homesteading tends to homesteading tends to be very hard on a person, not hard emotionally, but hard physically. I have always said that if your homesteading properly you're going to be working every moment you can. If you're feeling well enough and the weather Isn't So harsh it destroys you, you should be out working. That has been reinforced by recent events when I snapped a rib yesterday. Thankfully my point of view on working paid off. I got several key things done the day before. When I finally got good weather, I worked when I could. And now I can't do much of anything. The internet claims it's a 6 week recovery time, but somewhere near the end of day two I can actually walk around without horrible pain. My advice is to work when you can. and set things up so you don't have to work if you're broken.
Looking at history, there was someone that was interested as to why people in North America had pretty much everything they wanted, this was not the case in England. So they ventured out for a trip trying to figure out why this was happening. When they finally viewed it firsthand, they were really surprised that people in North America worked from sunrise to sunset. The people in England didn't do this. If you you want something, you probably have to work for it. Broken ribs aside, work as much as you can, it's about the only way if you're trying to actually Farm.
Monday, September 9, 2019
Sunday, July 7, 2019
Drying Rack
Lots of people need to use food dehydrators if they are dry foods.
You need about 100F, 15% humidity, and light wind. Thankfully that is my outside weather in the summer, so all I needed was a safe clean place to dry things.
So I built a drying rack with a wood frame. Aluminum window screen was stapled on each half.
it is hinged in the back, closes tight enough to keep mice and bugs out.
The legs keep it off the ground for good air flow.
Today I filled it with peppermint
the last batch took less than a day to get the leaves paper dry, it filled up a 5 gallon bucket when it was dry.
This time I am going to let it dry in the shade and not in the sun. I think it might end up being better mint tea that way, but I will not know that for a while.
the harvest has left the mint plot looking rather thin,
but it starts to look rather poor every summer when it gets hot enough to kill off the sugar peas.
You need about 100F, 15% humidity, and light wind. Thankfully that is my outside weather in the summer, so all I needed was a safe clean place to dry things.
So I built a drying rack with a wood frame. Aluminum window screen was stapled on each half.
The legs keep it off the ground for good air flow.
Today I filled it with peppermint
This time I am going to let it dry in the shade and not in the sun. I think it might end up being better mint tea that way, but I will not know that for a while.
the harvest has left the mint plot looking rather thin,
Sunday, January 25, 2015
how to get your first year garden to harvest
How to make sure that you get a harvest from your garden, just print this one out
many people fail the first 2 to 3 years of growing a garden,
others do well the first year but fail after that,
here are my ideas of how not to fail when you really need your garden
There are lots of things that will eat your garden. Insects, bacteria, fungus, squirrels, birds, and other humans are your biggest worry.
Watering things wrong can take out your garden, so can the weather, lack of water, to much water, and many other things.
Your job as a gardener is to keep the plants happy and safe, and this turns out to be quite a task.
Insects
The biggest threat are insects that keep the seeds from turning into plants.
I have many plants not even get to one inch tall.
The insect amounts changes from one area to the next, and often year to year.
In the Sierra foot hills it dries out in the summer, if you are watering anything at all, all the insects descend upon the plants, this happens at the end of spring when you are likely planting all the frost free plants,
corn, beans, and squash usually sprout fast enough to not have this issue,
but pretty much everything else needs protection.
To avoid this problem the commercial growers will start plants inside and then transplant them all outside,
so a screened in area is a great idea to have if you have this issue.
If you have a long enough growing season, just wait till everything drys up and the insects are gone, and then plant.
Nets can keep birds from eating things like grapes, but don't put the nets up to early or the insects can get out of hand.Other insects later in the season usually need to be hunted.
Feeding birds in your garden (like growing a few sunflowers) can get the birds to hunt for you.
The tomato worms are best hunted by people. they hide well. you can spot the leaf damage to see that they are on the plants.
Having a cat can solve the squirrel issue, but I have seen people fence in the sides and top of a garden to keep them out. you can't have any gaps at all or they will get in.
Birds will eat small plants entirely. Trash (like last years plant remnants, leaves, straw, and other things will make it harder for the birds to find your newly planted seeds.
You can just stay out in the garden for a week and keep them away if you feel like it.
Bad weather can be hard to deal with.
Wind can dry up and kill plants fast. Run your rows at 90 degrees to where the wind usually passes by and that will slow down the wind some.
A solid fence can slow down the wind, so can putting your garden on the other side of your house from where the wind comes from.
