Back in the Car Again

What kind of book is it?

2018-04-13T08:47:00.002-07:00

"Ten Thousand Secrets National Park" is a fairy thriller. Thanks to Andrea Humphrey of Boston for nailing down the genre!

Fact, Fiction, & Me

2018-04-13T08:32:00.001-07:00

Writing the novel "Ten Thousand Secrets National Park" has been a good way to share what I have learned about politics and human nature in my many years as a fact-based community organizer for environmental protection. Scroll down to 2015-6 blog entries to view synopsis, excerpts and back story. There will be at least a second book in this series, once TThSNP is published (my present task).

Meanwhile, my day job as exec director of a Finger Lakes, NY watershed protection nonprofit made its own demands, so I set aside the novel for a while to - with the help of hundreds - compile, edit and write the 2017 Cayuga Lake Watershed Restoration & Protection Plan, which can be read/downloaded here: http://www.cayugalake.org/files/all/clwrpp_2017_final_4_30_17.pdf . Several people have commented on how strangely readable this report is, for which I give full credit to the different writing muscles developed and flexed during my novel writing process, leading to a felicitous interplay between fact and fiction.

During this fact-focused two-year period I also wrote and had published a scholarly article about water resources and protection in New York State and the Commonwealth of Kentucky, two of the places I know and love best. You can scroll down to view the Abstract (I love writing abstracts) of "Whose Water Is it?" and contact me if you'd like a pdf of the full article. Or maybe you have access to the May 2016 issue of the American Journal of Economics and Sociology 75 (3)! I tried to provide a link to the full article, below, but I am not supposed to do that per my terms of publication (I did not pay), so you cannot view the entire article here.

So now, in mid-April 2018 when trouble is hitting the fan in Washington DC and elsewhere, I encourage you to have another look at "Ten Thousand Secrets National Park," which fits these times like a tailored wet rubber glove. Please send me words of encouragement as I strive to get it published and out there for you and others to enjoy. Thank you.

"Whose Water Is It? May 2016 article by Hilary Lambert

2016-12-08T07:20:00.001-08:00

"Whose Water Is It?" Hilary Lambert AJES 75 (3), May 2016 Click on this link to view "Whose Water Is It?" my article published May 2016 in the American Journal of Economic and Sociology 75 (3). Thank you.

ABSTRACT

Whose Water Is It?

By HILARY A. B. LAMBERT*

Legal protection of the USA’s water resources was reduced

during the Bush-Cheney Administration (2000–2008), facilitating coal, oil,

and gas development at the expense of clean water. The “Halliburton

Loophole” in the 2005 Energy Act exempted all oil and gas development

activities, including fracking (hydraulic fracturing), from the Clean Water

Act, Clean Drinking Water Act, and other federal statutes. Two U.S.

Supreme Court rulings weakened the Clean Water Act’s protections of

headwaters, streams, wetlands, and other water bodies. In New York

State, communities faced with the imminent prospect of fracking by

energy companies organized. From 2008–2014, they prevented fracking

in New York. Water protection played a major role in energizing

community response, In 2015, a fragile, but resilient, ban was declared

statewide. In Kentucky, 150 years of coal mining resulted in pollution of

many waterways, with hundreds of stream miles buried beneath

mountaintop removal debris. Kentuckians have been pushing back since

the 1930s to protect communities, farms, and water quality. They remain

hopeful in the face of great odds. Urban populations making daily use of

cheap, clean water and fossil-fuel-powered energy sources have little

knowledge of these struggles. In rural America, the fight to protect

communities, lands, and waters from energy exploitation is lifelong.

===

*Executive Director/Steward of the Cayuga Lake Watershed Network, a watershed
protection and educational NGO in central New York State. AB, anthropology, Brown
University; MA, PhD, geography, Clark University. Taught at Rutgers University, Miami
of Ohio, University of Kentucky. Former editor of FOCUS (American Geographical
Society of New York). Associate Director of the Kentucky Waterways Alliance. Community
organizer on behalf of the environment for many years in Kentucky and New
York State.

What could possibly go wrong? TTS excerpt - caving under the Green, Green River

2015-05-19T05:40:00.000-07:00

We turned toward Hugh, who was on his stomach next to the hole, shining the big light down. Creeping up carefully, Lena and I peered into the round, straight-sided limestone shaft, about ten feet across.

“How deep?” asked Lena.

“Thirty feet,” said Hugh. “Guesstimate.” The sparse cave stream poured over the edge next to him, plummeting noisily down the shaft and into a hole in the floor way below.

“That drain,” Hugh shone his big light at the hole, “must head toward the Green, Green River, which is only about two hundred feet that way” – he pointed toward the far wall – “north.” He got up and we backed away from the hole, stepping carefully in the slick mud.

“We shouldn’t be so close without a safety rope,” Lena said, but Hugh was shining the superlight around, and had found the hole in the wall of the big cave room.

“That has always been full of water,” he said, striding over and bending to look inside.

"Let’s go,” he called, disappearing into the hole.

“Wait,” said Lena as we leaned inside the small opening, lights showing a narrow muddy passageway that sloped steeply downward. “What are you planning to do?”

“We’re here, we have the time, let’s see if this goes,” Hugh called back, his voice muffled by the tight space.

Lena turned to me. “Can you manage this?” she asked.

“Only one way to find out,” I said, and began climbing down the steep corkscrewing passage, feet first.

“Go Mom,” she said, scrambling in behind me. The tight walls supported my shoulders as I scooted down, feet seeking the way, Lena close above, both of us accumulating a mud coating. I soon heard Hugh’s voice. His light was shining on my feet.

He called, “Just lie down and scoot out on your butt and back,” and I slid out a two-foot hole onto the floor of the shaft. I got up, followed by Lena, and stepped through the pattering waterfall. Hugh was shining the superlight at the drain in the floor.

“It goes!” he cried excitedly, and sat down on the edge of the hole, looking around for us to follow.

“Can you just wait a minute,” I said. Lena shone her headlamp at the sides of the shaft, the waterfall, the small side hole we had emerged from, and upward to the rim of the shaft, now thirty feet above us.

“What’s the plan, Stan?” she called to Hugh over the racket of the waterfall, loud in the confined space of the shaft. Removing a chocolate bar from a pocket, she broke off a chunk and handed it to me.

“Water break,” she said, deliberately slowing the pace. Hugh got up and joined us. We had a long cool drink from our canteens and relished our candy bars.

“It’s only another two hundred feet to the river,” repeated Hugh, wolfing down his snack. “Based on what we already know, this drain here should drop ten feet and then go right under the river.” He adjusted his pack, put the superlight away, and turned toward the drain hole.

“You are saying that this little hole here goes underneath the Green, Green River?” I asked. This situation was beyond my comfort zone. “Is this safe?”

“I think,” said Hugh, visibly impatient, “And Steve Roberts thinks, along with our entire science team - ”

Lena raised her eyebrows to interject, “A whole five people,” as he continued.

“The Pleistocene re-set of the river’s north shore re-opened a passage that went under the river during that ancient era. Water pressure here, in this drain, pushed open a plug. We can now get under the Green, Green River and into the Pleistocene via this drain. It’s the path the cat used.”

He said, “We have been in here only an hour. Let’s give it one more hour. OK?” We nodded.

“C’mon,” he said, scrambling into the small drain. I followed, Lena behind, climbing down, leaning away from the water. The drain was smaller than the last climb-down and I slid down the slick rock face. We scrambled downward on ledges, back and forth across the vertical drain. We climbed down one side of the widening canyon once our legs were unable to bridge the gap. Hugh’s light shone up from below and he shouted something I could not hear above the noise of the waterfall.

“What’d he say, did you hear?” I called up to Lena.

She puffed, “This is longer than he said it would be. Damn it.”

I heard Hugh again, and reported to Lena, “He said ‘hand-line.’ ”

“Oh shit,” she said, “Wait a minute, ok?” I held onto the wall as she opened her pack, removed a rope, and tied it off on a projecting rock. The line dangled down toward Hugh’s light, fifteen feet below.

