Brice Moss

Horse manure contains a lot of viable grass seed. six months in a hot compost pile will either heat kill or germinate and smother most of those seeds, the downside of using it fresh is more time spent weeding, but in a layered system that won't likely be an issue.

growing from tubers means you get plants that produce the same type of tubers, much like growing apples from seed rarely produces a palatable apple, growing sunchokes from seeds is unlikely to produce the lage vigorous tasty tubers we want.

Carl Moore wrote:

While the roundup has a long lifetime in soil, its also pretty mobile, the three year organic certification clock is based mostly on transport downstream and is pretty safe in most enviroments.

I would emphatically disagree with this statement, but I'll leave people to follow the info provided above if they desire.

if it were that persistent in the root zone there would be no need of a new application on each new years crop, I'm not trying to detract from the dangers of this stuff circulating around but giving up on every patch f soil thats been sprayed with roundup for the next century ain't gonna work.

juniper is indeed long lasting, especialy in the dry climates it tends to grow in.

To give a good answer to this we need to know about the climate and soil. Untreated pine poles will last 10 years or more in the well drained sandy soils of my families spead in michigan. But here on my homestead in the PNW on red clay with 6 months of rain with temps above freezing 6" treated poles are faling apart at 3-7 years. I'm hoping the red cedar I'm replacing them with will do better.

While the roundup has a long lifetime in soil, its also pretty mobile, the three year organic certification clock is based mostly on transport downstream and is pretty safe in most enviroments.

Your best bet for soild rehab would be to plant it in forage mixes and run a grass fed free range cattle or sheep and pig operation forthe first few years, slowly shifting to more veggies this also lets pastured poultry is also an option.

one big consideration as to weather this feild can become productive is the neigouhbors though, if its a 15 acre strip with cornfeilds on either side overspray and seed contimination will always be an issue and you'll never get non roundup ready broadleafs to grow well. if it's a small patch isiolated by woodlands it could become a great site in a few years and be self supporting in meat critter almost from the start.

The folks at Food Not Bombs here in Portland are doing great things in terms of conecting gardeners and garden plots and folks who need ta get some healthy food. I'm sure if you got in touch with them they'd be able to share some about their sucesses and pitfalls to avoid.

http://www.foodnotbombs.net/contacts.html

Blair Buchmayer wrote:Thanks for posting about that book for the Puget Sound region. I ordered it and am excited for it to come! I've been looking for something more specific to the region, feels like 99% of gardening books don't really apply here.

The climate here west of the cascades is similar to England in a lot of ways so organic guides written for that market work well. I don't put tomatoes in the ground till mid April or early June and will be planting kale broccoli and Brussel sprouts in august this year for December harvests

it's possible to make syrup from alder sap, not sure if you could find a market for the syrup though.

Mother Earth News highlighted this neat article in their email list this week might be a life saver for some bread addicted folks who are having issues with the gluten.

http://www.motherearthnews.com/relish/help-im-allergic-to-bread.aspx?newsletter=1&utm_content=08.13.12+HE&utm_campaign=2012+HE&utm_source=iPost&utm_medium=email

one thing to remember with coons is that they are territorial so if you have a coon that eats chickens and you shoot him chances are good the next one won't and if you have a coon that don't eat chicken she'll keep the other coons at bay, I've got a mama coon here that digs in my compost bins a bit and scares the crap outa an occasional housegeust cause she likes to hang out in my front yard in summer but she don't bother my chickens or goats so we get along just fine. in fact last years baby coons would walk right up within arms length of us to grab scraps at night.