Gardening Guru Goforth

Raised beds

2012-01-04T05:42:00.001-08:00

So many people want to use timbers or stone to create raised beds. While timber or stone does look nice, they are expensive and are not necessary for many situations. These pictures show two examples of raised beds. The bare ground beds were created by hilling disk on a small farm, although I have created raised beds on about 1/4 that amount of land just using a shovel. These beds were only used for one year because the tractor mounted tiller was able to level them back down. The raised beds covered by ground cover (a woven polyethene product) were built by a shovel about 20 years prior to this picture. The woven fabric kept the rain from washing the beds flat.

My goal for the farmers market.

2011-12-29T07:13:00.000-08:00

Two years ago, I wrote a grant that, among other things, allowed Piedmont Farmers market to hire a full time manager. Last year the market paid her from reserve funds. Long term, they will have to generate more income to mantain a full time manager. There are three things they need to do to keep hiring a full time manager. One is to generate more vendor fees. I have written a grant to build a new building that should attract and retain new vendors. Second is to develop a repeatable iconic fundraising event. I have done that through the Harvest Gala. The final thing I will work on this year is donations and sponsorships.

Busy Part 2

2011-12-29T07:05:00.001-08:00

The other project that I worked on this fall was our local farmers market. Here is a picture of the outside of the current building. The part to the right was build in 1988. I was involved in that project right after I was hired. The part to the left is a result of my grant writing efforts in 1999. I started working that year to be in a position to get additional grant money. I helped develop $100,000 worth of matching funds in 2007 and this year I wrote $150,000 worth of grants for a total of $250,000 to build a duplicate building right beside this one.

What kept me so busy this year?

2011-12-29T06:28:00.000-08:00

One of the things I was doing this past six months was developing a fund raising event for the local farmers market. With lots of help, we had an event with live music, local food, live auction, silent auction, door prizes, educational exhibits and demonstrations.

Here is a pumpkin that was carved for the event.

I can't believe the year is almost over

2011-12-29T06:23:00.000-08:00

You haven't seen many post because of a hectic work schedule. I finished the year by inoculating some more mushroom logs. Here is the set up with an electric drill, hot plate for wax, and inoculation tool. (If you were following all the rules, the logs should not be laid on the ground. ) I am using the tail gate as a work surface for the logs.

Here is a picture of my high tunnel built earlier this year

2011-07-25T13:16:00.001-07:00

I had the conduit bows on hand. I purchased some wood for the lowest purloin to attach the plastic and also purchased the plastic. The gross receipts for the first 10 days of harvest was higher than the amount I spent building it.

High Tunnel harvest

2011-07-25T13:11:00.000-07:00

Early season tomatoes from my high tunnel. Note the normal size ink pen for comparison.

Farmers market.

2011-07-25T13:08:00.000-07:00

A few shots of produce I raised and sold this summer. (I just picked and sold the blackberries.)

Some kids are harder to raise than other kids

2011-07-25T12:39:00.000-07:00

He has totaled 7 cars. He washed 1/4 mile downstream during the first wreck and broke his neck in 3 places after he was thrown 20 feet from the car in his last wreck. He got two skull fractures when he jumped on a gang. (I know it is normally the gang that does the jumping, but this boy is a little different. He stopped his truck to rescue somebody, putting 3 men on the ground after taking the blow to the head.) He has been struck by lightning and knocked unconsious by a live electrical wire (it is possible the fall restarted his heart) and had his nose broke when a guy tried to rob him (he fought him off with a box cutter). So I was happy to see him get married. I hope it will be a turning point. If you have difficult kids, enjoy them while you have them. Sometimes it works out.

Road building 3

2011-03-31T08:19:00.000-07:00

This is my driveway. (I think this was a public road as early as 1903, but my neighbor and I hold the deed and the title search company claims its legit.) This area shows proper crowning with adequate ditches on both sides. It has been regraveled about 3 times since 1989 and is due another layer soon. Obviously landscape fabric wasn't invented in 1903, so a good road is possible without it. My preference in the future will be to use landscape fabric when I want a good road. (Sometimes road sort of develop without planning. I can't promise that won't happen.) Also see post Road Building 1 and Road Building 2. For some real information go to this booklet. http://www.na.fs.fed.us/spfo/pubs/stewardship/accessroads/accessroads.htm

Road Building 2

2011-03-31T08:10:00.000-07:00

These 3 pictures show a situation where in 2003 a person started to build a road without landscape fabric. This can be done. In fact, the majority of rural roads were done this way. It takes several years, additional layers of gravel and ongoing maintenance to make it work. In this case, the individual put in the first load and then changed their mind. The first picture is the way the surface looks today. By now a second and third layer should have been placed on top to give you a good aggregate surface. The second picture shows the gravel that was originally dumped on the ground and the third picture shows the gravel soil interface. If this road was travelled frequently, the gravel would get pushed down and the red soil would mix upward. So option 1 is to use landscape fabric followed by one layer of gravel. (See pictures in Road Building 1 post). This should give you a road with less ongoing maintenance although it isn't carefree. Option 2 is to use large gravel to get a base, followed by several more applications of gravel layers. Also see Roadbuilding 3 post and this http://www.na.fs.fed.us/spfo/pubs/stewardship/accessroads/accessroads.htm

Road Building 1

2011-03-31T07:46:00.001-07:00

The picture to the left shows high quality woven landscape fabric on my property that was crossed repeatedly with emply logging trucks on the way in and loaded logging trucks on the way out. (The mulch wasn't present when the logging trucks were using this route.) The rut occured because this area wasn't crowned and held water which eventually led to this small dip. Still there is no tearing from the fully loaded trucks. The picture above is the back entrance of a former Class 3 dairy barn (Roughly 1940 to 1970) that has been used for horses (Roughly 1980 to 2000) and then equipment (2001 to present). When a cow or horse stands in a dry barn and then exits during wet conditions, the dry hoof picks up a little wet dirt and moves it away from the entrance. This eventually leaves a large hole. (One of my friends claims we can't rule out the possiblity that all dairy farmers looked for a hole and built their barn so the cows had to walk through it, but I really like my theory better.) About 2001 this hole was covered with landscape fabric and then gravel. The first picture shows the intact fabric in the bottom of the hole. The fabric has limited the gravels trip downward and has limited the red dirts movement upward. No additional gravel has been added over the past 10 years. Contrast this to the picture in the Roadbuilding 2 post. I figure if I am going to do build a good road the right way, I will use a fabric under the initial gravel. However, there is rural road building expertise in the Natural Resource Conservation Office if you wish to get an expert opinion.

Hot Links for Vegetable Gardening Class.

2011-02-18T12:47:00.000-08:00

Here is the post harvest handling link referenced in class
http://www.ksre.ksu.edu/library/hort2/mf1175.pdf
Here is the Home Vegetable Gardening Guide referenced in class
http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/hil/pdf/ag-06.pdf
Here is the web site for weed identification mentioned by Wendy.
http://www.dgsgardening.btinternet.co.uk/weeds.htm
Here is a composting site
http://www.p2pays.org/compost/.
This site was mentioned during the crop rotation presentation, however the specific article from Fall 2010 is no longer available to the public.
www.urbanfarmonline.com
Here is a place to sign up for quarterly newsletter that I help edit.
http://www.cals.ncsu.edu/extgardener/about.htm
Here is a portal to the Extension vegetable references on the internet
http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/consumer/hortinternet/vegetable.html
The Cabarrus County Cooperative extension website (with access to the Ask an Expert link)http://cabarrus.ces.ncsu.edu/

My direct email
djgoforth@cabarruscounty.us

2011-02-18T12:42:00.000-08:00

Again I pulled my maple sap collecting equipment by Feb 1. I rinsed it before storing it. I am calling this year's harvest about 5 gallons. My wife cooked some down until it was the consistency of corn syrup. It started crystallizing aroudn the edges almost immediately. She then used part of it for a pecan pie. Without a doubt this was the best pecan pie I ever ate. I am not sure what she did with the rest of the syrup/sugar. I cooks one small batch down to the sugar stage. I ate it as candy so it didn't get counted a part of the 5 gallons.

Willow Oak.

2011-01-13T11:40:00.000-08:00

This willow oak was increasing in diameter at the rate of 2 inches per year. I hated to cut it, but it was shading my persimmon trees and I valued them more.

Interesting Frost patterns

2011-01-13T11:15:00.001-08:00

Here are a couple of pictures of frost patterns on my truck. These are natural. I think this is the first time I have ever seen anything this extensive.

2011 Maple Syrup harvest

2011-01-13T11:05:00.001-08:00

This year we had a snow on Christmas night and I tapped my maple trees the next Monday December 27th. The first week there was a huge sap flow. I had over 3 gallons of syrup before the date I normally tapped my trees. I now have over 4 gallons total and hope the trees will continue flowing after this cold snap. I have heard that northerners call it a sugar snow when the snow is on the ground and the sap is running heavy. I am fairly certain it is the weather conditions and not the snow that makes the sap so prolific during that time. Here is the stove I use. I have it in an outbuilding because the house can't stand that much moisture. Out of 40 gallons needed for one gallon of syrup, I boil down about 38 gallons outside and then finish boiling off the last gallon inside. I have to boil it all day on the stove, but that is so much simpler than building a fire to boil it.

More on pesticides and peaches

2010-10-01T06:06:00.000-07:00

Just found a whole website devoted to the dicussion of the pesticide issue I reference in an August posting. http://www.safefruitsandveggies.com/
I have said it before but will say it again-farmers exposed to the undiluted fresh pesticides are living longer and healthier lives than consumers exposed to the diluted and environmentally degraded pesticides. I wouldn't jump to the conclusion that people aren't getting enough pesticides, but that would be a more logical jump than the one people are making.

Daniel Stowe Botanical Garden Talk

2010-08-27T07:30:00.000-07:00

Here are all my posted newsarticles. http://www4.ncsu.edu/~djgofort/.
Use this link for youtube videos on gardening and lawns http://www.co.cabarrus.nc.us/News/Channel22/successfulgardener.html (Look for the one labeled Lawns.)
Here is a link to Vegetable Gardening Guide http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/hil/pdf/ag-06.pdf.
More info on vegtables; http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/consumer/hortinternet/vegetable.html

Blueberry picking

2010-08-02T11:16:00.000-07:00

Once when we were kids, Dad drove us over to a swamp near Norman where we got to picking blueberries. We fill all our buckets and then emptied the 5 gallon water cooler and filled that. That was our first experience in that particular patch. There was Mom and several kids and I think we spend several hours at it. I guess we did fairly well given our inexperience and the berries we were picking.
The other afternoon, I left work and started picking my blueberries by 6 pm. I took a break and wound up watching close to 30 minutes of world news. I got started again and by 8:23 pm I had picked 5 gallons. I guess this is the most I have ever picked on my property. Friday I picked another 1and 3/4 gallons and guess I spend less than an hour doing it. Those sold for $4 a pint at the market.

An itchy bed

2010-08-02T11:13:00.000-07:00

Found this little fellow while picking okra. He felt at home. My slight movement of the leaves didn't disturb him enough to cause him to leave.