“OK,” she instructed, “Hold onto the line the rest of the way down. You may have to drop.” I edged carefully down, one hand and arm wrapped around the slender line. Next step, my left foot met empty space.

Hugh called, “It’s only a three-foot drop. Use the line to brace yourself – straighten out –” he was right there, holding on as I dropped, plummeted and landed. I let go of the line as Lena landed lightly behind me. We were in a small bowl-shaped room. To go back, we would have to climb up into the wide drain hole in the room’s low ceiling. Water from the drain flowed across the flat floor into a side passage. Something shiny on the floor –

“Is this cool or what,” said Hugh, walking over to an inflated dinghy. He spoke loudly over the racket of the water. “This was sucked all the way down here when the lake emptied.” He lifted and dropped it. “You saw there was only one up there, at the landing, right?”

“Why did it stop here?” asked Lena. She shone her light at the small passageway ahead.

“Maybe the suction dropped, at this point,” said Hugh, “Like, you know, the giant toilet bowl flush was complete.” I envisioned the rubber raft being yanked from its rope, circling the shaft and plummeting as the lake room emptied, then being sucked into the canyon we had just scrambled down. I’m mentally tough – have to be – but with the distance piling up between us and the blue sky above, I was feeling a little bit uneasy.

“Not much use here, is it?” I said, masking my discomfort with a kick at the poor lonely thing, stranded down here. Lena, who knows me well, shot me a look.

Hugh laughed and said, “We’re about ten feet below the bed of the Green, Green River – and that passage will take us underneath it to the Pleistocene.” He said, “I hope you understand how important this is,” and led the way. The three of us hunched over to fit into the narrow five-foot passage and headed north, splashing in the stream.

Synopsis, Ten Thousand Secrets National Park

2015-05-01T05:30:00.000-07:00

Janet Harper works at Ten Thousand Secrets National Park Casino & Entertainment District in Kentucky, following a mysterious explosion at her previous workplace, Nevada’s Historic Red Light District & Jazz Casino National Park. In hiding from her two children for over a year, Janet is tracked down by her daughter Lena, and they are drawn into a struggle between the Federal Parks Service and the Department of Defense over control of time travel, which has been in Park Service hands since its discovery by Cornell Tech scientists twenty years earlier.

Fronted by charismatic Professor Thomas “Cat” King, a small but influential faction at the Department of Defense is tired of hearing liberals whine about the “environmental impacts” of time travel, and is planning military expeditions to correct past disappointments. As King says at a D.C.-area holiday party, “George Bush is gonna thank me big-time when we go back and clean up his messes.”

Meanwhile, Janet’s son Brian writes a community development grant for a rural hamlet in south-central NY State. He meets their beautiful leader Maeve and becomes enmeshed in her fervent search for grant funding to support her immigrant Irish fairy community, hiding in plain view near the city of Corning for centuries. Brian and friends are soon fighting a highway project that Maeve’s Congressman has cajoled her into supporting. The highway would destroy a nature preserve in our world, while leaving the landscape untouched in Maeve’s alternate present time. She explains it this way to Brian: “Why would you deny us the chance to better ourselves? With an interchange and big road, we can draw in visitors for short and longer stays. We want what the rest of the world has. And we need people.”

Tom King has added Maeve’s community to his inventory of “natural time openings,” where he can mount military expeditions to the past without going through the federal government’s laborious environmental impact process. His dark ally, Senator Harlan Styce of KY, helps King seize control of the Park Service’s top-secret time travel research program, operating as the Pleistocene Place theme park attraction at Ten Thousand Secrets National Park. Styce lines up his ducks: “We funded the Parks folks to study time travel for the sole purpose of its defense applicability. OK! We’re there! Time’s UP.”

Janet races to complete her own dire mission at Ten Thousand Secrets NP before King’s military minions arrive, while struggling to keep her children safe from seductive fairies, malign Senators, fracking gas well explosions, flooding caves, bad time trips, and her own dangerous behavior. Wonderful allies emerge to help, among them Senator Liz Maximus of Massachusetts and her brilliant staffer Ravi Sen-Ellis, who knows the right questions to ask: “What time is this place?”

Meet Ravi Sen-Ellis, and get an eyeful of Dr. Tom "Cat" King: Excerpt from Chapter 7 of Ten Thousand Secrets National Park.

2015-03-31T19:43:00.000-07:00

King had augmented his pre-party drinks with whisky neat, twice. Standing next to his date he scanned the battlefield for prey, lusting to inflict lasting damage.

He saw Ayres and thought, ‘Time to finish him off in public.’

Professor King’s signature bullying move was to plow into a person’s private space belly to belly, eye to eye. Few in polite society could withstand this. He had tired of the hushed brutality of academia, where professorial gladiators fight for the death of their colleagues’ programs via committees, publications and tenure, always smiling and collegial. King brought physical intimidation and violence into the university coliseum. He used these weapons carefully, lacing aggression with charm and synthetic warmth, catching opponents off-guard. And now, his new position made him unassailable, even terrifying. As he shoved through the crowd to get at Ayres, people turned in irritation, falling back when they recognized him.

The Smithsonian guy felt the force approaching.

Looking up, he saw King, said to Bob Ayres, “Oh shit, well, come see us when the dust settles, a quiet life is what you need,” and vanished. King addressed Bob loudly, playing to the crowd.

“Go home, Bob. You’re out of the game.” His physicality smelled out the weak spots, where his victim’s vitals rode near the surface. He would hurt Bob quickly. “This party is for winners and players. You need to be sitting in the bleachers at Kevin’s ball game. At least he misses you. You’re wasting your time here.” King’s public naming of Ayres’ child was a threat. Bob was suddenly on fire, as King intended. But a quick retort was unwise, so he stood quiet, pale. A hand patted his shoulder – a warning to keep it cool. Who was that? Bob broke stares with Cat to glance at the Vermont Senator’s young head of staff, smiling supportively.

King took advantage of the distraction to step forward and push Bob against the wall.

Bob smelled the whisky as Cat stage-whispered, “Your liberal-assed science is dead, and I killed it. My science is hard – and mean – and takes no prisoners.” He pressed Ayres into the wall with each word. Even for King, this was excessive use of force in public, and a little gross. A voice called out the big man dominating the smaller man.

“Hey, King! Get a room!” This drew shocked laughter from the group, which scattered as King swung around, looking for the heckler. Ayres moved away, sucking in cold air from an open window. Up came the Vermont Senator’s staffer, mighty pleased with himself over his anonymous act.

“Do I need a drink after that?” Ayres asked him, while shaking his head to deny the impulse. “What I need is dessert first, dinner later. I am starving.” They walked to the buffet and Ayres piled up all the sweet stuff he wanted, thinking how he would describe the fancy array to his kids.

Through the crowd they heard King boasting, “New science, action-focused, restoring our nation’s pre-eminence,” but his words failed to sting. The two took their plates to a quiet nook and Ayres began to eat, soon feeling a rush of relief and calm.

“My name is Ravi Sen-Ellis, by the way,” the staffer said. “We met at the Parks Science conference last month.”

“Right,” Bob replied. “I was trying to hint to you, around the top secret elephant in the room, that time travel is emerging as an excellent tool for ecosystem management and recovery.” Ravi’s eyes flew open, and he stopped munching on a fancy morsel to think about what he had just heard.

He said, “Suddenly I have a million questions, but why don’t you keep going for a minute or two.” He took a couple of bites as Bob continued.

“It won’t be a secret much longer, with that asshole in control,” Bob said, shrugging a shoulder in the direction of King’s voice. At the other side of the room, Ard Sprinkle was having a heck of a time convincing the boss that it was time to go home. He had one of Cat’s arms into his coat and was walking him slowly, begrudgingly toward the door. Anna Holms waved bye-bye, shutting her ears to King’s exhortations.

