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 Mountain Views NewsSaturday, September 14, 2024

LENNY and LANA

• Siblings, age 1.5
• spayed, vaxxed, 
chipped


Meet LANA and LENNY. 

It is hard to believe 
that these two adorable 
teenaged Lynx Point mixes have been waiting on a 
home since last summer!

Lana and Lenny offer the perfect balance between the 
playfulness and curiosity of kittens and the calm and 
sense of self-preservation of seasoned house cats. 

They aren’t going to climb your curtains or 
inadvertently take a swim in your open toilet, but they 
also aren’t going bask in the sun or lounge on the sofa all day. There is still a lot of running, 
chasing, and wrestling going on, just without all the mayhem and destruction. 

See more of these cuties at https://www.lifelineforpets.org/lenny--lana.html. Can’t adopt 
yet? Please share with anyone you recommend who can!


CHRISTOPHER Nyerges 

[Nyerges is the author of several books including “Self-Sufficient Home” and 
“How to Survive Anywhere.” He also leads wilderness classes every weekend. 
He can be reached at School of Self-Reliance, Box 41834, Eagle Rock, CA 
90041, or www.SchoolofSelf-Reliance.com]


LOCAL BACKYARD “FARMER” PUBLISHES HER 
FIRST BOOK 

Urban farmer Julie Balaa sells unique plants at the local farmers 
market

 

Urban farmer Julie Balaa produced her 
first book, an in-depth guide to being 
prepared for emergencies and life’s crises 
without breaking the budget. Her book, 
“Low Cost Emergency Planning: A Do-
it-Yourself Guide to Family Disaster 
Planning,” (Skyhorse, 2023), covers the 
basics of water and food storage, home 
food production, making things, and 
how to live a more self-reliant life without 
spending an arm and a leg. The book is 
fully illustrated with color photos. The 
actor and environmentalist Ed Begley Jr. 
wrote the optimistic foreword.

She is scheduling book readings, lectures, 
and classes based around her book. 

Balaa lives in Highland Park, where she 
does urban farming. Besides growing 
things in the greenhouse she built, she 
farms the one acre urban sanctuary of the 
non-profit where she works. 

At the Tuesday Highland Park Farmers 
Market, Julie Balaa has been teaching 
her customers how to create sustainable 
gardens in their own yards for several years 
now. Balaa’s booth at the market caught 
my attention because she was selling less-
common foods, and instructing people 
how to grow their own.

At her farmers market booth, she sells New Zealand spinach, lamb’s quarter, California pepper 
seeds, cactus pads, as well as a variety of potted foods, such as purple tree collard, sapote, and ficus 
trees. 

Balaa is always engaged in conversations with customers, explaining that these are all the plants she 
grows and sells can be used to create sustainable gardens. Her book will be one extra tool that her 
customers can use as a guideline to creating their own self-sufficient home.

Her book addresses all the basic needs of any urban or suburban dweller who doesn’t have a lot of 
land, but wants to still be prepared for emergencies and wants to be a bit more self-reliant.

Balaa begins with a chapter on water, and since she’s in the Los Angeles area, she lets readers know 
that only 26% of the water that Los Angelos use is local – all the rest comes to the city via 3 aqueducts 
from sources about 300 miles away. Thus, Balaa encourages her readers to do as she does: conserve 
water, don’t waste water, and lots of grey water recycling. She describes what it takes to collect rain 
water, and how to store water in plastic buckets in case of emergencies.

Next, she explains how to store food, and that you can have some food in your yard if you grow food 
producing trees and vegetables. She discusses even the common wild foods – such as pricky pear 
cactus, lambs quarter, and purslane – which are common and have great nutritional value.

How do you cook when the power goes out? Balas shares some simple methods, including how to 
make a low-cost solar oven. She also addresses the basics of first aid in emergencies, how to create 
a simple backyard “survival camp,” and all the very important economic considerations that are all 
too often ignored in “survival” books.

The book is a pleasure to read, with lots of common sense coming from someone who had to work 
with a limited budget.

When she is selling her products at the local farmers market, one of her popular foods is the prickly 
pear cactus pad, or nopales, which have been used in Mexican cuisine for centuries. She sells the 
pads ready to be cleaned and eaten, as well as the potted pads which can be grown as a border plant. 
The prickly pear cactus has been demonstrated to be effective for treating high cholesterol and type 
2 diabetes, as documented in such books as “Prickly Pear Cactus Medicine” by Ran Knishinsky.

At her table at the Farmers Market, Balaa had a list of all the plants that her clients could grow in 
their yards to create a perennial, sustainable garden for the least amount of work. The list included 
trees, of course, like olives, citrus, and figs, and grape vines, asparagus, onions, Jerusalem artichoke, 
potatoes, tree collards, and, of course, prickly pear cactus.

As part of the permaculture philosophy which 
is embodied in Balaa’s new book, she and her 
family also recycle all of their kitchen and yard 
scraps by composting them into soil, rather 
than just tossing it all into the trash can. “It’s 
very rewarding to do these techniques,” said 
Balaa, “because I feel it’s what we should all be 
doing. Sometimes it’s hard, but it makes you 
feel good for doing it.” She also practices safe 
grey-water recycling, where she sends all her 
kitchen and bath water into the garden.

 

[Her book is available from Amazon. Balaa can 
be reached for consultations, and the hours of 
her nursery, at juliebalaa@gmail.com. 


Pet of the Week

 Meet Lobo, one of the wiggliest dogs around! This 
sweet guy with the always-wagging tail makes fast 
friends with everyone he meets! 

 Lobo is about 1 ½ years old, and full of energy and fun. 
He loves running around the yard and playing, but he 
finds time for snuggling as well. 

Lobo is quite a character- he has so much fun playing 
with his toys that he usually draws a crowd of onlookers. 
He runs full speed after any toy thrown his way, then 
grabs it, rolls onto his back and holds the toy in his 
front paws to give it a good chew. Then he throws it into 
the air and runs after it again. No one has more fun 
than Lobo!

As happy as he is with meeting new people friends, 
Lobo also seems to like doggy friends, too. He loves 
meeting new dogs at the shelter, so he would probably do well with a dog companion. 

Lobo is sure to bring a ton of love and a lot of laughter to his forever home- maybe it’s yours?

The adoption fee for dogs is $150. All dog adoptions include spay or neuter, microchip, and 
age-appropriate vaccines. 

 Walk-in adoptions are available every day from 2:00 – 5:00. For those who prefer, adoption 
appointments are available daily from 10:30 – 1:30, and can be scheduled online. View 
photos of adoptable pets at pasadenahumane.org.

 New adopters will receive a complimentary health-and-wellness exam from VCA Animal 
Hospitals, as well as a goody bag filled with information about how to care for your pet. 

 Pets may not be available for adoption and cannot be held for potential adopters by phone 
calls or email.


HOT TEMPERATURES CAN 
MAKE CONCRETE AND 
ASPHALT TOO HOT FOR 
YOUR DOG’S PAWS. 

Asphalt and concrete 
temperatures can usually be 20-40 degrees hotter than the ambient 
temperature. If the back of your hand can’t stand the heat on the 
concrete or asphalt for 7 seconds, it’s too hot for a walk.

When it's above 90 degrees outside, bring dogs and cats indoors.


Mountain Views News 80 W Sierra Madre Blvd. No. 327 Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024 Office: 626.355.2737 Fax: 626.609.3285 Email: editor@mtnviewsnews.com Website: www.mtnviewsnews.com