Misguided Journalism

2010-08-02T10:25:00.000-07:00

Every year during my peach season the misguided members of the Environmental Working Group promote a list of fruits and vegetables to buy organic. This mis-information is picked up by well respected publications. For example, here is Prevention magazines’ version. http://www.prevention.com/dirtiestcleanest/.
This article has issues.
The first fallacy is that organic means pesticide free. Organic doesn't mean pesticide free. See a list of 1700 approved chemicals here: http://www.omri.org/omri-lists . Some of the organic pesticides require more personal protective equipment than conventional pesticides for the same plant disease. Other organic pesticides require longer re-entry intervals. Compare the label on this organic pesticide (currently being recommended for downy mildew on cucumbers) http://www.hort.wisc.edu/cran/mgt_articles/articles_pest_mgt/labels_msds/labels/kocide%202000.pdf
with this conventional product being used for the same purpose http://www.tifton.uga.edu/veg/Alerts/PRISTINE%2003-0117%207-22-03.pdf
The second fallacy is that somehow the toxicologists are wrong and the dilute, environmentally degraded pesticides at the consumer level will cause some type of damage. Meanwhile the fresh, concentrated pesticide is not affecting the manufactures, commercial applicators or farmers. The commercial applicators are mixing and applying the fresh, concentrated pesticides every day in season. The farmers also mix, apply, repair pesticide spray machinery, get fresh concentrated pesticides on their skin and clothes and live their working lives in the fields and orchard where the fresh pesticides are sprayed. Thankfully, the toxicologists are not wrong. In fact, the farmers and commercial applicators live longer and healthy lives than the average consumer. The Agricultural Health Study is probably the latest up to date source of this information. http://aghealth.nci.nih.gov/ . I have followed this study since enrolling about 200 local farmers in the study when it first started. Each year of the study, I feel more confident that pesticides are not a problem for consumers.
This article found somebody that always peels their peaches before sampling. That is meaningless but if it makes a difference to you, I sample in excess of 300 peaches every year without peeling or washing the skin. I do this when I come to a broke limb and have to figure out if the peaches had time to ripen before the limb broke. I sample one and know whether to pick or abandon the rest. (By sample number 200 or so when I wish to know how good a peach is, I just taking a bite out of the center and discarding the rest. My mom would probably be upset if she caught me.)
Even if you wish to continue to accept the premise of thier pointless article, I hope you don't worry about my products. My blueberries have never been sprayed with insecticides or fungicides. I have used weedkillers in nearby areas, but never on the actual plants or even as a broadcast spray around the blueberry plants. As of August 1 2010, it has been 46 days since I sprayed an insecticide on my peaches. There have been 9 rain events during that time. As long as 30 days ago (July 15) honeybees were foraging on my peaches with no problem. I have insects from at least 5 different orders in my orchard right this minute.
I am sure the needless worry caused by irresponsible and lazy “journalism” in articles like this is no fun for the person going through it. However, the real damage caused by articles like this is the reduction in healthy food consumption. Fresh vegetables and fruits are the good guys. Eat them. There is no scientific reason to pay higher prices for fruits and vegetables labeled organic. If higher organic prices will keep you from consuming fruits and vegetables than buy conventional fruit and vegetables, preferably from local conscientious farmers like me.

The Way Grandpa Did it

2010-07-13T10:55:00.000-07:00

Every once in a while I hear people say they want to farm the way Grandpa did it. I don't think some of them could hold up to it. Grandpa lived 9 miles out of Mt Gilead. If he wanted the plow fixed , he toted it to town. Got there by the time the blacksmith opened at 7 am. Got back home and hitched up the mule by 9 am and plowed till dark. Once he had a toothache all day Sunday. On Monday he was in Mt Gilead by the time the dentist opened at 7 am, got his tooth pulled, then home by 9 am, and plowed the rest of the day. And he never let the dentist use any anesthesia because he didn't have time to be whoozy behind the plow. Grandpa would chop in the fields until he almost quit sweating. When the waterboy came from the spring with a gallon of water, Grandpa would drink the entire gallon. Sweat would drip in a solid stream from his elbow until it cooled him back down. And he would keep chopping. He didn't have caffeine to get him started in the morning or a fan to cool him down at night. Other than a linament that smelled like turpentine, all his medicine came from plants he found in the woods. For arthritis he stuck his hand in a beehive and took a few stings. He pulled his oldest girl out of school by 9th grade to help on the farm. Or to be more accurate, he pulled her out to sleep. She was already working on the farm and doing homework in addition to farm chores was causing severe sleep deprivation. He put is oldest boy to work at the sawmill at age 13. His wife would work the fields too, leaving the youngest on a blanket at the end of the row, the next oldest watching the youngest, the next oldest hauling water, and the rest of the children working. They did it all about 3 steps ahead of malnutrition and about six steps ahead of starvation. I have no interest in farming like grandpa did it.

Sweet Cherry Harvest 2010

2010-07-13T10:53:00.000-07:00

One days harvest. I was actually stopped by a severe rainfall and came back the following week to pick the rest of them. I have 3 sweet cherry trees.

What have I been doing this summer

2010-07-13T10:50:00.001-07:00

This is a sorting table for my CSA. I started a small 14 member CSA with once a week deliveries. It has been lots of fun and more profitable than farmers markets.

Some boys are harder to raise than others.

2010-02-26T12:55:00.000-08:00

The last picture shows the impact with the culvert that started the cartwheeling. If you knew where to look you could see the second, third and fourth impact in the previous picture. Impacts were in the following order: front right wheel, front left bumper, drivers side front and passenger side rear. The top picture shows the violence of the drivers side impact. The blood in the side ditch is 21 feet beyond the point where the car landed. The young man ejected from back window is expected to eventually recover from a broke neck. It hasn't been determined if his stupidity is cureable or terminal.

A pitiful looking woodpile

2010-02-10T13:07:00.000-08:00

The pile to the left only has two rows left. I had planned to have almost 3 rows left this time of the year but the cold weather has increased the amount of wood I have burnt. This view gives a fairly good overview of my wood burning set up. I can back a truck up to the wood splitter or on back to the pile. I can also approach the stove directly from the right and when the yard is dry, I don't mind driving up on the lawn side. The wood splitter is permanently located at this site. The wheelbarrow covers the engine when the splitter is not in use. Once the wood is split, it is stacked. I burn from one side of a center aisle and stack the green on the other side to dry a year. Next year I will switch. The outdoor furnace is located behind the pile. The ashes are temporarily stored beside the stove and later spread on the garden or orchard. With this outdoor furnace I can burn junk wood like pine, elm or sweet gum. Some years I heat the entire season with junk wood. This year I have burnt some very good oak and was thankful for every pound of it. Over the last 15 years about 1/3 of the wood has come off my land with the other 2/3rds salvaged from some place or the other. I have not paid directly for any wood, although repairing my chain saw this year set me back a little. The only bad thing is the amount of smoke I create. I calculate it at 200 lbs a year with about 100 lbs of that leaving my property. I guess I have created that much smoke from a single brush fire, but it is still something to think about.

Bad Day in Termite Land

2010-02-08T10:58:00.000-08:00

The rice looking stuff on the log splitter is actually termites. These fell out of a section of firewood as I split it. There were several more cracks in each section filled with termites. At least 4 sections has this many termites, with smaller numbers in some additional sections. Overall it was the largest termite colony I have ever seen. I suspect the tree had come down in Hurricane Fran. Any part laying on the ground was too far gone for wood burning but the main trunk was bridged off the groun and the heartwood was still solid enough to make burning worthwhile.

Maple Syrup harvest 2010

2010-02-02T14:20:00.000-08:00

This year I started tapping the southern sugar maples on January 8. Flow was finished by February 1. My yield per tree seemed down a little but I tapped some extra trees. So overall I had my best year cooking down at least 2 gallons of maple syrup. It is hard to be precise because some of it hasn't been cooked completely down. I cooked it down to a point and then sealed it in quart jars where it can settle. When I run out of syrup, I will carefully pour off the top and cook it down to put in half pint jars. I use some maple syrup as I am cooking it off which also throws off the estimate. I normally just use it for breakfast on oatmeal. But this year I also cooked a maple pecan loaf. I enjoyed it, but think I can do better. Last year I had 1 and 1/2 gallons of syrup. I gave about 1/2 gallon away and the other gallon lasted just about the entire year. I didn't use any of it for cooking. My plan this year is to give 1/2 gallon away, eat one gallon on oatmeal and use the other 1/2 gallon for cooking. My wife still doesn't like it so it looks like I won't have to share any with her.

Another Close Call

2009-12-22T08:27:00.000-08:00

My youngest boy Lee purchased a house back during the summer. It was in a mature woodlot. Since then there has been 4 trees that have fallen. Two smaller trees were destroyed in the process. This latest downed tree, shown in these two pictures, was actually touching the house. The other 3 were not that surprising. They were decayed, leaning, and recently exposed to wind throw. The only problem with this pine was recent exposure and perhaps a restricted root zone. (I still haven't decided if there was an old road or just a terrace on the back side of this tree.) It was a severe wind that brought it down. In nearby towns, the power was knocked out to thousands of people. Hope this is the last one for awhile. There are only two or three real threats to the house and they look in fairly good shape. There is a white oak that could cause problems. It has a natural lean and would create a glancing blow to the house if it went that way.

Big Tree

2009-12-22T08:19:00.000-08:00

I took this picture about 3 years ago. This post oak is the biggest tree I have ever cut. For comparison, the bar on the Stilh chain saw is 18 inches long. I don't remember the exact diameter but I think it was in the high 40's. I had only learned how to cut a tree larger than twice the bar lenght a few weeks earlier. This tree was 134 years old at least. The center decay prevented an exact age. In the course of cutting and splitting it, I found two bullets, two nails and two eyehooks. There were also two seperate colonies of carpenter ants.

High Tunnel from Local wood

2009-12-22T08:02:00.000-08:00

My post have been rare this fall because of my work schedule. Here is the latest project I have been working on at the Elma C Lomax incubator farm. This is a high tunnel about 96 long by 30 wide. A high tunnel is similar to a greenhouse but without a heating system. You can't grow warm season crops all winter but it extends the season early and late. (I also have a high tunnel at my house. I picked greenbeans for my own use until December 1.) I did a lot of the construction on this tunnel but haven't done much with the crops. The farmers I am working with have it almost fully planted by mid December. We chose oak boards since they are locally available. I suspect they are a more environmentally sound choice. They are cheaper anyway. Construction started on this tunnel at Elma C Lomax farm incubator in September and the ends were enclosed in December. The sides have a salvaged automatic pulley system that was salvaged from a poultry house.

A little insect humor

2009-10-16T06:51:00.000-07:00

Hope you enjoy this recent email conversation between me and some of our entomologists.

David Goforth
Client reports her son finding a white grasshopper. I don’t guess I have ever seen a white grasshopper but maybe I haven’t been looking. Maybe when they first molt they are white and I have never been there at the right time. Do you think a white grasshopper is rare and do you have any desire to own it? Thanks.

Specialist #1
I think you guessed right about the new molt. Next time you find a grasshopper nymph, keep your eyes on it and follow it around day and night for a week or two until it molts.

