Growing Tomatoes Upside-Down

At first glance, this might look like an unusual way to grow tomatoes. But Jim Appleby from Iowa has discovered several benefits to hanging his tomatoes in buckets. First, the air can circulate better so the plants have almost no disease problems. Second, the fruit doesn’t rot as quickly as that on the ground. And finally, some critters that eat tomatoes have trouble getting to the ripening fruit.

To make the upside-down containers, Jim used 5-gallon buckets with tight-fitting lids. He recycled his from a restaurant, but says you can find them many places, such as paint or hardware stores.

Jim scrubs each bucket out with soapy water and makes sure the handle is attached securely. He cuts a 2-inch or larger diameter hole in the center of the lid and one in the bottom of the bucket. To make the holes, he uses a drill with a hole saw bit (an attachment for cutting a door to install the doorknob).

With the bucket standing upright and the lid off, Jim covers the hole in the bottom with a coffee filter or scrap of fabric. That way the soil won’t fall out when he turns the bucket over. He fills the bucket full of a lightweight potting mix, shaking it to settle the soil.

2 in. or larger diameter hole cut in bucket lid for both drainage and watering	Established tomato seedling ready to hang

Before he puts the lid back on, Jim lays another coffee filter over the soil where the hole will be. Next, he puts the lid on and turns the bucket upside down.
Jim cuts a slit through the filter in the hole and plants a tomato seedling. To give the tomato a fast start, he strips off the lower leaves and plants the seedling deeply so roots can form along the stem. He places the planted bucket in a sunny location and keeps it well-watered for the next few weeks.

When the plant is about a foot tall, Jim’s ready to hang it up. The bucket needs a solid support to hold the weight. A clothesline pole is ideal. If you hang the bucket from a building, make sure it won’t bang into a window or the siding on a windy day.

This part is easier with two people — one to lift and hold the bucket and one to fasten the chain. Jim drapes a chain over the clothesline post while a friend lifts the bucket. He pulls the chain through the handle of the bucket and fastens the ends together. You can buy chain loops made specifically for fastening or use a piece of heavy wire and twist it to hold the chain together. Either way, Jim finds he can raise and lower the height to harvest his tomatoes


Thanks to Charles for this piece!

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Raised bed organic gardening How to Set Up an Organic Soil-Bed Garden You want to have a great gardening experience growing a high-production sustainable garden of healthy vegetables - and you're about to find out exactly HOW to do it! First off, you MUST have direct sunlight all day long for vegetables to thrive. Therefore, use only the space that has no shade. And don't worry if it seems small! You'll grow twice the food in one fourth the space others are using, so just do it right in the space you have. And actually, starting small is a good idea anyway! It's easier, more fun, and won't wear you out! Level ground, or something with a slight Southern slope is best, in order to catch the sun's strongest rays, and to avoid rapid water run-off that will wash out your soil, seeds, and seedlings. Begin by clearing your ground of EVERYTHING! No weeds, rocks, or anything else is allowed. "Cleanliness is next to godliness" certainly applies here, and you surely want your garden to be a thing of beauty, as well as being productive! Measure and stake the perimeter of your garden. This gives you an important starting point for figuring out how many soil-beds you can have, and then placing them properly. Let's use 25' X 35' as an example of what your garden area might be. It doesn't really matter what direction your beds face, so far as sun exposure is concerned. What does matter, though, is that the beds be level, and that you plant taller plants to the North or East of shorter plants. This is to assure that taller plants don't shade shorter plants, and rob them of essential sunlight. So, align your beds to maximize those factors as much as possible. I'll assume we are able to run the beds lengthwise along the 35' dimension. Your soil-beds should be 18" wide and any length you choose. When you become experienced in this method of growing, and want to specialize in growing certain crops all the time, you may want to begin using 4'-wide beds, but let's stick to the best family garden layout for now. The ideal size for aisles is 3 ½', and since we have 25' width in our example garden, this will give us 5 - 18" beds with 3 ½' aisles. If you have only 23' you could get by with aisles a little narrower. But don't squeeze those aisles! You will be growing plants that need all of that space, and reducing the aisle space only leads to problems of not enough light and air for your growing plants! We'll make our beds 30' long. This leaves us 2 ½' on each end of the garden for walking, and 30' is a good length, because it makes caring for the garden easy. More about that later. Using 18"-long stakes, stake your 5 - 18" X 30' beds, with 4 stakes per bed. Apply 32 ounces of the Mittleider Pre-Plant Mix, and 16 ounces of Weekly Feed Mix to the soil under your strings. This amounts to about 1 ounce and ½ ounce per running foot of those VERY important natural mineral nutrients. Dig or till the soil of your soil-bed to a depth of at least 8". Then, using nylon string, tie strings between the stakes, to outline your soil-beds. Begin making raised, ridged beds by pulling about 2+ inches of dirt from the aisles into the 18"-wide bed area under your strings. Smooth and level that dirt, and then check the level of your bed area. It must be level to make watering easy and efficient, so don't ignore this step! Move dirt from the high spots in your bed to the low spots, until your bed is no more than one inch higher at the water-source end than the other end. Make 4"-high ridges all around your bed by pulling soil from the center of the bed to just beneath the strings. When you're finished you should have a planting area that is about 12" wide and between 1 and 2" above the level of the aisles, with 4" ridges, the top of which are 18" apart. Re-check the level of your planting area, and move soil as necessary to keep the bed level from end to end. Your Mittleider "Best of Organic" garden is now ready to plant!

