Economics and Investing:

The spot prices of silver and gold recently dipped to $14.70 USD and $1,006 USD, respectively. This short-term aberration in long-term market trends can be attributed to both the sag in oil prices and to near panic shifts by European investors into the United States equities following news of the Greek bailout and a possible Euro collapse. I recommend that anyone who sees the need to diversify their portfolio do so NOW. If you wait until October, you may miss the boat. Physical silver is the logical choice. If you already have your beans and bullets squared away, then I highly recommend buying some pre-1965 US circulated silver coins, immediately. – JWR

o o o

Gold, Golf, & Silver … are Similar

o o o

1 out of 3 American workers support the rest of the country: Those not in the labor force surges to another record at 93,770,000.

o o o

How Microsoft Lost the Browser Wars and the Comex is Losing the Precious Metals Trade

Hugh’s Quote of the Day:

“Beware that thou forget not the Lord thy God, in not keeping his commandments, and his judgments, and his statutes, which I command thee this day…” Deuteronomy 8:11 (KJV)

Notes for Friday – August 07, 2015

7 August 1933 is the birthday of Jerry Pournelle. He, along with Larry Niven, authored the survivalist classic Lucifer’s Hammer.

o o o

Today, we present another entry for Round 60 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The $10,000 worth of prizes for this round include:

First Prize:

  1. A Gunsite Academy Three Day Course Certificate, good for any one, two, or three day course (a $1,195 value),
  2. A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses. (Excluding those restricted for military or government teams.) Three day onPoint courses normally cost $795,
  3. DRD Tactical is providing a 5.56 NATO QD Billet upper with a hammer forged, chromlined barrel and a hard case to go with your own AR lower. It will allow any standard AR type rifle to have quick change barrel, which can be assembled in less than one minute without the use of any tools, and a compact carry capability in a hard case or 3-day pack (an $1,100 value),
  4. Gun Mag Warehouse is providing 20 Magpul pmags 30rd Magazines (a value of $300) and a Gun Mag Warehouse T-Shirt. (An equivalent prize will be awarded for residents in states with magazine restrictions.),
  5. Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources (a $350 value),
  6. A Model 120 Series Solar Generator provided by Quantum Harvest LLC (a $340 value),
  7. A $250 gift certificate from Sunflower Ammo,
  8. KellyKettleUSA.com is donating both an AquaBrick water filtration kit and a Stainless Medium Scout Kelly Kettle Complete Kit with a combined retail value of $304,
  9. TexasgiBrass.com is providing a $300 gift certificate, and
  10. Two cases of meals, Ready to Eat (MREs), courtesy of CampingSurvival.com (a $180 value).

Second Prize:

  1. A Glock form factor SIRT laser training pistol and a SIRT AR-15/M4 Laser Training Bolt, courtesy of Next Level Training, which have a combined retail value of $589,
  2. A FloJak EarthStraw “Code Red” 100-foot well pump system (a $500 value), courtesy of FloJak.com,
  3. The Ark Institute is donating a non-GMO, non-hybrid vegetable seed package–enough for two families of four, seed storage materials, a CD-ROM of Geri Guidetti’s book “Build Your Ark! How to Prepare for Self Reliance in Uncertain Times”, and two bottles of Potassium Iodate– a $325 retail value,
  4. A $300 gift certificate from Freeze Dry Guy,
  5. A $250 gift card from Emergency Essentials,
  6. Twenty Five books, of the winners choice, of any books published by PrepperPress.com (a $270 value),
  7. A pre-selected assortment of military surplus gear from CJL Enterprize (a $300 value),
  8. TexasgiBrass.com is providing a $150 gift certificate,
  9. RepackBox is providing a $300 gift certificate to their site, and
  10. Safecastle is providing a package of 10 Lifestraws (a $200 value).

Third Prize:

  1. A Royal Berkey water filter, courtesy of Directive 21 (a $275 value),
  2. A large handmade clothes drying rack, a washboard, and a Homesteading for Beginners DVD, all courtesy of The Homestead Store, with a combined value of $206,
  3. Expanded sets of both washable feminine pads and liners, donated by Naturally Cozy (a $185 retail value),
  4. Two Super Survival Pack seed collections, a $150 value, courtesy of Seed for Security, LLC,
  5. Mayflower Trading is donating a $200 gift certificate for homesteading appliances,
  6. APEX Gun Parts is donating a $250 purchase credit,
  7. Montie Gear is donating a Precision Rest (a $249 value), and
  8. Two 1,000-foot spools of full mil-spec U.S.-made 750 paracord (in-stock colors only) from www.TOUGHGRID.com (a $240 value).

Round 60 ends on September 30th, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that there is a 1,500-word minimum, and that articles on practical “how to” skills for survival have an advantage in the judging.

Our Experience Growing and Storing Our Own Food- Part 2, by Tennessean

Seed (continued)

Winter Squash

One needs to give these cultivars a LOT of room, planting on a grid 8’ by 8’ is about right. This year we are growing two winter squash cultivars that keep a long time in a root cellar. Anna Swartz is a C. maxima and Waltham Butternut is a C. moschata and will not cross pollinate (this is why you must have Suzanne Ashworth’s book!), so we will be saving the seed from these. Insects pollinate the cucumber family, and we’ve oodles of all sorts of pollinator insects in East Tennessee, and they fly for many thousands of feet looking for blossoms. On each “hill”, dig an 18” wide, 12” deep hole, and mix two gallons of composted manure, ¼ cup lime, and ¼ cup enhanced triple 15. Plant four seeds at the corners of the “hill.” Water with a drip irrigation system.

Potatoes

We’ve settled on Yukon Gold potatoes. 95% of our seed potatoes that are saved in mesh bags on hooks in our root cellar survived over the fall and winter months. You really, really need a root cellar. Buy the recommended book and get to work. Grow potatoes on a plot where you have grown legumes the year before and you will probably get a decent crop without any added fertilizer.

Tomatoes

Prepare the hole for the tomato seeding about like that recommended for the winter squash. It is best to have a single row of tomato plants spaced about 2’ apart in an area that gets good air circulation to reduce transfer of the early blight fungus from plant to plant. You may need to fence in the tomatoes with 2’ chicken wire to keep Bugs Bunny out and hang old CD’s around the tomatoes. The bright reflection scares most birds away and vastly reduces losses due to bird pecks.

Tomatoes are either determinant or indeterminate. The latter keep growing vines until disease or drought kills the vines. The former are mostly hybrids; the latter are mostly heirlooms. We’ve tried a great many cultivars. In our area early blight (a fungus disease) is our major issue. Clemson University research showed that planting tropical nightshade family plants (e.g., tomatoes, eggplant, peppers) in the center of 5’ wide red plastic mulch speeds time to harvest. Since the fungal spores that infect the tomato leaves come from the soil, the red mulch and 3’ wide weed cloth on both sides of a tomato row reduce infection. Removing the lower leaves that seem damaged by the fungi also helps. We recommend burning all tomato vines at the end of the season. One heirloom cultivar that is somewhat resistant to the fungi is the Black Plum (from the Crimean region and indeterminate) that produces the most excellent pasta sauce you will ever eat. Our Black Plum vines in mid July are 7‘ long and have to be corralled with T posts tied to tomato cages. Researchers are working very hard to develop tomato cultivars resistant to early blight. We are trying one of these– Mountain Magic– this year.

The conical tomato cages sold at Home Depot, Lowe’s, and most gardening stores are as useless as a screen door in a submarine. Why? The conical shape virtually guarantees that if your tomato plant reaches a decent size, the cage will fall over. It is the idiotic geometry that is the problem. Sure, they will nest nicely. So what?

What is there to do? Go this winter to Home Depot or Lowe’s or wherever and get thyself a roll of reinforcement wire used for concrete work. This comes in tall rolls and is rusty. Forget about and ignore the rust. Get a pair of wire nippers (electrical tools to cut rather heavy gauge wire) and also a pair of smallish Vise Grip pliers. On sunny days this winter cut the roll of wire into sections about four to six feet wide. This will yield a cylindrical cage of about the right diameter.

Using the vise grip, grab the horizontal sections of wire at what will become the bottom, and cut these out. Cut out enough rows so that you will have only vertical wires at the bottom at least 12 inches and preferably 15 inches long, if your soil will permit. These are stuck into the soil with the tomato plant in the center.

My neighbor does this. I’ve yet to see a single cage fall over, and I’ve been watching over the last four years. He stores these off season on a tarp, covered by another tarp, secured against the wind.

