2011

It's About Food

Here at the end of January, as I am about to post this monthly blogazine essay, the country of Egypt is in turmoil. There are demonstrations in the streets. Protesters are clashing with police. Buildings are being looted and burned. People are dying. Why?

Yes, the people live in a dictatorship and they want freedom. But they have lived under that kind of government for decades. Something tipped them over. As I listen to the mainstream media on my satellite radio, very little is said about the spark that ignited this unrest. But I heard it mentioned in passing with a news media interview of the Israeli ambassador. 

The ambassador was at a world economic summit in Switzerland. In the course of the interview he made the statement that, "These people are hungry. They are facing food shortages." No further comment was made about this subject of food. But there it was. It's not really a secret but it doesn't seem to be something that the mainstream press is talking about.

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Back on January 22, I happened upon an online article at Business Insider titled, The 25 Countries Whose Governments Could Get Crushed By Food Price Inflation. I recommend the article to you.

Egypt is on that list. The amount paid for food, as a percentage of household consumption, in the country of Egypt, is 48.1%. The country is a negative net food exporter. In other words, Egypt is not food independent; it is unable to provide for the food needs of its population. And all those people who are clamoring for a change of leadership to bring them some relief are helpless to provide for themselves. 

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They are primarily city dwellers, and city dwellers are among the most helpless dependents of any nation when it comes to providing for their most basic food needs. This is a tragedy and it is bound to spread. Look at the countries on the list. Some of them may surprise you.

No, the United States is not on the list. As near as I can determine, the percentage of income spent on food in the US is around 12%. But that was an old statistic—from before the 2008 crash. Such statistics in this country have surely changed in the last two years.

Nevertheless, Americans are facing food price increases, and any unrest in other parts of the world can and will affect our economy, which really isn't all that stable at the moment. The industrialized world we live in is so interconnected, has so many complex systems, with complex dependencies, and control over major markets is so centralized, that we are in a precarious situation.

What lessons can we as a nation and as individuals learn from the chaos in Egypt?

Jeffersonian Democracy

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I get a kick out of mainstream news commentators who throw the phrase "Jeffersonian democracy" out when speaking of governments. The inference being that Jeffersonian democracy is a good thing—the ideal form of government—and that other nations would be better off if they could somehow become Jeffersonian democracies.

Well, of course they would. And I  believe that America would have a better from of government if we had a Jeffersonian democracy too!

Thomas Jefferson would be aghast to see what has happened to this country. It isn't what he envisioned. Jefferson warned about the dangers of industrialism and the powerful banking interests that would, if the nation was not careful, destroy the Republic. Jefferson believed American would be strongest if it were an Agrarian Nation. He warned of the great dangers of being a nation of dependents.

“Dependence begets subservience and venality, suffocates the germ of virtue, and prepares fit tools for the designs of ambition.”

Yes indeed, Jeffersonian democracy is a prudent form of government, but I dare say the talking heads out there don't know what they're talking about when mention Jefferson democracy. (Click Here to read my "Jeffersonian Solution" essay if you have not already done so)

29 Years Old!

The last day of January is my birthday, once again. I am 29 years old, once again. I am feeling wistful, once again. Birthdays are like that for me.

Three years ago (when I turned 50 26) I decided it was high time that I learned to play a musical instrument. Some of you longtime readers may remember this event in my life. You may remember that I settled on the banjo because banjo music agrees with me. I figured that learning to play a banjo couldn’t be that much harder than learning to butcher a chicken, which I like to think I’m pretty good at (Click Here to see).

So I bought myself a real fine banjo, handcrafted by a goat farmer/banjo maker in the hills of Virginia. It’s a beautiful instrument that I really like.

Now, three years later, I can tell you that, without a doubt, I am a failure as a banjo player. An utter failure. Butchering chickens is much easier to learn than playing a banjo is.

I will keep my fine, handcrafted banjo safe in its case and maybe, just maybe, I’ll have a grandchild someday that will take an interest in the instrument. That would please me.

Meanwhile, I have given a lot of thought to another instrument that I’d like to play, instead of the banjo.

Bagpipe music agrees with me. How hard can it be to play a bagpipe? I’ve got a good bit of Scot in  me, you know. Seems like that would help.