Specialist #2
That sounds about right. This is how references to white elephants got started -- you have to be there when it molts to see it, but who wants to follow an elephant around for weeks or months waiting for that to happen? All that time and expense. Been there, dung that.

David Goforth
Thanks. I have never even seen pictures of a cast elephant skin. They must not last long in nature.

Specialist #2
Didn't you ever wonder where suede came from?

Some friends I met on the yellow brick road

2009-10-13T11:02:00.000-07:00

The good witch, Dorothy, Toto, Scarecrow, Lion, tinman and me at the 2009 Cabarrus County fair. See related post below.

Wicked Witch

2009-10-13T10:59:00.001-07:00

The 2009 Cabarrus County Master Gardener fair booth motif was the Wizard of Oz. The carniverous plants shouldn't have went with the wicked witch but the washtub fit the motif so perfect that we did it anyway.

County Fair Booth 2009

2009-10-13T10:51:00.000-07:00

Cabarrus County Master Gardeners booth theme for 2009 was The Wizard of Oz. The good witch planted useful plants including vegetables while the curse of the bad witch was invasive plants, disease and insects.

Acorn Squash

2009-08-21T10:53:00.001-07:00

Last year I grew acorn squash from some seed I picked up at Lowe's. They had an okay taste (not a great taste) and I sold them with no problem. Acorn squash isn't an easy crop for this area, but since they sold so readily I thought I would try it again. I went to the catalogs, bought one the writer claimed had the best taste. These are great tasting acorn squash. Best I have ever eat. Which is good because it looks like I am going to have to eat them all. I have drop the price to 2/3rd of last year's price and still haven't sold them. There is no way to know for sure but I suspect the problem is that they are not green. Last year the acorn squash were green. This year they are not. These are a lot prettier but they are not green. The seed catalog writer suggested that people would enjoy them on the table as decoration for a few weeks and then cook them. I didn't realize he was talking about the growers.

Links for Daniel Stowe Botanical Garden Talk.

2009-08-21T10:43:00.001-07:00

Here are all my posted newsarticles. http://www4.ncsu.edu/~djgofort/. In specific fruit varieties are covered here http://www4.ncsu.edu/~djgofort/Fruit23.htm. Here is a link to Vegetable Gardening Guide http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/hil/pdf/ag-06.pdf. More info on vegtables and fruit.
http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/consumer/hortinternet/vegetable.html
http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/consumer/hortinternet/fruitandnuts.html

Irrigation system

2009-07-29T09:23:00.000-07:00

I rigged an irrigation system using a sump pump that I had, along with a generator I had on hand. I drilled a bunch of small holes in a salvaged plastic barrel for a pre filter, then dropped the sump pump and the barrel in the creek. I used a nylon rope to keep the sump pump turned on. I hooked the pump to a garden hose to the drip irrigation filter then to the spagetti tube. The spagetti tube is normally inside the drip tube but I pulled it out for the picture. I had 5 rows of drip tape about 150 feet long on this system. In the early season there wasn't a need for the irrigation but when it got dry, the system should have run 4 or 6 hours each day. I didn't manage to run it enough but what I did was certainly worthwhile. I realize sump pumps are not designed for irrigation. There was less than 10 feet of head and the drip system is designed for 10 lbs of pressure but will work on slightly less. Any more head or any more drip lines and the system probably wouldn't have worked. I also realize there was a lot of wear and tear on the generator. (I intend to replace the generator anyway. It doesn't have a plug in to run my 220 volt well. ) However, I got a lot of value for the actual money I spent.

Harvest status

2009-07-29T09:14:00.001-07:00

The rain isn't doing my peaches any good. Some parts of the county have had at least 9 inches of rain this week and I suspect many parts had more. Not sure what we had at the house but suspect it was closer to 6 inches over about 4 events. That was enough to keep the humidity high. I have China Pearl and Biscoe peaches ripe now. By next week the Sweet Sue should be ripe and that will be the end of the peaches. I have picked blueberries 4 good times. I am getting a lot of bird damage to the blueberries and suspect I have picked more than I have left. I picked Acorn Squash yesterday but haven't had a chance to cook any yet. Basically, the only commercial crops I have left besides peaches are eggplant, acorn squash, butternut squash, okra and ornamental gourds. None of those crops are going to amount to very much. I am looking forward to finishing up. I will plant some collards and turnips for myself and maybe some greenbeans.

tomato harvest

2009-07-29T09:05:00.001-07:00

This is the second year in a row that my best tomatoes came the second week of July. These were big beef tomatoes planted in a high tunnel on March 15. These 12 tomatoes fill up a berry box designed to hold 8 quarts of berries. The quarter doesn't do a real good job of letting you know how big they are. I should have used something else to measure with. You can take my word that these are nice tomatoes. You will have to take my word that they have a taste to match.

Native Lily

2009-07-06T11:25:00.000-07:00

This native lily was given to me by elderly lady from Concord named Clara (or perhaps Claris) who claimed here husband originally collected it from Montgomery County. In my last conversation with her, I had to inform her that the voles ate the bulb of the original and I had lost the lily, which really upset her. However, one of the little bubils came up near by. Then I accidently pulled that one up while weeding. But finally another bubil came up. Now I have it growing in 4 different spots. If Clara was around to see it, I think she would be pleased.

Picture of my cooler

2009-07-06T11:24:00.001-07:00

After picking last Friday and ready to load on Saturday morning.

Butter From the Lingle Spring

2009-07-06T11:22:00.000-07:00

Out of curiosity, I decided to make butter from milk stored in spring branch. So I placed some milk from the afternoon milking in the spring branch. The next day I pulled it out around 11. It was still good quality sweet milk so I decided it needed to clabber a little more. I left it at room temperature until that night. The milk still hadn’t soured but I shook the milk until the butter separated. I used the butter on my oatmeal the next day. The remaining milk was put in the refrigerator and I used it on some cereal later in the week. Growing up, I never liked the taste of buttermilk. In fact, I only remember trying it once or twice and that was enough. When I learned that before refrigeration butter milk was the only way people drank milk, I thought that was rather poor doings. But if my experience is typical, the people with a good spring branch made out okay.

Crop update

2009-06-23T06:14:00.000-07:00

Blackberries are going to be scarce for me this year. The blackberry patches I have been picking are playing out. Peaches are about 2 weeks out. Some are getting good color now. I am picking squash, cucumbers and beans. I am at the first of my eggplants. Some of my beans drowned due to the excessive rain. Just guessing, the specialty melons are about 4 weeks out. There is one watermelon variety that may be ready in 3 weeks . This is a picture from one end of the melon patch. I am trying 3 new melons this year. On the far left of this picutre, there are butternut squash. I have played with butternut in the past with out a lot of success but they are suppose to be easier than the acorn squash I had success with last year. This year I have changed varieties on acorn squash to one that is more decorative.

Shed Antlers

2009-06-23T06:12:00.000-07:00

I found this set of shed antlers while picking blackberries yesterday. They were within 100 feet of where I hunted once this past season. In fact I have hunted that set of woods off and on for several years. The sheds were within 400 feet of the place I killed the 8 pointer that I figured was making all the tracks this past year. The drop tine is slightly more than 4 inches. First time I have ever found two sheds together. First time I have found a drop tine shed. And previously I have only found one shed that was even close to this in size. All in all, it made up for the fact that I didn’t get many berries.

White Cucumbers

2009-06-15T12:01:00.001-07:00

These heirloom cucumbers where from seed saved by Clyde Faggart over the years. I have been saving these for about 6 years. My grandmother grew some that were very similar genetics and I think the ones offered by Johnny's Select Seeds are the same. These are not the same as the White Wonder sold in local stores. The simplest way to tell the difference is that these have black spines and the white wonder doesn't. Compared to regular cucumbers, these have a thinner skin and seldom have bitterness. They will have a slightly larger seed cavity than the newer hybrids but that isn't a problem particularly when picking them small. I use them fresh as snacks and also in salads. I also make Bread and Butter pickles with them. My uncle will freeze cucumbers but I just try to get a bait of them during the season and eat pickles the rest of the year.

Spring Box at Lingle Spring

2009-06-15T11:56:00.001-07:00

Finally got the spring cleaned out enough to see the spring box. The right hand board is made out of oak while the other two are made out of poplar. The aze marks are still visible on the bottom board. Suprizingly it is still white colored after all these years. When poplar is exposed to air, it will typically turn brown in less than 5 years. I measured the temperature and it read 64 degrees. Not refrigerator cold but refreshing on an 85 degree day. There is evidently a board missing on the end. It won't hold the water as deep as it needs to. I am going to add a couple of boards and see how it works.

A dry year will scare you but a wet year will starve you

2009-06-03T12:32:00.000-07:00

My peach crop is looking great this year. It is a small crop because of the cold 14 degree weather right after the snow and 3 frost events. The up side of that is there was almost no thinning. I did spend about 3 hours at it but that is a small amount of time compare to what could have been. It has also been difficult keeping things sprayed. I have increased my spray frequency. Once I spray later this week, I will have two extra sprays above what I consider normal. Right now I am planning to have my peaches at the Harrisburg, Winecoff (Saturday), Hospital, Midland, Concord and Research Campus Market.
I picked a cherry tomato on May 31 this year. First time I have every ripened a garden tomato in May. It lacked a day or so from fully getting ripe but that would have put it in June so I went ahead and picked it and cooked it in an omelet. This weekend I will have a good supply of squash but will basically be out of the broccoli business for another year.
I have lost most of the plums due to the various frosts and lost most of the cherries due to the excessive rains.

Lingle Spring

2009-06-03T12:25:00.001-07:00

As I continued to clean out the spring, I have found a trough set in the spring branch that is about 4 inches high and about 10 to 12 inches wide. The bricks in the picture are the top layer. I have felt down to 8 layers.

Digging out the old spring

2009-05-12T12:27:00.000-07:00

I finally got a chance to dig around the area I thought was the main spring on Laurence Lingle’s Property (See post titled German Dovetailing). Earlier I had dug out another place I thought might have been used as a water source for a sawmill that had operated on the property probably in the 1950’s. Sawmills back then used water for the horses and the boiler. When I finished digging that hole out, I still wasn’t sure whether it had been used as a water source or not. I was disappointed about not knowing for sure and I guess that is what kept me from digging out this other place any sooner. When I purchased the property, the only thing visible was one rock. I hoped it was the top of the spring. I wasn’t disappointed. When I got down 3 courses of rocks, the rest of the spring had bricks around it. So far I have gone down 8 layers of bricks and I am not sure I have got to the bottom yet. The bricks look newer than the ones used in the house. They look the same as the bricks around the surface of the well. My guess on the age of the well is early 1800's. If that is true, then the spring was redone after the well was already in use. That would make sense if the spring was more reliable than the well.

(I have attached a picture of the handmade brick with the dog print that was used when the house was remodeled after 1850. The other picture is the well which has newer bricks on top. )

Adventitious bud foliage on a mature Virginia pine.

