Like the illusion of Wall Street, with its vast and powerful investment banks, now shuttered, China too is an illusion perpetuated by the Globalists that gave us the 15,000 mile Caesar salad, poisoned cat food and lead based paint on babies' pacifiers. Like the illusion that money would come from thin air to always push housing prices higher, China has spent a generation pursuing its illusion. Pursuing an unattainable dream to be like the West, while 6000 years of its carefully shepherded top soil blows into the sea.
Julianj, How many plants do you have? What kind? I often get aphids on bell peppers indoors. I think I would try scraping the aphids off with my fingers and fingernails once a day (you want a green thumb, don't you?). Or make a stronger soapy solution and put it on with small brush, for a change.
Joined: Sep 30, 2004 Posts: 975 Location: On one of the blades of the fan
Posted: Fri Jun 10, 2005 1:35 pm Post subject:
Thanks for the advice nocar and Ludi.
I am growing lettuce, swiss chard, minature tomatoes, and one chilli pepper plant indoors.
I have no mercy on the aphids and will kill them with my bare hands if necessary. Please don't tell the Peak Oil Gun Club I'm getting - not pleasure - but satisfaction, out of killing, or they'll start sending me rifle catalogues.
Forgot the other two methods:
Yellow sticky flypaper - it's cruel, and quite frankly, with the short lifespan of aphids, Darwinian forces rapidly will trend towards aphids which are less attracted to yellow. I've tried it and its not effective enough.
Electric bug zappers. Mains operated. No objection to these other than the Powerdown one - I'm trying to diminish my use of lecky. I have not found any battery powered ones -
Solar battery recharger>rechargeable batteries> sustainable bug zapper.
I will try brushing on stronger soap solution, and report back.
Joined: Apr 03, 2004 Posts: 7023 Location: My Grandkids' Farm
Posted: Fri Jun 10, 2005 3:29 pm Post subject:
I was looking for a link but couldn’t find it – the idea is that aphids want to go under the leaves and so don’t like light; so, use a reflective mulch.
Straw in the field and…maybe foil shiny side up on potted plants?
Soapy water (the plainest, unscented, non-antibacterial you can get) is bad for aphids and good for soil too. _________________ Make a plan and work it:
Posted: Mon Jun 13, 2005 8:25 pm Post subject: Potatoes in a garbage can?
I am new to preparing for peak oil, but I do have a garden in. (So I feel like I am off to a good start.) My tomatoes are looking so wonderful that even the UPS man says he is jealous. But as someone already pointed out - tomatoes don't make a lot of food and I have four children and a spouse to think about.
Years ago I read an article about someone who planted sweet potatoes and "regular" potatoes in dirt in garbage cans. He drilled holes at intervals around the cans and the potatoes grew out the holes. After they were grown, he dumped the cans and got a lot of produce. The article said the cans were just about full of potatoes. (I don't know where all the soil went if that is true - into the potatoes?) Has anyone out there ever done this? It is too late to plant potatoes in my area (according to the experienced gardeners - this is my first year) and I don't have a lot of space anyway. But I do have two spare garbage cans I can devote to potato plantings if I can figure out how to do it. I could start them in the cool basement and then haul them outside when they'd come up a little? Any sugestions?
I've never heard of anyone growing potatoes in garbage cans, but to me, it makes perfect sense. I prefer growing potatoes in old, rich compost piles that have been 'fenced' in and re-used, so I think the premise is very similar if you mix the soil with some rich manure (not too much!!), a little bit of potting mix, water it really well, and plant the potatoes from the holes you make in the garbage can.
I am a HUGE potatoe fan. In my earlier days in eastern europe, I lived off of nothing BUT potatoes for up to two months at a time (with some 'flavors' from the veggie garden). I personally believe that this is a great idea and my mind is wandering towards the empty trash can I have inside the garage. Good luck. I'm going to try it, too.
(edit)- So how does your spouse react to 'getting ready?'
Yes, I have heard of this. Actually, you can still buy "potato pots" made specially for this purpose.
The method I have read about, but never actually used myself, is to place several inches of soil in the bottom of the barrel (pot, garbage can, etc.) and simply plant the potatos eye side up. When the potatos sprout a few inches, cover the plants with more soil and again wait for the sprouts to show.
Keep covering the sprouts, always letting some remain above the soil. Do this until the pot is full. Then let them grow. At harvest time, you'll have a barrel full of potatos. I have read some reports of people taking upwards of one hundred pounds of potatos out of one barrel.
This year, I am going to try this myself, instead of planting the potatos in my garden.
If you are working on setting up a garden I recommend Square Foot Gardening as the easiest and fastest was to get one going. In a post-apocalyptical scenario I would combine sq. ft and Lasgana methods, as sourcing some of the soil ingrediants for standard sq. ft. could be a bit more difficult.
