Blog - Tyrant Farms

Ducks

SECOND interview with Dr. Scott Echols: Duck nutrition & healthcare

Posted on April 13, 2024

This is our second video interview with Dr. M. Scott Echols, DVM, DABVP (Avian Practice). In this conversation, we asked Dr. Echols questions you and other duck-loving followers shared with us on social media.

If you raise ducks, you’re sure to find these questions and expert answers extremely helpful!

Expert duck healthcare advice from one of the world’s top avian vets

In our first interview with Dr. Echols, we took a deep dive into duck nutrition, dietary regimens, and supplements that can help optimize the longterm health and wellbeing of pet and backyard ducks.

For our second interview, we asked our fellow duck lovers on social media (facebook and instagram) what questions THEY wanted to ask Dr. Echols. So in this interview, he answers your questions!

2 Comments

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Melanie
April 23, 2024 at 1:32 pm
Thanks for the second part of this very informative interview! I will probably watch both parts again because they were packed with information. I was wondering about the tomato thing as well. I was always hesitant to feed them because I had heard about the acidity and how it prevents calcium uptake. But now I know that I can give them more often 🙂 Schnatterinchen is absolutely obsessed with them.

After the first Interview, we started to change the commercial feed and feeding routines. Our ducks are so picky…they are not really big fans of the Mazuri, and we are still offering the old (Purina) in addition to the new. But they need to work for it now and do not have it available 24/7 like they had before. We were already feeding greens twice daily. And I have noticed a decline in egg laying, which I am happy about 🙂 I am wondering how you make your ducks broody. Do you have a post about it? I would like to try that.

Anyways, Thanks again for these interviews. Are you planning to continue this series?

Melanie from Ducks of Providence

Reply
Aaron von Frank
April 24, 2024 at 11:44 am
Hi Melanie!

Once ducks acclimate to a certain feed, it can be hard to switch them to something new. Don’t expect them to do so willingly or quickly. Sounds like you’re doing it right by mixing in the old with the new and doing a slow, deliberate transition.

We do have an article about making ducks go broody: https://www.tyrantfarms.com/why-and-how-to-make-a-duck-go-broody/.

We hope to continue this series as we come up with new questions for discussion (or get additional questions from other duck keepers). Unfortunately, each interview is quite expensive for us so we can’t do them too frequently – ha. We certainly don’t expect Dr. Echols to give us an hour of his very busy life for free though. 🙂

So glad to hear you’re finding the information helpful!

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Recipe: Morel mushroom orzo

Posted on March 25, 2024

Morel mushroom orzo is a simple and delicious dish that showcases the wonderful flavor of seasonal morel mushrooms!

A new morel mushroom recipe

This year, after bringing home a nice haul of large, blond morels with our young son, we decided to create a tasty morel mushroom orzo recipe.

Wild child! Our son hovering over a beautiful morel mushroom.

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Gardening In Depth

9 ways to get rid of lawn weeds without chemicals

Posted on March 14, 2024

Trying to find natural ways to maintain an attractive, weed-free lawn without using harmful chemicals? In this article, we’ll detail simple natural methods you can use to manage your weed problem, build healthy soil, and grow healthy grass!

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Gardening

What plants repel mosquitoes? 13 best plants to help!

Posted on March 1, 2024

Can your garden plants really repel mosquitoes?

Short answer: no, your garden plants can not repel mosquitoes from your yard by simply growing there.

Yes, many common garden plants do have mosquito-repellent compounds in them, but they’re not exuding or off-gassing these compounds at high enough concentrations necessary to keep mosquitoes out of the area. The insect-repellent compounds in these plants are present to make them taste unpalatable to insects and other herbivores who try to eat them, not for keeping mosquitoes from flying near.

However, do note that some plant compounds will keep mosquitoes from biting you if you crush and rub the plants on to your skin. Even then, most of the mosquito-repellent botanical compounds in these plants are highly volatile and will wear off within 15-30 minutes, leaving you once again vulnerable to hungry mosquitoes.

You can render some of these botanical compounds more stable by making them into DIY skin sprays and/or salves, but you’ll still likely need to re-apply them more often than standard insect repellents sold at stores which contain long-lasting synthetic chemicals.

