Homesteaders

[Raech]

good song and that's a lot of corn.

Oh she didnt plant corn or cabbage. Instead we planted: 4 lettuce kinds, peas, beans, carrots, jalapenos, bell peppers, sweet onions, green onions, 5 zuchinni, 3 yellow summer squash, radishes, sugar baby watermelon, 20+ tomatoes, cucs, rosemary, basil, onion chives, garlic chives, basil, oregano and 2 blueberries. I think that is everything I think, it ended up being 18 tires, 14 for the tomatoes, blueberries were 2 tires high and the rest was all in the beds. Now I get to build my 2 beds, fill and plant them, then when Dad's stuff gets in go plant his garden and help take care of that as well as my own. I am exhausted just thinking about it.

 

[Beekissed]

I didn't think it was to late and good idea on the staggering..

I did plant leftover sprouted potatoes from the farmers market I bought last year in a old half barrel but no results yet..

I really would like to grow enough potatoes to last until the next growing season but haven't come up with a good enough storage method before they sprout any ideas?

Ok other option is dig a "cold storage " out back. Its super easy. Either use a cooler or a freezer depending on size needed. We are going to use multiple freezers.

Dig a hole big enough that your "box" will sit down just below ground level. Insert "box" and fill around with dirt. Add 6 inches of dirt to inside and start filling with root vegetables and dirt. The dirt is for temperature control.

If you don't have large enough crop for a freezer and don't want to dig that big of a hole, you can dig a more shallow, not so spacious hole, put your half barrel down in there to hold your crop, line the hole with straw, top your crop with straw and place a cover over that. My folks kept taters in just such a hole before and said they were the sweetest taties they ever ate due to being more cold in their storage than our typical cellars were.

I'll be storing apples and pumpkins in a sort of makeshift "cold room" above ground this year by placing them inside a hay bunker that has a soil floor, so they can get the humidity from the floor and hay but still be insulated enough not to freeze. My taters will be stored in an insulated tater bin in the cold room at the back of our house...will see how that goes and if I get too much sprouting in that manner. Will be storing onions in that cold room as well.

Seems to me where you live shouldn't determine who or what you are. Never liked the term "trailer trash" and all that type of thing. I seen some trailers kept better than some houses. Point being as long as a person behaves themselves shouldn't matter where they live.

I've lived in the city proper and in the country and in between. I've evolved as time goes by in my thinking. So I'm here for now. Only God knows what tomorrow will bring. You can be sure the weather man don't.

Cuz I'm freezing. I sure hope it's not this cold when we get to Alaska.

I think I'll pack some long Johns just in case. Wonder why they're called long JOHNS and not long Bills or Jimmies or some other name, and who was the John they're named after? Did John make them or Johns mother or wife? Was John really long or was it cuz he wore shorts and the underwear were long? Maybe he was Scandinavian and wore Ledderhosen, but then go the LONG underwear? Well I guess I'll just have to wonder.

OH, now I remember why I logged on. One of these days my mind is gonna wander and not come back.

Here's the rustic fencing, when it was good.

If not wanting to remove pieces of it that are compromised, you can just add to it, reinforcing the weak points. Anyone have any bamboo in your area you can glean from? Makes for some very strong wattle.

 

[Fuzzy Moto]

I love my crazy unorganized corner of the world. As far as I'm concerned there is no classification for what my family is. We are happy, we are healthy, we are alive that's all that matters. Most days we are clean but some days you can tell we have been playing in the mud. We raise our food to make us happy not to save money or please anyone. I actually started not so much as a hobby I guess but more to see how my ancestors lived. They were small scale farmers, just like me. We don't have a lot but what we do have we (including the 5 kids) have worked for.

Actually there is a classification for your discription of your family... A Happy and Healthy Family Unit.

.

 

[KlopKlop]

As long as we are on the topic of gardening... what do you guys think the definition of an 'heirloom plant' is? would you consider that to be synonymous with an open-pollinated plant (aka not a hybrid)?

Im curious what everyones take on this is

 

[OrganicFarmWife]

As long as we are on the topic of gardening... what do you guys think the definition of an 'heirloom plant' is?  would you consider that to be synonymous with an open-pollinated plant (aka not a hybrid)?

Im curious what everyones take on this is

I thought heirloom meant that the seeds would produce the same plant. So you could save the seeds and have the same breed again next year

 

[Molpet]

Heirloom , to me, is an open pollinate but old variety... older than 50 yrs

As long as we are on the topic of gardening... what do you guys think the definition of an 'heirloom plant' is? would you consider that to be synonymous with an open-pollinated plant (aka not a hybrid)?

Im curious what everyones take on this is

 

[Beekissed]

I agree, except maybe even longer than 50 yrs....."heirloom" itself denotes something that is aged and has been passed down through generations. As in a family heirloom, heirloom chickens/breeds, etc.

Quote:

 

[MoonShadows]

An heirloom plant is an open-pollinated cultivar that was commonly grown during earlier periods in human history, but which is not used in modern large-scale agriculture. Since most popular heirloom plants are vegetables, the term heirloom vegetable is often used instead.

Before the industrialization of agriculture, a much wider variety of plant foods was grown for human consumption.
In modern agriculture in the Industrialized World, most food crops are now grown in large, monocultural plots owned by corporations.
In order to maximize consistency, few varieties of each type of crop are grown.
These varieties are often selected for their productivity, their ability to withstand the long trips to supermarkets, or their tolerance to drought, frost, or pesticides.
Nutrition, flavor, and variety are frequently secondary and tertiary concerns, if at all a concern.
Heirloom gardening can be seen as a reaction against this trend.

The above text is excerpted from the Wikipedia article "Heirloom plant",

 

[Beekissed]

Every once in awhile, while staying in a rental unit for a weekend, I get to see a show called "Chopped" wherein they will often use "heirloom" tomatoes as one of their challenge ingredients. Those tomatoes are often very small and knotty looking, half ripened and not at all appealing looking. I see this too at many farmer's markets....I don't know if these folks realize there are many heirloom varieties that look much like any other tomato out there...nice, big, full and red.

I grow just such a one and am so thrilled with it year after year that I intend to grow that variety in every garden I have, if the Lord wills it. That variety is Brandywine, a large beefsteak type tomato with huge yields, the best flavor, disease resistant and hardy. This year I'm trying a similar style tomato, also considered heirloom~Pruden's Purple~just to see how it stacks up against my big Brandywines. There are many heirloom tomatoes out there similar in nature to these two beefsteak varieties if a person wants to explore them.

Heirloom doesn't have to mean small, low yield, knotty and uneven ripening....just in case folks out there got that idea from watching these cooking shows or attending farmer's markets. Most of the better heirlooms have been passed down simply because they produce a good product, not because they are known to be "heirlooms".

A few pics of Brandywine...not my own, just off the net:







I grew a few year before last that make all of these look like babies...truly....these Bs can get really big and have the sweetest flavor!

Pruden's Purples:

 

[mythreesons]

I bought almost all Heirloom seeds this year so I can save the seed and hope to never buy seed again..

Wondering if anyone else has done this?