I have a yard!

I spent the day moving the first of my stuff into the new house I'm renting. I'm very excited to finally be somewhere besides a one bedroom apartment. The yard's pretty shady but presents some interesting gardening opportunities that I'm working over in my head.

Putting up Hay

It used to be a common sight for me this time of year (on the way to the maize experimental fields) to see straw and hay being raked into windrows by hay rakes (video 1 2). Though most of us tend to use these words interchangeably, hay is a crop grown specifically for animal feed and straw is the leftover stems and leaves of a harvested grain that may be used for animal feed, bedding or construction. Common annual and perennial hay crops include legumes (e.g. alfalfa and clover) and grasses (e.g. timothy, brome, orchard grass and tall fescue). Straw usually comes from whatever grain is being grown in your area (e.g. wheat or barley).

First! (to harvest garden sweet corn)

Well, it's not from the garden, per se. It's from the greenhouse.

When I got the keys to my greenhouse space, one of the first things I did was sow a bunch of field crop seeds. I didn't know if there would be a need for me to grow them in the greenhouse, but I did know that it can be a tricky proposition. Better to sketch out a quick SOP now than wait till I need one and then add a 6 month delay to the project as I figure it out on the fly...

What's Cooking, Uncle Sam?

I just went to the new "What's Cooking, Uncle Sam?" exhibit at the National Archives. It tells the history of the government's role in U.S. food and agriculture -  a story of market protectionism, social engineering and the regulated tension between the aspirations of business and the demands of the people...