Your garden will die!

Discussion in 'The Green Patch' started by duane, Jan 14, 2019.


  1. duane

    duane Monkey+++

    No matter what we do, our garden's are going to die! Hopefully we will get enough out of them to either survive or make us feel it worth while to plant again. In New Hampshire I raise tomato's in a greenhouse and there is a 100 % chance that the plants will die of one of the blight's and all I can do is limit them and get as many tomato's as I can by using fresh or sterile soil, grow in greenhouse, spray with dilute chlorine solution, water from below and keep leaves dry, use hydrogen peroxide to sterilize my trimming tools, prune lower leaves and infected leaves, keep plants as well fed and as healthy as I can, raise plant types that have natural resistance and if all else fails, give up on organic at that point. Then the cost of fuel limits how early I plant, and how late I harvest. During the growing season in the greenhouse, on the hot dry day, I can lose all of my hydroponic tomato's in about 6 hours if they are not watered and greenhouse vented to keep heat down, and fans to give air motion to allow them to cope with the heat. If too hot or cold, the blossoms will not set and no fruit, not enough calcium or magnesium, the fruit is misshapen or it scars and rots. Hot, no air movement, and high humidity, in a few hours blight problems may start and take a long time if even possible to cure. Then there all the insect problems.

    In my out door garden, I have the deer eat the plants, the neighbor's pigs destroy them, dry spells require major watering, hot wet spells cause cracked fruits, different mildew and molds, destroy my plants and make the potatoes, tomato's, squash, corn, etc, unusable, have lost most of my plants to early and late frosts, etc.

    It has made me set up a greenhouse, use hydroponics, use Mittleider gardening and sq ft gardening, to get enough food to make it worth while, and I am still learning. I have 2.6 acres of land, for gardening purposes, it has at least 10 micro climate-soil type areas and each requires its own techniques. Some is in a lower field, been in garden for 20 years. soil is sandy, but row of tall pines on 2 sides of field and open side is to the north. Shaded 4 to 6 hours on one long side and next to trees shaded all the time. Second field has some exposure to south, but trees on neighbor,s land both to east and west. I have found that the lower flat field 75 yards from upper field, with a little slope, has a two week shorter growing season due to frosts on an average year.

    I know of no way to learn how to raise food on your land, with your soil, with your plant diseases, climate and shade, etc, other than planting plants and killing most of them. You will in many areas have neighbors who go to Walmart, Home Depot, Tractor Supply, etc, and buy plants that have been severely stressed, are in pots that are root bound, and are infected with every known plant disease. They will then plant and in many cases lose interest, and given the way their gardens look, I can understand that, water them just enough to keep them alive, spray them with every known plant medicine, and raise a bumper crop of the most resistant bugs, blights, and mildews known to man.

    If you think that the man who has a high value AR-15, 20 hi cap mags, 2,000 rounds of various rounds, and has only fired it twice is lacking in preps, the person with canned seeds, a hoe, and a yard out back, that he is going to dig up and plant if TSHTF, is in many senses even less likely to survive. I am 80 years old, was raised on a farm, have a 20 by 48 greenhouse, two gardens, and been gardening for 30 years. If I were to survive on my garden, it would be the will of God. 3 years ago my potato's were infected with the late season blight, I lost them all, including my seed potato's and in a true survival situation would have had to depend on either some one else production, my long term storage, or like the Irish who suffered from the same disease, die.

    Spring is here, if you have never planted a garden, try something, herbs in pots, a couple container tomato's, some salad greens, etc. Find someone in your neighborhood that gardens and talk to them and learn what works in your area. You can read forever and some techniques, sg ft gardening, etc, will work ever where, but you have to do it now while you have the ability to learn and fail and the resources to live and try again.

    I hope this is not too negative for you ganado, but is what I have seen in gardening. It is an art and in the end can only be learned by experience. YMMV
     
    Last edited: Jan 14, 2019
  2. techsar

    techsar Monkey+++

    Spot on Duane! Just because tomatos grew like weeds one year doesn't mean they'll do a repeat performance the next. So many variables...and you have to know what, when and why to change tactics. Over time, you may find that certain varieties are more resiliant, while others wilt if you look at them wrong even if they are listed for your "zone."

    Gardening is a constant learning experience...but you have to be doing before the learning starts!
     
  3. VisuTrac

    VisuTrac Ваша мать носит военные ботинки Site Supporter+++

    I've found that with the time I spend on nurturing a tomato from a seedling (let alone from an heirloom seed) trying to get the damn things to grow consistently, I'm better off buying them from the store or the greenhouse a mile from me. More cost effective. If I really need vitamin C, I've got strawberries and brussels sprouts (hate the them but I can grow 'em but typically trade them for sweet corn)
     
    Last edited: Jan 14, 2019
  4. Tackleberry

    Tackleberry Krieg Hündchen

    Very good post. I would say that an AR isnt really high dollar anymore (visit Palmetto), and having one is a good idea to go along with the garden.
     
