Fireweed

Finding Empathy

2012-01-20T13:40:00.000-08:00

-30 this morning. Warmed up. Yesterday morning the thermometer tube was empty. Its lowest reading is -40.
This being our first year keeping bees, as we’ve written about in a previous post, the cold snap is a bit of a worry. Until a week ago it was a warm winter.

So far the hives are strong.

After a very wet late spring and wet first half of the summer, the bees began to seriously gather nectar in August. The frost arrived at the beginning of Sept so we fed them open trays of sugar syrup until they stopped taking it near the middle of October so they could build up their winter stores.

It seems to be a crazy idea keeping bees here, a subtropical insect. We see the honey bee collapse as a microcosm of the state that human beings are manipulating the environment. They have as good a chance here as anywhere else… being kept. Maybe a better chance.
We stuck to the Warre hive management philosophy.

All three of us spent hours observing the hives, reading and researching.
With observation windows built into a few of the boxes and the observation of the hive entrance we committed ourselves to everyday, we are building confidence that we can have a reading of the health of our hives.

Meat birds, healthy and thriving, becoming predators. When they arrive as day old chicks they grow seeming to have no idea except to stay warm, eat their feed and drink. When they get older, 3 weeks, you can feed them grower, feed them all day, keeping their trough full. They lie around and eat.

After a couple of weeks of this most get comfortable and may only move half a dozen yards for the rest of their lives. After nine or ten weeks slaughter them and fill your freezer.
We did this one year. We felt so disgusted with the operation that we didn’t raise meat chickens again and realized that this method of raising chickens was still so much better than what is out there. We stopped eating chicken.

After reading an article in Mother Earth News about raising meat birds in a humane way, we decided to give it another try.
As soon as the chicks arrived our son Kai gathered worms and bugs from the garden and introduced them to the chicks. It was hilarious. Leaping out of the way of the marauding click beetles. Then, one stopped, slowly, with trepidation, watching, studying and zeroing in on one of the beetles. It made its attack. Soon they were chasing each other around trying to steal each others' finds.
After a couple of days they would all wait for Kai with anticipation.
We have a couple of hens who have chicks about the same time and that are about the same size. We put the Cornish Giant meat chicks with the hens and their chicks. All together into the same run. The meat birds quickly learned how to forage from the lessons of the hens teaching their chicks. The Giants began to dwarf the laying birds. They turned into ravenous prehistoric mini raptors.
By the end of their time they’re travelling in flocks with free run of the property. Foraging for bugs, toadlets, worms, seeds and whatever else they need. Twice a day, first thing in the morning and in the evening Kai feeds them grower to satisfy their insatiable appetites. Every evening 25 giant Chickens gather out front and wait for Kai. Their lives are fast and furious. Ten weeks go by. We slaughter all the Cornish Giants and fill our freezer with chicken.
　
From the standpoint of having nothing. Come closer to your end than you feel comfortable with. Then push it a little further. You could die. With a little time and imagination you will be able to empathize. you can begin to see what you need to survive as an individual living amongst life on this planet. Maybe even become a brother or sister with most on the planet.

Every year the winter firewood piles have become easier to build.
The mature pine forests are dead. Huge trees collapsing on each other falling like dominoes.

Time and imagination.
There are a lot of changes coming fast.

Regards, Aki and Scott

http://www.caribooblades.com/

Winter Bees and Beethoven

2011-12-27T10:39:00.001-08:00

Have a good New Year.

Kai, Aki and Scott

June Bees

2011-06-15T11:34:00.000-07:00

Lots of rain, sun in between.

Our first thought was that the flowers are going to be incredible.

Imagine waking to a torn sky.
Lying in your bed covered with debris. Falling.
A cacophony of sounds,
jets,
bombs... your child.

Just planted the greenhouse in our bushcraft garden. In a month it is a tomato, pepper and basil jungle.
You can refer to our post titled, "Sustainable Bush Gardening", posted on the 3/7/08 for information and pictures of our gardening methods.

Dandelions and saskatoon bushes bloom, indian paintbrush, strawberry, silverweed, violets and on and on. Meanwhile fireweed and the wild roses are growing strong. It is almost surreal even in a normal year when the bloom happens.

We've been having a wet spring similar to a season 8 or 9 years ago so .

Survival. This chick didn't make it.

Mushrooms that haven’t shown their fruit for years. Amazing to witness the boreal forest become
rainforest.

When it rains, when it pours the verdure explodes.

There was a Moose and her long legged calf crashing the pond today. Just browsing. Lots of bears this spring. A pair of eagles seems to have taken up residence close. Lots of ducks. Mallard, golden eye, merganser, bufflehead, red head, widgeon, ruddy, coot, scaup, ring neck.
Canada geese.

The resident sand hill cranes and red tail hawks are back. Our presence may be a nuisance but they get used to us and thrive.

Even the garlic, onions and peas are slow this year. Cool and wet. Most has started growing now. Potatoes still aren't up.

Short season, higher altitude and things grow fast and recover. Maybe..
We planted more seed rather than seedlings for late broccoli and cabbage. Looks like the seeds may catch the earlier planting of small seedlings.

We decided this was the year to start keeping bees. The more research we did the more daunting the task, between what they say you have to do, what humans have done to them and the short honey season and long winters here.

The point of death and extinction instead of sustaining themselves like they have been doing for at least the last forty million years.

There are so many opinions, so many who “know”. I read, “one question to 12 beekeepers and you’ll receive 13 different answers“. As far as I can tell, that is the case.

We built our own honey bee hives with several design ideas in mind. A STUMP, Emile Warre hive management, Kenyan top bar hives and the 8 frame Langstroth design. Another design feature, that was mentioned by a friend who kept bees for 15 years was a honey bee hive he helped removed from between the walls in a cabin. He said it was the strongest hive he had ever seen.
There has to be something more logical than an “all or nothing world“.

Using 2 x 10, double end walls for hive boxes (3 1/4“ thick), a few boxes with windows and coverings.
Warre’s dimensions wide (300mm) but 40% longer, 11 top bars each. Two boxes are deep and long enough to accommodate Langstroth frames. We ironed in bees wax and painted the outsides with linseed for moisture protection.

We can easily lift the hives whole with the pulleys we installed to fit boxes in from the bottom keeping the disturbance to a minimun. The hives will not be opened until fall. The hives are by our kitchen window under shelter. We can watch the hives and check their progess by looking in the windows once in a while.

We are feeding them sugar syrup because they arrived with nothing. We won’t take any honey this year. Next year they’ll eat their own honey during the spring.

I’m reminded, when I rinse my face off in the rain barrel that we’re in this together you and I, everybody… they have no choice. We have no choice. Some we don’t mind sharing water with…How many millions of barrels of oil and how many tons of radio active material were dumped into our oceans this year not to mention all the stuff that is routinely dumped. For many years.

To be people responsible for the way we live. Just being fair.

www.caribooblades.com/shop.html

That Time of Year

2011-03-14T19:30:00.000-07:00

http://www.caribooblades.com/

Imagination

2011-03-10T16:31:00.000-08:00

The snow melts. Leaving . Started tomato plants, spinach, onions are peeking , chickens are preparing soil in the green house.
Honey bees this year. Modified Warre hives. Just a little bit of honey. For us.

We're at a cusp, Aki and I. This winter was the best ever.

The struggle. Lying on the lake in the soft snow. Thinking.

Solar Power, Engines and Alternators.

2011-01-14T17:39:00.000-08:00

The sun is getting higher in the sky. A new season is coming. Looking forward to it for sure.

Aki and I have run our shop and cabin on solar power for 14 years.

We are 100% solar powered from March until the middle of October. We work full time making knives and large timber tools.

We designed and installed our system
starting with 6 volt golf cart batteries, 2 x 85 watt panels and a 1200 watt inverter. The batteries are tough, inexpensive and easy to replace. After 14 years we've replaced 4 batteries.. last year. Twice a year I'll clean them with baking soda and water then top off each cell with distilled water.
I've seen people spend lots of money on batteries. Tough golf cart batteries are the way to go for our shop and lifestyle.