2009-02-17T16:01:00.000-08:00

This is a rare example of a pine that has foliage from an adventitious bud that has persisted as the tree has continued to grow. I am not sure the cause of this phenomena. I was unable to propagate this. I thought at the time that is would stay in a bushy form if propagated but now I believe it could eventually revert back to normal growth. This plant lived behind Weddington School but the first time volunteers encountered this tree they whacked it down. Viruses can cause adventitious buds to sprout. I also see adventitious buds on pines that have been girdled by animals or equipment. I really don't know what happened here.

Potential State Record Sumac

2009-02-06T09:16:00.000-08:00

I first noticed this tree two years ago and even considered cutting it down to improve my shooting lane. (I have killed four bucks within 50 yards of this tree.) There were never any leaves on it and I just assumed it was a large alder like the other trees in the area. Then one day I was sitting in a nearby tree and a flock of bluebirds stopped to feed. There were 5 male bluebirds in this tree at one time with others nearby. That is when I finally realized this was one whopper of a sumac (Rhus copallina). Anyway, the county forest ranger in Rowan County came by one day and I got him to measure it. The current record is actually 6 feet taller, but this one has such a large circumference that I think it could become the record. (That is County Forest Ranger David Poole on the right.)

Maple Syrup

2009-01-16T06:12:00.000-08:00

This is the third year I have tapped the Southern Sugar Maple and by far my most productive. The main thing is tapping it earlier in the year. This year I tapped them on January 3 and sap was running even then. I may need to tap them around Christmas. There are several locations of Southern Sugar Maple in Cabarrus County. 20 years ago, I noticed a large population in Southern Mecklenburg County. Trees need to be about 10 inches in diameter. Last year I tapped a couple of smaller ones that were going to be cut anyway. They gave very little sap and it was at odd times compared to the larger trees. The injury is the same actual size which means it is a large relative size. The literature says to tap at least 3 inches over and 5 inches up or down. From the picture you can see that I didn’t spend a lot of money on the set up. The 2 liter drink bottles were salvaged. 3 liter bottles would be better. Last year I had 3 liter bottle and it only overflowed once. The irrigation hose was salvaged. I had the nails and string on hand. I suggest a square knot or two half hitch knot around the neck of the bottle and an overhand knot at the top of the string so the bottle can be removed to pour out the sap. One bad thing about this set up is that the nail will be held tight by the end of the sap flow. Future generations will probably curse me because of it. At least I can use the same nail for at least three years. If I had cut the irrigation pipe a little longer, the pipe could go anywhere on the tree while the bottle still hangs on the same nail. In colder climates, people have to worry about the sap freezing but here in the sunny south that isn’t as much of a problem. Sometimes I do get a little ice. I think the pure water freezes first, so little chunks of ice can be discarded without losing much other than water. I cook down the sap on a camp stove and finish it up inside. I am getting abut a 40 to 1 ratio of sap to syrup. The other two years, the amount of syrup I get per tap has been less than what growers in Maine and Canada report but this year I am at about 10 ounces per tap and still counting. You can look at the maple syrup in the store and get an idea of how far to cook it. You don’t cook it down to the consistency of corn syrup. Compared to the USDA grade A amber maple syrup in the store, I have cooked down one batch that is lighter this year. Most of the syrup is a little darker which is considered a lower quality although I can’t really tell the difference in taste. Even at grocery store prices, tapping and boiling syrup isn’t real profitable but it is fun.

German Dovetailing

2009-01-16T06:04:00.000-08:00

Lorentz Lingle received a tract of land north of my property from the Earl of Granville. Part of that property was donated for the church now known as Lower Stone Church. His son Frances received land adjacent to his father, including the land where this cabin sits, from Rowan County. A good guess would be that he got this property for service during the Revolutionary War. Frances married Marie Eve and their first four sons Joseph, Paul, John, and Daniel probably left for Illinois. This is based on the fact that Frances left them a dollar each in his will while Jacob and Laurence both got land. Frances also had 3 girls, Elizabeth who married a Moose and Catherine and Marie Eve. On March 30, 1825, Laurence bought the site where this cabin sits from his father Frances. By the 1830 census it looks like Frances had moved in with Laurence probably due to age. My guess is that Laurence built the cabin around 1825. I felt lucky to be able to pinpoint the property but it was described as on Second Creek and near the county line. Both are within 200 feet of the cabin. The county line is close enough that in 1850 Laurence was listed in both the Rowan and Cabarrus County census. Laurence had at least 4 kids, John, Anna, Louisa and Elizabeth. The cabin was 16 by 20 feet. The house is shown on a 1903 map as belonging to a J. A. M. Miller. In searching the land transfer records, I found no record of Laurence selling the property. I did find a record of J.A.M. Miller selling a portion of the land across the road from my property. I haven’t had much time to look beyond that. The cabin was extensively remodeled. Based on the style it was probably remodeled between 1860 and 1900. Additions were built to the east, to the north and a second floor was added over the cabin. Bricks were hand made on site for the chimney on the eastern addition. I found a huge dog print in one of the bricks. (A friend remarked that "everybody" got involved in that brick making.) The resulting house was abandoned before electricity was run in the area and the second story had collapsed by the time I purchased the property. So far, I haven’t found definite records of any of Laurence’s children. There was a Louisa about the right age that married a Bloom in Illinois about that time but no way to definitely connect the two. I need to search the marriage records looking for Anna or Elizabeth and see if one of them married a Miller. There were Miller families living within walking distance at the time. If Laurence did build this cabin, it would be at least third generation construction. (I found a difference of opinion on whether Lorentz Lingle was born in Germany or Pennsylvania.) One interesting thing is that all the original cabin logs are oak. I think it was more typical to use 2 or 3 runs of oak and then switch to pine. The remodeling cut 7 holes in the cabin for windows and doors. As a result, there isn’t much to save. And I don’t have much money to spend on it. I have had at least 4 people take a look at it and the best advice I have gotten is that taking pictures, sweeping it out and cleaning up around it won’t hurt.

2008-12-16T10:08:00.000-08:00

Some of my fellow county agents were discussing a landscape that heavily features Gold Mop Chamaecyparis. Here is one example. Since the Gold Mop is growing faster, there are angles where it looks like Gold Mop is the only plant. I think the other rounded plant is barberry and I can't identify the pyrimidal one from the street. It is an interesting design, but not one I would create.

Fascination with fasciation

2008-10-29T09:49:00.000-07:00

Sweet potato with abnormal growth. This is the second sweet potato I have seen with faciation. Someway the apical meristem gets deformed and results in plant growth like this. (Scroll back to my very first post to see something similar in wild mullein. )

Be Prepared

2008-10-29T09:30:00.000-07:00

I happened to get a look in the trunk of somebody working in the financial sector recently. Wonder if they know something I don't? This guy has plenty of calories at least for this winter. There is a little bit of protein in the beans although it isn't a complete protein. The part where he is really short is in fat. There isn't a good fat that will store at room temperature for a long period of time. Maybe he will find a possom to run over. On a similar note, people in Cabarrus County bought every canning jar and every canning lid available in the stores. Not sure how widespread that phenomena was. Must have been the year to stock up.

Food Availablility at the Goforth House

2008-10-29T09:03:00.000-07:00

I have been very busy with a project for work and haven't had a chance to touch base lately. Here are a few notes on the end of the harvest season. The fresh whole China Pearl peaches lasted until Oct in the refrigerator but commercially it would have been an unacceptable loss by that time. It wasn't brown rot but something more like Botrytis that took them out. The sliced tutti frutti style china pearl peaches lasted a little longer but they are gone now. I pulled the last of the fresh blueberries out of the refrigerator so my little boy could make a smoothie this morning. I rate them as still marketable if I had done a little sorting. The last of the outdoor blueberries were picked on October 17th. Figs played out about the same date in Oct. I still have muscadines unless the freeze last night destroyed them (and I don't expect it did.) I started picking muscadines on August 8th so I am close to having 3 months of fresh muscadines this year. I have gotten several oriental persimmons already and need to check the tree again. In fact, I have enough that I ought to try drying some this year. Also I still have apples. The Yates, Arkansas Black and limbertwig apples have just started. Changing the subject a little, I picked my first "foot round" apple this year. This is the only variety I have on its own roots. It may not be as outstanding as a few of the other selections but it is still a true heirloom (obtained from Mr Sid Hartsell of Concord, now deceased but actually planted by his father from a source in Southern Cabarrus county.) I really ought to try to propagate it this winter since 3 nearby apple trees were killed by either voles or cotton rats.
In the burned over area, a number of wild cressy greens came up. Now that they have matured, I will try to harvest some. I'm glad they are available because the vast majority of my turnip and kale seeds washed down stream in the heavy flooding we had some time back.

Hunt Shack

2008-09-08T12:56:00.000-07:00

The lower picture is the first picture I have of the shack where my uncle used to live. When he died, everybody expected the cabin to fall down. After about 10 years, I noticed it hasn't fallen down. After a closer look, I noticed that it was made from oak boards and had some fairly good bones. My brother and I replaced some of the foundation, hauled off a dumpster load of trash, replaced the porch, installed some salvaged windows and have started adding pine siding. For the last 15 years, I have been backpacking and deer hunting out of primitive campsites during muzzleloading season. Eventually, I plan to hunt out of this shack instead of hunting out of primative campsites way back in boonies.

The Story of the 3 little piggies

2008-09-08T12:23:00.000-07:00

The first little piggy planted invasive plants. They eventually overwhelmed his entire landscape.

The second little piggy had a traditional landscape. She didn't know the names of the plants or their uses. The third little piggy planted a landscape that provided food and shelter for wildlife and humans.

County Fair Ribbons

2008-09-05T11:23:00.000-07:00

I had quite a bit more loss in my refrigerated China Pearl Peaches this year than I did two years ago. Still I was able to pull out peaches which were good enough to win a ribbon at the county fair. These were put in the refrigerator on August 1 and removed on September 3. I still have some peaches left in there.
I also won a ribbon with apples, muscadines and a specialty melon.

Fair booth features landscaping by the 3 little piggies

2008-08-29T10:16:00.000-07:00

Visit our booth at the county fair. It features landscaping by the three little piggies. The first little piggy used invasive plants. The second little piggy had a typical landscape with high energy cost and plants of limited value. The third little piggy created a landscape that feed and sheltered humans and wildlife.

The biggest brush pile I have ever burnt

2008-08-29T10:00:00.000-07:00

The road up to this old house had logging debris piled head high on both sides. I cut last year's fire wood from it. This summer I had a fireline bulldozed around the brush and lit it up. Flames were 40 feet high at times. The wind was just a little off from the forecast but still close enough that I didn't burn anything I didn't want to burn. The smoke was visible in Concord 12 miles away. This was a large enough site that by lighting a fire in the middle first, I was able to pull the fire in from each side which made it safer. This site will be replanted in loblolly pines. I have mentioned this old house before. It was abandoned before electricity came to this area. I just wish I could have bought it 20 years ago.

