This is an obituary some of Bill Hatke’s friends wrote, which I was told appeared in the paper version of the Lawrence Journal World as a paid announcement:
William F. Hatke 61. He gardened. Bill was born May 23, 1946 in Idaho and grew on a farm near the Salmon River also called the river of no return. He was from a family of 6 sons and one daughter. Bill lived a purposely simple life. He loved being an organic market gardener, working hard physically every day, he loved East Lawrence, and he loved to dance. Bill worked in his gardens all summer and wrote daily in the winter. He was in the service, serving in peacetime Korea. After service he attended Seminary School at Loyola University in Chicago, then graduate school brought him to Lawrence where he received two Masters, one in Philosophy, one in Psychology and a PhD. in Criminology. He gave generously to his community through his hands, through his mentorships, through his friendships and by his presence. He belonged to the Kaw Valley Organic Gardening Society. He was a founding member of the Farmers Market. He attended the peace vigil at the Douglas County Courthouse every Saturday. During the last month of his life he saw that his crops were gathered, and weeded his gardens. After suffering a long illness Bill checked out September 27, 2007 the night of the harvest moon. He is survived by his wide family of friends. A gathering is planned Sunday October 7th, 6 pm to 9 pm. at the North Lawrence Train Depot. A potluck supper will be followed by stories of Bill. Please bring your memories, stories and photos to share. Memorial donations may be made to The Shelley Miller Trust, as she meant so much to Bill and they both cared so much for their East Lawrence community.
Years ago, when pondering what I could do to live a more sustainable life, I realized I’d need to obtain most of my food locally. Being reared on grocery store food, where everything is in season all of the time, I struggled to imagine not only living without certain fresh foods at certain times of the year, but also living without certain foods altogether. At the time, I lived in a place where subtropical plants wouldn’t grow. As I tried to imagine myself living as sustainably as possible, I couldn’t see myself living without citrus. During most of my childhood, I’d started every day with a glass of orange juice. The smell of torn lemon rind, the tang of a tangerine–it would have been too much to lose. I’d have to move to a warmer climate. Now I’m happy to report that I live in a warmer climate, on the cold northern edge of the subtropics. Agricultural zone 8. Warm enough for citrus, but just barely.
We’ve had a pair of satsuma orange trees in the ground for 8 years. This year was a banner year for one of them. Satsumas are cold tolerant to at least 18 degrees F. or reportedly even lower temperatures for brief periods. Satsumas have a low number of seeds and they are very easy to peel. Their segments separate easily–all in all, a very tidy citrus fruit, great for on the go snacks and for kids.
I don’t water much. The Satsumas have thrived during a hot, droughty year when lesser plants died. If you want to grow citrus outside of the Rio Grande valley in Texas, Satsuma is the variety of choice.
Information on harvesting:
http://aggiehorticulture.tamu.edu/patiocitrus/harvestingtext.html
I planted Kagraner Sommer butterhead lettuce and Red Sails leaf lettuce today.
We have a sun oven that we love. We’ve had it for a few years, and it works great. It usually gets up to around 275 degrees Fahrenheit (135 Celsius), but tends to sit at 250 F. (121 C.) once it has food in it. In the summer, when eggplant is prolific in central Texas, I really like to eat baba ghanoush, a tasty cold paste that goes great with chips or pita bread. I throw about 5-7 small eggplants into a clear glass dish, close up the sun oven, point it approximately where I think the sun will be about an hour before I want to remove the contents, and walk away for 3 or 4 hours. On the outside, a sun oven is mostly cool to the touch. I would never leave a gas or electric oven in a building unattended, but with the sun oven, I don’t have any worries at all. It makes great baba ghanoush, and you don’t heat up your house making it.
We have figs, lots of them. Fig trees have a unique fruit-like structure, called the syconia, essentially an inside-out flower cluster. At the bottom of the syconia, there is a small opening, called an eye, which gets larger as the “fruit” turns color and ripens. In it’s native environs, female fig wasps enter and pollinate the flowers inside, laying eggs while they’re at it.
We’ve got the Petit Negri varietal, which is extremely prolific. Unfortunately, it has a rather large eye which provides entry for some kind of tiny beetles. Once they invade, the figs can turn into a gooey fermenting mess. However, if you pick the figs too early, they don’t have much flavor and are better for jam.
I’ve harvested a couple grocery bags of figs so far this year, have given some away and still have many. There aren’t a lot of recipes for fresh figs and they don’t keep long, even when refrigerated. I’ve tried drying tomatoes outside before, but due to the high humidity, I had moldy results. Alternative methods include oven drying or building a solar dryer, a little too ambitious for me. However, I came across a post on the internets where a woman described drying fruit in her car. Pure genius, the car seems to be a perfect solar dryer, hot but not too hot. Consequently, my lovely wife has been good enough to drive around with the “food pantry” food dehydrator, basically a mesh bag with racks, hanging in the back of her car. So far so good. I think they should be done by tomorrow.
I harvested 9 lbs of grapes (I believe muscadine) from our arbor today. It probably would have been a bigger harvest had I picked a little earlier. I’m making grape juice. To do this, I added a cup of water to 7 lbs. of grapes in a stainless steel pot, put it on low heat until the whole mess was hot to the touch. Then I used a bean masher to mash the grapes and simmered for another 15 minutes or so. Next, I used a wire mesh strainer to strain out the skins and seeds. I took the remaining juice and strained it through 2 layers of cheesecloth laid in the strainer. The instructions I had said to let it sit for another 24-48 hours and then filter through cheesecloth again to remove sediment which apparently can turn bitter. Optionally, you can simmer and dissolve sweetener in it. Since I’m watching my caloric intake, I may foresake the sweetener. I got more then 2 quarts out of it and it’s grapeilicious!