So I mentioned this desire of mine to learn the bagpipes to my wife, Marlene. She looked at me with a perfectly straight face and suggested that maybe I should consider the tambourine instead.

Then she burst out laughing at her suggestion, like she had told a funny joke.

A real comedian, that Marlene is.

The Franz Family

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Speaking of music—I mean really good music—have you seen the Franz family? Mom, dad, and the four kids are remarkably talented (perhaps I could learn to play the dobro).

Some Blogs For You To Visit

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Photo of Owen Bridge with his haymaking equipment from The Ruminant web site

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It has always been my policy to recommend other agrarian-minded blogs that I come across. I think there are a lot more of these coming online all the time, and that's a good thing. Here are three links that you may like...

Stone Cottage Diaries— I'm not sure how I found my way to this down-to-earth blog, but the first thing I read there was Nickel & Dimin' it in 2011 in which the young woman who writes the blog tells of how she and her husband are focusing on paying off their mortgage early. But, beyond that, Bo (her husband) has done something this year that most men only dream of... and his wife is totally supportive of it.... and it is really nice to see.

The Ruminant— Jordan Marr up in Canada has a nice little blog in which he's trying to spread some good farming and homesteading ideas around. I read his story titled Owen Bridge's Hand-Made Hayrake and liked it very much. 

Stumbling Homestead— The Menard family out in Oregon have a pleasant web site with a variety of podcasts. I found them when they asked me if I would be interested in doing a podcast interview. It is my policy to politely decline all requests for interviews (because I am a shy and not-well-spoken agrarain) but I do like what they are doing.

Update on My Book Project
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I'm so  old... 
I did my first typing as a kid on a typewriter very similar to this.

As mentioned last month, I have decided to self-publish another book and I launched myself into it as of January first. I have spent many days this month working on the book. I have sat for hours pounding the keyboard and staring into the cathode rays of my computer screen. My fingers hurt and my optical nerves are frazzled. But I am making very good progress towards my goal of having the book ready for the printer by the last day of February. 

In high school I learned to type on an electric typewriter like this. It was probably the most useful thing I ever learned in high school. I'm a five-finger typer. I use three fingers on my right hand and two on the left. I'm pretty fast.... but I have to look at the  keyboard most of the time. So I guess I didn't really learn to type very well in high school.

I’ve told Marlene that I think this might be my last book. She has never heard that from me before. Well, maybe one more after this. We'll see :-)

My new book will be something of a magnum opus for me. It will be large at 8.5” x 11” and I think it will have 200-plus pages. It will contain a tremendous amount of information.

And right about here, a good ways into the project, with a good ways yet to go, with a surprisingly high price quote from the printer, with the economy in the dumps, I find myself questioning whether I should even be doing this book. 

But this kind of questioning is pretty much par for the course.

Maybe it is the same for other seat-of-the-pants, amateur, self-publishers too. But I wouldn’t know because, frankly, I don’t know anyone else who self publishes books like I do. It’s a lonely obsession.

I bought myself a Personal Word Processor similar to this in the early 1990s to help me with typing job descriptions and price quotes for my remodeling business. I would compose what I wanted on the screen, hit a button, and the typewriter would automatically clack away, typing off a single copy. I started my career as a professional writer (meaning that I got paid for it) by typing articles for Fine Homebuilding magazine on this kind of machine. When I wrote my first book for Fine Homebuilding back in 1995, they told me they needed the manuscript on a computer disc. That's when I bought my first computer.
A Mac, of course.

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Regardless of any pangs of doubt midway through the project, and barring any unexpected problems, I will get this book done because it is something I've felt compelled to do for a few years, and I believe a lot of people will find it informative, useful, and inspiring. 

The book will be appreciated by people with an agrarian mindset, and especially people who are have an interest in old agrarian ways and the culture of America when we were once an Agrarian Nation. It will be an informative, thought-provoking book with new-old ideas and inspiration. Did I mention that it would be an inspiring book?  

I will be starting a new educational blog to promote the book and to expand on the ideas and information in it. I will post to the blog a couple times a month (more frequently than here!) and I think it will be a lot of fun.

More details next month..... hopefully

The New Precious Metal

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I was speaking with a 12-year-old boy the other day. He told me he collects coins. I asked him what kind of coins he collects and he told me that mostly he looks through the cash register at his parents diner for wheat pennies. That got me to thinking....