If a plant can't take frost, and you are likely to have frost, then water them first. Water is harder to freeze than air or dirt.If they do frost, you can sometimes water the top of the plants before it warms up with the morning sun and that can save them.It works for vegetables at least and is worth trying if you need to.
The biggest way to keep frost from plants is to plant them at the correct time of year.
The other thing to do, if you might get frost, is to plant things that can take frost. Beets, turnips, parsnips, peas, wheat, potatoes just resprout from the roots.
There are plants that can take frost and extreme summer heat, but there are not that many. Parsnip is one of them and bugs don't really eat them either.
There is not much to do with low humidity and high heat other than to plant things that can take it,
corn can take any heat I have ever seen, some squash plants and there are others. test things if you can.
setting up the ground to hold more water can help to some degree.
gophers can be a total pain, they have been known to climb into a pot or a raised bed that you have screened in the bottom of (they are easy to catch in a pot, but be careful as they bite)
gophers would rather be eating the weeds, but at least here in the summer there are no weeds, and just watering a plot for the gophers would take more water than most gardens, the only way to get them on a large scale is the metal snap traps that kill them, your cats will love the fresh meat if you have any, and if not you might like it after you cook them up.
be sure to use a chain and stake to keep the traps from vanishing, the cats and other animals will take the gopher trap and all, and you will never see the trap again.
never touch your traps, the gophers can smell you on them and you will catch nothing, so use gloves or rub your hands in the dirt lots before you touch them if you till your garden they will all run away, so all you have to do is trap the edges, trap crops on the edges can help you not loose the plants you care about, use bitter things like dill or mint to make the gophers think there is nothing worth eating inside, but either way you need about 10 foot of boarder and watch for the dead or missing plants to know where to start digging to set the traps, I will use a metal rod shoved in the ground, by the pressure you feel you can tell if it is solid dirt or a gopher tunnel, if a gopher sees the outside, it will just fill in the tunnel without getting trapped, so make sure you block off view, you can do this a few ways, I usually just clear the hole with a matching size trowel and stick the trap quite far down the gopher hole, then blocking the view with cardboard that I never touch or bring inside.
good luck, you will need it.
most animals can be kept out from your garden with a good fence, so at least start there, humans end up taking a fair amount of your food if you are in the wrong place, you should think about how you want to deal with this.
the idea that you can just grow 5 times as much food as you need to deal wtih other things eating is is just wrong, I have tried.
happy plants tend to fight things off better,
half of a plant is in the air and half is in the dirt where you can't see it,
not much you can do about the air other than give your plants proper sun (calories are not grown in the shade), but you can set up the soil quite easy and it is likely the more critical half, and this makes a huge change in the plants
so how do you fix messed up soil ?
easiest way is to get it to hold more water, and make more soil bacteria,
the water is easy for people to understand,
but the bacteria is less easy,
bacteria resource share with the roots of the plants, so this makes the available nutrients of the plants way way more,
the easy way to get all this going is to mix organic matter into the dirt, a mix of leaves, straw, wood chips, and charcoal is ideal, just till it into the soil, even a hoe width wide down your row will help huge amounts,
I try for about 4 inches of each on top of the soil, and till in each one at a time with the first tilling being done with just the dirt there, this works great on regular vegetables, but don't do anything like this to a tree as it would keep it's roots from going down and finding the water table
you can over water or under water many plants,
one of the ways that you can tell how well your water is getting into the ground is to water a spot of example dirt and then dig it up to see how deep the water got
you can see wilting leaves and lots of other things,
remember to change under watering by watering enough, if you have been over watering something, the last thing to do is to stop watering it, it is a sure way to kill it, try going for the correct amount, or cutting what you are doing in half, or some other thing, but taking a plant stressed in one direction and giving it the other is just going to make things worse
raised beds drain water better than flat ground,
sunken beds hold water better,
apply what you need to where you live.
(flat ground works just fine for me, and many others)
biggest thing at all is once you get your garden working well,
spend your time making sure that it continues to work well and figuring out what you did correct in the first place
many people fail the first 2 to 3 years of growing a garden,
others do well the first year but fail after that,
here are my ideas of how not to fail when you really need your garden
There are lots of things that will eat your garden. Insects, bacteria, fungus, squirrels, birds, and other humans are your biggest worry.
Watering things wrong can take out your garden, so can the weather, lack of water, to much water, and many other things.
Your job as a gardener is to keep the plants happy and safe, and this turns out to be quite a task.
