The Tangled Nest

Here in Seattle, we like to repeat the words of Mark Twain:  “The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in Seattle.”  (Don’t quote us.  For one thing, the original phrase read “San Francisco,” not “Seattle,” and for another thing the quote is apocryphal–Mark Twain probably never said it at all.  But let us [...]

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Remember the Bicycle Pea Trellis that I only sort of liked?  I promised an updated photo after the peas grew.  Here’s how it looked in March: And last week:OK, yes, I love it. And while we’re about it with the “found” trellises:  After pruning our runaway corkscrew willow, I saved some of the beautiful curving [...]

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Well, one thing growing in this cold Seattle spring is lettuce!  Last night while picking a head of Romaine for the dinner salad, I saw the familiar “milk” rising from the cut.  Such amazing organisms, the plants among us–full of life and secrets.  I decided that as long as my photographer-husband is on a little [...]

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We looked out one recent morning to see Esmeralda and Marigold buried up to their necks in the cold frame, right behind the last of the arugula. It was a very cute little scene, but also an essential reminder for the urban chicken farmer.  In the dripping Seattle winter, there is not much dry dirt [...]

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My daughter and I are both vegetarians, but my husband Tom, and the rest of my family, are not.  We usually celebrate Christmas day at my house, everyone gathered about our dining table, made long with the addition of two leaves.  I love it.  For years I dreamed up celebratory meatless dinners designed to make [...]

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If you have chickens, you likely have a chicken run.  Or maybe you’ve seen the movie: Well,  around here it’s Chicken Walk: All of our chickens were raised by hand, growing up in a corner of our kitchen from the time they were 2 days old until they were ready to move out to the [...]

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As autumn settles in, I am getting busily to work on my new book called, in its working-title,  The Urban Bestiary. It’s a wonderful project (if I may say so!) that explores our constant continuity with the wild earth through our daily coexistence with wild animals (as well as other animals that are breaking down [...]

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In her book, Eating Stone: Imagination and the Loss of the Wild, the wonderful desert nature writer Ellen Meloy wrote, shortly before her sudden death  (a great loss to us all) about a flicker that had been incessantly drumming her house.  She had named him Stalin, and one morning she found him trapped in her [...]

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Amdist the brown branches of February woodlands and urban forests in the Pacific Northwest, one native shrub always turns out the first flowers and bright new leaves– the Indian Plum.  The pendants of tiny greenish-white flower clusters fall beneath glowing green leaves that stick straight up, like the ears of a rabbit. The flowers will [...]

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