Solar Roof Panels

http://www.architectlines.com/solar-power-panels-solar-shingles/

Protecting the Home From Wildfire

We've had a respite from worries about brush and forest fires over the last few weeks, with cooler temperatures and rain. My Australian husband and I have been keeping up with the bush fire situation in Australia, which reminds me that I need to fire-proof my country place to the best of my ability, before weather conditions get hot and dry again, as they undoubtedly will.

The closest I've come to a forest fire was in 1996 when an electric wire fell and started a fire at Altamira. Fortunately, I saw it happen, and The McMahan Volunteer Fire Dept got there within a few minutes (which reminds me, I need to send in a donation to them), but not before it got large enough to be very scary. The most frightening thing, to me, was seeing the fire jump from tree top to tree top. Pine trees were the very worst. There would be a tree standing in relatively isolation, say, 15 feet away from its nearest neighbor, looking just like it always had. Then, suddenly, explosively, it would burst into flame -- the whole canopy all at once.

I have planted 3 pine trees at the Berry Farm and a few junipers, mainly because the grasshoppers were killing everything else I tried to plant. Both of these species burn readily -- I've observed that the pine is especially bad. Dead juniper wood and leaves burn easily, but green branches not so much, at least in my experience. There are no trees at all within 45 feet of my house, but there are 2 large old junipers in the yard of the old homestead (I need to tear the old homestead down, because it is beyond redemption), and I planted a few more near the pole barn, as a wind break.

I'm wondering ... if I keep all the lower branches pruned from the large old trees and keep the young junipers cut low, would it be OK to keep them? Or should I remove them? Or should I let them grow tall and keep the lower branches trimmed back? It's the leaves and small branches that burn, not the trunks. It's not all that easy to get a cedar log to burn. I used to throw a cedar log on my fire every evening, for the fragrance. I'd always need to get the fire going with some other kind of wood first. Some other windbreak possibilities are: native plum thicket, yaupon holly (which I've heard burns readily but which, in my experience, is not nearly as likely to burn as pine), Japanese ligustrum (a very well adapted exotic which, I have to say, the grasshoppers love to eat), Chinese photinia (a well-adapted exotic), Russian olive or eleagnus (a well adapted exotic that produces berries in cooler climates, but it tends not to fruit in central Texas), and hardy olive trees, which tend to form thickets and do very well in my garden in San Antonio but which are frost sensitive below 25 degrees F.

Sunset Valley, Texas has published a nice article on plants that don't tend to catch fire easily. I'm just east of the Hill Country, but many of the same plants grow on my land. Sunset Valley recommends:
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Unfavorable tree don’t have to be removed, just keep branches pruned to 10 feet about the ground

                                                 

   Firewise Plant Recommendations for your Region

EDWARDS PLATEAU or HILL COUNTRY

TREES:

Texas Persimmon                                                              Desert Willow                                                         

            Crape Myrtle                                                                     Bigtooth Maple                                               

            Mexican Sycamore                                                            Black Walnut                                                    

Texas Ash                                                                           Mexican Plum

            Texas Mountain Laurel                                                      Texas Smoke Tree

            Red Maple                                                                           Silver Maple

            Boxelder                                                                               Pecan

            Bitternut Hickory                                                                 Shagbark Hickory

             Pignut Hickory                                                                     Mockernut Hickory

             Sugarberry                                                                            Hackberry

            Netleaf Hackberry                             

SHRUBS:

                Red Yucca                                                                          China Rose

                Tea Rose                                                                            Pomegranate

                Winter Honeysuckle                                                          Coral Berry

                Strawberry Bush                                                                Eastern Coral Bean

                Indigo Bush                                                                        Common Buttonbush

                               

FLOWERS:

                Purple Leatherflower (Cover for small birds)           Coral Honeysuckle (Hummingbirds)

                Snapdragon Vine (Fruits eaten by birds)                     Engelmann Daisy (Seed-eating birds)

                Turk’s Cap (Attracts hummingbirds)                           Maximilian Sunflower (Seed-eating birds)

                Golden-eye (Provides nectar to bees)                            Rose Pavonia (Attracts butterflies)

                Indian Blanket (Attracts butterflies)                             Coreopsis (Attracts butterflies)

                Purple Coneflower (Seed-eating birds)                        Sweet Violet (Attracts butterflies)

GRASSES:

                Redtop (Good birdseed)                                                    Black Grama (Wildlife grazing)

                Hairy Grama (Wildlife grazing)                                   Buffalo Grass (Drought tolerant)

                Weeping Lovegrass                                                           Plains Muhly (Wildlife grazing)

                Bush Muhly (Wildlife grazing)                                      Tobosa

-------------------------------------------------------------------------                                                        

I do like the junipers for their berries and fragrant wood. When my father was lying on his death bed, I took a juniper branch to his bedside on Christmas day and lit it on fire in a ceramic container (over my mother's strenuous protests). My father was quite moved by this. He said the fragrance of the burning juniper took him back to his youth when he and his father used to go on camping trips into the Hill Country west of Austin. He said it was one the of the nicest Christmas gifts he'd ever received.

