Mick Fisch

my grandma used to fry up cactus.  She would cut it up and steam it to remove most of the slime.  Then she fried it up in bacon grease and salted it.  It tasted a little like okra, but way better.  Okra hopes it can taste that good someday.

A note from southeastern Idaho.  (I wish people would note their area in their messages.  The timing, and challenges of the south texas coast are quite different from, say the Canadian Plains or the intermountain west.)

I went out a few days ago and saw my honeyberries and juliette cherry bushes survived the winter.  Major WIN!!!  Other survivers were, my juneberry trees, my gooseberry and current bushes, and my linden trees.  I wasn't worried about my seaberries, they are tough!

The first year is always a worry, the plants often just limp along that first summer and I wonder if I wasted time and money trying to grow these things.

In a while I'll see if my apples, plums and hazels also survived.  I think they wake up a little later.

I've already planted 60 strawberry plants this year, along with more raspberries and a bunch of cold weather garden crops.

Also going into the ground this year, a mess of chinese chestnuts, more apricots, apples, (altogether around 100 tiny trees) grapes, hardy kiwi, mulberries, triple crown blackberries and I can't remember what else right now.  

I got one of those flow hives.  I'll be driving to Twin Falls, Idaho in a few weeks to pick up my bees.  The neighbors bees are very productive here and one of my neighbors bought a flow hive and loves it.

As long as they are on top of the ground rather than dug in, I think they will be great for a garden.

Moose are browsers.  The poop looks like sawdust if you break one open.  But as browsers they eat the twigs, leaves, etc.  So what you're going to get is basically the same as if you took a bunch of twigs, etc and put them on your ground, except they've been through a gut and are already partially broken down.  The advantage of this is that the 'little branches' they eat are actually fairly low in carbon and pretty rich in all of the good stuff, as well as partially digested, as compared with the kind of sawdust you would get from a sawmill.  Even so, I think they would be better on top of the ground as a fertilizer rather than dug in (they may take up the nitrogen to break down the still relatively high carbon content).  

How about sweet potato.  According to google it's perennial in zone 9.  It would provide a creeping vine ground cover and an extra harvest if you want to dig some of them up.

not on subject, but semi-related.  My wife and I have a king sized bed, using two single mattresses.  2 singles are quite a bit cheaper than 1 king and we can each pick the hardness we want.  Besides, since there are two of us, neither of us sleeps in middle, and any other activities are on one side or the other.

maybe some maximillian sunflowers?

Bread.  Not all bread is created equal.  Wonder Bread is a poor, misbegotten imitation of real bread like you can get in german bakeries.  When I was a kid living in Germany back in the 60s you could almost gain weight walking by a bakery.  It smelled so good!!!  I've made my own bread, had bread that was supposedly freshed baked.  For some reason it isn't the same animal as what I got when I was in Germany or France.

I have a brother in law who is an economist.  He told me there are only 2 jobs where if your right 50% of the time you are recognized as a genius.  Economist and weatherman.

I thought this will be an interesting read, from what I have read so far.  

I agree with his definition of poor.  I know my oldest son felt we were poor, although we always had enough for necessities and a few luxuries.  He was probably frustrated by my lack of sympathy over his having to co-ar-dinate to get to drive the family car when his friend was given a new, tricked out truck upon graduating from high school, but he knew me well enough to know not to even bring it up.  The lack of the latest Apple phone does not make you poor.

I see some of his ideas are obviously wrong, given 200 years of rapid increasing knowledge and a different culture.  His assumption of the importance of beer is the obvious one.  Still I believe he was simply voicing the common belief.  As evidence I refer you to read Benjamin Franklin's autobiography about working in a printers shop in England when old ben was a young man, where they felt that you couldn't be strong without drinking beer).  

If you are upset about the patriarchal focus, go find another book, but look for a more recent publication.  Most of the writing of this time will be similar.  Alternatively, you could simply right it off for what it is, a man's perspective given at a certain culture, time and place and thank God you were born here and now.

As far as idleness is concerned, at this time in England the commons were pretty much gone, which had provided a cushion for the working rural poor, this drove down wages, and people worked much harder just to get enough to eat and keep themselves clothed (When well made pants were expected to last a couple of decades).  In that situation, a couple of hours each day might be viewed as a waste.

I agree the guy writing this took a lot of time to write it, which indicates to me he was NOT one of the poor.  

two different ideas.

My moms family were among the first anglo settlers in Arizona.  My grandma would make fried cactus from nopals in the spring.  She used spineless prick.ly pear cactus she grew for that purpose.  She would harvest the pads, peel the pads and steam them to remove as much of the slime as possible.  Then she would fry them in bacon grease and salt and pepper them.  she may have floured them prior to frying, I don't know.  It was similar to fried okra, but way better (what okra wants to taste like when it grows up).

When I was a little kid we visited relatives in eastern arizona and they made a delicious salad with prickly pears (deseeded). I was a little kid and don't know the particulars.  The next morning I walked out and saw a prickly pear cactus with ripe looking pears.  Being a little kid and remembering how good it tasted, I walked up and tried to pick the pear.  Everyone thought I was kind of a dumb kid not to realize the pears had those fine hair spines.  My mom told me afteward you had to pick them carefully with tongs and a knife and then burn off the spines.