Banana Peppers and Farmers Market Customers

2008-08-29T09:25:00.000-07:00

I tried a banana pepper variety this time around. Can't remember the variety off the top of my head but it tasted great. Two other vendor I respect had banana peppers on their table so I decided to test them. Mine were beautiful. Some of them were a foot long. People stop by the table to admire them and tell us how beautiful they are. They were a little tough to grow early on. Required lots of water and I had some blossom end rot on then during the mid season but recently they have been making up for it. The trouble is that nobody buys them after they admire them. I had them priced at 25 cents each but I don't think the price mattered. Doubt anybody would have bought them for a nickel. Reminds me of the Biblical quote "Why encumber the ground?" I have learned that any farmers market item needs to be tried more than one year so I will grow a few banana peppers next year. But if they don't sell next year that will be their last strike. Can't think of an innovative way to display them. I tried cherry tomatoes for several years and the only way I ever sold them was with yellow and red tomatoes in pint baskets alternating in a checkerboard pattern. You could sell lots of reds this way and had to keep putting them back into the pattern. Gradually over the course of the day you would sell yellow ones until you lost the pattern. Then you have to take the rest of the yellow ones home. Another incident was with sunflowers several years ago. I grew some dwarf ones in pots. The first year I tried it, I really didn't do that good of a job with them but when I took them to market, I sold every one of them include one that lost some petals at the market. I had put it back on the truck when a few of the petals fell off. A lady came by and begged me to sell it to her. I explained that it would not bloom again but she wanted it anyway. I was a little uncomfortable with the fact that people wanted plants bad enough to buy a bloomed out sunflower. The next year I grew 4 times as many and did a quality job. I only sold 3 plants and that was at a drastic discount. I have come to the conclusion that you can't figure out the customers in one year.

Sometimes I wonder how any business can get started these days

2008-08-22T13:19:00.000-07:00

Cabarrus County is exploring different ideas to improve our local food system. We have a 7 million dollar beef industry here in the county and a good market for people who want grass feed beef. But right now every cow that gets into commercial channels has to leave the county to die. Put everything together and it is fairly obvious that we could use a kill floor. The county commissioners are okay with the idea, the neighbors are okay with the idea and there is a local family interested in operating such a facility on their property. So the first step is to determine if there is enough ground water available to operate the facility. This study is going to cost $10,000. They didn’t offer me the $10,000 but I decided I would just figure it out for fun.
The facility would need about 2500 gallons of water a day five days a week. Of this amount about 2475 is returned to the ground for treatment. The rest evaporates. Subtracting gives me 25 gallons per day which I multiply by the 210 days they would operate per year for a total of 5250 gallons per year.
The underground aquifer is a shallow surface aquifer that is recharged by at least 10 acres that runs from a nearby fire department north to Barrier Rd and about 500 feet both sides of the proposed facility. (For $10,000 I would actually look up the contour lines and get a precise measurement and subtract out the paved area, but I have no doubt a 10 acre estimate is very conservative.) The area receives about 42 inches of rain per year. On the flat ridge top around this site, about 7 inches of this will go into the ground per year. Multiplying out 7 inches times 27,500 gallons per acre inch times 10 acres equals 1,925,000 gallons of recharge annually.
So the question is can you take 5250 gallons out of 1.9 million gallons. Well, since the recharge is mostly during the winter and the withdrawal is year around, plus there is some flucuation from year to year, I also need to check the amount of ground water to make sure it will budget out on a daily basis. The static water level is currently 20 feet. The depth of casing is 70 feet. Therefore the amount of water saturated soil is 50 feet. The amount of water held in a clay soil like this is roughly 10 percent. So that translates to 5 feet of water. Multiply times the 27,500 per acre inch times the 10 acres of surface recharge times 12 inches per foot equals a little more than 4 million gallons.
YES. There will be no problem taking out 5000 gallons from 4 million gallon aquifer being recharged at the rate of 1.9 million gallons annually.
I can be so definite about this because I use more water than this from a smaller aquifer than this to irrigate my garden.
When you get to thinking about this, the amount they intend to use is roughly equivalent to 40 houses on wells. If that caused a problem there would be lots of places in the county that would be hurting.
There it is. Roughly $10,000 worth of consulting at no charge.
By the way step 4 is to determine what it would take to treat the waste water. That will be a $5000 consulting fee. I don’t know the answer on that one, but for a $500 finders fee I could get them in touch with David Troutman who could give them the answer for half that price.

I expect to eat fresh peaches in October

2008-08-15T12:30:00.000-07:00

The primary method I use to save peaches for a later date is to freeze them. Contender is probably my favorite one to freeze. When dead ripe, it has a beautiful flesh color and keeps the color very well. Of the varieties I have frozen, Sun Prince does a poor job, while Intrepid and Challenger does a good job. I have pickled a few peaches but not enough to figure out a variety difference. I have only pickled them whole and a cling peach might be the best choice for that. I don’t grow any cling peaches. I could try pickling them in slices but I have never got around to doing that. Some years I make peach jam. With jam, I just use whatever peach is available when I get some time to make the jam.
So how do I intend to eat fresh peaches in October? By refrigerating China Pearl. In 2006, I put a few China Pearl in the refrigerator on August 1. I pulled two or three out at the county fair and shared it with the volunteers. The quality was very good at that time. I continued to check on them and ate the last one on Oct 15th. Honestly, it had gone downhill by that point but I think part of the problem was low humidity in the refrigerator. I only had a few peaches in the refrigerator and they were drying out. This year I placed a half bushel of china pearl peaches in the crisper section. I figure to go through them every couple of weeks and pull out anything fixing to go to the bad. Peaches are not supposed to do this. In fact, when I mentioned that I had done this to the guy who selected China Pear (Dr Denny Werner) he was surprised that it could be done.
If this can be reliably done, there should be a point in the United States where China Pearl gets ripe around September and can be saved until November when you should get a premium on fresh white peaches.
I also save some peaches in the refrigerator using another process, again with China Pearl variety, but I won’t share that because I am not totally sure it is safe. You can find a similar process by searching the internet for recipes for brandied peaches that create the alcohol instead of pouring it over the peaches. Carla Emery in her book The Encyclopedia of Country Living also mentions a similar process.

A business risk

2008-08-08T11:40:00.000-07:00

Last year Lisa decided to give up a career in real estate and become an herb grower and farmers market vendor. Lisa and I decided it would be beneficial to work together. My wife Rene doesn’t like to sell at the markets so Lisa could sell fruit and vegetables I grow on the weekday markets and then Lisa and I share a booth on Saturday. Working with Lisa has allowed me to keep my inside space at the farmers market. Otherwise, I would have lost my inside space this year. To some degree the herbs Lisa grows and the produce I grow are complimentary. We have never put our business association in writing since we have agreed to quit as soon as it doesn’t work for one or the other of us.
When we first started, I figured the safest thing would be if Lisa and Rene never met. Lisa caught onto this first and asked if Rene thought I had an imaginary friend.
I ignored that and kept them apart last year. This year I had to go out of town during the peak of peach season and the only logical way to get my peaches on the market was for my wife and Lisa to meet. It was quite a risk. I could have come back and found one dead and the other in jail. Turns out they got along very well. Now I guess I am more worried about them ganging up on me and tag team nagging or something.
I never did sell any tomatillos for WIC vouchers to get my tax money back. There were far fewer Mexican immigrants at the market this year. I suspect there are fewer around. For one thing, there are less job opportunities right now and I have heard more about enforcement against illegal immigrants. I am going to grow the tomatillos again. Sold enough to make it worthwhile although I doubt it will every be a major profit generator.
I did get some tax dollars back. Mostly sold the WIC people peaches and tomatoes. I did sell green tomatoes to several WIC customers. I have never considered fried green tomatoes to be a food for poor people. If it is, the rich people are really missing out on that one. Still the only people who bought them certainly gave the impression of being poor.
My first WIC customer (who bought some top of the line tomatoes) really aggravated Lisa. I asked Lisa if she didn’t like getting her tax dollars back. She started complaining about the $200 dollar stroller and the $100 dollar tennis shoes the lady was wearing. I explained that you couldn’t expect somebody who made those types of decisions to have any money left for food. If Lisa was in charge of the world, that lady would have gone hungry.

Gardening update

2008-07-31T11:30:00.000-07:00

Finishing up peach harvesting. Well not really, but I can see the end of the row. I picked a few China Pearls today and the Sweet Sue should get ripe in another week. Intrepid and Challenger were the best tasting peaches so far this year beating out even the Norman and Windblow. China Pearl might taste better once it comes on board. When I first planted the peaches I tried to plant them in order of when they ripened. I couldn’t find a date for Carolina Belle so it is way out of order. The information on Intrepid and Challenger was readily available, but somehow I managed to switch them around.
Within a couple of years, I am going to have to make a decision about replanting the peach orchard. My wife says we are not planting any more peach trees but I think she will change her mind about that.
Evaluating it by dollars over the lifetime of the orchard, the Contenders and China Pearl have been the best peaches. These are the least likely to have problems with late frost. Even the Intrepid and Challenger haven’t been as reliable. I attribute most of this years' crop other than the Contenders to the burn barrels I had going in the orchard. The radiant heat is what keeps blooms alive. I have considered planted only Contender and China Pearl in my next orchard. This would trade the production problem caused by late frost with a marketing problem with everything getting ripe at once. With the internet it may be possible to solve the marketing problem easier than the production problem.

Homegrown Tomatoes, No S***.

2008-06-27T12:25:00.000-07:00

(*** salmonella )
Because of the food scare, tomatoes have sold real well this spring. It was a good year to start the high tunnel. I take the following steps to ensure safe food. First I grow high quality stuff. Second, I wash my hands before I pick it. I visually inspect containers to make sure they are clean. If they are not clean, I wash them. The irrigation and wash water come from the same well I drink out of. The only way I have used animal manure around my tomatoes is to compost it a year before it is used. I would prefer to apply it one year and grow a covercrop. Maybe I can get that done when I retire.
The reason we are having a salomonella scare is probably either human manure use in Mexico or poultry dust from a large confinement operation in some washwater at a huge packing house. Another potential food problem is human waste in the field when field hands are pushed so hard they fell like they can't afford to walk to the bathroom, or they don't feel comfortable going to the bathroom. Well, I can easily walk back to my bathroom and there are currently no chickens on my farm.
The only thing I know that would make my operation safer is to include chlorox in the wash water. I have used it. It takes roughly a cup per 50 gallons of water. The trouble is getting rid of the chlorinated waste water. Plus I can no longer tell people the tomatoes are pesticide free.

Gardening Failure

2008-06-27T12:18:00.000-07:00

First total failure of this gardening season is the Gold Nugget tomato. Highly recommended but I don’t like it. It all got ripe at once and didn’t have very much taste. I am not even picking it for market. It has a beautiful color. I remember Ivory or Snow White as being a better option. Don’t really get much out of the different colored cherry tomatoes but they help sell the red cherry tomatoes. I have some partial failures. Peppers are not doing worth anything. They must need more water than I am willing to pump on them. In places where I can’t water them regularly, they really look bad. Tomatillos are doing okay. I have eaten several of them. I cooked them the same way I do fried green tomatoes. I haven’t used them in any other recipes. So far I have sold all them to gringos. So I haven’t directly got my tax dollars back. I think this happened because I sold out of everything by 10 am last Saturday and the WIC people tend to not get moving by that time. May be one of the reasons my tax dollars are going to them and not vice versa.