Today we have 315 watts of panel with one 120 watt panel waiting to be mounted when the new roof goes on. Four panels, a 30 amp regulator and we have a 1,750 watt (with a surge of 3,000) inverter.

We built a manual tracker. Three panels are mounted on top of a 20 foot pole set 2 feet into the ground in a cement housing. As we work we turn the panels to face the sun. Turn and tilt.
This has increased our power by 45%. The manual tracker we designed.
The tracker put us at the level of power we are satisfied with and grounded the system well.

An excellent ground is really important. Ground your inverter, batteries and panels.

Trick is to work with the sun. Don't think of it as storing power. Use power a lot when it is there in the sky.
At night use stored power for light, music and small amp tools.

If you have a steady wind a wind generator is the way to go.
It's quite amazing once you begin... Turning on your grinder and being powered by the sun.

Back up power has always been a concern here this time of year.

Late fall and winter. By the beginning of March we are free again to use as much as we want from the 4.5 billion year-old nuclear power plant in the sky. Although we've come to a spot in our time where we don't need a lot, we do want some.

The way we use oil. We're like maniac chain smokers. It's killing us and everything else. Whether it be cancer, war, starvation or the destruction of our environment. You know, everybody knows...

Besides solar in the winter the first power generation we produced 13 years ago was from a 35 amp 12v alternator I parted from an old wreck left on the land here. Rigged it up to an old 3 1/2 horse lawn mower. Did the job for a while. It was handy to have had it on wheels, kept the throttle on the handle bar but the old motor was pushed down with those 4 dead energy-sucking deep cycle batteries. The small 3 1/2 hp engine drank a surprising amount of gas, began to burn oil then died after a couple of seasons.

We traded for a second hand 10hp honda motor. It was nice. Ran well and was not loud.

Built a frame everything could sit on securely. Rigged a 50 amp alternator up to it from another wreck on our land. It ran well until...

Living off the land. We lived on an average of $400 a month for those years. For 1997 we lived on $200 a month. We ate a lot of rabbits, deer, dandelions, mushrooms and wild onions. It was a little rough but when we look back we realize that starting from there was great . Determined we were and still are.

...We needed more power. We needed the late fall and winter to be power-ready to be able to " exploit" Christmas and cover the spring when we needed time to plant our gardens.

We bought a 150 amp alternator from a trucking outfit and used parts and wiring from the from the wrecks.

Machined a pulley, adapted the larger alternator to the engine. Started it up. The unit was giving the four 6v deep cycle batteries what they wanted but the 10hp engine was working hard. Wasn't ideal - again it wasn't great on fuel because it was working hard but was better. Bought a small sanding machine a second and slightly larger grinder and a small band saw.

Could not believe we had lived without the new shop machines. Everything fell into our lives like a new pair of socks.
We were travelling around the province with handmade knives and edge tools participating and selling at 6 Christmas shows, 2 spring shows and 5 summer and fall shows. Fairs, art and craft and knife shows. We even did a couple of trade shows. The best was the Sto'lo nations Pow Wow in Chilliwack B.C..

Not a second to spare for 6 years.

Aki and I started to build a reputation for our art,tools and knives. Over half of our sales were repeat customers by 2004.

Crazy thing was that we did not have any time or money. We kept up our garden but that was absolutely the only time we had. All the money we made was for fuel to travel, motels, food, show fees, insurance...

The piston rod broke. The engine was worn out. It was September. Orders had to go out. The Christmas stock had to be started.

We had a '84 Safari van. 4L engine, propane. The rear end was shot from heavy loads, lots of travelling and no maintenance.

Looked at the engine. The air conditioning had been dismantled. With some small adjustments and fudsing with belt size the 150 amp alternator would fit right into the spot the compressor was in.

More power, burned much less fuel, burned cleaner and it was quiet. I thought small engines would be more fuel efficient, less impact. The thing was they were working hard. Like six cylinders in full size pick-ups. They don't burn less gas and they wear out faster and when the going gets tough they have a hard time performing the tasks.

In idle position the alternator still put a demand on the engine but wasn't threatening its life. We had added another solar panel. Our power needs had been met. Bought a bigger bandsaw and added a couple more batteries.

When the van was on in the winter we`d pump water, vacuum, charge batteries and the computer and grind steel.
The van lasted 5 winters. It started making sounds, worn sounds. The crank shaft pulley`s centre had shattered and 2 mounting bolts were sheared off. The drive pulley was being ripped off the engine. Holy torque.

In comes our old S-10, 2.8L. The great aspect to this plant was that the crank shaft pulley was a double belt to the alternator. A double pulley. Easy fit. Welded up an adjustment arm to accommodate the size. A couple of attempts at sizing the 2 belts which were different lengths.
It should run for awhile. We shut down for December and January now. By adding one more panel we have the power we need in those dark months and we cut down our consumption of oil.

Unrealistic some say, every person has their price some say. We don't believe that. Some can't be bought. Reality is only a figment of your imagination.

What is the threshold you can live with exploiting other people and our environment.

How much do you need to get started?

We 've posted some of our work done last season, www.caribooblades.com/newknives.html

Aki and Scott

Winter

2011-01-02T12:07:00.000-08:00

We do live in a unique area. In the bush, a couple of kms off a logging road.Complete isolation except for the odd plane or two yet we can journey into Williams Lake for our mail.

It is simple. If it isn't we are doing something wrong, but every time we are mistaken here we learn.
So though we don't try to make mistakes, when they happen we welcome them and adapt. It's when they happen twice or the killer three times that it hurts. That hasn't happened often.

I'll say, "It`s not going to frost tonight, it's July 14th ..." Patatoes keep us on our toes.

Now we plant potatoes in three different patches. Something will probably fail. Frost, hail, bad seed, bugs, mice, moose. We are not the only ones in the bush that like garden fresh vegetables. We`ve done a lot of experimenting. Some great failures. We are dependent on our gardens so we learn.

Plants are amazing. When we've thought they were mortally wounded they`ve come back, almost every time.
What doesn`t kill them (us) will make them (us) stronger in most cases.

After 14 years every sauna we`ve had, somewhere around 1000, has been rejuvenating. Personal hygiene and r&r or when things get tough is when we take a sauna. Aki is making one now. Beautiful sunny day...

For us it has been a process of living with what we need.
Rather than start with everything before we moved in here, we started with nothing and have added little.

It is our fourteenth winter. Most of the catastrophes you can think of have happend. The major ones like death, severe illnesses and accidents haven't. Crop failures, food spoilage, injuries, flooding, vehicle breakdowns etc... have.
Aki and I are heathier and stronger, not to mention more resolute in our convictions than ever. We have a 7 yr old who is thriving. Home schooling, chess and being raised in the forest.

In the past few years on our blog I've described the simple way we've lived with solar power. For 9 years we lived without a computer and internet connection. With a little of today`s technology, like a computer connected to the internet by satellite, and a small cash flow life in the bush is easier.

I suppose it's not for everyone.

