a small swath of a large-ish planting of high-oil sunflowers suitable for use in the production of biodiesel. the field is owned by cropp ( organic valley ) which happens to own organic logistics which hauls organic products on trucks that run on, you guessed it, biodiesel.

this is an experimental crop to help quantify biodiesel yields from this particular high-oil variety of sunflowers.

update – sources in the know have told me that cropp ( organic valley ) planted 27,000 flowers per acre over 14 acres or 374,000 sunflowers! as indicated it’s a high-oil "industrial" variety which is certified organic.

phew. the habaneros aren’t quite ready for harvest, but the cayenne peppers are ripe for picking and, whoooweee, they are hot!

there’s plent-o 8-methyl-N-vanillyl-6-nonenamide in them thar peppers.

an odin original photograph taken while spinning in circles in his swing as he practiced saying the phrase, "iiiiiiii’mmmmm going to tooooooss my coooooookies!" ( much laughter ensued )

odin has become quite the storyteller and it’s not uncommon to find him telling himself elaborate tales while pretending to be reading a book.

if you ask him about particularly fantastical plot points in his tales, he’ll tell you matter-of-factly that it’s possible in his "imaaaaaaginaaaaaaation".

i can’t imagine where he picked up his storytelling skills 🙂

like their bee brothers and sisters around the world, our local, organic bees are thriving while much of the rest of the population is suffering from colony collapse disorder.

i’ve heard more than one local bee keeper theorize that the culprit is high fructose corn syrup produced from genetically modified corn containing bacillus thuringiensis, but apparently the data doesn’t fully support that conclusion.

whatever the reason, we’re thankful to have what seems to be a nearly unlimited supply of yummy raw honey fit for a pooh.