Category: practical guides

Diversity is Delicious: Uncommon Fruits for Every Garden

I know that Summer just got here, but part of being a farmer is planning for the seasons ahead… With the sun at its apex for the year, the apples are hanging thick and green on the boughs and the bees are buzzing among… Continue Reading “Diversity is Delicious: Uncommon Fruits for Every Garden”

Maybe Read This: Experiments with Plants, 6th Edition

As a farmer and a researcher, I am constantly reminded that agriculturalists from earlier times are often the best teachers. Experiments with Plants (6th ed.) written in 1911 by Harvard Associate Professor of Botany Dr. W.J. V Osterhout, is a good example of this… Continue Reading “Maybe Read This: Experiments with Plants, 6th Edition”

The World is Filled with Solutions: A Guidebook to Healing Spices

It is wonderful how the Earth gives us an abundance of delicious, beneficial, healing plants that we can grow and use to make our lives better. I have so many favorite books, and Healing Spices – How to Use 50 Everyday and Exotic Spices… Continue Reading “The World is Filled with Solutions: A Guidebook to Healing Spices”

Who’s A Good Boy? The Doctors Book of Home Remedies for Dogs and Cats

The doctor's book of home remedies for dogs and cats book cover

Living in a rural area, it’s not always possible to get to the vet in an emergency, and we must do what we can with what we have. Example: a friend had to google “dog Heimlich maneuver” when her dog started choking – and… Continue Reading “Who’s A Good Boy? The Doctors Book of Home Remedies for Dogs and Cats”

Haybox: The 18th Century Slow Cooker

Haybox: The 18th Century Slow Cooker - Using "retained heat" cooking to have fun and safe energy.

These days, everyone seems to have a slow cooker to make life easier. But guess what? There’s a simpler, less expensive alternative that’s been helping rural people cook food and conserve fuel for at least 200 years! According to Wikipedia, a haybox is a… Continue Reading “Haybox: The 18th Century Slow Cooker”

Feed the Soil

Feed the Soil - little-known soil-building legumes and other crops, as well as enhanced descriptions of well-known ones

In the 1980s, Ron Whitehurst of ACRES U.S.A. wrote: “Central Florida is being mined down sea level for phosphate clay; and spiraling natural gas prices are making synthetic nitrogen fertilizer exorbitantly priced. Even using all the solid and liquid wastes from the cities, there… Continue Reading “Feed the Soil”

Quantum Level Transformation

Quantum Level Transformation Book Cover

A thanksgiving tradition at dinner tables across the country is to ask each person “What are you thankful for?” It’s an interesting question, because it is so vitally linked with the other fundamental questions we all ask ourselves in one way or another: What… Continue Reading “Quantum Level Transformation”

A Little “Culture”

Mastering Fermentation by Mary Karlin book cover

As harvest season draws to a close, it’s time to preserve the bounty. And what better way to do it than with the time-honored method of fermentation? With the earliest known examples of fermented foods appearing in the Fertile Crescent over 8,000 years ago,… Continue Reading “A Little “Culture””

Cookstoves and Coppicing

With winter approaching, people in rural areas of the developed world are thinking about heating and cooking. And firewood. And stoves. Around the globe, in the developing world, it isn’t a seasonal thought – it’s a daily thought. “More than half of the world’s… Continue Reading “Cookstoves and Coppicing”

Cover Crops! Interplanting with Legumes

With summer drawing to a close, it’s time to start thinking about your winter garden, and that means cover crops! Here are some things to consider when planting your cover crops this year: Normally, a gardener or farmer planning a crop rotation (over time)… Continue Reading “Cover Crops! Interplanting with Legumes”