Eelworm

Tomatoes

2011-06-29T17:56:00.000-07:00

I have been gardening in the same area for 18 years. Have used all the various fertilizers commercial, organic, liquid , solid, animal based and synthetic. Have tried and retried various heirloom and new hybrid seed and plant varieties. Have had many years that the neighbors thought was impressive production to the point I could not give the produce away as fast as it grew.

The past two years I entered a new course of gardening. Trying to learn how to manually prepare beds, produce my own mulch and compost. I determined to not use any commercial fertilizer or insecticidal products. I read several books by Steve Solomon and began to follow his direction on breaking new ground, deep digging to break up hard pan and using my own produced organic compost to fertilize the soil. I also followed his recipe to make COF, "complete organic fertilizer". This year I planted several varieties of vegetables resistant to root knot nematodes( which saturate my fields) to see which ones did well and to recover seed to be seed self sufficient in the event some catastrophe prevented obtaining commercial seed. To that end I had 3 to 4 tomato plants of different varieties. With the deep digging together with the COF they have grown to virtual small trees with massive productive branches. The weight of the produce is so great that every single one of the commercial tomato cages collapsed before the fruit even began to ripen. My peas and beans also did better than ever before.

I do not know if it was the breaking up of the deep soil or the use of just the COF as the fertilizing agent, but the results have been truly astounding. I very highly recommend one read Mr Solomon's books and see what improvements you can make to your garden routine.

2011-05-20T21:03:00.000-07:00

Swamp lilly last week on the Yellow River flood plain. The most impressive spring wild flower here next to the trumpet vines. Once planted some in a friends Koi pond and they bloomed year after year untill replanted to the wild and Koi pond dug up. My friend got tired of water moccasins trying to get the fish and her.

Failings

2008-04-13T20:17:00.000-07:00

What does one do when you let a besetting sin that you cannot seem to kill come between you and the Lord. You are going blissfully along sharing wonderfull fellowship, things could hardly seem to get better, then BAM, IT shows up in your heart and mind and body. You know better but you chase after your sin, you revel in it, all the time knowing it is wrong. You push your RIGHTS as if you were equal to God or as if He were just another man. Then comes shame and you look for the fig leaf and promise with the help of The Spirit never to do it again, knowing full well you will as you have time and time again. One begins to wonder will or has the patience of the Lord past a point of forgiveness and caring because you have sinned knowingly. As has been said," that which I would not do I do, and that which I would do I do not do." I often wonder how will the Lord change me at death that I will be able to enter into His house and rest and still have any vestage of the being I was in this life, for I am assuming perhaps wrongly so that we will not all be automatons with white robes and harps, hardly worth the Son Of God dieing for.

Mighty Oaks

2008-03-12T19:02:00.000-07:00

Today I salvaged some old plastic potting pots from the gully out in the woods behind the barn and filled them with dirt given to me as a Christmas present from my nurse. I then took the acorns given to me by Ms Daffron the housekeeper at Davidson Middle School, where the body of Convergence met for a year before setting up in the Coffee Shop, and gave them to my 83 year old mother to plant. Ms Daffron had used acorns from the trees in front of Davidson to make an acorn gelatin, mud-brown and the smell of musty wood soil. She had gotten the recipe from her 83 year old mother who during the Korean War used that gelatin process to help save the lives of her family from starvation. Now as those mighty oaks grow from those seeds planted today I plan to plant them along the road leading to the garden the Lord has prompted me to plant for the community for use in the years ahead. And if the Lord sees fit to keep me around for a few more years I will tell the story of the trees and the dirt and the church and the gelatin and the people and friends God brought together for a season and a time. And in the telling I will bless My Lord the lover of my soul.

Dream Singing

2008-03-11T19:13:00.000-07:00

Do you ever wake singing songs of love and worship to the Lord? Rarely, very rarely this will happen. This morning was such a day. I awoke as the dream was swiftly vanishing away but I caught the light of a glorious open white rose its golden - yellow center radiating brilliance, as my spirit sang out, "My white and Wondrous Rose I shall follow you forever." It carried me to the garden in the "Song of Songs" and all day I have sought for the glimpse and fragrance of my beloved Lord who has gone ahead of me for I was slow to open the door. As the decades have gone by I have come to know what is my greatest peace, my greatest treasue, it is The Lord ever by my, ever close, ever loving, ever carrying me never leaving me to my own destruction. I await the day when I may lay my head upon his neck as John did and know I am finally fully home forever.

Now What?

2008-03-08T08:14:00.000-08:00

So now I have got this page/blog all because I simply wanted to post a comment to a art piece on a blog in Australia. God forbid what I will need to do if I want to post a (for sale) notice. Does anybody remember pencil, paper, envelope, tactile touch of opening a letter just like a birtday present. Never to be, never to be.