Aki and Scott

http://www.caribooblades.com/

The Walrus

2010-12-06T16:03:00.000-08:00

I am he as you are he as you are me
and we are all together
See how they run like pigs from a gun
see how they fly
I'm crying
Sitting on a cornflake
Waiting for the van to come
Corporation T-shirt, stupid bloody Tuesday
Man you've been a naughty boy
you let your face grow long

I am the eggman
they are the eggmen
I am the walrus
Goo goo g' joob

Mr. city policeman sitting
pretty little policemen in a row
See how they fly like Lucy in the sky
See how they run
I'm crying
I'm crying, I'm crying
Yellow matter custard
Dripping from a dead dog's eye
Crabalocker fishwife
Pornographic priestess
Boy, you've been a naughty girl
you let your knickers down

I am the eggman
They are the eggmen
I am the walrus
Goo goo g' joob

Sitting in an English garden
waiting for the sun
If the sun don't come you get a tan
from standing in the English rain

I am the eggman
They are the eggmen
I am the walrus
Goo goo g' joob

Expert, texpert choking smokers
don't you think the joker laughs at you
See how they smile like pigs in a sty
See how they snide
I'm crying
Semolina pilchard
climbing up the Eiffel tower
Elementary penguin singing Hare Krishna
Man, you should have seen them kicking
Edgar Allan Poe

I am the eggman
They are the eggmen
I am the walrus
Goo goo g' joob
Goo goo g' joob
Goo goo g' goo
goo goo g' joob goo
juba juba juba
juba juba juba
juba juba juba juba
juba juba

John Lennon

December 8th 1980.

http://wikileaks.nl/

Tree Huggers on Easter Island

2010-04-28T16:21:00.000-07:00

It seems easier to get started this year.
Looking back over our fourteen years in the bush here we can see the dramatic ways our environment has changed.

Nobody had lived here for a couple of years. The small cabin, with all its windows shot out, had been taken over by swallows and mice. A half dozen wrecked vehicles dating back to the fifties, dilapidated outbuildings, and garbage strewn throughout.
But aside from the small stain of irresponsible humans, this spot on earth was peace.
We cleaned, patched up the cabin, re-used the wood from the outbuildings, but kept the wrecks lying around for art's sake.

It has been very dry this year. Last year we put time a couple of times a week digging a hole into a spring run on the slow rise some 10 metres above and 300 metres behind us. It has paid off. We are planting early crops and watering with gravity feed along with the garlic and parsnips coming up. Fruit trees, and even the cultivated wild Saskatoon berry bushes are getting their fill.

Fourteen years ago we camped on the land. For a cool, rainy week in September we relaxed here. The mornings were enveloped in mist. There were hundreds of ducks and geese sliding through the mist, into and out of the reeds that surrounded the small lake we were going to stake as a place to live. Isolation.
Around the lake in the mature lodgepole pine, spruce and Douglas fir forest there was an incredible display of mushrooms. Enchanted. We foraged delicious oyster mushrooms, boletes, field and horse mushrooms.

Since then all the mature forest has been cut. The mushrooms and the bats, the most obvious victims, went with the forest.

doubt we’re are going to burn every drop of oil and burn every pound of coal. A forester once told us, when we were trying to stop the mill from cutting all the forest around us, that there is not a safe stand in Canada and that it’s only a matter of time before they’re all cut.

It’s not just oil that will be expensive. Everything is going to be expensive. 10% of the world population owns 85% of the world's assets and half of the population of the world owns barely 1%.

Terrorism, fighting for freedom…we haven’t seen anything yet. Blaming it on fundamentalists and extremists while hanging onto our decadence.
You would fight to save yours.

Our whole high standard of living was built completely on the backs of slaves.
It’s not complicated. We could share.

Tree huggers unite but watch your backs

or you’ll get eaten.

Our business

http://www.caribooblades.com/

Moving and Static Photovoltaic Systems.

2010-01-17T17:39:00.000-08:00

By static I mean solar panels mounted on your roof, facing south and angled at 20 degrees. They don't move. Controller, battery bank or grid tie, inverter, your load...your demand. If you know how much electricity you want it's fairly easy to calculate the photovoltaic equipment you will need. Many of the sellers out there have user friendly calculators on site that will tell you what they think which equipment you will need.

Maintenance free, as far as the present technology goes, but even then, maintained by a technician or yourself once or twice a year. Self-sustaining electricity generation on your roof top. Simple and expensive.

Basically this kind of system is replacing or enhancing your connection to the grid.

Aki and I practice a kind of kinetic photovoltaic. "Hands on" with the sun. Our main system is 270 watts of panels tracking the sun from a manual tracker that stands 20' high beside our cabin.

Tracking systems can be manual or automated, single or double axis and mounted on a pole or track. Some trackers use movable mirrors and concentrators rather than moving the panels themselves.

We built a tracker with two axis and are diligent tracking the sun at tilt and angle from the time the sun comes up till it goes down. This practice has increased our energy production by 45 %.

Tracking the sun sounds like a chore but is far from it. We work and live in the same location and the tracker is located on the way to our shop. We have become in tune with the sun, always aware of where it is in the sky and adjusting the panels leading the sun by an hour or two on either side. In a 15 hour day of sun we may adjust the tilt and angle 6 times at most on a day of intense demand, continuously using a table saw or some other higher amperage machine.

The pole swivels for angle, as the sun moves across the sky, on its base of 1/2" plate steel set in the ground with concrete. This mechanism, as shown below, is a "T" of larger diameter pipe slipped over the pole end and welded in place. Sliding a smaller diameter pipe through the top of the "T" accommodates tilt.

Click on pictures for larger images

We drilled a couple of holes through one side of the larger pipe at the ends, welded nuts over the holes and then screwed bolts snugging against the smaller pipe within to control the tilt.

We tie a rope to the top and bottom of the panels to adjust tilt and a cross on the pole to move with the sun across the sky.

If you snug up to the smaller inside pipe with the bolts you'll have complete control of the tilt with the ropes. It is very simple and effective.

By using standard bolts, there is very little wear. For the 6 years we've operated this tracker the bolts have worn off paint. We figure in about 100 years somebody will have to shift the assembly over a 1/2".

This method of tracking the sun may not be for everyone. There are many solar trackers on the market.

Using recycled pipe this photovoltaic panel tracker cost us $45 and a days work, installed.

A second action we perform happens on winter days. On a perfect solar energy filled winter day there are only 6 - 1/2 hours of sun here. After a couple of dark days in December our batteries are hovering around 20%. First thing when the sun begins to peak over the horizon we'll charge the battery bank for 20 minutes, 10 minutes on sunny days, with a generator. Because we find our batteries are discharged to low levels in the winter, there is resistance in the batteries. The low amperage the panels produce in the morning is not sufficient to wear through the resistance in time for a good charge but the high amp charge from our charging system is sufficient, breaking through the batteries' resistance and allowing the panels to do their job. This method has increased our battery charge up to 70% on the darkest days of winter. We are working on a system to generate this short burst of charge without the use of fossil fuel but by our own power.

We suppose that the whole point to this endeavor is to find the point at which we find what we need as opposed to what we want.

Some sources for photovoltaic tracking info:

www.raytracker.com/track/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/solar_tracker

For more information on our sun power system and our back up power system please visit,
Solar Power, Engines and Alternators.

Enjoy the sun.

Aki and Scott

http://www.caribooblades.com/

Pink Salmon & Dandelions

2009-10-25T14:40:00.000-07:00

Our gardens have been tucked in for the winter.

After we harvested the potatoes we turned in the soil with the potato plants and the season's mulch of reeds, grass and cardboard. Aki broadcast rye seed and peas. Let them grow for a month and at about 5" high turned them under with some seasoned chicken manure, raised the bed, skirted the rise with bark and cardboard, planted 2/3 of the garlic crop for next and covered it in a thick blanket of reeds.
The reeds will be pulled back in the spring to let the soil warm. When the plants are up the reeds get distributed throughout the garlic as mulch.

Some yells, some screams.

Some friends gave us some red kuri squash. It looks an awful lot like pumpkin. So we carved it for halloween. We had it lit for a night...then we ate it... Jack's head. We found our halloween tradition.

We have been spending some time in the forest collecting firewood. Always rejuvenating. We are looking forward to the deep dark winter.

The three of us watched a movie a month back set in Afghanistan, "The Kite Runner". It spanned a timeline of 30 years. We're still thinking about it.

Basted in honey and butter. Roasted and eaten.

Served on a moose antler platter.

Pink Salmon, dandelions, artists and farmers all have something in common, and we are still trying to grasp and pin down this thread.

December 21st. We are alone and we've got something all to ourselves.