Carbon Footprint

2008-06-06T06:54:00.001-07:00

Many of the vegetables I sell at the farmers market have a fairly low carbon footprint for the following reasons. Any early transplants are produced in a greenhouse completely heated by solar heat. (See article on solar greenhouse below). Some items are direct seeded. I am reusing pots that I originally bought in 1975. The raised beds require very limited tillage. In fact, what tillage is done is done by hand or a trowel. No gas powered equipment is used. The other handtools I use are a shovel or pitchfork to dig compost, a bucket to haul compost, and a tire tool on certain weeds. The majority of my fertility comes from site produced compost. I seldom use insecticides and never use fungicides or herbicides on this area. Post harvest is another place the carbon footprint is fairly low. I carry them out by hand, wash them and load them in the pickup. Since I sell at the market 3 days a week, there is very little energy intensive storage. And most of the packaging is washed and reused. The plastic landscape fabric had a high carbon cost initially but some of it has been down for 18 years which should put me far ahead of anybody using plastic mulch on an annual system. Another high carbon cost is traveling the 18 miles to the local farmers market. Even though my truck gets 28 miles to the gallon, the carbon cost per pound of produce is still fairly high.

Raised beds

2008-06-06T06:30:00.000-07:00

I see and hear about people going to a lot of trouble or expense to make raised beds. Browse the internet and you can find suggestions from plastic to wood to concrete block. You can alsso find instructions on splitting tires. Here is a better option. These are my raised beds. The center two are about 15 years old in this picture. 2008 will be their 18th season. The closest ones were developed in 1994 while the far side was put down around 2002. I formed the first ones with a shovel but the latter ones were formed with a bottom plow. Drip irrigation is laid down the center. Then the bed is covered by a ground cloth. It takes a high quality woven ground cover to prevent weeds. I use a propane torch to burn a small hole about the size of my hand in the bed. Turn the irrigation on so you know where it is at and don't drip melted ground cover on it. I used 8 mil T tape which is designed for annual use although I got more than 10 years use out of the oldest ones. Each year I put compost through the holes and then seed or transplant into the holes. The only tools I use are a shovel to load compost, a bucket to transport compost and tire tool to dig out a few of the tougher weeds. I generally use gloves when putting in the compost.

Cherry Harvest

2008-06-06T06:20:00.000-07:00

The loose cherries are my second picking of Stella sweet cherry. This is about 7 lbs. My first picking was 20 lbs. I didn't weigh myself but I'm sure I gained weight as I picked. We canned some, ate a bunch fresh, sold some. I sold the pint clam shells for $3 each which was close to $4 a lb. Might should have asked for more, but local food stores were advertising 2 lbs for $3 at the time. The quality of some of these were better than anything I have ever bought in the store. We had frost damage this year although I am not sure how much that hurt my harvest. I suspect the frost thinned out the cherries and improved the quality.

Status on Garden

2008-05-16T07:48:00.000-07:00

I have planted the largest garden I have ever planted and things are looking great. I have an excellent crop of peaches and anticipate them getting ripe the week of July 14th. I have finished the asparagus and I am picking strawberries along with English peas and kale now. I have never tried kale in the spring but somebody gave me the plants so I stuck them in. I picked the first set of leaves and fried them like you would cabbage. (No boiling ahead of time like we do on many greens.) Wonderful method of cooking them. During the first dry spell I had some of the tomatillos to die because they were not established plus the fact they were such large transplants. Most are growing very well.

Fruit Class at Daniel Stowe Botanical Gardens

2008-05-16T07:38:00.000-07:00

List of species and varieties recommended for planting
http://www4.ncsu.edu/~djgofort/Fruit23.htm
Home Orchard Spray Guide
http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/pp/notes/Fruit/fdin002/fdin002.htm
HIL's
http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/consumer/hortinfo.html#fruit
List of links.
http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/consumer/hortinternet/fruitandnuts.html

Native Pink Dogwoods

2008-05-05T06:47:00.000-07:00

I have only seen two pink dogwoods in nature. Neither one is very good but the best one happens to be along the edge of my driveway. I didn't see the other one this spring so it may not have survived recent years. Years ago there was a naturally pink dogwood visible from Hwy 49 near Asheboro. Rick Hamiliton mentioned it to me but I never saw it. This is a great year for tis one. It isn't in the best of locations with a full canopy on the south side.

Optimism

2008-04-25T06:03:00.000-07:00

It has been a busy winter with Greater Charlotte Home and Garden Show, Southern Spring Show, 3rd Annual Herb Festival, Ideal Home Show, pesticide classes, Country Living Seminar and Master Gardener Training along with all the other TV shows, news articles and phone calls that are part of my Extension Job. I have a talk scheduled for Daniel Stowe Botanical Garden and also at the Research Campus in May.
My garden looks great. I have planted more than I ever have and the tomatoes in my high tunnel cold frame are close to waist high with my first tomato set on the same day we had our last frost.
This winter I put up more maple syrup than I ever have. That only amounts to about ½ gallon but I have used it on pancakes and oatmeal. Then I found the best morel I have ever found. Morel hunting is my least profitable activity and I have only found them 3 times. With the same effort, a person in Ohio could have filled up several bushel baskets. Then I have harvested some shitake mushrooms for the first time in several years. I hope things continue as the best. Of course there are some things less than rosy. The cherry and plum trees have a very poor crop with the late freezes and my tomatillo plants went to the garden very overgrown. I think March 1 would be a better seeding date on them. In fact, I might wait until March 10 or so next year. Some peaches lost all their blooms in the freeze but overall I still have a good crop. Maybe it will be like the maple syrup and the morel.

By the way, I have bees on my property for the first time since my last hive died out in January of 2000. I have them on welfare right now (about a quart of sugar water a day) but hope they build up strong enough to take some persimmon honey from them. (My wife doesn't like that terminology and thinks talking abou them that way may be the reason I lost the last hive.)

Hardinesss Zones

2008-04-03T13:23:00.000-07:00

I read an article in the Mother Earth News about how hardiness zones have changed. The referenced a map from the National Arbor Day Foundation. http://www.arborday.org/media/map_change.cfm
While it is mathematically possible to have that much change with the 2 degrees or so of actual global warming we have had, I wouldn’t expect it. So I did some checking I noticed that the new hardiness map says Raleigh NC is zone 8. So Raleigh should have a low temperature between 10 and 20 degrees at least every five years. Yet Raleigh had a day with 9 degree and another day with 7 degree temperature in January of 2005. That would keep it in zone 7 not the zone 8 shown on the new map. (http://www.weather.gov/climate/local_data.php?wfo=rah)
Using the same website I found Greensboro had a 7 in 2004 so it remains in zone 7 not the zone 8 showed on the map. Fort Wayne had a -15 in December of 2004 which puts it in zone 5 not the zone 6 show on the map. http://threadex.rcc-acis.org/threadex/program/process_records
Using the same website I found that Sioux City had a -14 in 2003 so it hasn’t changed from zone 5. Wichita Falls had a 7 in 2004 which makes it zone 7 not the zone 8 shown on the new map.
In summary, 100% of the locations I checked (5 out of 5) have had a minimum temperature within the last five years below the zone listed on the hardiness zone change map. My conclusion is that the map from the Arbor Day Foundation over states the zone changes for the last 16 years.
Actually each temperature I quoted was in the top three of all time minimum temperature records for the day it occurred. My conclusion is that the global warming has increase minimum temperature extremes. This is what I would predict from bigger winter storms caused by global warming. They are sucking the colder air farther south.
I bounced this off a real climatologist and he said the maps may be accurate but 10 years of data was not enough to draw conclusions or maps. He thinks we need to use every year we have data and then some. Be curious to hear what you think.

Call back slips

2008-04-01T10:12:00.000-07:00

The end of an era. Call back slips have gone digital so I am throwing out the olds ones. This collection is about 20 years worth but even so, it looks impressive.

New crop for me

2008-03-26T08:05:00.001-07:00

For the last few years I have been growing hot peppers to get some of my tax dollars back from the Mexican immigrants who use the Farmers Market Nutrition Program. This year I decided to grow a few tomatillos for the same purpose. It is a new crop for me. They got off to a spindly start in my solar greenhouse compared to their close relatives tomatoes and peppers. Eventually, I placed them toward the center of the greenhouse where they would be warmer and then found some foil to reflect more light on them. Now I have some fairly good looking transplants. Next year I think I will give them some supplemental light. They seem to be closer to tomatoes than to peppers in growth habits so far. My next concern is figuring out when to pick them. The references say to wait until the inside fills or splits the husk. Only time will tell if that works. When I ordered the seed, there was a Hispanic in our church and I was hoping to get some picking advice from her as they got closer to ripening. She recently dropped out so I will have to find somebody else who knows how they are suppose to look. The other thing that will be interesting is eating them. I intend to try some of them in the fried green tomato recipe we have been using for years. (I have a coworker who expressed horror about that recipe but I have recently had my cholesterol checked and it didn’t even pick up any LDL. The HDL was 16. They say the optimum HDL is 60 but since HDL’s function is to return LDL to the liver and there was not any LDL available for it to return, that shouldn’t be a problem.) Anyway, the next time somebody tells you that Mexican immigrants are necessary to do farm work that American’s won’t do, tell them you know a farmer who is doing work that the Mexican’s aren’t doing.

Busy winter at the Goforth Farm

2008-03-25T12:56:00.000-07:00

I started a number of projects this winter. One of the most interesting is a blueberry plot. I planted 8 different types of Rabbiteye blueberries. I started with Columbus, then Ira, Montgomery, Onslow, Powderblue, Premier, Tifblue and Yakin. When planting, I typically go in alphabetical order with the first one closest to the house. That helps sometimes when the labels are lost. I planted at least 5 of each type. Once they get some size on them, I will be able to compare and figure out which is best. My suspicion is that the Powder Blue will extend the season, while Columbus will taste the best. Premier is suppose to be a large one which may help during picking. It will be educational to have them all in one place and see what happens.

Master Gardener Class Hot Links.

2008-02-28T05:41:00.000-08:00

Here are the links you need for the first class.

