[Homestead] bean straw

Lynn Wigglesworth lynnw1366 at hotmail.com
Sun Feb 22 13:00:10 EST 2009


We don't have much straw locally. There's a lot of corn, soy, and oats, but 
the plants are all chopped and put back on the fields. I use lawn clippings 
for mulch (I still have more lawn than I want...slowly converting it to 
garden). I've got cows, so I have a lot of wasted hay...I compost the pooped 
on hay and use the cleaner hay for mulch.

I'm trying to reduce my costs, too. I still buy some seeds; I save some, but 
alway like trying new varieties. I buy lime, rock phospate, and some other 
minerals once in a while, but most of the fertility comes from compost and 
legume cover crops (I'm going to try harvesting seed from the cover crops so 
I don't have to buy more). This year I need some fencing to keep the 
critters out of the tomatoes (I have the  posts). And I'm buying a  scythe; 
I'm sick of fighting with the gas-powered weed whacker.

Lynn Wigglesworth
Tioga Co. PA
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Leslie" <cayadopi at yahoo.com>
To: <homestead at lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Sunday, February 22, 2009 12:43 PM
Subject: [Homestead] bean straw


> Finally found straw locally....
>
> Only the straw here is "bean straw", not the kind of straw I used to get 
> in S. Florida (which I think came from oats). It never occurred to me that 
> straw could come from beans... LOL. This area is a big producer of pinto 
> beans so the straw comes from pinto beans.
>
> Is anyone here making their own straw?
>
> I was looking for straw for the potatos. Picking up tires today and with 
> luck will have the potato seeds in soon.
>
> In trying to figure out how not to have to spend much money on growing 
> food, I was happy to find that I can use leftover bean stalks for 
> straw.... :-)
>
> Also Milo grows great here and is draught tolerant and can also be used 
> for straw easily.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> --------
>
> “All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. 
> People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own 
> wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are 
> unwelcome. Political language... is designed to make lies sound truthful 
> and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure 
> wind.” ~ George Orwell
>
>
>
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