Gardening

[Jericurl]

James, people have always eaten guinea pigs. It's just now starting to be heard of in the U.S. They are really very good.

 

[jamesngalveston]

I just saw an article on it...Me being from Louisiana would eat it, I think I have eaten worst.
Kinda small, like a cornish hen is to a chicken.
I guess you have to raise your own..i do not see them for sale in the store yet...But i would certainly try it....Everyone says it taste like pork.
WHere did you try it at...Texas

 

[Jericurl]

I would imagine it wouldn't be much different than eating nutria, except a nutria is much bigger.

I had some when I was down in Yucatan a few years ago.

 

[jamesngalveston]

I have eaten nutria many times and like it...
I am going to the amazon this summer and was thinking about going to machu picchu on the way home...maybe it will try it while there..
I kinda hope i dont like it....cause if i do..i will have them little suckers penned up everywhere....lol

 

[jamesngalveston]

Where did you go in the Yucatan. I go to honduras alot, specifically an island about 40 miles east from La Cieba .

 

[Jericurl]

I never had the opportunity to eat nutria when I lived in La.

I bet you will find some piggies on your trip. I had them when I visited Dzibilchaltun.
If you get a chance to visit Tulum, you should go.

I've never been to Machu Picchu but always wanted to go.

and I hear you about raising your own.
Manthing wants meat rabbits.
Right now I'm just trying to convince him that we need chickens.

 

[Jericurl]

Do you go to Roatan?

eta: We went to Progresso and Merida

 

[jamesngalveston]

Been to Roatan many many times.
The island i go to is owned by a good friend ..its called the cay island, just south of guanja...to the east and south of roatan.

Roatan has a big yacht dock there, and sometimes we go there for supplies.
fuel, ice,beer, etc...if we run out.

 

[Deezil]

I don't know how many noticed, but there was a few weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas where I was pretty much M.I.A. around here...

I was diving (deeply) in how organic farming, soil microbiology, plant biology, and nutrient breakdown/uptake, all work together. Anyone serious about their gardening, I would highly recommend picking up a few books - Teaming with Microbes, Teaming with Nutrients - both by Jeff Lowenfels, and Botany for Gardeners by Brian Capon. These books are eye-opening; I cant recommend them enough. I'm still in the process of reading them, and I know I will have to read them another time or two before I fully comprehend all the information within.

I dont know if I'll get my vegetable raised beds set up this year or not, I have other priorities first, so it depends on how far the dollars stretch, but I've found a lot of resources to get heirloom seeds and rarer versions of more common plants - chocolate mint, anyone?

Before the raised beds get built, I need to get my composting up-to-par, which is another topic entirely

 

[jamesngalveston]

Deezil, If i lived where you lived I would be reading on it also, because there is only one thing i would be growing....

When growing up, I would have to clean the chicken pens, and had to put the stuff in the garden work it in with a hoe...as did the horse droppings, cow stuff, and all the stuff from cleaning vegetables, made a heck of a garden.
Today it is easy to get mulch,good soil,organic anything.

 

[Deezil]

When growing up, I would have to clean the chicken pens, and had to put the stuff in the garden work it in with a hoe...as did the horse droppings, cow stuff, and all the stuff from cleaning vegetables, made a heck of a garden.
Today it is easy to get mulch,good soil,organic anything.

That method can work for quite a while - this is basically what built America, in the beginning - but in the long run (over several generations), the soil is actually being depleted rather than built-up.

No-till farming/gardening is a different beast. Granted, you have to till rather good that first time, to break the surface up and amend that top layer of soil.. But after you lay that first cover crop, theres no more tilling.

In a no-till set-up, all that mess you got from the chicken pens, and the left over garden clippings, the grass clippings, the weeds you pulled, leftover food from the kitchen, leaves in the fall - it would all get composted. That compost would be worth too much to sell, and you'll never find that quality at and store - unless you 'know a guy' (you could do one better by taking the compost, adding more leaves and small amount of food scraps and running that all through a vermicomposting set-up). That compost, could be used in compost teas which are a way to increase microbial life in the soil; or can be used for top-dressing, which is the act of taking the compost itself and spreading it out on the ground or around the base of the important plants you're treating, and this increases the organic matter and nutrients available to the microbial life.

There's also a trick about never having bare soil... And down in a place like Texas, you might have to grow a lot of trees, to give the sun something to hit before it bakes the soil & ground cover.. But it's entirely do-able, it's just a lot of work.. You'd have to establish the trees (fruit, anyone?) with some clover/alfalfa/borage/vetch/rye/etc.. Probably in the fall..

