Food 2019 Amateur Farm and Garden thread

I found a whole nest of wild mantises on the other side of my property this year! The biggest one was as long as my hand. Me and the kids moved most of them over to the garden.
They are so f'n cool. Look in that area in 6-8 weeks and maybe you'll find some of the egg cases hanging onto branches/weeds, then you can move those into your garden area.
 
fuckin monsters of the insect world though, them and dragonflies.

Would be way scarier than wasps if they were big.

Spiders probably still beat em though in terms of "things not to fuck with if human sized"
 
fuckin monsters of the insect world though, them and dragonflies.

Would be way scarier than wasps if they were big.

Spiders probably still beat em though in terms of "things not to fuck with if human sized"
Agreed on the spiders would be the worse.
We have lots of the jumping spiders here - these little fuckers(1-2 cm leg spread, at best) bite. Fortunately, it's not a major problem - non poisonous, bump like a mosquito at worse. Still, fucking spiders.

9182
 
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I've come to a strange realization about what grows well in my locale. Its all the tropical stuff.

Peppers, tropical vines, etc. The cooler temp stuff always has problems of one type or another
 
Love love love those things!


ANTS -
Choppers like some medieval torture killing machine. Can lift 20-40x their weight or more.
I bet some mad scientist somewhere is working on militarizing giant ants.
YEAH!! Ants ARE pretty fucking formidable, even the little ones if enough. Yeah, wife and I were moving some 4X6 wolmanized a fe days ago and at a point she was like "fuck it, I can't take those fucking ants biting me!" Her legs WERE getting kinda fucked up. Stinky, smelly man - no bites. Clean haus-frau - death by ants. I swear they were going for the v-jay.

Those ground cherries - threw down a 4X5' of thick cardboard, drilled holes through on about an 8" grid and planted 36 of those. It forced them to grow more upright but I think overall production will beat a more luxurious spacing like last years crop. Wife swore she didn't like them the first year, now I have to bitch at her to save some for the friggin gardener. :mad:
 
ehh, im actually not that impressed this year with my batches :/

I was wrong about the pepper ratio. I dunno why it worked in previous years, but this year its way off, i bascially have hashed peppers with some tomatoes.
We do 5 lbs of peppers to 25 lbs tomatoes.
 
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picking the second batch of tomatoes this weekend, figuring another 50lbs or so. Gonna make tomato paste this time around. Run em through the victorio, drain with cheesecloth, then spread the paste out on sheets and cook it down
 
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:eek::eek::eek::eek:

Good article. They left out one substantial piece of the pie on the topic - disruption of soil via tilling and overtilling. Tilling of soil carries micronutrients down and beyond the roots of most plants grown for food. It also carries aerobic(needs air) and anaerobic bacteria into areas of the soil where they die in mass quantities, introducing large amounts of cancer causing aflatoxins as they die, which plants can pick up. This is contrary to how nature builds topsoil. This is finally being studied more. And the fucking earthworms introduced from Europe have helped fuck the soil in North America greatly too. Some people make active efforts to kill them - I'm not quite at that point but have considered it. *Haven't tilled my garden in 15 years, only first time to bust the soil.
 
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Good article. They left out one substantial piece of the pie on the topic - disruption of soil via tilling and overtilling. Tilling of soil carries micronutrients down and beyond the roots of most plants grown for food. It also carries aerobic(needs air) and anaerobic bacteria into areas of the soil where they die in mass quantities, introducing large amounts of cancer causing aflatoxins as they die, which plants can pick up. This is contrary to how nature builds topsoil. This is finally being studied more. And the fucking earthworms introduced from Europe have helped fuck the soil in North America greatly too. Some people make active efforts to kill them - I'm not quite at that point but have considered it. *Haven't tilled my garden in 15 years, only first time to bust the soil.
how do you incorporate new biomatter/nutrients if you dont till them in?
 
how do you incorporate new biomatter/nutrients if you dont till them in?
Trickle down just as nature has done for eons - most vegetables only have roots extending .5 meter or less.. And plant roots themselves, as they die, are carrying large amounts of nutrients downward. Mushroom mycelium(layman: "roots") often extend a few feet into the soil and help prevent the further trickle down of micronutrients. Most people don't get that with the exception of a few types that attack trees, mushrooms are awesomely good for plants and primarily consume stuff plants can't consume without their help. They are "primary composters" of organic material, plants are secondary. *You find mushrooms in your garden, throw them in a blender with some water, then water the garden to spread them. Your plants will thank you.
 
Trickle down just as nature has done for eons - most vegetables only have roots extending .5 meter or less.. And plant roots themselves, as they die, are carrying large amounts of nutrients downward. Mushroom mycelium(layman: "roots") often extend a few feet into the soil and help prevent the further trickle down of micronutrients. Most people don't get that with the exception of a few types that attack trees, mushrooms are awesomely good for plants and primarily consume stuff plants can't consume without their help. They are "primary composters" of organic material, plants are secondary. *You find mushrooms in your garden, throw them in a blender with some water, then water the garden to spread them. Your plants will thank you.
you've gotta augment somehow though dontcha? Your soil would be exhausted in a couple years if you arent bringing in manure or compost, or something