Local Voltage

Under Construction: Hamptonhenge

2007-04-19T10:44:00.000-04:00

2 more raised beds built with fieldstone

Because I'm a true glutton for punishment, I'm building a new pair of raised beds out of fieldstone. My brother-in-law has dubbed this great pile o' rubble HamptonHenge. He's quite the comedian.

The beds are 10 feet by 6 feet, and all of the stone comes from our property. It's not called the Granite State for nothing. Here are some pictures of the progress...

Building a fieldstone wall is like assembling a puzzle with infinite pieces...
that are buried all over the place.

“The observer, when he seems to himself to be observing a stone, is really, if physics is to be believed, observing the effects of the stone upon himself.”

- Bertrand Russell

Rocks with flat surfaces! Easier to stack! Woohoo!

My dog inspects the 3 old beds I built last year.

The Cucumber Forest

2007-04-18T20:43:00.000-04:00

The cuke seedlings are pretty happy...

The 2 varieties I'm growing:
Alibi Cucumbers from Johnnny's Seeds (pickling cukes)
Marketmore 97 Cukes from Hart's Seeds (burpless salad cucumbers)

Onions from Seed are Doomed!

2007-04-09T13:32:00.000-04:00

For the record, I'm still committed to a strong onion harvest from seed. In fact, here's the latest look at how some of my 'tub onions' are growing:

In a disturbing turn of events, however, I've come across a dissenting voice from a favorite blogger Farmgirl. She writes:

"Anyone can produce a delicious crop as long as they follow my cardinal rule: Never ever start them from seed.....It only took me several growing seasons and at least two dozen packets of seeds to finally face the truth: This is never going to happen. Onions simply take too long to mature."

Farmgirl goes on to describe that she ends up with a basket of cocktail onions each time she starts them from seed. Oh dear, that sounds eerily similar to my 2006 onion crop.

This does NOT bode well for The Great Onion Challenge.

Prevent Leggy Seedlings!

2007-04-09T11:05:00.000-04:00

I planted (what I hope to be) stunning Juliet tomato plants from Johnny's Seeds. (I'm hoping they end up looking like the picture on the left).

I planted on March 13th, and the seedlings sprouted and have progressing nicely... until....they have begun to look leggy over the last week.

After doing some research, this is what I've learned (forgive my newbiness):

Heat mats after germination are a Bad Thing. When using heat mats (as I do), remove them as soon as the seedlings start to break the soil. If you don't remove the mats, the heat will force the plants to stretch up.
The light source needs to be 2" to 4" above the top of the seedlings. Seedlings stretch towards the light if they are too far away, becoming leggy. In my case, I built my light stand with fixed fluorescent lights. They are 10" to 12" above the seedlings. Time to revisit that design.

Some useful reference articles:

The Great Onion Challenge - Part 1

2007-04-07T11:34:00.000-04:00

I'm having a conversation with my father the other day, and we were discussing how last year's onions were not as successful as I'd like. My dad has always kept a large garden since I was an infant, and he has always had successful yields despite the lack of sunshine in his garden in Massachusetts. He knows what he's talking about. So, I had wondered aloud why my onions had underperformed. In that inimitable way he has of explaining everything, he gave me the answer. "Well", he exclaimed, "Nobody grows onions from seed anyway. Everyone uses sets." The gears in my mind began to turn. Aha! The gauntlet was thrown. In my competitive little world, I now have a challenge for 2007....the challenge of growing a bumper crop of onions from seed.

Last year (my first garden year), I was disappointed with my onion crop. The onions came in late, and were smaller than I was hoping for. Why? I can only guess, but here in New Hampshire, we had record-setting floods last spring, which kept the plants out of the ground until summer. Additionally, I had not started the onion seeds until mid-April. The seedlings were small and immature.

This year, I hope to have a stronger onion crop by following a more structured plan. Here's the plan:

Two different varieties. I'll plant a white onion and red onion this year. My hope is that, at the very least, one variety thrives.
Staggered planting times. I'll stagger the times I've set the seeds to germinate. The goal is to make the season longer and to harvest more onions throughout the fall.
More plants! In my humble mind, more plants will provide more opportunities for success.