  5. Zimmy

    Zimmy Wait, I'm not ready!

    The old folks would say the light was bad for tomatoes and peppers year before last. Nobody from commercial to porch Potter made well. Pears and jujubes did very well. Plums we're so so.

    Last year was better for tomatoes, peppers, and squashes. I did well in raised beds, pots, and volunteer plants around the hog pen. Pears were fair, jujubes and plums only flowered.

    This year should be bumper crop for tomatoes, peppers, pecans, and field peas but don't bet on fruit trees if the old sayings are good.

    There's a cycle there but it is not consistent across the crops. Fail, fair, loss, repeat. Some do good, some do bad every year.

    In a collapse, the only salvation on fail years will be foraging. Plantains, dock, chickweed, henbit, thistle, milkweed, ect. or maybe heaven forbid...briar roots, acorns, and hackberry.

    Since you really shouldn't eat seed stock, you need to learn how to get through the failure years when your larder is finally empty.

    My goal this year is to plant 50 more fruiting trees (figs, peaches, and pears) not including putting in an olive hedgerow.
     
  6. duane

    duane Monkey+++

    I have a German Dr that I see who came to the US in about 1968. He was raised in rural Germany and was born about 1943 luckly in western part. The German army took their food and animals, they couldn't get any help from the US for a year or so, he said that his parents knew all the weeds, etc, and they lived and stayed on the land while their neighbors either starved or left. Bull rushes, our cat tails, acorn flour, weeds, etc and a little wheat, oats, and barley that was a couple years old and had been put away for cattle feed kept them alive.
     
  7. Ganado

    Ganado Monkey+++

    So my rule of thumb is grow 25% the wildelife 20% for other calamities. Basically plant 150% of what you think you will need.

    I pre rinse my seeds in water and hydrogen peroxide to kill fungi and virus. 1/100 seeds from commercial growers will have fungi you don't need.
     
  8. Motomom34

    Motomom34 Monkey+++

    I did a thread on blight. It is not easy to get rid of. Takes a lot of work to heal the soil and kill the spores. Blight
     
  9. oldman11

    oldman11 Monkey+++

    If it will quit raining I need to get my garden ready,it’s almost time to plant Irish potatoes. Here were I live you need to plant potatoes the second Monday in February to get a good yield. I have turnip and mustard in garden now that need to be plowed under to rot before I can do anything.
     
  10. Dunerunner

    Dunerunner Brewery Monkey Moderator

    I was thinking that the recent shift of the magnetic North Pole due to changes in magma flow were probably more responsible for the weird weather patterns in the North Pacific. I've watched those weather patterns for over 20 years and those I've seen in the past two years are Not what I have observed in the previous 18... [tinfoil101]
     
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  11. BTPost

    BTPost Stumpy Old Fart,Deadman Walking, Snow Monkey Moderator

    Have you noticed... No Polar Vortex so far this winter.... Also, No Siberian Express has run yet either....
     
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  12. Gator 45/70

    Gator 45/70 Monkey+++

    What is your mixture rate?
     
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  13. Ganado

    Ganado Monkey+++

    1 tbls per gallon of water,

    swish it around for a minute
    drain and rinse again

    NOTE: I have heavy sediment in my water aka hard water, so if you have soft water with low sediment 1 tsp might be enough.
     
  14. duane

    duane Monkey+++

    My point exactly, soil and plants are least of worries in garden, can use methods like square foot, etc, different ways of watering, different ways to beat growing season limitations, etc, but the things that will destroy your garden can happen in a short time and if you were depending on it to survive, you would be dead. Frost, wild animals, hail, thunderstorms, neighbors pigs, have totally destroyed my garden in the past in a couple hours. Late blight, potato bugs, white flies, cucumber beettles, different mildews, molds, failure of automatic watering system in greenhouse, etc, have destroyed my crops in a short time as has over watering. It is easy as ganado has said to at least try to protect your garden, but hydrogen peroxide, different chemicals, resistant seeds, fertilizer, fish and sea weed fertilizers, etc, while all easily available now in my location, 25 pounds of very concentrated 20-20-20 fertilizer for about $32, veggie special 25 pounds, 12-5-19, with all trace elements, 7.6 % calcium, 1.3 % magnesium, boron and selenium set for our area, for about $30, can be used for drip irrigation, calcium nitrate 25 pounds for $26, potassium nitrate, 25 pounds for $39, 5 gallons of 2-3-1 fish and seaweed blend for organic hydroponics, etc for $95. I used less than 5 gallons last year for all my greenhouse tomato's, peppers, squash, green beans and everything else. I have to drive about 20 miles to one greenhouse supply, and can pick it up, does need notice if I want more than one pallet. If I drive 30 miles to another supply, in Mass, I can pick up 10 times as many things, or 30 miles in another direction to pick up a greenhouse or anything in it, he makes and sells greenhouses. The local Agway and Blue Seal stores, now that weed is legal to grow, have so much available for a greenhouse that I don't even dare go in to shop with a checkbook.

