Garden Notes From a Neighbor…

With fewer than  723,000 people spread over its roughly 586,000 square miles,  Alaska is the least densely populated state in the United States. However,  almost 388,000 folks live  in the Anchorage/MatSu region   , so most of the state has considerably fewer than the 1.2-1.3 persons/square mile so often quoted. 

We  think of ourselves as neighbors,  however far flung we are, and the internet has made visiting with  each other regularly a delightful reality not possible  before the advent of the “tubes” due to distance and dollars. When  weather and electricity cooperate, email allows for daily visits . Blogs by Alaskan neighbors expand the visiting  further and have become a wonderful way to peek in on projects , join conversations, and keep up with each other.

One of our favorite Alaskan blogs is Nasugraq Rainey Hopson’s Stop and Smell the Lichen .  Rainey lives in Anaktuvuk Pass , a village in the North Slope Borough, north of the Arctic Circle.

 Rainey’s art and blog reflect her love of her home and community. These works of her hands and mind are as meaningful as her home place is beautiful. It is always a pleasure to find a new post on her site , whatever the subject is!

Rainey plans  to learn  how to grow vegetables in her far north home . She has agreed to share her 1st year gardening adventure here with us at Anonymous Bloggers.

I asked her if she had “before” pictures of the to-be garden space  we could share here but, as it is apparently still buried in snow  , we’ll have to wait for “before” until “after”… :-)

Thank you for sharing, Rainey!

An Arctic vegetable garden….the details of stage one.

by Nasugraq Rainey Hopson

A while back I had a reader ask me if I was really going to be able to plant a garden here.  The answer is yes!Of course living where I am living poses some pretty big obstacles,  which meant that I did a lot of research and planning and general milling about in anxiety.  I thought I would share the beginning of this journey! 

Location.  The garden will be located behind our house.  I did find out that there was an elder that grew a  small vegetable garden here but she did it far out of town, to avoid the dust and exhaust.  We decided to use our back yard, which is protected by several buildings, some dense tall willows, and the luck of being shielded from the road by some neat tricks of the wind.  Since we have dried meat there we know that it gets good air circulation, sunlight galore, with very little contamination, which is a must.  Plus it will be closer to monitor and work on!

Cold.  The cold is probably the biggest barrier.  The permafrost layer is not far beneath our feet, and this chills the earth so much that it will prevent or hamper most vegetable plants from growing.  So I will be using above ground warming techniques.  My husband is building several raised beds from wood, in which I will fill with soil from a fertile spot away from town that I know has escaped being contaminated by human beings.  The beds will be taller than what you usually see in most areas, at least a foot high, and long and slim rather than more of a squarish bed.  Having the earth exposed to the warmer air temperatures will keep them warmer.  I also plan to use an army of plastic buckets and bins for the plants that can tolerate being in a container, this will give me the option of moving them inside to a more protected area (in the arctic we call this part of our homes the ‘kunnichuck’ or ‘vestibule’ in English.)  Since I plan to have a few water loving plants I am going to try and build a few self watering buckets.  I will also be using some plastic covers to warm the beds before planting and while the seedling are germinating, once they sprout then I will remove the covers.  The cold at the beginning and end of the season will be the problem, but in the summer the temperatures usually get to 80-90 degrees.  The date for the last frost here is June 1st, which gives you an idea of how cold it gets and how short the season is! 

Sun.  Believe it or not the 24 hours a day sunlight will be a problem.  Here the growing season is a very SHORT. And most of that season will include the sun never setting.  This limits the types of plants that I can grow, though I plan to experiment with one: soybean. Soybeans require nighttime, and I have researched several techniques that I am going to try and trick them into thinking it’s night time.  Hopefully if it works I can get a good harvest and start creating a plant that will do well here, I am starting with two types of soybean, one of which is a short season plant.  My husband, like so many Natives, is lactose intolerant so a ‘milk’ source for him would save us a ton of money.  The never setting sun will also make it so that we are watering more than usual. 

