Aug
31
By admin
Categories: Proto Grow, Survival Gardening, Videos
Tags: companion planting, survival garden, Survival Gardening, video
Aug
31
I shot this video in my garden during July. It is JUST about time for me to re-plant the survival garden with Fall/Winter crops. Enjoy my video!
Aug
25
Hi Everyone!
I wanted to take a few minutes to tell you about a new website that I’m working on with the people who make ProtoGrow! It is called MyGardenWalk.com: Protect Your Perimeter. It is a FANTASTIC new website for survival gardeners and preppers to share information with each other about how to grow your own survival garden.
This blog is mostly about how I grow MY survival garden, and use ProtoGrow to help. MyGardenWalk.com will let us all share our tips and advice about how to get the most out of our survival gardens. Now’s the time to learn how to actually GROW the survival seed banks that we all have. Now, before our lives REALLY depend on it.
Here’s what the new website looks like:
It is free to join, and joining lets you into the community without being worried about OTHER people who are not in the community being able to see your tips.
Come on over and see what’s growing: http://www.mygardenwalk.com
Aug
11
I have been absent for a couple of weeks, and I apologize for that, but I have been in the heat of a serious show-down with the cucumber mosaic virus! It’s been a tough battle, but I think I’ve won! At least for now!
It all started a few weeks ago when I noticed some of the leaves on my cucumber plant looking pretty bad:
I have to admit, I wasn’t too concerned at first and really took my time looking into it and trying to figure out what it was. Within just a few days, it got worse and it started to spread:
Once it got to this point, I knew I was in trouble and I hopped online to get some help from fellow gardeners through a few different forums I follow/post on.
One fellow gardener in particular was very, very helpful. She explained to me that there was no cure; the only thing I could do was removed the infected plants and keep an eye on my garden very closely to see signs of any more break-outs.
Well, I removed the infected cucumber plants in question and thought I was in the clear because I didn’t see signs of any other break-outs for a few days…but then I noticed…
You’ve got to be kidding me, right?! Needless to say, I ripped that plant out right away and doubled my “look-out” efforts! Fortunately, since that last plant, I have not seen any more signs of the cucumber mosaic virus.
This has been, in my humble gardening opinion, an all and out war with this virus. Just when you think you’re in the clear–WHAMOO!–ATTACK OF THE KILLER CUCUMBER MOSAIC VIRUS! If this summer has taught me anything, it has taught me that to survive, you need to always be on your game and prepared!
For now, I think I’m in the clear…but let’s face it, I think a lot of crazy stuff!
Jul
27
Transplant your tomatoes by tearing off the lower 1/3 of the leaves and burying the stem DEEP. Tomatoes are one of the ONLY plants you do this with. In this video, I show you how to plant your tomatoes so they grow big and strong!
Tomatoes LOVE ProtoGrow! Get some here!
Jul
24
Hey all! Thought I’d do a quick post on some of the negative side effects of chemical fertilizers when it comes to our health and what we’re consuming. Here are just a few of the bad things chemical fertilizers can do to us:
- Certain chemicals (beryllium and barium) found in man-made fertilizers have been found to cause cancer and can have negative effects on our lungs and kidneys.
- Chemical fertilizers are very high in nitrates. High levels of nitrates have been found (by the EPA) to cause severe health risks or even death because of deposits that form and can cause hemorrhaging.
- Children are at very high risk because of all the fruits and vegetables they eat–whether whole foods, baby foods, or processed foods.
- In addition, because children play in the dirt and can get in to things, the chances of them being exposed to chemical fertilizers (whether directly or indirectly) is high.
- Many chemical fertilizers are high in toxic metals, particularly lead. Obviously, lead is not a good thing to ingest.
Now, keep in mind these are just a handful of the effects chemical fertilizers have on us because we are eating plants fertilized with them. I’m not even mentioning what theses chemicals do to our environment and all the other creatures that share it with us!
Let’s take a look at some of the benefits of organic fertilizers, Protogrow in particular:
- Because Protogrow is all natural, you can rest assured that the foods fertilized with it are safe to eat; they are non-toxic.
- Protogrow is safe for children–you can use it in your home garden and know that your kids (and pets!) are safe and will not be exposed to any harsh chemicals.