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Ducks

Duck nutrition & healthcare: FIRST video interview with Dr. Scott Echols

Posted on February 27, 2024

Video interview 1 of 2 with Dr. M. Scott Echols, DVM, DABVP (Avian Practice). In this conversation, you’ll learn all about duck nutrition and healthcare advice as it relates to backyard and pet ducks.

1. Background

Here’s a bit of relevant background and context before you dive into the video interview:

4 Comments

Reply
Melanie
March 6, 2024 at 2:54 pm
Thanks for this very informative interview! As someone who deeply cares about their ducks as pets, and not for food production, I was wondering about many things that were covered in this interview. Seems like we are doing some things right already like giving them maintenance feed and lots of greens, allowing them to forage in the yard, and giving them access to deep water for them to be able to swim. We even have artificial turf because our surfaces are so hard. We are trying to monitor their weight and got one of these baby scales. I had the suspicion that some of our babies added weight over the winter, but it was all feather fluff 🙂 I am looking forward to part two. Your friends from Ducks of Providence.

Reply
Aaron von Frank
March 7, 2024 at 10:05 am
Glad the information in this interview was helpful for you, Melanie! We’ve had to postpone our second interview with Dr. Echols until next week, but we’re really looking forward to learning more and sharing.

Sounds like we’re in the same boat with you. When we first started raising ducks over a decade ago, our primary aim was egg production – and we knew very little about ducks from the standpoint of physiology. As our goals shifted towards raising them for health and longevity, we had to start from scratch and fundamentally shift our understanding and management approach (and we’re still learning and tweaking!). Unfortunately, all the “how to raise duck” books and websites (other than ours) provides advice solely based on maximum egg production and/or meat production, and that info does not at all apply for people who view their ducks as long-lived pets who sometimes make breakfast. We’re hoping that bringing this information to light (for free) via experts like Dr. Echols will help us and others consider a different management approach AND know how to go about making it happen.

Also, winter duck fluff does indeed make a duck’s hips look a bit chunky – ha!

Reply
Kimberly Hecker
February 29, 2024 at 7:07 am
The ducks chose not to watch with us but they certainly appreciate you sharing this knowledge with their people. Thank you Aaron, Susan and Dr. Echols

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Aaron von Frank
February 29, 2024 at 1:38 pm
You’re very welcome! Hope the information proves helpful for you and your ducks, even if they don’t watch.

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Recipes

Recipe: Rose flower vinegar – a homemade living probiotic

Posted on February 7, 2024

In this article, you’ll discover how to make rose flower vinegar. Unlike most store-bought vinegars, this recipe produces a living vinegar that’s as rich in probiotics as it is in flavor!

What’s does fermented rose flower vinegar taste like? A rich, incredibly nuanced vinegar with subtle rose flower notes; it’s more akin to a white wine vinegar or champagne vinegar than a red wine vinegar. And as we detail below, the longer you allow the vinegar to age and reduce, the better the flavor becomes.

Also, if you’re new to fermentation, don’t fret – this is a VERY simple, “wild” fermentation process that doesn’t require any fancy products, knowledge, or equipment.

Rose flower vinegar is a great way to unlock the culinary potential of roses.

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Ducks Gardening

14 benefits of adding a backyard pond

Posted on February 5, 2024

Are you considering creating a backyard pond and wondering what the benefits of having a small pond are? We built our own DIY backyard pond (which holds about 1,200 gallons of water) over a decade ago, so we can share the unique benefits a beautiful pond has created for our family — and may create for yours, too!

1 Comment

Reply
Debbie Fleischer
February 6, 2024 at 3:03 am
Hi Aaron, The new ducklings and older ducks are all getting along. I meant to update you. Thanks for your advice. I have a huge pond. About 15,000 gallons. The older ducks would neve go in it. The ducklings loved it. Once they were old enough to be alone in the pond they jumped right in. Well Buttercup and Cocoa didn’t like anyone in their pond even if they never went in. First thing I know all the ducks are in the pond. I’m breaking up fights between the old and new ducks. After a few days they all stared getting along. Whew. Long story short, they’re in the pond all day long. They get out in the late afternoon to go to their pen for the night.
I’ve discovered that you can have a pretty pond or a pond with ducks. They ate all my water lilies. Not sure if they’ll grow back in the spring. Flattened all the iris and they keep it well trimmed. Up and down the creek beds and in the biofalls. They’re very happy. Just have to watch that they don’t flatten the liner so I get leaks. Ducklings are just starting to lay eggs. Yay.
I was so surprised to get a black egg from my black duck. I’ve had the pond for 24 years. Love it. We’ll see what happens this summer. I’m used to all the maintenance so it’s no big deal to me. Just part of it. I have huge Koi, but can’t see them because the ducks mix the water up. My pond was originally set up so my labs could go in. It’s pretty well duck proof. My lab does go in and swim with the ducks when she gets hot. Thanks again for all your help with my ducklings.,
Debbie

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Gardening

How to grow Meyer lemons in pots – anywhere!

