summery

I have no plans of updating this blog again, so here is what I hope is a good final post

some key points to growing your own food:
 
trees are way easier than annual crops.

annual crops are needed till your trees reach the size they need to be to give you food

soil bacteria resource share with plant roots
effectively making the area of roots in the plants way bigger
mix organic matter (leaves, straw, wood chips, compost things) in the soil to make the bacteria grow better
even a hoe width strip down your row will do wonders

sunlight makes water evaporate fast, so total ground cover saves you lots of water
I tile the ground to fix this, the tiles don't absorb any water at all and also keep the wind from causing evaporation as well.

saving seeds from one year to the next gets you a local type that will grow much better,
even if you are not picky about what plants you save them from, it still works well

here is how to save your own seeds,
there are many other guides out there, but this is a pretty good one
http://www.howtosaveseeds.com/


get your seeds while you can
here is the post I did about neat seed companies
http://coarsegoldsurvivalgarden.blogspot.com/2013/12/seed-catalogs.html

pay attention to your first and last frost dates,
plant when you should be planting, and never let this slip out of your head

once things are working well, keep working to make sure that it keeps working well.

watering with ground water can cause salt issues in the long run,
use the rain water if you can.

here is a fantastic book on how to keep your garden from running out of key elements
after 100 years it is still a popular and fantastic book
"The farm that won't wear out"
download it free here
archive.org/details/cu31924003695636
read it online here
www.soilandhealth.org/01aglibrary/010134hopkins/010134toc.html
also at amazon
www.amazon.com/Farm-That-WonT-Classic-Reprint/dp/B008LI55IK/

don't bother planting anything that you can't defend (window screen is my new favorite for insects)

there is nothing quite like home grown food

best of wishes and good luck