The two varieties I've planted are:
Snow White Hybrid Onion
Red Delicious Hybrid Onion

Let the games begin!

Some useful articles:

Burpee's Growing Onions from Seed

Blizzard of April

2007-04-05T13:57:00.000-04:00

Snow?! On April 4th! Looks like I won't be ammending the garden soil today. My garden is covered with 8 inches of snow. Did I hear correctly... it's supposed to be Spring in Southern New Hampshire?

Windmills in the Sky

2007-04-05T12:33:00.000-04:00

Flying Wind Farms!

The Economist has a fascinating article on a novel way to produce electricity via wind: a flying wind farm. Consider that as you travel higher in the atmosphere, the winds become much stronger, able to produce significantly more energy. Using an airborne rig to capture this energy would provide much more predictable and significant amounts of power. Additionally, terrestrial wind farms are limited by the space you can place them on land. Launching generators into the air, however, offers so much more area for a power generator like this to work.

Is this technology science fiction? I'd have to say this technology has a ways to go before it can be useful, and may be a longshot to work even then. There are some interesting companies out there that are working to realize these ideas commercially. Some of these include:

Sky Windpower (the company mentioned in the article)
Magenn Power, Inc. - interesting helium-filled air rotor system

I'm certainly intrigued by the thought of generators like this. Perhaps they will be commercially realized someday. I'd love to have one of these hovering over my place generating our town's electricity! I'd hate to be under one of these rigs when something went wrong and they crashed to earth, though.

An Easier Way to Start Seedlings

2007-04-04T15:05:00.000-04:00

Using Jiffy 7 Peat Pots to grow seedlings

I was stocking up on some seed-starting supplies at the local Agway and stumbled upon these little pucks of peat called Jiffy 7s. They are compressed blocks of peat wrapped in a mesh covering. At about 20 cents per peat pot, they certainly are inexpensive enough, so I decided to try them out.

My experience with them has been excellent. Bottom-water these solid little pucks and...poof!...they expand into pliable little planting cups ready for a seed. The best part is that, once the seedling is ready, you can plant them directly into the soil - never needing to remove the seedling from a seed tray. So far, I've used them for bell peppers (the seedling shown in the picture on the left) and some cukes. Very convenient!

Reference:
Amazon has several different sources for the Jiffy 7 Peat Pots.
There also is an online tutorial about these at the Ferry Morse website.

Which Organic Fertilizers Should you Use?

2006-12-21T10:52:00.000-05:00

In addition to compost, there are a number of manufactured organic fertilizers that are great for the home garden. These are bonemeal, bloodmeal, fish emulsion, cottonseed meal and wood ashes. The Wilmington Star (NC) has an excellent article that describes the differences of each.

Organic fertilizers have advantages over chemical fertilizers, as well as a few disadvantages. On the plus side, organic fertilizer avoids:

the possibility of "burning" plants with the concentrated chemicals (i.e. an over supply of some nutrients)
the progressive decrease of real or perceived "soil health", apparent in loss of structure, reduced ability to absorb precipitation, lightening of soil color, etc.
the necessity of reapplying artificial fertilizers regularly (and perhaps in increasing quantities) to maintain fertility
the cost (substantial and rising in recent years) and resulting lack of independence

Some additional helpful links:

Fertilizer entry at Wikipedia

2006-12-16T07:56:00.000-05:00

Sheet Mulching with Pizza Boxes
Cardboard in the Garden

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer has an arti cle by Marty Wingate about cardboard used in composting. According to the article, "...many people recommend using cardboard as part of sheet mulching, along with layers of newspaper and compost. Bare vegetable beds benefit from sheet mulching. Applied in the fall, the organic material breaks down over winter while also suppressing weed growth and preventing the soil from eroding."