Plants.  This was probably the area I spent the most time.  Some of the plants I have chosen are known to do well here.  Some are just experiments. But I seriously think that people should warn you of the incredible urge to BUY.  I seriously think I over bought seed …but it was FUN.  Such an addicting FUN.  I did set myself a basic rule though: buy only heirloom seed, and buy a couple of really good seed saving guide books…so hopefully next year the seed buying spree will not be as …big.  I bought seed from several areas: Denali seed company (specializes in Alaska friendly plants), Etsy (some amazing varieties in there!), and a few here and there from more well know large online companies (if I couldn’t find the variety I was looking for at the first two places).  I  also bought a soil tester kit, a couple of good fertilizers, some seed starting kits and soil, silica gel packets, and some very cheap growing light bulbs (cause I found I can’t afford actual grow lights!).  So what seed did I get?  The list is embarrassingly huge, so I’ll try and be brief. 

Hulless Oats – I love oats and will be buying a ‘roller’ later in the season to make rolled oats to use for food and for my products I sell.  This plant will act as a barrier between plants that might try and cross pollinate.  It will also work to condition the soil, as I will be rotating this crop every year. 

Peas – I have two types: Green arrow and dwarf grey sugar. 

Cabbage – every Alaskan veggie garden has cabbage!  They love sunlight.  I also love kimchi and cabbage soup.

Calendula – works to help keep your garden pest free and I will use the petals in my products.

Onion and chives – evergreen bunching and Alaska loving chives.  Pretty much use onion in every meal. 

Sunflowers – cause OMG you can grow these here!

Spinach – Bloomsdale long standing – got these as a free packet so I will give then a try even though they bolt early in the Alaska sun. Hoping I can get a couple of quiches at least!

Leaf lettuce – grand rapids variety – Probably the plant I will love the most, getting a good salad here is a rare treat and much loved!

Winter squash – gold nugget – I am a bit afraid of squash in general but I thought I would give it a try.  I know I like eating them. 

Radish – oddly enough we love this in some seal oil. 

Herbs – i love cooking.  Love it.  I will be growing Cilantro, Sage, Basil, and Rosemary.  I will have to figure out how much I will actually use in the year and what space they will take to get a feel for this area.

Round carrots – a short cute carrot that I know will go well in seal oil and also the nephews will LOVE.

Peppers – hungarian sweet wax- seems to me that this plant will need to be babied but I want to see how well it will do!

Soybean – Butterbean and edible early hakucho – or experiment one and experiment two as I like to call them

Tomatoes – i fell in love with the idea of tomatoes.  Which is probably why I ended up with so many.  I bought ‘spoon’ tomatoes, which have a shortish season.  One called ‘early wonder’ which is also short season, and I received a free packet of a random variety which the seller told me contains several Russian and Siberian varieties. Who can say no to tomatoes?

Sweet corn – well I said to only buy heirloom but when I ran into this variety my curiosity wrestled me to the ground and put me in a headlock.  This variety is called ‘Trinity hybrid’ (sounds scary I know) and is a short season and short stature corn (it will grow only about 4-5 feet tall).  I am only going to try and plants one small bed with it to see how it does. 

Echinacea – Pretty, and extremely useful. 

Potatoes – cause it’s Alaska.  My husband is going to design a series of boxes that I can stack on top of each other to make a ‘potato’ box, to get the most yield out of them.  

So that’s the list!  I seriously think they should have a Seed Buyers Anonymous, because it took me a while to shake that seed buying fever.  I have every inch of my backyard planned out, and I plan to use some vertical space for my herbs.  So far I have mapped out my lay out, and started the tomato, peppers, and Echinacea.  They are pretty little plants sitting next to me here in my lab/office, under the cool light of a full spectrum light bulb.  The stevia did not germinate and I’m thinking it is because I could not get the soil warm enough.  Next year I will give it another try.  Next week I will be transplanting the seedlings to a larger peat pot as they have almost completely taken over the little peat pellet thingies.  At the end of this month I will be starting the Squash.  I have started keeping a journal for my garden and have kept good notes on what I am doing, because I plan to do this every year and I know it will pretty much be a ‘learning’ year for me.  I told my husband that I expected at least half of our plants to not do very well, he frowned a bit and told me that he will be helping too, which pretty much upped the percentage to at least 80%.  Out of the two of us he has the greenest finger whereas I rely on luck!

