Spore Lore

Big Bunny Seat — a wildlife habitat installation

1- Residential Habitats -- Critters and Their Homes, 6-Outdoor Classroom, Blog Comments Off

Nov 142014

Big Bunny Seat is a wildlife habitat installation.

Big Bunny Seat is a wildlife habitat installation that is an art installation.

Big Bunny Seat is a wildlife habitat installation that is a seat, a resting place.

Big Bunny Seat wildlife habitat installation is an outdoor classroom project. School: Orchard View School, located in Sebastopol, California.

Big Bunny Seat wildlife habitat installation, AKA “Big Bunny Seat”, AKA “BBS”, was fun!

The Before

The Laguna de Santa Rosa Foundation, located in Santa Rosa, California, operates the Laguna Environmental Center, on Stone Farm, Stanford Road. The LEC’s (Laguna Environmental Center’s) path to its Observation Platform and adjacent viewing bench terrace wanted something artistic.

BBS (Big Bunny Seat) will be created here in two weeks (from photo date). It will be a seat alongside the path, so that someone just leaving the bridge over the LEC’s Pond will have a place to rest. This habitat installation (because all this effort is about habitat installation foremost!) will be a solid, secure, trustworthy seat for the weary traveler. In other words, while considering the safety and comfort of the sitter, we will be considering this art installation’s ability to nourish wildlife habitat.
Alas, a lone log lays. This log will be removed to create BBS and will ultimately be dug into the woodchips under the Observation Platform’s ramp. Note!: A student from Orchard View’s Biology class (Teacher: Sunny Galbraith; school located in Sebastopol, California) found 2 praying mantis cocoons on the log’s underside. We also saw an empty paper wasp nest. When relocated under the ramp, care was taken to protect the cocoons.

Note also, in the pic above, the irrigation tube (exposed), and the easy, smooth slope of land, particularly in the middle of the young shrubs. The shallow bowl of woodchips and the exposed black tubing will change during this project.

Installation Day

Big Bunny is a hulk of redwood, perhaps a chip off a great redwood tree’s top crown to early trunk. In other words, the bulky “head” wood grain is swirly like root wood, while the other end is more linear, like a tail.

Habitat feature: Redwood loves water. The soft, moisture-laden wood will work in tandem with the adobe soil to create a moist soft interface, mud. That’s a great amphibian, soil microbe, crustacean, gastropod place to be. Biodiversity is likely to thrive in this proposed wildlife habitat. Note: The Sonoma fieldstone (local rock) on the skid in background waiting for the installation to start. Thanks for the delivery Stuart!

Fungi hunting grounds at the LEC – Heron Hall’s back slope mulching woodchips. The woodchips are a habitat restoration resource. Heron Hall was recently built. The woodchips will allow the native plants and seeds, provided by the Laguna Foundation, time enough to establish, to thrive, before weeds take over. Race between Weeds and Native Plants aside, we get to harvest mushrooms. Those mushrooms will be used to inoculate the new habitat’s (Big Bunny Seat’s) new woodchip mulching. Note: White polka dot irrigation flags (pretty fancy stuff!) mark mushroom colonies.

Beginning of class. Today we will be making an art installation as well as a functional bench. And, it will be a wildlife habitat.

The 10-foot trench for the redwood branches starts at 6” (six inches) deep and gradually surfaces. The longest branch will rise out of the trench and become a small snag below the Observation Platform ramp. Small snag to you, nice perch for a field mouse or Pacific tree frog.

Water to the rescue! A quick hosing and the trench’s adobe clay will become easier to dig.

Student digs hole for the “praying mantis head” alongside the packed granite path. The Sonoma fieldstone rock is roundish up top and angular on bottom. It will sit firmly in the small hole dug for it. Besides providing a pool of moisture, the rock will prevent Big Bunny from tipping when the next traveler sits.

Spades and trench shovels and digging bars, oh my! Students eke a trench out of the stubborn adobe soil.