This Post is Dedicated To Jimmy Arrington

As it takes years for our soil to be depleted of nutrients, so does it take years for our bodies to be depleted of nutrients, to keep us sick. At a time of crisis, extreme measures are taken, and they will take us out of crisis, but we must, follow up with the rebuilding so to speak, the renourishing to survive those extreme drugs that have taken us out of crisis. Look at what our so loving mother earth has given us to provide us with those answers.

The Austrian word for sick, is "what are you missing".

I support you in your life saving actions and I love you, Kate

photo by G.A. Jarrell

First Step in Organic Gardening

A simple effective thing that you can do today:

Begin a compost heap. Find an out of the way place in your garden and make a pile of leaves and grass. Save your coffee grounds and filters, fruit peels, tea bags,fruit cores in a milk carton and mix them with the leaves. Throw a handful of dirt on top of the pile and stir it with a shovel. Nature will do the rest.

Each day I will give step by step instructions on how to have an organic garden to feed you and your loved ones.

The Depletion of Our Soil

I ran into a good friend the other day. We live in the same neighborhood. We are also the only ones in the neighborhood that have our own organic gardens. We discussed how our gardens did this year, and how great it would be for the environment, if everyone had an organic garden. Of course that discussion lead to starting a business of putting gardens in for people, and helping them maintain it, and Gaffney named the business "Sun Spots". It will be great someday, when our priorities will be on our health and our children's future health as well.


"In the future, we will not be able to rely anymore on our premise that the consumption of a varied balanced diet will provide all the essential trace elements, because such a diet will be very difficult to obtain for millions of people."
Dr. Walter Mertz, U.S. Department of Agriculture, told to congress in 1977.

Dr. Linus Pauling the two-time Nobel Prize winner states that: "You can trace every sickness, every disease, and every ailment to a mineral deficiency.

Dr. Charles Northen, MD researcher reports that, "In the absence of minerals, vitamins have no function. Lacking vitamins, the system can make use of the minerals, but lacking minerals vitamins are useless."

1992 Earth Summit Statistics

1992 Earth Summit Report* indicate that the mineral content of the world's farm and range land soil has decreased dramatically.

Percentage of Mineral Depletion From Soil During The Past 100 Years, By Continent:
North America 85% **
South America 76%
Asia 76%
Africa 74%
Europe 72%
Australia 55%

* You may remember the 1992 Earth Summit by the fact that President Bush wouldn't sign any of the treaties.

** Some US farms are 100% depleted and some are 60% depleted, the average is 85% depletion as compared to 100 years ago. This is worse than in any other country in the world because of the extended use of fertilizers and "maximum yield" mass farming methods.


Mineral nutrient depletion continues to be a problem in U.S. farm, forest and range soils. This depletion is caused by natural processes, such as weathering and erosion, particularly in the sensitive soils of the southeastern United States. More significantly, throughout the United States, human accelerated depletion is caused by the production of high yield crops and livestock grazing. Those activities cause nutrients to be removed and organic matter to be depleted from the soil's natural cycling system. Moreover, when commercial growers attempt to replenish the soils of only some mineral nutrients by fertilization they may exacerbate mineral nutrient imbalances. While methods exist to replenish the soil of its mineral nutrients there is a relative lack of knowledge on how to identify all deficiencies and to fully correct them. In addition, the lack of an economic incentive to implement long term, soil-building solutions perpetuates the relative fragility and inconsistency of US soils' nutrient supplying power.

Michael Karr, Ph.D.

ARCPACS Certified Professional Soil Scientist

Baby Juan Pablo

Juan Pablo came into this world very quickly. His mother barely made it to the hospital, before he was born. He was hearing impaired, could not nurse, did not respond to anything, rarely cried, had trouble swallowing, and would frequently stop breathing for no apparent reason. Many tests were run, only to show, Pablo was a very healthy baby boy.

I found his first thoracic vertebra, first cervical, and fifth cervical were misaligned, his left jaw, his occiput, temporal, and parietal cranial bones were also misaligned. His stomach was up applying pressure on his sternum, causing him much distress while eating.

Five minutes after Pablo's chiropractic adjustment, and cranio-sacral therapy, he immediately started to nurse, could move his head from side to side, smiled, responded to sound, and had a bowel movement.

I attribute Pablo's problems to a very aggressive birth. Chiropractic care and
Cranio Sacral therapy should be a part of every childbirth. Pass this story to all, so that every child will have the opportunity if needed.

Please say a prayer for Juan Pablo.

Thankyou to LMT Jennifer Bogan for her help with Baby Pablo

Parenting

As I follow Cate Ryba's Blog on her life with Winnie, I find myself thinking, if I only had the technology to blog about my son's life. I think it is beautiful beyond words. My son, now 24, has asked me to let go, and think positive about his endevours. He is celebrating being alive, and traveling the world, I here, wait for his calls, and emails, to know he is ok. I love him with my heart and soul. I remember, as I watch Cate with Winnie, changing diapers, and lacking sleep, thinking, when will I be me again, and now that I have "me" again, I long for those intimate days of snuggling, embracing, holding, and reading to my child the books that would make him smile.

My message to all, is to love the present time, for it will pass, and as you look back, you will know, you have loved.