Cabarrus County Cooperative Extension http://cabarrus.ces.ncsu.edu/
Extension Master Gardener Program http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/consumer/masgar/
Successful Gardener http://www.successfulgardener.org/
Soil Map http://websoilsurvey.nrcs.usda.gov/app/
Soil Test Information http://www.ncagr.com/agronomi/uyrst.htm
Composting http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/hil/hil-8100.html

Environmental Stewardship in Landscape Design

2008-02-20T06:47:00.000-08:00

In my latest news article I mention a courtyard at The First Assembly Living Center which originally contained 22 ligustrum. My understanding is that a traditional vegetable garden was grown in front of the lisgustrum in the past. Now the residents have added roses, dianthus and annuals along with a clematis vine. This location is tough for a couple of reasons. One is limited sunlight on one wall. The other is the possiblity that there may be residents who are elder and fragile. So I have concerns about plants I would normally rate as excellent for environmentally friendly landscapes. For example, muscadines could constitute a choking hazard to certain residents, while figs would have the potential to irritate fragile skin. Plums could be somewhat thorny in my opinion although some cultivars wouldn’t be as bad as the roses which the residents recently planted. If I was in charge of the world, I would included a non astringent oriental persimmon in this design. I don’t see much danger to this plant and it should grow better here than in most areas because the radiant head from building on all sides would help protect it from winter injury. Blueberries would make a suitable addition as would service berry. I would leave some of the ligustrum for evergreen structure during mid winter although I might swap out a few of them for sasanqua camellias which have prettier or at least larger blooms. Or I might research loquat, an evergreen plant that I am not familiar with, but I think would grow and perhaps even fruit in that location since it is so protected. In the beds, asparagus, daylilies and tomatoes are easy selections giving both beauty and food.
Some of my readers may have recognized the other landscape as Taylor Glen, a Baptist retirement complex off Pitt School Road. The idea of going from 150 to 140 Burfordi’s was somewhat of a joke. Burfordi’s are good cover for songbirds and provide a food during a time when there isn’t much food. Still 20 or so is plenty for a landscape this size. If I was designing this landscape, I would include blueberries, muscadines, figs, oriental persimmons, sour cherries, service berry and crabapple within this landscape sometimes as a one for one replacement for the Burfordi hollies. I don't have any reason to create a complete landscape design, but this landscape is crying out for plant diversity and overall improvement in its environmental stewardship.

Successful Gardener Country Living Seminar

2008-02-18T12:31:00.000-08:00

Tips for cutting back on your food bill

2008-02-01T08:45:00.000-08:00

There was an article in the paper this week about reducing your food bill. The reporter rehashed the typical little tips like making a list to go shopping, making soup with leftovers, and not going to the grocery store hungry. Nothing wrong with those tips but there has been times when I have taken slightly more drastic steps. Like the time I killed, cleaned, wrapped and froze a huge turtle. I then cooked turtle for Tuesday and ate leftover turtle for Thursday. I did this for 7 straight weeks. It really wasn’t that bad because the taste varied. The forelegs tasted like duck and the back strap tasted like shrimp.
Then there was the night we had a lantern and gig in the creek and collected suckers, bream, jack, turtle, and eel. Then a huge creek minnow went in a hole in the toe of my uncle’s boot. We kept and ate the minnow. (Flavored the stuffing with sourgrass I picked off the side of the road.) Growing up we occassionally gigged over 100 lbs of fish a night. We ate some fresh, put some in the freezer to eat whole and canned the rest to eat in patties over the winter. The reporter suggested going vegetarian for a meal. Growing up we never bought meat to eat during the week. Sunday dinner occasionally featured store bought chicken and pork chops. Some Sundays we had hamburger and the hamburger may have been in spaghetti sauce or on pasta. Sometimes we might eat meat we had caught or killed but some weeks we ate vegetarian every day but Sunday. I bet I have a slightly different perspective than that reporter in the paper. So for what it’s worth, here's a few tips if you really want to reduce your food bill.
1. Take up hunting. I have killed over 50 deer for my family. A couple of deer a year can go a long ways. Besides it is great recreation. And if you are able to process deer, people will occasionally give you road kill.
2. Don’t bypass the little varmints. The way city squirrels sit around they look mighty vulnerable to a sling shot. I have eaten raccoon and muskrats too.
3. Take up vegetable gardening. I ate peanuts for several years with no inputs other than time. Somebody gave me the original seed and I saved seed every year. Peanuts don’t need any nitrogen fertilizer. And there are dozens of other plants you can grow in your garden.
4. Add some edible plants to your landscape. In piedmont North Carolina think blueberries, muscadines and figs. Put the excess in a freezer.
5. Learn to eat wild plants. I hate to think of the winters I didn’t eat many vegetables while chickweed went to the bad in yards up and down the street. Of course I have taken advantage of many wild edibles. One year I would pick blackberries during my hour lunch break. I froze them and ate them all winter. Almost every year in Cabarrus County white acorns go to the bad. Shell them out and wash them in a couple of changes of water. Then toast them and grind them up. If you don’t care for the taste you can sweeten it with sugar. You don’t have to find left over country for edible plants. I have eaten daylilies collected in suburban areas.
6. Learn to fish. One year I caught a couple of hundred little bream and put them in the freezer. The following winter I told my friends I would provide and cook the fish if they would provide French fries, slaw and drinks. We did that every Tuesday night for over 10 weeks.
7. Pintos will make a meal. To change the taste you can add catsup, pickle relish, beet pickles, black pepper, or hot peppers. Milk and cornbread are nice compliments but there have been times when I had pintos for supper and pintos were what I had for supper.
8. If it comes right down to it, you can take flour and sugar, mix them together, and then mix in butter and maybe a touch of water to get it mixed in one big gooey gob. Then eat it. This will increase your risk of diabetes, stroke, heart attack, obesity and arthritis. If you keep doing it, additional problem will develop. (These statements weren’t approved by the FDA but you can take my word for it.) Still10 dollars will buy two weeks worth of calories which may be enough time to scrape together some more food money. And for that matter, a cream cheese Danish isn't much better nutritionally speaking.
9. If you get down to one food left on hand, you only have to figure for 2 meals a day. I don’t care if that one food is grits or potatoes or stewed tomatoes; you won’t be able to eat more than two meals a day. Even if you aren't getting enough calories you won't be able to eat that third meal(For the most part, people that know this have been there. This is the first time I have ever seen it in writing.)
10. If you are going to sell blood plasma, make sure you do it before you run completely out of food before going to the clinic. First of all you have to lie about whether you ate or not. If you don't lie, they won’t take your plasma. And there is a reason they ask. Lying there on the gurney with cold blood flowing back in around an empty stomach was a pretty tough point in my life.

Blackberry Planting Frenzy

2008-01-11T09:41:00.000-08:00

I was talking with the county agent in Cleveland county (about 90 miles west of Cabarrus County) about a year ago and he said he suspected there would be 100 acres of blackberries planted in Cleveland County during 2007. This week I asked the actual count. It was 150 acres. He suspects there will be an additional 150 acres planted in 2008.
I don't forsee very much acreage being planted in Cabarrus County. If a person planted 10 acres, that person should be prepared to hire 70 workers during picking season.
At any given time the total number of people in Cabarrus County willing to work that hard and who don't have a job is probably less than 70. I moved to the Charlotte area during the recession in the early 80's. I remember a guy telling me in 1986 that anybody who really wanted to work during that depression never had to leave town. It has pretty much been that way ever since. There have been people working at jobs they didn't enjoy, or a jobs where they wished they were paid more, but anybody who wanted to work hasn't had to leave town. When cuts down on the number of people who would want to pick blackberries.
Twenty years ago there were people willing to pick blacberries and strawberries for the fun of picking them and the ability to save a little money. In 1986 there were 4 pick your own strawberry operations in Cabarrus County. Today there are none and while strawberries could be a profitable crop, you better plan on hiring somebody to pick them.

2008-01-04T06:23:00.000-08:00

I was asked to talk to some Concord City planners about the downtown market. Here are the talking points.
We feel a downtown farmers market is an amenity that brings several advantages to the City. It brings people out on the street, it is a social equalizer, and it increases number of visitors to downtown.
Here is our current situation.
30 day lease with Wachovia is problematic. Farmers need to plan on a yearly basis.
Difficulty of Parking
Customer mix seems about 50% drive up/50% downtown workers. Drive up traffic could double with better access. Several customers who worked in the CTC building have been terminated in the change to Windstream and nobody knows if replacement workers will support the market at the same level.
Vehicle traffic crosses pedestrian traffic within farmers market. Not sure if this is suppressing customer counts but we suspect it might be a factor.
Lack of Shade
Difficult on produce
Reduces customer count on hotter days (around 90 degrees)
Difficult on farmers

The future of the Farmers Market is unpredictable.
Most likely scenario is that vendor and customer counts will stay steady given current conditions.
Vendor count could rise with better conditions.
The farmers market has discussed finding a better venue for Wednesday (Mt Pleasant, Odell or Midland) but currently the market doesn’t have volunteers willing to take on this task. If another location was found outside of Concord and all vendors given the option of moving, vendor count would probably be cut in half.
Piedmont Farmers Market is committed to building a local food system. Any help achieving this goal would be appreciated.

Horticulture Newsarticles Available

2008-01-04T06:20:00.000-08:00

Between the holidays, I finished putting my 300 best news articles on line. http://www4.ncsu.edu/~djgofort/ I still need to index them better but you can access them. News articles are written for Cabarrus County which is near Charlotte North Carolina.
Also some of my TV shows are on line at http://www.co.cabarrus.nc.us/News/Channel22/programs.html

Potential Opportunity for somebody interested in farming

2007-12-20T10:18:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I visited a farm where the development rights have been sold to Central Carolina Land Trust. There is a house on the property. The owners would be willing to rent the house ($500 monthly was mentioned) along with some farmland ($50 per acre annually was mentioned). They are not interested in selling. If somebody is renting anyway, this is a beautiful place just to live back off the road. Location is about 4 miles out of Mt Pleasant. The house was originally built around 1800 but has been expanded and maintained so that it looks very livable (from the outside anyway). There is a 7 acre field adjacent to the house along with two smaller garden plots although one garden plot won't be useable until some weed control takes place. There are a few mature pecan trees and mature blueberries with the potential to make a marketable crop. There are plums, pears, figs, apples and muscadines in various conditions. I wouldn't plan on selling anything from these last ones, but the potential for something worth eating is fairly high as well as the opportunity for saleable preserves and jellies on some items. Several people would share the deer hunting on the back side of the property (there seems to be at least 30 acres of woodlands) but I figure a person who lived there would be able to shoot some of their own food. Soil is probably a Badin. I know for certain it is a slate belt soil which won't be the best soil a person has ever seen but I know farmers living off that type of soil. Not a lot of potential for erosion in the 7 acres. (More nearby cropland is available for rent if a person needed it). Irrigation could come from a pond on the property or from the well which was originally rated at 35 gallons per minute. There is a beautiful white oak around 120 years old in the front yard and a cedar near the old spring in the back yard that I bet is 200 years old with character to match. There are some sheds so some storage space could be arranged plus I suspect there are some farm shop type items a person would find useful if they did much farming. Let me know if you know somebody that would fit this opportunity.

Solar Greenhouse Pixs

2007-12-12T06:49:00.000-08:00

The most recent Successful Gardening article for the Cabarrus Neighbors (http://www.charlotte.com/) talks about solar greenhouses. Here is a picture of mine without the plastic covering. The green color in the bottle is algae evidently growing on left over corn syrup. Some people suggest adding dark food coloring to the water. This may improve heat collection but isn't critical.