I remember very well when I was 11 or 12 years old and started collecting coins. Back then it was possible to find an occasional buffalo nickle, or a mercury dime, or even a standing liberty quarter in circulation. But mostly I looked for pre-1965 dimes and quarters because they had real silver content.

When I had some spending money I would walk to the bank branch in the shopping center outside our housing development and trade cash for rolls of dimes, nickels and quarters. Then I'd eagerly sort through the rolls looking for the silver coins (Jefferson nickles between 1942 and 1945 had a 35% silver content). After a few days I'd turn the rolls back in at the bank for cash. Then after a few more days I'd repeat the process.

Today a roll of pre-1965 silver dimes, with a face value of five dollars, sells for around $100. That's twenty times the face value. So if you had the foresight in 1964 to put aside $100 worth of common pocket change (dimes or quarters), it would be worth $2,000 today.
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I never took wheat pennies very seriously when I was a kid. The last year they were made was 1958, the year I was born, and they were plentiful for a lot of years. But, amazingly, a 50-cent roll of wheat pennies is now selling for $3.50 on ebay. They are worth approximately seven times their face value. That's a 700% increase in value.

This got me to thinking about the value of paper money and coins. The intrinsic value of paper dollars is pretty much nothing. But it turns out this is not the case with some coins, even though they no longer contain any silver. 
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It so happens that the copper content in  Lincoln pennies minted before 1982 is 95%, and the copper content in any Jefferson nickel now in circulation is 75% copper (and 25% nickel). With the current copper value at around $4.30 a pound, pre-1982 pennies are worth just about three cents each. And the copper/nickle value of every nickel now in circulation is just about seven cents.

Based on that knowledge, it makes a lot of sense to save those pre-1982 pennies and every nickel you can find. Before long, the copper/nickel alloy used in nickels is sure to be cheapened, probably to inexpensive zinc, as has been done with modern pennies.

If I were 12-years-old again, I'd be looking for not just wheat pennies but all Lincoln pennies with the 95% copper content.

It turns out that quite a few people are now "investing" in rolls of nickels. They are getting $100 boxes of rolls at the bank and just squirreling them away. And there are a lot of people out there seriously "mining" rolls of pennies, looking to extract all the copper cents. There are even machines you can buy to run your pennies through. The machine automatically separates the zinc pennies from the copper pennies. It won't be long before the copper pennies are gone from circulation.

Copper, primarily in the form of pennies and nickels, is now the "poor man's" precious metal. Do an Ebay search of "copper penny bullion" and you will find copper pennies for sale. For example, you can buy $100 face value of pennies (68 pounds worth) for around $200. There are no listings for Jefferson nickel bullion.... yet, but there will be some day. 

Many people are loading up on a supply of nickels and pennies for another reason. If the Powers That Be can't work their financial magic and save the economy from it's decline, we may well have an inflationary depression. The value of paper money will decline significantly, perhaps even to the point of worthlessness. America has never experienced this sort of thing, but that doesn't mean we won't. If it happens, copper pennies and nickels, with their intrinsic metal value, may become widely used for exchange instead of worthless dollars. It's entirely possible that a Jefferson nickel would have more buying power than a one hundred dollar bill. And if we go the other direction with a deflationary depression, the coins will hold their value. It would appear that you can't go wrong with copper pennies and nickels as an investment, or so it seems to me.

To keep track of the current melt-value of all kinds of American coinage, check out www.CoinInflation.com

For my young readers who are inspired by this coin collecting idea, I suggest that you let your friends and relatives know that you have taken up penny collecting. I'll bet many of them will be glad to help by saving pennies for you.

Here's An Idea

(for 12-year-old boys of all ages)

If I understand correctly, no significant new copper ore discoveries have been made in a hundred years. Copper demand currently exceeds production levels. That's why scrap dealers are paying the highest prices they've ever paid for copper scrap. This could, of course, change if industrial demand (primarily from China) were to drop significantly, and that's why pennies, with their face value, are better to "invest" in than bars of copper bullion. But there is another way to get yourself a supply of premium copper....

Every electrical appliance that has a motor has a power cord that has copper wire in it. And the electric motor itself has a lot of copper. Everything from garbage disposals to washing machines to vacuum cleaners to electric kitchen mixers have copper in them. If you see one of these items being thrown away, cut the cord, extract the motor, and salvage the copper. 

