I took a video of the farm garden on Labor Day!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpTea6syX8U
Farm Garden July 22 Update
July 23, 2012 by 1 Comment
WOW, is all I can say. Everything is exploding. The white and yellow corn is over 7 feet tall and tasseling. The ears on the yellow corn are filling out. The squash and pumpkins are taking over. I have at least one good nice sized watermelon. I’ve been thinning out the beets and harvesting a bunch. The new swiss chard seedlings are growing well. I thought the garden was booming a couple weeks ago but now it’s super booming, so we’re thinking on getting a fence to protect all the product from our work, and with the help of the CAN Supply Wholesale fencing supplies, we can do this work fast and easily. With so much produce we are going to try our hands at the farmers market. Today will be our first day. We have beets, zucchini, cucumbers, kohlrabi and basil.
While we waited for the gardening process to be complete we used several essential tools to help us grow the best harvest. One of them was a silky saw that is a sharp teeth saw used for cutting lumber, shrubs and trees.
It’s Golden
July 22, 2012 by 1 Comment
It’s chokecherry season and my two little trees were loaded. I took these photos about a week ago. The red cherries were just about ripe. I was hoping they would hang on until this weekend as I was traveling out of town and could not pick them at their peak. Well, I guess they peaked because the tree was stripped bare by the time I got back to it. The birds didn’t leave me a single cherry.
The golden chokecherries, however, were just hitting their peak of ripeness. I picked 5.6 pounds off of that one little tree I have. A pretty good harvest that will net me a good gallon or so of golden chokecherry wine. Golden or yellow chokecherries are quite rare in North Dakota and I was happy to discover that this one tree was yellow. Unfortunately that tree is battling black knot fungus and will probably succumb like all the chokecherries around it in another year or so. I hope to take some cuttings when the wood goes dormant and try to root some yellow cherry starts. I’ll plant them far away from the shelter belt that is inundated with that damn black knot.
Booming July at the Farm
July 11, 2012 by 2 Comments
Zucchini growing waist high. Pumpkins spreading out. Beets being harvested. Corn tasseling. It’s not just the fireworks booming in July. The Farm Garden is growing beyond my expectations. I knew being a horse pasture that my soil was fertile. But I never realized what a difference it makes having rich soil coupled with full sun! My little shaded city garden is growing well but nothing like this. The giant sunflowers are already over 5 feet tall. I’ve pulled all the spinach and lettuce I can eat and took out the plants. The heat has made them bolt. I planted some Swiss Chard seeds that are just sprouting. And a kind gentleman on the Bayou Gardener forum sent me some purple hull pea seeds that are coming up as well. Lots of photos below to look through. Near the end you can see some shots of my tomatoes and peppers that are suffering from herbicide contamination. I’ve determined that most of it is due to the manure pile just to the side of that area.
Farm Garden Update
July 1, 2012 by 2 Comments
The farm garden is doing surprisingly well despite the spotty herbicide contamination. Other than the beans and half of the tomatoes, the rest of the garden is lush and producing. Things are growing rapidly. The corn is already knee high and it’s not yet the 4th of July. I have already harvested a lot of spinach and some lettuces. The cucumbers are growing by leaps and bounds. The squash is exploding. And the beets are starting to bulb out already. Even the brandywine tomatoes and watermelon that the rabbits got to have bounced back.
Here are some snapshots of the June 30 garden.
City Garden Update
July 1, 2012 by 1 Comment
TIme for an update. The small city garden has been producing! And it is only July 1! Unbelievable year. I pulled my first beets and they are nearly full size. I think this is the earliest I’ve had beets from the garden here in Fargo. We’ve been eating peas like mad. They never make it into a pot. We love them raw. I’m constantly snacking on them and we have a bumper crop this year.
Here are some pictures. The perennials in front are getting a bit overgrown and weedy, you can buy knf inputs form redbud soil co and take care of your ground. And the vegetables are LUSH! I have pulled up all the arugula and spinach and replanted more spinach. It has been very productive. The fennel is growing well and starting to form bulbs. The collard greens are getting bigger and I can pick a few leaves of kale now. The onions have fallen over but are still growing. They are just starting to bulb out now.