    Point being that at the moment I have an almost unending supply available in commercial amounts, tailored for my climate, soil, and water and at a fraction the cost of the packaged products at Home Depot. I have a few hundred pounds of the ones that will store for future use, the potassium nitrate and calcium nitrate, as well as the mixed ammonium salts, are made in Germany,, and it would not take much of an event to make them no longer available. Even the natural ones depend on processing, shipping, and an operating distribution network for availability, and others require, electricity, hydrogen preoxide, oil, most nitrates, shipping etc. The natural products I use for blights, insects, etc, are even more specialized and more prone to not being available. If you raise a garden, you will at least know what you wish to stock for future use and what stores well.

    Here in NH, part of my water comes out of a deep well in granite, sulfur, iron, manganese, radon, have to be removed, not hard, no calcium at all.
     
    Last edited: Jan 16, 2019
  15. chelloveck

    chelloveck Diabolus Causidicus

    I don't think your post is negative....(in the context of the Our Beloved Monkey is Sick! thread. You are just highlighting some of the problems of gardening / crop raising in an austere environment where self reliance / sufficiency has become a necessity, and where food insecurity is a likely life threatening reality. In fact, your OP is a rhetorical question that each member / visitor to the site ought ask themselves about their preparations for an uncertain future (A future that has become present reality for some affected by the US Government shutdown which is presently occurring). The question is...what actions will one take, to prepare for that future?

    You, and others have made the point that the time to discover and start working out solutions to all of the potential problems affecting garden / cropping production is before dire necessity obliges it, when cultivation mistakes and disasters are like to result in malnutrition or starvation.

    The positive benefits of doing this now, rather than relying on the supermarket supply chain are:

    There will be some saving in food costs, that go into your pocket for discretionary spending, rather than to some corporation as their revenue / profits).

    Growing your own produce builds the knowledge bank of what grows best in your soil / climate, and which varieties are best acclimatised / adapted to the prevailing pathogens, pests, and weeds in your area.

    Gardening is therapeutic, and can, if done in the company of others, build relationships and alliances with other gardeners in your family / tribe / community.

    You will know what inputs you have given to your produce, and have the option of 'going organic' rather than relying on commercial chemical inputs which may not be readily available in a SHTF crunch.

    Gardening will offer opportunities for developing ancillary skills, such as preserving, animal husbandry (a good way of conserving gardening surpluses / gluts), and creative cooking...:)

    Along with the physical inputs of gardening, are the cognitive aspects of learning to grow stuff...you will have the opportunity of developing a library of books and articles that will help you on the way...why reinvent the wheel when the wheel is already substantially invented and evolving. A good source of relevant information are the various rural / agricultural extension services in your state / province. Agricultural extension - Wikipedia

    This season I have been growing chillies and aubergines as potted plants with some success in my townhouse courtyard.
     
    Last edited: Jan 16, 2019
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  16. Gator 45/70

    Gator 45/70 Monkey+++

    [worthless]
     
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  17. chelloveck

    chelloveck Diabolus Causidicus

    WILCO....just have to dust off my ol' digicam...it doesn't embed my location in the file metadata like my 'smart' 'phone tends to do.
     
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  18. Gator 45/70

    Gator 45/70 Monkey+++

    Airplane mode Capt.
     
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  19. duane

    duane Monkey+++

    They list OXIDATE 2 as an effective anti fungal, etc. Jonny's Selected Seeds carries it at about $165 for 2 + gallons and it is peroxide based. Don't know how it would store and it is a strong oxidizer, bad for bees and fish also. Hydrogen peroxide doesn't store well so that might be a problem. Seems to be sold in large containers so it would most likely be used by those with some knowledge in applying chemicals and following instructions. Would like to try it, but not at $165 plus shipping.
     
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  20. Ganado

    Ganado Monkey+++

    @Gator 45/70 airplane mode turns of the geolocator? are you pulling my leg again? [hug}

    @duane I use the seed sterilization for sprouting as well. I will think about long term.

    Mostly i have been trying indoor gardening and it's not very successful. I find I like doing soiless sprouting for micro greens. I don't like the indoor sprouting with soil as mold and mildew are more prevalent. I did add some Liquid fulvic acid to the sprouts and it helps alot.

    I think on the High Plains you have alot more issues with gardens than other areas ... if I still lived there I would really consider using hugoculture, in addition to conserviing moisture it provides it's own nutrients and if you do the hills right you could provide some safety for your family from marauders
    :D

    its all part of having back up plans within back up plans.
     
    Last edited: Jan 17, 2019
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