Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["Tradingpost" <tradingpost@lobo.net>]

Right. Writers make it sound like setting up extension stuff is all there is 
to it. NOT. And I don't even have to deal with year round due to our winters. 
And marketing involves a lot of earlier seed starting under protection and 
transplanting when direct planting would be fine normally. All out extension 
can double the work, just to have early vegetables weeks ahead of other 
growers. Right now store tomatoes here come from enormous greenhouses in 
Mexico. They can't sell at our local markets. People would avoid them like 
the plague anyway. No flavor.

Getting that earlier start here has been a royal pain. I set up plastic cover 
for tomato beds inside the greenhouse but it meant pulling the plastic down 
carefully over the hoops and laying 2x4s on the edges to hold airtight. It 
worked even down to 20 outside but did have small heaters in 4 of the beds 
under the hoops. And reverse the process every morning, for maybe 6 wks. That 
was a quickie setup but it's a pain and got to be easier setup next year. A 
lot of flats and pots needing early starts did fit between the tomatoes till 
last frost. BTW it was hula hoops from the dollar store.

Not everything worked out this spring. Lots of early winter squash pots were 
set out under hoops and covers but being outside they froze that cold nite. 
More gallon backups were set out this week with more to set out. Fingerlings 
& asparagus got set back in the cold and may still sprout enough.

Garden books & articles don't go into this kind of detail. But the Devil is 
really in the details. Still way too much to learn.

paul tradingpost@lobo.net

*********** REPLY SEPARATOR  ***********

On 5/15/2011 at 7:45 PM John D'hondt wrote:

>I am all in favor of this but in practice it means that I am rushing to
>get
>seedlings ready almost all year round. We still have almost 1/3rd of the
>summer crops to go in the ground with a colder than usual Spring. No sweat
>there we are almost ready. But the problem is that I need to get to have
>my
>next winter crops ready and planted by mid September at the latest. That
>may
>be difficult.
>John
>
>>
>> Extending the Harvest in Your Home Garden
>>
>http://www.chrismartenson.com/blog/extending-harvest-your-home-garden/51656
>>
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