Posted: Tue Jun 14, 2005 9:34 am Post subject: Re: Potatoes in a garbage can?
Laurie wrote:
Years ago I read an article about someone who planted sweet potatoes and "regular" potatoes in dirt in garbage cans. He drilled holes at intervals around the cans and the potatoes grew out the holes. After they were grown, he dumped the cans and got a lot of produce. The article said the cans were just about full of potatoes. (I don't know where all the soil went if that is true - into the potatoes?) Has anyone out there ever done this? It is too late to plant potatoes in my area (according to the experienced gardeners - this is my first year) and I don't have a lot of space anyway. But I do have two spare garbage cans I can devote to potato plantings if I can figure out how to do it. I could start them in the cool basement and then haul them outside when they'd come up a little? Any sugestions?
A local school grew potatoes in straw in a cylinder. The straw was held together by what looks like concrete-reinforcing wire but could be plain fencing. They included worm castings and some compost, but most of the volume was originally straw that compacts well as the potatoes grow.
Plants don't "use up" soil; they collect some nutrients from it and absorb the water held in the soil. I just read about an experiment where a tree planted in 200 pounds of soil ended up weighing just over 100 pounds and the soil still weighed 198 pounds. Most of the weight of the tree was from the products of photosynthesis: Carbon dioxide plus water plus sunlight becomes glucose plus oxygen. The glucose then provides the energy to build other molecules.
Joined: Nov 09, 2004 Posts: 1257 Location: Big Rock Candy Mountain
Posted: Tue Jun 14, 2005 1:40 pm Post subject:
Potatoes can also be grown in spoiled hay. Just place the spuds on the ground and cover with 1 to 2 feet of hay, straw, or whatever you can get. Makes harvesting easy-just fork over the covering.
Thanks for all the potato info! I am going to try a combination of methods with my old garbage cans and see what produces the most. I'm really excited about it!
It'll be a first for me. I've never grown potatoes before, but my mother grew up on a dairy farm. She was one of 17 children, and Grandma O'Connor used to feed them almost exclusively on potatoes. Her potatoes were a perpetual cycle. Grandpa plowed a trench outside the kitchen and Grandma would throw the peels in the trench all winter. (I think she covered it as she went along.) Anyway in the spring they'd have new potatoes, later they'd harvest and store, then Grandpa would plow the trench again and the whole process would start over. My mom swears potatoes are the best, most healthful food around. And Grandma O'Connor is in her 90's so there might be something to it. (BTW- you could see through my Grandmother's potato peels as well as you could see through a window - she didn't waste anything! - And potatoes still grew from the peels. That's hard for me to believe, but true. I'll go ahead and waste whole potatoes while I plant )
Now I'm on my way to look up square foot gardening. (So glad I found you guys)
Also - My husband just came home with "Backwoods Home" and "Home Power" - He's getting into this too. He works with power backup systems (UPSs and generators) So we are planning to use some of the old batteries he has to dispose of "properly" that are no longer in good enough condition for a hospital or internet server facility to rely on to set up our own off-grid system. This is gonna be a lotta work . . .
Does this mean that the potatoes just need good soil and the minimum of sun? I'm thinking of my shady balcony here...
BTW I can also recommend Square Foot Gardening, from my novice point of view, anyway.
How shady is your balcony? I have a house now, but I used to do all my gardening on the very small patio of my townhouse. My neighbors would walk by and marvel at all my pots.
Good soil and sun compensates for a lot. Still, growing in pots means you may have to supplement with some sort of fertilizer like "miracle grow." Plants do deplete the soil of nutrients and you've got to replenish it.
What kind of soil do you use? What kind of climate / geographical area do you live in?
Joined: Sep 30, 2004 Posts: 975 Location: On one of the blades of the fan
Posted: Thu Jun 16, 2005 7:46 am Post subject:
Interesting ideas!
Erl - my balcony faces East but has a brick wall, so it only gets a limited amount of sunshine in the morning until the sun moves round and is cut off by the bulk of the building. I shall take a couple of pix but I haven't time today.
I live in London. I didn't notice before, but the balcony gets wind channelled into it.
Currently I am using a mix of shop-bought compost and vermiculite (from Sq Ft Gardening). Plus various fertilizers.
I do have a small compost making bin and some powder called Garota which is supposed to accelerate the composting process.
I am a novice - year before last I grew herbs, tried a few veges last year. So this is the first real year of my attempts.
As I said before, the indoor plants are going great guns, but the same plant on the balcony is a sad, weakly thing. I'm wondering in my geeky way if I could fix up some sort of polished aluminium mirror to direct more sun onto the plants.
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