Posted on January 26, 2024

In this article, you’ll find out how to grow your own organic Meyer lemons in pots in any climate zone!

We live in Greenville, SC (Zone 8a) and have been growing potted Meyer lemons for over a decade. We also grow about a dozen other citrus varieties.

Which citrus variety is our top recommendation for new citrus growers? Meyer lemons.

Reasons: They’re relatively easy to grow in pots, they tolerate cold weather well, and they consistently produce a huge amount of delicious fruit once the trees are over a few years old.

Two potted Meyer lemon trees with ripening fruit in December in front of other potted citrus growing in our driveway. We live in Zone 8a in Greenville, SC. Just because you live in a non-tropical environment doesn’t mean you can’t grow citrus!

4 Comments

Reply
Rebecca Caldwell
April 21, 2024 at 5:44 pm
Excellent article. Is it possible that this article is in a booklet, phamplet form? Would be glad to pay for it as this has so much information that one needs to reference more than once, especially when one is an advanced senior citizen. Have lost 3 Meyer Lemon trees to Texas fluctuating temps–but determined with your instructions to try again. (Moved from Calif where I had over 20 diff varieties of fruit trees). Thank you again. Please let me know.

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Aaron von Frank
April 23, 2024 at 10:29 am
Glad this Meyer lemon article was helpful for you, Rebecca! I emailed a word document version of the article to you this morning. Best of luck growing them in Texas!

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Kate Estes
January 28, 2024 at 1:33 pm
The link to growing citrus from cuttings is broken – I’d love to read the article.

Reply
Aaron von Frank
January 29, 2024 at 12:06 pm
Sorry about that, Kate! Links are fixed. Here is a link to the article about growing citrus from cuttings: https://www.tyrantfarms.com/how-to-grow-citrus-from-cuttings/

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Gardening

Yuzu: a rare citrus you can grow in cool climates!

Posted on November 19, 2023

Looking for a citrus you can grow in-ground in cooler climates? We’d like to introduce you to yuzu fruit — and give you tips and tricks to help you grow your own yuzu!

A quick video introduction to yuzu:

Our citrus obsession

We live in Upstate South Carolina. Until the 2023 USDA hardiness zone update, we were in zone 7b, but we’re now zone 8a. For context, during the winter months, our temperatures regularly drop below freezing.

Nevertheless, we also grow about a dozen varieties of citrus, but we have to grow them in pots. Why?

Our potted citrus plants in November. These wouldn’t be so pretty and productive if we couldn’t move them into protection before freezing weather.

Most citrus isn’t very cold hardy. Thus, we use a pot-moving device lovingly named the Porta-Potter to lug our large potted citrus plants in and out of a heated garage as needed to get it through winter. Are we crazy? Very likely.

But once you taste a fresh organically grown blood orange, kumquat, satsuma, or other citrus you’ve grown yourself, you’ll understand our plight. Plus, our young son LOVES the all-he-can-eat citrus buffet in the driveway.

6 Comments

Reply
Micah North
April 4, 2024 at 9:28 am
I’m looking for frozen yuzu and sudachi juice. Figured I’d ask the community here if they know of any US growers that might be interested in having a chat? Food manufacturing application.

Reply
Aaron von Frank
April 5, 2024 at 10:57 am
Hi Micah! I don’t know of anyone up where we live, but you might want to check with McKenzie Farms, a citrus grower and nursery in Lake City, SC: http://mckenzie-farms.com/contact.htm. I know they grow and sell yuzu. Good luck!

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Trevor Woodhams
March 7, 2024 at 5:14 pm
I ran across your website while searching for yuzu and calamondin recipes. I am in zone 8a in Atlanta. Glad to see you all doing so well with citrus trees so far north of the GA-FL state line! I have 20+ citrus trees (in pots) and had about 25 yuzu in the dwarf tree’s 2nd year. Made a yuzu sherbet am thinking about a limoncello(or yuzucello I guess). I have heard of the Kabusa citrus which reportedly has the same taste as yuzu but much more juice. Can’t find it for sale online though.