Finally, in support of the widely maligned juniper, a quote from Edward Abbey:

“The fire. The odor of burning juniper is the sweetest fragrance on the face of the earth, in my honest judgment; I doubt if all the smoking censers of Dante's paradise could equal it. One breath of juniper smoke, like the perfume of sagebrush after rain, evokes in magical catalysis, like certain music, the space and light and clarity and piercing strangeness of the American West. Long may it burn.”

A reminder from a couple of years ago, when I watched helplessly as the Bastrop fire approached Altamira: Wildfires in Texas

ARC - Animal Road Crossing

ARC—Animal Road Crossing—is an interdisciplinary partnership working to facilitate new thinking, new methods, new materials and new solutions for wildlife crossing structures.

Our primary goal is to ensure safe passage for both humans and animals on and across our roads. We do this through supporting the study, design and construction of wildlife crossing structures throughout North America.

ARC builds bridges in other important ways: We reconnect landscapes and wildlife habitats that have been split apart by our road systems; we reacquaint people and wildlife, helping drivers to be aware of the habitats our roads interrupt and the animals that use these places; and through these strategies, we reaffirm the need for humans and animals to coexist in the landscapes we call home.

Situated at the intersection of science and design, ARC is a forum for creative collaborations and surprising synergies.

I have not read extensively on this. I wonder if organizations such as ARC place attractive plants close to the animal crossing bridges and culverts, to encourage the animals to use them.

There are large herds of deer near my country place. At night, I don't like to go over 45 mph on the stretch of road between my place and the Interstate 9 miles away.

Enterobacter and Obesity

ISME Journal Dec 13, 2012 has an article by Chinese researchers reporting evidence that a diet which makes the pH of the gut more acidic changes the bacterial composition of the gut, decreasing the population of enterobacter to non-detectable levels. Decreasing the number of bacteria also reduces the toxin produced by the bacteria. The toxin causes insulin resistance and weight gain.

An obese subject who was put on a diet of whole grains, traditional Chinese medicinal foods, and probiotics for 23 weeks lost 51 kg, which is a bit more than the amount of weight lost after weight-loss surgery. The subject did not change the amount of exercise he did.

The Chinese researchers took bacteria from the obese man before the diet and fed them to rats, after which the rats began to gain weight.



Abstract:

Lipopolysaccharide endotoxin is the only known bacterial product which, when subcutaneously infused into mice in its purified form, can induce obesity and insulin resistance via an inflammation-mediated pathway. Here we show that one endotoxin-producing bacterium isolated from a morbidly obese human’s gut induced obesity and insulin resistance in germfree mice. The endotoxin-producing Enterobacter decreased in relative abundance from 35% of the volunteer’s gut bacteria to non-detectable, during which time the volunteer lost 51.4 kg of 174.8 kg initial weight and recovered from hyperglycemia and hypertension after 23 weeks on a diet of whole grains, traditional Chinese medicinal foods and prebiotics. A decreased abundance of endotoxin biosynthetic genes in the gut of the volunteer was correlated with a decreased circulating endotoxin load and alleviated inflammation. Mono-association of germfree C57BL/6J mice with strain Enterobacter cloacae B29 isolated from the volunteer’s gut induced fully developed obesity and insulin resistance on a high-fat diet but not on normal chow diet, whereas the germfree control mice on a high-fat diet did not exhibit the same disease phenotypes. The Enterobacter-induced obese mice showed increased serum endotoxin load and aggravated inflammatory conditions. The obesity-inducing capacity of this human-derived endotoxin producer in gnotobiotic mice suggests that it may causatively contribute to the development of obesity in its human host.

Commercial uses of Castor Beans

I was surprised today to find 8 [make that 12 -- I keep finding more] very healthy-looking castor bean plants growing near the site of a pear tree I had to dig up and move to the San Antonio garden last year, after it had been defoliated twice by grasshoppers here in the country. I planted the castor bean tree next to the pear tree, hoping that maybe the castor bean would discourage the hoppers or maybe even kill some of them. Although the hoppers did nibble on the castor bean leaves, they didn't seem to be terribly fond of them. Didn't seem to discourage them at all from ripping into the pear tree. I have seen no evidence that any part of the castor bean tree is poisonous to grasshoppers, but the hoppers might have gone elsewhere to be sick and die.

You can see some hopper damage to the leaves in the photo I just took, but I've never seen a castor bean tree completely defoliated or even seriously damaged.

I had no idea castor bean trees could survive so well in dry, sandy soil. It's been about a month since there was any significant rainfall here, and I've seen potted castor bean plants go all droopy if I wait too long between waterings. It's very strange -- everything I can find on the Web about castor bean trees says the have shallow roots, and I've observed the same thing when I pull them up (in my garden in San Antonio, they tend to be a bit overly fecund). This article [An Assessment of Alternative Perennials For Use in Agriforestry Systems of Smallholder Famers] says that castor plants are drought resistant. Maybe they store water in their trunks and stems?

A 1937 article in St. Petersburg FL Independent says that grasshoppers love to eat castor bean leaves and die after eating them. http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=ZuNPAAAAIBAJ&sjid=M1UDAAAAIBAJ&pg=3470%2C286829

If only!

