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Sue, I like it. I like it! Day to day observations by the trained eye is so invaluable. Louis Pasteur said: "Chance favors the prepared mind" Some of our observations: Moving our potatoes just 50 feet to a new location with new ground where the hogs had been located the previous year, resulted in no potatoes beetles even though the previous year had a lot of them. Doing a second cutting of alfalfa early (in the bud stage) disrupted the alfalfa weevil timing and the alfalfa came through pretty much untouched. Yellowing of the upper leaves of most plants that are otherwise healthly may be a sign of boron deficiency. (In alfalfa it's difinitely true, soil test results) ***************************** Dr Tom Zennie 4963 E CR 900 S Cloverdale, IN 46120 765-795-5526 ----- Original Message ----- From: "Susan Houghton" <[log in to unmask]> To: <[log in to unmask]> Sent: Tuesday, July 18, 2006 4:03 PM Subject: Observations > Ok, so I have two spare minutes - which will rapidly disappear in weeds. > > I have been doing all the typical things - weeding, seeding, cultivating, > harvesting, and going to markets, (and reducing the varmit population) the > same as most of the other farmers on this list. > > Giving Tree Farm is 21 acres, 6 of it in vegetables of many kinds (over 50 > different plant varieties this year), and 8 hoophouses. So we do nearly > year round production (mostly greens in the winter). Our markets are > local > restaurants, East Lansing Food Coop, two farmer's markets and a small CSA. > > I started pulling some potatoes and noted what I thought were alfalfa leaf > hoopers (could have been potato leaf hoopers, I really don't know enough > about the differences yet to identify exactly which it was). > > This started me thinking that I also have made other observations, for > instance: > When I pulled quack grass, the soil was still moist, even though > everything > else was dry as a bone.... > > I broadcast seeded rye at the same time I planted summer squash, and the > cucumber beetles didn't even attempt to work on those plants (even though > there was other winter squash about 50 feet away, planted earlier, that > was > almost overtaken with squash beetles and cucumber beetles). > > So my whole point is : most of us farmers make obeservations like this > daily, and then don't follow through with any action (sometimes I have > time > to go look it up, other times I just can't), and by the time I have time > to > look something up, I have forgotten what it was I wanted to know. > > So, what if this list could maintain an archive, or a collection of > observations, and then either we would have a collection of solutions, or > maybe someone could put them together for research projects. ? > > Whaddya think? > > > Susan Houghton > Giving Tree Farm > 15433 Turner Road > Lansing MI 48906 > 517-482-8885 > [log in to unmask] > Why Wait? Move to EarthLink. > > If you would like to access previous postings to the Mich-Organic listserv > you can copy and paste the following URL into your browser address bar > http://list.msu.edu/archives/mich-organic.html > > If you would like to access previous postings to the Mich-Organic listserv you can copy and paste the following URL into your browser address bar http://list.msu.edu/archives/mich-organic.html