As for kumquats, they do really well here: both Meiwa and Calamondin consistently produce over 100 fruit each winter.

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Aaron von Frank
March 8, 2024 at 2:25 pm
Right on! We also have a 10 year old potted kumquat tree (‘Nagami’) that produces loads of fruit each winter. Wish we had even more room so we could grow more citrus.

Reply
Jeffrey Yu Jeffrey
January 11, 2024 at 12:23 am
Hey! I live in Greenville SC as well! That’s super epic, I’ve been looking into Yuzu as a possibility for in ground-growing as well, and super fun to hear that it is 100% feasible, been thinking about kumquats as well, thoughts? (any chance I could get an air layer off the yuzu? lol)

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Aaron von Frank
January 12, 2024 at 2:48 pm
Hi Jeffrey! Neat that we live in the same town. Yep, yuzu grows well here. Ours is about to have another good cold test over the next week with forecast temps dipping into the mid teens. Our tree currently has leaves, but won’t on the other side of those temps. The tips of the branches will likely die back as well. Reach out again in late April once our yuzu has bounced back and I’d be happy to get you a cutting.

As for kumquats, Greenville is still probably too cold — unless you happen to be living in the city (urban heat trap) AND have a particularly warm microclimate such as in front of a sunny, south-facing house. We live out near Furman and it’s always interesting to see how differently plants break dormancy in the spring or experience first frost in the fall relative in the city relative to where we live. We do grow kumquats, but we grow ours in a giant pot so we can move it into a heated garage as-needed to keep it happy and productive.

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Gardening

How to grow ginger anywhere – cool zones, pots, and more!

Posted on November 15, 2023

Ginger (Botanical Name: Zingiber officinale) is one of the world’s most popular culinary and medicinal herbs. In this growing guide, you’ll find out how to grow ginger no matter where you live: warm climates, cool climates, in pots, indoors…

You’ll also discover many unique qualities and health benefits of “baby ginger,” which can be grown much faster than mature ginger! Use the links below to jump right to the specific section you’re interested in or read the whole article.

We've grown ginger for over a decade in our garden and have also grown it commercially. In this guide, we'll share everything we know about growing ginger with you!

We’ve grown ginger for over a decade in our garden and have also grown it commercially for a local farm. In this guide, we’ll share everything we know about growing ginger with you!

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Foraged Recipes

Fluffy acorn flour pancakes

Posted on November 9, 2023

Acorn flour pancakes are a simple and delicious breakfast recipe to help you show off the incredible flavor of cold-leached acorn flour!

Acorn pancakes?

Hopefully, you’ve read our detailed guide or watched our video about how to make high quality, homemade cold-leached acorn flour. If so, maybe you now have a bag of acorn flour that you’re trying to find good recipes for.

In that case, this acorn flour pancake recipe is the perfect way to put your flour to good use for breakfast or brunch!

Acorn flour pancakes – a good simple recipe to show off the unique sweet and nutty flavor of cold-leached acorn flour.

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Foraged Recipes

How to make acorn flour the best way – with video!

Posted on November 8, 2023

We’ve been making and eating acorn flour for over a decade. In this article, we’ll share all of our tips and tricks to help you make your own high quality homemade acorn flour!

white oak acorns ready to be made into acorn flour.

From forest floor to table. Acorns ready to be made into acorn flour.

36 Comments

Reply
Kameela
November 9, 2023 at 7:48 pm
Great Post about acorn flour. You’ve broken down the process into easy to hollow steps. Thank you for sharing. I always wanted to try making it but wasn’t confident enough. Too late now, but I’m motivated to try next year. A propos nothing to fo with acorns but my brother lived in Greenville for a long time.He still has property there and goes back regularly.

Reply
Aaron von Frank
November 9, 2023 at 10:54 pm
Thanks Kameela! Hope you get a chance to make your own acorn flour next year. Neat that your brother has a place here in Greenville. If you happen to be here in the fall, we can point you to some acorn foraging spots where you can fill buckets with giant acorns in no time.

Reply
Jonathan Ives
September 13, 2022 at 10:13 am
Re leaching. I am lucky enough to have a stone mill. Would it be easier/more effective to leach after grinding?

