[ Update 7/13/2010 Most of the plants in the beds have matured. Some did well, other not so well. I've come to believe that the differences in plant hight noted below have a more prosaic cause. The two beds were built similarly, and are similarly located in the garden, but I suspect that Bed B is slightly [...]
Author: Gary Rondeau
Inflation and the “Risk Free” Interest Rate
Two years ago, with the price of oil at all time highs, there was concern that we could start seeing run-away inflation again. A few months later, the financial system was on the verge of a total meltdown, credit dried up, and the specter of a deflationary spiral appeared on the scene as oil fell [...]
Tomato Futures
I invested in tomato futures this week end. Ellen and I rode our bikes to Saturday Market and I returned with the panniers filled with a dozen tomato plants. There are so many varieties of tomatoes that I'm always sure to find something new and different. This year I returned with Pineapple, Brandywine, Isis Candy, Black Plum, and Tula, [...]
Squash Planting
The middle of April is the ideal time to plant squash, according to Nick's Spring Seeding Guide. Squash like warm weather and warm soil to sprout, so the middle of April can be a bit marginal around here. In my shady garden, any extra time for the winter squash is a benefit worth going for. If we [...]
Vichyssoise – the Begining
This famous leek and potato soup starts with planting the leeks and potatoes. I did that on Sunday. Leeks have become a favorite garden vegetable, because they are edible, from the garden, for more than half the year. Long-season crops have a tendency to get big and produce a lot of food - leeks are [...]
The Growth Conundrum
The comparative luxury in which we live is the direct result of centuries of steady economic growth. But we live on a finite planet, so never-ending population and economic growth must eventually stop. We find that societies that have high standards of living have lower fertility rates, yet much of the world's population lives in [...]
Spring Beds
The sun was out on Saturday, some of my lettuce starts were crowding the borders of their six-packs, so it was time to transplant. In the past I would rototill virtually all of the garden. Lots of vegetables came out of the garden using that method, but as I've tried to garden more year-round, [...]
Coconut Harvest Declines
Just a quick post from vacation on Maui. Ellen and I enjoy trips to Hawaii on a regular basis, but with enough time in between that we notice the changes. We like to to eat fresh produce and enjoy picking up coconuts when we find them. This time it was more difficult than usual to [...]
Dessert Squash
Last week we cooked up one of the last big squashes that were still sitting on the kitchen table. This was a nice big pale green squash that looked a little like a sweet-meat / kabocha cross. It came from plants raised from seed I saved in 2005, from the original very tasty squash that [...]
Symphylan Biochar Experiment
I present here the results of a small trial I did last summer that combined a couple of my interests at the time. I had noticed the presence of large numbers of symphylans, small centipede-like invertebrates, in the garden. I was also having more trouble than usual with germination of seeds - spinach, carrots, beets. Symphylans travel [...]
Squash Practice 