This is an educational, as well as a lucrative, little hobby that I recommend primarily to boys (and men) because most boys (and men) have a natural love of disassembling machines.

Just last week Marlene's electric kitchen mixer broke. No problem (she had a garage-sale backup on hand).  I decided to see just how much copper wire I could get out of that cheap little mixer. I performed the extraction operation using a few basic hand tools at the  kitchen table. It took about 15 minutes. And it was a lot of fun. In the end, I had myself 1-3/4 ounces of clean, bright copper wire, which always brings a premium at the scrap yard.

Broken mixer on left. Copper "mining" tools on the right. Copper wire in the center. Small Farmer's Journal underneath

Now, let's see.... If the value of copper is now up to $4.30 a pound, that's about 27-cents an ounce. So my 1-3/4 ounces of copper is currently worth about 47-cents. That's from a chintzy little plastic mixer. 

Who knows what copper will be worth a year from now, or five years from now? It could be worth a whole lot more than $4.30 a pound. Recycling can be a good investment. Mining thrown-out appliances for the copper makes good financial sense. Put your wire in a big plastic pail and add to it whenever you can, like a savings account. That's what I'm doing.

Inflation Calculations

Speaking of inflation and all of that, I think this is a good time to mention the US Inflation Calculator. It's a fascinating little web device that allows you to figure out how much value the American dollar has lost since 1913, which is the year the Federal Reserve Bank was established. :-(

For example, according to the calculator, it would take $754.52 in today's dollars to buy what $100 dollars would buy in 1958, the year I was born. 

So, according to the calculator, in the year 1964,  when my Grandfather Kimball made two $500 deposits into the savings account he started for me, it was the equivalent of a grandfather today making two deposits of $3, 517.02 (a total of $7,034.04) for his grandson. That puts things in a whole new perspective.

It's unlikely that I will ever be able to put away money like that for my grandchildren. Maybe I can save a few rolls of pennies and nickels. :-)

Garden Planning

Another Great Idea!

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After much consideration, Marlene and  have ordered our garden seeds. I have great hopes for this year's garden. The last couple of years I've had very productive gardens but they have not looked so good. My problem is a real lack of time to keep them properly cultivated, especially as I am working at the factory job and trying to run the Planet Whizbang business here at home. It's too much for me, and the garden gets neglected. Still, I have high hopes, and I mean that literally...

Last year I experimented with some trellis growing ideas for beans, tomatoes and cucumbers. I had some successes and some failures, but I learned a lot, and I'm anxious to expand on the ideas that worked. For example my trellised tomatoes, pruned a certain way, came out beautiful. Here's a close-up from last summer...

These Tommy Toe tomatoes trellised up beautifully and yielded bountifully for us in 2010.

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We ended up with many pounds of those Tommy Toes from three tomato plants. This year I will be trellising eight varieties of tomatoes, and only three plants of each. If they grow and yield anything like the Tommy Toe, we will have plenty of tomatoes for our needs.

I grew a section of trellised green beans last year and a couple long rows of bush green beans. Marlene told me to just grow the trellised beans this year. They are much easier to pick and seem to yield over a longer length of time. 

Trellised cucumbers were also much easier to pick. Someday I hope to have my trellising system worked out to my satisfaction and I'll give you a  lot more details. 

One gardening idea I decided to try last year that did not work at all for me was those upside down tomato planters. I put two by our back patio. They were vibrant, healthy, plants (that Marlene had started from seed) when I put them in the upside down planters. A few days later, this is what they looked like....

I won't be trying this idea again

“Oh God, Pride Of Man,

Broken In The Dust Again”

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In my younger days, I liked to listen to the folk music of Gordon Lightfoot. Feeling wistful and a little nostalgic in this month, I went to YouTube and checked out some of the Gordon Lightfoot clips. One was a song that I had never heard before. It is titled Pride of Man and was written by the folk singer/actor, Hamilton Camp, back in 1964 (there's that year again).

Pride of Man is a secular song, yet full of prophetic and vivid Biblical imagery, with the destruction of Babylon, and Egypt, two ancient pagan cultures. It’s interesting to note that he mentions a  falling tower and terror. I happen to believe the Twin Towers were a symbol of the pride of man in our modern Babylonian culture, just as is the entire modern financial system.