Deep in thought in the deep, dark winter.

http://www.caribooblades.com/

Smoke in Our Skies

2009-08-25T11:59:00.000-07:00

It's been a spring and summer of sunshine, hot, dry and fires. In the last month smoke from forest fires blocked out the late afternoon sun for a couple of weeks. A forest fire just south of us was 53,000 hectares big. Very high ground water levels. The mosquitoes were extreme and lasted an extra month into August - still a few around.

For Aki, Kai and I it has meant a great harvest. This winter holds a palette of sun dried tomatoes, dried broccoli, cauliflower, broad beans, peas,herbs and kale. Aki is canning pesto, hot pepper jelly, Saskatoon jam etc, etc... .

Every knife and tool we've made this year has been produced with just solar power. We work with the Sun. The Sun basically dictates what we do, how and what we eat, what time we go to sleep, when we wake up, how many movies we watch and in the deep, dark winter, how many emails we can write. We'd much rather be guided by the sun than by Exxon or Shell.
We've been harping about solar power for 15 years to anyone who would listen. Not many were listening but a few were watching. To us it is mind baffling that everyone hasn't a panel or two. We all know the sun.
Today, silicon, which makes up roughly half the cost of making of most solar electric panels, has dropped from $400/kg to $70/kg in one year..... and the silicon Baron's are still making money. Kind of sounds like the oil companies. Right now you can get Sharp panels for 2/3 of what they were a year ago. .

At the time when we moved here we invaded Iraq. Now we're occupying Afganistan. Sure is a disgraceful situation we find oursevles in. All for a pipeline. All for oil.

Anyone can.
Running your shop on solar electric power is easy. With this system we've run our cabin and shop for 13 years. We started with one panel, 2 batteries and an inverter.
We are 100% solar powered from the end of March until the end of September now. March and October are good for sun energy just not unlimited. We work full time making edged tools. Our power needs decline until December 21st, by the end of February we have the power we need from the sun again. It's December and January when we slow down and burn candles in the evening. If you're connected to a grid there is no fluctuation. We tried to keep up the production for these dark months only to fall behind and get stressed. This year we'll snow shoe, think more, and play more music.

We designed and installed our system. It was fairly easy.
We went with 6 volt golf cart batteries. They are tough (We've frozen them solid and they have come back). These batteries are inexpensive and easy to replace although we haven't had to. 8 batteries and they are all in good shape. Twice a year I'll clean them with baking soda and water, then top off each cell with distilled water.
We've seen people spend lots of money on batteries. You don't have to, tough golf cart batteries are the way to go, especially for a shop. If you live within a grid you don't need batteries.

We have 390 watts of panel. 2 are BP and one is made by Sharp, a 20 amp regulator and we have a 2,500 watt (with a surge of 3,500) inverter we bought at Canadian Tire.

We built a manual tracker. Three panels, framed, on top of a 20 foot steel pole set cemented into the ground. As we work we turn the panels to face the sun.
This has increased our power by 35%.
The tracker put us at the level of power we are satisfied with and gave us a very good ground.--- An excellent ground is really important. Ground your inverter, batteries and panels.

Trick is to work with the sun when it is out. We don't think of it as storing power. Use power when it is there in the sky.
At night we use stored power for light, music, watching movies, and small amp tools.

If you have a steady wind, a wind generator is the way to go.

It's quite amazing once you begin... A different way of seeing. It feels like a breakthrough. Life on another level. Being responsible for your own power instead of being forced to be part of the crime. We are all, in this part of the world, part of a crime.

Questions like, "what do you do when the sun's not out", or statements like, "solar panels are made by oil energy" seem true enough in an all or nothing way. When the sun's not out we relax. The real cost to the environment of a panel is paid off in as little as 5 years. Life is saved. Solar electric panels are guaranteed for 25 years.

Electric cars are a boondoggle unless you plug into the sun. Electric anything, otherwise your plugging into oil, coal and nuclear reactors.

Living with the sun as the source of power, growing your own food, taking time to think, taking only what you need and most of all being empathetic, not psychopathic.

http://www.caribooblades.com/

Storm

2009-06-20T08:17:00.000-07:00

We can see and hear them coming. This one is a storm to the northwest. We've experienced many terrific lightning and thunder, wind and rain storms. This was a new and ominous sound to us. Threshing, mashing sounds of a huge wind. Aki was at the coop preparing a space and run for the new hen and chicks. "What is that", I said in part incredulously because of the unfamiliarity of this steadily approaching sonorous sound. I headed down toward the lake where the sky opens up for a better look. A storm of solid dark grey blanketing the northwest sky moved swiftly, loud, swiftly and louder. I stood in this wide sky space in wonder, taken by the power of it. It wasn't coming head on. The path of the storm was just north of us and the sound was becoming very loud. Instinct kicked in, adrenalin shot into my system. I was awake.

It was across the lake, in the middle, then a loud "tat" on the metal roofing of the outhouse just behind me. For that split second I pondered and could not really believe how dense I was. "Hail!" . We raced for the gardens grabbed all the tarps still, luckily, in their positions ready for the next frost. Working quickly as the hail moved across the lake with deafening sound Aki and I just had the vulnerable plants in the garden covered when the hail hit full force. We stood over the last half dozen broccoli plants, straddled over the bed holding a piece of plywood to shield them. We stood and waited out the storm, pelted by hail stones .

This kind of storm happened 6 years ago while we were away. We get hail all the time but this hail is big, solid and comes down thick. 6 years ago it pummelled the garden leaving every plant in shreds. It shreds the leaves on the trees, puts dents in our truck hood.

We are always in awe of the power of the elements, as we mattock sod, coax boulders out of clay, turn hard-packed soil and carefully build garden plots. Every year it is different with different challenges. This year we watched as tadpoles congregated between the onion and zucchini plots, and we still have to roll up our pant legs in order to weed the garlic. Dikes, we concluded, would have been the solution. Perhaps next year, unless the lake drops again.

When we moved up here we found a mound of rocks just down the hill from the cabin and some 200 ft up from the lake waterline. The discovery of an old fish hook led to speculation that it was the remains of a dock, and that the lake had once been much higher. Around the lake's shallow shoreline the reeds are tall and the grass grows lush for 100 to 500 feet up to the forest line. 20 foot tall skeletal remains of spruce trees rise out of the grass referring to a different time, a higher water level that drowned them and a stretch of time when they grew.
An old timer told of us of a time in the 30's when our lake was a meadow that, as a boy, he used to help hay.
This year the lake has taken most of our lakeside garden. Over the last 2 years the lake has risen 3 feet. 6 years ago we had a 100 ft pallet walkway built over the soft mud to the receding water line. At least 7 feet lower than it is now.

The gardens on higher ground are looking green and lush now, and as we feast on chard and spinach and basil and watch the tomatoes ripen and the cucumbers and apples form, it is often with amazement.

They call this the simple life.

http://www.caribooblades.com/

Entitlement

2009-02-18T09:31:00.000-08:00

We both grew up on middle class streets in Canadian cities during the 60's and 70's. Gas was 35 cents a gallon. Electricity was almost free. Water was free.
During that time I watched my father convert our whole backyard into a garden. After reinsulating the roof and upgrading the windows, he plumbed in an 80 gallon preheating tank beside the furnace which received city water before entering the hot water tank, built in a wood stove in the basement and plumbed it into the central heat, and cut and dug a small root cellar off the basement. That was 40 years ago. I'm sure if he was still alive he'd have at least a solar array on the roof and a heat pump in the cellar.

Following that patriarchal line, he was doing what his father and mother did. They did what my great grandparents had taught them to survive and my great, great grandparents were pioneers and they did what they had to do to survive in a rugged unforgiving new world. The environment cannot be denied. All lines do lead to the same... survival.

Like so many boys of my generation, I didn't get to know my father because he died young. Heart attack. Doing all kinds of stuff for the environment and feeding everybody he could...didn't take care of himself. He was 56. Aki's dad died of cancer when he was 47. Looking for a better life for their children, Aki's parents brought the family over from Japan in the 60's. The only "ethnic" family in their suburban neighbourhood. Aki was one of three Japanese-Canadians in her high school of 1200 students.

