October on the Homestead
Closing One Season and Making Room for the Next
Hey friends,
Welcome to the October newsletter from Kern River Permaculture. We’re glad you’re here.
There comes a point toward the end of every growing season when you have to stop looking at what you hoped the garden would become—and take an honest look at what actually happened.
September has been that month for us.
Some things grew beautifully. Some failed spectacularly. There were baskets coming into the kitchen, jars going into the pantry, pesto going into the freezer and herbs going into the freeze dryer.
And outside, there were places where we finally had to admit:
This isn't working.
That may sound like failure, but after all these years of growing food, we've learned that it is often where the most interesting part begins.
Because regenerative homesteading isn't about forcing the land to conform to a plan.
It's about paying attention.
When the Garden Changes the Plan
This summer taught us a lot.
Our Three Sisters garden didn't become what we'd envisioned. The corn failed, voles devastated the summer squash, and that area simply didn't function the way we needed it to.
The Sun Garden gave us another lesson. We planted roughly 100 bean plants there, only to lose nearly 90 percent of them under the intensity of our summer sun.
Even our aeroponic towers—usually remarkably free from disease and pest pressure—weren't immune. Two towers of Dragon Tongue beans were devastated by mites.
Those are hard losses after you've put in the work.
But there were successes, too.
Our cantaloupes absolutely loved the big greenhouse. Tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, herbs and greens continued finding their way into the kitchen. And throughout the season, our hydroponic and aeroponic gardens reminded us why they've become such an important part of how we grow food here in our hot, dry climate.
Perhaps the biggest lesson, though, came from one of the gardens that failed.
Instead of rebuilding it and hoping for a different result, we decided to change the system entirely
That garden is becoming a 20-foot greenhouse.
We've spent September tearing things apart, moving things around and beginning the transformation. It isn't finished yet—not even close.
And that's okay.
We're documenting the entire process, including the parts that don't go according to plan.
Sometimes the most regenerative thing you can do is stop trying to make something work and ask:
What does this place actually want to become?
September Was a Preservation Month
While things were changing outside, the kitchen was busy.
Very busy.
This year's cucumber harvest was particularly generous, which meant jars and jars of cucumbers began making their way into the pantry.
We made whole dill pickles, dill spears and dill pickle chips.
Those pickle chips are especially important around here. Our granddaughter loves them on her sandwiches, along with other things she harvests from the garden herself. There is something pretty wonderful about watching another generation walk through the garden choosing what will eventually become lunch.
We also put up bread-and-butter pickles, pickle relish and Armenian cucumber chutney.
Blue Lake green beans were canned.
Anaheim peppers were diced and canned.
A large basil harvest became pesto for the freezer, preserving one of those unmistakable flavors of summer for the colder months ahead.
And while all of that was happening, the freeze dryer was busy with lemongrass, mint and fig leaves that we'll use for tea this winter.
This is one of our favorite parts of growing food.
The harvest doesn't end when something comes out of the garden.
It simply moves into its next form.
From the Homestead Kitchen: Jalapeño Jelly
September's peppers also mean it's time for something I've been making for decades:
Jalapeño Jelly.
My version began with a recipe from Mel's Kitchen Cafe, but over the years I've adapted it to the way we eat and preserve food here.
One change, in particular, was a game changer.
I use commercially bottled lime juice instead of white vinegar.
It gives the jelly a bright flavor that works beautifully with the peppers without the vinegar flavor I don't particularly want in the finished jelly.
And this is a recipe that offers some wonderful flexibility.
The pepper mixture can be adjusted according to what you grow and how much heat you enjoy, while maintaining the recipe's total quantity of prepared peppers. Jalapeños can share the pot with sweet peppers, Anaheim peppers or something considerably hotter.
I also choose between 5 and 6 cups of sugar depending upon how we're going to use the jelly.
Five cups gives me a softer spread that is wonderful spooned over cream cheese and served with crackers.
Six cups produces a firmer jelly that I prefer when we're going to use it on sandwiches—including a sweet-and-spicy PB&J.
That's the kind of practical knowledge that comes from making the same foods year after year.
Canning can sometimes feel intimidating to someone just beginning. You encounter instructions telling you never to alter anything, and it can leave you afraid to experiment at all.
I think it's much more useful to understand why particular ingredients and measurements matter.
In this jelly, the peppers themselves are low-acid. The added acid is important. Current Extension food-preservation guidance permits an equal quantity of commercially bottled lemon or lime juice to replace 5% vinegar in a tested canning recipe. That's why I use bottled lime juice and don't reduce the measured amount of acid.
Other choices—such as the combination of peppers—give us room to make the recipe our own.
A note about canning: This is the pepper jelly I make in my own kitchen, adapted from Mel's Kitchen Cafe. I substitute commercially bottled lime juice for the 5% vinegar called for in the original recipe. Extension food-preservation guidance permits equal amounts of bottled lemon or lime juice to replace 5% vinegar because commercially bottled citrus juice provides standardized acidity. This specific Kern River Permaculture version has not been independently laboratory-tested as a complete recipe. As with all home food preservation, understand the process and use proper canning practices.
Closing the Loop
There was another kind of harvest happening here in September.
We've harvested most of this year's roosters, with only a few remaining, as well as two of our tom turkeys. We'll finish the roosters shortly and then begin working our way through the ducks.
That may seem surprising coming from two vegetarians.
Frank and I don't eat the birds we raise.
But our decision to be vegetarian doesn't change the realities of maintaining a working homestead. When we hatch and raise poultry, roughly half of those birds will be males—and a flock simply cannot sustain all of them.
We keep the male we need for breeding.
The others are harvested, and I can the meat for our dogs.
For us, this is part of trying to work with the earth rather than against it.
We accept responsibility for the animals we bring into our system, and we try not to waste what that system produces.
It isn't always the picturesque side of homesteading.
But it is part of it.
And if we're going to document this life honestly, we think those parts of the story belong here, too.
Nothing Wasted
When we look back over September, there is a thread connecting things that at first don't seem particularly related.
A failed garden becomes a greenhouse.
Cucumbers become winter pickles.
Basil becomes pesto tucked into the freezer.
Lemongrass, mint and fig leaves become winter tea.
Peppers become jars on the pantry shelf.
And animals raised here become food for other animals in our care.
Not everything worked this year.
Far from it.
But regenerative homesteading has never meant creating a perfect little ecosystem where nothing goes wrong.
It means observing what happens, learning from it and deciding what comes next.
Sometimes that means preserving abundance.
Sometimes it means accepting a loss.
And sometimes it means tearing apart an entire garden and building something completely different in its place.
And Now, October Begins...
The seasons change quickly here in the mountains.
The summer garden is beginning to give way. Fall and winter vegetables are taking its place. The days are getting shorter, and we're watching the weather a little more closely now.
There is still plenty to harvest and preserve.
There are still roosters to finish processing and ducks ahead.
And somewhere underneath all of the construction mess, there is a greenhouse waiting to emerge.
We don't know exactly what all of it will look like yet.
That's part of the fun.
Come Along With Us
There is far more happening here than we could ever fit into one monthly letter.
That's one of the reasons we've begun documenting our journey on YouTube.
We're sharing the homestead as it actually happens—the gardens that thrive, the ones that fail, the food we grow and preserve, the projects that take much longer than expected, and the decisions we make as we continue building a more regenerative life here in the Kern River Valley.
If these monthly letters are a chance to sit down together and look at where we've been, YouTube is where you can come along while it's happening.
We'll see you again in November. There is a lot that's going to happen between now and then.
Care well for the land...and it will care well for you.
— Cherri & Frank
Kern River Permaculture
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