Gardening

[parsley]

Soil garden-cultivated deep. (I drove slowly,lol) One row carrots planted. Red,and dutch and spanish and multiplier onions are in. Dill. Fifteen or so hills of Norland and German potatoes.

Aiming for new potatoes on July 1st. With dill. When will you dig your first potatoes?

Another day of planting tommorow. Pars

[crusher]

If you're not making money farming, then you're just gardening.

Could be a bunch of us gardening in Central Alberta again this year.

[parsley]

Lots of farmers like to hoe "a row" of garden and enjoy it. LOL

Uncle was a bachelor and gerw potatoes and carrots and horseradish until he died!

Has nothing to do with success or failure, and everyrhing to do with enjoyment.

Unless of course, crusher, you simply don't have the ability/expertise to grow a big fat early potato. LOL Pars

[newguy]

An old guy around here waters his early potatoes with warm water from the house to get them going. . He will be eating them before anyone.

[parsley]

Should we put a loonie on that?

[btjadenlepp]

got carrots, spinach, peas planted so far. will do the potatoes next, and try the warm water tip. thanks!

[crusher]

Sounds like its "game on"! We don't usually put our garden in until the crop is in. I'm supposed to build raised garden boxes for the boss, but that hasn't happened yet.
Neighbour has 30 acres of spuds out my door, he knows what he's doing, good thing his security is lax. I've got seven acres of upick raspberries coming on stream this year. What is your expertise on that crop?

[parsley]

I grew Boyne. Had a small patch. Soaked the patch continuously so they yielded well. They require picking every other day to keep them coming on or they fizzle. We served the tourist trade, mostly and they wanted them picked and clean to serve after golfing. Had a half dozen farm women who picked and supplied rasps in ice cream pails picked half full so they didn't settle and go to juice. Washed hands before picking. Clean pails. Paid them by the pound. A heavy rain and they are mushy or on the ground. Had so many hired to work, most of them hated picking rasps. The students got their arms grazed by the rasperry's thorny bushes and often tramped the patch like cows in a chop bin. The women picked spotlessly clean and often delivered other products as well. One brought bison all the time. Another lamb. Rasps have a short shelf life. But Boyne were so tasty. One girl brought yellow rasps, but my trade prefered Boyne. Had to cut dead stalks out in the spring, yuk, and throw on 6 in of good black soil on them in the fall.

You don't want two inches of beating ran with a strong wind or you are dead in the water. Lots of shelter for them. Buy new containers to display them in and stick with your price per pound. Everyone pays the same. Don't refrigerate unless you have to or their is flavor loss. Noticable.

You should not have asked. This is all too boring for most. Pars

[crusher]

Parsley,

I guess the rest don't have to read. It will be good diversification, if we get two inches of rain in July, that should help out the other 1,700 acres.

We were planning upick, not prepicked. My back is getting sore just thinking about it. We've got several different varieties, Boyne included. Red Bounty yields double to Boyne, but not quite as tasty.

Finally getting our first rain of the year.

[parsley]

Weigh the empty containers people bring and mark the weight with felt pen. I have super good commercial scales weighing from 2 grams and ^ . Test weigh a pound of butter for them as everyone can relate to it.

Some can really pack rapberries tightly into a pail, doubling the amount most people would put in, so maybe you would be better off weighing by the pound. Consider value ading by selling them in baskets, as some want only a basket or so but don't want to pick them.

Number each area with a high sign, correlated to a chart. You'll have to clean-up pick sections missed. And "strip" the rows just picked so they keep coming. Otherwise, you'll end up with massive amounts of berries to freeze. One good farmers' market in Ontario I went to had their own plastic pails for picking and poured the contents into a paper bag. They had every fruit imaginable. Mostly it was an adventure to take kids picking but then the adults bought the available apple sauce, and apple butter and blueberry jam and strawberry syrup etc....ALL PREPARED for sale. LOL.

Toilets. They just get there and they need a toilet. Trust me on that one. LOL

[sumdumguy]

parsley, potatoes rot when the ground is too cold. Once I tried the tire stack potatoe method-no luck, but I have had potatoes on July 1.

[parsley]

I cultivated on a slanting rise at least 15 inches deep, fine and soft. It's loamy, humusy soil. No clay. I let it warm in the afternoon sun for an hour. I only use dugout water from a trough, it's been warmed by the sun. I row covered Norland with thick plastic, tamping the sides with dirt to make a mini-greenhouse row. Yup. I should have potatoes by September 1st.