Shaking off our sense of entitlement.
By the second year we knew we were onto something. Now 13 years later we are just plain sad that more people aren't living this way because it really is simple. Working with nature. More healthy physical work. Breathing fresh air, drinking fresh water. We grow all our own organic vegetables and keep free range hens for eggs. Trade and hunt for meat.

Except for hunting there are people doing this in the cities. Small , large backyards and container vegetable gardens

for healthy food.

Eating fresh food, drinking fresh water and breathing fresh air, of course, is possible in the cities.

We initially came up here for ethical reasons.
Saving money, living comfortably with much less has turned out to be much more.

http://pathtofreedom.com/about/ I found an interesting site the other day.

Our freezer is on a light timer. We separated the compressor and condenser from the backside, carefully bending the copper tubing so that it is 1' from the freezer. New freezers have a built in condenser. A bad design. Heating while you're trying to freeze. So much of this society is designed with the assumption of cheap, unlimited and uninterrrupted power. Separating just the motor will make a big difference. We throw a duvet over the freezer when it's not on.. Huge difference. We haven't had a fridge for seven years. Between the freezer, pantry and root cellar we don't need one. We don't have a basement but our pantry floor is not insulated. From September until May the bottom shelf in the pantry keeps things cool. The root cellar always keeps things cool. An old sixty gallon water tank thermal cycling through our wood cook stove is like having a second wood heater and supplies us with hot water. I've also done this fit to our shop wood heater. A small green house off the south wall of our small house heats up for vented heat into the house, and supplies greens earlier and later in the season for us. For our power we've 310 watts of panel, a 25 amp controller, 6 - 6 and 2 -12 volt heavy deep cycle batteries and a 1750 watt inverter. $5000 Canadian. This system over 13 years has paid for itself at least twice considering the real cost of fossil fuels.
The newest stat I've read is that the real cost of a solar panel operating in ideal circumstances is paid for in 5 years of operation financially and environmentally. In the city there is the huge advantage of being able to tie directly into the grid, eliminating the need for batteries. So many possibilities.

We went a little watt heavy as far as panel:battery ratio. During the dark months of January and December when the batteries get low repeatedly I'll sometimes disconnect 2 of the batteries to make it easier to break through the batteries' resistance to accept a charge. I found that reading a bit about batteries and 12 v (DC) was a good thing. From March until September power is not an issue here. We run our cabin and a small shop without any sacrifice. Working with the sun is the key. When the sun is full we pump water from the well and fill a tank, charge our flashlight, computer and storage batteries, vacuum. We really live by the sun. For a couple of years it was an adjustment living off grid... now we just can't live any other way.

Nancy Brignall and George Rammell's web sites, http://www3.telus.net/4 . Together they're changing their neighbourhood. Sites of art and rejuvenation.

Our site,

http://www.caribooblades.com/

We humans excel at adjusting, adjusting, adapting - until we almost completely forget how we used to do things... Forget what we've done, forget what we're doing. Forget where we're going.
Aki and Scott

Don Quixote

2009-01-12T21:05:00.000-08:00

Aki is reading Don Quixote. Every day or so she gives Kai and I an update on Don's exploits.... Fascinating.

Reminds me a bit of Notes From the Underground by Dostoevsky in the way that you almost want to close your eyes before it happens again. Before Quixote attacks again, donning his barber's basin. Before the underground man delves deeper into the depths of human despair.

Really there could not be two stories more opposite to each other.

Our shop in the evening.

Thinking one's onto something when everyone else thinks you're insane.

A tragic folly? Interesting to consider these two stories from our little spot in the bush, with no curtains on our windows. Here we are thinking we are perfectly sane...

We are 43 dozen eggs ahead of ourselves.

Most winters our chickens take it easy and almost come to a halt in egg production.

During one of the cold spells, one of the chickens decided to go out for a stroll, found a nice spot under our work truck, and found herself frozen to the ground. That evening when we went to close up the coop we discovered we were missing one, went looking but couldn't find her. The next morning (-26 C) Kai found her under the truck, clucking softly. It took several buckets of warm water and an evening in a box infront of the woodstove, but she seems to have recovered completely.

We are eating a lot of eggs.

The temperatures of Winters past.

Some Chilcotin neighbours say 30 years ago it would hold at -40 C for weeks and dip to -50, -60 some nights.

I found that the wood stove door became a regular workbench for me.

The beast that plows our road.

We don't feel insane.

http://www.caribooblades.com/

Just put in our seed order for the spring. Hope springs eternal.

Reflection

2008-12-07T10:18:00.000-08:00

With freezing rain soaking the foot of snow on the ground we are .....“slushed in”.

Trees are falling over from the weight of ice.

I was 36 and Aki was 32. Until then life had been easy. Both coming from middle class families. I had a career in film, Aki as an artist. We knew we could do anything we wanted, how lucky we had been to be born on the planet in the situations we were in.

We both had the same yearning to live the way we live now.

We loaded up the school bus and moved into the bush in the spring of 1997. When the money ran out that fall the camping trip was over. That is when our survival started.

We had our first roast rabbit feast at about this time 12 years ago by candle light and accompanied by our rosehip-bearberry-rice wine.
We had 7 snares, a squirrel pole and 2 bird traps set.
Two chickens, one laying. We kept them at night in an apple box on the porch of our cabin.
Iraq was refusing U.S. weapons inspectors.

Moose everywhere. Wolves were close.
Lots of clear nights. The moon was so bright it was hard to sleep. Aurora Borealis.
The sauna was one of our first projects . We took lots of saunas that winter. Saunas and homemade wine got us through a few winters.

Rabbits - we ate rabbits, rabbit stew, rabbit curry, teriyaki rabbit, hare soup, roast hare.
By the end of the winter we could snare rabbits very effectively. For some reason rabbits seem to want to be caught, we just have to help them a bit.

We skied on the lake, snowshoed, read, painted and wrote. Drank lots of home made wine, hauled water from the lake, hauled and melted snow, cut and split wood, hunted for our food and thought about what we had got ourselves away from. No idea, at the time, where we were heading except that we were tasting freedom…. Just ahead of us. We would run into its dulcet smell, stop to savor its taste and it would disappear.

Sounds like a good time but there were some rough spots.
We both got “fall down couldn’t get back up sick”. It was between -30 and -40 for two weeks. Truck wouldn’t start. Everything was freezing.

One day it went to zero degrees, sun came out. El Nino had kicked in. Within a week or two we were outside in our t-shirts.

Determined we were.

I = E x R and P = E x I

www.caribooblades.com

The Autumn Bush

2008-10-21T21:20:00.000-07:00

The nights are still and quiet. Three owls talk over the boreal forest in the crisp autumn air. The tremendous sky of stars sets a relative perception clear... We're looking forward to the winter. Clearing our minds, closer to each other, reaping meaning and understanding from the information of the past year.

I'm thinning our woods of the dead. Letting in light for new growth, bringing in firewood. For what it's worth it's our twelfth winter and we have not cut a living tree to build with or for firewood. The trees are dying so fast here that we haven't had to.

6 cords of firewood a year, fencing and a couple of buildings.

Except for the fuel for the chainsaw, burning firewood is basically carbon neutral.

Our gardens are almost tucked in for the winter. We grow rye grass for cover and mix in rotted wood, compost, reeds, cardboard, ash and egg shell from our chickens. We also mix in sand because our soil is clay based.

Aki planted 109 garlic bulbs worth of garlic for next year, saving 20 or so to plant in the spring between other crops. After the potatoes were harvested at the beginning of September we dug in the potato plants, planted rye and let it grow 6". We then covered the bed with 4" of sand mixed with rotted wood, turned the bed with a fork, planted the garlic toes, watered with manure tea, then covered the bed with reeds. In the spring Aki will pull the cover back and as the garlic comes she'll give it another shot of green manure tea.

