Mary Cook

It's so easy to say "add tons of organic matter" and so hard to find tons, and sometimes hard to transport it. I saw an article about the best way to compost that suggest using two meters square of kitchen scraps...even most industrial kitchens don't generate that much at once!

It worked for me too. But I think I read that in the Southwest there is type of clay it doesn't work with (caliche?) and also you should use coarse sand not fine sand.

All of these, chopped:
10 C tomatoes
5 C green peppers
5 C onions,
2 1/2 C hot peppers
1 1/4C vinegar
3 C tomato sauce
1 C sweet fruit
6 cloves garlic
1 T salt   boil for about 45 minutes, till the liquid content looks right, add in some chili powder, and put in a boiling water bath for 15 minutes. I need 24 pints of this for a year's supply...we have it on our omelet every morning and put a spoonful in a taco or burrito...

Likely the UK ones are filberts, which are related to hazelnuts but not the same species. The Arbor Foundation had a project to cross the two, because filberts are much bigger--both the plant and the nut--than American hazelnuts, but are susceptible to Eastern Hazelnut Blight when grown in the US. Most production in the US is in the Pacific Northwest, and they're growing filberts. My neighbor coordinated orders for 40 of the crosses which were supposed to have the size of the filberts but with the blight resistance of the natives--perhaps they were released too soon, because few of them even survived, I have one of the survivors, a Jefferson, many years later and it's like 12' tall, many trunked, but has yet to produce a nut. I once planted a native next to it in hopes of cross pollination but it sickened and died just like the other crosses that were originally supposed to be the Jefferson's companions.

Lavender is one of the ingredients I use in a tea mix I call Hangover Helper, good for unhappy guts from any cause. The other three ingredients are mint, fennel seeds, and chamomile. I try to grow all four of these myself, but the fennel I planted this spring, which did quite well for awhile, dried up and died (as did the parsley) in midsummer. The chamomile bed kept getting invaded by weeds so I eradicated it all and started again, but I'm not sure it's going to come back this fall as it has been so dry and hot. I think I have peppermint and spearmint going well again in planters. I have a nice lavender plant--not that much harvest but this is the least important ingredient, I mostly add it because an old herbal said it was good for "a simmering braine" and I've used the tea for migraines. Sometimes I cut off a thin slice of ginger root and put that in the cup too.

Several general points rather than a suggestion. One, I would think twice about a job that requires major commuting. I think that is likely to, and should, become a thing of the past. Cheap gasoline has a sale date. And rejecting the "trades" because you had a couple of bad experiences might be a mistake. One of my neighbors moved here with some electrical experience, left his name and number in the local hardware stores and started getting work; he has now expanded to other renovation work, sometimes has an assistant, and makes a living. Which leads to my main point: I don't know what area you're looking at, but if you'd consider West Virginia, we have cheap land, low property taxes, no hassles about building codes in the rural parts, low cost of living (also low wages), and it's one of the oldest states...so able-bodied young people willing to work can get work. Another general point is that it's a good idea to consider a sheaf of small income streams rather than one well-paid job that could be lost.

Snarl. Can you tell I have a chip on my shoulder? I just want to say that if it ever happens that my three peach trees all bear heavily, and I have to COPE WITH an overabundance of peaches, I will manage somehow. I will can peaches till I run out of quart jars, can peach jam till I run out of pint jars, and then put peach halves in my dehydrator. Not to mention pigging out on peach pie and peach cobbler and giving away more of that mountain of imaginary peaches. For most of us, a year when you have an overabundance of any crop is a good time to preserve that crop if at all possible, because leaner times are coming. When late frosts kill your peach crop the next two years, you'll be glad you spent all those sweaty hours canning. And even the ones you gave away tend to return in some other form, as people like to reciprocate.

I don't know as that's necessary--the ones that are still standing surround the ones that have fallen, so their tassels are dropping onto the fallen. But it's been a couple weeks and I don't see them standing up.

No, pollination is still ongoing; I planted late because of spring drought.