Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["Wayne" <wa2yne@gmail.com>]

Just ran across this going through old emails.
Had forgotten to reply.
I'm not sure when last frost date is around here, maybe late February or 
sometime in March.
Elevation around 2500 feet, soil  kinda sandy, gets hard as a rock, almost, 
when it dries.
Needs amending, don't have much grass for clippings, and what I did have 
had too much mesquite chunks in it.
Not sure about the PH here, but pouring a bit of vinegar on it makes it 
fizzle quite a bit, so on the alkaline side.

I need to get some garden started, have to protect it from the critters 
here.
I transplanted one small tree, with leaves, and something ate the leaves, 
might have been the rabbits, tons of those here.
Now we're starting to get warm days, and cool nights but above freezing, I 
really should get something started, but protected from rabbits, gophers (at 
least I think that's what they are) and other small critters.
I'll have to go through my seeds and see just what I have, and hope to get 
some of the older seeds to sprout. Doesn't hurt to try em.
I've had fair results with older tomato seeds, though some I tried last 
year waited till I used the dirt for something else
Have some assorted lettuce seeds, some bought last fall, some rather old, 
but won't hurt to try anyway....

Wayne WA2YNE
www.desert-rat.com

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Laura McKenzie" <laurabrownmckenzie@worldnet.att.net>
To: "Healthy soil and sustainable growing" 
<livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Tuesday, November 28, 2006 7:38 PM
Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] winter and spring vegetables?


> Wayne,  I had no trouble with growing spinach when I lived west of
> Albuquerque. I didn't grow it in the fall there though.  I did add lots 
> and
> lots of organic matter in the form of composted brush (from my M-I-L's 
> home
> in Corrales), leaves and grass clippings to those gardens. I started with
> ground that was nothing but pure sand and caliche about 24 inches below 
> the
> sand. I never tested the pH there.
>
> Don't you get pretty late frosts in the spring? We had frosts as late as
> Mother's Day where we lived. Your tomatoes are going to need a lot of sun
> for a long time.