Photos of Joseph Lofthouse's Garden

I work on building a new garden and food forest this summer.

The property contains about 3 acres. About 15,000 years ago, the Lake Bonneville shoreline crossed the property. Therefore, it offers three kinds of soil : A silty/loam from underwater. Sand from the beach, and a cobblestone boulder field where a seasonal creek enters.

I intend the sandy area as pasture, the boulder field as a food forest, and the silty/loam as an annual vegetable garden. I envision a vineyard at the interface of the sandy/loam and boulder field.

Food species already growing there include black hawthorn, plum, rose. Some medicinals/herbs like biscuitroot and wild onion. I collect weed seeds in my old garden, intending to introduce them to the new. The low species diversity of the new area entices me to add as much diversity as I can manage.  

We plan a European speaking tour for me in October. Visiting Croatia, France, Scotland, England, Denmark.

About half of the quail eggs didn't start developing. I broke two via rough handling. One pipped but didn't hatch. Three hatched. One of them died from no discernible cause at about 3 weeks. Another's leg splayed around like 180 degrees from normal, so I culled her.

I have started another batch...

It must be exciting to start over in a new place.  

I forget how much infrastructure and knowledge is tied up in the old place. Simple things that I take for granted, like irrigation, fences, understanding of the animals habits, familiar weeds, predictable insects, the human community.

Joseph Lofthouse wrote:We plan a European speaking tour for me in October. Visiting Croatia, France, Scotland, England, Denmark.

I am living in denmark, so would like to hear when and where in denmark you are speaking. Would like to make it. Are you taking any seeds with, that can be bought, by any chance?

Copenhagen Hospitality College
October 19th or 20th.

Farm Tours 21st and 22nd.

I am not going to try to take seeds through 6 international borders...

The new batch of quail have hatched.

27 eggs went into incubator
7 didn't develop at all
2 hatched days prematurely (before lockdown)
1 got crushed by the turning mechanism
Most developed, but didn't hatch
1 drowned
1 didn't ever get up after emerging
1 died mysteriously after a few days

That leaves 4 survivors.

Joseph Lofthouse wrote:Copenhagen Hospitality College
October 19th or 20th.

Farm Tours 21st and 22nd.

I am not going to try to take seeds through 6 international borders...

Great. How do I sign up or buy tickets?

I have started this year working on my own landraces on a  1.2 acres field. Started with squashes, beans, corn, fennikel, kale and cucumber. Planning to extend it next year to at least peas.

Which farms are you visiting? Curios to hear if I know them.

I thought so much about the seeds, but thought I might as well ask.

Details are still being worked out for my European speaking tour. I'm uploading details as they become available to:
https://permies.com/t/263040/Joseph-Lofthouse-European-speaking-tour

Joseph Lofthouse wrote:We plan a European speaking tour for me in October. Visiting Croatia, France, Scotland, England, Denmark.

I think you and Svalbard would be a good fit. (I get why they want to preserve named varieties, but if they also preserved seeds like you produce, they'd save a lot more genetic diversity.)

I have water envy.  It seems that southwest Oklahoma and the Texas panhandle are becoming more desert than the desert is.

Judy Bowman wrote:I have water envy.  It seems that southwest Oklahoma and the Texas panhandle are becoming more desert than the desert is.

My ancestors spent a fortune building the water systems that I now use.

I harvested our native ground cherry. These grew with irrigation, but it survives on 15" of annual rain in the nearby deserts. Flavor is great.

I made sweet pepper powder today. Wearing a blindfold, most people couldn't distinguish it from paprika.

Recipe: Dehydrate peppers. Blend in a spice blender.

That is excellent, Joseph! Look at all those ground cherries! And I must try the dehydrated peppers. We've only done that with hot varieties.

A week ago I spoke at the Utah Food and Farm Conference in Cedar City Utah. I just finished editing a youtube video that contains the live presentation and slide deck. I talk about how I became a spokesperson for adaptation agriculture, and in doing so, regained my health, and lost 70 pounds.

Tomorrow is the big day! The 2025 landrace seed share begins. I've scheduled an email for 9 AM tomorrow morning with the URL. If you'd like to receive the link via email, please sign up for my newsletter on the bottom of the page at https://Lofthouse.com

Here is my contribution:
Fukuoka's Grab Bag
Everything Else

The Fukuoka Grab Bag exists to honor the life and work of Japanese farmer Masanobu Fukuoka, who wrote One Straw Revolution, and Sowing Seeds in the Desert. Fukuoka recommended combining many species together into clay balls, and spewing them into the garden willy-nilly to discover which ones might thrive.

This mix also tips the hat to Gurney's Seed Company, which sold a Jumbo Packet of mixed seeds for one cent. My first garden was grown from this packet of seeds, and inspired me for my entire life. I still remember the huge size of the nasturtium seeds!

This year's Fukuoka Grab bag contains about 40 or more species.