“We can finally optimize our country’s military heritage. George Bush is gonna thank me big-time when we go back and clean up his messes. Congresswoman, Ohio’s bases are going to benefit big-time.” Out the door, his voice trailed off, “Better get on board while you can.” Cat’s date was waiting in the car, fuming. General Granger stood well clear of the uproar, busy lobbying on behalf of King’s interests with a Ukrainian arms dealer over Cognac, as the door closed behind King and Sprinkle.

Granger shrugged, “Hey, he just won the biggest fight of his career. Has to let off a little steam, you know?”

In the quiet nook, Ayres told Ravi, “The Homeland-Interior program I just lost was researching the environmental and societal impacts of time travel.”

“OK, so I didn’t imagine you said that,” replied Ravi. His voice trailed off; he was dumbstruck with wonder. And desire. “Oh my goodness,” he said. “That Kentucky Pleistocene theme park. That’s real?”

Ayres nodded, smiling. “Each day there is the same day, re-set every twenty-four hours. That way we can – could – entertain visitors safely, and do research, without long-term impacts.” He scraped the last bit of ganache off his plate and looked at the dessert buffet. He would snag some of those neon-bright cookies for his sons. They loved the silly stories about his big nights out, his wife giggling, relaxing after her own hard day.

Ravi was staring at him. “Can you come give me and the Senator a briefing? I can barely believe this, but I guess I have to.”

“Sure,” said Bob. “I’d love to tell you the science. I’d love to talk to someone who appreciates what we have achieved. The secrecy has been a real bummer.”

“I don’t get that part,” said Ravi, gently probing, privately horrified. “How could they keep a discovery like that under wraps for twenty years?”

“Back in the day, the development team at Cornell Tech was Homeland funded,with proprietary protections in the contract. When they hit paydirt, a bunch of profs quit their day jobs to work for Homeland under tight security.” Ayres swept a pile of neon macarons into a napkin, and the two walked toward the door.

Putting on his coat, Ayres bent close to Ravi’s ear. “You may be too young to remember that we had a brief window of liberalism in the White House back then, so Homeland was forced to go halfsies on the program with the Department of Interior. They gave it to the Federal Parks Program, where it landed in my lap. It was my top-secret baby until they gave it to King.” Out on the steps they breathed cool air, momentarily alone as Ayres’ car approached.

Bob summed up: “Twenty years of top secret time travel research, serving the Park Program’s twin goals, protection and enjoyment. While fending off Homeland, which pushed us to develop ‘military applications.’” Bob spared Ravi the “quotes” gesture.

“So,” Ravi said, “The Senator and I regard King as a kook. His teaching colleagues say he is disruptive, and they suspect his science is fake. Why is he running this show? What’s he planning to do with …” Ravi sighed and shook his head in awe, “…time travel?”

As Bob stepped into the car he said, “Fake science, huh? That could be very useful. He is running the show because he says what some in the military want to hear. What’s he wanna do? He wants to go back and change history, so the USA comes out on top. I mean, to coin a phrase, duh.”

Ravi watched the car depart. The muted nighttime roar of our nation’s capital region hummed outside the enclave of big houses. He was aflame, his life’s dream come true, in a casual party conversation. Wherever this led, he was already there. In a state of bliss, he walked to his car in a distant lot.

The Road to Hollymount Inn... Excerpt from Chapter 2 of Ten Thousand Secrets National Park

2015-03-21T09:41:00.001-07:00

The woods ended. Beyond lay winter fields, dotted with small cottages. In one field stood a small horse, a miniature variety. This looked normal – back-to-the-landers, ten acres, cabin, off the grid. At the foot of a distant wooded hill, buildings lined the road. One was larger, the elusive Inn, I hoped. The beauty of this upland valley scene caught me, golden light deepening the mild browns and pale blues of winter. The land gleamed with wisdom, speaking a language I did not understand.

‘Where are all these wild thoughts coming from,’ I thought. ‘I need to get out more, hang out online. How can I get my career going if I am a kook? I gotta cut out the fantasy books and games. I’ll be useless over lunch with Maeve and they’ll never hire me again.’

I walked fast, gazing at the lazy arc of a crow overhead. It descended to the road, ten feet ahead. The crow – two feet tall, a strut to its walk and shining black eyes – approached me, bowed, turned around, and walked alongside. We moved forward at a good pace, and I met the gaze of my silent companion. The crow tilted its head and nodded in a friendly way.

I said, “Hello, I am Brian Owen, but maybe you already know that.” The crow nodded in response, and we proceeded in what seemed a friendly silence. Nearer, the big wooden building had an Inn-like air about it, romance novel style. Its two storeys had curtained windows along both floors, and it was painted dark blue. Stone chimneys wafted pine-scented wood smoke. Two shapely trees framed wide steps up to a wooden door in the center of the rambling old building. Above the Inn loomed white pines and holly trees – tall, massive, twisted. There was no parking lot.

The crow darted into a nearby cottage garden and returned, in its beak a sprig of the small white flowers that speckled the fields and roadside. Fluttering off the ground, the bird hovered in front of me, placing the sprig carefully in my jacket pocket. Then it spiraled upward, cawing loudly in the cold air, and was gone. I did not watch, my eyes caught by the sign posted by the big front door. Written in chalk, it read:

Hollymount Inn

Today’s Lunch

Smoky broth

Roast viands

Ambrosia

Special today!

Serving Humans

Something was a bit off there, but I was hungry, and climbed the steps. The door swung open inward, and a beautiful woman stood in the doorway. Not red hair – black and soft, curling. Pale white skin, dark blue eyes, long black eyelashes. Wearing jeans, cowboy boots – and a green sweater a little bit unbuttoned at the top – she was smiling at me.

Excerpt from Ten Thousand Secrets National Park (c) 2015 Hilary A.B. Lambert

The photo depicts the woods along the path to Hollymount Inn. At the O.D. Von Engeln Preserve, Dryden NY.

The Sabertooth Tiger: While government factions vie for control of time travel, the tiger follows his nose.

2015-03-18T05:08:00.002-07:00

Sabertooth tiger. The young sabertooth tiger was hungry and tired. He wondered why his friend the sun was being mean, burning his eyes and making him thirsty. Back home where the sky was a comfortable grey and the temperature just so, he had followed his nose into a hole in the ground, trailing a delicious odor.

Its allure drew him through miles of dark passageways under a river, through a tingling barrier, and up into daylight onto a hard black surface surrounded by giant trees. He would take a nap in their branches, but first - that big meal. Ahead was the dumpster with its siren scent of discarded taco salads, burgers, chili, grits, sausage gravy and bacon. Oh man.

The young beast leapt lightly into the bin and began to feast, right outside the back door of the Hideaway Café & Curiously Satisfying Breakfast Buffet, one of many fun eateries in the national park's Casino & Entertainment District.

Presently a busboy came out and climbed up the steps to the bin, intent on dumping a full trash bin from satiated lunchtime eaters. Large tawny eyes rose to meet his. He saw a five-foot long, 150-pound wild cat with curving foot-long canine teeth, screamed, dropped the trash bin and fled, slamming the door behind him. The cat started in on the cascade of delicious fresh garbage, thinking maybe soon he should climb into a tree and ponder the edibility of these hairless animals. His family would be proud of him for finding new food.

The above photo was taken on an unnamed road in an unnamed Kentucky national park. Fabulous new hunting grounds for the young sabertooth tiger who had found a hole in the time barrier maintained by the Federal Park Service and Homeland Security.

Maeve. A thousand years ago or longer, Maeve departed Ireland for the New World...

2015-03-17T05:11:00.001-07:00

Maeve. A thousand years ago or longer, Maeve departed Ireland for the New World, after one too many spats with the thickly-settled fairy communities at home. She found all the room she needed in what is now the Southern Tier of New York State, and settled in the uplands there with several close fairy friends. They built an Inn under the lee of a steep hill, planted holly trees and made the area round about homelike and comfortable.

