Anna Miller

I am growing two garden huckleberry plants this year, and want to respond to one thing in the original post. Mine started fruiting about a month ago, and are all still on the plants. I have had no issues with them rotting. One of the things that initially piqued my interested was a description of how they can stay on the plant almost indefinitely.

I have tried one raw, and like others have said, there is nothing appealing or redeeming about them in their raw state. At this point, I am waiting until I have enough to make a batch of jam with them, and am almost there.

I am going to agree with Hans. A friend of mine tried growing various beans and peas in mulch last summer, and they all showed signs of dehydration and Nitrogen deficiency. They all died before creating enough biomass for what you would want.

I learned:

1) cattle panels contain lead, and can leach into the soil

2) i don’t need to rush to get everything into the ground as soon as possible. Last year, i got sick right around our last average frost, and a lot of my plants got put in the ground 1-2 weeks late. My plants were perfectly fine, and my neighbors tomatoes died because of a late frost

3) i need to water more than i think i do

4) at least for me, leaf mulch should be composted before being used, otherwise it can do weird things with water. I watered one patch for five minutes, and checked the soil underneath, and it was still completely dry.

5) c. Maximas should not be trained vertically- they get attacked by squash vine borers. The ones i left on the ground to sprawl were able to make more roots along the stem, but the ones i grew vertically died

6) chickens do not do a good job clearing Bermuda grass- i put my chickens on a section of my garden that had a problem with weeds the year before. They ate everything except the bermuda grass, which had a head start thanks to the chicken fertilizer/poop it had gotten

7) i go through a lot of green bean seeds. I ordered some 1/2 pound bags for this year because last year i kept having to run out and buy more. Previously, i grew more pole beans, but trellising them started to feel like it was more trouble thank it was worth.

It’s somewhat of a story, but i have two five pound does that i would like to breed for meat purposes. Both are mutts, and both were pregnant when we got them and have already given birth once. One was an excellent mother, and the other had a kit get stuck in her birth canal, and aborted the other one.

I would really like to breed them for meat, and am trying to figure out a good buck to breed them to. I know a florida white would be the obvious choice, but the closest person to me i can find who breeds them is unwilling to sell one to me, because i would not be “keeping the bloodline pure”. She is three hours away from me anyways.

There is someone much closer who seems to always have silver foxes for sale. I love how they look, but would be nervous about breeding my ladies to a rabbit almost twice their size.

Does anyone here have any experience with this kind of thing?

A few years ago. I got this as a gift.
https://www.gardeners.com/buy/deluxe-galvanized-seed-saver-kit/8610573.html
In it, my categories are roots (onion seeds, carrots, beets, turnips, etc), brassicas (except the roots) solanaceae, tall things and grains (corn, okra, sunflowers, millet etc), legumes, curcubits, herbs, greens (except brassicas), functional flowers, decorative flowers. I have a separate box with my large quantities of seeds- buckwheat, a few beans, and an oat/pea cover crop mix.

I garden with a three year rotation in the main part of my planting area- nightshades+companions, curcubits+companions, and brassicas+companions. This grouping keeps things mostly together, and when I need to find something to fill in an empty spot, the rest is grouped by function.