Amaranth
Arugula X3
Beet, Going To Seed
Chicory
Cotton
Eggplant X2
Endive
Escarole
Fava
Lambsquarters
Lettuce X2
Luffa cylindria
Lupine, sweet X2
Mayapple, American
Millet
Moonrose
Moringa
Mustard spice, Yellow
Mustard, leafy brown seeded X4
Okra
P Doumous
Parsley
Parsnip, X3
Peanut
Penstemon
Physallis longifolium
Radish Grex, Going To Seed
Roselle
Rye, Cache Valley
Sage
Serviceberry
Shiso X2
Solanum lycopersicon
Solanum peruvianum
Solanum pimpinelifolium
Spinach
Sunflower X2
Sweet Cicely
Thlaspi
Turnip X2
Wheat, Rocky Mountain

We may have forgotten to write down some crops. We measured out 1 Tablespoon per packet. Then added a few larger seeds by hand. We ran out of peanuts half-way through.

O' wow, that's the first time in years and across two or three forums, I've seen anyone besides me mention peanuts. They are easy to grow at least in my climate and the best nitrogen fixers I've ever seen. I just thought nobody else was interested in them.

Mark, I also grow peanuts here in Hawaii. They are easy. And they are a decent seller at the farmers market. We get $4 a pound straight out of the ground. When we pull the plants, we pull off the nuts, knock off most the dirt, pile them in a box. We let the buyers pick out what they want. Whatever is left at the end of the day goes into the cook pot for the pig slop. It’s only the dregs leftover by the end of the day.

Peanuts are used here for cooking. Only the recent mainlander transplants ask for instructions on how to roast them. Folks here boil them, then either eat them as is or use them in a variety of cooked dishes.

Radish weeds growing in the (unheated) greenhouse this winter.

I took the opportunity between the snow storm a couple days ago, and the snow storm tonight to start planting my garden.

While I was in Europe, every farm I visited practiced not till. Will I be able to set aside my habits, and childhood indoctrination and do the same?

Today I transplanted radishes (grown overwinter in the greenhouse). Sorted them, to grow seed. It looks like white radishes have come to dominate the population. They seems to grow better for me than red radishes. I also planted onion bulbs to grow seed.

Moving my farm to a new location didn't work out, so I'm farming again this year at the place I've been for 16 growing seasons. I'm converting it into a food forest, so that I can more easily manage it as I age.

Please see the announcement about the Canadian Landrace Seed Swap.

Also, I have a few seeds available from my apricot breeding project.

I grew about 30 apricots from seedlings. About 2/3 died on their own, or got chopped out by me. I did grafting last week, to move some of them that I like best onto different root-stocks.  

🌱 Ask Joseph Lofthouse Anything – Live Zoom Q&A! 🌱

Feel curious about landrace gardening? Want to discover how to grow resilient, locally-adapted food with less fuss and more joy? Join Going To Seed for a live Ask Me Anything Zoom session with Joseph, author of Landrace Gardening, on Tuesday April 29th at 5 PM Pacific Time.

Whether you explore Joseph’s work for the first time or continue along your own landrace journey, this session offers a chance to connect directly, ask questions, and hear stories from his experience. Bring  your curiosity, your wildest gardening questions, and your seed dreams — Joseph welcomes all of it.

Mark your calendar and enjoy this rare, real-time conversation! 🌿

My seed grown currents started flowering for the first time. I collected them from the nearby wildlands. Pigmentation of the mother fruits included black, yellow, or red.

I started with about 33 seed grown apricots. About 1/3 self-culled by not surviving the winter. I culled others because the bark died on part of the trunks. One plant of the 12 currently flowers, a week later than the rest. What a lovely trait. One plant hasn't started flowering yet, but it doesn't thrive due to lack of winter-hardiness. Perhaps I should grow offspring from it anyway, to see we can delay flowering even more, and perhaps find  more winter hardy offspring. The later to flower, the more likely the flowers will survive frost.

I didn't cull any plants due to the flavor of the fruits... The whole population tasted good.

Edit to add: That tree that hadn't started flowering just went ahead and winter-killed.

I visit Mansfield Missouri the first weekend of May.

My lunch yesterday.

The richest fertilizer might bloom from love, not soil.

Yesterday, I spent time with the apricots.

Pruned off the watershoots, because doing it while young and tender saves lots of time and labor compared to doing it a year from now.

I thinned fruits, in hopes of harvesting larger fruits with less damage later on. I prune to one fruit per spur, and no closer than 2 inches to each other.

A couple of grafts from earlier this spring started growing!

I feel delighted to share that my conversation with The Provident Prepper just went live! We talked about Adaptation Gardening, food resilience, and the joy of growing seeds that thrive in your place—with your soil, your seasons, your community.

I also sent along a bunch of photos from my gardens, fields, and seed adventures—and they wove them beautifully into the video. You’ll see the plants and stories come alive as we talk.

Watch here:  

If the conversation speaks to you, I’d love it if you’d leave a comment or share it with someone who might benefit from growing in cooperation with nature.

Today, a local bakery serves my Malva sylvestris as a garnish on their pastries.

I planted the Going To Seed Eggplant grex this spring. Here's some photos of the fruits.