But it was lonely there, and the fairies did not get along with the Iroquois tribes and obnoxious European settlers, many of whom were straight off the boat from Ireland, singing songs that created a deep longing for their older home. By the early 21st century most of her kind had returned to Ireland, leaving Maeve with a few dull, marginal fairies to help her tend her nature kingdom and find the funds and human flesh to pay her regular taxes to the underworld.

In desperation, Maeve began to haunt local bars in Corning and learned that she had a friendly Congressman, and could apply for grants to support her little community. The men who explained these basics of American life to the apparently guileless, black-haired, blue-eyed beauty sometimes did not return to their homes and families. As our story begins, Maeve has hired a local grant writing consultant, young Brian Owen, to help her obtain a community development grant.

This photo was taken along Goodhue Creek, just off the Great Eastern Trail on the north bank of the Canisteo River, near Addison NY. Maeve's community is not far away.

Introducing Ten Thousand Secrets National Park, a science fiction fairy tale embedded in present-day US politics.

2015-03-16T05:37:00.001-07:00

Last fall I found the time for novel-writing: 6:00-8:00 am. Six months later, I have the second draft of a grand novel - finally, out of my head and onto the page. In it, a mom and her family cope with the fallout of her obsession with environmental causes. Their attempts to reconcile are complicated by a political fight for control of government-regulated time travel, and the seductive call of an immigrant fairy community nestled in the New York State landscape.

In this slightly altered present, casinos and gas fracking wells pay for our national parks, and a Kentucky senator rallies his bad-ass allies to update our nation's proud military heritage.

Will science survive? Can we ignore the Grandfather Paradox of time travel and get away with it? What's Brian's mom up to now? Which of the many secrets would you want to explore?

I'll share excerpts and images here while embarking on the grueling process of publishing this novel of fast-paced adventure-fairy tale-ecofiction. If you accept the presence of swear words, plot-appropriate mayhem, and delicate hints of off-stage romance, the book is enjoyable for adults and older kids.

The photo of young woodlands comes from Kentucky's Little Barren River valley, just east of a famous national park. In this story the government has re-named it Ten Thousand Secrets National Park Casino & Entertainment District, to attract a more diverse, bigger-spending clientele.

A better nutcracker: Black walnuts and hickory nuts galore

2013-12-23T06:20:00.001-08:00

Thanks to family members, I now have the right tool for the job - a nutcracker built to open black walnuts, not to mention shagbark hickory nuts.
Nuts are healthful, and available by gathering them into a bag as we walk in the woods or along pasture edges.
To shell the nuts easily, if you don't have access to workshop tools, vices, grips and the like, you need one of the super-strong, expressly designed nutcrackers available via a google search (see photo - around $50).
Now I will be less dependent on watching for supermarket "specials" on the price of English walnuts. Black walnuts are famed for their rich flavor and go for very high prices in the market place. A big thank you to my family for helping me bring the price waaaaaay down.
Woodland riches are free for the gathering. Watch for future posts on my recent adventures with black walnuts, shagbark hickory nuts, beech nuts, beech sprouts and more.

Jackie Kennedy's condolence thank-you cards - one came to me

2013-11-22T04:59:00.001-08:00

On November 22, 1963 I was 11 years old. I remember where I was when I heard the news, of course, and subsequently was watching live black and white TV when Oswald was shot by Jack Ruby. During these days I asked my mom what I could do, and she suggested that I send a letter of condolence to Jacqueline Kennedy.

I promptly wrote and sent the letter. Its contents are no doubt lost to history, but I saved the response I received in March 1964, after the Beatles had arrived in America and the world was rapidly changing beyond belief from those dark November days.

The black-rimmed card reads "Mrs. Kennedy is deeply appreciative of your sympathy and grateful for your thoughtfulness." The accompanying card has her signature on the upper front right-hand corner in place of a stamp, my name and address written in exquisite calligraphy in ink, and her married name printed across the back flap.

My newly-12 year old self also saved the March 18, 1964 New York Times article, "Shamrock is left at Kennedy grave," describing Mrs. Kennedy's visit to her husband's grave on St. Patrick's Day, and announcing "Mrs. Kennedy chose today as the "appropriate" time to acknowledge the messages of sympathy she received after her husband's death. She mailed 900,000 black-bordered prayer cards and letters"....the article adds that 2000 volunteers had been working since the previous December to open and sort the letters; that 1000 per day were still arriving at the White House; that the signature-franked letters had been distributed over a week's time to avoid post office overload.

-- Hilary Lambert November 22, 2013

Grape leaves are ready by June to make dolmas

2012-07-22T05:13:00.005-07:00

In June around the summer solstice, I took an early morning walk in the fields across the road, and followed a side path into a profusion of young goldenrod plants and trees festooned with wild grape vines. I quickly gathered a passel (30-40, that is) of big lush new grape leaves, to make a pile of dolmas for a solstice party that night.

Yep you don’t have to buy them at the $7.89 per half lb olive bar, you can make them yourself. I used to buy jars of preserved grape leaves, but this is more fun. I first posted about dolmas using wild grape leaves late last August http://www.backinthecaragain.blogspot.com/2011/08/wild-grapes-their-leaves.html, but by then the leaves are a tad leathery and not so succulent when cooked. So grab ‘em young (a good motto generally!). They are still fine in late July – I harvested a bunch on July 21 on the high ground above Fall Creek off Freese Road. The local hipster enviro camp counselors seem to be using the “forked dragon’s tongue” characteristic of the grape vine’s growing tendrils to help little kids identify this plant but heck, it’s just grape leaves, eh?! (other motto: “What could possibly go wrong?”).

I cooked the grape leaves in boiling water for 1-2 minutes until they turned from bright green to olive green – drained and let them cool.Cut off the stem ends. Reserve a few to cover the bottom of the dolmas simmer pan.

Anticipating a gluten free vegan crowd at the solstice party, I grabbed my ancient trusty “Middle Eastern Cookery” by Eva Zane (101 Productions, San Francisco, 1974) and went with her “Basics” dolmas stuffing recipe:

1 cup (white) rice soaked in cold water and drained.

¼ cup each currants and pine nuts (I had raisins and not-roasted almond slivers, used them instead – this is based on the Peggy Renwick principle of “substitute everything”).

1 cup finely minced green onions or 1 cup grated onion (me, 1 cup roughly chopped onion).

3 T minced (fresh, please) parsley.

2 T fresh chopped dill.

2 garlic cloves (Zane sez “optional,” I say “Nonsense”)

½ tsp allspice

Salt and pepper to taste.

Stir this all up. Place a grape leaf on towel or counter or plate (“dull side” up – I could not discern a dull side; they both work). Place 1 – 3 tsp of filling on the leaf (depends on the size of the leaf). Here are the directions I cannot seem to fully comply with: “Fold end of leaf over to cover filling, fold sides in and starting at stem end, roll carefully to form a firm cylinder about 2 inches long, depending on size of leaf.” My firm cylinders look more like tiny envelopes, but they work just fine. Do this for all the grape leaves, eh?

You may have leftover stuffing. I cooked it in a saucepan w/added water and served as a side dish with certified gluten free tortilla chips and it was wolfed, reckon that should be deered, down.

Spread the “reserved” leaves on the bottom of a heavy saucepan, place the dolmas side by side across the bottom, then stack them up until all are, well, ya know, in place (my recipe lingo falters occasionally, here because I am way too self conscious about that foodie term “reserve”).

Sprinkle the layers with lemon juice if you have it. Add 1 cup water or stock (I added more as needed while it cooked – don’t want the dolmas to scorch), 3 T olive oil, and cover with a heavy plate, saucer or other simmer-proof item, to prevent the dolmas from unfolding while cooking. Cover and simmer over low heat, checking frequently, for about 1 hour. Test for tenderness (eat one). Remove from pan, cool, and place on a serving platter, garnish with parsley sprigs and lemon wedges if you got em. Serve with bowl of chilled yogurt (plain not sweetened), or not. They will all be eaten quickly.

