Recommended Reading

The second edition re-released in 2008 with updated information and more stories from the great grain raiser himself. Considered one of the founding fathers of the modern garden farming and sustainable agriculture Gene Logsdon delivers a educational yet easy to read book on raising your own grains. He gives his weighty opinion on techniques for grain selection, planting, raising, disease concerns, harvesting and storage. For anyone that is even mildly interested in growing grains for themselves or livestock in a small garden setting this is the book for you. I will be adding it my collection just as soon as I can and it will be a well read resource. It can be found at Amazon. Com and in the the Young Environmentalist Store for easy purchase and shipping.

Dealing With Slugs in your Compost Bin

Anyone that lives in moist climates and or does a lot of composting will occasional run into slug or other insect problems.  In a effectively run composting they will not be much of issue because of the higher temperatures that are inherent in composting will kill any slugs that try to make there home in the compost.

But sometimes through no fault of the composter you will end up with slug and insect problems in your bin.  If they are just in your compost and it is away from your garden then the slugs will not be much to worry about as long as they are well fed by your veggie and fruit scraps you add to the compost.  However if the compost is close to your actives gardens then some control or eradication of the slugs might be in order.

There are many options our their for slugs in the garden from traps to poison pellets but when dealing with then in the compost pile the options are more limited.  You want to steer clear of poisons or chemicals since that would end up in the compost and would later be spread on the garden.  There are two common and easy ways to deal with slugs in your compost if you feel it is necessary. 

You can either pluck them out by hand and toss them in a bucket of soapy water which will drown them.  Make sure to use soapy water as they will most likely find some way to get out of a bucket of plain old water. 
   
The second effective way to deal with them is to empty the composter on a patio or tarp layed out in the sun.  This will have two effects on the slugs in the compost, they will be dried out by being exposed to the sun and they will be vulnerable to hungry birds that inhabit the neighborhood.  The sun and the birds will also kill and eat the eggs(hopefully) that the slugs will most likely have layed in the compost.   I say hopefully because when you are dealing with nature nothing is ever certain. 

Slugs will always be a ongoing battle in the garden but they can be managed quite easily with just a few simple methods like the ones outlined above.  If you wish to try and exclude slugs from your garden or keep them contained in your compost you can try using a copper mesh fence.  Research has shown that the copper produces a reaction in the slugs and snails akin to a electrical shock and they will not want to cross it.  The copper mesh can be found easily at places like Amazon and if deployed effectively it can be useful at keeping them out or in what ever you want.

Using Windbreaks to Protect Gardens

If you live in the Midwest like I do you you are familiar with a little thing called wind. Wind is what defines many aspects about our lives. It effects where we build homes, if we plant trees, gardens, snow management, what we drive and the list goes on and on. Someone who is not from the plains states may have a hard time understanding just how much wind impacts our lives. Sometime in the dead of winter with the wind howling along at 40 miles and hour with snow and ice flying through the air it sometime seems like the wind has it out for you.

In the war against the wind we fight here on the plains we have only one defense against it. We use windbreaks. It you are not familiar with the term windbreak it pretty much means what it sounds like. Windbreaks are something that that puts the brakes on the wind and stops it from exerting its full force on a people or objects.

Windbreaks can either be living using trees, shrubs, tall grasses or constructed like wood slate fences.

Tree and Shrub Winbreak

Both types can be very effective but they have draw backs as well. When using a living windbreak they will need to be planted, water, fertilized and mulched in order for them to become effective. It can also take up to ten years depending on the species of plants for a living windbreak to become effective. A constructed windbreak on the other hand can be effective as soon as you are done building it but it will not last has long as well designed living windbreak.

There are many purposes that windbreaks can be designed for but for this post I want to discuss why it can be used in a garden. For any of you out there that garden you know that many of the species that are commonly grown in gardens are very fickle and sensitive. If things are not exactly what they need to grow they will give you no end of grief. Along with watering, nutrition and sunshine protecting your garden from wind can be crucial to good production.

Studies around the world have demonstrated that windbreaks can improve crop yields anywhere from 5-45 percent depending on the type of crop. Now most of these studies were conducted on traditional field crops like wheat, corn and soybeans but what holds true for those crops is also applicable to garden vegetables as well. As a gardener that deals with wind on a daily basis I cannot stress enough how important it is to have protection from it.

A perfect example of why windbreaks are important is a potted zucchini plant that I grew about a year ago. When I was growing the zucchini on my deck it was doing just fine. It had plenty of water and sun and was well on its ways to producing excellent zucchini. But by this point in the summer I had already been eating zucchini like crazy from my garden and I didn't want anymore. When my girlfriend found out she said she would take it since she loved zucchini and hadn't had any yet. To sum it up when it left the safety of my deck the wind got a a hold of it and it was never the same zucchini plant again.

For the purposes of garden a constructed windbreak would probably be best. This type will go up

Cattle Windbreak made with tin sheeting

quickly and can be moved and raised with relative ease when compared to planted windbreaks. They can be constructed in many ways including a slatted fence, greenhouse plastic over a wood frame or even metal sheeting like you see with cattle windbreaks.

Until next time

Josh