You can also mulch your plants with newspaper, leaves, or any regular mulch to help conserve water.

 

For anyone interested in "GIANT VARIETIES" of vegetables, I have a lot of seeds left for Weeks North Carolina Giant:
Cantaloupe
Watermellon
Tomato
and
Pumpkin

Same deal, fire me off a PM so I can give you my postal mail address, then send a self addressed stamped envelope. I will put whatever I've got available in it for free!

- It just don't get no better than that...


~Dutch

"When your grocery store is right outside the door, You've got it going on - because getting rich is about saving money, not how much you make..."

 

We need a deer control plant, sure wish dad could do his own deer harvesting, since you can kill them legally if they are eating your garden, they disappeared hunting season.

 

There ARE plants that do that - if you can web search them out and convince local authorities that you were not "CREATING A BAITED FIELD" you should check into that.

But then again, deer feeders and even "DEER COCAINE" are legal, so why not go for it?

ALL deer require some kind of forage during hunting season, and that can be exploited. Even if it means fencing it off until JUST THAT TIME OF YEAR...

Seed corn may be one answer. But I am not at all clear on what the laws are about it all.

When can you set out "DEER FOOD" legally?

You know dang well that they are going to go where they can EAT! They are not much different from people in that way.

I knew some people a year or three back that ran a managed hunting ground in north west Mississippi and they regularly planted forage on their land for just that reason. The last time I talked to them they were planning on skipping a year to let the herds come back up in numbers. They had about a hundred forty acres to play with, and it was dedicated to that use/purpose strictly.

The actual land ownership was split up between more than a dozen people and comprized woods and watershed areas. Tresspassing was heavily enforced... It was not a place to go without an invitation!

You may want to look into forming a cooperative like that, where many small adjoining land parcels form a "CLUB" and get together to manage it.

 

Game man is in the area, he has been harassing the guy down the road for baiting, seems people are illegally entering his property and setting up a hunting spot, he don't want anyone on his property.
Dads garden keeps getting wrecked by the deer and ground hog, the deer loved his purple hull peas last year. You can kill deer out of season if they are eating your crops I believe, you have to cut it up yourself.

 

I'd go after the GH first - BEFORE SPRING!
You want that sucker DEAD before it breeds.

But that's interesting to know, as I will be planting "BLACK BEANS" which are a bush-like plant this year (it's one of the new ones, and a south american favorite)

 

The butter peas were what dad used to plant, I'm trying to get him to do some this year, he swapped to the purple hull, taste more like a black eye pea to me, the deer loved them.
As soon as it warms up, and hibernating time is over, dads headin to the barn, set up a spot to stay and kill that groundhog, he's too big to trap. He said the bunny this year will be shot too, it used to watch him exit the truck, no fear, the only animal that's safe is the turtle, he said he'll not kill it. You ever seen okra with 12" pods, that's old school, dad's planting it?
BTW my cousin planted a field of sweet grass for the deer, they ran off last hunting season, not sure why.

 

I wouldn't mind some of those tomato seeds, but for some reason, I can't get ANY type of melon to grow in my garden. I did get some little white pumpkins to grow one year, though.

 

I told one of my neighbors that stopped by while I was watering the mellon patch last year that one of the keys to mellons besides direct sunlight is:

"Make sure they get plenty of water - that's why they call them WATER FREAKIN' mellons!!!"

Tomatos also have to be kept from getting dry - but it's a tricky two step. Too much, and they rot...

I've pretty much decided to go ahead and do four pumpkin vines this year, right along one edge of my property next to the road. But they won't be planted until the beginning of june. I figure start the seedlings about the second week of may. My reasoning there is that three weeks allows two weeks for germination, and a week to get strong, then four months should see good things happenning right at the first of October

 

A table spoon of Epsom salts during planting of tomatoes, or gypsum, we've had great luck with the salts. A barrel by the house, with the gutter run into it to trap the rain is a great source of free water, I can't do it here, no guttering. I tried to get dad to work on the old hand well pump at the farm, it's on the cistern, he could shuttle buckets, but won't do it, there is a well with an electric pump, but the power is off.
The animals have really made it a problem, but my uncle has let dad get the barn lot cut, so the weeds aren't thick, giving them cover to come and go, he bought all my grandmothers share, so most of the farm is his.

 

What's in epsom salts? I mean, I suspect it isn't salt at all - but some other compound.

 

It is a form of salt I think, used as a water conditioner or treatment for dry skin in baths, the main ingredients in bath salts so to speak.

 

Okay - then what are "BATH SALTS"?

I don't remember much that I don't use every day, but I seem to recall they contained some magnesium and other trace elements.

(I read the carton many years ago)

 

No clue, just know they work. LoL

 

Magnesium and sulfur are the two major components of Epsom Salt. Crop researchers have determined that magnesium is:

A critical mineral for seed germination.
Vital to the production of chlorophyll, which plants use to transform sunlight into food.
An aid in the absorption of phosphorus and nitrogen, two of the most important fertilizer components.

Sulfur, the other major component of Epsom Salt, is also an important plant nutrient. Sulfer may:

Contribute to chlorophyll production.
Make the primary nutrients (nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium) found in most fertilizers more effective.
Although magnesium and sulfur occur naturally in soil, they can be depleted by various conditions, including heavy agricultural use over time. But unlike most commercial fertilizers, which build up in the soil over time, Epsom Salt is not persistent so you can't overuse it. Tests by the National Gardening Association confirm - roses fertilized with Epsom Salt grow bushier and produce more flowers, while the compound makes pepper plants grow larger than those treated with commercial fertilizer alone.