Insects
The biggest threat are insects that keep the seeds from turning into plants.
I have many plants not even get to one inch tall.
The insect amounts changes from one area to the next, and often year to year.
In the Sierra foot hills it dries out in the summer, if you are watering anything at all, all the insects descend upon the plants, this happens at the end of spring when you are likely planting all the frost free plants,
corn, beans, and squash usually sprout fast enough to not have this issue,
but pretty much everything else needs protection.
To avoid this problem the commercial growers will start plants inside and then transplant them all outside,
so a screened in area is a great idea to have if you have this issue.
If you have a long enough growing season, just wait till everything drys up and the insects are gone, and then plant.
Nets can keep birds from eating things like grapes, but don't put the nets up to early or the insects can get out of hand.Other insects later in the season usually need to be hunted.
Feeding birds in your garden (like growing a few sunflowers) can get the birds to hunt for you.
The tomato worms are best hunted by people. they hide well. you can spot the leaf damage to see that they are on the plants.
Having a cat can solve the squirrel issue, but I have seen people fence in the sides and top of a garden to keep them out. you can't have any gaps at all or they will get in.
Birds will eat small plants entirely. Trash (like last years plant remnants, leaves, straw, and other things will make it harder for the birds to find your newly planted seeds.
You can just stay out in the garden for a week and keep them away if you feel like it.
Bad weather can be hard to deal with.
Wind can dry up and kill plants fast. Run your rows at 90 degrees to where the wind usually passes by and that will slow down the wind some.
A solid fence can slow down the wind, so can putting your garden on the other side of your house from where the wind comes from.
If a plant can't take frost, and you are likely to have frost, then water them first. Water is harder to freeze than air or dirt.If they do frost, you can sometimes water the top of the plants before it warms up with the morning sun and that can save them.It works for vegetables at least and is worth trying if you need to.
The biggest way to keep frost from plants is to plant them at the correct time of year.
The other thing to do, if you might get frost, is to plant things that can take frost. Beets, turnips, parsnips, peas, wheat, potatoes just resprout from the roots.
There are plants that can take frost and extreme summer heat, but there are not that many. Parsnip is one of them and bugs don't really eat them either.
There is not much to do with low humidity and high heat other than to plant things that can take it,
corn can take any heat I have ever seen, some squash plants and there are others. test things if you can.
setting up the ground to hold more water can help to some degree.
gophers can be a total pain, they have been known to climb into a pot or a raised bed that you have screened in the bottom of (they are easy to catch in a pot, but be careful as they bite)
gophers would rather be eating the weeds, but at least here in the summer there are no weeds, and just watering a plot for the gophers would take more water than most gardens, the only way to get them on a large scale is the metal snap traps that kill them, your cats will love the fresh meat if you have any, and if not you might like it after you cook them up.
be sure to use a chain and stake to keep the traps from vanishing, the cats and other animals will take the gopher trap and all, and you will never see the trap again.
never touch your traps, the gophers can smell you on them and you will catch nothing, so use gloves or rub your hands in the dirt lots before you touch them if you till your garden they will all run away, so all you have to do is trap the edges, trap crops on the edges can help you not loose the plants you care about, use bitter things like dill or mint to make the gophers think there is nothing worth eating inside, but either way you need about 10 foot of boarder and watch for the dead or missing plants to know where to start digging to set the traps, I will use a metal rod shoved in the ground, by the pressure you feel you can tell if it is solid dirt or a gopher tunnel, if a gopher sees the outside, it will just fill in the tunnel without getting trapped, so make sure you block off view, you can do this a few ways, I usually just clear the hole with a matching size trowel and stick the trap quite far down the gopher hole, then blocking the view with cardboard that I never touch or bring inside.
good luck, you will need it.
most animals can be kept out from your garden with a good fence, so at least start there, humans end up taking a fair amount of your food if you are in the wrong place, you should think about how you want to deal with this.
the idea that you can just grow 5 times as much food as you need to deal wtih other things eating is is just wrong, I have tried.
happy plants tend to fight things off better,
half of a plant is in the air and half is in the dirt where you can't see it,
not much you can do about the air other than give your plants proper sun (calories are not grown in the shade), but you can set up the soil quite easy and it is likely the more critical half, and this makes a huge change in the plants
so how do you fix messed up soil ?
easiest way is to get it to hold more water, and make more soil bacteria,
the water is easy for people to understand,
but the bacteria is less easy,
bacteria resource share with the roots of the plants, so this makes the available nutrients of the plants way way more,
the easy way to get all this going is to mix organic matter into the dirt, a mix of leaves, straw, wood chips, and charcoal is ideal, just till it into the soil, even a hoe width wide down your row will help huge amounts,
I try for about 4 inches of each on top of the soil, and till in each one at a time with the first tilling being done with just the dirt there, this works great on regular vegetables, but don't do anything like this to a tree as it would keep it's roots from going down and finding the water table
you can over water or under water many plants,
one of the ways that you can tell how well your water is getting into the ground is to water a spot of example dirt and then dig it up to see how deep the water got
you can see wilting leaves and lots of other things,
remember to change under watering by watering enough, if you have been over watering something, the last thing to do is to stop watering it, it is a sure way to kill it, try going for the correct amount, or cutting what you are doing in half, or some other thing, but taking a plant stressed in one direction and giving it the other is just going to make things worse
raised beds drain water better than flat ground,
sunken beds hold water better,
apply what you need to where you live.
(flat ground works just fine for me, and many others)
biggest thing at all is once you get your garden working well,
spend your time making sure that it continues to work well and figuring out what you did correct in the first place
Tuesday, October 7, 2014
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
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
Friday, October 3, 2014
why
I really started trying to figure out survival gardening fora few reasons,
this sort of info use to be very common
so lots of people could go do it, and that is mostly lost now,
and if needed again, almost no one knows anymore
the other reason is that I wanted to help my good friends through any hard times that may show up,
there are a few fantastic people I have met in life,
and I have lost one of them,
I am quite sad
if you ever for one moment think that life is fair,
think again, it is just not true,
I need a new direction in life,
might take a while
this sort of info use to be very common
so lots of people could go do it, and that is mostly lost now,
and if needed again, almost no one knows anymore
the other reason is that I wanted to help my good friends through any hard times that may show up,
there are a few fantastic people I have met in life,
and I have lost one of them,
I am quite sad
if you ever for one moment think that life is fair,
think again, it is just not true,
I need a new direction in life,
might take a while
Saturday, September 27, 2014
rain
it actually rained here today,
like real rain, hours and hours of it, the kind that will keep the ground wet for days, and will help the trees,
I got a day off from watering,
there was snow 3 thousand feet higher than me...
it sure is an early winter like I thought,
they predict that summer will return in a week from now,
not sure about that, but
time tells all.
like real rain, hours and hours of it, the kind that will keep the ground wet for days, and will help the trees,
I got a day off from watering,
there was snow 3 thousand feet higher than me...
it sure is an early winter like I thought,
they predict that summer will return in a week from now,
not sure about that, but
time tells all.
Wednesday, September 24, 2014
daily plans
so I woke up this morning with plans,
the chard seeds have been harvested quite a while ago,
and it is past time to put them all into canning jars and remove the air for long term storage,
later in the day I got out the friction threshing hardware and threshed the sorghum seeds,
it is just amazingly quick, (by the way, when cutting grain heads, leave a longer stem as a handle than I did in the picture)
you don't need fancy hardware to process grain seeds for a family scale operation,
then I kind of winnowed and put the seeds in a jar and took all the air out
all packed and set and stored for the 2015 garden (this is not even all the grain from only 4 plants)
then I walked into the kitchen and spotted the bag with the chard seeds...
the chard seeds have been harvested quite a while ago,
and it is past time to put them all into canning jars and remove the air for long term storage,
later in the day I got out the friction threshing hardware and threshed the sorghum seeds,
you don't need fancy hardware to process grain seeds for a family scale operation,
then I kind of winnowed and put the seeds in a jar and took all the air out
then I walked into the kitchen and spotted the bag with the chard seeds...
Monday, September 22, 2014
fire
5 new fires for today,
it is kind of like living in hell this summer,
one of my friends keep telling me to move to the USA...
I really hope it all ends with winter
fires are very bad for gardens.
ever wonder what a sweet potato flower looks like,
wonder no more
that has to be one happy sweet potato as they don't flower so often
it is kind of like living in hell this summer,
one of my friends keep telling me to move to the USA...