Hope this finds all of you warming up in the spring weather! 

 

 

 

Beauty in the Eye of the Beholder

Who are those guys?!

Worms!

Quite some time ago here at Anonymous Bloggers, we tried to start a conversation about worms. I would love to revive that conversation and would hope people can bring more ideas and information we can look at.

Composting is tough for me for a number of reasons. Tiny garden space, bears, trying to keep it all hot enough during the cold months, bears…

Some small success with in-season composting keeps me trying, but I have been bummed about how much kitchen stuff is just flat wasted through the winter.

Aren't they beautiful?

Late last summer I was given a “Worm Farm” by someone who was leaving Alaska for retirement near family Outside. She sent hubby on ahead by air to scout for a home, loaded up her rig, her dogs, and dropped off her worm buddies with a few instructions about care and feeding at my place on her way to the ferry.

The homemade worm bin allows liquids to drop into the bottom container, has a lid, and the nested containers fit quite nicely in my front coat closet.

The lil boogers, red wigglers, settled in quite nicely and busily worked their way through everything I gave them through the winter.

Recently I realized it was time to harvest the compost.

That got interesting as I also realized I had not asked enough questions of my departing neighbor and didn’t know anyone with a worm bin. (I’ve since met someone who is just starting out.)

I looked round the “tubes” and found a number of descriptions of how to separate the worms from the compost depending on one’s set up.

Given the size of my container the “manual harvest” was the only real option as mine doesn’t have room to pile old stuff to one side and encourage the worms to migrate to fresh bedding and food.

Holy moley and sweet merry!

What a mess I made!

I did not take any pictures of that project for fear of ruining my camera.

In the end I had lovely compost, happy worms, and need of a shower.

I have written myself a note for next time to lay the plastic out in the bed of my truck to discourage all the neighborhood dogs who showed up to “help”.

We would love to hear from any of you who have worm composted, in or out-of-doors, and any tips you have would be much appreciated.

For folks who are interested in trying out a kitchen waste bin, this HOW TO is pretty good.

I imagine Alaskans will still have a bit of a go, in most places, in getting worms and wonder if anyone knows the best way to go about that, in hopes the wormies make it here safely, unlike our neighbor in the original post here who had his go missing along with his luggage!

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UgaVic and I are excited that one of our favorite Alaskan bloggers has agreed to share her garden experience from above the Arctic Circle  with us this season. Look for our guest blogger soon!

Spring? It Should Be!!

Frozen rivers still abound!

On this first official day of spring it is still a little hard to feel it will be here in a few short weeks no matter what it might look and feel like now. 

 

While much of the lower 48 has had a much warmer than ‘normal’ winter and probably that trend will go into the spring, Alaska has not. Many places have shattered records for snowfall and cold temperatures and we have not been released from the grips of winter just yet, despite the calendar.  

 

Somewhere under all that snow is a wood deck, 25' high bank, and river!

 

Those of us who garden, and farm, have been telling each other ‘it will be OK’, spring will come and thus we keep up with our plans and activities. Seed catalogs that have pored over for at least weeks, if not months, now are yielding orders for the chosen seeds. Seed mats and flats are out and being put to work. If there is a grow lamp it is being hung up again and plugged in.

 

There is much discussion about how deep the frost level might be, given the mild fall, snowfall and THEN deep freeze with still more snowfall. Many old timers are thinking the ground is not frozen very deep and once the thaw starts it will move fast. Flooding might also be a concern for some areas.

 

Garden plans are coming closer to finalization and those with high tunnels and greenhouses are making sure they are cleaned up and ready to accept the seeds and starts once they warm up more.  

 

The bug to support those producing local food and/or to grow more of your own seems to have hit Alaska full force in the past few years. Whereas much of the lower 48 has been experiencing this movement for somewhat longer, it is something that has still not reached its full power here in Alaska.  

 

For many it seems impossible that such a cold, many times inhospitable place when it comes to growing conditions, could also be able to give us variety and great locally great food. It is not just the cold, but in many places the wind and soil that is less than perfect that has kept many from feeling anything of much value could be produced.  

