Here in Maine as I type this it’s around 24 degrees and there is still quite a bit of winter left. At any time we could get a foot or snow – give or take. With this being the case many of the local businesses are beginning to stock Spring supplies such as gardening and canning goods. Even the local Dollar Tree has gotten in the game and has seeds – 4/$1.00.
Heirloom, non-GMO seeds are available even at the Dollar Tree for the cheap. Simply look at the individual seed varieties and verify. Want a list of commonly available heirloom seeds? I created THIS LIST several years ago and you can use it to save some money.
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Continuing with the “gardening” talk there is so much to do here on the homestead. Maine Prepper Girl and I have a long list of things to accomplish and add to the property. Chickens is a huge priority that we failed to get last year. This year? Absolutely and it’s right around the corner. The garden was mediocre at best in 2023 and will be completely revamped this year. I spent nearly 20 years gardening in South Carolina and new the land and seasons extremely well. Here in Maine? We are learning.
Raised beds and container gardening are becoming a larger part of our efforts. The reason is simple: We can control the garden and spend less time tending to weeds. As Maine Prepper Girl and I both work full-time (for now) this is a big advantage.
So many plans to make the property as self-sufficient as possible. 2024 is such an important year as we both believe some extremely difficult times are close at hand. Producing our own food is just one part of our plans for the homestead and being able to deal with what the future holds.
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I posted this video recently on a couple of social media platforms and decided to share the Youtube version here as I know some do not have Instagram among others: got hot chocolate?
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So a bit of a change here on 1776 – I’m going to start scheduling all posts for 5 pm Eastern Standard Time. Why? Well…..the research says most people simply don’t have the time during the day to focus on frivolous information and content as most are working and only have a few minutes here and there. While I certainly think what I say is much more important than anything you may deal with at work(even if it is related to nuclear secrets and brain surgery) posting in the evening is supposed to provide the maximum opportunity for people to check out my magnificent words.
Anyways……something like that.
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Stay safe all and please…..keep preparing.
Rourke
Big shock for you comparing SC to Me growing seasons right. Growing season is way to short up here in New England. Could use at least another month of warm weather. May is always iffy and come September it starts to change already. That drives me nuts! I lived in PA before coming up here to NH. Big change for us. Winters are to long. Spring is not good either. Mud season. Summers are to short. Fall is great! Oh well.
The old in the stove will last longer than batter in that weather.
Well, those seed prices are very good. Jump on them and test germinate some of each of them because you will find that some of them are duds if you run into what I have been encountering lately especially among the pepper seeds. Best to know in advance.
Well, I just opened up my last bag of vacuum sealed sugar dated August, 2013. Just as good as if it came from the grocery store.
Still have some beans and corn meal. Will be interesting to see how the corn meal did.
Still preparing.
people should have been stocking up and stashing back consumables two years ago. remember the great toilet paper crisis a few years ago. get it while you can. it ain’t gonna get any cheaper if it’s available at all.
grow what you can and stock up on everything else NOW. tomorrow may be to late.
it’s still nine months until the election and nothing they have planned now to upset or stop it would surprise me one bit. and they do have plans. if they can’t stop Trump they will stop the election.. the plan now is to allow as many terrorist into our country as they can and then invoke martial law. watch and see
here in 8b. temps here on the gulf coast have leveled off at 60s in the days and mid 40s at night, we always have a cold snap before Easter but we planted potatoes last month, corn will be planted if it ever stopes raining long enough to plow.
after Easter it will be on with everything else, again depending on the weather. we always get a lot of rain until May and then it dries up like toast.
good luck with the garden JR. and thanks for what you do here.
Just opened and ate a qt.jar of cabbage vegetable soup( cabbage,carrots,
onion,celery,and tomatoes dated 9/19. The seal was good as was the smell
and taste.
Very cheap to make even now days.We are flush on jars but I think I can
never have to many lids.
Sausage and pulled pork canning next week.
The USDA states the cattle herd numbers are at a 73 year low and are
predicting beef shortages and record high prices starting in April/May.
Note to JPinMt. Big storm headed your way.
Note to Sleepy Joe: Treason is a capital offense.
Raised beds are a great idea. I recently came up with the idea of using 16” x 16” concrete pavers standing on edge to create my newest beds. I glued them together with construction adhesive and secured the top with 5/4 deck boards. Contact me through my email and I will send you a picture if you would like. Happy gardening.
i tried container gardening last year as opposed to row gardens. it did not work out well for us here in the deep so. it gets hot enough here in the summer to melt lead, may be one reason. rows have always worked well for us but they are a lot more work. having the tools and equipment is the key to row gardening.
check out youtube.com/@DeepSouthHomestead/videos on how we do it in our area. he is just down the road from us. it’s a lot of hard work but we have great returns, depending on the weather. we had a hailstorm in July years ago, beat the garden to a pulp, destroyed it.
plant enough to put up for two years because you never know how the next year will turn out. and ya just gotta have a tractor off grid.
i think raised beds will work well in your area. ya get out of it what labor you put into it. we plant in acres. we have the tools and it has worked out well for us for 35 yrs now but we are getting older and the rows seem to be getting longer. we are going to cut back this year, not as many older folks to feed now as there once was.
best of luck JR.
Years ago I planted my usual seeds and plants in ground and some of the same varieties in buckets. The plants in the buckets did extremely poorly compared to the plants in-ground. I hope yours perform better. I have since gone 100% to raised beds filled with 100% mushroom compost with excellent results. Your short growing season up there might require you to build some type of greenhouse or hooped rows to extend your season.