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Aaron von Frank
September 13, 2022 at 10:35 am
Yes, it would be easier to leach the tannins from acorns after grinding them versus leaching tannins from larger nut pieces. However, you’ll then have a different challenge: you’ll need to strain the water without losing the finely ground acorns. Perhaps straining through cheesecloth would be the way to go here. Best of luck!

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Maria Uyehara
October 20, 2021 at 7:37 pm
Help! Just started this process, and was wondering for there are slightly darker brown or gray portions in the acorn meat, is that something one can’t use? And same for acorns that have black sections – do you throw out all the meat from that acorn, or just cut off the black part?

Reply
Aaron von Frank
October 21, 2021 at 3:58 pm
Some spotting and discoloration is to be expected on the exterior surfaces of the raw acorn meat. Oxidation happens. If there are holes where acorn weevil larvae have been at work, we generally discard those acorns. If the nut meat is black, we’d discard those as well. It’s hard to say for certain what your dark brown or gray spots are without seeing them. Feel free to send some pictures to aaron at tyrantfarms dot com (not putting the actual email in to avoid bots/spam emails).

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Krissy
October 27, 2020 at 6:33 pm
Could you provide a bit more detail on the possible contamination you mentioned when doing the cold method and changing the water a minimum of twice a day? I’d like to try this out but want to make sure I don’t do something wrong. Thank you!

Reply
Aaron von Frank
November 4, 2020 at 7:18 am
Hi Krissy! Sorry for delayed response, we’ve been without power or internet since last Thurs due to hurricane damage. The idea is to avoid pathogenic microbes gaining a foothold in your acorns and proliferating. Anaerobic conditions plus a food source for microbes creates the potential to do just that, so changing the water regularly not only provides oxygen but helps flush out potential pathogens. If you’re anxious about cold-leaching your acorns, you may want to go with the hot-leach method instead.
Reply
Neal Pritchard
November 26, 2021 at 9:21 pm
I’ve been using the cold water method decant to drain the water, then triple rinse once per day with giving it a stir a couple of times a day.

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Ryan V. Gagliardo
October 19, 2020 at 12:33 pm
I’ve heard that acorns dried and left in their shells have a longer shelf life. Any idea how much longer than when you dry them out of the shells like you did? With how hard they become once dried I’m inclined to believe they are quite stable even without their shells, especially if kept in an airtight container. Also, by cracking them fresh do you not have a hard time since the shells are still soft and not brittle like they are once dried? Thanks-

Reply
Aaron von Frank
October 21, 2020 at 7:09 am
Hi Ryan! Great questions. We’re in South Carolina, where it’s quite hot and humid. If we’ve had a good bit of rain prior to our acorn foraging, we’ve found that the acorns can and will mold quite easily if left in their shells. As far as storage of in-shell vs out-of-shell acorns goes, we’ve never really experimented either way since we usually process them into flour soon after gathering. If you can dry your acorns for a bit in their shells prior to cracking, that would likely speed up processing by making the shells easier to crack and the nutmeat easier to separate from the testa. We’re inadvertently testing that approach this year since time constraints made it impossible for us to crack all the acorns we gathered. We have the nuts laid out in a single layer underneath a ceiling fan turned on high so hopefully they won’t mold before we’re able to get to them.

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rogersan
April 29, 2020 at 2:03 pm
The Chumash indians would grind the acorns first and then leach the tannins using natural materials to keep it from washing away…you could easily substitute cheese cloth or white cotton sheets/shirt material. I would be inclined to use my sink and just change the water for each flush.

The extra surface area and more exposed parts of the ground nut makes for much faster tannin leaching. Not sure if all of the tribes did something similar or not just learned that when I was a kid growing up.

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Aaron von Frank
April 30, 2020 at 1:22 pm
Interesting, thanks! Problem with that approach for us would be that the raw acorns we use are quite hard. Even our Ninja blender has trouble chopping them. We’d still have to soak them from probably 1-2 weeks before we could grind them into smaller chunks. Perhaps the acorns used by the Chumash were a softer variety that could be more easily ground.

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rogersan
May 1, 2020 at 6:59 am
Well there are a lot of live oaks and they were not too hard. I think it does depend on the tree. There are morteros all over in California if you know where to look…usually old growth oak forests. I am in the south now and there are more of the white and red oaks not the year round live oaks with the real spiky leaves.