Student levels the Sonoma fieldstone. The rock has a dip on one side, which is facing skyward in the pic. Water is used to determine “level”, or better, that position of the rock that holds the most water. The goal is to create a mountain lake for tiny critters, like amphibians, reptiles, and crawly creatures smaller.

A student and I have the redwood hulk balanced on its head, resting before the final flop.

Lowering the redwood seat into position. The Bunny’s tail will rest on the water-holding fieldstone, ensuring a stable seat.

Sonoma fieldstone offers a shallow hillside lake to the critters inhabiting Big Bunny Seat. Newly planted grass will add to the installation’s richness.

Covering the spore-covered redwood branches with straw.

Students plant native grass plugs. Note: The facing side of Big Bunny has been covered with woodchip mushroom harvest. Those old chips will inoculate the new wheelbarrows of chips in queue.

This student knows plants, and this one is the native California fescue, Festuca californica.

This biology class is outdoors. Exposure to soil, Nature, time off campus are among the curricula. Note: Adobe soil from the trench is used to create a new grass hill. Mix things up a bit, change the terrain. The trench, topped with a layer of moisture-loving straw, is ready to be covered with new woodchips.

Student unwinds the flexible black irrigation tubing (plastic python).

Oops! Forgot the irrigation. The flexible black emitter hose, which was watering the young coyote bushes (4) and the larger ceanothus, has been hijacked. Those five emitters will now irrigate the mulch woodchip bed that encompasses:

–drought resistant native grasses

–a clay trench that is filled with a lasagna of redwood branches, puffball spore (Found by redwood roots as whole dried puffball.), and straw. The straw will hold moisture, perhaps nourishing the puffball spore. Maybe we’ll see fungi emerge from the trench this winter. (Outdoor classroom.)

–a hulk of redwood that wants water.

Any time soon the irrigation can be removed; BBS is a drought tolerant wildlife habitat. In the meantime before the piping is removed, the new grass plugs will be in Water Joy.

The day Big Bunny Seat was installed. View sitting on the redwood seat, or standing very close to it. Mid November afternoon in Northern California. The LEC’s Pond and native plantings and habitat landscaping look beautiful, thriving.

The day Big Bunny Seat was installed. Late afternoon November skies. This outdoor classroom rocks!Big Bunny Seat’s first day. Who will sit on you tomorrow, Big Bunny?

Thank you for the wonderful pictures, Jenna. To all the Orchard View students, and teacher (Sunny), and Cordy and David, and the Laguna Foundation’s staff (especially Brent Reed, Restoration Projects Supervisor), cool project!

Enjoy your wildlife habitat creations. Habitat it!

Tony

Compost Cricket Corral — completing the wildlife installation.

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Oct 102014

Compost Cricket Corral is a wildlife habitat installation at The Laguna de Santa Rosa Foundation‘s complex, Laguna Environmental Center, in Santa Rosa, California, 95401.

Compost Cricket Corral, installed on October 8, 2014 (2 days ago at this writing), is also about both creating an efficient compost system for the Laguna Environment and also having students experience working with Nature, in Nature.

Stakes mark the pole locations for Compost Cricket Corral. Nice view of Stone Farm’s northern pasture, Irwin creek, and Mount St. Helena while we work! The above pic is where Spore Lore left off detailing the progress of Compost Cricket Corral, on 9-4-2014: “Compost Cricket Corral“.

Compost Cricket Corral – The Before. This is installation day, leaving off from September’s prep of the site. The stakes, as discussed in last month’s article, show the location of the 8 posts to be installed. Six postholes have been partially dug. The 8 posts will create 3 compost bin areas, each roughly 6 feet X 6 feet.

Some prep before the students arrive today. The 8 post holes are started and filled with water to make digging deeper in the adobe clay soil easier. Large concrete chucks were found under the soil; they will be used later in the project. True, the blocks were very hard to extract from the soil but they will come in handy to support the posts upright. As is said in Permaculture, “The problem is the solution.”

