Christopher Weeks

I don't think you need the sponge-trench if you're growing in Mel's Mix. The ingredients are designed from the ground up to manage water distribution and retention. That sounds like a great idea if you're growing in dirt!

Out of curiosity, what's the connection to permaculture? This doesn't seem like the kind of thing I normally see posted here.

I have two basic approaches -- neither one of which works well for sunflower seeds, I haven't got that one figured out, though it would be easier if I was only growing one seed-size.

1) Like Matt mentioned, I winnow by pouring from one bowl to another on a windy day. Some seeds get away, but mostly, the chaff blows off. I haven't ever gotten out a fan to simulate wind, but I've been tempted. It takes a little practice to figure out how to aim the main stream of seeds so that it makes it in the bowl, especially as the wind shifts direction or strength, but it's not too bad. When I'm doing this, I combine in Eino's swirling the bowl suggestions too. If you can get all the chaff to percolate to the top, you can scoop or blow it off and then the winnowing goes more quickly.

2) I also use a set of graduated mesh sieves like this: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0946BX45M. Depending on your seed size and the characteristics of the chaff you're dealing with, you can use it to let the seeds fall through and leave the chaff behind, or vice versa. Or, honestly, both in different orders.

At 0430, the clouds had all blown away.

Too cloudy for really spectacular aurora, but here’s what I got at just 46.66° north. Thanks for the warning!

And while you're out looking, maybe you'll catch some Taurid meteors, which are amazing -- we saw one on our morning walk today and it was huge and lasted for seconds!

Just so we're on the same page -- you're saying the light is creating a microclimate of sorts, right? That's pretty neat.

Poor kitty always getting blamed while entirely 100% innocent!

I'll be interested to see what this ends up being. It doesn't sound like a cat-step issue to me.

At first I thought you only couldn't send, which sounds like an SMTP issue at Zianet. But rereading, you can't send or receive. Do you have security (firewall, antivirus) software that could be targeting your email provider? I'm imagining one of those apps created a dialog box asking you if you want to block zianet (or whatever) and the cat saying 'yes'.

A couple weeks ago, I won a pumpkin carving contest.
It was a hollow victory.