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Post by prairiegarden on Oct 4, 2016 7:58:10 GMT -5
The gmo apple that won't brown when cut is apparently going to hit the market big time in the next 5 years or less, it will be interesting to see what sort of reaction it gets. Reading this morning about gmo chickens and cows, the chickens are supposed to be susceptible to avion flu but unable to infect, it gets stranded In the bird somehow, and the cows are supposed to give milk which lacks the proteins or sugars which cause allergic reactions. Brave New World...I'm glad I grew up when food was food. Maybe they could cross a cow with sugar cane and cocoa and have it give chocolate milk. Apparently quite a number kids think that brown cows already do.
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Post by prairiegarden on Oct 3, 2016 3:35:05 GMT -5
Hoping I can unload some of them in a month or two, now about 15 plants have shown up ( now they started it seems a new one or two each day!) which is a whole lot more than I need, taking way more space than can be happily spared, will soon have to put a new shelf with lights just for them. Still, if nothing else I can always dry it and use it knowing that it's the real stuff. There are so many horror stories coming out almost daily about herbal stuff being sold that has little or sometimes actually none of the ingredient listed in it, and the fresh stuff is not available at all around here.
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Post by prairiegarden on Oct 2, 2016 18:40:57 GMT -5
Humans are nothing if not stubborn. Curious that it would seem not to have occurred to them to stop using pesticides. Fear is a mighty motivator, perhaps, and maybe they have been conditioned to think the trees will all instantly become a heaving mass of hostile insects if they stop. Maybe now they would, if they've killed off all the insects then they have killed off the predator insects as well as the ones which might be a problem.
It's going to be a very dark day when insects/diseases that have evolved to deal with the pesticides turn up, as they absolutely will, in time. It's a one way street to more and more virulent poisons until the food is clearly poisonous to people too; right now that takes long enough to show up that it's a bit ambiguous to some people, most of them in government regulatory agencies.
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Post by prairiegarden on Oct 2, 2016 17:44:50 GMT -5
Well if you want to spend the money it's possible to bring in anything almost, but I think now it's something like $125 or so for a certificate, whether that's the actual cost or the cost plus the charge for the nursery's time to go through the hassle I don't know. But as has been pointed out on another thread, the huge shipments that cross the border every spring most decidedly don't have every plant checked, a neighbor got a healthy looking gooseberry and it didn't produce gooseberries, it produced a bumper crop of worms which did in the bush. Seemingly our climate is too cold for them as they've never been seen before or since, whatever they were.
Most nurseries understandably want nothing to do with phytosanitary certificates, we aren't a big enough market to make it worth while. One Green World used to sell to Canadians but won't anymore, just more hassle than it's worrh. Or so they said a few years back when I asked.
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Post by prairiegarden on Oct 2, 2016 0:53:23 GMT -5
I have a friend who has a nursery and lots of contacts in Britain. If you let me know exactly what you want to know I,m sure she'd do her best to find out.
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Post by prairiegarden on Oct 2, 2016 0:47:48 GMT -5
A few years back when there were food riots happening, the shortage wasn't because of cafos it was because production was going to produce biofuel. Poor people in developing countries can't pay for food what the people in rich countries can pay for fuel. Nothing personal, just more profit and they are after all, in business...
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Post by prairiegarden on Oct 1, 2016 15:19:56 GMT -5
Don't know about the US undoubtedly someone does, there are lots of people doing interesting stuff with chestnuts and hazelnuts, I don't know about walnuts. The butternut/heart it cross is called a buartnut here. Butternuts are considered endangered, I got some and they were growing really well but something..probably deer or moose, but maybe just gophers, those destroyed my chestnuts..took them out the first winter. Haven't replaced them as they are marginally hardy here and the best location I have for them is too far away to monitor adequately.
There is apparently some interesting work being done with hardy pecans as well. Grimonut.com has walnut crosses, not sure if they sell into the U.S. or not, if so, with the dollar what it is, they'd be cheap and their trees were great.
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Post by prairiegarden on Oct 1, 2016 15:03:52 GMT -5
Those look interesting, and I may just need to get a extractagator, neither is cheap but if the Extractigator actually works it would be a blessing to help get this garden back under some sort of control. I can't do the digging so hired help this summer but although he was one of the nicest people I've hired he never wanted to finish anything and liked to chat so basically got very little done that I'd hoped. Some that did get sort of done..eg blackberry bushes dug out...hasn't stayed done, they came back! Thanks for the information and link.
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Post by prairiegarden on Sept 30, 2016 14:29:22 GMT -5
Thanks Bill. i just need to read up on storage requirements, if anything special, since we are heading into winter soon. I will definitely be in touch. And thanks to Kevin as well, I didnt.know anyone had redfleshed TPS for sale. Good stuff! A new adventure!
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Post by prairiegarden on Sept 30, 2016 14:16:49 GMT -5
The 20 foot greenhouse was specifically associated with the tropical trees like papaya and avocados they were growing, not to bananas per se. I hadn't seen that dwarf cavendish before though, but tend not to spend much time on American sites as its too frustrating, since I can't buy plants from them due to border restriction
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Post by prairiegarden on Sept 29, 2016 23:54:36 GMT -5
He made a mighty sound when alive which will likely reverberate for many years to come. Hopefully, unlike most echoes, his voice will only get louder and the message clearer and reaching more and more people as time moves on.
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Post by prairiegarden on Sept 29, 2016 23:05:34 GMT -5
Prairiegarden: Sounds like you need pots over your plants to limit "day-length". Good luck "playing" in hopes of results that "work". Not sure I care THAT much, tbh
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Post by prairiegarden on Sept 29, 2016 23:02:36 GMT -5
What a great site you have, full of interesting information. I tried maybe 6 or 7 years ago to buy TPS from Cuzio, but after weeks of emails he was still insisting I could get them from Fedco, which I couldn't so gave up on the idea. I am certainly interested! I am in a much different growing situation than you are, being in the Canadian Prairies, so was interested in your comments regarding the effects of day length. Our summer days reach almost 20 hours before Equinox, so any that won't start setting until day length is 12 hours or less likely won't produce anything here, we are probably seeing frost by that time. Would some of the seed in the red mix be likely to produce tubers? Or would they only be good as a parent crossing with a variety that's day neutral? Sorry if if the questions are really basic, the knowledge most of the people here have is staggering but I'm not among them, just enjoy trying different things and trying help diversity along a little. Lol. This is Billw's website. He is a regular here. If you want to ask him something, use the @ username function on here. I know a bit about potatoes from readings and a bit of growing.The tetraploid mix I linked to Billw's website is a better suit for your daylight issue. They are less sensitive to daylight than diploid. Genetically, tetraploids have a more complex genetic code would more possible combinations for each trait. I imagine that the seed mix will produce potatoes with a tendency to red. There is a potato guide on his website, so checking it out would be a good idea. Oops sorry!!
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Post by prairiegarden on Sept 29, 2016 22:57:10 GMT -5
Bananas are great. Fast growing relative to other fruit trees, and huge harvests that are perfect for freezing. Ain't a bad idea to grow them. Recently got some teaser videos regarding aquaponics systems, one of them had to do with raising bananas and other topical fruit trees in greenhouses. Think you'd likely need a 20 foot roof though to deal with most of those trees and in our climate at least, that's a whole lot of space to keep warm when it's -40C outside. The bananas appear to be quite a bit shorter , but it seems almost all of the available species ( that I could find at least) are described as ornamental rather than edible fruited. If a person had the space/ right set up it might be a winner, rumors have been circulating for a couple of years that the common banana variety of the grocery store is in major trouble. Although they are showing up here as abundantly as they ever did so maybe that's just a marketing ploy. It would be really interesting to know how they are going about it in Siberia.
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Post by prairiegarden on Sept 29, 2016 22:00:10 GMT -5
What a great site you have, full of interesting information. I tried maybe 6 or 7 years ago to buy TPS from Cuzio, but after weeks of emails he was still insisting I could get them from Fedco, which I couldn't so gave up on the idea. I am certainly interested! I am in a much different growing situation than you are, being in the Canadian Prairies, so was interested in your comments regarding the effects of day length. Our summer days reach almost 20 hours before Equinox, so any that won't start setting until day length is 12 hours or less likely won't produce anything here, we are probably seeing frost by that time. Would some of the seed in the red mix be likely to produce tubers? Or would they only be good as a parent crossing with a variety that's day neutral? Sorry if if the questions are really basic, the knowledge most of the people here have is staggering but I'm not among them, just enjoy trying different things and trying help diversity along a little.
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