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How to Grow Your Own Crops Agreed that you like the idea of farming, how are you to succeed at it? I can't guarantee success, but I can put the informational tools in your hands that will make your success likely. Following are hyperlinks to as many aspects of crop production as I could think of. Pursue the ones that interest you. Cash Crops - Make Your Farm A Cash Producer Companion Gardening - Some plants grow better together than apart. Composting and Soil Preparation - How to work with the soil you have and how to improve your soil with things you throw away. Foraging - Wild plants can become a important part of your diet. Fruit and Nut Trees - Does money grow on trees? It does if you have one of these. Gardening Software - Small farmers can now get the best advice on-line and market products nationally and internationally just like the giant corporate farms. Grains - Raise grain for your own bread and for your animal feed. Greenhouses - Trap the sun's rays to grow bananas and lemons in the snowbelt. Extend your growing season by starting your garden weeks before the last frost, in your very own greenhouse. Cold Frames - There are several companies selling cold frames over the Internet, but Virtual Garden has instructions on how you can build one yourself. Garden Resource Center for Northern New York also has on-line plans for a cold-frame, with even more details.
Hydroponics - the science of growing plants without soil.
Integrated Pest Management - Growth inhibiting hormones for insects, habitat destruction, manual removal, bait traps, crop rotation, attracting predators, actively introducing predators or other biological controls, breeding plants for resistance, pest exclusion through mesh fabric, soil barriers or other physical barriers, heat or gas treatment of soil, gas treatment of stored grains, planting early as possible in spring to avoid times of the year with high insect population, and applying pesticides when appropriate (as seldom as possible, but no less than recommended dosage and duration of treatment). Be sure to visit : Links to Biocontrol Information Sources
Pasture - This page covers pasture and range management, and as a result, leads to the livestock pages. Saving Garden Seeds An article by Roy Wyatt, Atlanta Journal & Constitution Succession Planting - In the southern U.S., you can garden year-round. Vegetables - Delicious vegetables you can raise. Here's how. Vineyards - Muscadine grapes for the Deep South; bunch grapes for cooler climes. Woodlots - How to get the most benefit from the wooded parts of your property.
Links: HEIRLOOM and OTHER OPEN-POLLINATED SEEDS: Browning
Seed, Inc. Seed Sources & Organic Products Redwood City Seed
Company Shepherds Garden Seeds
HEIRLOOM SEED NETWORKING: SSE's 8000 members are working together to rescue endangered vegetable and fruit varieties from extinction. These members are maintaining thousands of heirloom varieties, traditional Indian crops, garden varieties of the Mennonite and Amish, vegetables dropped from all seed catalogs and outstanding foreign varieties.
Sources for Organic Fertilizers and Amendments Appropriate Technology Transfer for Rural AreasMany links to companies supplying every imaginable type of fertilizer and mulch.
OTHER ONLINE RESOURCES Farmer's
and Consumers Market Bulletin The National Agricultural Library
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