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  • From: Clansgian AT wmconnect.com
  • To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [Homestead] Hops into action
  • Date: Mon, 31 Mar 2008 08:35:13 EDT



>
>

For insuring your own supply of brew perhaps.

Three was a piece in the odd magazine "Green Prints" called "Garlic Fever".
It is short enough that I could reproduce the whole article here, but out of
a seldom felt sense of copyright fairness, I'll summarize:

The writer describes the phenomenon of someone seeing a braid of 12 galic
bulbs selling for $12, does a quick calculation of how much garlic can be
grown
on an acre, and comes to the startling conclusion that he can get $100,000
for
an acre of garlic.

The blurb goes on to explain that only the very best, perfect garlics are
used for such braids, the labor involved in braiding them is tremendous, and
the
farmer only gets about $4 out of that $12 retail price. Moreover, not one
bulb in 30 on a commerical sized planting is suitable for braiding. Despite
the
optimistic arithmetic there is not $100,000 acre of garlic.

I grow some hops here for my own use. The resin forms in tiny capsules (much
like those micro-encapsulated medicines) inside the green flowers. The resin
us useable any time, but as the flower ripens, the petals loosen and it
shatters. So the flowers have to be picked after the capusles have formed
but
before the petals have loosened. On a small scale operation, the harvest is
by
hand. And it is tedious work with an hour's labor yielding a couple of
pounds
at most.

For homestead use, this is plenty plenty! But to sell them, you would be
better off as a greeter at WalMart.

James </HTML>




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