Onions

The seed only lasts a year or so. It’s very hard to keep them all winter, though we try. We suggest Egyptian Walking onions. Read about these on Wikipedia. Thomas Jefferson grew these in his Monticello garden. Around here they are called “winter onions” because people leave them in the ground all winter and dig them up as needed. In colder climates, bales of straw on top of the raised bed will keep them happy. IF one has sufficient rain in April to June then in July the flower stalk does not make flowers but oodles of bulblets, which are planted (only halfway) in the soil and kept watered until the fall rains. Over the winter the in-ground bulbs will divide. In midsummer, as they go dormant, I divide up the bulbs and replant. I strongly suggest growing these on a 3” by 3” grid in an easily weeded raised bed. One may also (as I am about to do) put the bulblets in small pots in starting mix and keep watered. I note in passing that we have found that bok choi interplanted with these onions is pretty much ignored by leaf beetles. We wish to test this with other members of the cabbage family.

Peanuts

If your soil and climate allow for peanut cultivation, consider peanuts for their quite high fat (and caloric) content as opposed to other legumes, like field peas. A caution about peanuts: very quickly dry the peanuts as they are still attached to the plant. A fungus that produces a toxic carcinogen (aflatoxin) very readily grows on damp peanuts. After the peanuts are mostly dry, detach them from the plant and dry until they’re a constant weight. A homemade bulk dryer as described below will be invaluable. Weigh four cups of peanuts in the shell before drying the peanuts in the shell and at intervals during the drying process. When the weight approaches a constant value, your peanuts will be as dry as you can get them. I suggest immediately shelling the peanuts and roasting them. Then put them in glass canning jars, with a band and lid, and pump out most of the air with a Pump ‘N Seal. Hold back enough shelled peanuts from roasting for next year’s seed. Beware: rabbits love peanut leaves, and mice will travel from adjacent counties to eat your peanuts while they are drying. Squirrels have been known to dig peanuts right out of the ground and eat them.

Garlic:

In October, separate out individual cloves of garlic and plant them a couple of inches below the surface. Remove the flower heads in May to direct all the food storage to the bulbs. In mid summer, after the garlic tops die down, carefully remove from the dirt and braid the garlic into braids and hang in a cool, dark, moderate humidity space. Territorial Seeds has an astounding number of different garlic varieties. The main difference is the “soft neck” versus the “hard neck” distinction.

Oregano

In our area, this is a perennial. Now I strongly suggest that you grow oregano in a raised bed far, far, away from any other veggie plots, as the small seeds will wind blow and next spring you will have ‘volunteer” oregano growing in any nearby veggie bed. You’ll likely have lots of it.

Perennial Leeks

We are propagating perennial leeks, both by seed and by division of the cloves as they begin to sprout come fall. We do this in raised beds.

Rotation

It is important for several plant families not to plant veggies from the same family in the same plot until three years have passed. This is especially true for the nightshade, cabbage, and cucurbit families. Keep a detailed record of what veggies were grown in what plot each year for rotation planning. Corn and legumes do not seem to need as much rotation as other families. Yes, we’ve grown all these veggies, as well as peppers, sweet potatoes, cabbages, broccoli, cauliflower, Brussel sprouts, cucumbers, eggplant, and others.

Cover Crops

Unless you are very fortunate, your soil will not have nearly enough organic matter (aka humus) in it. There are beneficial fungi that form (sometimes critical as in the lady slipper orchids) symbiotic relationships with plant roots. These need a soil with substantial organic matter to prosper. Humus, with its negative charges, also acts as a cation exchanger to hold on to the important cations (more below). Sowing a crop of annual winter rye in the fall will:

  1. Add humus to the soil,
  2. Come spring, will inhibit the germination of many weeds, and
  3. Will sequester nitrogen thru the winter.

