PICA groundbreaking

October 31, 2009. This morning we gave C quad a rude awakening with pick axes and digging bars. At first just Jose, Hannah, and I brought tools over to the segment of cut asphalt by C4 and started in. Slowly more picans trickled in and then the excavation was in full swing. We broke the asphalt with the ground-shaking digging bars and then pried it out with pick axes. After a few hours and lots of sweat the spot was asphalt free. Now we'll take out the gravel, help rebuild the soil, and bring some more green life to C quad!

Fall in the Garden

We're a month into fall quarter now and new picans are becoming comfortable with the garden. The abundance of summer is fading and we've been preparing beds for winter. Workdays have been busy with turning beds, planting plenty of collard greens (leftover from the agroecology lab), harvesting beautiful corn and anasazi beans, much more, and of course, celebrating with a delicious meal afterwards. Soon we'll be loading some pictures of the garden and also of our workday out in Bonny Doon at the Shumei Natural Agriculture farm.

Some new additions to the garden are a new long bed in front of the apple trees by B2. Behind it some perennial collard trees, a perennial tomatillo (Incan ground cherry), and a perennial melon-like squash. A small new bed over by the compost, a nice flower bed next to it and a mulberry tree in between. Just today we put in a loganberry bush in the shaded corner of the garden, part of expanding our berry row. In our effort to beautify the shade-structure we planted one banana passionvine. Future plans are to plant a purple passion vine to keep it company, and some other either beautiful or edible vine(s).

That's it for the moment, more later, and pictures too. Come stop by if you get a chance! : )

Sean

Pergola and garden Action

Hey all. It is going down in the Garden. Pergola got started on Saturday and is looking amazing! Thanks to everyone who put in their time and effort working on that project. This Saturday Pergola work will continue, so be there, as we work to complete this awesome garden structure. Also, we have turned almost all of the beds and have got a bunch of new crops in the ground. There is still lots of planting and other work to be done so don't miss out on the action. Come take part in Saturday workdays and get involved!

Now they're flowers!!!

Remember, way back in October when we stuck all those bulbs in the ground behind B1? Well I sure as heck do! Guess what? Now they are beautiful flowers! Check it out!

Winter Tree Pruning

The Winter Tree Pruning Workshop was an amazing success! Thanks to everyone who came out! And thanks to Dave Shaw for leading such a great workshop! We were able to prune all the apple and pear trees in the garden. We will hold off on pruning the stone fruit trees (peach, plum, etc.) until summer because they will require a different type of pruning. Hopefully. because of the awesome pruning we gave the trees last weekend, we can expect lots of delicious fruit come summer and fall, so get ready!

Harvest List as of February 17th 2009

Garden
• Chard
• Collard Greens
• Bok choi
• Mustard Greens
• Broccoli and Cauliflower will be ready soon, keep an eye out, they are a bit too small right now. These are planted primarily on the south edge of the garden in between fruit trees, do not confuse with collard greens and harvest the leaves or else the broccoli and cauliflowers will suffer and may not produce.
***Chard, Collard Greens, and Bok Choi are real small just due to the lack of sunlight, you can still harvest them small. Remember it is a good idea to leave at least 5 leaves per plant so they will maintain productivity and cut leaves from the outside inwards. Also, in beds 8B ad 15, there are brussel sprouts which have leaves, but should not be eaten because they the plants will not be able to produce brussel sprouts. Check with Andrew if there is any confusion about this.

A-Quad
• Collard Greens
• Cauliflower
• Romanesco broccoli
• Mustard greens
• Lettuce
• Kale
***If you have any questions or are confused about harvesting any goodies in the A-quad, check in with Bee or Molly in A-1 they will be happy to hook it up.

PICA's Farm Beds
• Broccoli
• Cauliflower
• Collards
• Kale

What PICA means to me

The following is a piece written by one of our PICAns expressing a little about what PICA means to them. It is likely that this piece will be included in a campus wide environmental media project currently in the works. If you have anything you would like to share, please do.

PICA

We eat together.
Monday, Tuesday, Wendesday, we eat dinner together. We sit around enjoying delicious meals that we take turns preparing. The kitchen is warm, the food is warm (and delicious), and the way I feel inside, as I am surrounded by all the good company, is warm. After the meal is finished and cleanup begins, we head back to our respective buildings, and with us we bring our sense of community.
We live together.
Someone puts on some hot water for tea, and maybe some folks sit around the kitchen sippin mate and shootin the breeze, talking of mushrooms and the up-and-coming 5th weekly sunrise meadow barefoot run. Down the hall a few folks are studying together or their watching a movie. There are no strangers in my building, nor in my quad. PICA is my home, and when I am away, I miss my home and everyone who is a part of it.
We work together.
On Saturdays we work in the garden. We turn the soil, pull the weeds, make the compost, plant the plants, and do a wide array of other tasks and projects that keep the garden healthy and thriving so that we in turn can remain happy, healthy and well fed. Food from the garden goes into our meals, and the work we do not only brings us together as a community, but it allows for the opportunity of others who don’t live here to become involved and be a part of the PICA community.

Back to Winter

Welcome back everyone. Hope you all had a great break and are getting settled back into university life for the winter quarter. Most of us were gone for a few weeks over the holidays, including myself, and the garden was left to its own devices for that time. Over break there was a bit of rain and several days of very cold temperatures, along with the fact that during the winter months little sunlight penetrates the garden, the growth of the garden has slowed considerably. There has also been an uprising of weeds and a few gophers that have been wreking havok on the brocolli and brussel sprouts. That being said there is plenty of maintenance to do in the garden. Hopefully we will have a great turnout this Saturday, at 10am, for our welcome back Winter Garden Party. We will be doing lots of garden maintenace, including sheet mulching and pruning, as well as planting more winter crops, an asparagus bed, and strawberries. As if that wasn't enough we will be firing up the old cob oven and cooking some pizzas along with some other tasty treats for lunch. The weather is supposed to be great. It should be a blast. Tell your friends and I hope to see everyone there.