I was curious about the process of sheet composting, so I looked around. A great article describes it in detail. Here's a picture:

In this illustration, the cardboard would act as the 'weed barrier'. From the article, "...Materials for the weed barrier that work well are: 4-6 sheets of newspaper, cardboard, burlap bags, old rugs of natural fiber, worn-out jeans, gypsum board, or whatever you can find around."

Some useful links on sheet composting:

2006-12-15T22:48:00.000-05:00

Home gardening and E. Coli
What the home gardener needs to know about bacteria

Several frightening outbreaks of dangerous bacteria have broken out recently. The culprits appear not to be undercooked chicken or hamburger from a mad cow, but fresh produce such as spinach, lettuce and scallions. Today, NPR's Science Friday (a LocalVoltage fave) featured a pair of experts who discussed bacterial outbreaks. You can catch the podcast here.

So, how is this stuff spread? According to the Centers for Disease Control, E. Coli, "...can be found on most cattle farms, and it is commonly found in petting zoos and can live in the intestines of healthy cattle, deer, goats, and sheep." The 2 ways that E. Coli may get from cattle to the vegetables is the manure that is used as fertilizer, or water run-off from feedlots that may be collected and used in irrigation of plants. So, at the farm level, it's manure and irrigation water as the risks.

As a home gardener, my thoughts turned to my own garden. Is my own home-grown produce at the same risk as commercially grown vegetables? What might be the chief method of transmission? How can it be prevented?

Here are some guidelines (taken from the CSU Extension Service) :

Irrigate your Garden with potable water.
Never apply uncomposted manure to growing food Crops.
Compost manure properly to kill most E. coli O157:H7.
Wash your hands thoroughly before working with food.
Thoroughly wash fruits and vegetables before eating them.

No keeping cattle here at the LocalVoltage farm, so the risk from cattle is quite low. The only risk that I can imagine is from something from my composting process, or the rampant local deer population. I plan on obtaining some horse apples from the horse farms in my area for composting, so I'll be sure to make sure those are well composted before adding to the soil. As for the deer, they tend not to leave anything in the garden. They tend just to be greedy, and take.

Here are some links that might be useful on the topic of organic gardening and E. Coli:

2006-12-13T22:15:00.000-05:00

Vermicompost Tea Goes Mainstream
Look out, Miracle-Gro

What happens when you combine worm castings (AKA worm poop), recycled soda bottles and a business deal with Home Depot? Apparently, this combination yields a hot new company with it roots firmly in composting and environmentally friendly consumerism. Enter TerraCycle.

Feeding food scraps to red worms produces worm dung. What use is the worm poop? It's an odorless natural fertilizer, but without the pesky requirements of the chemical fertilizers (like fossil fuels). The worm poop is converted into liquid form, and packaged in old soda bottles. Then, this worm poop in a second hand bottle is sold in Home Depot. Cha-ching!

This is such a pure business concept. It takes something nobody wants, converts it into a useful resource, packages it using a bottle nobody wants, and sells it to an eager public. It's an environmentally friendly product that serves a public good (reduces landfill usage) and has an economic value. As the guys on those Guiness TV commercials are fond of saying, "Brilliant!!".

2006-12-12T22:17:00.000-05:00

Organic Farming Bad for the Environment

At least, that's the opinion of Norman Borlaug, a Nobel-winning scientist. This Economist article lays out Mr. Borlaugs argument. In a nutshell, he argues:

"..the idea that organic farming is better for the environment is “ridiculous” because organic farming produces lower yields and therefore requires more land under cultivation to produce the same amount of food. Thanks to synthetic fertilisers, Mr Borlaug points out, global cereal production tripled between 1950 and 2000, but the amount of land used increased by only 10%. Using traditional techniques such as crop rotation, compost and manure to supply the soil with nitrogen and other minerals would have required a tripling of the area under cultivation. The more intensively you farm, Mr Borlaug contends, the more room you have left for rainforest."

I find this a compelling argument. But are there techniques other than traditional ones that would allow higher yields? Yes, says Mr. Borlaug, there are such techniques. Those techniques are genetically engineered crops.

Thanks to Chris at Thinking on the Margin for the Economist article.

