Yesterday afternoon felt very American to me. I went over to visit with our friend Mark Christensen and collect bean seeds (most from  Turtle Island) and some suckers off an American paw paw.

Mark works with others to propagate and disseminate heritage beans, tomatoes and apples, among some others.

The paw paw was a tree in Mark’s heritage orchard. When I was visiting him about 6 months ago he mentioned it was sending out suckers. I made a note to come back and dig some out. Yesterday I finally did.

The suckers were so small they were hard to pick out in the tall grass. According to wiipedia, here is some information about the paw paw:

Asimina, the pawpaw genus, a genus of trees and shrubs native to eastern North America

• Common pawpaw (Asimina triloba), a temperate fruit tree, native to eastern North America

Here is what the suckers looked like planted at our place.

As we try to manage the property to be productive, we have brought some animals onto the land to graze the grass while it is still young and tender. Our friend SImon brought by this ewe…

…and this lamb.

We also have a temporary border called Shady.

Peace, Estwing