Ann Maud

I'm located in canada, zone 4 and I've grown skirret for about three years now, it grows nice and healthy and it spreads easily but the roots are too skinny to bother cooking with.  Last year i pulled it all out to plant something more productive.

I have sunchokes and they make great privacy between my garden and the road.  But we only eat a few.  

Thanks for the tip about the sweet potato stem.  I've  grown slips from organic sweet potatoes but i always find i run out of hot weather before they have a chance to mature.  I usually get about three small tubers per plant.  This year I'll plant them in my new high tunnel and hope the longer season helps.

Thanks everyone for the suggestions.  I think I will pull the shelves out from the windows a bit and wrap curtains around.  And then with an incandescent light on the floor that would probably keep the soil just above freezing.  Then after a couple of weeks it'll probably e warm enough overnight.  Luckily I'm not planting any tomatoes, my husband is avoiding high histamine foods.  I think my new setup will be much easier than last year, when I kept bringing the seedlings in the house at night, and I had a heck of a time barricading the cat out.

I have an uninsulated sunroom which I plan to use to start seedlings.  I'm almost finished making a set of shelves encased in wire mesh to keep the cat out.  The seedling shelf is set against the windows and will get sun from about 10am to 5pm.  In about two weeks I plan to start half my seedlings and germinate them in the sunroom at this point it'll still be below freezing at night.  So the dilemma is how to keep the seedlings warm overnight until the room warms up in the morning?  I could put in a small electric heater to heat the whole room, but maybe there's something more energy efficient.  Any ideas?  Thanks.

Your garden looks so green.  I wonder if it's inspired any neighbors?  I also love the sunchokes as a privacy screen to the road for my side garden, they work great.

Thanks so much for the link.  After reading what has been learned from so much experience, I feel more confident now continuing on with trying the deep litter method.

I added a lot more wood chips and I'm leaving the nesting area lid open a crack during the day and that seems to have solved the ammonia problem.  I think I'll add even more wood chips.  

I could probably use more ventilation too, but I'm hesitant to cut another hole in the coop.  I understand that the chickens can withstand cold temperatures, but it can get really cold here some nights in the dead of winter, down to say -30F overnight.

I have made compost heaps with manure and wood chips from the chicken coop, directly on the vegetable garden bed starting from fall.  Then in the spring I spread it all around.  There is a huge difference in the health of the new veggie plants in spring where I've spread out the thickest amount of old manure.  Much more growth.  This year my garden is bigger and I've started two compost heaps and I'm adding kitchen scraps, chicken manure and old plants.

More info: There are two air vents about 4" square located at either end of the coop on the side walls near the ceiling.  I only have the litter about 4" deep.  The smell is ammonia like.  Doesn't smell like pee or poo.

I wonder if I do still need more air.  I can definitely add more wood chips.  And I've got lots of leaves I can add.  What do you think?

I'm trying to start the deep litter method in my coop but tonight I cleaned it out because the odor is too strong.  I must be doing something wrong.  My coop has a floor area of about 18 sq. ft with 8 hens in there only for sleeping.  Half the coop is about 2 feet tall and the other half is 4 foot tall.  They free range all day.

I had about 3 weeks of old wood chips/poop in the coop but the smell was getting bad.  I've got two decent size air vents in the coop as well.  I've been adding new wood chips one a week and raking them into the old wood chips.  Also the coop door is open all day and temperatures are around freezing at night.

Any ideas on why the smell is so high?  I wanted this to work to help heat the coop at night.  The coop is partially insulated but I'm not planning on heating it, I didn't heat my previous coop and it the hens were fine, but now that I have a bigger coop I thought I could give the deep litter method a try.

Thanks.

I have a load of Jerusalem artichokes in the garden.  We've had a couple of frosts here already.  The first ones I picked seem to really taste like artichokes, but sort of in a sickly way.  Am I imagining this?  The whole family thinks they taste like artichokes.  We also grow regular artichokes.  But some how the Jerusalem Artichokes have a very strong flavor when cooked.  I need a way to mellow them out.  At this point no one will eat them except me.

Here's my coop.  It is mobile with an atv.  We've moved it to many locations but I find it doesn't need to be mobile as the chickens free range all day in the backyard.  We did put the wire mesh on all sides of the outer coop including the floor to keep predators out.