The down and dirty on raising livestock in the city

Novella Carpenter, the author of the new memoir "Farm City," may have created her own slice of rural life on the mean streets of Oakland, but what about enterprising urban farmers here in Los Angeles? Where does one start?

I spoke with Erik Knutzen, co-author with Kelly Coyne of the 2008 book "The Urban Homestead: Your Guide to Self-Sufficient Living in the Heart of the City."

Knutzen and Coyne have been tending to their 35-foot-by-100-foot garden in Echo Park for 11 years, and their blog Homegrown Evolution is chock full of day-to-day tips for aspiring urban land tillers.

If you're lucky enough to have a backyard at all, the first thing to do is get your soil tested for things like lead and other pollutants.

"Everyone says very good things about Wallace Labs," Knutzen told me. "It's a little more expensive, but they'll get on the phone with you. This can be very important, as it's sometimes difficult to interpret the results if you're not a soil geek."

Even if your soil is tainted, the raised-bed method works in a pinch and requires only a couple of feet of soil and some wood.

Although Knutzen and Coyne aren't urban livestock raisers like Carpenter -- they keep four hens for egg-laying purposes -- Knutzen directed me toward the section of the City Municpal Code regarding animals.

This section is vague when it comes to backyard livestock, but the Department of Animal Regulation guidebook's Additional Permit Requirements (dated Aug. 27, 1998) states that rabbits, pheasants, chicken, turkeys, ducks and any other kind of fowl must be kept at least 35 feet away from the next property (and at least 20 feet away from your building).

If your fowl likes to stretch its vocal cords in the early morning -- like, say a rooster -- you're going to have to back that up to a 100-foot distance.

State Senate committee votes against some animal antibiotics

The California Senate Food and Agriculture Committee passed a bill, by a 3-1 vote, to phase out the use of non-therapeutic antibiotics in animals raised for food.

Senate Bill 416, by Senate Majority Leader Dean Florez (D-Shafter), next goes to the Senate Education Committee.

Florez made school meal programs the initial target of the bill, which would forbid schools from serving meat or poultry treated with non-therapeutic antibiotics after Jan. 1, 2012.  By 2015, the ban would apply to all animals raised for human consumption in the state. 
 
“We tell people to take antibiotics only as prescribed for the very reason that they not develop resistance to these drugs they may need when they are truly sick,” Florez said in a statement. “Then we feed those same antibiotics daily to the animals they will consume.”  

Several food producers and organizations opposed the bill. Among objections are that the provisions reduces the illness prevention tools that farmers or ranchers have and that banning non-therapeutic drugs could lead to an increased use of therapeutic antibiotics.
 
Another Florez bill, which would require food growers and processors to promptly report a positive test for any food-borne illness to the California Department of Public Health, also passed the committee Tuesday. Senate Bill 173 would also give state public health authorities the power of mandatory recall.

-- Mary MacVean

Photo: Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times

 

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Want to be a beekeeper? Here's how.

Many thanks to everyone who has written in about Tuesday's urban beekeeping story asking about bees, beekeeping and honey.

If you are interested in getting started as a beekeeper, here are a few resources:

• The Backwards Beekeepers' blog
• Kirk Anderson's website
• Beekeeping resources, including where to get supplies and academic sources

Good luck harvesting bees and discovering the magic of your very own honey.

-- Lori Kozlowski

Photo: Amy Seidenwurm checks on the honeybees that she and her husband, Russell Bates, keep in the backyard of their home in Los Angeles. Credit: Spencer Weiner / Los Angeles Times

Urban beekeepers know it's more than just honey and money

It's an unusual hobby, but backyard beekeepers are working to revive the lost art of apiculture. In a story in L.A. Times, Lori Kozlowski explores the world of urban beekeeping, an especially vital service as colony collapse disorder, a phenomenon in which worker bees abruptly disappear from a hive or colony, continues to strike in Europe and North America.

Kirk Anderson bought his first honeybees from a Montgomery Ward catalog in 1970.

The 3-pound cage came in the mail, and as he opened it and fed the bees sugar water, his lifelong passion with Apis mellifera began.

Nearly 40 years later, Anderson, 61, calls himself an urban beekeeper, and he cares passionately enough about bees that he does house-call rescues throughout Los Angeles County.

Anderson gets 20 calls a week. He fishes the insects out of Jacuzzis, removes them from chimneys and shakes them from trees.

Click here to read the rest of the story on urban beekeeping.

-- Elina Shatkin

Photo: Amy Seidenwurm (pictured) and fellow beekeeper Russell Bates have 50,000 bees in their backyard and helped start a club called Backwards Beekeepers. Credit: Spencer Weiner / Los Angeles Times