The students are here! Biology students from Orchard View School, in Sebastopol, will be installing Compost Cricket Corral. Lots of posthole digging! Old wood to be gathered and a wood chip pile to be shifted over a few feet.

Digging, digging, digging. Outdoor classrooms include fresh air, sometimes exercise like this one, and kinesthetic learning, or otherwise known as, tactile learning. Doing is learning! Note the large wood chip pile (right foreground).

5/16” holes are drilled 3″ deep into the top of the posts to encourage insects to habitat in them.

Measuring holes to get 3 plus feet deep. The deep holes will better support the posts without having to pour new/fresh concrete at their bases. Also, the overkill deep, untreated fir wood posts will hold life-sustaining water for the habitat’s soil microbes, larger critters, and fungi/plant growth.

A post is placed in its hole, then leveled vertically. Concrete chucks are used to hold the posts in place and to create shelter cavities for wildlife.

Habitat installation at the Laguna Foundation might be hard work but it sure beats being in the classroom. Outdoor classrooms rock!

The Biology students from Orchard View School (Sebastopol, California; teacher: Sunny Galbraith) have installed Compost Cricket Corral’s 8 vertical posts AND have fled. What great work they did! Local materials, especially those that others consider “junk”, will become this wildlife habitat’s treasures.

The compost bins now have defined areas – making compost will now be more efficient for the Laguna Environmental Center at Stone Farm.

NW view. Student-carried oak logs await insertion into Compost Cricket Corral.

Class is over; Tony stays on to finish the habitat installation. Students gathered these oak logs from the farm to be used in the habitat installation. The logs are used to edge the back of the compost corrals and to create a wood pile next to one end bin. That log pile will house gastropods (snails and slugs), insects, other crawly critters, lizards, snakes, and other animals. The purpose of this habitat installation is to maximize the compost area – the animals sheltering nearby will visit the compost and add to its richness. Rich biodiversity at the compost will create better soil, faster.

W view. Half of this refuse concrete blocks pile was used to support Compost Cricket Corral’s posts. The blocks were snuggled up against all sides of each post, in the gaps of the posthole. No new concrete was poured/made for this installation.

Stacking functions (Permaculture) – let’s clean this place up, raise the level of the compost, AND create habitat. Old concrete chunks are used to bolster the back edge of the compost. A raised floor to the compost pile will help it drain better, preventing an anaerobic condition (no oxygen to support decomposition) in the rainy winter months. Besides holding logs in place, the concrete chunks also create cavities for critters.

The sun is setting on this project. Posts are in, the soil base is leveled, and the log pile has been started (far end).

Time to call it a night. I finalized the project under a rising full moon. Excited to see the finished result in the morning!

NE view. Compost Cricket Corral (CCC) was completed last night and given a good sprinkle of water before being to put sleep by the chill night, enjoying its warm Northern California October night, till the warm fog rolled in this morning.

E view. The next morning. Finished and looking good! Ready to make compost and invite the growing neighborhood of critters.

N view. 3 compost pile bins, each roughly 6 feet X 6 feet.

NW view. Note the sawdust from drilling insect holes on the tarp in the foreground.

NE view. The log pile, Log Pile Apartments, will house many critters.

West view. Critters will travel between the compost, log pile, wood chip pile, and surrounding fenceline.

Vacancy at Log Pile Apartments.

5/16” holes drilled into posts to encourage insects to live in the wood. These fir posts will invite insects and fungi to thrive in Compost Cricket Corral. Fir wood (#3 rough) was specifically chosen because of its vulnerability to Nature.

Close-up of post insect holes.

Other Photos of Habitat-Friendly Features of Compost Cricket Corral:

Nice job, again, Sunny and the Biology students (Uly, Tristan, Nick, Moses, Matt, Lily, Leo, Lauren, Kaleb, Jenna, Hannah, Cordy, Coco, Brendan), and Dave.

