Heidi Hegwer

thanks for the vid. Reminds me of sites in Southern Arizona.
Good to hear about the bird and insect response, very exciting after only 6 mobths
A great seed source for you might be the desert-adapted seed varieties that they collect over at
NativeSeed Search in Tucson. (nativeseeds.org)These are heirloom desert-adapted food plants, grown for many
generations on Indian Reservations. Desert watermelon, besides the corn / squash / beans that you
would expect. There is a desert Carob too, very beautiful with fantastic shade canopy.

I've seen the fenced in "picking grid" idea that Bobby mentions. Actually it was a deer-protected apple tree that got Himalayan blackberry[Rubus discolor] canes grown up to a height of approx. 10 feet inside of the 5x5 deer cage. It worked pretty well for keeping the blackberry canes erect and pickable from outside the cage. It didn't work so well for making the apple fruit pickable. ha ha.

One thing you may want to look into, is identifying exactly which blackberry you are dealing with. In our area, the native blackberry [Rubus ursinus] is entirely less invasive, smaller thorned than the Himalayan. It can be handled without leather gloves, which is a must with the tougher berry. We have to dig Himalayan up from it's underground trunks sometimes with a digging steel or a pick axe, and watch it all night long with a flashlight so that it doesn't touch down and root itself from the top of the cane bending over near the ground. It's reported they know when you go out to a friend's house for dinner, and use the opportunity to root then. For anyone considering desperate measures, the selective use of super-concentrated acetic acid to burn the roots can be a tool to use. It's not patented by Mon-Satano.

Hi, Adrienne. Since you don't know absolutely everything about the health and exposures of the llama....what about taking the 3 days or so required to run the manure through the hot composting process? After 84 hours (that's three and a half days) of 130 degree temps, all pathogens are wiped out anyway. Your only investments are a $20 compost thermometer, a source of water, and a little back muscle turning and watering the compost twice a day to keep it going hot. Presumably there is somewhere on your property some carbonaceous (dried leaves, straw, shredded paper, half composted twigs from your preexisting compost pile, etc etc etc) material that you can use to balance the highly nitrogenous llama manure? If it's fairly fresh you would need a larger amount of carbonaceous stuff. If it's been aging for a year or something, then not so much. I know, I know those are vague quantities. But the thermometer will tell you everything you need to know. As far as watering the pile, you are going for something as moist as a wrung out sponge.

Anyone searching for detailed info on growing Eleocharis dulcis, I found a very in-depth feasibility study that was done in Hawaii which discusses things like climate, temperature, soil fertility, how deep to plant, etc... Very thorough and helpful. Even for those of us in colder climates.
It's a 10 page PDF file. Authored by:

Steve Hopkins
Rain Garden Ornamentals
49-041 Kamehameha Highway
Kaneohe, Hawaii 96744
stevehopkins@hawaii.rr.com
www.raingarden.us

I would attach the document if I could figure out how, but am working with a computer that is new to me and unable to figure out how.

--- good luck