 

The Interior region of Alaska has had a reputation for years due to its jumbo cabbages and other extra-large produce but the variety has always been questioned. Other areas of Alaska have never developed a reputation for growing much of anything but that is changing. 

 

Tim Meyers of Bethel,  whom we first wrote about in 2009 after attending the Alaska Sustainable Agriculture Conference, has helped bring attention to that area of the state. Dillingham has now run an ever growing gardening set of workshops to the growing movement there. Sitka is ahead of most villages and cities for its holistic view to growing local. It is making it a city-wide effort that hopefully more cities will follow.  

 

 

In our backyard here on the Alaska Peninsula we are moving forward with plans to build on the last few yeas of lessons learned. We will putting more land into production, expanding the varieties we grow and hopefully increasing the volume of food we can actually produce.

 

Hopefully this year we will actually have time, the space and means to raise some turkeys. Some plans for the a future orchard will be explored. We hopefully can add some additional types of fruit to the mix and mostly show still more people what all we in Alaska can accomplish.

Too Early For Spring Fever…

It’s been a wild winter for much of Alaska. Extreme cold, oodles of snow, warm interludes, high winds – lots of normal winter type weather, only squared or tripled.

The latest warm spell in my area has pushed me right past cabin fever into spring fever.

To quiet it some, I’ve been looking at garden notes from last year. My notes always start out great and as the season wears on get more and more scant and peppered with remarks and abbreviations I can’t understand this far away from events.  “NO!” scribbled on empty seed packets usually means whatever it was was not a success , but who knows what “ftt” or “snf” or “fgqh” mean now?! Once again, I’m promising myself I’ll make a list of terms and abbreviations… sigh… and know that I’ll probably forget by July.

The one section of notes which is easy to understand is “Potatoes”.

I tried something different last year and it was so successful I’m doing it again.

A  7 Ways to Plant Potatoes article I found outlined a number of methods and the author’s notes about what did and didn’t work and their notions of whys and hows of each result.

My criteria for choosing the wire cylinder method included suited-to-my-climate, cost in dollars and hours of work, and space needed in an already overcrowded garden.

Suited to my climate:

I wanted a method which drains well.

Southeast Alaska is just plain tough in a lot of ways. Summers are cool and wet and cloudy for the most part.

The last half of April, and May and June tend to be the driest months here. July and August are wet, averaging 4.5+ and 6.0+ inches respectively, but often exceeding those averages, in recent years, by as much as triple rainfall amounts. Gardens which start beautifully early on can simply melt or rot by late July or early August.

Native soils don’t help much with the rot thingy in many parts of my area as we are, in many places, mostly glacial till or flour (powdered rock dust) left behind by retreating glaciers. It packs almost as tight as clay soils do if it is not amended heavily.

I wanted a method which didn’t cost much to put in place and didn’t take a lot of time to manage through the growing season.

I wanted a method which would make maximum use of space as I’ve stuffed the small area I have very full but am always looking to expand what I can grow.

Potatoes do ok here in containers but most are expensive. After the last of the barrel type I used for years bit the dust I liked the inexpensive hardware cloth and zip-tie container idea!

My cylinders were almost 30 inches in diameter, much more than the 18 inches the article author made. I put leftover pieces of weed cloth in the bottom in anticipation of what heavy late summer rains might do in terms of washout in my larger cylinder. Given we had 12.91 inches in August, 15.06 inches in September, and 12.63 inches in October, I’m glad I did and will do so again!

The sticks are to keep curious ravens out – they sometimes dig around in or dig up fresh plantings. I’m not sure what is going on in their birdly brains when they do that but I try to discourage them, whatever it is that they are doing.

I used peat to fill up around the plants as they grew as it is readily available here.

This ended up being an almost no-maintenance way to grow spuds for me. The darn plants got to be almost 5 feet tall and worried me some that too much energy was going to above ground greens.

Harvest? Just yank the cylinder off!

The yield in the end was very high and very good quality so I guess they were just happy spud plants in all ways!

For Alaskan gardeners, here’s a list of certified seed potato sources here in Alaska, along with a list of all the mouth-watering varieties available. If I have to have spring fever, you do too!! 

My order is ready to go. Yours?

Just Have to See!