Everyone, enjoy your wildlife habitat creations! Play outdoors!

Tony

Compost Cricket Corral

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Sep 042014

The BEFORE — area behind the Laguna Foundation’s native plant nursery before installation of Compost Cricket Corral, which will consolidate the compost pile and provide wildlife habitat.

Yesterday, I started prep work for a wildlife habitat installation, Compost Cricket Corral, at the Laguna Environmental Center, which is the headquarters and showcase educational property for the Laguna Foundation.

Staking out Compost Cricket Corral’s post locations, which will define three compost piles/bins. No T-square, but piping with a 90-degree elbow worked fine.

We will be installing vertical driftwood posts to replace the current stakes; the posts are to encourage insect activity.

See:

Insect Hotels — Inspiration Green

Insect Hotels – Encourage Beneficial Insects Into Your Garden

Creating Habitat For Native Bees | Deep Roots at Home

Compost Cricket Corral, that is, the new and improved compost pile(s), will be within easy access of the nursery’s work stations.

Stakes mark the pole locations for Compost Cricket Corral. Nice view of Stone Farm’s northern pasture, Irwin creek, and Mount St. Helena while we work!

This project will be completed in October by Sunny Galbraith’s biology students from Orchard View School, Sebastopol, California. Compost Cricket Corral will be our first wildlife habitat installation for this school year. Chirp chirp!

Enjoy your habitat garden.

Tony

Growing Amaranth To Attract Birds and Insects

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Jul 152014

Great Green Bush Cricket on Amaranthus caudatus.

Amaranth is an ancient grain. Its family name is Amanthaceae, with nearly 900 species worldwide. This article focuses on the non-native species Amaranthus caudatus, a species grown by the Aztec Indians of Mexico 8000 years ago, and which has naturalized in my area, Northern California. Yes, that the popular amaranth in our garden is not native was a concern to me when considering it as a topic for this blog site. However, I am taking the time to discuss it here because of its generous gift to both humans and wildlife as a food source.

Mature amaranth in the fall surrounds garden seating. Note the pale color of the seed heads — time to harvest seed.

Amaranth likes disturbed soils. It gets its common name “pigweed” because it frequently thrives in the disturbed soils of barnyards, especially pig pens. But because there are so many plants commonly referred to as pigweed, I use “amaranth” in this article. Furthermore, I do not use Amaranthus caudatus‘s other common name, “love-lies-bleeding”, because that’s just plain weird! We’ll stick to “amaranth”.

Young volunteer amaranth in the author’s garden.

A curious thing happened in our garden recently. We reclaimed a garden bed that had laid fallow– it was an excellent undisturbed wildlife brush pile creating excellent soil!!! The soil was pushed back off off walkway slates and churned into a planting mound. It was disturbed, first time in a couple of years. Up came amaranth, all along the borders of the bed, some on the mound. Yes, there’s cucumber in there somewhere.

Young amaranth in the author’s garden competes with dock and rhubarb.

The young amaranth leaves have been a delicious salad addition. Tastes a little like soil to me, but I appreciate the not-iceberg-lettuce! hearty flavor.

These amaranth (foreground), by fall, will have been thinned, will grow to over 6 feet tall, and will drape luscious tassel-like, seed-rich flowers.

Amaranth is considered an insectary plant, and that’s no wonder considering how many zillions (don’t quote me) of flowerlets there are, with each needing to be pollinated before becoming a seed.

Amaranth stalks are filled with pith, a welcoming overwintering habitat for insects.

The substantial sturdy stems of amaranth can become so ridged and thick that an adult’s hand just reaches around it. Inside is a porous pith — perfect burrowing material for insects. At harvest time, don’t forget to leave some stalks in the garden to encourage wildlife to overwinter in your garden. Besides, you will never get the last seed from the Medusa of flowers, but hungry songbirds might. So leave harvested stalks in your garden. One person’s “debris” could be a whole ecosystem’s habitat.

