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Summary
part 1 of a 2 part podcast
Brock lives in Minnesota which is cold in winter. There are lots of lakes. He's already listened to a bunch of Paul's podcasts.
He has 3 raised beds and a crab apple tree in front of the house where it's sunny, to grow vegetables. The property is mostly flat and is about 2 acres; he aims to feed 5 people and some chickens. Right now he has a lot of cucumbers. He planted a bunch of potatoes and beans but the rabbits ate a lot of them. He plans to rabbit proof the fence.
His wife likes cooking and canning, but mostly the gardening falls to him. Paul thinks that's a big bonus.
He's already started making a hügelkultur, using ash trees which are being killed by off pests. He has more dead trees to cut down.
They talk about RMHs, but there is a robust department of making you sad, plus a neighbor who tends to object to stuff. Paul suggests building an extra big berm between him and the neighbor. Paul says you have to comply with the government at all times so they have nothing to complain about.
Brock needs soil for the proposed hügelkulturs and mentions he has a source of compost which is bio-assayed. However, Paul points out the pitfalls of the bio-assay and doesn't recommend importing it. Instead, he suggests digging in between the hügelkulturs and using the nice clean soil to build the hügelkulturs.
The talk turns to the crab apple trees. They have harvested one and like the fruit. Paul feels crab apples are more work than other apples.
Paul's next point is sunchokes. They discuss the side effects and Paul explains ways to mitigate those. Sunchokes give high calories per acre. They also can be left in the ground and harvested during fall and winter. Brock like the sound of that. The other excellent thing is walking onions.
Relevant Threads
Midwest USA regional forum
Hugelkultur forum
Rocket Mass Heaters forum
Food Preservation forum
The great big thread of sunchoke info - growing, storing, eating/recipes, science facts
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This podcast was made possible thanks to:
Dr. Hugh Gill Kultur
Kyle Aster
Sasquatch
Bill Crim
G Cooper
Mehron Kugler
Bill Erickson
Julia Winter, world's slowest mosaic artist
Sean Benedict
Rita Bliden
Brent Lawson
Amy Berry
Song Zheng
Dana Martin
Janelle
thomas adams
David Lucey
Kay Gelfing
Clay McGowan
Shay Riggs
Dr. Jackie
Cindi Duehmig
Samantha Lewis
Polly Jayne Smyth
Banter Couch
Rebekah Harmon
Chris Holtslag
Zach Keeshin
Paul Tipper
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