I really hope it all ends with winter
fires are very bad for gardens.
ever wonder what a sweet potato flower looks like,
wonder no more
Saturday, September 20, 2014
rain
it rained today,
and not just 5 min.
it was for a while,
the air was damp a few days ago,
it feels like fall in the air,
the polar vortex in the southern hemisphere is starting to decay yesterday,
it will be shifting back to the north soon,
so it should only be a few weeks till fall, and no more than a few months before it shifts entirely
I was really not ready for summer to leave before,
but I am ready now,
the rain was nice,
it is time,
and not just 5 min.
it was for a while,
the air was damp a few days ago,
it feels like fall in the air,
the polar vortex in the southern hemisphere is starting to decay yesterday,
it will be shifting back to the north soon,
so it should only be a few weeks till fall, and no more than a few months before it shifts entirely
I was really not ready for summer to leave before,
but I am ready now,
the rain was nice,
it is time,
Monday, September 15, 2014
summer of fire
yet another big fire today, 10 buildings lost and 300 acres so far,
I will remember this summer as the summer of fire and smoke,
summer was going away earlier,
and I was sad to see it go,
but it came back,
many days over 100F lately,
and daily humidity is in the 15% range,
the smoke of this summer also came back,
it is odd to have the sun low in the sky and still have it hot,
it is a unique thing to have happen, and
it is clear by watching the plants that most need the light and not the heat of summer,
so now thinking of using mirrors to get plants to grow better in the winter here.
I know that many places are getting an early harsh winter,
hope you are ready, and good luck.
I will remember this summer as the summer of fire and smoke,
summer was going away earlier,
and I was sad to see it go,
but it came back,
many days over 100F lately,
and daily humidity is in the 15% range,
the smoke of this summer also came back,
it is odd to have the sun low in the sky and still have it hot,
it is a unique thing to have happen, and
it is clear by watching the plants that most need the light and not the heat of summer,
so now thinking of using mirrors to get plants to grow better in the winter here.
I know that many places are getting an early harsh winter,
hope you are ready, and good luck.
Sunday, September 14, 2014
cold weather growing
quite a few places in the USA did not get a proper summer this year,
and now it is already winter there,
it appears to me to be the new weather from at least a mini ice age
the food supply is the big issue when that happens,
and you can grow food if you know what to grow,
so let's assume that is happening for the moment,
so how do we get ready ?
the new weather requires something that is frost tolerant, and can deal with low CO2 levels,
many current crops are already having issues from low CO2, just wait till the levels start dropping and see what happens,
there are 3 kinds of plants as far as dealing with CO2
they are called C3, C4, and CAM
C3 are most plants out there, and 160 PPM CO2 is the lower limit where they will just stop growing, this is all the wheat, oats, trees, ect...
C4 plants will collect the CO2 and can deal with quite low levels, corn and sorghum are the big ones here, but they can't take frost,
CAM plants are some cactus, they gather CO2 at night and photosynthesize in the day, pineapple and agave are pretty much the only foods this applies to
went and looked for any plants that are a C4 type that can take frost, turns out there is one groop, it is the brassica family
so that is cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, rutabaga, turnips, kohlrabi, bok choy, ect...
now lets go look at the diet of people in the mini ice age,
and it turns out to be lots of brassica plants...
no mystery why anymore
I suggest getting seeds for them.
potatoes and wheat will also end up doing pretty well for the first few hundred years before the CO2 drops to far
and now it is already winter there,
it appears to me to be the new weather from at least a mini ice age
the food supply is the big issue when that happens,
and you can grow food if you know what to grow,
so let's assume that is happening for the moment,
so how do we get ready ?
the new weather requires something that is frost tolerant, and can deal with low CO2 levels,
many current crops are already having issues from low CO2, just wait till the levels start dropping and see what happens,
there are 3 kinds of plants as far as dealing with CO2
they are called C3, C4, and CAM
C3 are most plants out there, and 160 PPM CO2 is the lower limit where they will just stop growing, this is all the wheat, oats, trees, ect...
C4 plants will collect the CO2 and can deal with quite low levels, corn and sorghum are the big ones here, but they can't take frost,
CAM plants are some cactus, they gather CO2 at night and photosynthesize in the day, pineapple and agave are pretty much the only foods this applies to
went and looked for any plants that are a C4 type that can take frost, turns out there is one groop, it is the brassica family
so that is cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, rutabaga, turnips, kohlrabi, bok choy, ect...
now lets go look at the diet of people in the mini ice age,
and it turns out to be lots of brassica plants...
no mystery why anymore
I suggest getting seeds for them.