Birds feeding on Amaranthus caudatus. Photo credit: Diane Kennedy of Vegetariat (http://www.vegetariat.com).

Bird feeding on Amaranthus caudatus. Photo credit: Diane Kennedy of Vegetariat (http://www.vegetariat.com).

The advantages for including amaranth in my edible garden, which is within our “habitat food forest”, keep adding up. Buckwheat and amaranth pancakes for us, pollen and leafage for insects and small critters, seed for birds, a soil builder, and an overwintering material for insects and soil critters.

Enjoy your wildlife habitat garden!

Tony

Some Extra Photos:

Amaranth caudatus growing alongside Bird Bath Beach in the author’s garden. Note rocks in the bath — steps to the deep end for wasps, bees, butterflies, and birds. Also note the driftwood perches to allow birds to check for safety before committing to the water.

The red pigment in amaranth was used by the Native American Hopi tribe to dye cloth.

Amaranth seedlings (purple, back right) are tiny in relation to a sunflower seedling (green, with seed still attached).

Drying stand for amaranth. The flower clusters will be “milked” so that the seed will drop onto the sheet for easy collection.

Installing Snag Wildlife Habitat Installations — plans for 3 options

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Jun 162014

spore lore, habitat it and they will come, tony mcguigan, garden, soil, soil under my nails, gardening, gardens, native plants, permaculture, wildlife garden, environmental education, ecological landscaping, snag, Native Plants and Wildlife Gardens, tree snag, dead tree, Scrub Jay, bird perch

Scrub Jay atop Gondola Perch, enjoying its lookout vantage point above Tony’s garden. A very long redwood tree limb has been lashed vertically to the heavy-duty post that suspends cables for grape and fig vines.

Every month, I write an article for Native Plants and Wildlife Gardens. This month’s article was Pipevine Swallowtail Hummock – A Habitat Installation yesterday — my articles appear at that blog every 14th of the month.

This article is my response, in pictorial detail (sometimes I just want to draw up plans!), to a comment requesting ideas for what to do with part of a dead tree being removed by a neighbor. Dead trees left to weather time are called snags. So this article is about how to install a snag.

Post

As the first photo of this article demonstrates, a snag, or long tree limb, can be lashed to a vertical post. The picture above, “Post”, is a simple diagram of doing just that. The heft of the pole required will be determined by the expected weight and wind resistance of the snag or tree limb. Think heavy wind, heavy rain. Think heavy, rain-soaked wood being twisted by the wind. Fill the pipe with cement if possible. Use a salvaged pipe to lower cost. An old pipe will develop a beautiful, rich red-brown patina: rust. Benefit: Pole is sunk once, can be used for multiple snag installations.

Downside: Not much happening underground in the way of habitat cavities.

Hole

Now we are getting somewhere; we have dug a hole to secure the snag upright. The wood of the snag is now receiving soil-to-wood contact. That soil-wood interface creates a WELCOME mat for an enormous array of critters to leave the soil and enter into or crawl onto the wood. My general rule for supporting fairly consistent weight (the diameter of the pole/log does not vary much) is to dig the pole/snag in one third of its length. For example, a 15-foot pole would be dug in 5 feet. I might miss the foot or more of height I have lost in the hole but I will be happy to see the pole stand sturdily for many years.

Benefits: Wood-to-soil interface. No cement. Base of snag will rot — a cascading spectrum of Life will visit the garden.

Downsides: Base of snag will rot — will eventually fall.

Hole Plus Cavities

You do not have to go to India to visit the Taj Mahal! Yes, “Hole Plus Cavities” is my favorite option of the three plans diagramed. Know where the snag, or limb, or weight wants to lean/fall. When I move a hulking piece of wood, I find the center of gravity such that the massive weight can be held up by one finger. Finding the center of gravity will ensure that your resources are applied most efficiently. For example, your base rocks in the hole will become most effective if the snag is leaning in the correct direction.

