Guest Post by the Hedgeless Horseman
If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.
-Cicero
Suffering from quarantine induced depression? Put down the phone, mouse, or HotPocket, and pick up a hoe!
I had mentioned in my recent article on raising chickens that I would write a garden article.
This article is the sum of our experiences since 2008 with the chickens. I may write the garden article another day.
However, unlike my chicken and family milk cow articles, which are highly detailed guides, this is more of a photo essay intended to motivate you, dear ZeroHedge reader, to get out in the yard and garden. Truly, everything you really need to know about gardening has already been written on the internet, and is in this great book:
The Encyclopedia of Country Living, 40th Anniversary Edition
Carla Emery, $ 19.77
Especially if one does not live on a farm, it is a good thing to know the how, when, what, and where of providing for ourselves.https://www.zerohedge.com/contributed/2013-01-24/will-you-pay-kid-read-12-books-your-selection
…or, is available in a gardening guide through your local ag extension office:
Please understand that mrs_horseman and I are not gifted gardeners, nor do we spend massive amounts of time in the garden. Despite these truths, we are still able to produce an abundance of healthy and delicious food throughout the year, and you can too!
You might choose to start easy with a kitchen herb garden like ours.
Or maybe you want to create some raised beds on the lawn that get watered automatically with the sprinklers. Make sure that your lawnmower fits in between the beds.
You want the beds narrow enough that you can easily reach into the center.
Some folks say that railroad ties are not good for beds, because they may leach chemicals into the soil. I don’t know, but I can tell you that they will last for more than a decade, and are totally resistant to child laborers ramming them with a lawnmower.
Our garden is always 100% organic…right up until I see the first insect…then I bomb the shit out of it with pesticides. We tried the organic methods, and failed miserably. Feel free to knock yourself out.
We do, however, use only natural fertilizer in the form of our horses’ manure that we compost with lawn clippings. You should have no problem finding a local horse stable that will allow you to come pick up some for free. This black gold is the key to a productive garden.
Potatoes, or sweet potatoes if you live in the humid South like we do, are probably the easiest way to produce large amounts of calories from a garden.
Cruciferous vegetables like broccoli, cauliflower, kale, and cabbage are high in vitamins A, C, and E.
Beans are easy to grow, and provide an opportunity for the family to spend quality time together shucking them at the kitchen table. Listen to some Bluegrass music to set the mood.
Nothing tastes like a fresh salad from the garden.
Buckwheat makes a great cover crop and a delicious salad.
Don’t forget to throw in a berry patch. You will be glad that you did.
Peas and carrots from the garden taste so much better than frozen or from the can, especially when paired with homegrown rabbit and freshly baked whole wheat bread.
Swiss chard grows like a weed and is great for stir fry.
Eggplant for freshly made baba ganoush is not to be missed.
What are you waiting for? Get out there and get started!
Peace, liberty, health, and love!
h_h
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excellent, but a small item – youll be better off without the pesticides.
– youll be better off without the pesticides.
I used to think that too until I realized that in Texas the bugs are as prolific and destructive as anything found in the Amazon basin. If you want to eat what you grow here, you use pesticides. I use sevin dust and a neem spray. We have fireants and they love to build nests in containers so sevin is a must.
This is a floating fire ant colony….
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and these are fire ant bites….
Yeah, stay away from the pesticides. You’re killing benefical insects, soil bacteria and birds that eat the insects. Use Neem oil as a deterrent and do daily inspections for detrimental insects, bacterial and viral diseases. Here in FL I have an army of lizard assassins that are bad ass bug busters. Using pesticides would take them out too.
The best part of the garden today is that it gets me away from the computer and calms me as I realize that yes, I can feed myself. Our neighbor has chickens, so we have eggs. I have about 1,200 lbs of green coffee & a commercial coffee roaster, so I’m a “rich” man if the stores all close.
Everyone can grow food, start your Victory garden today!
Buy land, they’re not making any more of it…Mark Twain
1200 lbs of green beans! Well, at least you’ll be awake for the ending.
Lol
If I were single then a Ho’ to quarantine with during this crisis would have helped .
Make sure your mower can fit between the beds. That. I learnt the hard way. Nice cabbage, I can never grow those things
I’m never had much luck either, aphids or something always seem to get them…
Make it even wider than necessary, as you might get a chance to trade up to a bigger one.
Cabbage is easy. Just make sure you spray with BT when the cabbage worms arrive. Harmless bacteria to humans, turns cabbage worms to mush. It is a beautiful thing.
First thing I noticed was your middle of the back handgun carry.
Carry on.
Just came in to cool down after hours of planting and saw this, outstanding post Hedgeless Horseman…we are simpatico.
I’m in my 8th year of building a modest farm, self-sufficient homestead.
I have also taken significant interconnected self-defensive tactical measures.
Yo is right on about Diatomaceous Earth been using it for years…I also use a little Seven dust (as little as possible).
One little tactic that I use is toilet paper rolls, they are perfect for protecting some plants against cut worms, and I suspect other bugs.
Keep the faith, your powder dry, and a glint in your eye!
For plant collars I take 3.5 inch pvc and chopsaw 3-4″ circles, one for each plant. Protects against cut worms and if you water manually, just fill it up once or twice. That way you do not water overhead which encourages fungus, and you do not water the weeds. For tomatoes/ groups of green beans etc, I buy rolls of steel roofing flashing, cut them in pieces and tape/weld circles. Just water in the circles. And you can fertilize/ mulch /compost heavily in the circles, goes right to the roots. I’ve never seen anyone do this stuff, but it really works for me. Wouldn’t work on a commercial scale obviously, unless you could rig up some sort of auto drip system into the circles, but I just don’t have time to work on that idea at this time.
OK, you got my attention but how do you put it together? Got Pics?
Never uploaded pics anywhere, do you have a service you recommend where I don’t need an account? I’m kind of a hermit that way, ie no facebook, etc.
IluvCO2,
Yea ‘me too’ on the pics. Outside my tight inner circle have only loaded two pics on TBP in five years. Me with Shari Lewis in the 80’s (I had such a crush my whole life) on my own post, and me with a beard on a Llpoh post.
Had some cut worms eating some plants…put them inside the castle walls of used toilet paper holders…sprinkled a little Diatomaceous Earth around them, and insect problem solved. For bugs it’s like walking on razor blades…bare foot.
Diatomaceous Earth works on Japanese Beatles as well. First week or so of June my garden, arbors, and orchard looks like Pearl Harbor on December 7th 1941.
Use a spray on the high branches…but toss DE on the lower ones. It’s a death sentence to the little Jap Zero’s.
Speaking of Pearl Harbor and race, I grew up with a guy who had a real problem every December 7th. He was half black and half Japanese…every year at that ominous anniversary he was always overcome by an irresistible urge to bomb Pearl Baily. Poor guy was conflicted.
Goodness golly gracious, great gardening glimpses!
As for the the library part of this missive; I strongly recommend the readership of TBP acquire by any means “Henley’s Formulas For Home And Workshop”.
The particulars on this invaluable, must-have treasure trove: Hiscox, Gardner D, ed., “Henley’s Formulas For Home And Workshop”, Avenel Books, Crown Publishers, Inc. 1979.
ISBN: 0-517-29307-2
If you have a garden, a library, and a .308 you just about everything you need.
Turns out I have just about everything I need.