Ugashik Lagoon

As parts of the US have had mild weather, then killer storms, and some parts of Alaska are getting buried by record snows the Alaska Peninsula has had just ‘heavy’ snows and a long cold snap.

As usually the case for our part of Alaska when we get these cold snaps we usually get lots of bright sunshine!

SunDogs in January

It makes for some great opportunities to enjoy the abundant wildlife .

A neighbor!

One resident, Robert Dreezsen, and his wife live in an area of the Alaska Peninsula many do not venture into during our coldest months. He has agreed to share some of his great pictures with all of you. We hope you enjoy them as much as we do!

A pair of eagles seen fairly often in the area.

A Chuckle While Tidying Up…

Tidying Up

A couple of our favorite blogs have changed their “homes” recently. We would like to congratulate them on their new digs and encourage you to look at the the projects they’ve taken on since moving.

Bill Hess , Alaskan photographer and blogger extraordinaire (amongst all his other accomplishments and activities ) has moved from his delightful Wasilla by 300…  to a more photograph friendly set up at Logbook -Alaska, Wasilla, Beyond.   The quality of the visuals on his new site are blow-your-shorts-off better . Bill is the same , thank heavens, and has created another wonderful place to visit.

Saima of Kotzebue had started a blog about raising chickens in the far north at Tundra Chicks in 2009 on a Blogger platform. This last October she moved to a WordPress platform and the new tundrachicks  promises to continue to delight as a window on her chicken projects as well as family life .

The links in our blogroll on our Home Page lead to the new homes our neighbors have moved to and we hope you stop by and see what they are up to!

A Welcome Smile

Search terms which bring  folks to Anonymous Bloggers tend to be fairly predictable. People who have questions about Alaskan Salmon, cold climate housing, cold climate gardening, and fishing issues stop by regularly since they tend to choose  those terms for searching.

We see folks regularly popping in to read the little bit we have about subsistence issues, alternative energy info, and so on.

Sometimes a term just makes us wonder though, wonder how it got people here and what they got out of their visit.

In this last few days “just found out alaska is not an island” has brought someone(s) to visit here 3 times.

I laughed until I almost cried when I saw that in the Search Engine Terms list in the background here.

It reminded me of so many funny and sometimes frustrating attempts to get things shipped into or out of Southeast Alaska, trying to explain we don’t have UPS Ground because we don’t have any roads ,well yes, we have local roads, but there is no road into or out of Southeast, no, we’re not nearer Hawaii than Seattle, the barges which serve us come out of Seattle, yes, we are mostly islands but also part of the continental United States while not being part of the contiguous United States… Agh!

I remembered opening a gift at Christmas when I was 6 and how my excitement  turned to horror when I really looked at it . It was a map puzzle of America and Alaska was an island off in the South Pacific ! My ma assured me with a smile that Alaska hadn’t fallen off  the continent but I never did put that puzzle piece back in that place. I  laid it north of  Washington State and taped it on so it wouldn’t fall off ever again!

We appreciate everyone who stops by, even and especially those who remind us in unconventional ways of how much we treasure this place, this Alaska, this non-island on the huge island of North America.

Thanks for stopping by.

CDQ 101

We are  approaching the  first decennial  review of CDQ entities after  2006 changes to the law governing the Community Development Quota program and entities took effect.

UgaVic and I hope to talk about a number of the issues surrounding CDQs and the upcoming review in the coming weeks.

We thought it might be best to start  with a very basic overview of the CDQ program- to refresh the memory of those who know about it already, as well as   provide a framework for those who have never heard of it.