From what I’ve read of him, Hamilton Camp was not a Christian, yet his song resonates with me as a Christian. I am particularly struck by the last two lines:
 

And only God can lead the people back into the earth again 

Thy holy mountain be restored, thy mercy on thy people Lord
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Deliberate Contentment

(A Chapter From My Book)

One Man's Ruminations About Faith, Family and Livin' The Good Life

In the comments on last month's blogazine, a man mentioned that he appreciated the chapter about contentment in my Writings of a Deliberate Agrarian book. Since I have been working feverishly on a new book this month, and have not been able to commit the usual amount of time to preparing this here blogazine issue, I've decided to publish that portion of the book here for you....

Chapter 6
Deliberate Contentment

A few stories back I told you how Marlene and I acquired our land and the home we live in, and how God has blessed our family. I believe the agrarian life we experience here is truly idyllic. That is, however, not to say it is carefree, because it is not. And neither do I mean to imply that difficult and unpleasant things do not come our way, because they do. But the goodness and satisfaction of our lifestyle is authentic.

All of this originates with our Christian faith and rests on the fundamental truth that God is in total control. He orchestrates the circumstances of our life for His good purposes. This is the very definition of His being sovereign.

Understanding and accepting God’s absolute sovereignty is foundational to living a godly life. Whenever I talk about The Good Life, what I really mean is a godly life lived within an agrarian paradigm.

I do not believe you can remove godly living and still realize The Good Life. You can have a lesser imitation but not the genuine article. All of which leads me to the subject of contentment, which is another vital part of The Good Life.

To my way of thinking, contentment is the same as being satisfied and comfortable with God’s provision, with His blessings. It is, very simply, the humble acceptance of His sovereignty and will.

On the other hand, discontentment is pride, it is anger, it is war against God’s providence. It is the same as saying to Him: “This is not enough! I want more!” Discontentment breeds bitterness, and rebellion, and worse.

Instead of working and waiting patiently for God’s greater provision (if He so chooses to grant it), the discontented person gets what he wants by other means: plunging into debt, questing for wealth, and even stealing, which, to my way of thinking, includes culturally acceptable forms of theft, like taking government grants or other handouts of taxpayer dollars.

Those who live with a proper understanding of their relationship to God understand that, because of Adam’s sin, God doesn’t owe us anything more than death and damnation. That this Holy Sovereign would send His sinless Son to live among us and then die a cruel death to atone for our sins is difficult to comprehend. This alone is far more than we deserve. That He then meets the basic needs of those who call Him Lord (and many who do not) is further evidence of His incredible goodness. That, in most instances, He grants us gifts far beyond our genuine needs is a further manifestation of His grace (getting what you don’t deserve) and mercy (not getting what you do deserve).

Nevertheless, after all such blessings are embraced and enjoyed, God’s people are prone to whine and cry and moan and complain. We have the audacity to believe we should have more. Some even think to themselves that they deserve more. This is nothing short of a crime, and when we do this sort of thing, we open ourselves up to very bad consequences.

the spirit of discontentment is always there, in the shadows, watching. He dogs you, waiting for his opportunity, waiting to exploit your weakness. He will let you first entertain those other spirits: jealousy, envy, covetousness, and materialism. They will lead you off the path. They will tear at your soul. They will weaken your faith. They will marinate you in their sourness. Finally, they will deliver you to the demon. And when discontentment sinks his teeth into you, the joy and peace of godly contentment leave.

It is sad to see discontent in others. It is sadder yet to see it in ourselves.

Some Quotes to Ponder
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“To have what we want is riches, but to be able to do without is power.”

—George McDonald
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"There are two ways to get enough: one is to continue to accumulate more and more.  The other is to desire less."
— G. K. Chesterton

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"Prosperity knits a man to the world. He feels that he is 'finding his place in it' while really it is finding it's place in him."
—C.S. Lewis
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"The public are swine; advertising is the rattling of a stick inside a swill-bucket. "
—George Orwell
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"We must achieve the character and acquire the skills to live much poorer than we do. We must waste less. We must do more for ourselves and for each other. It is either that or continue merely to think and talk about changes that we are inviting catastrophe to make. The great obstacle is simply this: the conviction that we cannot change because we are dependant on what is wrong. But that is the addict's excuse, and we know that it will not do."
—Wendell Berry