tiller newbie notes

[ronjhall]

Terry
I try to remember that in a couple of years when I retire. I don't think that are many Elm's up around Atlanta Michigan. But there sure are a lot around here. Dutch Elm Disease has just about killed them all. /w3tcompact/icons/sad.gif

 

[TerryinMD]

Ron,

Yes, us too! We have lost some large beautiful trees to dutch elm. If you don't have any patches in your area you can buy some mushroom spawn and "seed" your around your dead elms. May or may not work! If you are successfull, do NOT tell anyone where you grow them. Around here, morel patches are closely guarded secrets as are any other good mushroom patch.

We also have another variety called a shaggy mane. They appear overnight and look like a (excuse the wording couldn't think of anything else) male appendage (creamy white) with rostafarian hair (light tan). Once they open up, you really can't eat them.

Terry

 

[TerryinMD]

Bird,

Here are the onion varieties we use:

Granex
Mars (red onion)
White spanish
Yellow spanish

Hope this helps. Another issue that my wife brought up was that you need to be careful on the type of onion - long and short day varieties. For Texas, we believe you need a long day variety. Where we live, we can use either.

Terry

 

[fractal]

RPM: I bought it used from the guy who sold me the tractor. He cut me a deal on the tiller cause I didn't argue the price of the tractor after he asked me not to I think we both did ok on the (whole package) deal. Normal price for used 4ft tillers seems to be 700-900 from what I have seen.

Robert: Yeah, the ckickens were back in the garden were in there before I finished the row. Had to chase them out several times. Chickens are not very smart and I could imagine what would happen if one wandered under the tiller when it was running Animals and power equipment just don't mix.

 

[Bird]

Thanks for the information, Terry. I guess I'd better just stay with the Texas 1015Y. We pull them, tie them in bundles of 4 or 5 to a bundle and hang them in the shop. In spite of the heat, we sometimes have onions that last until December. And we've had a fine crop every year except this last year. We didn't have any get bigger than a baseball (and a lot of them no bigger than a golf ball) this past year because the grasshoppers ate the entire tops off of them. I guess if the grasshopper plague isn't over this coming season, I may have to start using some insecticide on the garden; something I haven't done up until now.

 

[TerryinMD]

Bird,

When we harvest our onions, we wait until the tops are beginning to brown and droop over. We then take a rake and "break" the necks of the onion greens just above the bulb. You don't want to completely snap the neck, just bend it over. This sends a "signal to the plant to seal off the top. We the wait a few days and dig all of them out and begin the drying process. Once the greens have browned a little more we clip off the greens, give the bulbs a haircut (trim the roots), and cure them on big plastic bread trays for a couple of weeks in a cool, dry area. Usually, the basement of our house.

It's then Market time!!

Terry

 

[Bird]

<font color=blue>cure them on big plastic bread trays</font color=blue>

That's quite a coincidence, since that's what I used this past year, since there were no tops to tie them with./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif I used them for potatoes, too, and need to get some more of those trays.

 

[TerryinMD]

Cool - I would like to find some more myself!!

Just to expand a little, what we do is put the trays up off the floor on a set of portable saw horses to get plenty of air circulating under them. If we had the room, I would set out each tray individually to quicken the curing process.

We just lay the potatoes on the ground for a couple of hours and rotate them. We then put them into wooden baskets or crates for storage. Find a nice cool, dark corner of basement and cover them with old sheets to keep out any light.

I have been wanting to build a root cellar for years. Just haven't put it on the radar scope. I need to build a shed/shop and will begin to do that within the next year or so. I will incorporate a root cellar into its design. I've finally decided on a small bank barn design. Sizing is still in question. Final determination will be on the financing.

Terry

 

[Bird]

Terry, do you raise turnips, too? My tractor hadn't been started in nearly two months; still had the finish mower on it, so I did just a little mowing (mostly just to mulch leaves), then I pulled the last of the Fall turnips, put the tiller on, and tilled our garden spot and a neighbor's garden today.

 

[TerryinMD]

Bird,

Those are some BIG turnips. No, we haven't grown any turnips. That's one crop that we haven't experimented with and to be honest, we don't eat them either.

We grow a couple varieties of beets, sometimes some carrots (pain to get the soil just right), collards, kale, swiss chard, halapeno and habenero peppers for my wifes hot pepper jams, lots and lots and lots of basil (one of the main crops for us), bell peppers, mainly roma tomatoes and some beefsteak varieties, snap beans, snowpod peas, fresh dill, sweet potatoes, rhubarb, red raspberries, strawberries, and pickling cucumbers (another main crop). We have some fruit trees but have not had much success with them. Either the frost gets the blossoms or the varmits pick them clean. Did you know that groundhogs climb trees!! We were ready to harvest some beautiful peaches this summer. We went away on vacation for a week and the tree was full and would be ready when we returned. When we got back, every peach was missing. A nice trail to the varments hole. It was history within a day..... /w3tcompact/icons/mad.gif/w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

This year I would like to try to grow some Chimayo Chiles. Man, they are great. Use to get them when we lived in New Mexico. Yum..... We need to start planning now. We are changing the layout of the garden and will expand it a little. So we need to think it all through plus order what we need for the season.

Terry