Setting the blade on high and risking leaving some very rough patches as I blaze over the subject but hoping to be somewhat inclusive of any folks who have never heard of CDQs I will make a flying run at it all.
CDQ, Community Development Quota , is the federal legislative response to concern by small communities on the Bering Sea in relation to their ability to partake in the catch share programs in federal waters off the coast they live on.
The law established that a percentage of  yearly allowable catch , in multiple fisheries, be set aside for these villages who could not and would not be eligible for shares under the rules established for allocation of shares otherwise because of their historical lack of presence in the fisheries . (Their lack of presence , the whys, hows, and wherefores is a piece of the whole but needs a post by itself) )
Six regional non-profits were organized to manage the monies derived from the profits the sales of the set aside quota made. The ones I’ve had occasion to cross paths with are organized as 501(c)(4)s -social welfare-but I have never checked to see if all six are. Member villages  have representatives in the regional corporations. Each CDQ entity has bylaws governing how those representatives are chosen.
As often happens, the term CDQ began to stand for the organizations themselves as well as the program  so there’s a lot of flinging around of the term which gets confusing.
The law required that all CDQs have Community Development Plans and limited investments , outside of monies earmarked for education opportunities for stakeholders in their villages, to fishery infrastructure and support related projects.
It also required yearly state oversight of the CDPs to see if  intent and reality matched
Within a few years , some of the CDQs started fishing their own quota rather than receiving the monies  from sale of their quota, by investing as partners in other companies or buying their own boats/ships/processor companies. This was hailed as win-win as they  were then in the position of being able to provide employment opportunities to their stakeholders as well.
Along the way , the law was changed to drop yearly state oversight, lengthen reporting time between CDPs,  and allow for some non-fisheries related investment amongst other changes.
Some CDQs now  have large for-profit corporations  which operate as “feeders” of monies to the parent non-profits.There have been wrangles over how much information the “feeders” do or do not share with their parent non-profits and stakeholders, as well as how much  information the CDQ entities must share with their stakeholders .

People ask about  what  the real benefits to CDQ communities are/ might be – it’s not simple to answer.
Many of the metrics used to measure benefit fall into what I think of as taking the temperature of the picture of the people on the box the thermometer came in.
They are measures of dollars piled up, spread around, employment figures without full context, glossies of completed projects, and so on.

The current  law says :

(H) DECENNIAL REVIEW AND ADJUSTMENT OF ENTITY ALLOCATIONS.—

(i) IN GENERAL.—During calendar year 2012 and every 10 years thereafter, the State of Alaska shall evaluate the performance of each entity participating in the program based on the criteria described in clause (ii).

(ii) CRITERIA.—The panel shall establish a system to be applied under this subparagraph that allows each entity participating in the program to assign relative

values to the following criteria to reflect the particular needs of its villages:

(I) Changes during the preceding 10-year period in population, poverty level, and economic development in the entity’s member villages.

(II) The overall financial performance of the entity, including fishery and nonfishery investments by the entity.

(III) Employment, scholarships, and training supported by the entity.

(IV) Achieving of the goals of the entity’s community development plan.

At this point, the State of Alaska is attempting to develop a way to evaluate performance and looking to funding to perform the review.

Many stakeholders in member villages feel that the weaknesses identified in this 1999 report have never been addressed and should be integrated in meaningful measure in the upcoming evaluation process.

“Perhaps the greatest weakness of the CDQ program as implemented is lack of open, consistent communication between the CDQ groups and the communities they represent, particularly a lack of mechanisms for substantial input from the communities into the governance structures. There has also been a lack of outreach by the state to the communities to help ensure that the communities are aware of the program and how to participate. Some controversy has surrounded the uncertainty about the intended beneficiaries of the program—essentially, whether the program is intended primarily for the Native Alaskan residents of the participating communities, and, if not, review the governance structures to ensure that non-native participation is possible. “

I think stakeholders are correct here. Accepting what these CDQ entities say about their own performance, weighted at their own discretion, creates  a very narrow window on what might be called “success” .

With that in mind, I do not think we will be able to judge clearly whether the CDQs are really benefitting their communities if we cannot extend or adjust the way we measure success and benefit to include criteria for judgment not normally employed by “blue ribbon panels”  or self interested self-reporting.

Stakeholders and their communities , the supposed beneficiaries of “success’ must have  a place at the table, a part in the evaluation process, for the process to be credible.

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postscript 

 I have skipped right on by anything to do with the uproar over CDQs participating in trawl fisheries which are suspected of damaging other fisheries including subsistence fishing but it is an important aspect of questioning real benefit as well

From The Tundra To The Tongass…..

As some of us have started our holiday celebrations and others are still preparing, we here at AB want to wish everyone much happiness, warmth, joy and love during this celebration time.

