Life goes on - Summer 2023

We have had very little rain as well, but at least it hasn’t been hot. I can water my little garden in about a half hour but it prefers water from the sky.

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We have our first rain here in exactly a month, last time it rained was may 17, and it started rain yesterday, much needed. :smiley:

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weather manipulation is possible with geo engineering…
people should believe in climate change, so we have this show everywhere…here too much rain every day, last year no rain…and so on…

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Thats what I thought too but my memory is a bit sketchy so I don’t really trust it when it comes to day-to-day stuff.
It is actually falling a few drops as I write but it is not going to be enough by a longshot and the weatherforecasts for rain changes to sun when there is a day or two to go.

Göran, you guys have a beautiful garden. Natural lines and lots of nooks and crannies where you could sit comfy :blush:

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Some geo-engineering is possible, but it isn’t that good of technology. We can’t predict the weather muchless change it that accurately.

There are a couple of things going on. The first is the planet is hotter, which means more energy is required to be removed for a water droplet to form.

Then we drained a lot of swamps and other areas, so the water goes into the ocean much faster instead of evaporating locally, which both cools and adds humidity to the air.

Then we basically destroyed the micro-organism life in the soil, and the carbon washed away. Instead of water soaking into the ground it runs off and takes the topsoil with it. Which compounds the water and drainage issues.

Houston built over their marshes, but the marshes could absorb 30-40 inches of water that kept Houston drier.

The larger issue is no one wants to admit they are part of the problem and find a better alternative. It is like all the people in the city complaining about farmers using moldboard ploughs, most don’t anymore. But then never realize their 100sqft of lawn, is watered with chlorinated water intended to kill the bacteria in the water, but it also kills all the microbiology in their own soil.

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All Truths you lay out here SeanO’

Seeming Little, local, individual living choice actions across enough time and areas do add up alright.
Negatively. Or positivly.
Some - too many; simplify, and broad brush slop-out solutions:
Too many people! So have less people. Not true in my mind. Diversity in people thinking, and their indivual living actions is a safer broader basis to work from. Histories say.

Other say too many IC cars and trucks. So convert to mass public transit systems. THAT only works with dense living people. That solution bites its own tail. Need power plants and BIG energy hungry systems to support 5,000 people per square mile.
They then double down, and say too many IC small unnecessary engines. Personal use. Recreational. Unnessary. Eeee-limit-nate.
Recreate in front of small and large flickering mass entertainment screens instead. Eat from tall structures vat grown sources. There you go . . . MORE energy needed to support that Matrix. Each Individual counted then as a consumer unit.

I could go on, and on, and on.
The new Eco religion, like too many other religions have, and still do; want to force growing participation. Self-Rightious as the Only-True-Way. So damned convinced since they are Right . . . All others must be wrong.

I will only respect those who will actually hoe their own a Gardens. Accept we are here and now; as always, required to sweat out individual results to move ourselves forwards.

So in my mind, not too many people at all.
Too many people allowing themselves to be simplified down to sheeple.
In your own Life make it Action-This-day. One day at a time. Step by step. And that multiples outwards positivly.

Want a change? Be the change for yourself, and yours.
Steve Unruh

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It is a blame game. They want the government to force other people to change so they don’t have to change themselves. It is mostly a city/country disconnect, but there is also an income based disconnect as well. The ‘eco religion’ wants the people in the country to fix their problem, and the people in the country say no, we don’t want to change. And change costs money or is more work and not enough want to foot the bill or do the extra work.

I dont know if it is biblical in nature but there is a saying that is something like ‘change your corner of the world and others will see the good and follow’

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Oh I ran into this quote " The worst suggestion of your lifetime may be the catalyst to the grandest idea of the century, never let suggestions go unsaid nor fail to listen to them."

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My potatoes are already blossoming. I hope that the early ones will go out of soil in few weeks.

And tomatoes are already above my waist and first row of green balls appeared

We have had pretty rainy Saturday with four or five good showers so before Sun will try to bake us next week, we have got enough water to fight the heat.

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All of a sudden many growers on youtube are saying to cut the blossoms off to get the energy to go into bigger potatoes and not flowers. Makes sense but it’s the first time I’ve heard it.

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Nah, l dont buy it. The amount of energy in those few litle berrys is a shadow compared to whats underneeth… plus most worietys rarely ever make much fruit anyways. But brees like the flowers and thats something too right?

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Do you pick the blossoms off? Some say leaving them on takes away from tuber growth trying to make seeds from blossoms.

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Strange thing, honestly first time ever to hear. Don’t see too much in it since normal producers don’t use that practice and their potatoes are like handgrenades :nerd_face:

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It is recommended by the university of california, and it is very true with other plants. But I didn’t see a study trying to evaluate the yield loss.

IF a commercial grower can’t do it easily and cheaply the yield loss from the flowers isn’t worth it. But for the home grower taking a half hour to snip buds to get say 5% more growth might be worth it.

If you have a 500 acres you aren’t going to run out and snip buds. So you would have to spray, which in turn costs you money and the 5% may not cover the cost or maybe you only get like 1%… probably not worth it.

I am sure I study exists as to how much more yield you would get and it would probably depend on variety as well but I made up the 5% number.

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That’s a very pretty garden, Kamil! :+1: I wish my back yard looked like that.

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I gave a try to Czech internet and get tons of similar advices. Maybe next year I will test.

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I think it will be hard to really know. I get different returns from a pound of seed potatoes nearly every year. I’m usually happy around 10 to 1. In containers is is usually around 7 to 1. I have never done better that 12 to 1. This year I am planting in trenches with weed cloth in the bottoms, six inches of dirt over that, potatoes just laid on the dirt and covered with shredded leaves. I mixed wood ash in with the leaves. Another thing from the internet. We’ll see how it works. I’m hoping to just pull up the leaves and kind of roll the potatoes up in the tarp. I really hate digging them.

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Haha. Couldnt resist. Our grass looks exactly like my woodgasadventures. Hope is on its way, tomorrow is some rain expected. And I almost found some time for my projects last weekend :grinning::frowning:

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Tom, we are similar birds you and l… l too break down my crops down to mass/area and seed/yeald. Maybee since we are both chemists?

Anyway, l like to predict my potato harvest as 5/1 to 10/1. To be sure. Last year, l managed 17/1, a personal record. But those were early potatoes, winter ones were l think were in the 11/1 area. Im bad at keeping records :smile:

Now, this sayd. Daughter planted one seed potato in her litle garden. That plant alone produced, if l remember right, over 10 pounds. The ground under the plant literaly hilled up from the spuds fattening up. Newer ferilised, never waterew. Just hay mulch. And the plant looked kinda average too. I still try to figure out what exactly happened there.

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Looks like God Blessed a little girl with one seed and made a lot of potatoes. Start having her help plant your seeds.

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