If you read those books, you'll come to understand that what you're trying to 'feed' is the microbial life, not the plant. Plants feed on what is excreted from the microbial life, in the 'root zone' - very narrow area around each particular root. Plants excrete sugars, themselves, that attract this microbial life, and by controlling what sugars they excrete, the plant can control the amounts of different types of life, which directly influences what nutrients become available to the plant when that life dies, is consumed or excretes waste itself.

Miracle Gro made its millions by skipping the step of feeding the microbial life, instead feeding the plant with nutrients that are already plant-ready. Sounds great, right? Maybe? Not really, when you realize that microbial life are what actually hold the nutrients in the soil, and when they become 'plant ready', they also become water-soluble.. You didn't hear about farming fertilizers leaching into our water supply until they started using water-soluble, plant-ready, lets-skip-the-microbial-action, products in a bottle.

When you put this together, it shows a picture of chemical fertilizers trying to tell the plant what it needs instead of the plant telling the microbial life what it needs. How could we - who dose the liquid fertilizers - possibly know what a plant needs, better than it does itself?

It's all pretty interesting stuff..

 

[Runningwolf]

James, people have always eaten guinea pigs. It's just now starting to be heard of in the U.S. They are really very good.

I think GreginND talk about eating Guinea pigs.

We do extensive gardening at home but it is mostly flowers with an extensive collection of Heath and heathers, day lilies, hostas, peonies and peony trees, and a host of other perennials.

We got Christmas put away early and my wife has been busy cleaning out drawers and closets. She said her spring cleaning is nearly done. Once the weather breaks her entire awake time is spent outside in the gardens.

 

[LoneStarLori]

Dan, that is a beautiful place! I wish my lawn looked that nice.

Manely I am going to have to get that book. This is some interesting stuff that I need to learn.
I have been trying to give back to the garden any scraps the plants produce and if I use a fertilizer, it's organic and worm based. I bought a small worm composting system last winter and although they seem to be happy little guys, I am not getting any tea and very little finished compost. Maybe I need to start singing to them.

 

[Deezil]

Manley I am going to have to get that book. This is some interesting stuff that I need to learn.
I have been trying to give back to the garden any scraps the plants produce and if I use a fertilizer, it's organic and worm based. I bought a small worm composting system last winter and although they seem to be happy little guys, I am not getting any tea and very little finished compost. Maybe I need to start singing to them.

The liquid that comes out of the worm composter is different from the 'compost tea' I referenced above.. That liquid can, though, be diluted into several gallons and applied in much the same way but it has different benefits.

Composting slows down in the winter, especially if the medium the worms are in, lowers in temperature. Make sure, on the flip side, that they dont get too hot in the summer and literally cook. Might want to make sure theres enough aeration, as most people tend to over-load their worm composters with too much food scraps and that'll throw the whole thing anaerobic which ends up killing off the worms in the end... I've yet to give it a go, but done lots of reading.

 

[JohnT]

Dan,

Your yard looks incredible! I could see myself spending all of my time out there!

 

[jamesngalveston]

thanks deezil..i will look into all that you said.

runningwolf...that is outdoor art....just beautiful.

 

[Runningwolf]

Dan,

Your yard looks incredible! I could see myself spending all of my time out there!

It's always revolving. If my wife runs out of space she'll completely tare out a garden keep parts of favorite plants and start all over. In the last 8 years there were two summers when I gave away three truck and trailer loads of day-lilies.

It's always a debate who spends more money, me on wine or her in the gardens. It's tough going to a decent nursery and not dumping $150 - $300.

This is the trailer loaded up while the truck is being filled.

 

[Jericurl]

Oh, that garden is just fantastic! WOW!

 

[LoneStarLori]

I noticed that my fall crops were not nearly as fruitful as the spring crops with the new "super dirt". So I ordered 500 Canadian night crawlers and 250 red wigglers today. I don't really know if the nutrients just got exhausted from the summer crop or if it was just the cooler weather of our fall. By cooler I am talking about 70º highs and 50º F. lows.
Maybe the worms will ward off the gophers

 

[drumlinridgewinery]

got into this whole crazy mess with to much produce. Couldnt give enough away. Its amazing what you can grow if you feed it. I like to use 2 year old chicken manure that is turned twice yearly. On the 4th turn it is dumped on the garden in the fall and the chickens are let loose to turn it into the soil. Still eating fresh onions, carrots, and potatoes. Have enough peppers, green beans, peas, corn, spinach, stewed tomatoes, and broccolli either frozen or canned to last till mid summer. The veggies go great with our home raised chickens, beef, and pork.

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