Fluid Seeding, aka Cornstarch Gel Germinating

Several sites recommend using a cornstarch gel for planting out delicate barely germinated  seeds, or as a medium for germinating them.  It's used because after a seed has germinated artificially it will continue to grow even though it's too cold for them to germinate in the ground.

In an area with a short growing season you can gain a couple weeks of growing time by pre-germinating. 

The claim is that the gel and sprouted seeds can be squeezed from a bag into the prepared seed bed without damaging the delicate new roots.  If you are germinating in a dish of gel, you can spoon a sprout and some gel and place it where you want it.  The gel cushions the roots during transfer and provides a small reservoir of moisture for the first few days.

I tried germinating seeds on a dish of gel because my success rate when planting directly is usually poor.  Keeping a garden plot damp during a seedling's delicate early days is not easy in the arid Southwest.
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The New Raised Bed Corners

The nail-free raised beds I made have a minor flaw: they leak dirt at the corners because it's a simple right angle butt joint.  The cedar fence slats touch but they are not connected.

Corners touch, but do not connect. Dirt leaks out

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No-Tools Needed Tall Raised Beds

This has been entered in an Instructables.com contest!

The garden used to be the bottom of an arroyo, so it's mostly sand, some silt and some big rocks.  Instead of a short barrier to keep mulch contained, I need serious soil amendments and a deeper vegetable bed to hold it all.

Two slats high, with ends butted together

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Shed Door Retainer - What Took So Long?

This is a simple solution to the problem of a tool shed door that would not stay open.  After a couple of years of propping it open with rocks and bricks, and getting trapped in the dark when the wind blew it shut, I found a solution.

DUH!  Put a hook on the fence rail and the eye on the door.  Latch it open!  What took me so long, I think, is that the solution was so simple. 

Yes, it's a hook and eye!

The other shed is further from the fence, so I bent skinny steel rod into an 18-inch hook.  Chain and a hook to connect between the shed door and the fence would also have worked, but I had the rod in the workshop and no chain. Read more!

The Garden: Rebooting In a New Location

Oh wow, it's been over a year since I posted anything.   It's been a busy couple of years, with fixing up a house to resell, then fixing up the antique adobe house to move into, and moving from one state to another.

New garden, new challenges.  Look at this flower and I'll be back soon with projects and gardens in a different climate.

Sunflower growing wild in my yard

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Mary Kay: Home Business Opportunity or Flopportunity?

Does the Mary Kay home business opportunity provide the typical consultant with enough income from product sales to replace an entry-level, minimum-wage job such as burger flipper, Wal-Mart greeter, or convenience store cashier?

Not only no, but hell no!   You'll be lucky to afford to buy a burger for your kids. 

Potential Income for Mary Kay IBCs

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10 Pound Chili: New Mexico Style, with No Sissy Gringo Ingredients

Huge Boxes of Locally Grown Chilis, Roasted to Order

In the summer, supermarkets sell a lot of steaks. That means that the cuts of beef that aren't suitable for steaks will be abundant and cheap. So when the neighborhood's grills are full of steak, I buy the less tender cuts to make New Mexico style "Chilis Verdes con Carne". This is just what it says in Spanish: green chilis with meat. It combines the essentials of New Mexican cooking, green chilis, garlic, onions and slow-cooked beef with the classic spices of Old Mexican molés.

It's called 10-pound chili because it takes 10 pounds each of the three main ingredients.

The recipe makes about 4 gallons of chili, which is enough for a crowd, or to freeze for later use. Start it the day before you plan to serve it, because the time in the oven is when all the flavors blend together.

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How to Kill Bermuda Grass in 10 Easy Steps

In its proper place, Bermuda grass (Cynodon dactylon) makes a good lawn or good pasture. Unfortunately it doesn't stay in its proper place. The underground roots and the above ground runners spread everywhere. Soon you have Bermuda grass erupting from your flower beds, creeping through your cactus, tangling in your shrubs and even invading your garden shed.

Killing Bermuda grass is not difficult, but it's not going to happen overnight. I'm a desert landscaper. I spend a lot of time killing lawns, especially Bermuda grass lawns, to replace them groundcovers that use less water. I have learned that no matter what the herbicide package says, it will take at least a month and several applications of herbicide to kill 90 to 95% of the Bermuda grass, then several months of spot application on surviving sprigs to get the remainder. It's a tough plant. It's so tough that it grows in the cracks of the concrete medians in the middle of a Phoenix freeway.

Bermuda Grass with seed heads
By Harry Rose from South West Rocks, Australia via Wikimedia Commons

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Natural Pest Control for Gardeners and Landscapers: It's a Bug-eat-Bug World

The no-work, pesticide-free approach to controlling garden pests is to let their natural enemies eat them. The easiest and cheapest way to minimize the numbers of insects that damage your plants is to encourage predator insects that will eat the plant-damaging insects for free. The easiest and cheapest way to encourage these insect predators is to stop killing them - stop using pesticides in the garden. There may be a brief surge in the plant eaters, but the predator populations will expand to control them.

Caterpillar on 4 O'Clock Flowers

Think of the advantages for you - no buying pesticides, no weekends wasted spraying pesticides, not worries about pesticide residues on your vegetables. Just sit back and watch the food chain in action. For sex, violence and mayhem, it matches anything you can find on television, except maybe Game of Thrones.
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Okra: How to Grow, Cook, and Preserve It

Okra is not easy to find in supermarkets and outrageously expensive when you do find it. But, if you have dirt in all-day sun, a reliable water supply, and lots of hot days you can grow your own okra. The okra plant has large leaves and pretty hibiscus-like white or yellow flowers that would look good in a sunny flower bed.

Okra Flower

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