potatoes and wheat will also end up doing pretty well for the first few hundred years before the CO2 drops to far
Sunday, September 7, 2014
evaporation
I had read that it is sunlight on water that makes the most evaporation,
and the wind second,
I decided that this needed tested,
so with the last rain I filled some 5 gallon buckets,
one of them I left outside in the shade,
nothing more than that,
just a 5 gallon bucket outside in the shade with no lid on it,
today is the day it finally was dry,
so that is about 12 or so inches of evaporation from the last rain in spring,
now the water I had in the 5 gallon bucket that I planted the rice in would loose an inch of water a day
and that was before the rice started growing, so it was nothing to do with the rice taking up water,
so the lesson here is that sunlight really really speeds up evaporation,
if I put the fish pond in the shade and have it 3 foot deep or more,
they will be just fine with only filling with rain water when it rains in the winter
and the wind second,
I decided that this needed tested,
so with the last rain I filled some 5 gallon buckets,
one of them I left outside in the shade,
nothing more than that,
just a 5 gallon bucket outside in the shade with no lid on it,
today is the day it finally was dry,
so that is about 12 or so inches of evaporation from the last rain in spring,
now the water I had in the 5 gallon bucket that I planted the rice in would loose an inch of water a day
and that was before the rice started growing, so it was nothing to do with the rice taking up water,
so the lesson here is that sunlight really really speeds up evaporation,
if I put the fish pond in the shade and have it 3 foot deep or more,
they will be just fine with only filling with rain water when it rains in the winter
Monday, September 1, 2014
cucumber seeds
so it is time to harvest cucumber seeds !
they are not that hard to get,
have to let the cucumbers ripen on the vine,
that will take longer, and they tend to get yellow, big, hard, and might even be rotting a bit (that will not hurt things)
how many should you save seeds from ?
for inbreeding depression reasons, the reccomented number is at least 6
read here for details
here are some ripe cucumbers (ignore the small round yellow tomatillos also in the picture)
now you open one and strip out the seeds with all the slime in the middle
then you do it to all of them
then you go wash your hands and add your cucumber outsides to the compost, but you could eat them if you wanted to, but they are a bit out of there prime
now you wait, stirring each day (or more often),
here is day one
here is day two
the seeds are still all mixed in with the gel coating on each seed,
but a fungus is at work, just stir the mold down in when you spot it on the top
here is day 3
many of the good seeds have sunk to the bottom, and the no good ones are rising,
one more good stir and let settle and all looks good at the end of day 3, if you leave it past day 4 you might get sprouting or death in the seeds, so don't leave them to long.
so I pull out the gunk at the top, I could have poured it off, but that mixes the seeds to much for me,
next time I will be floating the gunk on the top off by adding water slowly
then wash the seeds with clear water,
I use a wire screen strainer
and let dry,
and you are all set for spring and sharing some seeds through the winter
they are not that hard to get,
have to let the cucumbers ripen on the vine,
that will take longer, and they tend to get yellow, big, hard, and might even be rotting a bit (that will not hurt things)
how many should you save seeds from ?
for inbreeding depression reasons, the reccomented number is at least 6
read here for details
here are some ripe cucumbers (ignore the small round yellow tomatillos also in the picture)
here is day one
but a fungus is at work, just stir the mold down in when you spot it on the top
here is day 3
one more good stir and let settle and all looks good at the end of day 3, if you leave it past day 4 you might get sprouting or death in the seeds, so don't leave them to long.
next time I will be floating the gunk on the top off by adding water slowly
then wash the seeds with clear water,
I use a wire screen strainer
and let dry,
and you are all set for spring and sharing some seeds through the winter
Friday, August 29, 2014
deer
the deer keeps eating everything,
I allowed the fence project that should have taken 2 days to be in the control of someone else,
and it has been most of the summer now,
so much of the garden is gone now I wonder if I should even bother watering it anymore,
I am kind of happy the deer is getting food,
but going to so very much work to just feed the deer is not worth it at all,
even if I was going to eat the deer it was just to much work,
the sorghum grain heads were ripening from the outside in,
and were close to being done, but not totally done,
I am sure they are good enough to sprout next year so I am not that worried,
either way I just picked them all before the deer figured out what they were,
the deer ate half of a rather large pumpkin,
the next day it finished that one and started on the next,
and already finished off several water melons,
it seems to love eating the sweet potato leaves,
ate about half the tomatillo plants, so no large harvest like I was expecting,
likely made sure I will not get another cucumber this year
ate 3/4 the one tomato plant I had,
leveled all the potatoes,
there are 2 good reasons not to have your compost pile right in where you are growing food,
one is that the mold will get to your growing plants and hurt them,
the other is that it will attract the wild life that will find the rest of your garden because of it.
