The front cover of the New Seed Starters Handbook, by Nancy Bubel with Jean Nick   The New Seed Starters Handbook, Nancy Bubel with Jean Nick 2018, 452 pages, 6.5 x 9.1 inches approximately, with drawings and tables throughout. $19.99 Rodale Books.com. Distributed by Penguin Random House. This 2018 edition is an updated version of the old favorite 1988 reference book by Nacy Bubel explaining how to start seeds and grow healthy seedlings of vegetables, fruits, herbs, flowers, trees and shrubs; how to tackle seed-starting problems, and where to find seeds and gardening supplies. It i ..read more

  Rye and hairy vetch cover crop. Photo Kathryn Simmons Organic no-till cover crops are grown to flowering (or very close), killed without tilling or chemicals, and left to become dead mulch for the next crop. The food crops are planted into the dying residue. We have used no-till cover crops for Roma paste tomatoes, which are transplanted in early May. We don’t need early-ripening for these, making them a good no-till food crop. This method enabled us to have 1 year in 10 as a no-till year. Four ways to kill cover crops without herbicides or tilling Winter-killed cover crops for early s ..read more

  Beds of young buckwheat. Photo Bridget Aleshire In January I shared some resources to give the Big Picture of Cover Crops, including a compilation of slides for SARE (Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education) and my slideshow Cover Crops for Vegetable Growers. In February, I described limiting winter annual weeds by sowing oats in spaces without a cover crop and no planned food crop for 6-10 weeks. Six–ten weeks (depending on your climate) is long enough in early spring to get worthwhile growth from oats before prepping for the food crop. Also see February’s post for the Stale See ..read more

  Alkindus lettuce from High Mowing Seeds This is the last of my series on tips I learned at sustainable farming conferences the past winter. The sessions reported on here were at PASA. Harvesting Techniques for Small and Medium Scale Farms This was presented by Julie Henninger and Andy Russell of Goodkeeper Farm in Gardners, PA. They run a Full Diet CSA, with 7.5 acres of vegetables including five high tunnels and outdoor vegetables, and turkeys, cows and pigs. Their well-organized workshop covered their Top Crops (head lettuce, baby greens, carrots, bunched greens and roots); Pre-Harves ..read more

The Barefoot Farmer Volume I, 1993-2000 Book Review The Barefoot Farmer, Volumes I and II. Jeff Poppen, 2001 and 2021, 233 and 221 pages, 6 x 9 inches approximately, with drawings throughout. $20 each or $35 for two, via https://barefootfarmer.com. The Barefoot Farmer Volume II, 2000-2011 Jeff Poppen at Long Hungry Creek Farm, TN, is a lively and fascinating farmer and writer. Jeff’s style is folksy, lyrical, reverent, amusing, at times whimsical or iconoclastic, and always attentive to what works, what benefits the land, and how to farm better.  No doubt you will heartily agree on some p ..read more

Carrots under shade cloth in summer. Photo Pam Dawling2023-2024 Conference Tips Part 3 – Climate Change, Less Usual Edible Plants I reported earlier on good tips I got from the CFSA Conference and the VABF-SFOP Summit.  Here I’ll continue the theme. At the VABF-SFOP Summit, I also attended workshops on Meeting the Climate Challenge with Mark Schonbeck, and Eating and Marketing the Whole Plant with Chris Smith. I’ll tell you more about those now, then move on to the Pasa Sustainable Agriculture Conference. Meeting the Climate Challenge: Sharing Stories, Co-Creating Solutions with Mark Scho ..read more

In March, where we undersowed clovers in the broccoli patch in August, the old broccoli trunks are surrounded by a sea of green clover. Photo by Kathryn Simmons In December I wrote about Cover Crop Planning for Next Year, including 5 steps of cover crop planning for all opportunities. I have a slideshow Crop Rotations for Vegetables and Cover Crops, which I find to my surprise that I haven’t posted here since my 2014 version. Here it is now <iframe src=”https://www.slideshare.net/slideshow/embed_code/key/yLTqhulLBKVR9?hostedIn=slideshare&page=upload” width=”476″ height=”400″ frameborder ..read more

VABF/SFOP Summit conference January 2024  At the VABF-SFOP Summit in January, I attended the half-day intensive by Jean-Martin Fortier, Market Gardening 2.0. He covered a brief description of what market gardening is, five different crops that are most profitable, and three management tools for profitable farming. He briefly covered his career from 2004 establishing the 1.5 acre vegetable farm La Grelinette with his wife Maud-Hélène Desroches; his 2015 move to run a training farm school, La Ferme des Quatre-Temps,  with 10 2-year trainees per year; his 2023 move to set up a farm-to-t ..read more

  A Spacemaster cucumber plant in our hoophouse on April 23. Photo Pam Dawling I love learning new things and getting tips for improving our vegetable production. My events page tells you about recent and upcoming conferences. After I get home from conferences, I usually need to dive back into work, and am in danger of ignoring things I learned. Hence this blogpost. I’ll pass tips on, and extract the gems from my hand-written notes, making it more likely I’ll do something useful with them! CFSA SAC 2023 banner In November 2023 I took part in the Carolina Farm Stewardship Conference. I wen ..read more

Tokyo bekana in our hoophouse in late December. Photo Pam Dawling  My  Winter-Kill Temperatures of Cold-Hardy Vegetables 2021 has not changed much in recent years. But I’ve just got some precise information on Tokyo bekana, the Asian green that grows well in summer as a lettuce substitute; grows very well outdoors in the fall; and grows wonderfully in the winter hoophouse even in low light conditions. In my 2023 list the outdoor killing temperature is listed as 25°F (–4°C). Ugly, but not dead yet! Tokyo bekana outdoors on January 7, 2024 after several cold nights at 11°F (-11.5°C) at ..read more