Quick Fixes and the Sustainable Long Haul: Hemlock Woolly Adelgid, Hydrilla and Our Watershed

2012-07-09T19:55:00.000-07:00

Quick Fixes and the Sustainable Long Haul

Hemlock Woolly Adelgid, Hydrilla and Our Watershed

Forthcoming in Network News 2/12, newsletter of the Cayuga Lake Watershed Network www.cayugalake.org. Thanks to Mark C. Whitmore and Judy Abrams for editorial assistance.

Hilary Lambert, Steward

In the winter 2011 issue of Network News, our lead article stressed the need to work toward a sustainable energy future for the Finger Lakes, in the face of a rapidly warming climate. The choices we make and paths that we follow in the near future will determine the long-term fate of the clean and plentiful water our region (and the Great Lakes) is presently known for.

The Cayuga Lake Watershed Network Board of Directors’ actions and Network programs increasingly stress the interdependence of clean water and energy choices. The Network’s 2011 Strategic Plan includes the goal of “supporting new and ongoing successful collaborative projects with short and long-term impacts on maintaining and improving the lake, its tributary creeks, and the watershed,” by “helping communities prepare for climate change impacts.” Further, in May of 2012, the Board voted to approve a “Position Statement on Hydraulic Fracturing,” stating that “We oppose the continuation of hydraulic fracturing and urge immediate emphasis on an energy policy that promotes conservation and renewable energy sources."

Early symptoms of climate change are extreme weather events and the movement of species into regions where they previously could not survive. The invasive species presently bedeviling Cayuga Inlet in Ithaca, Hydrilla verticillata, is from temperate latitudes similar to ours in Korea, and survives well in northern climates: it is not a true climate change opportunist. However, part of the Hydrilla Task Force’s initial response strategy was the hope that a cold winter would kill off plants established in shallow waters. Instead, the mild (or “missing”) winter of 2011-12 helped hydrilla survive and prosper. As with the Asian Clam infestation in Owasco Lake to the east, this apparently “new normal” weather benefits the spread of these aquatic invasive species.

For information about the excellent long-term eradication program developed by the Hydrilla Task Force of the Cayuga Lake Watershed, information about possible impacts of herbicide use, and “everything” hydrilla: http://www.StopHydrilla.org. To sign up as a Hydrilla Hunter, contact: ambismb@gmail.com.

Another aggressive invasive – this one attacking the hemlocks in our gorges – is the aphid-like Hemlock Woolly Adelgid (Adelges tsugae, aka HWA). A true climate change opportunist, HWA has been making its way north for decades with terrible destructive force, sucking the life out of majestic old hemlock stands in the southern mountains and valleys, and turning the hemlock stands in New Jersey’s wilder places and Pennsylvania’s uplands into brown skeletons (maps: http://na.fs.fed.us/fhp/hwa/maps/distribution.shtm).

Cornell’s Mark Whitmore is a forest ecologist and nationally-recognized expert on HWA, which first appeared in the Finger Lakes area of New York State in 2008. He has been mapping its spread and advising on limiting its immediate impacts, and is also concerned about the Emerald Ash Borer’s potential for ecosystem destruction/transformation, in this period of rapid climate change.

Why is HWA a problem? Most obviously, it destroys one of our most beautiful, evocative trees. In ecosystem terms, hemlocks are a keystone species for our cool creeks and their biodiversity. If hemlocks die, creeks will be exposed to the sun and warm up, and steep shale banks will erode and collapse, altering creek habitat and sending warmer, turbid waters to Cayuga Lake.

In 2009, HWA was found on hemlocks in Cornell University’s Cascadilla Gorge and around Beebe Lake. In response, a collaborative project, involving Cornell Plantations, Cornell’s Department of Natural Resources and Mark Whitmore, was organized to track and where possible mitigate HWA impacts. A trained group of citizen-stewards carry out regular monitoring for the spread of HWA in Six Mile Creek, Edwards Lake Cliffs, Fall Creek, Fisher Old Growth, Lick Brook, Steep Hollow, and Coy Glen. This local effort is part of a larger project, led by Whitmore, to meet the challenge of invasives by increasing stakeholder knowledge and involvement. That means you! Learn more and get involved via the Cornell Plantations invasive species web pages: http://www.cornellplantations.org/our-gardens/natural-areas/invasive

The non-winter of 2011-12 may be responsible for a sudden leap of HWA along Cayuga Lake’s western shoreline. In 2011, the infestation was mapped as individual infested trees and small stands, in the Glenwood Pines area along the southwestern Cayuga Lake shoreline. Not so any longer.

In early July 2012, Judy Abrams noticed something wrong with a big hemlock that holds down the banks of a steep shaley creek on her lakeshore property, several miles north of the Glenwood area. She learned that the tree was infested with HWA, and soon realized that all of her estimated 200 hemlocks are infested or will be soon. Judy called neighbors to the south, toward Glenwood – they have it too. A quick check revealed that it is present in hemlocks on all their properties.

Lakeside landowner Judy Abrams and affected hemlock tree.
Note the creek it shades, and steep shaley banks it stabilizes.

As with hydrilla, the immediate, short-term management options for HWA include insecticides – infested hemlock trees can be protected individually with chemical insecticides. Cultural practices can also slow impacts; biological control agents are under study (Fact Sheet, Early Detection of the Hemlock Woolly Adelgid (Adelges tsugae) in Small Northeastern Hemlock (Tsuga canadensis) Woodlots, www.ForestConnect.info).

Here we arrive at the question of the sustainable long haul mentioned in the title. Herbicides and pesticides applied over several years will have adverse impacts on Cayuga Inlet, and on our gorges and their creeks. The potential for homeowner misuse of currently registered soil drench pesticides and subsequent environmental contamination (proximity of streams) is great. Professional applications pose far fewer risks and can help save the local genotypes of hemlocks. However, maintaining the current habitats with pesticides is untenable for the long run. We’ve got to continue to develop biocontrol and tree resistance. Experts like Whitmore and the Hydrilla Task Force know this; monitoring of impacts from treatment programs is standard (although underfunded, in the case of hydrilla).

So, what about the sustainable long haul? In a situation of rapid climate change, when do we let the hemlocks go? Long-term, can we really prevent the takeover of our lakes by green mats of suffocating hydrilla, and impacts from other invasives steadily wending their way into warming places? Beyond the next few years, can we realistically expect to keep our cool creeks and clear waters?

A 2011 study reports that, by 2100, “global climate change will modify plant communities covering almost half of Earth's land surface and will drive the conversion of nearly 40 percent of land-based ecosystems from one major ecological community type -- such as forest, grassland or tundra -- toward another.” The study further states that the rapidity of change “will disrupt the ecological balance between interdependent and often endangered plant and animal species, reduce biodiversity and adversely affect Earth's water, energy, carbon and other element cycles” (NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory 2011, December 18. Climate change may bring big ecosystem shifts, NASA says. ScienceDaily; Jon C. Bergengren, Duane E. Waliser, Yuk L. Yung. Ecological sensitivity: a biospheric view of climate change. Climatic Change, 2011; 107 (3-4): 433 DOI:10.1007/s10584-011-0065-1).

This is not good news for the future of our favorite places, plants, animals, and water resources. We can ignore this freight train coming at us; we can say “It won’t happen until after I’m gone” – or we can begin to think and plan ahead in a meaningful way, that can lead to an increasingly different, eventually transformed – but healthy, sustainable – landscape and life for our descendants.

Locally, the Tompkins County Climate Protection Initiative (http://www.tccpi.org/) is already looking ahead. Their mission: “We are committed to helping Tompkins County achieve a dynamic economy, healthy environment, and resilient community through a focus on energy efficiency and renewable energy.” Their programs need everyone’s support to reduce greenhouse gas emissions locally, the results to serve as a template for other local communities. As with banning fracking one town at a time (www.cedclaw.org ), perhaps we can slow this freight train down, one locale at a time.