2006-12-11T23:18:00.000-05:00

Living Paintings
Patrick Blanc's Vertical Garden

When i first saw pictures of Patrick Blanc's work (at PingMag), I was compelled by how attractive these works are. Then I read how these structures are built, and I marvelled at their innovation.

Each of these works are created using three layers: a metal frame, a thin PVC sheet and a layer of felt. The metal frame is attached to the wall providing the structure. The PVC sheet provides more structure and a waterproof barrier. The vegetation actually roots in the felt. No soil! It's a giant urban hydroponics project!

The watering system is fully automated, delivering the water and liquid fertilizer from the top and letting gravity do the rest. With the lack of soil, the whole structure is relatively light at 30kg (66 lbs) per sq Meter.

Patrick's combination of art with ingenuity is inspiring.

Patrick's site has some additional pictures. Unfortunately for Americans, Patrick has done relatively few works in the States, so there are few opportunites to see his work in person. One American project in progress is at Morgans Hotel in New York.

2006-12-07T12:27:00.000-05:00

'In My Marvellous Compost Bin' Video
On a lighter note...

I've been looking everywhere for composting information, and in my travels, I've discovered one of the zanyiest, bizzarely laugh-out-loud videos about, wait for it, composting!

One of my favorite refrains...
"Cabbages and cauliflowers
Only take a couple of hours
The next-door-neighbour's bowling shoe
Took a day, or maybe two
I can compost anything
In my marvellous compost bin"

I not sure there is anything else to say.

2006-12-06T22:30:00.000-05:00

Can I compost sawdust?

As winter rolls in (it was in the 20s today) , I am embarking on the project of cleaning up my woodworking shop. After a summer of projects, my shop was filled with sawdust. White cedar sawdust from a recent project is *everywhere*. After some cleaning, I ended up with a full trashcan of the stuff.

Is sawdust a beneficial component for compost? I decided to get into researching it. Here are the highlights of what I found:

Sawdust can be a useful component in your compost pile
Sawdust is considered a 'brown' component of compost, meaning it lacks nitrogen.
Sawdust from pressure treated wood should not be used - the chemicals in it are dangerous

What is the 'right' amount of nitrogen in compost ingredients?
When creating a 'recipe' for your compost, it's important to focus on the carbon to nitrogen ratio of ech ingredient. Here's a table of compost ingredients from an excellent article over at www.savvygardener.com:

Table 1. Average carbon to nitrogen ratios for organic materials.

Greens:

Pig manure 5-7:1
Coffee grounds 20:1
Vegetable scraps 12-20:1
Grass clippings 12-25:1
Cow manure 20:1
Poultry manure (fresh) 10:1
Horse manure 25:1
Alfalfa / sweet clover hay 12:1
Poultry manure w/litter 13-18:1
Horse manure w/ litter 30-60:1

Browns:

Leaves 30-80:1
Cornstalks 60:1
Straw 40-100:1
Bark 100-130:1
Paper 150-200:1
Sawdust 400:1
Wood chips 800:1

Good stuff. We can conclude that sawdust is low nitrogen, but a usable ingredient in compost. The next question is what would we need to do to cut it to make it easier for microbes to digest quickly.

The rule of thumb: 30:1
Microorganisms are at their best when the material they are working on has a 30:1 ratio of carbon to nitrogen. With this rule in mind, it's clear that sawdust needs to be rebalanced with nitrogen.

2006-12-05T13:10:00.000-05:00

How do you judge the right moisture level of your compost?

In my battle to make good, steaming compost, I have concluded it might be the moisture content that is slowing my compost pile. Since I'm no compost expert, I had no idea what the right amount of water should be in the compost pile.

A tip from another composting article discusses several 'truths' in composting. Here's an excerpt on moisture content:

"You can gauge the moisture level of your compost pile by its fragrance.
When you dig around in a heap and don’t smell the desired earthy fragrance, lack of moisture is usually the reason. Dryness is a big challenge in the fall, when most gardeners make new compost piles from leaves. Shredding the leaves before composting them will help them break down faster, but they’ll need time and an amazing amount of water before they start breaking down.