Every chemist knows that all nitrate and ammonium salts are soluble. One may mix rye with hairy vetch to add nitrogen. For a summer cover crop, try a hybrid that comes from sudan grass and sorghum. It is best to bush hog the crop at the flowering stage, as it will become “weedy” if the seeds are allowed to mature. Another great summer cover crop (if your climate permits it) is Iron and Clay field peas. Thomas Jefferson grew these, they take a long time to make flowers and make very long vines. Diakon radish (aka Tillage Radish) is an interesting cover crop, because the roots go deep and it winter kills for ease of spring planting. A very useful cover crop is Austrian Winter Peas sown in the fall. In our area they survive the winter and fix some 160 pounds of nitrogen per acre. If one allows them to mature, the green peas in their pods taste (at least to me) exactly like English peas. Of course, all non-food vegetable matter is returned to the soil via a compost pile, except of course the pieces the chickens like to eat. You do plan to have chickens, right?

For all cover crops, bush hog these before roto-tilling them into the soil; otherwise, you will waste time and energy unwinding vines and stems from your rototiller. Yes, we have tried all these cover crops.

Fertilizer

We augment commercial 15-15-15 with a micronutrient mix and magnesium sulfate (aka Epson Salts) from your drugstore to add to the commercial NPK fertilizer. See www.foodforall.com for this micronutrient mix. For legumes, we mix ½ 15-15-15 with ½ 0-20-20 and for corn we mix ½ 15-15-15 and ½ 46-0-0 (urea). We stockpile LOTS of triple 15, 46-0-0, Epsom salts, and bags of micronutrient mix. Since some of our soil has a lot of clay we add gypsum (calcium sulfate) to the soil to loosen the clay. William McKibben’s book is a must read on balancing soil nutrients. His book is based on the massive research done by Dr. William A. Albrecht at the University of Missouri on balancing the cations in the soil (e.g., Ca, Mg, K, and the micronutrients). I’m now reading the second of his books with his collected papers. Albrecht showed that having the correct mix of major and micro nutrients was critical to growing food that led to healthy animals. Cows and pigs could tell the difference between food grown with the correct mix of macro and micro nutrients and food grown on plain soil! Albrecht showed over and over again that the main benefit of adding lime (calcium carbonate) to the soil was the addition of enough calcium for great plant growth, not raising the pH per se. Dr. Albrecht suggests that exchangeable cations in the soil should be about 70% calcium, 20% magnesium, with 5-10% potassium. The remainder is mostly bound hydrogen ions.

Letter Re: Calcium Hypochlorite

I recently bought a 1 lb. bag of DryTec calcium hypchlorite through Amazon. When I repackaged it for long-term storage I noticed there was very little chlorine odor. I made a 1/2 gal. per directions for stock. I poured the stock directly on the tail of a non-colorfast shirt (bright red that already had white spots from a sodium hyphochlorite spill) and left it for hours; it didn’t even lighten the color. I don’t know any other way to test the amount of available chlorine that I have on hand, but I am deeply concerned that a lot of people who think they have excellent water purification stored for the future are going to get sick due to the failure of the calcium hypochlorite. – K.M.

HJL Responds: Thanks for that feedback. That is an excellent reason for testing and sampling your long-term preps while you have the ability to replace the defective items. Once your ability to replace the items is gone, the need for constant sampling is certainly lessened, but until then you should be regularly testing your ability to “make do”. You will often hear of “Grid-down” challenges, where families will simply turn the power off for the weekend and live as if something had actually happened. You will be amazed at how often well-laid plans don’t quite work out the way you had envisioned. The peace of mind brought about by expending a couple hundred dollars every year on things you consume is well worth it.

Notes for Thursday – August 06, 2015

On August 6, 1945, the United States of America dropped the first Atomic bomb on Japan. The bomb, though small by today’s standards, possessed more power than 20,000 tons of TNT, a destructive force equal to the load of 2,000 B-29s and more than 2,000 times the blast power of what was previously the world’s most devastating bomb. While the effect of the bomb on the outcome of the war is still debated today, one thing is sure–Pandora’s box had been opened. Even today, the fear of a single nuclear bomb in the hands of an unstable government sends chills down the spine. To date, the U.S.A. is the only country to have ever used nuclear bombs in a military attack on another country.

o o o

Today, we present another entry for Round 60 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The $10,000 worth of prizes for this round include:

First Prize:

  1. A Gunsite Academy Three Day Course Certificate, good for any one, two, or three day course (a $1,195 value),
  2. A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses. (Excluding those restricted for military or government teams.) Three day onPoint courses normally cost $795,
  3. DRD Tactical is providing a 5.56 NATO QD Billet upper with a hammer forged, chromlined barrel and a hard case to go with your own AR lower. It will allow any standard AR type rifle to have quick change barrel, which can be assembled in less than one minute without the use of any tools, and a compact carry capability in a hard case or 3-day pack (an $1,100 value),
  4. Gun Mag Warehouse is providing 20 Magpul pmags 30rd Magazines (a value of $300) and a Gun Mag Warehouse T-Shirt. (An equivalent prize will be awarded for residents in states with magazine restrictions.),
  5. Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources (a $350 value),
  6. A Model 120 Series Solar Generator provided by Quantum Harvest LLC (a $340 value),
  7. A $250 gift certificate from Sunflower Ammo,
  8. KellyKettleUSA.com is donating both an AquaBrick water filtration kit and a Stainless Medium Scout Kelly Kettle Complete Kit with a combined retail value of $304,
  9. TexasgiBrass.com is providing a $300 gift certificate, and
  10. Two cases of meals, Ready to Eat (MREs), courtesy of CampingSurvival.com (a $180 value).

Second Prize:

  1. A Glock form factor SIRT laser training pistol and a SIRT AR-15/M4 Laser Training Bolt, courtesy of Next Level Training, which have a combined retail value of $589,
  2. A FloJak EarthStraw “Code Red” 100-foot well pump system (a $500 value), courtesy of FloJak.com,
  3. The Ark Institute is donating a non-GMO, non-hybrid vegetable seed package–enough for two families of four, seed storage materials, a CD-ROM of Geri Guidetti’s book “Build Your Ark! How to Prepare for Self Reliance in Uncertain Times”, and two bottles of Potassium Iodate– a $325 retail value,
  4. A $300 gift certificate from Freeze Dry Guy,
  5. A $250 gift card from Emergency Essentials,
  6. Twenty Five books, of the winners choice, of any books published by PrepperPress.com (a $270 value),
  7. A pre-selected assortment of military surplus gear from CJL Enterprize (a $300 value),
  8. TexasgiBrass.com is providing a $150 gift certificate,
  9. RepackBox is providing a $300 gift certificate to their site, and
  10. Safecastle is providing a package of 10 Lifestraws (a $200 value).

Third Prize:

  1. A Royal Berkey water filter, courtesy of Directive 21 (a $275 value),
  2. A large handmade clothes drying rack, a washboard, and a Homesteading for Beginners DVD, all courtesy of The Homestead Store, with a combined value of $206,
  3. Expanded sets of both washable feminine pads and liners, donated by Naturally Cozy (a $185 retail value),
  4. Two Super Survival Pack seed collections, a $150 value, courtesy of Seed for Security, LLC,
  5. Mayflower Trading is donating a $200 gift certificate for homesteading appliances,
  6. APEX Gun Parts is donating a $250 purchase credit,
  7. Montie Gear is donating a Precision Rest (a $249 value), and
  8. Two 1,000-foot spools of full mil-spec U.S.-made 750 paracord (in-stock colors only) from www.TOUGHGRID.com (a $240 value).

Round 60 ends on September 30th, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that there is a 1,500-word minimum, and that articles on practical “how to” skills for survival have an advantage in the judging.

Our Experience Growing and Storing Our Own Food- Part 1, by Tennessean

A recent post commented on how it is next to impossible to grow one’s own food. It’s very hard work, has a difficult and long learning curve, but it can be done. This essay explains how to efficiently grow and store your own food. You can learn from our mistakes. Both my sets of grandparents farmed with a team of mules. We know a couple in a county north of us who farm using with a team of mules; they are able to feed themselves, the mules, and also customers at a farmer’s market.

About Me

I’m 73 years old and retired. I grew up in West Tennessee. Both my wife and I have a PhD in biophysical chemistry and have worked in academia and in the pharmaceutical business. Our scientific background in biochemistry is extensive. Now for my experience in farming, I grew up on a Farmall A tractor. My dad worked for the USDA, in the Soil Conservation Service. He used almost all of his vacation time building up the farm. At various times we had horses, turkeys, goats, chickens, pigs, and always cattle. We, at one time or another, grew soybeans, corn, cotton, and always hay. We had a sizable veggie garden. My mom did not work, and she put up much produce each summer. We always had two large freezers full of meat and veggies.

For the last six years, we’ve farmed on a 2.65 acre minifarm and sold veggies at local farmer’s markets. This essay is based on our farming experience and biochemical knowledge.