Aaron von Frank
May 1, 2020 at 12:02 pm
Really interesting! I’d never heard of morteros before. I grew up finding Native American artifacts in the southeast and remember finding specialized grinding stones at some of the sites where we’d look – but have never seen grinding spots built right into boulders.

We’re in Upstate South Carolina on the outskirts of Greenville. The acorns we like best for making acorn flour are on a friend’s property on Paris Mountain. They’re giant nuts – almost as big as Chinese chestnuts, and they come from a grove of white oak, subspecies unknown. The nut meat is quite hard, however. Frankly, even though the final product isn’t quite as good as cold leaching, hot leaching is the best option since it takes a fraction of the time and uses far less water. With hot leaching you can have a final acorn flour product dried and bagged within 48 hours whereas it takes at least several weeks to cold leach them. (Unless there’s an easy way to grind them down right off the bat, as you say.)
rogersan
May 2, 2020 at 5:47 am
I am definitely going to try the hot leaching technique. I tried to do some acorns a few years back but there were a load of grubs in the bucket and I found it discouraging. If I can fight the squirrels and deer here and get a decent amount that aren’t too grub infested we will see. Thank you for all the great tips!

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Neal
November 26, 2021 at 9:09 pm
I take the dried nuts that I’ve shelled and pass them through a meat grinder. It works like a charm and I wind up with a course grained flour with some pieces that are couscous sized.

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WinterIsComing
October 22, 2019 at 11:06 pm
Hey there,
What temp. do you set your dehydrator for?

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Aaron von Frank
October 23, 2019 at 10:05 am
Sorry for the non-specificity in the article on that point. Whether drying the cracked acorn nuts or dehydrating the acorn mush in the final stages of making acorn flour, we put the dehydrator on ~135F.

Reply
JCaganteuber
October 15, 2019 at 12:00 pm
P.S. my parents would grind the acorns in an old electric coffee grinder.
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JCaganteuber
October 15, 2019 at 12:00 pm
My parents used to hot leach their acorns with boiling water. The only cold leaching I had known about was the natives in the Eastern Sierra Nevada Mountains who used to put acorns in a bag and stick them in swift flowing streams. My parents taught me how, but I never had enough acorns til this year. I’m still in the process of taking the nuts out of the shells, but have quite a lot. I will be getting more, before the winter.

Reply
Aaron von Frank
October 15, 2019 at 12:28 pm
Thanks for sharing! We mention cold leaching acorns in streams in the article – the problem with doing that today is virtually all US waterways are fairly heavily polluted with contaminants that you don’t want your acorns soaking in. If you happen to have a clean, spring-fed creek that’s upstream from any source of contamination, this is a great way to go about cold leaching your acorns. Otherwise, you’ll have to make other plans to cold leach or hot leach indoors.

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JCaganteuber
October 15, 2019 at 2:16 pm
Yeah. It’s sad that streams are so polluted. I’ll do it the way you describe in your article. I’d rather that than boiling out the vitamins.

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Will C.
October 13, 2019 at 10:59 am
Wish a person could buy acorn flour! I’d definitely try to make them in bread if I had some!

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Aaron von Frank
October 14, 2019 at 10:25 am
Us too! As of now, the only way to get high quality acorn flour made in the US is to make it yourself.

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susan von frank
September 4, 2018 at 2:15 pm
Hi Lindsey! This is Susan @ Tyrant Farms. There shouldn’t be nearly that high a percentage of bad acorns, so we’re wondering if either: a) the ones you picked were just really old, or b) you stumbled on an oak/acorn variety that has an air pocket between the shell and nut meat that would cause them to float. It’s probably worth cracking a couple of your “floaters” open to see just in case? The good ones won’t have any weevil damage inside and will look like whole, solid nuts.
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GB
May 2, 2017 at 4:39 am
Interesting but it did not tell how to make acorn flour or have recipes for it as the title says.

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Aaron von Frank
May 3, 2017 at 10:49 am
GB: there are three tabs at the top of the article: The Acorn Story | How to Prepare Acorns | Acorn Recipes. You have to click the How to Prepare Acorns tab to see how to make them into flour, and the Acorn Recipes tab to see recipes.

Reply
GB
May 3, 2017 at 4:10 pm
Thank you.