Our hope is that all who are traveling arrive safely, that you are surrounded by those you care for, that any health issues are lessened, that all have enough food, that homes are warm and most that we all find some peace during this time.

 

 

Strictly Personal!!

The lifeblood of rural Alaska !!

Although this is a glimpse into one particular event that can, and does, happen in ‘bush” Alaska something tells me almost anyone can relate, especially if in a committed relationship! Just think about this incident like the car, washing machine, etc., that will for sure die when the partner that is  most familiar with it leaves town, usually within 24 hours of said leaving.

The beginning was simple and predictable enough. Spouse and I were in the ‘big’ city, Anchorage, a few weeks ago for some business. Since winter was also almost upon us I had made a lengthy list of things I felt we needed to get to make sure at least the start of the winter was survivable.

We were lucky enough to get one whole day, the use of a car and have two able bodied adults, to just run errands, something that almost never happens. (Usually you are cramming personal things like errands into lunch hours, evenings after meetings or even super early times due to other commitments. Most times there is also only one of us in town at the time)

A trip, or even two, to one of the big wholesale food, clothing, books, and whatever else they can think of to offer stores is ALWAYS on the list when coming in from the bush! Trips to a big box tool store, the ‘regular’ grocery store, some specialty tool places and of course the last place we all end up at, the airport post office to get all items heading home are also on the list of ‘must dos’.

So, back to the beginning, spouse and I were in town, had time and were off to get a few things done. Knowing that most items I had on the list could be gotten at the big discount store we head there first. While tromping the aisles, moving quickly but trying to see if there were items of need they had that you had not thought of (so often called impulse buying and what gets so many of us in hot water) we come to the automotive, batteries, mundane and expensive but needed section. I look at the rack of batteries, car/truck type, not camera type and my list with notes on it. I reach for a battery and spouse asks what I am getting. I explain that I usually try to get us at least 2 new batteries sometime during the summer as back-ups for the winter and this year I had not gotten it done yet. I am then informed that these are the ‘wrong’ kind. Given I have bought these from the same place year after year, had made notes of previous purchases, I was not convinced. Also realizing that this was not the time or place to ignore said comments I ask a few questions like. “well what type do you want to get?” The type mentioned was not there, of course. I voiced that given that we surely must make some time to check another place and get them before we leave as being without back-up batteries is not a lesson I need to relearn. Agreement was reached. At that time my inner voice, OK actually ALARM voice, said,”you better keep at this as spouse is likely to forget, ignore and overall leave us without back-up batteries since he had not lived “the lesson learning” time in a number of years”….meaning spouse would not be the one stuck ‘up the river without a paddle’.

This is the same as the time all of you have mentioned to a loved one, ‘shouldn’t we get a new washer hose soon as that one is leaking’, or ‘the noise in the car is happening more often and louder’ and been told not to worry they would take care of it can relate, I am sure.

So fast forward a few weeks to a month, the spouse heads out of town for a few days, no biggie as this has already happened a few times this year and goes on all winter.

Of course that first night the first good snow fall hits, causing 2-3 foot drifts and temperatures that are now much closer to 0 than freezing.

Spouse has been gone about 30 hours, things are running smoothly and you are about done for the day. Having buttoned up all outside activities, gotten the dogs inside, eaten dinner and settled in with a good book….alas the power goes off! Given we produce all our own power, be it from the diesel generator or some renewable energy (RE) system this is not a matter of waiting for someone else to deal with it. (The RE system happened to be waiting for spouse to replace a part that had arrived while gone and thus was not operational for these few days)

Now this could be a matter of running out of fuel, unlikely but still possible, a battery issue or something even worse like a blown seal. On go sweats, heavy socks-as this could be involve a lot of walking back and forth through drifted snow, clunky big winter boots, hat, ear muffs, big jacket, and gloves. Flashlight is unhooked from the power source (another relatable story for later about how always having a working flashlight is a MUST) and off to tromp to the generator building.

