Joseph Lofthouse

My family's traditional way to make carbonated wines involved fermenting to dryness, then adding a known/measured amount of sugar to the final bottle.

In my ecosystem, Juniper, Piñyon, and apricot can grow in non-irrigated drylands.

As a bit of a Luddite, and using an outhouse in my early years, I am not convinced that modern technology necessarily reduces labor, improves efficiency, or makes life more comfortable.

Consider basing the essential infrastructure of the community on technology from around 1890. That allows gravity-fed water, wells and hand pumps, wood and masonry construction, passive heating/cooling, root cellars, canning and fermentation, animal and human power, belt-driven machinery, blacksmithing, woodworking, mechanical workshops, sewing, bicycles, railways, windmills, simple electrical generation, and sophisticated agriculture.

Base it on systems that people can understand, maintain, repair, and reproduce locally.

Then layer modern technology on top wherever it helps. Solar panels, electronics, automation, power tools, computers, modern materials—all wonderful. But when possible, let their failure result in inconvenience or more human labor rather than failure of the essential system.

If an irrigation controller fails, open a valve by hand. If a pump fails, perhaps gravity still moves some water. If refrigeration fails, some of the food supply still stores by other means.

Plan for graceful degradation: modern technology makes the community easier to operate, rather than making the community possible to operate.

They look like long bean seeds to me.

G Freden wrote:Request:  I would find it helpful if permies had an AI policy to reference for questions like these, could that maybe be in the works?

At the present moment, no reliable LLM detector exists.

During my childhood, the local restaurant put a heavy weight on burgers while cooking—I presume to flatten them. Or perhaps to reduce cooking time?

Rescuing a tomato breeding project from 1974

In 1974, plant breeder Donald W. Denna at Colorado State University was working with crosses between wild Solanum peruvianum and domestic tomatoes.

Denna died unexpectedly the following year, at only 44 years old. His breeding work ended, but some of his seeds survived.

As the story came to me, the seeds spent decades forgotten in warehouse storage before someone rescued them and passed them along through the seed-saving community. Eventually, many hundreds of them reached me.

I have previously tried planting them with miracle rescue techniques. None germinated. This year I planted the last of the 1974 F₂ seed without any special care other than hydrating them gently. Two germinated.

Both are now producing fruit.

I don't know how much of the story of their fifty-two-year journey I can document. What I can document is Donald Denna's work. He studied S. peruvianum, self-incompatibility, and pollinator attraction, and proposed transferring those traits into domestic tomatoes. His published work sounds remarkably familiar to some of the tomato breeding I've been doing half a century later.

I rarely care whether an individual plant lives or dies. Populations matter more to me. But I wanted these two to reproduce.

Apparently they did.

Denna studied S. peruvianum, self-incompatibility, and pollinator attraction, and proposed transferring those traits into domestic tomatoes. Half a century later, I find myself exploring remarkably similar territory.

I rarely care whether an individual plant lives or dies. Populations matter more to me. But I wanted these two to reproduce.

They did.

Thank you, Donald Denna. I'll do what I can to keep the genetics moving.

Also today, because of proximity and abundant pollen, I pollinated some of these flowers with Solanum pennellii pollen.

New varieties of tomatoes. I expect to send them to Experimental Farm Network this fall.

Wild Sunshine
Descendants of a cross between SunSugar and the Profoundly Promiscuous and Totally Tasty tomatoes. Selected for years for fruity flavor and orange fruits. Three species contributed to this population.

Island Joy
Derived 50% from Solanum cheesmanii and 50% from Profoundly Promiscuous and Totally Tasty tomatoes. A young, highly segregating population, so expect lots of diversity and wildness. Orange and yellow fruits. Four species contributed to this population.

Island Sprite
Derived 50% from Solanum pimpinellifolium and 50% from Profoundly Promiscuous and Totally Tasty tomatoes. These tomatoes captured my imagination by growing as highly productive micro-plants. The fruits taste like familiar red tomatoes. Four species contributed to this population.

Island Dance
A diverse mix of the three Galápagos Islands tomato species, their natural inter-crosses and off-types, with additional influence from the Profoundly Promiscuous and Totally Tasty tomato project. Expect abundant diversity and plenty of surprises. Orange, yellow, and red fruits. Six species contributed to this population.

Alfalfa tends to rot when it gets wet, much more than straw does. The seeds in straw may sprout quicker and more reliably than those in alfalfa.