Mark Wyborny

Yes you are very right, it is very important to make certain the bamboo stalks are fully mature. At least old enough to have lived a full summer and overwintered before cutting them down or they will be too tender. Three years is best if you want strong timber.  Overwintered after a year is bare minimum for projects like weaving or furniture but still too weak. Very good to point that important fact.

Yes there is a very sustainable cheap way very ancient cultures have treated bamboo. Make a small fire and pass the bamboo culms across the flame gently. This changes the chemical structure of the resin and causes it to rise to coat its own surface into a preservative. It also gives the bamboo a beautiful dark glassy shiny color and a slippery water resistant surface. The texture completely changes.  I have done this and it works beautifully.  It is done while still green and sappy any time of year. I think maybe a gas torch might work but maybe it would be way too hot? A flame is what everyone has always used. It takes time but a skilled bamboo craftsman enjoys that.

Thom Bri wrote:

Joao Winckler wrote:The timing thing is underrated. Two varieties maturing at wildly different rates can end up fine grown right next to each other, while two that mature at the same time would cross even at distance. Worth checking the days-to-maturity on both just to know where you stand.

I planted a row of a different corn in the middle of my usual corn this year, hoping for some cross pollination. Turns out the new corn pollinated a MONTH later than my usual corn. Oh well.

You can save your good pollen you want by shaking tassels into a jar. Add a dessicant package from a new pair of shoes you bought or something to help keep it dryer until next season and put the jar labled in freezer. Next season pollinate the  receiving silks with that and a paint brush on a few dry mornings after cutting off the tassel of the receiving corn variety before its tassels open, plus clamp or tape a loose plastic bag over its silks . Pollen dies when it gets wet. That will ensure it works at least next time. I havent done that myself but shown how by others. I am sure you just needed reminding of that insured method for next year.

The Really nice soft corn nuts are made of fried hominy. If you want to nixtalamize and dont have caustic lye or wood ashes just put baking soda in a oven safe pan in the oven 1 hour at 350° Fahrenheit and it works exactly the same as ashes. Everyone can get baking soda cheap at any store but not the other stuff so I know its an old post but nobody mentioned this.

The corn cross pollinates very easy that close. The trick is to plant different varieties a couple weeks apart and pay close attention to the time each variety will naturally mature. That way when the variety is tasselling wind borne pollen none of the other varieties are receptive yet. They can be grown right next to eachother if you time your planting  that way.

The corn is best planted properly spaced and as a forest with its own deep shade canopy. About one seed every 4 inches and 3 feet between the row.  There wont be any weeds at all or dreaded dry soil in deep canopy that way. Wind wont be able tolodge it over in its forest.  The outer edge row of the grove of pure deep corn get a rim of thickly planted climbing beans and a WIDE outer border of rambling squash, or whatever cucurbits you want to grow to keep the animals from getting curious and venturing into your corn grove. You need to plant the beans on the outside row of the grove so you can pick them and they can get their sun and the bean pods do not mildew after rain. The wide squash border has uncomfortable leaves that keep out raccoons and bears noses and opossum. Animals dont like eating squash or edible gourds. People used to pick and eat the squash bugs for spices and still do in some cultures south of the USA.  Plus some kinds of squash also need easy access for picking frequently. Very difficult to squeeze through corn looking for your beans and squash. I don't grow corn fields at all anymore, its just too cheap at the feed store but it's the original eastern American way. I have switched to wheat fields because I can get it in the ground in fall and utilize barren winter ground and use summer ground for expensive foods.

I plant the corn seeds a little deeper so when the sprouts make it to the surface, the kernel is used up a little and not as good to them anymore. They don't want the grassy part, just the kernal. I also hang a few aluminum pie pans from a cane pole stuck in the ground. The crows come early in the morning on the day the corn hits the surface so I don't put any scare crows like that up until just before the corn hits the surface so they don't get used to them. When the crows swoop in to investigate the aluminum pie pans  move in the still morning air. I also make a temporary scarecrow out of a coat on a clothes hanger and a hat for that sensitive week of germination. There are only about 3 days crows want the corn so those are the scarecrow days. After that nothing bothers it. Planting a little deeper also prevents lodging better and helps with drought I think but maybe not.

The only worm I've ever seen in mid winter at the surface and active are redworms. They are also called manure worms and red wigglers, but they really dont wiggle once you've held an Alabama Jumper. During the summer they are deep under ground doing hibernation.  Once it gets cold and we've  had a first frost the redworm has its action time. I kick any pile of horse manure in the pasture and there are redworms swarming inside, even when snow surrounds the horse manure. But once it gets 85° Fahrenheit they are gone. I am with the others, the red worm ( manure worm, red wiggler) is the only really cold hardy one. During late spring nightcrawlers come up to breed right on the surface.  You can see them stuck together by the head rings with their tales still in their tunnel in the ground. This happens on the rare nights when things are just right. Old timers used to know when the nightcrawlers mated by the signs. During the cool wet mating nights you can snatch up bucket fulls of them.  I saw it happening last May 15 2026. Nightcrawlers never go into horse manure. No earthworms do except the red worms. During summer since at least the 1800s the Alabama Jumpers are the hot weather summer earthworms.  They are the best fish bait because they are firm bodied to hold on a hook and wiggle better to entice fish to bite. They can be found at the surface under piles of tree leaves in the woods all over the southest usa. I used to sell them for bait in 1970 in Pensacola, and my grandpa in 1920s in Galveston. They wont survive cold so dont even think about them, theyve had 200 years to prove that. Now the news changed their name to Asian for sensationalism and fearmongering. You  wont find an all around ,all season earthworm. They each have their own seasons.  There is two species of NATIVE Alaskan earthworms you might look into but I have zero experience with these two. I bet they are hardy as they obviously survived ice ages up there on the arctic circle. Everyone seems to agree Red Worms for the win! The redworms are small but they are your cold hardy earthworms. I am in usda zone 7b and we get around 0° Fahrenheit but the winter red worms dont even notice.