wildlife conservation

We're humbled and honored to receive an extraordinary honor from the National Society for the Protection of Endangered Species. Our home, tin box, is now a Certified Jackalope Habitat! Their citation notes, in particular, our "dedication to preserving and maintaining the necessary balance of flora, fauna, and topography to support the life cycle of North America's most elusive mammal species."

While there are a handful of other certified habitats for this rare creature east of the Mississippi River, we are the first to achieve Platinum-level certification. The Society's rating system rewards property owners for installing landscape elements that support the jackalope (Lepus cornutus) throughout its life cycle. Pregnant jackalopes ("jennies") prefer folic acid-rich greens, such as spinach and collards, while juvenile jackalopes ("kits") often gorge themselves on wild berries and carotene-rich root vegetables. Our gardens feature areas dedicated to all of these plant species.

The topography of a jackalope habitat is important, too. This shy creature prefers secluded areas sheltered from predators by fallen logs or naturally occurring warrens. The mountainous landscapes of the American West are more conducive to jackalope life, yet even in South Florida we can support jackalope populations by carefully crafting wildlife habitats using available materials, such as our coral rock boulders and piles of fallen banana leaves.

Announcing tin box's new partnership with IKEA

We are pleased to announce that tin box is now an official supplier to IKEA USA! Starting today, you will be able to purchase our sustainably ranched house rabbits, which IKEA will sell under the name Lïvstök. The rabbits are, of course, raised in a free range environment and fed only organic produce from our own garden. Initially, we are offering rabbits in three color schemes, but we are experimenting with new color combinations as we respond to the ever-changing tastes of the Millennial generation.

Rabbits are the ideal pet for small spaces, such as dormitory rooms, apartments, and your parents' basement. Their vegan diet also aligns nicely with many Millennials' cruelty-free lifestyles.

the garden at mid-winter

The winter solstice is a good time to take stock of the garden at tin box. It's been a weird winter with unusually high amounts of rain (we're still using rain water from the cistern for all our indoor use, about a month later than we could last year) and very hot temperatures (over 80 degrees most days). This has made it difficult to grow cool season vegetables. Nonetheless, we're starting to harvest green beans (left) and tomatoes from volunteers, those self-seeded plants that grow from last year's crops.

garden, giant vine edition

The fence that closes off the back yard gave us an opportunity to plant some vines, of which the most spectacular is the Dutchman's Pipe, or aristolochia, that we planted just beside the side porch, facing the park. There are about 500 species of aristolochia, and we're not quite sure which one this is. The flowers are enormous (well over a foot long), smell intensely like lemon-flavored hard candy, and start out as gigantic hollow buds that resemble partially inflated balloons.

The thing has grown incredibly fast...

garden, leafy green edition

Our goal has been to fill the planting beds with an understory of leafy greens and low-growing vegetables, while creating a canopy of fruit-producing trees above. So far, we've run into two problems with the leafy greens and veggies: bitterness and pests. The lettuces and chards, left, have grown well through the winter, but the lettuce has been very bitter. This is also true of the basil that has grown prolifically around the garden, and which we've used to mitigate the second problem: peafowl. The peacocks and peahens are particularly fond of the tender leaves of seedlings, and they've ravaged our collard greens, broccoli, cauliflower, arugula, mizuna, bok choi and other plants. The basil and lemongrass seem to keep them away, so we've been using these herbs as a kind of bodyguard around other plants.

certified

On Thursday, we received our Florida Water Star and Florida Friendly Landscape certifications from our rater, Lorna Bravo. We earned Florida Water Star's highest certification, Gold, for our water conservation measures, and the Florida Friendly Landscaping certification recognizes our sustainable landscape practices. Lorna, a brilliant sustainable construction consultant and master gardener, guided us through the certification processes, and James Jiler, the landscape designer about whom we've written before, is responsible for creating a native wildlife-sustaining habitat and food forest that does not require irrigation.