Getting the Basics

I’ve found repeatedly that city folk who have never grown or raised any amount of their own food do not really understand very much about agriculture. The anecdotes in Barbara Kingsolver’s wonderful book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, demonstrate this all too well. I’d figure that maybe 3% of Americans would recognize an asparagus plant in July.

One may grow enough food for one year for one person in 8000 square feet of good, correctly fertilized, full sun, away from trees, soil. As Ragnar Benson correctly points out in his recent book, Survival End Game, mechanization is essential. Every task that can be mechanized should be. One needs to use efficient irrigation systems that do not require dragging a hose around a half acre. Sprinkler irrigation is to be avoided, especially for those of the cucurbit family, as it will lead to powderey mildew. Carol Deppe’s suggestion to first focus on high calorie content crops that are easily stored is great advice.

Essential Gardening Books

I consider these to be absolutely essential books:

The Resilient Gardener by Carol Deppe. Read this first.

Seed to Seed Suzanne Ashworth. This is the Bible on saving your own seed, which is an essential skill.

Root Cellaring by Mike and Nancy Bubel (You need a root cellar to benefit from this.)

How to Dry Foods by Deanna DeLong

The Art of Balancing Soil Nutrients William McKibben (There’s more on this subject later in the article.)

Diet for a Small Planet by Frances Moore Lappe. (This is essential to learn how to correctly combine a legume and a grain to give the optimal mix of the eight essential amino acids we humans need to consume. As a general rule a mix of 80% grain and 20% legume, by dry weight, works well.)

More-With-Less Doris Janzen Longacre, Herald Press, Scottsdale PA (If you only have one cookbook for hard times, this is IT! The Mennonite Central Committee of Akron PA commissioned this book. It has a great chapter on making soap with a novel idea I’ve not seen elsewhere about how to best “cure” the soap.)

Land

First, learn about soils. See who grows what in your area. Go to your local Natural Conservation Resources Service office and County Extension office and learn about soil types. Beware of areas that have lots of rocks in the soil. Before you buy any farmland, get a hand auger and sample the soil in a number of locations to a depth of 18”. You need to know the amount of rocks and the thickness of the topsoil. We’ve spent a great many hours picking up rocks from our veggie plots. Oh, did I mention about full sun and trees? Veggies do best in full sun, which means they need to be at least 50’ away from any trees. Trees suck water out of the soil at a fast rate and water will diffuse from your veggie plot to the trees. However, if you have a tree windbreak to the west and north, it will help.

Seed

The second thing to consider is your seed. With few exceptions we use non-hybrid seed. Each year we save a LOT of seed, enough to share with our neighbors when The Crunch comes. Each year we grow a different mix of legumes, so that we will have a large variety of legume seed available. The seeds are stored in the root cellar. (There is more about this below.) We also save seed potatoes in the root cellar. We store seeds in glass mason jars with the air pumped out and in the cool dark root cellar. Insects will not be able to grow if the partial pressure of oxygen is too low. Researchers in Iowa have ascertained that the major factor in seed life is the moisture content. We gently dry legume, winter squash, and similar seeds in an Excalibur dehydrator at 90F.

Suggested Seed Cultivars and How to Grow Them

Here are some suggested seed dealers with extensive listings:

  • Southern Exposure Seed,
  • Seed Savers Exchange,
  • Territorial Seeds,
  • Seven Springs Farm, and
  • Totally Tomatoes.

Prices do, however, vary a lot, so do comparison pricing.

Seedlings

For plants to be started as seedlings (e.g., tomato, eggplant, peppers, cucurbits, and cabbage family) the good folks at the University of Tennessee Agriculture Institute strongly advised us to start all our own seedlings in sterile starting soil, and not to buy them. Do you have a small greenhouse in which to start seedlings? We do. Now, Sweetie Pie is a serious experimentalist and has found that adding a ***AMAZON.amazon.com/Grow-More-7508-Hawaiian-1-5-Pound/dp/B00CJJ0ZT6/ref=sr_1_1?s=lawn-garden&ie=UTF8&qid=1438818297&sr=1-1&keywords=soluble+phosphate+solution***soluble phosphate solution to the seedlings on planting them really jump starts them.

Beans

First, only grow pole beans. Why is this so important?

