Category: Growing organic

coursera – it’s great

Coursera, the MOOC (massive open online course), has kept me very busy.  Last year I took the sustainability course and earlier this year, 2 physics introductory courses.  My background is accounting, business and the humanities.  Now, with access to excellent tuition from top flight college lecturers, all for free, I am greedily imbibing the sciences.  I am currently taking 4 courses: Animal Behavior (University of Melbourne, Australia), Preparation for Introductory Biology - DNA to organisms Read more [...]

growing update 0822

Good news - my squash have not (yet) been visited by the dreaded borer and are growing rampaciously. So I have a new pest to respond to and I have set a live trap with some enticing carrots to try catch the rabbit.  A more tedious, though inevitable response will be to better secure the growing area and the fence which surrounds it.  Here is a welcome visitor. My most productive bed which is just 4ft by 4ft and was an afterthought, in addition to pumping out tomatoes and cucumbers Read more [...]

growing tomatoes – a curious result

Why is one plant outperforming the other tomatoes? This year, as in other years, I grew several varieties of tomatoes in my greenhouse and in May planted out 32 tomatoes in wire cages in a new growing area.  We had heavy rains and this set the tomatoes back but now they are producing, though with average/poor yields. In a nearby 4ft sq raised bed I planted a few vegetables including a tomato and a cucumber plant.  Both have been growing gangbusters. I pick 3 to 4 large tomatoes each Read more [...]

first apple harvest

My Pristine apple tree is the first to ripen in my orchard and each day drops many apples.  In Atlanta and northwest Georgia we have had record making rains, so the apples are relatively large, very juicy and, for the Pristine, relatively sweet. I do not spray so, inevitably, there are occasional visitors but these are easily removed with my pocket knife as I gorge away.   Nice thing about not spraying is I don't wash my fruit and I eat the skin. Since there are too many apples for consumption Read more [...]

mullein is an unusual plant

The Permies permaculture website recommended mullein.  So last year I bought seeds of 3 varieties and grew them.  In their first year they are low lying with large very soft leaves.  The leaves can be used for various purposes and apparently the plant has some medicinal uses.  But they appeared to contribute little to my vegetable garden.  Unlike comfrey (one of my favorites which sends its roots deep to mine nutrients) the mullein roots run horizontal and suck the nutrients out of the adjoining Read more [...]

my new hand sickle

The winter rye is tall and surrounds and shades my berry plants. Now it is summer the winter rye is drying out and will soon drop its seed.  I like the wilderness of this luscious growth and see no point in cutting it down, except where it dwarfs my plantings.  It is shallow rooted and after a rain comes easily out of the ground, but that leaves an open spot quickly invaded by weeds and Bermuda grass.  For clearing the rye away from my plantings my large scythe is ill suited since it requires Read more [...]

planting out the tomatoes

My main ritual early each summer is the planting out of the tomatoes.  I grow these from seed, initially in the basement (0.75" soil blocks) then in the greenhouse (2" soil blocks).  My first year was a glorious year, since then hard going.  Not beginner's luck but a case of slipping under the radar the first time.  Now each year the pests and problems await me.  Though I rotate the growing site, this does not thwart the soil borne diseases - there is an interesting piece in this morning's NYT Read more [...]

shading the PawPaw

Last September I purchased two PawPaw trees from HiddenSprings Nursery - a Mango and an Overleese.  Initially I planted them in an extended area of my new orchard but when a sickly apple tree had to be removed from my old orchard I decided to transplant the two small PawPaws close together where the apple tree had stood.  Incidentally this apple tree was purchased from a big box store to replace an apple tree which had previously failed.  So either there is a problem with the soil in this specific Read more [...]

sweet potatoes

I listened in on a nutrition lecture and heard a pointed saying, ascribed to Ayurveda: "With good food, medicine is of no need.  With bad food, medicine is of no use." Sweet potatoes were prominent in the highly regarded traditional Okinawan diet - see my recent post.  In March I ordered "southern" styled sweet potatoes, they arrived yesterday and today with the Ayurvedic prescription in my thoughts, I planted them. Detailed instructions accompanied the package and, as recommended, Read more [...]

tomato seedlings

Now is the time I focus on my tomato growing.  As discussed in the growing organic tab, I start with tomato seeds in .75" blocks on a heating pad and fluorescent lighting.  For the first few days the tomato seeds are covered in plastic to raise the humidity and temperature. The tomato seeds are individually located in .75" seed blocks and there are 20 seed blocks in each of the 6 bigger blocks - so there are 120 seeds germinating in this tray.  On the right is my summary of which seeds Read more [...]