wildlife, amphibian edition

Say hello to Bufo marinus, the Cane Toad. This is the big South American native (usually 6 inches from nose to butt) whose appetite for cane beetles led to its introduction in sugar producing regions around the world. Yes, it's the amphibian that's devastating Queensland (the Simpsons even made reference to it in their Australian episode), and yes, the cane toad is poisonous to potential predators, except for possum, possibly. But they seem to really like eating the palmetto bugs (the enormous Florida woods cockroach, Eurycotis floridana), so they're cool with us. And they make a great sound in the evening...

habitat

We have to admit that when we first started talking about making the house a habitat for wildlife, we were thinking roof gardens and native plants. We did not plan on steel walls making a home for critters. Apparently, the local creatures are pretty resilient, and they've adapted quickly to the house. In fact, we've started re-looking at the house with an eye toward eliminating areas that could become wasps' nests or other unwanted habitats.

fenestration, entomology, ornithology

Yesterday, our window installer (Astor Windows) came by to install the last window, which had to be re-fabricated. The fenestration is now complete, except for the garage door, which is due to be installed this week. Once it goes in, we should be able to move quickly with completing the air conditioning system, then get our framing inspection, and then our gypsum wall board, trim and interior doors.

ornithology, again

A peacock in the park next to tin box. Our site visits are getting more colorful.

ornithology, continued

There are some amazing birds around tin box. We're not sure what this creature is. It looks like a cross between a chicken and a vulture. We have no shortage of vultures here. And, apparently, we have chickens, too...

ornithology

Tropical Park isn't a sublime landscape on the scale of New York's Central Park, nor is it a vast constructed wilderness built to contrast against an overly dense metropolis. It is a collection of highly programmed play spaces (baseball, soccer, tennis, boating) interspersed with picnic pavilions and barbeque grills. There's also an equestrian facility. The park is well used, which means it produces a lot of refuse. And in South Florida, trash means vultures.

The huge vulture population in Tropical Park illustrates how even after trash has been thrown "away" it continues to transform our ecology. Nourishing dump buzzards is probably not what William McDonough and Michael Braungart meant when they wrote Cradle to Cradle.

Below, iPhone video of vultures circling over the football field at Tropical Park. Better than flying toasters...

wildlife, crustaceaous edition

Blue Land Crabs live in the moist soil of the mangroves and along the Snapper Creek Canal near our house. They also sometimes show up in the breezeways between the classrooms at our kids’ school. So far, we haven’t spotted any in the immediate vicinity of our house. So far…

More images of crustaceous carnage after the jump.

wildlife

An old photo from the archives for a lazy Sunday: stalking wildlife in the subtropical foliage at Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, one of Miami's real treasures.

a more sustainable alternative to electric-powered paper shredding

We've stopped burning fossil fuels to generate electricity to run the machine that shreds our important documents. Introducing Marco and Polo, the official gerbils of tin box.

grading

Had a site visit today with some of our students from FIU. That's them in the shade, under the avocado tree in the rear yard. The big development at the site is that the contractor graded the lot by spreading out the piles of excavated soil (you might remember the large piles left around the perimeter of the site when they excavated the foundation). The soil is now at the approximate level it will be when the house is complete, which gives us a slightly better sense of how the house will sit on the site when it is complete. For example, we can see the scale and proportions of the courtyard and the patio a little better now (the patio is to the right in this image, under the sapote tree and facing the park across the street.

productive landscapes

The intoxicating, thick scent of rotting mangos in the back yard is triggering more thoughts about food in the domestic landscape. One question we’ve been grappling with at tin box is the extent to which we’ll use fruits, vegetables, herbs and spices in our mix of plant species.

wildlife

Our design for tin box always considered the house and its site as habitat for wildlife. As these photographs from today show, the site is home to numerous species, even during construction. The big polychromatic bugs are Eastern Lubber Grasshoppers. The ones shown here are young nymphs, and they'll grow to the size of your palm. There were scores of them on the fence this morning. Yes, they'll eat our vegetables, but they're just too cool to get rid of.

And they are not alone...