Benefits: Large hole allows easier insertion of snag. Cavities, of varying sizes, between rocks invite critters, of varying sizes. The snag bulk can be larger because heavy, dense rock is keeping the base securely rooted. Only diagram with a smiley-faced flower. Lots of digging — the soil from the hole can be bermed/mounded to increase the site’s non-linear, less anal, aspect (let’s face it, most gardens are flat, boring!).

Downsides: Lots of digging — hard work. Care must be used to snugly pack rocks against snag. Settling of rocks over time will occur; will require testing strength of base on occasion.

Marilyn, Thank you for asking!

All, Enjoy your habitat creations. Habitat it!

Tony

Creating Perches To Welcome Pond Wildlife — my monthly post at Native Plants and Wildlife Gardens

1- Residential Habitats -- Critters and Their Homes, Blog Comments Off

May 152014

Oak Tunnel Tower — BEFORE.

Oak Tunnel Tower — AFTER.

Lizard Stone House — BEFORE.

Lizard Stone House — AFTER.

Turtle Pond Pier — BEFORE.

Turtle Pond Pier — AFTER.

See the post

Creating Perches To Welcome Pond Wildlife

for more pictures and for how these habitat installations were created.

Yesterday (the 14th) was my monthly blog post at Native Plants and Wildlife Gardens. This month, my blog article discusses these wildlife habitat installations at the Laguna Environmental Cental in Santa Rosa, California.

Enjoy! And please comment me under my NP & WG article if you have any comments or questions.

Tony

Snake Sedge Rockpile Resort — my monthly post at Native Plants and Wildlife Gardens

1- Residential Habitats -- Critters and Their Homes, Blog No Responses »

Apr 142014

The BEFORE.

The Plan.

The AFTER.

Snake Sedge Rockpile Resort

Today (the 14th) is my monthly blog post at Native Plants and Wildlife Gardens. This month, my blog article discusses this wildlife habitat installation with high school seniors from Orchard View School in Sebastopol, California.

Enjoy! And please comment me under my NP & WG article if you have any comments or questions.

Tony

5 Minutes of Kayaking on the Laguna de Santa Rosa

3- Habitat It And They Will Come -- Tony's book, 5- Resources for You, Your Neighborhood, and Beyond, Blog No Responses »

Feb 192014

From my YouTube channel:

20140217 Kayaking on the Laguna de Santa Rosa with the Laguna Foundation

David Bannister, the Laguna Foundation’s Executive Director, leads this kayak trip on the Laguna. Great birding! Peaceful to be out on the water during high-water season.
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Enjoy the wildlife habitat in YOUR community.

Tony

Twisty Toad Tunnel — A Hugelkultur Wildlife Habitat

1- Residential Habitats -- Critters and Their Homes, 2- Food Forest Gardening, Blog No Responses »

Feb 142014

Golden Crowned Sparrow in Tulip MagnoliaTwig Pile

Twisty Toad Tunnel is a hugelkultur wildlife habitat in our Northern California garden. I severely pruned back a lichen-covered and overgrown tulip magnolia tree and stuffed the cut-down limbs, prunings, and cutting into The Bog — a hole in our garden where we make soil by winter and grow crops by summer. Much of the magnolia cuttings are elegantly draped with lichens, surely a beneficial source of wildlife shelter and food for animals microscopic to crawling to larger.

The beginning of this post focuses on video installations of Twisty Toad Tunnel.

The last paragraph provides you with a link to learn more about Twisty Toad Tunnels’ rich lichen contribution to out wildlife habitat hugelkultur.

Installation of Twisty Toad Tunnel

Learn more about Twisty Toad Tunnels’ rich lichens

Today (the 14th) is my monthly blog post at Native Plants and Wildlife Gardens. This month, my blog article discusses how lichens support wildlife habitat in our residential gardens.

Enjoy! And please comment me under my NP & WG article if you have any comments or questions.

Tony