April In Rochester

This has been a pretty terrible april for growing stuff. It has been unseasonably cold, unseasonably cloudy, and unseasonably rainy. Even stuff that is supposed to be very quick growing like arugula and radishes are behind schedule. The radishes were sprouted when I returned from vacation on 4/1. They are supposed to be ready for harvest 28 days after sprouting. At least 23 days later, the radishes are still in the 2 leaf stage. And when I say two leaf, I mean the two leaves that came out of the seeds. They haven't grown any actual leaves yet. The radishes were supposed to be done growing before the corn gets planted in mid-may, but that is looking highly improbable at this point. I'm pretty worried that my peas haven't sprouted yet, either.

This past week we had a particularly nasty spring storm. I woke up at 1:30AM to the sound of thunder. The lightning was nearly constant and as the storm got close it started to rain. It kept coming down harder and harder until the street became a river. Then it started to hail. The whole thing only lasted 30 or so minutes or so, but it was a worse storm than I remember all of last summer. I feared the worst for my little sproutlings in the garden. I assumed that some would be washed away and some would be crushed. The next morning I took a look and everything looked perfectly fine. I was amazed and relieved. I checked the weather report and it looked like there was a second short storm later in the night. Between the two short bursts we got 1.4 inches, which was a new record for that date.

The weather for the next week looks quite a bit better. I took advantage of the first nice day in a long time to do some more planting. I transplanted some cauliflower and broccoli seedlings. I also planted another round of lettuce and some radishes in a few unused spots. Lastly, I planted the potatoes. There are two different kinds. One is a very early season small red kind(red norland). The other kind is a late season white (kennebec). I dug 8" deep trenches, put the potatoes in the bottom, and and covered them with a couple inches. After the tops get a foot high or so, I'll fill in the rest of the trenches. Supposedly that encourages more potatoes since they are generated off the sides of buried stem.

Vacation

One more off-topic post. If you haven't seen pictures of our trip to New Zealand, check it out on my wife's blog.

Everything Is Toxic

This is a bit off-topic for the Miller homestead, but its something that I am frequently reminded of, and its something that I'd like to write about. Periodically I see an article or hear people talking about some food item or substance being toxic. I'm getting a little sick of it. This week its sugar. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/17/magazine/mag-17Sugar-t.html

The gist of the 9 page article is that when fructose (which makes up about 50% of table sugar, raw sugar, high fructose corn syrup, and the sugar in fruit) is ingested in significant quantities and is absorbed quickly (for instance when drinking a pop), the liver and pancreas freak out. A bunch of insulin is produced, and if this happens frequently enough, a person will develop insulin resistance and get fat, then die of heart disease or cancer.

So, frequently eating too much sugar will cause blood sugar spikes, mess up your body's natural regulatory system and cause long-term health problems? Wow, who knew? Perhaps the "Toxic" part in the title is just a sensationalistic way to get more readers, but I would expect a little more from a New York Times writer who has "spent most of the last decade doing journalistic research on diet and chronic disease."

I think the word toxic should be stricken from the English language, or at the least it should be temporarily banned until people stop using it in ways that it should not be used. If you look up toxic on mirriam-webster.com it will give you the following definition: "containing or being poisonous material, especially when capable of causing death or serious debilitation". Ok, then how is poisonous defined? Again, according to mirriam webster, it means "destructive, harmful".

That gives us a vague understanding of the word. The problem is that something that is destructive or harmful in moderate or large quantities can be harmless, beneficial, or even necessary in small quantities. Most people would say that snake venom is "toxic", but some people in southeast asia will ingest small quantities of snake venom because they believe it to have medicinal effects. Granted, the venom might still be doing harm, just too little harm to notice immediately, but I was just using it as an illustrative point. Too out-there for you? Ok, how about the evil poison Vitamin A?

Vitamin A is a necessary substance and having too little of it causes temporary or permanant blindness and impairs the immune system. Ingesting too much of it can be just as bad. Symptoms include nausea, loss of muscle control, and birth defects. Feel free to check out the wikipedia page for Hypervitaminosis A. Thanks to that page, I now know that due to dangerous levels of Vitamin A, one should not eat polar bear liver if you are ever stranded in the Arctic.

How about salt? Obviously salt is a necessary nutrient, but most people are aware that excess salt can be dangerous and, it has even been used as a murder weapon. The longer-term health effects of a high-salt intake are debateable, and there are multiple conflicting studies on the topic.

In case I needed another reason to love Wikipedia, when I tried to look up "toxic" on wikipedia it redirected me to "toxicity". One of the early paragraphs says "A central concept of toxicology is that effects are dose-dependent; even water can lead to water intoxication when taken in large enough doses, whereas for even a very toxic substance such as snake venom there is a dose below which there is no detectable toxic effect." I couldn't have said it better myself.

So with that in mind, here is my hierarchy for various levels of toxicity:

Extra-Super Toxic:
Stuff that is going to cause significant damage even is small doses like arsenic, cyanide, and some mushrooms

Really Toxic:
Stuff that will cause serious damage in significant quantities like glycol, many poisonous plants, some prescription drugs

Pretty Toxic:
Stuff that will cause serious damage or death if ingested in large quantities or small quantities for a long period of time like
- narcotics
- many prescription drugs
- household cleaners
- gasoline

Mildly Toxic:
Stuff that can cause serious injury or death in very large quantities or long-term health problems if used in significanat quantities for a long period of time such as
- Alcohol
- Tobacco
- Over-the-counter drugs
- Salt (but maybe not for the long-term effects)
- Soaps (dish soap, anybody?)