Let’s keep talking, thinking, and being creative. The quick fixes are good for what ails us right now; the sustainable long haul is necessary for what comes after us.

Here is what landowner Judy Abrams is doing right now, with an eye on the sustainable long haul: "I was horrified that all the hemlocks on my property were infected with HWA and relieved to learn from Mark Whitmore that even trees near death can recover if treated properly. Because the insecticide is an imicloprid product I weighed the consequences: untreated, badly infected trees last a year or two; less affected trees live up to 4 years. If my 200 hemlocks die, my beautiful gorge would be denuded, and the cliffside and driveway would erode. The insecticide is toxic to bees, but is painted on trunks and absorbed. This treatment plus slow release pellets later protects trees up to 7 years, and by then there may be natural control methods. On Mark's advice, I hired White Oak Nursery in Geneva. The cost of saving 200 hemlocks is less than the cost of removing two large dead trees."

To find out more about climate change, looming impacts, and what can be done, consult these sources:

http://environment.yale.edu/climate/about/ - Yale Project on Climate Change Communication;

http://climateaccess.org - The network for those engaging the public in the transformation to low-carbon, resilient communities;

http://climatecentral.org Climate central: why climate change matters.

Day lily and stinging nettle feast in May

2012-06-22T10:41:00.000-07:00

Primitive Pursuits Day in May was planned as an all-day public event with music, food and numerous crafts and activities for all ages. As a trainee instructor I was assigned to helping people make dogbane cords for necklaces and bracelets, accompanying the making of bark baskets, hot-coal burning of wood containers, chipping points for arrows and tools, throwing atlatls, weaving mats out of reeds, meeting animals and raptors – and eating wild foods.

The day before the big event I volunteered to gather day lily bulbs for the wild foods cookery. Jed sent me and Abby down to the floodplain of Fall Creek across the road – big beds of day lilies there. Following a hot and grimy half hour of vicious grinding efforts to dig into the dry soil with our picturesque digging sticks, I trekked back up to grab a shovel and Sefra’s extremely cool trowel. (From comments, I gathered that it is THE trowel to have. I felt so ignorant, of a well-developed American subculture where garden trowels enjoy high status.)

After that we were rolling, and at the end of two hours staggered back uphill with our arms full of day lily plants – the tasty (dirt-covered) bulbs attached to the long green leaves. The beautiful flowers had yet to form. It is ok to harvest day lilies – they are a prolific non-native and their numbers recover quickly; and as with the ramps mentioned earlier, you can re-plant what’s left of the bulbs after cleaning, for re-growth.

Unhappily for a brief time, both of our trusty leaders Jed and Tim looked at us in dismay when we showed up all proud and such. I guess due to the prep required for such a large amount of plants, it simply looked like a problem to them. Jed said, “How will we prepare them?” as though he and Tim had not, a few weeks previously, showed us how to dig them up, clean them in the nearest running water, cut the best solid firm dark bulblets from the rest of the roots, mash them with a big rock and fry up with a bit of flour and salt into tasty day lily bulb fritters. I guess he was doing the ol’ Coyote Way thing, because we burst out with big explanations of how to do all that and he just shook his head and … ran away to work on something more pressing.

So I took the big heap back to my house, soaked them overnight in buckets of water to loosen the dirt, got up early the next day to trim the roots from the leaves, cut off all the usable bulbs, washed and scrubbed some more. This took several hours and yielded about 1.5 pounds of day lily bulbs. That’s a lot, considering, but – also consider the inputs of water and labor. (During the day-long event, our chef Shawn added about another quarter pound of cleaned bulbs from lilies I had not had time to “process.”)

The day lily green leaf stalks can be peeled down to a white inner core (like cattails) with a tender not-quite-scallion flavor, but that is a VERY labor intensive process with low yields, so I gave it up after cleaning and prepping a few handfuls.

Happily, wild foods chef Shawn took one look at the 1.5 lbs of concentrated day lily bulb treasure and knew what to do. Like me, he felt that sauteeing the bulbs in a bit of oil with salt (in a big skillet over a hot-coal wood fire) for a few minutes was all the prep needed. (That’s how I prepared them a few times back in the 1970s when I first got into this stuff.) This gentle treatment allows their surprisingly complex flavor to emerge. To get folks to take a bite, Shawn said they were “like tiny potatoes” – but the flavor was more interesting than “potato.” Surprise and thoughtfulness were the expressions on samplers’ faces after their first bite.

The other delicious wild food gathered and prepared for the day-long event was nettles, yes the very same, the scary dreaded stinging nettles that cause people to cry and thrash around for ten minutes until the pain subsides.

Wear gloves! Gather them in giant quantities while they are young (when cooked they are greatly reduced, like other greens)! Break off the tender, new-growth top third. When they are dropped into boiled water or sautéed, the prickers instantly vanish, and the resulting cooked green is deeply flavored, tangy and iodiny like seaweed (or, I am told, certain single malt Scotches). They reflect the essential flavor of the deep green that emerges outdoors in late springtime.

Chef Shawn combined these two flavorful treats as small bites served in tiny paper cups. He sprinkled a garnish of chopped day lily leaf cores on top until those ran out. Assistant cook and fire tender Stephen carried the morsels around through the crowds in a pine bark basket. People would bravely try a nibble – then their expressions would change and they would say “Wow!” “Delicious!” “I can’t believe how good this is!” and many other mildly astonished remarks. We had enough to feed folks steadily from 10 am to 3 pm.

I subsequently replanted the leftover discarded and less-than-perfect day lily bulbs in my backyard and many are already sending up new shoots. Previously established plants are now flowering. The big red-orange blossoms of day lilies are edible – either just to munch, or Italian cooks batter and fry them and squash blossoms, tempura style. NOT ALL BIG or small LILIES ARE EDIBLE – many contain toxins. Know your plants!

Beautiful sounds in the early morning

2012-06-22T08:43:00.000-07:00

I woke before dawn when the weather changed slightly and rain drops began to fall. I lay in bed and listened to the hesitant, occasional drops hitting the window and roof overhead, hoping that the process would gain velocity and turn into a good downpour. So many rainstorms “nowadays” yield only enough water to lay the dust, and then dry up or move on. Not enough to satisfy! After about ten minutes of drips and drops, the sound began to change into steady rainfall, and I relaxed.

Drowsing, I heard a wonderful new sound – a plasticky “thump thump,” coming from the corner of the house just outside my window – outside of the bedroom corner into which my bed is tucked.

Dreamily, I thought of it as the first spurts of milk into a pail (where have I ever heard that?). The individual thumps became a rapid thumping – and then morphed into the sound of drops landing in water. It was rainwater coming off the roof into the big bucket at the bottom of the downspout.

Oh how beautiful the sounds, as I listened to the rainwater rushing down the drainpipe in drops and pretty little trickles, landing in the rising water to fill the big bucket. Later on that day I walked around the house to stare with deep comfort at the four 5 gallon buckets now filled with clear cold rainwater.

Maybe, with sufficient conservation and management, this July and August won’t be as bad as last summer, when I overwatered and my well went dry for six weeks.

(Read all about it – scroll down to Older Posts, or go to 2011 summer and fall dates listed in the archives)

The water marmot

2012-06-15T19:42:00.001-07:00

We are slightly uneasy here in utopia about a rabid fox having bit a dog one day and a hiker at Buttermilk Falls State Park the next. (It was then shot dead.) Is this the start of an epidemic??

So at a recent Primitive Pursuits wilderness skills training they put us through our paces with our throwing sticks, to aim at targets in the woods “as though your life depends upon it.” Their serious message was somewhat marred by the nature of the targets – sticks set upright in the ground, each with an Oreo cookie perched on top. Hit the stick, get the Oreo. (Hit the Oreo, obliterate it.) These were Paul Newman brand cookies, highly virtuous in many ways, but not alas gluten free. We did this for about fifteen minutes. I did not bag a cookie.