There's an article on the same page of the newspaper about a guy who moved into a condemned lower east side apartment in NYC and rented out rooms for 5 cents per day. In addition to the space, the tenants received firewood and candles. http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=ZuNPAAAAIBAJ&sjid=M1UDAAAAIBAJ&pg=4921%2C286509

Here's an article about the various commercial uses of castor beans:
http://nceed.com/Spilling_the_Beans.pdf

It says the main use of castor bean oil is in making nylon. Castor oil is also used as a component of lithium grease and other types of grease; as a component of plastic polymers; and corrosion inhibitors. Researchers in Israel are working on selectively breeding castor bean plants for the production of bio-fuel from the oil. Castor bean oil is ideal becuase:

• it is soluble in alcohol, and does not require heat to be transformed into fuel 
• Oil makes up about 50% of the weight of the castor seeds  
• The castor-oil plant is easy to grow and drought- resistant
• The castor bean can be grown on marginal lands, which are not usable for food production
• The castor plant can be adapted to large scale mechanized production  

Enhancing the Castor Bean for Bio-Fuel Production

Castor oil certainly makes a LOT more sense than corn oil for making fuel. 

One of My Favorite Websites on Weight Loss & Maintenance

I forgot to include this one in the letter to my friend:

http://weightmaven.org/

An Open Letter to a Friend Who Wants to Lose Weight

Dear ___________.

If you truly do not like being overweight, you need to do whatever it takes to get rid of the fat. The only logical way to lose weight is to eat fewer calories than you use, each and every day. Sugars and starches are literally addictive, and they're fattening so it helps a lot to eliminate 100% of the sugar and concentrated starches from your diet. Concentrated starches are things such as wheat, corn, and rice. The refined versions of these grains are even worse than whole grains, but even eating whole grain products can make it more difficult to lose weight.

Eliminating sugar and concentrated starches means no sodas (diet sodas are OK, except many of them are sweetened with aspartame, which is toxic), no sweet tea (you can use Splenda or stevia sweeteners to sweeten tea, but the sweet tea sold at stores and fast food places contains corn syrup), no tortillas, no hamburgers, no bread, no rice, no fast-food french fries (they add sugar to the french fries to make them taste better!), and go easy on potatoes.

It sounds grim at first, until you actually start eating meals without sugars and starches. Once you get used to not having these things, it becomes much easier to enjoy meals without them. For example, I love Mexican food, especially things such as enchiladas and tamales. I've been working on recipes that approximate these foods but without the masa. For example, a beef and cheese fritata is a tasty substitute for an enchilada. I'm pretty sure one could make something similar to a tamale using ground nuts instead of masa. They would not have the smooth consistency of a traditional tamale, but they would taste great.

One of my favorite lunches is the lettuce roll, where you roll up sliced turkey, chopped tomato, onion, olives, etc -- whatever veggies you want -- in a large lettuce leaf. It tastes a lot like the sandwiches they make at Subway, only I actually like the lettuce rolls better.

Here's the website of Barbara Berkeley,  a doctor who specializes in helping people lose weight and maintain their new weight once they've lost:

http://refusetoregain.com/

Dr. Berkeley has also written an excellent book called Refuse to Regain about how to keep the weight off for good, once you get to your target weight.

Here are some websites of people who were overweight and who have lost weight and, even more impressive, kept it off:

http://refusetoregain.com/refusetoregain/about-lynn-haraldsonberin.html

http://justmaintaining.com/about/ (scroll down to the middle of the page to see her "before" picture)

http://www.freewebs.com/ivanarama/apps/photos/

http://www.fittothefinish.com/blog/

http://www.escapefromobesity.net/

http://annieweighsblog.blogspot.com/2011/04/year-from-now.html

There are lots more blogs and websites. You don't have to do this alone, there are thousands of people out there trying to lose weight.

I KNOW how hard it is. Even though I've only lost 26 pounds (9 to go to reach my target weight of 130), I've gone through the same things everyone else goes through when they lose 10% or more of their body weight. I posted a comment on the weight-loss doctor's blog, and she confirmed that it's just as difficult to deal with maintaining one's new weight after a 20 pound loss as it is to maintain it after a 150 pound loss.

I'm not going to lie and say it's easy. It's one of the most chanllenging things I've ever done. It's much harder than quitting smoking and, I suspect, harder than quitting addictive drugs. One reason is that we're constantly bombarded with temptations to eat unhealthy foods. You have to plan each day carefully. For example, if you know you're going to be away from home all day, pack a healthy lunch and healthy snacks instead of buying food at a convenience store or fast food place.

Here's something surprising -- even though I'm eating more fresh veggies and good-quality nuts and grass-fed beef from Central Market, my food bill has actually gone down. I'm not spending money at restaurants, I'm not buying prepared foods and I'm eating less. For a snack, I used to have, say a mini-cheeseburger from Wendy's or a $1 carton of yogurt and some crackers or maybe some prepared food from Central Market (they add sugar to their prepared foods, including things such as chicken salad). Now I eat a few nuts. Easier, cheaper, healthier. And, surprisingly, just as satisfying.