We will do the same with some parsnip seed.

This year we were able to save more seed: garlic, parsnip, peas, fava bean, squash, zucchini, spinach, chinese greens, potatoes. Almost had some broccoli seed...next year.

Out there in the world the environment is once again on the back burner, the rich are richer and we are a little poorer.

We've been duped again.

It is hard to see that anybody gives a hoot about children.

People are bizarre. We're going to leave the kids our problems because we're too selfish to give up a bit of decadence.

Our food is canned, dried and in the root cellar. Warmth is taken care of.

We have 16 chickens this year, the most we've ever had. All laying - we've discovered pickled eggs... Reinsulating the coop - the mice love it in there.

This year has been a good solar power year. Every day that's sunny we appreciate the power of the sun, and every day that it's not we appreciate it even more.

It will be a good winter.

Our business,

http://www.caribooblades.com/

Harvesting

2008-08-24T09:54:00.000-07:00

Our gardens have done well this season. Root vegetables, the brassica family, peas and most greens have thrived here.

Getting ready for the frost in the middle of August. By August 25 we had a frost every night for 1- 1/2 weeks, a break of 2 or 3 nights and then the frost was back. By October there's a hard frost every night.

It was a cool and short growing season this year with a couple of frosts overnight in July. Natural. It lets every plant know ...

Aki has dried our winter supply and she has been canning over the last couple of weeks. I brought in our second load of fire wood. Aki dries broccoli, kale, beet greens, wild mushrooms, rose hips, herbs like basil, oregeno, sage etc.., cauliflower, tomatoes, peppers, cherries and horseradish.

We've been eyeing the rose hips - they're red and ready to pick, just have to get around to it. Perhaps that'll be a job for Kai, who is helping out more and more. We dry rose hips for tea and cooking and our rose hip wine is on the go. This year we'll try rose hip/apple jelly, as we're enjoying the first real crop of apples from our little orchard.

We love this time of year. Cool enough for the cookstove, warm days, no bugs. A good harvest is an added bonus. Things are coming together as we prepare for winter.

Bugs had their way this year but were overcome with a little extra work from ourselves as well as the plants. We've found that cardboard box makes for really good mulch and the worms and toads love it.

An organic farmer told us that rather than worms being good for your soil, they are more importantly a sign, with their presence, that the soil is good.

The cardbord biodegrades over the season. By next spring it is decomposed and the soil is richer for it. We're not worried about what it looks like because of the amazing things it provides for the garden. We have researched whether it will cause any ill effects to the soil and it doesn't. The cardboard is easily biodegradable.

The inks are vegetable based and degrade as well leaving nothing behind but great compost.

In fact we've begun mulching with newspapers and magazines.

The results are huge.

This is August

Lunch is fresh.

A fresh lunch becomes challenging

by the middle of October.

Now we are seeding rye grass and peas as a cover crop for the winter. All our kitchen compost is buried directly into the garden. We dig in rotten wood, egg shells, wood ash, composted chicken manure and grass that hasn't seeded. We find that what we prepare now will have a lot to do in determining next years yield in our bushcraft /survival garden.

Please check out the body of work we've done over the summer at, www.caribooblades.com/newknives.html

One Week Later

2008-08-17T11:46:00.000-07:00

After 3 direct bomber hits

We woke up this morning to a pond filled with smoke. After 3 days of rain and 3 days of sunshine.

A lightning strike from a week ago smoldering. With a couple of days of hot dry weather and some wind the fire was back.

We had to Skype friends in Williams lake to phone Forestry and give them our googled coorordinates. For some reason we don't have access to

1- 800 emergency numbers. After the fire spotting plane saw the small fire it swept dozens of times checking the area for more smoldering fires. A couple of times they flew over our cabin with their sirens on. About ten minutes later 3 bombers dropped their loads of red fire retardant.

I never thought of it but Aki finally remembered the camera after the bombers were gone but caught the spotting plane doing one last pass with their siren on.

A fire fighting ground crew is here now pumping water onto the remains from the lake.

Watching the bombers flying at the tops of the trees and dropping their loads was quite a sight.... Damn I wish I had my camera.

http://www.caribooblades.com/

Lightning...

2008-08-08T20:26:00.000-07:00

We were under lightning yesterday. Kai and Aki watched a strike on a tree just inside the forest line at the end of our small lake, start a fire then trees began igniting. I was changing a tire and heard Aki yelling "fire!" Lightning began striking all around us. Another fire started on the west side of the lake about 300 metres away. We couldn't see the flame but we watched the smoke. We watched the smoke speed up very quickly.

We got over how cool it was.
With lightning striking all around us we planned our escape. Funny, the computer was first on the list.
At that moment light rain started with a breeze. It built and within minutes it was a raging rain storm. Winds tossed the trees around, bathing ... splashing them in water. For a 1/2 hour the forest was drenched.

Within 10 minutes after that the sun came out, the sky cleared and we went back to work --- exhilarated and full of awe.

Sustainable Survival Gardening.

2008-07-03T17:42:00.000-07:00

We live in the bush and have created a garden. Cultivating wild flowers, greens and vegetables along with domestic greens and vegetables. Enriching the soil with what is around us. Doing it all by hand with the help from tools we've made. Simply. Leaving a light footprint.
We call it bushcraft gardening but we do have friends that do it in the city.

We've learned about stamina and how to relax here. Growing our own food has taught that to us in between frost, hail, bear, moose and deer, rabbits, mice and voles and the dreaded free range cattle. The boreal forest is filled with animals that want almost everything that we grow.
This gardening method is sustainable, organic and has very little impact .

In a state of mind going into the wilderness with nothing but seeds and a shovel, an open mind, relaxed and keenly observing your surroundings with a sense of freedom and balance.

How does this all work together?... because it does all work together

Everything around you may have a use for your bush garden. Rocks act like sinks storing heat energy from the sun that can offset cool nights. They are fertilizers slowly giving important nutrients to the soil. They collect and trap water. They can also be protection from animals and cover for others, like toads.

That old stump – do I remove it, or can I plant a garden around it and let it slowly fertilize?
Rotten wood has got to be the supreme bush fertilizer adding organic material and fluffing up heavy soil.

Harvesting what you need with care and never taking more than 20% of anything.

Surviving with respect and again, with a light foot step

About 65 years ago the lumber mills creamed the bush leaving stumps here. Just under a 1/2" of hard shell we can dig our hands in shovelling out a bit of soft fluffy red rotten wood, covering our tracks, leaving most of it behind.
Decay, rot, beauty. Things die, break down, become food for the next living thing.

There are droppings from animals like deer, moose and rabbit which are good fertilizers.

Those “weeds” or wildflowers – pull them out or cultivate them, let them flower to attract the bees. If the location of your plot is covered with grass or weeds turn it over and leave it in place. It will decompose and become food for your plants.

Oxeye Daisies--Excellent greens

Certain bugs, wild plants and critters can help. In a wilderness garden you may cultivate dandelions, wild onions, wild parsnip, lambs quarters, mushrooms, chickweed, cattails. In fact one could have an excellent wild garden cultivating just wild plants.

Crops like garlic, potatoes and broad (fava) beans can be grown with without the stress of everything else wanting to eat them. We grow these crops without any protection.
Location.

I asked my 5 year old son what his first thought was on our gardening in the bush. He said spinach.
It is about the food, the sustenance.

Soil, your climate, exposure to the sun, access to water, location of your plot, predators...

We'll write about: how we do it, seeds, making our own gardening tools, harvesting then putting our food away for the winter in the next posts.

Our business, http://www.caribooblades.com/

Gardening with the Tide

2008-06-09T19:22:00.000-07:00

Lots of rain, thunder, spectacular lightning and the mosquitoes are to be reckoned with and getting worse.

This is all adding up to a great mushroom season. Morels and boletes . An excellent start for the saskatoon berries. All the seedlings have lots of water.