Thank heavens spouse has listened and an emergency light box is in the shed and working like a champ. There is enough light to at least see where to walk and equipment fairly well. Fuel is checked, low but OK, so onto the control panel/start switch. It looks to have vibrated off its normal place and fallen onto the top of the battery. Sure enough once righting things the switch is turned and it is determined quickly the battery is dead. Close by is another battery that had been hooked up to the charger so things look like they will be easy to remedy.

After a couple of different changes of batteries it is determined either none have enough life in them to start a dead generator OR the connections cannot be made tight enough to get enough juice to the generator to start.

Desire to return to a warm house, and probably soon to bed, overrules any desire to spend the next hour or two trying to right things that night.

A quick call is made to spouse to enlighten about said situation at home. Only an answering machine is gotten and two messages updating on what happened and attempts to right it are made. (Don’t worry, having lived through these things any number of times over the years we have back-up heating, telephone, radio and a light or two that can either run without electricity or are hooked to a 12 volt system in the house. All of this, most times, can keep things comfortable and communication going for a minimum of 24 hours)

Dragging the phone extension up near the bed everyone settles in for the night. About 15 minutes later comes a return call from spouse. All remedies attempted are explained in more detail and plans laid for early morning attempts. It is settled that the house is warm enough and will stay that way, everyone is safe and spouse will head home the next day unless early morning suggested new remedies are successful.

The night proves uneventful, no winds kick up to cause damage to items needing electricity to maintain integrity and animals figure out that making noise to get up at 5 AM is not going to result in anyone getting up to turn on the lights and feed them.

Once the sun is up far enough to actually help with seeing items, all the possible remedies are attempted. In the course of these attempts are searches for tools, since said spouse has borrowed your tools so many times and failed to return them you no longer having any. There are obstacles that result in you stumbling, remember those clunky boots, and setting a 100# battery down just hard enough to break a cell and have battery acid form a pool on the generator building floor (yes, we have soda handy to keep this from being more dangerous than batteries already are) and hook-ups on the last battery tried do require additional parts not readily available. By mid-morning, after a number of calls to spouse, any attempts to play junior mechanic are done and a hot cup of tea is being enjoyed inside.

Spouse will be home in a few hours, probably righting things is less than an hour, the sun is shining, the house is warm and we WILL be getting a couple of back-up batteries purchased and out here ASAP. No ‘I told you so’ will be necessary but some inner voice says that next time it is suggested that we get an item as back-up there will be compliance.

Winter Outside, Greens Inside!

The river is showing some serious 'ice building' on this 9 degree day.

Well after being battered by storms these last few weeks all up and down at least the west coast of Alaska we are wondering if this is how our entire winter is going to play itself out.

For those of us on the Alaska Peninsula and Bristol Bay the weather has actually been pretty mild in many areas with only a few cold snaps, into the 20s and not a lot of snow. The  storms have had lots of rain and sleet associated with winds upwards of 70+ kt.  So when this real ‘cold snap’ hit we were all a little surprised.  We had become accustomed already to watching for winds speeds and not paying too much attention to temperatures.

We had been harvesting the last of the outside cold tolerant crops like cabbage, any potatoes left in the ground and covering the perennials that we are attempting to grow through the winter these last few weeks.

This week was the time to see if the things we are trying to grow and  harvest late into the winter are going to make it or if our efforts were now killed with these hard freezes. Ground temperatures are holding right now at 34/35 degrees even through the night, as measured by probes down about 6″-8″ under the surface inside the high tunnels.

Late fall planted greens under row cover and making it through the first few freezes and so far at least one single digit night and day.

So far, so good. We clipped a salad from the chard (rainbow) just a few evenings ago, letting these greens get bigger and pulled a few other things.

The last bits of cold tolerant crops, as they have been now clipped off by the chickens.

In our high tunnels we still have green onions, some spinach and carrots still being harvested. I was told a week or so ago that at least one high tunnel grower in Dillingham was still getting kale, and a number of other crops the last week in October. They generally have colder, wetter weather than we do further south in this part of Bristol Bay, even being only about 50 miles away by way the crow flies.

The last few years have been fast-moving as a lot more information is being shared, projects considered, even other set of high tunnels in our tiny village, and generally an effort to be more sustainable in our own areas.

We will keep you posted on how the winter efforts go to furnish at least part of our own fresh things up here in Alaska!