To make it easier to keep these piles wet, I arrange a soaker hose in a figure 8 pattern, with about 4 inches of mower-shredded leaves and weathered hay between each layer of hose. I’ve found that hay vastly improves a leaf heap’s ability to retain water, and until the weather gets too cold to use it, there is no easier way to moisten the inside of a dry heap than by using a soaker hose."

2006-12-05T12:33:00.000-05:00

Making compost for your garden - The Basics
A quick list of best practices for making your own compost

After building a compost bin last year, we've been steadily building up kitchen scraps, shredded leaves and grass clippings in hopes of some nice compost. It's been taking quite a while to get compost (I was hoping for a bunch of the stuff for the 2007 garden), so I started doing research into how to more efficiently make good compost.

I found a good article on home composting from the Composting Association in Britain (who sponsor a Composting Awareness Week, believe it or not). From the article, here is a list of best practices:

1) Put your compost bin in the garden on bare soil.

2) Good compost needs the right mix of ingredients. Create a good carbon to nitrogen ratio, browns to greens. Dried flowers, woody stems and cardboard (browns) are high in carbon; fresh grass cuttings and kitchen waste (greens) are high in nitrogen.

3) Composting works best of you add a lot of materials at once. Chop large items into small pieces to help speed up the process. Try to ensure your compost is moist but not wet. Add water if it is too dry, cover and add dry material if it is too wet.

4) Every now and then introduce air into your bin either by using a garden fork to mix the material or add more scrunched up paper and card.

5) To help speed up the composting process add a handful of soil, finished compost or a compost accelerator (young nettles are an excellent natural accelerator).

6) Keep adding a good mixture of materials.

7) Your compost will be ready to use when it resembles dark soil and has a sweet, earthy smell. This can take anywhere between 6 – 24 months.

For a much more in depth discussion of home composting, check out this NC State article on home composting.

2006-11-29T12:31:00.000-05:00

Why raised bed gardening?
A better method for home vegetable gardening

Early this year, I chose to take the plunge into gardening. My father and my grandfather have always kept thriving gardens, so I was familiar with working the soil. My experience was limited to the role of the kid who helps weed, build the mulch pile, and weed some more. So, when my wife and I returned to New England and purchased a home with a large plot of land, the stage was set for me to continue the family tradition of gardening. Although I have my family to lean on for experience, I had a lot to learn.

This area in southern New Hampshire has soil with a lot of clay. It's dense, and full of rocks. The area near our home is rocky, with a large open sunny meadow surrounded by forest. The soil, unfortunately, is not ideal for vegetable gardening. In the planning stages of the garden, I put a lot of thought into meeting this challenge. I focused my research on understanding how to efficiently increase the quality of the garden soil. My research brought me to consider raised bed gardening.

The practical advantages of raised bed gardening that were important to me:

Better soil conditions: With the dense nature of our clay soil, raised beds allow the soil to remain loose. I was able to build up the soil in the beds as I wanted, and rely a lot less on the clay soil in our meadow. (For those interested in the cultivating the clay soil, this article is useful) Compacting the soil by too much foot traffic, our happy labrador, and the tractor is also avoided.
Higher crop yields: There are 2 advantages for increasing crop yields with raised beds.

Soil is loosened and deep enough to promote root growth.
Raised beds also support greater number of plants, allowing us to experiment with the concept of intensive planting.

Improved drainage: Water can't pool and stand in a raised bed (as it does in the marshy areas around our home). After the record-setting floods in New Hampshire during the Spring of 2006, this became a more important advantage of the raised beds.

After examining this approach, I was sold. After the floods abated, I built three raised beds (picture above).

2006-08-09T10:15:00.000-04:00

Localvoltage is live!

"If money is your hope for independence you will never have it. The only real security that a man will have in this world is a reserve of knowledge, experience, and ability."
- Henry Ford

"Electricity is actually made up of extremely tiny particles called electrons, that you cannot see with the naked eye unless you have been drinking."
- Dave Barry