  1. It is far easier to spray pythetrins for insect control (approved for organic growers) on the north side of the pole bean row as the larvae feed on the underside of the bean leaves. A backpack sprayer is essential.
  2. The yield is larger and spread over time. (This is important!!!)
  3. Many of the pods of bush shelly beans will rot with ground contact.

Now many years of trying different bean cultivars have shown us that different bean cultivars are attacked by Mexican bean beetles at vastly different rates. One year we grew four different bush bean cultivars, all next to each other, all fertilized identically. One cultivar–the coco rubio– drew the bean beetles like a supermagnet and stripped the leaves clean in several days. Guess what? We will not grow this cultivar ever again. Italian canillini bush beans were also a supermagnet for the Mexican bean beetles, and only a meager harvest was obtained. So we choose from our own field trials cultivars that have the best yield and are least attractive to the bean beetles.

As an aside here… we have two species of weeds that are supermagnets for Japanese beetles. We are in the process of identifying these two species. These, usually very destructive pests, leave every other leaf on the farm alone and focus on just these two weeds. Thus, these weeds serve as a “sacrifice crop.” Chinese cabbage works as a great sacrifice crop next to any plants of the cabbage family. The beetles prefer these leaves to the other leaves.

We grow pole beans on 60” high Red Brand horse fence because horse fence has twice the vertical wires of other fences. At chest height we have a run of 1” PVC pipe with two hose outlets every twenty feet for easy watering of veggies between the pole bean fences. We connect the run of PVC pipe with a hose to yard faucets. The system is easy to drain come late fall. With more vertical wires, one has better separation of the vines for more sunlight and carbon dioxide assimilation. Run the pole bean fence west to east to shade the weeds on the north side of the fence. Plant the bean seeds on the south side of the fence. You will have to help the vines find the fence wires, several times a week for a couple of weeks. Place 2’ high chicken wire around the pole bean fence else Bugs Bunny will chomp the vine 3” off the ground for the sweet sap. Keep the bottom of the fence about 6” or so off the ground for easier weeding. It is important to inoculate your bean seed with the bacteria that fixes nitrogen in the root nodules. Different legume species prefer different strains of the root nodule bacteria. Pull up some of your dying bean vines and examine the density of the root nodules. Dr. Albrecht (more below) showed that 1/16 of an ounce per acre of molybdenum was enough to supply the nodule bacteria with this essential micronutrient that is a cofactor for the enzyme that splits the triple bonded nitrogen molecule. No molybdenum, no root nodules, and no nitrogen from the air gets turned into proteins in the beans. Plant seed 1” deep and 5 to 6 inches apart. Water with a soaker hose or drip irrigation system. Do NOT cultivate when dew is on the leaves else you will efficiently transfer soil pathogens to the leaves.

After trying a great many pole green bean cultivars we find that the Rattlesnake pole green beans are the best. Two shelly pole bean cultivars which are less attacked by the Mexican bean beetle and have good yields are Turkey Craw (16 lbs dry beans per 100 feet of row) and Good Mother Stallard. We are growing this cultivar for the first time, and this is an amazing cultivar. Sweetie Pie told me I was going to pick these beans as the leaves are so big and thick she could not locate the beans under them!

Field Peas

For those living in the south, field peas are the legume of choice. Southern field peas make the most edible seed of any legume. My family in the 1930s called them “lifesavers” for a reason. Rabbits seem to leave these legumes alone in contrast to the damage they will do to any sort of bean plant. Our dry pea yield data per 100 feet of row are: Whipporwill (will climb a fence a la pole beans) 19 pounds and Brown Crowder; 24 pounds. Plant seed only after the soil is warm 1” deep and 8-10 inches apart. I suggest growing the Whipporwill field peas on a fence with soaker hose irrigation.

Corn

As Carol Deppe correctly points out, field corn is the grain of choice for a number of reasons. We like the heirloom Bloody Butcher dent field corn for two important reasons: it has the best and most prop roots of any corn I’ve ever seen. This reduces wind damage. Secondly the ears are 5 to 6 feet above the ground and too high for the (expletive deleted) raccoons to reach. Around here both coyotes and raccoons will devastate any sweet corn, so we do not bother with it. Plant seeds 1” deep and 8-9 inches apart, only after the soil is warm. Side dress with 23-7-7 enhanced fertilizer. Your corn leaves should be VERY green if they are getting enough nitrogen. Note that corn is wind pollinated and a corn patch best have at least six adjacent rows. One may always tell a newbie veggie gardener as they will have only one row of corn. Our yield per 100 feet of row is around 40 pounds dry shelled corn. Please note that corn is sold by the bushel, NOT by the protein content. Commercial hybrid corn cultivars are selected to have the most bushels per acre. In doing this, the protein content of the dry corn is considerably less than old heirloom corn with lower bushels per acre.

Now it is critical to note that the niacin in corn is unavailable unless the corn is heated with alkali. In MesoAmerica, folks made tortillas with corn meal and wood ash. One may make hominy by slowly boiling corn with alkali. In Little House on the Prairie, hominy was made by putting wood ashes into a small cotton bag and boiling until the skins came off. Both methods make niacin available. Pellagra results from niacin deficiency. In one of Joe Nobody’s novels a community living off mostly corn suffered badly from pellagra.

Letter Re: Jade Helm 15

HJL,

What do you think of Jade Helm 15? I’ve heard lots of things about this from mild to wild… What say you? – B.D.

HJL Responds: While our minds always have a tendency to fall to the conspiratorial side, I am a firm believer in Occam’s Razor. The more complex an issue is, the more people have to be involved and people are the greatest weakness of any “plan”. JWR and I are in complete agreement on the implications of Jade Helm 15 and its impact on the people in the United States. It is nothing more than a training exercise. The states selected for the training bear more than a passing resemblance to the parts of the world that are in the most turmoil and have the greatest prospects of U.S. military involvement. This allows the military the ability to save money on their training by not having to ship the hardware to and from the overseas destinations just for an exercise. On the surface, that is an acceptable reason for the training that they are engaging in. However, a person would literally have to have their head stuck in the sand to not see the coming civil unrest over the economic situation. I don’t believe it is unreasonable to imagine Baltimore on a national level. The media and TPTB have worked hard to create racial division among the people, and we are seeing that work come to fruition.

In every major natural disaster, the U.S. government has taken heat from the public sectors for not responding in a timely manner, whether it was the responsibility of the government or not to respond in the first place. I see the additional benefit to the military that they are trying to meet this coming civil unrest head on, because they know they will be tasked with dealing with it. The local governments have shown an amazing lack of interest and ability to handle even the most basic trouble situations, and I fully expect riots on a grand scale. However, the danger to you as an individual will probably not be coming from the military. Rather, I believe it will be the roving gangs causing the civil unrest. I believe that that is the long game being played by the government.

I do have friends who fear the time for the rounding up of Christians and the declaration of martial law is just around the corner, but this isn’t it. In the first place, the military does not have the manpower to declare martial law across the nation. In a country of 318 million people, it will take more than 500,000 military personnel to maintain that order. To add to that problem, the average American is more independently minded than the average person found anywhere else in the world and is more likely to ignore, either passively or overtly, any attempt at martial law. The Christian world tends to think of themselves in terms of the Roman persecutions, but in reality, today’s Christian is milquetoast. They are not a danger to the government, and the government knows it.

You can think of the convoys that are being reported across the nation as similar to the reaction of a pregnant woman. When a woman finds out she is pregnant, she suddenly starts realizing how many other women around her are also pregnant. She sees belly bulges everywhere she looks. Since Jade Helm 15 is on everyone’s mind, they think they are seeing more military hardware moving than they normally do, but I suspect the total tonnage of moving hardware is about what is normally moved.

There really is no short-term danger presented by this training exercise. However, the long-term issues do not bode well for the citizen but are in line with moves that the government has made for the past 100 years. Anytime the government gets you to trade a little bit of freedom for a little bit of safety, you will run into problems. The greatest danger will be when you see the military collaborating with the local law enforcement agencies. While the government does not have the military power to declare martial law on their own, they are working towards the federalization of all police forces. The process is well underway and the police forces will willingly allow themselves to be co-opted. We’ve seen it before; just look at the school systems. The once powerful and independent (and actually useful) school systems took the money that the federal government handed out like candy and got hooked on it like it was crack. All the government had to do was threaten to take away that money and the school boards folded. The local law enforcement will be no different, and they are already getting addicted to the money.