Then we put our packs on and walked up the trail through the woods. Leader Jed discussed with us the animals that are prone to rabies locally, one of them being the water marmot. No one had heard of a water marmot? He insisted that it was a local, indigenous member of “the marmot family” and that he and co-leader Tim (who had vanished from our group) had often stalked it and the elusive fisher, up the very trail we were headed.* When it contracts rabies, Jed told us, it transforms from being a water animal to a land animal, and takes to the trails.

We continued to trudge up the steep trail, heads down, bunched in a group, thinking over all these worrisome things. Jed spun around and said, “I really think you all had better have your throwing sticks out and ready. And separate – get about ten feet apart – in case you need to throw that stick in a hurry.”

OK! We finally got it! We drew our sticks like lightsabers from our packs, spread out along the trail and began to scrutinize our surroundings. Several people ahead of me topped a little rise and were out of sight. Suddenly screams erupted from up there!! A loud bellowing and banging! People were shouting.

We ran up the hill, to see Tim galloping toward us through the trees, chased by a gallon water jug half filled with water, that he was pulling behind him via a string. “Help! Help!” he was shouting, “Save me from the water marmot!” We all threw our sticks forcefully at the gallon jug as it hurtled past. “Water marmot! Water marmot!” he screamed but then the string broke, and the marmot ground to a halt behind him.

We all ran to grab our sticks as he re-tied the string, and we regrouped to each again savagely attack the water jug as it hurtled back past us, chasing Tim to a big tree where he, it and we all stopped for lunch. Sefra Levin ran around in the woods with the marmot chasing her for another few minutes as she happily screamed “Water marmot!”

* Jed Jordan has corrected the water marmot facts listed above. It is an invasive species.

<<< Group recovers, following ferocious attack.

Garlic mustard makes a bitchen dip and pesto

2012-06-15T19:19:00.001-07:00

Spring weather was on a gradual but definite warming trend – though not on the Friday that our Primitive Pursuits wilderness skills training group (aka Barred Owls) met down at the dog park parking lot on Cayuga Inlet. We spent the day in the willows and wetlands on Cayuga Lake’s southern shore, in the teeth of a stiff wind funneling crisp cold air straight down Cayuga Lake from Canada.

After digging up burdock root (to eat!) and being blindfolded to find out how hard it is to walk a straight line unsighted, and playing deer-coyote in the dry grass from last year, we finally got under shelter in the willows that I have looked at so often when driving the lakeshore road. It’s not completely a natural setting in those woods – I think there’s an old dump of concrete and asphalt debris from the airport runways that were once part of Ithaca’s airport. But the trees and grasses and coyotes (big dens!) are softening and naturalizing the area. Beyond this somewhat uncomfortable zone, a beautiful small creek comes down via waterfalls out of the steep wooded slopes that drop to the lake’s western shore.

And there we all sat, on a low shore of rocks, surrounded by the creek’s gentle flowing waters, under big trees that were beginning to leaf out. Trucks zoomed by on the lakeshore road in the woods a few hundred feet away, but our group felt private and at peace.

We took notes on Jed and Tim’s discussion of the daily, seasonal and directional values that underlie Primitive Pursuits programs, and THEN…. it was time to start mashing up the garlic mustard we had been instructed to gather under the willows.

This early spring weed is regarded as a major nuisance plant. People whine and moan about it everywhere you go, and have big events to pull it up and discard it. Wait a minute, because garlic mustard sure makes a bitchen dip and pesto. We had all grabbed up handfuls of the fresh green upper part of the plants, and set to work pounding it up on flat creek stones with round stones into a garlicky green mash. Leader Jed just happened to have a small jar of olive oil in his pack, and a very natural bowl in one of his pockets, and Tim dredged two packets of crispy gluten free crackers out of that big white pail he had been hauling around all day.

It was all swirled together with a nice clean stick – and then we fell upon it, eating mouthfuls of the fresh green garlicky spring essence out there in the middle of that pretty creek. This was also a lesson by example on how to construct a daily program for kids and adults – following up active games and learning activities with quieter teaching and reflection, and having something to eat that embodies and exemplifies what has gone on during the day.

At a Primitive Pursuits spring camp session for kids, at day’s end I watched thirty children wolfing down this rough and ready treat and other woodland delicacies, surely something they would not be caught dead doing at home!

Our adult training group mopped up every gooey green morsel, drank water, chattered a bit more and then began to thread our way back through the woods and fields to our cars, replete with good food on a wonderful day.

Ramps in early spring woods - abundant, vulnerable

2012-06-15T10:14:00.000-07:00

We had a fabulous crop of ramps in the woods early this spring. One day Peggy and I really got into it, and gathered about 2 pounds (in a half hour). The ramps have a VERY delicate, yet full onion-shallot flavor. She carried this treasure away to her apartment, and ate ramp-flavored everything for several days.

The white below-ground bulb has a lot more flavor than the green leaves that show above-ground. Many folks are worried about over-harvesting so they leave the bulbs in the ground and just take the leaves – and then probably wonder what’s so special about ramps!

We dug with a trowel or shovel to fully remove several plants, in scattered areas around a ramp bed. New plants will spread to fill in the small gaps left by the digging. But you do need to be careful because the growing areas are fragile, usually an uneven woodland surface with little or no soil, covered in rocks and roots amongst which the ramps flourish. If you are really concerned about over-harvesting, after cleaning the ramps you can carry the remnants of the roots back out to the woods and bury them for re-growth.

Someone not acclimated to these careful harvest practices can easily damage woodland ramp beds. I was contacted by a restaurant person who said he’d like to come by with a shovel and dig ramps out of my woods.

At first I thought that would be ok, if I went along, but my new Primitive Pursuits friends said, “Never let anyone else do the harvesting or they’ll ruin it.” They meant that the well-meaning ramp hunter could crush the ramps, rip up and trample the beds, and make a giant mess with a shovel, without even realizing it.

So I offered to harvest and deliver a certain amount of ramps, but the contact never finalized – probably just as well! Maybe next year, with the accent on maybe.

Wonderful learning

2012-04-01T18:39:00.000-07:00

http://www.ccetompkins.org/4h/primitive-pursuits

Last Friday the Primitive Pursuits training session was uphill off Coddington Road in the woods near Ithaca College. We parked next to extensive new-built wetlands (to replace those bulldozed to make way for new campus buildings downslope). These brand new wetlands had been quickly overrun with undesirable cattails (they take over and prevent amphibians – whose presence is no doubt stipulated in the permit requirements for being allowed to destroy old wetlands and create new ones - from flourishing etc).

Later on we walked uphill and into the woods to a clearing for a different learning and resource-harvesting setting. The weather was cold but clear, so we were always seeking direct sunshine to stand in, but what a day of learning, fun and – good food!?

I had some melancholy feelings in the afternoon, standing at a distance and watching the group – it all seemed already in the past, my life is pushing on so fast and relentlessly. The younger ones (everyone other than I) perhaps do not feel that time pressure so keenly – I hope not. May they (and some of you) be cushioned by the comfortable feeling of ‘time enough for everything’ for a while longer.

So, we –

Worked on our two-person friction kits (3 pieces of wood of different types + a cord, used to start fires – we struggled to get a coal from rubbed-up wood dust, then tried to get that coal to flame and become a trusty fire).

Then, we -- harvested cattails (some took off their shoes – and pants – but I was conserving my personal warmth and grubbed in the pond’s near-shore areas) to cook and eat later;

I also learned … how to choose non-fracturing rocks for water boiling; learned how to cut white pine sections and peel off the white pine bark to make vessels for drinking and cooking and holding stuff; learned how to make a drill out of an old fence wire section to punch holes in bark for cords made of thinly cut white pine bark; was reminded that white pine and hemlock needles make a tasty tea sort of beverage; heated the rocks in the campfire coals; learned that a small hot rock cast into a pine bark vessel filled with water and pine needles heats it to boiling in a flash and creates a tea that sure tastes good under the circumstances; how to pare down the cattail shoots to get to extremely tender tasty innards and boil them over that campfire made from friction-produced coals; that roasting the cattail roots produces charred woody sections that, when peeled, have tasty white innards (can yield cattail flour). The cattail feast was enhanced with a small container of a dip made of (definitely imported) olive oil mixed with mashed woodland ramps – whew!!!!