by the way, someone else is adding the compost there
the really sad part of this is that it is time to plant beets and turnips and other fall things before the soil cools off and they will not sprout,
and because of the deer and lack of fence I have no where to plant it all,
now that I have figured out how to really grow plant easy here,
I have no real hope of doing so because of others.
it has been 2 years here and I am not really closer to any of my goals, only thing that has changed is that I spent my money on food while not growing my own, and due to that can no longer can buy things like fencing and other things that could have got the first year that would have let me grow my own food way easier, it is all still possible, but way harder, hard enough so that my heart is just not in it anymore.
the lesson with all of this ?
deer like your garden as much as you do and can eat more, also they don't harvest as to not pointlessly kill the plants.
don't trust others that can block projects (even if they are trying to help)
don't bother planting anything you can't defend,
and don't think about how hard things are when you only got 4 hours of sleep.
things should be better with more sleep, I am sure of it.
I allowed the fence project that should have taken 2 days to be in the control of someone else,
and it has been most of the summer now,
so much of the garden is gone now I wonder if I should even bother watering it anymore,
I am kind of happy the deer is getting food,
but going to so very much work to just feed the deer is not worth it at all,
even if I was going to eat the deer it was just to much work,
the sorghum grain heads were ripening from the outside in,
I am sure they are good enough to sprout next year so I am not that worried,
either way I just picked them all before the deer figured out what they were,
the deer ate half of a rather large pumpkin,
the next day it finished that one and started on the next,
and already finished off several water melons,
it seems to love eating the sweet potato leaves,
ate about half the tomatillo plants, so no large harvest like I was expecting,
likely made sure I will not get another cucumber this year
ate 3/4 the one tomato plant I had,
there are 2 good reasons not to have your compost pile right in where you are growing food,
one is that the mold will get to your growing plants and hurt them,
the other is that it will attract the wild life that will find the rest of your garden because of it.
the really sad part of this is that it is time to plant beets and turnips and other fall things before the soil cools off and they will not sprout,
and because of the deer and lack of fence I have no where to plant it all,
now that I have figured out how to really grow plant easy here,
I have no real hope of doing so because of others.
it has been 2 years here and I am not really closer to any of my goals, only thing that has changed is that I spent my money on food while not growing my own, and due to that can no longer can buy things like fencing and other things that could have got the first year that would have let me grow my own food way easier, it is all still possible, but way harder, hard enough so that my heart is just not in it anymore.
the lesson with all of this ?
don't trust others that can block projects (even if they are trying to help)
don't bother planting anything you can't defend,
and don't think about how hard things are when you only got 4 hours of sleep.
things should be better with more sleep, I am sure of it.
Monday, August 25, 2014
grain threshing
so threshing your own grain is made out to be quite hard,
but it is not really that hard at all,
check out my how to video of the friction grain threshing method
I know I should have had someone else hold the camera, but you can see enough to copy it
some people use an old shoe and not a block of wood with rubber on it,
I wrap the hardware cloth down around the bucket so it does not move,
but others will make a fancy wood frame for it.
so get to work and build your own small scale grain threshing setup,
that is if you plant grain on a small scale...
but it is not really that hard at all,
check out my how to video of the friction grain threshing method
some people use an old shoe and not a block of wood with rubber on it,
I wrap the hardware cloth down around the bucket so it does not move,
but others will make a fancy wood frame for it.
so get to work and build your own small scale grain threshing setup,
that is if you plant grain on a small scale...
Sunday, August 24, 2014
hulless pumpkin seeds
if you ever grow a hulless pumpkin seed pumpkin,
you should know something,
the seeds sprout very easy,
the instructions I read sad to remove seeds within 2 months of harvest or they will sprout,
now I know that when it changes color you have about 3 weeks,
you can't leave them till the first frost to harvest,
I will try the entire thing again next year and see how it goes.
and don't forget that small farming errors can take an entire year to fix. (or more)
you should know something,
the seeds sprout very easy,
the instructions I read sad to remove seeds within 2 months of harvest or they will sprout,
now I know that when it changes color you have about 3 weeks,
you can't leave them till the first frost to harvest,
I will try the entire thing again next year and see how it goes.
and don't forget that small farming errors can take an entire year to fix. (or more)
Tuesday, August 19, 2014
goodby summer
so summer is going away,
I am now closing windows to keep the heat in, and not to keep the heat out,
was cold this morning,
it is sad to see summer slipping away, the tips of my fingers are holding on tight, but I am not winning,
it is not frosting yet or anything like that,
just getting to be fall.