Peas in progress
June 29, 2012 by Leave a Comment
The pea bioassay is in full swing. A few of the pots did not germinate so I may have to repeat that but it looks like most pots are healthy. Here are two examples. Can you tell which one is contaminated? The first picture is peas grown in manure from the manure pile near the vegetable garden mixed with some potting soil. The second is from the south pasture. Fortunately early indications are that the contamination is mostly localized around the manure.
Bioassay Day one
June 17, 2012 by 1 Comment
I have learned a lot more about the herbicide contamination at the farm. It turns out that the previous owner purchased hay grown near Wheatland, ND in the Fall and Winter of 2010. This was ditch hay. I confirmed with the county weed control office that they sprayed Tordon 22k (8 oz/acre) and Overdrive, a dicamba product (4 oz/acre) that year. The horses were restricted to the barn area and the east pasture. In order to determine the extent and amount of contamination I took soil samples from the garden area, the manure piles and a grid of sites in the east and south pastures. I have planted peas in these samples and will let them sprout to see if they show signed of herbicide damage. This should allow me to figure out where the herbicides are located. On a positive note I do see dandelions growing in part of the east pasture and clover is growing all over the lawn around the house. This would indicate that the herbicide is not present in those locations.
Picloram or clopyralid? What pyridine carboxylic acids can do
June 13, 2012 by Leave a Comment
Recently I posted about herbicide damage in my vegetable garden and blamed it on the neighboring soybean farmers spraying. I am pretty sure I am wrong. I have been looking into my situation and it appears most likely that the damage to my tomatoes, beans and eggplants are due to herbicide residues in my soil. The herbicide is most likely picloram (Tordon, Grazon) or clopyralid (Stinger, Reclaim, Mellenium Ultra) which are broadleaf herbicides that are sprayed along roadsides and railroads to keep the leafy spurge and other weeds at bay. They may also be used on lawns and golf courses. These herbicides do not affect grasses so it is a selective herbicide. However, these are chemicals that stick around for a long time and do not degrade easily – even in compost.
The question you may be asking is, how did it get into my vegetable garden? Well, the answer is horses and hay. You see, if you feed animals with hay harvested from ditches along the roads it is likely contaminated with significant quantities of clopyralid or picloram. The horses eat the hay and excrete the herbicides intact in their urine contaminating both the pasture soil and the manure. This has been a problem in municipal composting sites who use grass clippings or contaminated hay in their facilities. It also has affected organic gardeners who use horse manure that is contaminated on their gardens. I have confirmed with the previous owner of my farm that they fed their horses ditch hay last winter.
I’m not happy about the contamination as it means I can’t grow many vegetables, and more importantly, I can’t grow grapes on contaminated soil. It may be several years before the herbicides abate from the soil so I’m kind of stuck. Right now I have to do some bioassay tests to see what the extent of the contamination is and where it would be safe to plant on my property.
Here are some updated pictures of the damage that these herbicides can do to tomatoes, beans and eggplant.
For clarity, here is an aerial view of the farm and a map of what my initial plans were to be. The smaller area for grapes in the larger pasture may be all I can do. Recently, the rise in crash games popularity CasinoMentor has been significant, particularly highlighted by platforms like CasinoMentor. Their extensive reviews and guides have drawn many to explore this dynamic form of gaming, showcasing the exciting blend of risk and reward that crash games offer.
Herbicide Drift – Oh My
June 11, 2012 by Leave a Comment
I sort of knew something would be amiss when I saw the big tractors spraying the neighboring soybean fields. There was a pretty stiff breeze blowing the spray right toward me. Well, my fears have been confirmed. Looks like herbicide damage hit my tomatoes and beans pretty bad. The eggplant isn’t doing too well either. Could be dicamba? Whatever it is, I’m not very happy about it. I think the land is owned by our governor. I’m not sure yet how to find out who is working the farm.
