3 Sisters Garden, 2024, Year 2

May Lotito wrote:
The late planted corns are growing fine, although the ears are only inches off the ground on some shorter stalks. The color is gorgeous.

I only have less than 400 sq ft of regular garden area since I can't get enough organic matters to keep more area properly mulched year round. This solarize-and-plant method works very well so far, I will have more space to grow corns next year. After all, it is like nine months of cover cropping and three months of gardening.

Derek Thille wrote:Nice...this year we had a volunteer tomato or two that actually produced and a couple volunteer ground cherries (known as golden berry in Peru).  Based on a lack of harvesting, I expect we will have volunteer tomatillos and radishes next year.

Earlier today I took photos of our dry bean harvest, but haven't yet gotten them off the camera.

Derek Thille wrote:


We had our first frost this morning, well over 2 weeks later than our average first fall frost, so we've been intent on harvesting the sensitive stuff.  I just set up tomatoes on a dehydrator to ultimately powder which can then be reconstituted into sauce or paste or added to soups, stews, etc.

I love your description of planting volunteers.  I don't want to count on volunteers though as our frost-free season is short enough that it would be a challenge for them to produce.  We did get a few fruit from volunteers this year, but nothing like the ones I started indoors.

Thom Bri wrote:Purple leaves, cobs and seeds. Goal is to increase anthocyanins and carotenes. Purple with yellow endosperm was top choice. The purple is claimed to be a nutritional factor. It is also claimed to resist insects and diseases, cold and drought. Mr. Lofthouse has often said too much purple leads to lower production, and I believe he is right. The more energy the plant pours into resistance factors the less it has left over to produce seeds. However, my goal is not maximum production, but maximum reliability.

Derek Thille wrote:

Thom Bri wrote:
I can't speak to corn, but we've seen less insect damage on purple (red) cabbage than green.  I find it fascinating that it may apply to other crops as well.

I have read quite a few papers where the issue was studied and they pretty much confirm that anthocyanins are resistance factors. But I can't quite shake the feeling that it is confirmation bias. The researchers all seem to really want to find benefits, nutritional and others for the colorants, that I wonder if they are not fooling themselves.

May Lotito wrote:How are the bee hives doing in the garden? Are squashes the main food source for them? I see fewe honey bees on my corns but long-honed bees are crazy over the the pollens.

May Lotito wrote:How much fertilizers did you put in the first year of the three sister garden? Did the numbers match up with nutrients removed in the harvests? Do you plan on skipping input in the following years to see how long the fertility lasts?

May Lotito wrote:I was able to harvest mature cobs from the morado corns, while Martian Jewels got caught up with fungal infection and they were only good as sweet corns. I also bought a 3-pack of ornamental Indian corns from the store. Can I grow those seeds? From the color and appearance,  they seem to be hybrids.

May Lotito wrote:Hi Thom, the article is with restricted access and the link doesn't work.

In the ebook about the Agriculture of Hidatsa Indian, I can't find the documentation about corn yield, but it was usually sufficient to last the family till next year's harvest. They also noted the yield was the highest in new ground, second year nearly as good and going down from the third year on and the land was eventually left to fallow for two years to restore fertility.  I haven't finished reading the whole book but found the details very interesting.

May Lotito wrote:Hi Thom, the article is with restricted access and the link doesn't work.

In the ebook about the Agriculture of Hidatsa Indian, I can't find the documentation about corn yield, but it was usually sufficient to last the family till next year's harvest. They also noted the yield was the highest in new ground, second year nearly as good and going down from the third year on and the land was eventually left to fallow for two years to restore fertility.  I haven't finished reading the whole book but found the details very interesting.

Derek Thille wrote:

May Lotito wrote:Hi Thom, the article is with restricted access and the link doesn't work.

In the ebook about the Agriculture of Hidatsa Indian, I can't find the documentation about corn yield, but it was usually sufficient to last the family till next year's harvest. They also noted the yield was the highest in new ground, second year nearly as good and going down from the third year on and the land was eventually left to fallow for two years to restore fertility.  I haven't finished reading the whole book but found the details very interesting.

Thanks for the link May.  My heirloom seed supplier has a couple varieties of bean with Hidatsa in the name (as I recall), so they are quite likely linked to that group.  Another rabbit hole to go down.

Hidatsa Shield Figure Bean noted as being grown in ND (which our acreage isn't that far north of).

Hidatsa Red Bean - seems to be a vining variety.

Thom Bri wrote:Of interest if looking to buy land

https://www.landandfarm.com/

May Lotito wrote:The soil productivity index map from USDA. The corn and wheat belts are so blessed with fertile soils.

Thom Bri wrote:First snow of the winter, and it will be a few degrees of frost tonight. I built this today, hoping to keep my greens alive a few more weeks.

Thom Bri wrote:

Essentially, her argument based on 19th century records is that Native Americans probably got 10 bushels per acre, up to 18 on average. Earlier writers speculated averages were 20-30, based on white farmer's averages in the same era. There was a long series of back and forth arguing by different researchers who were rather sarcastic with each other in their various papers. Only 3 or 4 actually attempted to grow corn using native techniques. So I decided to try it. So far I have gotten 57 and 59 bushels per acre using only hand tools.