Andrea Arens

So in the true spirit of permaculture I’m trying to wrap my head around substrates/grain spawn… for grass loving mushrooms why could we not just chop up a bunch of grass? Instead of using rye or wheat berries? I presume they are less nutrient dense but if you add a bit of composted manure wouldn’t that be the most similar to nature? Or is it just not enough nutrients to get any yield? Too easy to get contaminated? I just wonder if it really is as difficult to grow stuff as they say or is it just about trying to get MAX yield? It just seems like these mushrooms wouldn’t grow in nature if it really was that particular.

I wish I could support right now and go to the private forum, my tiny bit of suggestion (without going into problematic reasoning) is to take off your shoes! Spend as much time in contact with the ground as possible, the wetter the better! Spend long periods of time in natural water, creek, lake, etc.

St. John’s wort also has melatonin in it, though my first thought is more in regards to behaviour. Have you tried ‘sun gazing’ in the daytime to naturally reduce melatonin production, then towards bed time remove all bright light for a few hours and wear a sleep mask that makes it pitch black? The body doesn’t produce melatonin unless your eyes have been exposed to bright light (daytime) preferably natural light. And then it doesn’t START to produce melatonin until it’s dark. The greater the difference between day/night the better your body is able to produce melatonin.

I just discovered in my front yard a 1-2ft tall hawthorn seedling growing up beneath an old rose bush. I am very excited about this as I’ve always wanted a hawthorn tree…the question is how long does it take to produce fruit?

I’m not sure what kind it is, there is three shoots coming up from the same spot, so maybe a bush type? I know of a few tree type ones in the area but have never seen a bush.

Does anyone have a general idea of how long I’ll be waiting for fruit? And could I transplant to a more suitable location while it’s young, or best to leave it where it is?

    Looking to make comfrey tea, but don’t want to wait the lengthy period of time for anaerobic process.
    I read somewhere(can’t remember where) that someone used a bubbler for their tea and it took less time and didn’t smell. Being a person who regularly ferments food at home I am very curious if this has any merit. I’m sure the smell will be a lot less obnoxious but will this be a good environment for bacteria? Or is there a better way to make comfrey tea quickly?
    I’ve also read that you can use boiling water and steep for 24 hrs like you might with drinking tea, but then I’d have to assume there is no bacteria but just the nutrients directly from the leaves….?

I know this is quite old but in case somebody else is interested I thought I’d add to it. I am in zone 8b and though I never tried to overwinter outdoors I did quite successfully grow them in a large container under cover on my porch. I mixed half soil and half sand, and watered them maybe once a week if they were dry. At the end of the season I loosened the soil in the pot and then ran it all through a colander. I got about 3 cups worth of tiger but tubers and I think it was about a 14” pot, I started with about 6-8 tubers that were maybe 2tbsp in volume. I’m going to be growing them again this year (skipped a year because I had a baby) and the tubers look great still even though they’ve been in a glass jar in my cupboard for two years. I actually found them kind of attractive in a pot but maybe I’m strange.

I’m looking for a home grown treatment for peach leaf curl on my nectarine. The tree is about 3 years old and only about 7 leaves survived this year. I tried spraying garlic concentrate last fall and early this spring but maybe it was just too rainy.

I was just reading an article about horsetail being a good fungicide for peach curl, and then also thyme oil apparently works on fungus too. So I was wondering if anyone has experience using any of these for peach leaf curl…or a combination? I’m thinking of making a batch of horsetail and thyme tea and then adding the garlic and letting it sit overnight. Is this overkill? Will they cancel each other out? Will this work on rust spots on my pear too? Thyme is also an insecticide so should I omit the thyme? I also have soapwort, would that help?

Any advice is appreciated! Thanks

Before I even finished reading your post my thoughts were that there was something allelopathic nearby! I just had to move my baby pecan tree to the other side of my property because I just read an article that says apples are particularly sensitive to juglone. My bet is that this is your problem, if it were me, I would actually leave the apple tree there and dig up the roots from the hickory leading up to the apple tree. I think as the roots decay they release the hormones into the soil even more than when they are alive. So I think this unlucky apple tree just went in too close to a root.

I have a 30ft tall ‘wall’ of laurels on my back property line and I have to be careful when I plant things for this very reason because I’ve found their roots going more that 20ft away so far! If only I could afford to have them removed lol.

Also on a similar side note….lilacs are ALSO allelopathic. In case you didn’t know… I didn’t. I also have a ‘wall’ of lilacs on the side of my property that must be about 50-60 years old, as they are as tall as my laurels. (Pawpaws are NOT sensitive to juglone, if you want to try something different lol)

    Hello, I have a shade greenhouse here in zone 9 coastal British Columbia. It is a converted quail hutch, that still has quail in it. I’m looking to grow some plants in there that are edible/useful that I can harvest that aren’t particularly dangerous for quail if the eat it.
    Also would be good for enrichment for the quail as they used to be in the sun with plants in the enclosure in the ground. But they destroyed them all. I can only do hanging baskets and put pots in there now because they are on concrete since we moved.
     Anybody have any suggestions? I was thinking nasturtiums, maybe some yarrow....if it can tolerate the shade enough. But I’m kind of lost as to what will grow in full shade with humidity, and that are useful/medicinal/easy to keep alive.