My fave thing, was learning how to make clothespins (see the ends of my first bark vessel, with its boiling rock and pine needle tea) out of small chunks of honeysuckle shoot. So useful!! Invasives like honeysuckle are fair game for harvesting but with native spp like white pines, we can only use dead or downed materials – no harvesting of standing trees etc.

We also played games, sang songs, and continued to learn how to teach these new skills to others, via trial teaching to the group, with critiques. And more knife safety stuff. I am scared to death of trying to teach knife skills to kids.

You can friend Primitive Pursuits on Facebook to learn more.

Coals-baked breakfast

2012-03-11T19:15:00.001-07:00

On a cold Saturday morning in the wilds of Danby, our Primitive Pursuits trainers showed us some of the mysteries of cooking over slow-burning coals. This tasty dish is an onion, hollowed out to hold an egg (both hen and duck eggs were available). They baked together over a slow coals campfire, yielding a tender and luscious hot camp breakfast. The accompanying bagel was grilled by placing it face down in the coals. Mmmm.

Time of Year

2012-02-22T12:57:00.000-08:00

It's that late winter time of year when what's in the freezer can be the most refreshing food available. Although the jars of tomatoes canned last August are long gone, my freezer contains fresh-frozen sweet corn cut from organically grown ears; garden-grown tomatoes and basil; flash-frozen (on a baking pan, to keep pieces separate) green squash in chunks; bags of a gorgeous mix of chard and kale, just barely simmered before being frozen. And there's a bag with smaller containers holding raspberries, strawberries and cherries that my family gathered in during the high summer months of 2011. Gorgeous ingredients for that indoor time of year when outdoors, grey and white gradually begin to yield to green, and we hear the call of springtime birds - and worry that spring is coming too soon. Time is always hastening forward. Savor your fruits and vegs! (Further digging in the freezer unearthed tubs of basil pesto, tomatillo-green tomato salsa, and wild apple-pear sauce.)

Nasturtium Buds and Blossoms - Yum!

2011-10-28T08:56:00.000-07:00

Nasturtium blossoms and buds, like violets, add a delicate and piquant flavor to salads. I grow them for their beauty and forget to use them for food – so when it started to snow yesterday afternoon I rushed out into the front patio to harvest the autumn array of nasturtium blossoms and buds. The red and orange flowers with their chic flat leaves were being crushed by the heavy wet snowflakes. The resulting harvest, captured in a bowl indoors, was small but very beautiful. I ate one or two blossoms right away – their crunchy peppery flavor is similar to true watercress (be careful where you harvest watercress – the water it thrives in may be polluted. It’s best to go for market-grown cress, unless you really know the water source).
I read years ago that nasturtium buds can be prepared and used like capers. I am a caper fanatic, pardon me while I switch to my favorite spelling, capar – but their high price and excess saltiness can put off even this extreme saltaholic. As you can see in the photo, I put the buds in a wee bowl with a small amount of olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Go ahead and add salt – I did not.
I placed a covering over the blossoms and marinating buds and refrigerated overnight. This morning the blossoms were still crisp, ready to glamorize the salad that I will have tonight – and the buds are succulent, subtle microcosms of a good salad – they burst and melt in the mouth.

(Those are post-blossom seed pods in the lower left of the photo.)

Autumn is icumen in

2011-10-28T08:12:00.000-07:00

Food appetites and preferences shift gears with the approach of colder weather. What causes this shift – the drop in day-length? Why does it happen – to fatten us up for the winter?
While I am sure that “studies have been done,” a conclusive understanding no doubt remains elusive. This is a good reason to get out of the academic grove and head into the kitchen to cook a hearty autumnal meal.
My first clue that autumn was upon us, was an unexpected wild craving for roasted root vegetables – Brian Jaques’ “Redwall Cookbook” suddenly stood out on the cookbook shelf as if spotlighted. While my first autumn feast was not out of those pages, it was certainly inspired by Jaques’ twee but tasty recipes, such as “Mole’s Favourite Deeper’n’Ever Turnip’n’Tater’n’Beetroot Pie” ! We’ll call my meal a cabbage and potato roast-up – no apostrophes were harmed in the making of this dish.
At Ludgates Farm Market I purchased a small head of purple cabbage and a pound-plus of Finger Lakes fingerling potatoes. I cut the cabbage into quarters, put it in an ovenproof pan with a bit of olive oil, garlic, salt and pepper and a small amount of water, covered the pan and roasted this glorious item for at least an hour at around 400 degrees F.
Meanwhile I washed, dried and cut in half the small potats and put them in a glass oven pan with fresh rosemary, salt and pepper, and a few Tbs of olive oil – mixed it all up and roasted it uncovered for 20-25 minutes at 425F. An Epicurious recipe suggested scattering a few Tbs of balsamic vinegar on the finished dish and re-roasting for a couple more minutes – intense favor enhancement!
These handsome, deeply-flavored, aromatic and comforting items lasted me three days – first as a one-person feast; then as side dishes for other happy, home-cooked meals.
The second autumn-craving dish has a name with capital letters: Two-Bean Turkey Leg Chili. It needs improvements – it is a tad heavy on the digestive system – but sure tastes good. I soaked black and pinto beans together with olive oil and garlic. I added about ten more cups of water and simmered, adding a (defrosted) turkey leg left over from our Canadian Thanksgiving, a half cup of uncooked brown rice, and a 15 ounce can of Mexican tomato sauce (hot). Whew!
After 1-2 hours I had me a warming, (spicy), satisfying, but heavy dish – best savored in small bowls with a green vegetable side-dish. Following these two mad forays into midwinter, I ate salads for two days in a row.
The photos show the finished cabbage and potato roast-up and the Two-Bean Turkey Leg Chili, which I ate out of an original Bledsoe Batware mug.

Garden Gratitude – 2011

2011-10-28T07:48:00.000-07:00

I am not a very good gardener but am getting better. Last fall I realized, following another growing season of minimal results, that standing in front of lackluster plants shaking my head in puzzlement was not enough – that I had to do hard physical work continuously, and quit griping.
While this year’s harvest was not what anyone else around here would term abundant, it sure was better for me: The additional compost, weeding, mulching and watering (even when the well went dry and I had to lug buckets from the neighbors’ pond) paid off in a modest but continual yield for my fresh produce needs and earthly delights.
I especially want to give a call out to the TOMATOES who gave me daily joy – the small blasts of flavor from the cherries, straight off the scented vines, in the warm mornings, and the earthy aromas of tomatoes in sauce and bright salads in the kitchen; the incredible luxury of having all the SNOW PEAS I could consume daily for over a month; the repeated astonishment of being able to harvest TOMATILLOS in my own backyard for sauces. (Beets and potatoes, let’s try again next spring. And this fall I got the garlic planted in October!)
Most of all -- thanks go to the Plantsman Nursery in Lansing for getting me started in earliest April, when the local outdoors was still a mud-bath, with a container of small lettuce and kale plants. I harvested the lettuces within a couple of weeks – what a confidence-booster and SO GOOD; I also planted another kale type and collard green seedlings, from Earlybird Farms just south of Ithaca. The result - ALL SUMMER long I had PLENTIFUL, incredibly flavorful greens for every type of dish – sautéed, boiled, cut up and added to other dishes. When cut, these plants regrew. OMG.
The photos show a midsummer yield and assorted greens bed; the final lingering cherry and plum tomatoes in September, and the goodbye-til-spring harvest of assorted greens – harvested on October 26. Oh yeah!