Long-Term Slightly-Toxic:
- Sugars
- Trans Fats
- Saturated Fats

Barely Toxic:
- Unsaturated Fats

Hard To Think of As Toxic:
- Complex Carbohydrates
- Proteins
- Fiber

As Non-Toxic As You Can Get:
- Water

The lesson here is moderation. You can eat small quantities of stuff that is bad for you(even snake venom if you want), but keep it to a minimum. Eat mostly complex carbs, proteins, and fiber.

Perhaps Mid-March Really Is Too Early To Plant

I tried planting some hardy things in the garden extra early this year to see how they would fare. The answer is....not well. The arugula seedlings did not survive. The Kale did not sprout. The snow peas did not sprout. The scallion seeds did not sprout. Some of the onion sets sprouted, but about 50% has not, and the stuff that did sprout looks to be only a few days ahead of the onion sets that I planted 3 weeks later. The radishes did sprout, but they are growing very slowly. I will say that it was unseasonably cold and there was an 8" snow fall here in late March. Still, I think I've decided that I don't need to try to plant anything outside before April 1st next year.

Weather permitting, the I'll be doing a bunch of planting this weekend. I will replant all the stuff from my March planting that didn't sprout. Potatoes will be going in. A second planting of Rapini, Pak Choi, Arugula, Lettuce, and Broccoli will also be going in. Everything I'm planting is relatively hardy, but there is actually a good chance that we are past the last freeze/frost of the year here at the Miller homestead.

The seedlings are doing well, for the most part. Thanks to the light system and the heating pad, they are definitely doing better than last year. The peppers are a bit sluggish, but that is too be expected. Here is what the seed tray looks like at the moment.

The only thing not growing well is the peanuts. I have officially given up on peanuts for the year. The internet says just go to your local supermarket and buy raw peanuts....they're easy to sprout! When I was at a local gardening store I looked for some there just in case, and the clerk told me they don't sell them because you can just go to Wegmans and buy raw peanuts. Well, I tried twice with peanuts from two different Wegmans stores and with different amounts of watering each time. Both times the peanuts just got moldy and rotted in the potting soil. Ugh. I will probably grow some extra lettuce and maybe extra edamame to take up the space.

Garden Update

I returned from a 17 day absence and checked on my seedlings. The soil was still pretty moist, but there was not any water left in the bottom of the tray. Some seedlings sprouted, but some appear to be failures. Here is what it looked like when I got home.

The stuff in the bottom right hand corner is the Arugula that I had planted a few weeks before I left as a test. It is pretty happy. Most of the Broccoli and Cauliflower sprouted, though I failed to write down what I planted where, so I don't know which is which. Hopefully that will become more obvious as they grow. I had planted two varieties of tomatoes, but only one sprouted. One variety was just a few seeds from a friend while the other was a variety that I purchased and have spare seeds for. Since I don't know which is alive, I planted more seeds from the variety I bought. About half of the pepper seedlings sprouted. There are three different varieties of pepper, but I planted different amounts of each, so I think I know which is which. After a little careful digging, I saw that at least some of the pepper seeds look like they have germinated and are trying to grow, so I'm hoping more of them will come up. That is not the case with the tomato seeds that didn't sprout. They look the same as when I planted them. The peanuts did not sprout and are all moldy and rotten. I planted more and I'm thinking that if I don't give them much water they won't rot and might sprout, but I'm not getting my hopes up.

As far as the stuff I planted outside before I left (onion sets, kale, scallions peas, and radishes), Only a few of the radishes have sprouted so far. A couple of the onion sets had been taken out of the ground by some mean animal. Those sets had grown some nice roots, so that seems like good news for the rest of them.

I did a bunch of work in the garden today and its starting to take shape pretty well. Here is what it looks like as of 4/3.

As you can see it is all separated into beds with paths between. Almost all of the garden has had last year's compost spread over it and then the soil was turned over. The only area that has yet to be done is approximately 30 square feet that will be used for a three-sisters planting of corn, pole beans, and squash (left side of the picture above). That stuff probably won't be planted for at least another month. A bunch more stuff was planted outside today:

- part of the cauliflower

- part of the broccoli

- the rest of the onion sets

- part of the rapini

- part of the arugula

- part of the bok choy

- part of the lettuce

I also did an at-home soil test that I bought from a supermarket for $5. It consists of 4 vials with a little powder packets in each one. One is for pH, one is Nitrogen, one is Potassium, and the last is Phosphorus. Basically you put some dirt and water in each and then add the power, shake them up, and they turn colors. It seemed like there were a lot of variables that could throw off the results like how dense to pack the soil, how wet the soil is, etc. I suppose I shouldn't complain for a $5 test. Anyway, the pH showed up as being ever so slightly acidic (probably a good thing), the Nitrogen was medium-t0-high (probably a good thing), the potassium was very low, and I couldn't tell where the phosphorus fell on the scale because it just looked dirt colored. I'm not sure I trust the tests, but at least the fertilizer I bought last year (pelleted chicken manure) has higher potassium and phosphorus and less nitrogen than most fertilizers. I'll top-dress (scatter it on top of the soil) with that fertilizer in the late spring or early summer.