I will miss being warm all the time.
I am now closing windows to keep the heat in, and not to keep the heat out,
was cold this morning,
it is sad to see summer slipping away, the tips of my fingers are holding on tight, but I am not winning,
it is not frosting yet or anything like that,
just getting to be fall.
I will miss being warm all the time.
Monday, August 18, 2014
fire
there is a big fire near here,
I listened to the radio most of the day,
here is what I learned:
lots of people have no where to live now,
first thing they did is to cut the power to the areas,
so people trying to stay and fight the fire themselves likely had no water,
also people that just drove past the road blocks were let go due to no one being available to go after them,
gets me thinking about my plan for fire,
fire is hard on houses, people and gardens,
and hard to fight a fire without electricity,
I better get more ready
I listened to the radio most of the day,
here is what I learned:
lots of people have no where to live now,
first thing they did is to cut the power to the areas,
so people trying to stay and fight the fire themselves likely had no water,
also people that just drove past the road blocks were let go due to no one being available to go after them,
gets me thinking about my plan for fire,
fire is hard on houses, people and gardens,
and hard to fight a fire without electricity,
I better get more ready
cucumber issues
so I planted cucumbers this year,
I really like growing them,
I like going out to the garden and being able to get food I don't have to cook,
but the deer started eating the plants,
so I set up a fence to stop them,
it is not much of a fence,
just 3 foot tall, but it is right on top of the plants, so it works,
the issue is that it was suppose to be there for only a few days,
maybe 4 days at most,
a bigger fence was planned, and it would have worked,
but I made the error of letting someone else have control of the project,
and it is still not done,
now the issue is bigger
the cucumbers have climbed up the small fence and now I have to leave it,
seems like a small issue, but it is not,
I can't get to the cucumbers on the far side due to the fence,
I need some to go to seed, so it was fine for a while,
but now many have gotten quite big where I can't reach them,
and the plant quits producing if it has enough places for the energy to go,
so I will have hundreds if not thousands of times more seeds that I will need next year,
and I have no new cucumbers for at least a while this year,
things are out of balance,
so just remember to plant your cucumbers so you can harvest all of them (until you want one for seed)
next year I am putting the same fence up, but it will be in the center of the row so the cucumbers can climb up them and I can get to each side, they should all be super easy to find that way.
I really like growing them,
I like going out to the garden and being able to get food I don't have to cook,
but the deer started eating the plants,
so I set up a fence to stop them,
it is not much of a fence,
just 3 foot tall, but it is right on top of the plants, so it works,
the issue is that it was suppose to be there for only a few days,
maybe 4 days at most,
a bigger fence was planned, and it would have worked,
but I made the error of letting someone else have control of the project,
and it is still not done,
now the issue is bigger
the cucumbers have climbed up the small fence and now I have to leave it,
seems like a small issue, but it is not,
I can't get to the cucumbers on the far side due to the fence,
I need some to go to seed, so it was fine for a while,
but now many have gotten quite big where I can't reach them,
and the plant quits producing if it has enough places for the energy to go,
so I will have hundreds if not thousands of times more seeds that I will need next year,
and I have no new cucumbers for at least a while this year,
things are out of balance,
so just remember to plant your cucumbers so you can harvest all of them (until you want one for seed)
next year I am putting the same fence up, but it will be in the center of the row so the cucumbers can climb up them and I can get to each side, they should all be super easy to find that way.
Saturday, August 16, 2014
onion seeds
anyone remember the onions I planted 2 springs ago ?
if I remember correct it was about 900 onions, and quite a few types,
only about 30 or so grew really well,
and 10 ended up storing well over the winter (they did not rot),
I planted them out this spring,
and they have been making seeds this summer,
so now I have harvested seeds form 9 plants
almost time to plant seeds and see what I get
getting a good local onion from seed takes a bit of time,
but is worth it,
and very exciting.
I am likely almost half way there
if I remember correct it was about 900 onions, and quite a few types,
only about 30 or so grew really well,
and 10 ended up storing well over the winter (they did not rot),
I planted them out this spring,
and they have been making seeds this summer,
so now I have harvested seeds form 9 plants
almost time to plant seeds and see what I get
getting a good local onion from seed takes a bit of time,
but is worth it,
and very exciting.
I am likely almost half way there
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