Hot Links to Websites Referenced in Rotary Club Talk

2007-12-05T12:51:00.001-08:00

United States Geological Survey
http://water.usgs.gov/
Blue Ridge Aquifer
http://capp.water.usgs.gov/gwa/ch_l/L-text4.html
Information from NC State
http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/disaster/drought/
http://www.bae.ncsu.edu/programs/extension/wqg/publications.html
Other Links
http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/consumer/hortinternet/water_quality.html

Bring Local Food to Consumers with a Real Farmers’ Market

2007-11-21T11:54:00.000-08:00

My sister is rich enough to shop where she wants and to buy what she wants in the way of food. I guess most of us are that rich but most of us won’t shop and buy what we want. She does. I’ve seen her cook a $10 steak for her little boy’s bedtime munchies. She says vegetables straight from the garden are best but she thinks Harris Teeter is almost as good. I really wouldn’t know since I don’t shop there, but their use of the term “farmers market” does bother me most every time I hear it. In my mind a real farmers market has to have farmers.
If one of the other chains would like to compete with Harris Teeter, here is an idea.
Let a local farmer set up in the parking lot of each store. Then advertise that you have real farmers. The customers would come to buy something in season then wander in the store to get what they can’t get from the farmer. The customer traffic would pick up enough to pay for the advertisement plus give you an increase in sales. The farmer can’t be there all the time, but the customers will still come. (Such is the nature of variable rewards). Limit what the farmers sell to what they can grow themselves. This will keep the volume low enough so there isn’t a chance they will hurt your inside business. Just the increase in customer traffic will make this strategy worthwhile, but go ahead and charge the farmer about 10% on his total sales. If you have no stocking cost, no product loses and no overhead cost, you can almost make money on 10%. Like I said, it doesn't really matter since you have improved your bottom line already. The final point is that with the number of farmers in our area, the first chain store in will be the only chain store in. There are not enough farmers to go around.

Ponds in our landscape

2007-11-20T05:30:00.000-08:00

In a world with higher energy cost and more frequent water restrictions ornamental pond design needs to change. Ponds designed so they have to be topped off to maintain aesthetics require more water than a similar size lawn or vegetable garden. Ponds designed where large pumps have to run continuously use quite a bit of energy. Neither of these features will suit a certain clientele in the future. These environmentally conscious consumers might be interested in water features that could double as rainwater storage and fluctuate in depth to comply with water restrictions without compromising aesthetics. But those criteria are not the best practices of the current water gardening industry. I’m not sure how to make these clients happy, but there will be opportunity.
These clientele will be born after 1962. The first earth day occured before they were ten years old. 10 years old is the time when people look around and say "This is what the world is like". Everybody wasn't affected by the environmental movement but the ones that were have a totally different mind set than people born a few years before 1962.

Peak fall color for Cabarrus County

2007-11-16T11:11:00.000-08:00

Peak fall color for Cabarrus County for 2007 was on November 14. A rain fell overnight and knocked many leaves off, however there is still plenty of color. Some plants that partly died from the drought had excellent color in the rest of the plant. Wonderful year for sweet gums. Dogwoods are still hanging on. Often they drop their leaves early. Poplars and maples are still providing good color although the leaves dropped during the drought would have improved them. Blueberries have colored earlier than normal. Oaks still haven't colored. Black Walnuts still have leaves. Often, their leaves are diseased and gone by the middle of September.

Strenghtening Our Local Food System.

2007-11-15T10:28:00.000-08:00

This morning I set in on a meeting about our local food system. There are three proposals on the table for strengthening our local food system. They include a small farm incubator. This is a facility to help young people interested in farming overcome two major barriers. The first is the capital expense and the second is the knowledge of how to run a farm. Prospective farmers lease a portion of the property to farm. The only one I know in NC is called Raft Swamp Farm. Another idea is developing a local facility for killing livestock. Right now a farmer would have to haul a cow to a different county for slaughter and then go back in a separate truck to haul the animal back. The extra expense increases the cost and makes it less profitable for farmers. Concurrently, we are looking at developing institutional markets for the cheaper cuts of meat. One of the problems with growing local beef in the past has been selling the cheaper cuts. Solving these two problems should create more money for the 7 million dollar livestock industry here in Cabarrus County. Finally, improved management for our local farmers market would strengthen our fruit and vegetable industry.

Sources of Water for Cabarrus County

2007-10-26T09:37:00.000-07:00

Somebody asked me why the local government didn’t develop more sources of water. My initial answer was that additional sources were limited and had their own set of problems and costs. While that answer was true, there are additional sources of water that could be developed fairly reasonably.
One of the most obvious sources of water is Rocky River. People tend to discount it because it isn’t very clean water. Yet it could easily be cleaned up well enough to use it for downstream water at Lake Howell. The EPA requires the release of 1.3 million gallons of water downstream from Lake Howell daily during drought times. Mother Nature would have dried Coddle Creek up in 2002 if man hadn’t been interfering. I’m not satisfied that man knows better than nature in this particular situation. Anyway, to get the water from Rocky River to the dam on Lake Howell would require a pumping station and about 3 miles of pipe. The city already owns land around the airport and some land on the east side of Coddle Creek. The line would only have to cross one road. The water line should be run near the rock quarry. Once Vulcan quits digging rock out of the rock quarry, they might sell the quarry to the city rather than undertake the expense of reclaiming it. Then the Water Authority could fill the quarry from Rocky River during times of high flow. Then when the river gets low, they could then use the quarry to supply the downstream water at Lake Howell. I don’t have any figures but I suspect having both this quarry and a pump from Rocky River on line would increase Lake Howell’s capability by 50%.
Another possible water source is above Mt Peasant’s water intake on Dutch Buffalo Creek. My understanding is that the Corp of Engineers had approved a site on Dutch Buffalo the same time Mt Pleasant built the reservoir on Black Run Creek and that the landowner was willing to sell land for that purpose at that time. In the past Dutch Buffalo Creek has been more reliable than Coddle Creek. This year it wasn’t, but having a reservoir on both would allow us to hedge our bets. Again, I don’t have any figures but I suspect this reservoir would be about 10% of the capacity of Lake Howell.
If a reservoir is built on Dutch Buffalo, an idea I brought up before the Lake Howell was constructed ought to be revisited. Private individuals throughout the county have been willing to construct ponds on their own land for fishing, watering livestock and recreation. Additional ponds would be constructed if the cost was lower. The water authority could subsidize the cost of pond construction within the Dutch Buffalo drainage in exchange for the right to purchase water during droughts. The individual landowner could use the pond for anything other than irrigation until a drought situation occurs. Then the water authority could mandate the release of the water which would gravity flow downstream. The upstream ponds need to be in place before the downstream pond is built or the sediment from pond building will negatively impact the downstream pond. There are probably 50 landowners on the drainage willing to put in a pond if there was total payment. This would give a volume close to 5% of Lake Howell for a cost of around ½ million and almost no environmental problems due to the small size of individual ponds. There would be some loss moving the water downstream but not enough loss to ruin the idea.
When you get out west and see people pumping water for 100’s of miles and tapping every river and aquifer, it makes you realize that we could do more.

We can't let those chickens cluck.

2007-10-18T09:41:00.000-07:00

Chickens have the potential to turn kitchen scraps and excess vegetation into healthy high protein meals for inner city children. This has the potential to reduce fossil fuel consumption, reduce landfill waste and reduce poverty. Borys and dhijana Scott-Harmony were demonstrating this in Charlotte. Unfortunately Mecklenburg Animal Control has ordered the chickens slaughtered. In their memory I wrote this song. I think a male country vocalist could do the best job with it, but feel free to set it to any kind of music you wish

Great Tasting Eggs?
Well you’re out of luck:
We can’t let
Those chickens cluck.

Vitamins up
Cholesterol down
That’s not the kind of eggs
We eat in town.

We buy our eggs
From the store
When they have aged
A month or more

Great Tasting Eggs?
Well you’re out of luck:
We can’t let
Those chickens cluck.

Other noise doesn’t bothers me
We’re a world class wannabe.

But Great Tasting Eggs?
Well you’re out of luck:
We can’t let
Those chickens cluck.

Screaming kids
Whistling trains
Barking dogs
Shrieking planes

Bobcat screams
Panther cheers
Verizon concerts
Till you can’t hear

Great Tasting Eggs?
Well you’re out of luck:
We can’t let
Those chickens cluck.

Other noise doesn’t bother me
We’re a world class wannabe.

But Great Tasting Eggs?
Well you’re out of luck:
We can’t let
Those chickens cluck.

Radio Blaring
Amps a thumping
Rock Star cursing
Till the cars a jumping

Mufflers roaring
Jake brakes choking
Gears a grinding
Engines smoking

Great Tasting Eggs?
Well you’re out of luck:
We can’t let
Those chickens cluck.

That other noise doesn’t bother me
We’re a world class wannabe.

But Great Tasting Eggs?
Well you’re out of luck:
We can’t let
Those chickens cluck.

Maybe you should try moving. Didn’t the Soviet Union give you that much freedom? Just don’t go to Concord.

Cause Bruton Smith and the politicians are in bed
To build a drag strip that would raise the dead
With car engines you can hear 5 miles away
You will barely hear some bureaucrat say

Great Tasting Eggs?
Well you’re out of luck:
We can’t let
Those chickens cluck.

That other noise doesn’t bother me
We’re a world class wannabe.

But Great Tasting Eggs?
Well you’re out of luck:
We can’t let
Those chickens cluck.

Farm Land Preservation

2007-10-11T11:14:00.000-07:00

I am in favor of letting people who want to live stacked up like chickens in a coop do just that and leaving the rural areas to people like me who know how to take care of it. For example, some of the zoning laws that force people to live in one place and work in another place ought to be changed. Legislate how it will look not what it will be. On the other hand, I don't favor mandating farm land preservation.
The state is going to spend some money on Farmland Preservation. I am not sure this money will be spent wisely.
Some of my thoughts are that the more profitable the farm, the more likely it will stay a farm. So any project designed to make local farms more profitable would be a candidate for this type of funding. One idea that has already been bounced around is a business incubator for value added products of local farms (kind of a community kitchen where a farmer could produce some product and get some cash flow before investing in their own facility). Another idea is a type of “Vegetable Mobile” to take local farm products into various subdivisions creating a larger market than our current farmers market. Or perhaps a small farm incubator that gets some of the farmers who want to farm a chance to start. If you have any ideas, let me know.

And Durn Good Riddance

2007-10-01T09:13:00.000-07:00

For the most part, I have been impressed with the way farmers have responded to the shortage of hay. Most are going to cut back on the hay they feed an individual cow but they can't cut out the roughage completely without hurting the cows. They have culled cattle so they need less feed. They have green chopped corn, cut soybeans for cattle feed, rolled up corn stalks. One farmer even baled up some sweet gum leaves. Other farmers have fenced in woodlots so the cows could get to fresh tree leaves before they start falling. I noticed one farmer had went through a woodlot and cut down the understory trees making those leaves available to their cows. Overgrown areas that normally get bushhogged or ignored, have been harvested for hay. One farmer has lost some cows from a cutting like this. Farmers are back hauling hay from all kinds of places on any empty truck (furniture trucks mostly). One guy is hauling cows one way and backhauling hay.
The one sour note was the whining individual who called in last week. Best I could tell he hadn't struck a lick for himself. "Is the government going to do anything about getting me some hay for my cows...l. I think the goverment should help me out..... If the goverment doesn't help me out there will be one less farmer in Cabarrus County."