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Lissa
December 21, 2016 at 12:55 pm
Thank you for this insightful knowledge on the white oak tree! We have two in our back yard, and enjoy collecting their acorns each fall. I am so fascinated with these beauties, like an instinctive ancestral memory is sparked forth at the sight of them 🙂 I will be trying for acorn flour next season.

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Aaron von Frank
December 21, 2016 at 1:54 pm
Glad to hear you’ll be giving acorn flour a try, Lissa! Best of luck and let us know how it turns out.

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Lauren Anderson
October 5, 2016 at 3:07 pm
thanks for this great overview! i collected a bunch of acorns (before the snow falls) but don’t have a free weekend yet to process them. can i dry them in a dehydrator before processing them in the winter? how long (and at what temp) should i dehydrate them?

Reply
Aaron
October 20, 2016 at 4:45 pm
Sorry we missed your question, Lauren! Yes, you can dehydrate them. Apparently, many Native American people would dry store acorns to make sure there would be plenty in the event of an off year. This response is probably too late to do you much good, but you can dehydrate your acorns. If you leave the shells on, dehydrate them at a higher temp setting on your dehydrator and keep them going for 2-3 days. If the shells are off, you could probably get away with 24-36 hours in the dehydrator.
Reply
Aaron von Frank
December 21, 2016 at 1:56 pm
Sorry we missed your question, Lauren. Our comment system has been a little nutty (pun intended). Yes, you can dehydrate acorns. Apparently, Native Americans would often dry store acorns to make sure there would be plenty in the event of an off year. This response is probably too late to do you much good, but you can dehydrate your acorns. If you leave the shells on, dehydrate them at a higher temp setting on your dehydrator and keep them going for 2-3 days. If the shells are off, you could probably get away with 24-36 hours in the dehydrator.

Reply
Stephen Dekastle
October 13, 2014 at 11:39 pm
Have already made about a Kilo of acorn flour, wonderful! Made delicious cookies for Thanksgiving, everyone was a fan. It is even tasty sprinkled in granola with milk, just like you would use flax meal. Excited to try more ways of cooking and using this amazing resource. Thank you for this guide. I will be trying cold leaching to see how much of a difference with taste and consistency it gives. Great site here! I live in BC near the coast, and am enjoying reading about your farm.
Happy Foraging!
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How to Grow & Eat King Stropharia: The Gardener's Mushroom - Tyrant Farms
April 30, 2013 at 2:08 pm
[…] which delicious, whole foods are produced. From our majestic white oak trees and their rich, sweet acorn flour to our edible “weeds” such as dandelions and sheep sorrel, all eight layers in our […]

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Recipes

Guava quick bread with macadamia nuts & whole wheat pastry flour

Posted on November 6, 2023

This guava quick bread has an exotic, tropical flavor thanks to guava fruit puree, cardamom, and nutmeg. It’s also made with organic whole wheat PASTRY flour rather than refined/white flour. Read on to find out how to make your own!

Guava quick bread with macadamia nuts – a delicious recipe you can make from any variety of guava!

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Gardening

Deer-resistant plant guide: edibles, ornamentals, and natives!

Posted on November 1, 2023

Want to create a deer-proof garden? Utilizing deer-resistant plants can help! In this guide, you’ll find out which edible, ornamental, and native plants deer don’t like.

In our article Dad’s trick: how to keep deer out of your garden or yard, we detail a trick my dad taught us to effectively keep local whitetail deer populations out of our garden beds, plus six other tips you can use to keep deer from destroying your plants.

One of the six additional tips is using deer-resistant plants, which is the subject of this article.

2 Comments

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Garden Gal
November 4, 2023 at 10:59 am
Thank you for this article and “Dad’s Trick”. I have read several of your articles and find them really good. They’re very readable, clear, smart, helpful and not riddled with filler. Though I’ve read many gardening articles for ideas and problem solving, I find your articles reflect that you give the topic considerable thought, spend time organizing the information and craft it into an informative but fun read. Thanks, again and continued happy gardening!

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Aaron von Frank
November 5, 2023 at 9:28 pm
Thanks so much for your kind words! A lot of effort goes into creating our articles, so it’s nice reading your affirmations.

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Recipes

Chestnut and shiitake mushroom soup

Posted on October 24, 2023

Chestnut and shiitake mushroom soup is a delicious seasonal dish you’ll love! It’s loaded with nutrition and features flavor combinations that are to die for: sweet, nutty chestnuts and earthy, umami shiitake mushrooms.