- Studies have shown that plants fertilized organically maintain higher levels of nutrition over time. This is because organic fertilizers, such as Protogrow, do not harm or strip the soil you’re growing in (like chemical fertilizers do).
- Because of organic fertilizer’s all natural ingredients, there are no health risks to the consumer, such as cancer, kidney and lung problems, lead poisoning, etc. All of these are a risk with synthetic fertilizers.
- Let’s also keep in mind that plants grown organically simply taste better! And with Protogrow, they are guaranteed to taste better, grow faster, and grow bigger!
For more information on Protogrow and organic gardening in general, visit the main website here!
Jul
19
How do you know when you have aphids in your garden? Well, you’ll see them EVERYWHERE. Here’s some more info about Aphids, and why you want to keep them OUT of your garden.
Jul
16
Squash is one of the easiest, most nutritious, and best storage plants for the survival garden. Here’s where I show you how to plant squash.
To get the LARGEST squash possible, fertilize with the BEST NATURAL FERTILIZER around: ProtoGrow.
Jul
14
This is just a REALLY quick post about how to harvest your survival garden food.
A few days ago someone emailed me and said “I don’t think my pea plants produced very many peas.” Well, I told her (only half-joking) that might be because she didn’t feed them ProtoGrow. (Peas make a lot of their own food, but if you live somewhere with really bad soil, you DO need to feed them.)
Anyway, I asked her how many peas she got? As in, cups of shelled peas. And she said “What does shelling peas mean?”
I almost fell out of my chair.
Mrs. Greenfield and I got a BIG laugh, and then a “sorry for this person cry” out of that one.
The thought had not really occurred to me, though I guess it should have, that some of you probably don’t know how to tell when your survival garden food is ripe, and then what to do with it when it IS ripe. So, below, I’m offering you a few pointers.
You’re welcome.
Harvesting from your Survival Garden
Here are some tips about how to know when your survival garden food is ripe, and what to do with it after you pick it.
- Tomatoes: Unless you’re making fried green tomatoes, or you’re growing yellow or purple or some weird color of tomatoes, wait until they are REALLY read, but still firm to pick. They are the sweetest and most nutrient-dense at this point. And, if you’re canning them for sauce or juice, this is the way you want them.
- Eggplants: It depends upon the variety you are growing. The eggplant pictured, below, is ripe because it is a longer, skinnier variety, and it won’t get very big. So, you have to know how big your plants are supposed to get. After harvest, do not refrigerate, but use within TWO days.
- Peas: shelling peas that you want to eat fresh are ready to pick when their pods are very swollen. Bring them inside and shell them. (Pop open the outside and scrape out the peas on the inside.) Snap peas should be picked when the flower has just BARELY fallen off the pea pod. Peas for drying should be allowed to stay on the plant until they are almost dry. Then, harvest them, shell them, and let them dry on a screen. Store in a dry place.
- Corn: you can eat field corn when it is still immature. When the silky strands start peeking out of the top of the corn ears, peel back a leaf of the shuck around the corn. If it LOOKS like a light-yellow ear of sweet corn, eat it. To have corn to plant next year, and for cornmeal, let it dry on the stalk. Then harvest the corncobs and let them dry out. Store in a cool, dry place.
- Winter Squash: Pick this BEFORE it gets soft. Once it starts looking like it should (for instance: a pumpkin has turned orange), it is ripe enough to harvest. Do NOT wait until frost. It will turn to mush.
- Summer squash: You can eat zucchini when it is as big as your arm, and if you need to feed a lot of people with a little garden, you might have to let it get that big. BUT, it is MUCH tastier when it is still small, and the flower has just barely fallen off one end.
- Pole beans: These can be eaten like stringbeans when they are still young. To save them to use as dry beans, let them dry on the stalks. Then harvest them. Remove them from their pods, and put them in a bag and FREEZE them to kill any little bean borers that might be lurking.
I hope this helps you enjoy your survival garden even more!
Jul
13
The Indians used to plant beans and corn together, and for good reason: corn uses lots of Nitrogen and beans “fix” nitrogen in the soil. (They convert it to a form that plants can suck up.) In this video, I talk more about why I planted a late crop of beans and corn together: