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Post by steev on Jul 31, 2018 0:03:13 GMT -5
Yeah, well; gotta do what you gotta do. I'm looking at bailing from town paid-work December 31, 2019. Will I be able to? Maaaybe. I'll be 75 and will have run my business 40 years; am I tired of this? Is a bear catholic? I want more in my "golden years" than decrepitude and incontinence.
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Post by walt on Aug 4, 2018 13:24:58 GMT -5
Got my old job back, after 5 years retirement. I'll be working four 7 1/2 hour evenings, then three 7 1/2 hour evenings, alternating. This will give me a little more than 50% increase in income. I hope to be able to have a greenhouse by winter. That means I have to find some land to buy quickly
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Post by walt on Aug 6, 2018 14:51:19 GMT -5
Two days ago, sweet potatoes in my wife's 20 gallon pot started blooming. Today my first maypop, Passiflore incarnata, bloomed.
I hadn't been in my garden but once in the last 4 days, and then only for a quick look to see if I HAD to water. I didn't. That was good as I had many things I had to organize for my new job.
But this morning I spent working in my garden. It was so beautiful! Sure there were some weeds to hoe, but not that many. Corn tasseling, sorghum in bloom, other sorghum about ready to harvest. Tomatoes in bloom, and it is cool enough they might set fruit. So far not a single fruit set on tomatoes, though they have been blooming a couple weeks.
First paycheck from my job tomorrow. I already bought finger lime seeds with some of it. Not that I'm in a hurry or anything.
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Post by walt on Aug 9, 2018 13:49:42 GMT -5
Finger lime seeds arrived today from Australia, along with a couple of seeds of Sydney x virgata. A while back, citrus scions and seeds came from Germany. Thanks Imgrimmer. My hardy citrus project is moving along pretty well, concidering there are no flowers to pollinate yet.
Yesterday a Prunus maritima 'Nana' and an apricot plant arrived from Oikos Tree Crops. Plans are to cross them and try to get the late bloom and precocious bloom of Nana into apricots. While an ambitious project, it is tiny and simple compared to the citrus plans.
So today I dug holes in my garden to plant them. I dug down about 6 inches and found hard dry soil! My garden is looking good but it seems that this year I'm only using the top 6 inches. Rain has been low this year and I've only been watering enough to keep the plants looking good. But it looks like if I miss a couple days watering, it might dry up and blow away. This comes from carrying water 5 miles to water a garden. And it doesn't help that I have to carry it the last 50 yards.
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Post by walt on Aug 10, 2018 13:14:07 GMT -5
Today I worked a couple hours weeding the garden. I notice less energy since I started a job. Not surprising really.
Now I'm trying to get some ground ready for planting Kernza wheatgrass on a bigger scale.
Also, I've decided to buy a bushel of wheat and plant the garden and orchard to wheat for a winter green manure crop. That won't take even 1/4 bushel, but the coop won't sell less than a bushel. I can eat the leftovers.
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Post by philagardener on Apr 19, 2019 16:56:54 GMT -5
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Post by keen101 (Biolumo / Andrew B.) on Apr 19, 2019 19:29:32 GMT -5
cool! Thanks for sharing! |
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Post by steev on Apr 20, 2019 10:01:47 GMT -5
Very encouraging; I wonder how it would do in NorCal.
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Post by walt on Apr 22, 2019 11:50:52 GMT -5
I wonder too. Do you have time and space for it?
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Post by steev on Apr 22, 2019 21:13:10 GMT -5
One must prioritize; what interests me gets the time to make it happen; space? I've got ~17 acres on which I'd like something perennial of more interest than the weeds, not that I'd start with more than a small patch of Kernza (clearing and tilling constraints); I don't think planting could happen before Fall, as the rains are over until late October and I can't spare the riega. The other grain I want to get serious about is the volunteer wheat that keeps self-seeding OTF; it gets no riega and does fine, spreading without noticeable critter-predation, a valuable characteristic OTF, where I have to fence off everything in which they have any interest.
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Post by walt on Apr 23, 2019 0:16:19 GMT -5
The link gives a name I haven't seen before. Thinpyron intermedium is the name used by those breeding it. And Agropyron intermedioum is the formerly accepted name back when I was a pro working with it. I see the link does also give the old name. The taxonomy of the family was messed up, in part, because western scientists were ignoring soviet scientists, who had more species to work with, giving a more complete picture of the family.
But when Kay and Asay did a taxonomy based on chromosomes, only then did the taxonomy make sense.
There was debate going on about which taxonomy is more useful. Taxonomy based on chromosomes showing actual relationships, or a taxonomy based on morphology that easily identifies plants in the field.
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Post by steev on Apr 23, 2019 2:01:51 GMT -5
The volunteer wheat survives and spreads without irrigation, nor does it get critter predation, both very desireable characteristics OTF; it isn't too hard to thresh, so at the very least, I think it will be good critter chow that I'll not need to coddle, only spread around and harvest.
I'll see if I can look into that "what's growing here" app; I'm really not tech savvy, nor do I much want to be.
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Post by walt on Aug 23, 2019 15:43:59 GMT -5
I've been gone quite a while. One of my brothers was dieing and I spent as much time as I could with him. I didn't plant a garden at all. I can garden next year, inshala. Spending time with my brother can't be done next year.
It was strange, not having a garden. I've gardened for about, well, I don't even know when I started. But I've gardened 60 years at least.
I did keep up with my citrus. And I've updated the cold hardy citrus thread. More can be learned on tropicalfruitforum.com .
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Post by steev on Aug 23, 2019 16:50:47 GMT -5
Calflora shows a site around Stonyford, which is ~6 miles from my farm; any clue whether wheatgrass would be of much interest to deer?
Modoc is not, I think, much less rigorous, rain-wise, than Colusa; Cali dry-bakes from April to November. Hence the rule: "Wine is for drinking; water is for fighting over."
The volunteer wheat apparently shatters well enough to self-seed, as it has spread and scattered with no help from me; this will be the first year I'll help it out; same for Patience dock, cardoon, and salsify. I don't resist success, only entropy, and that but weakly (weekly?).
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Post by walt on Aug 25, 2019 13:59:43 GMT -5
Intermediate wheatgrass is good forage for cattle, so I'm sure deer will eat rather that go hungry. But I don't know if it is one of their favorite foods.
My garden is on the edge of a small town. Deer tend to stay away during spring and summer. In fall, dominant males push other males out of the woods along the rivers. Then they get in my garden and might eat somewheatgrass, but that doesn't hurt it. In winter, deer will eat anything, and they prune my fruit trees, which I don't like. But if they eat the wheatgrass, they don't hurt it. Wheatgrass blooms in spring and produces seeds early summer here. Seed is ripe a little later than wheat seeds.
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