A great aspect to all the rain is that the range cattle have enough to eat out there and will leave us alone.

Ranchers lease crown land, range, for their beef cattle. We are surrounded by crown land. Some dry years they eat all the grass, flowers and shrubs in the gov't range so they begin busting down our gerden fences.. This is not an enjoyable experience. We end up harvesting early because they won't stop until they've eaten everything. If there is enough rain in May and June the vegetation grows , gets a head start. Fingers crossed, the beef won't bother us.When it comes to beef, we have no rights.

The lodge pole pine is gone but still standing supplying us with easy firewood and building logs.

Looking across the lake at the fringe of trees left in the riparian zone, it appears as though we live on the edge of a cliff, but the open space just beyond is a clearcut. Trees take up water, and when the trees are cut down, the water runs into the lake, and the lake rises. The tide.

The tilled garden plots that are now under water have sprouted cattails. .

Our new crop.

Each spring now we wait to see how much garden space we will have. Raised beds help enormously. We wait, but there is inevitably much mud-slinging in the turning of the soil.

We have everything in now, and the gardens are looking good.

The swallows are building, the air is full of birdsong, new life begins.

http://www.caribooblades.com/

Loading Shotguns

2008-04-19T13:43:00.000-07:00

It was -8 this morning. All the mud has frozen. Good thing in a way because we can get out and back in tonight from a visit to some neighbours.

A break from the nice post....

We have lived in this beautiful place going on twelve years. Peace, freedom and we have almost shaken off our urban ignorance and anxiety.

Almost but probably never completely.

In our very first post we were excited to write about our lives here, share it and maybe be a bit of light .

There is a huge elephant weighing on our minds.

The abuse and disrespect toward the natural world here is right in our faces. The abuse is absurd.

We are urban people transplanted into the forest, or what's left of it. It is mind-blowing to witness the extent of human greed. It seems we are loading our shotguns, taking aim and blowing off our own feet.

Supplying the world with the pillages of rape.

They are talking "bio-fuel" now, with the "bio" making it sound friendlier somehow. The pine beetle killed off the Pine forests, we suppose because of the warm winters, now we want to cut them all down for bio fuel and plant "marketable stock". They are saying, the money suckers who survive from bending our rubber minds, that the threat of dead decaying pine forests will produce enough carbon emissions to threaten the planet ? We are crazy. What does all the wildlife do while we are clearing the forests. Have you ever walked through a clear cut? There is no place to go. There is nothing left. We are proposing clear cuts of the like never seen before. Meanwhile lumber mills are cutting, killing, the last 500 -600 year old fir trees. Our neighbours found a 1000 year old lying in a cut block left because it had some rot in the middle. The point is why was it cut down and left in the first place! Maybe the last one. It won't even get a chance to rot and become fertilizer for the next generation - the "unmarketable timber" is pushed into piles and burned.

We humans, whether you like it or not, are ripping off the dead, eating them and then complaining about the aftertaste and the heartburn.

We'll go in with feller bunchers and cut the trees, skid them out with skidders, load them on trucks and truck them to plants that aren't built yet, process them into ethanol, put the ethanol into our vehicles and burn it.... Sounds like a green plan to me.

But everyone knows this. That's what makes it so absurd and difficult to even talk about.

http://www.davidsuzuki.org/Forests/Canada/BC/Beetle/

Nice post cotinued....

Next morning: An enjoyable evening, a small gathering of neighbours (anyone living west of the Fraser River is a neighbour) who tend to stick to ourselves but venture out occasionally to share views, good food, homemade wine and also to offer a bit of support. Sometimes it is easy to feel completely alone in our quest to live simply with minimal damage.

We left their candlelit yurt with the nearly full moon rising in the sky, driving carefully past shadows of countless deer, bumping down the logging roads, finally into our yard to be greeted by our two dogs, tails wagging - good to be home.

http://www.caribooblades.com/

Muddy Boots

2008-03-13T09:21:00.000-07:00

The melt down, break-up has started. With the sun higher and rising, the days warming up and revealing the earth, the famous Cariboo/Chilcotin clay mud is just beginning to form. In about a week the mud will be deep enough to keep us mudded in for two weeks. It begins to dry out in about a month and turn into a cement hardness. Any attempts to get out will leave ruts until the rains in the fall. Nothing quite like getting stuck in the mud. Over the last 11 years we've spend days digging out until we figured r and r was a better way to go. Now we don't even attempt to get out - if there is one concept we've learned here it's how to relax.

Now we thoroughly enjoy being able to stay in. A sense of freedom really.

We are almost through our dried food and the winter meat supply. At the same time our chickens are now laying a dozen eggs a day, our small green house attached to the cabin is producing a small amount of greens. In a couple of weeks dandelion greens, wild onions and fireweed shoots will become welcome additions to our diets.

It all happens eventually...with no worries.

Anticipation and a great sense of our lives is the fruit produced after a winter of work and thought. We used to think that everyone should attend an art school for awhile just to learn about themselves in relation to everyone else. Now we think that maybe living in the bush with nothing could be the way to go a longer distance.

We are setting a date now for some time off our knife and tool making.

A new charcoal burning forge and a new charcoal making kiln are the goals for our time off. A busy gardening month as well. The cycle continues.

http://www.caribooblades.com/

A Conversation in 2004

2008-02-18T18:08:00.000-08:00

Hi Scott and Aki.

I have bean sending The following testimonial to a few people:

Speaking of beauty... I wanted to pass on a little conversation I’m having with a friend of mine, Scott, who lives in the bush, no hydro.... He makes a living making carving tools, chef and hunting knifes. All made from the sun. He is astounded that we are fighting wars; killing people over energy. Mean while every day huge amounts of energy are delivered free to every home on earth.

From my friend Scott:

When I get up in the morning I race out and face my solar panels to the sun.
I was in the shop all day yesterday, full sun all day. 3 hours straight on the grinder, + 1 hour sanding on my machine, + 1 1/2 hours drilling and reaming on the drill press, then 3 1/2 hours on the computer with the satellite connection (it takes power as well), 2 hours of tv with a light on for three hours and I still have plenty of power stored (in batteries) to email you this morning. It's looking like it's going to be a beautiful sunny day today again. We can't use all the power. Oh ya, the freezer was on for 3 hours yesterday.
You guys could have systems running easily. I don't understand why you don't. A solar array (250 - 300 watts), a regulator, an inverter. Total cost is around $2500 - $3000. That's it.
It is so simple. You can start right now by building a sun tracker, you need to follow the sun. I built one for $35. If anyone tries to tell you that you must have more or says you can't do it for that, they’re full of it.
Ciao,

Scott.

www.caribooblades.com

The Heart of Winter

2008-01-20T22:14:00.000-08:00

There
Is so much information.
Everything is information. I
Seem to hear everywhere. A barrage. Seemingly all
Out of proportion. Overwhelming. Confusing.
Frightening. Floundering, until I pick out a familiarsound. It could
Be a voice, the way a hammer hitsa nail directlyon the head, a perfectconnection.
Suddenly my own space expands.
I fade and block certain sound. I can
Pick up more familiarity,more sounds, untilevery sound Ihear isfamiliar.
The sounds of a city become mesmerizing.
So much sound iscommunicated is untrue
misguided, illogical,
Nonsense, malice.
This information surrounds us, can destroy us…
Survival in any space depends on the way we adapt to that space.

The State of being free.

(or maybe we're just bushed)

Snow ice cream

Mix together in a big bowl:
1 egg
half cup sugar
half cup milk, cream or evaporated milk
1 tsp vanilla

Add snow and flavouring (maple syrup is good) and stir. Enjoy!

Winding down

2007-12-02T17:47:00.000-08:00

We've finished our shows, the gardening tools are stored, the roof of the new shop is up. An arctic outflow has ensured the lake is well-frozen, tonight they say it is going down to minus 29 Celsius.

The woodstove is always going now, with a pot of soup simmering, and a kettle or two of hot water on top, something roasting in the oven, a pan of yogurt forming on the shelf behind, boots drying beside, mitts and hats hanging nearby. There is an abundance of fuel now, thanks to the pine beetle, but every log is still precious, as we are aware of the costs of even this "free fuel".

We still need gas for the chainsaw and gas for the truck to pull the trees out. And there are other costs - the damage to other plant life when we fall and skid trees, the smoke from the burning...

We, it seems, cannot exist without adversely affecting our environment.

We chop wood, shovel snow, gaze out at the frozen lake, and ponder this predicament
while politicians discuss the future of the planet in Bali over wine and cheese.

We are thinking, always thinking.

Solar Power in the Winter.

2007-10-21T15:01:00.000-07:00

We have lived by solar power and wood for 11 years About 90% of our needs are met. When the sun comes up, it determines what we do for the day.

With 290 watts of panel and six golf cart batteries, and a little propane powered generation we run a knife and tool business and live comfortably.
We did rid ourselves of some stuff.

The first item we stopped using was a refrigerator. It did take some adjustment but after 5 years without one we're convinced a fridge is a totally decadent piece of equipment for many people. Of course not everyone can stop using one because of their circumstance. A root cellar, pantry and freezer are all one needs. A simple camp cooler goes a long way.
Added insulation on the freezer and a timer reduced the power consumption of this appliance by 1/2. Now we only use the freezer in the winter and keep it outside under cover which cuts its consumption by another 70%.
We eat fresh mostly, from our garden and what we forage, and whatever we are able to dry and can.
We are always expanding our vegetable gerdens. Our meat comes from trade and hunting.

We heat and cook by wood and our hot water is heated through a water jacket in the cook stove which feeds a tank we installed. With the lining off the tank it is like having another heater. A small propane cook stove for back-up uses about $25 in fuel a year.

In Chilcotin territory in B.C. (there is no the, like Yukon territory) there is lots of sun but we do have spells of up to a couple of months without much sun. I installed a big alternator (200 amps) in a propane powered vehicle, machined a drive pulley to increase the rpm so that idling gives what the batteries demand, and it plugs into our small house to the batteries. About twice as efficient as a new Honda generator, quieter and as mentioned, on propane.
If you have the luxury of working at home the

trick to solarpower is to use it when the sun is

out and work around it

when it is not.

In our business we recover all our steel, wood and antler. The highest quality is there but you have to look for it. We do as much by hand as we can (it is a trade off towards surviving in an unfriendly world) and sell through the internet, locally and a few shows.

We used to travel across the countryside to sell. With a connection to the internet by satellite we drive much less and spend maybe $60 a month on gas.

We try to buy only what we need - I suppose the method is to figure out what one truly needs. For us it is a never ending process to be self sufficient and sustainable.

Harvesting

2007-09-15T08:36:00.001-07:00

The month of August has been a busy one this year. It all started with a hard frost August 8th. First time this has happened and it was devastating to parts of our garden.

We survive the winter with the food we harvest and forage now.

The main point to surviving here off the land is being able to sustain the blows that come. Between hail that set the garden back in June and the frost in early August, all in all it was a good harvest.

We picked up the pullets at the end of July.

Their combs are beginning to turn red now, Sept 22. We'll have a fresh supply of eggs all winter while the older hens take a winter break.

Aki dried about 16 kg of broccoli. Broccoli dries well and reconstitutes itself in stir fries, soups and egg dishes beautifully. She also dried cauliflower, beet greens, lovage, basil, mint, tarragon, she sun dried tomatoes and she dried a winter's worth of boletus mushrooms.

Fresh mushrooms

Dried Boletes

We're big garlic eaters. This harvest will last till June.

With a small freezer of venison we're almost ready.

Summer

2007-07-30T21:04:00.000-07:00

Life in the bush during this time of year. I think there is no other place we'd like to be.

There's lots of work to be done and there is lots of living to do.

Skidding out pine beetle killed trees with the

old 1955 Massey - Harris.

After a day of falling and skidding out trees.

Our winter supply of cariboo potatoes . We water the potatoes and the wild flowers take off.

The mosquito eaters are more than welcome to tag onto our eaves.

Fried Fungi

2007-06-30T19:26:00.000-07:00

Lots of rain in the boreal forest brings out mushrooms. With the right balance of temperature, sun and rain mushrooms come out. In past years there has been so many mushrooms and of different varieties it is almost too much for my small mind to handle because of its quality of magical beauty.

We harvest edible mushrooms.

We take about 1/3 of the mushrooms we find leaving the rest to continue their life cycle.

Rosy larch and king bolete have pushed their way through the earth everywhere in the past couple of days.

Aki dries them. By the time winter arrives we have a mushroom cache; Oyster, field, horse and bolete.

We discovered an incredible delicacy yesterday. A large grouping of oyster mushrooms that had dried in the last week in perfect condition. We brought them home, marinated and reconstituted them in wine. Fried in butter, a touch of lemon, salt and pepper. It was one of the best meals I've had.

Rose hip wine is coming.

In the 10 years we've lived here surrounded by "crown land" we've lost 90% of our mushrooming grounds. Five years ago lumber mills got a blank cheque with the excuse of the pine beetle. They've taken everything around us. Fir, spruce aspen along with the pine. After they've taken what they wanted everything is bulldozed into a slash pile and burned. The trees go, the mushrooms go.

On a late fall evening, we drove up to the edge of the Chilcotin. It was dark. A red glow on the horizon grew larger as the climb home gave way to the plateau. The fires had been lit. There appeared dozens of red glowing halos dotting the ravaged forest along the roads. Massive fires fueled by gasoline and diesel, which would for weeks burn limbs, roots and unworthy trees, erase them as if they had never existed.

Dandelions

2007-06-17T23:39:00.000-07:00

Dandelions are high in vitamins A, B and C and minerals like calcium, potassium, iron, phosphorous and magnesium.. The flowers are rich with vitamin D. The roots are said to be good for your liver and blood.

Aki, Kai and I eat dandelion as a main source of vegetable and green for the months of April, May and into June.

As we get our garden turned in the spring the dandelions we let alone the season before have small carrot sized roots. We stir fry them. They're excellent. The young greens are excellent salad material. The flowers we mix into omlettes, stir frys, salads and soups. Aki rolls the flowers in flour and seasoning and fries them in butter. They taste like a mushroom. We eat bags of them. We stop eating the greens as they mature because they become quite bitter but we continue feeding our chickens loads till the fall. We'll continue to eat the flowers and roots.

One dish Aki likes to make using the roots is based on one she grew up eating (her mother used burdock instead of dandelion root).

Slice roots and a carrot into thin strips.

Stir fry in a bit of sesame oil. Add soy sauce and a dash of chili pepper to taste.

Enjoy!

When bears come out from the high winter hibernation grounds one of their first foods is the dandelion. They get fat eating just dandelion flowers.

We've all heard about dandelion wine.

May 27th. They're here.

2007-05-28T20:25:00.000-07:00

While I sit, I'm attacked.
I've got to keep moving and my typing isn't fast enough.
They're swarming around me and biting .

They're coming in somewhere. All we can figure is that they're coming in with us, on us, everytime we come back in after being outside.

There are so many mosquitos.
Oh man I can't write this post. They're biting my fingers.

With clear hot days like these it will dry up and they'll have no place to breed. They will be gone for another year.

2007-05-21T19:00:00.000-07:00

We live in the bush. On the edge of the Chilcotin plateau in British Columbia. We are isolated, no neighbours, off the grid.

Our power comes from the sun through photo electric panels. We are connected by satellite to the internet.

Right now we're putting our garden in. We grow most of our food, trade for some, forage a fair bit for mushrooms ,shoots, dandelion roots and flowers, wild onions hunt and fish some and the rest we buy.

11 yrs ago we said goodbye and moved from the city into the bush. Leaving, looking for freedom to create, paradise to be free and get what we thought was crazy with society out of our faces.

It is nothing like we thought it was going to be.