Equipment for large-scale agriculture is too big or too expensive, and many home gardening tools don’t work efficiently on larger jobs or break easily. Tiny farming on plots up to two or three acres requires its own special gear…
The Troy-Bilt Horse walking rototiller is back in action for the first day of tilling in the field. I prepped a 50’x50′ section for snap peas. The Horse is noisy and uses a fair (though not unreasonable) share of gas, … Read the rest
Plastic cling wrap is everywhere. I tried it out last year as a replacement for clear tray covers and it seems to work fine. The method so far: fill the plug sheets with seedling mix, place tray in water so … Read the rest
It doesn’t take much to get seed started indoors. Fingers, mainly. The Seedmaster is a bit of a gadget from last year, not liked much at first, but rising on the tiny tool chart. You roll the yellow wheel, which … Read the rest
Plant racks, light stands…I usually call ’em grow racks. They’re filling up now.
Pushed to capacity, the three racks can hold a total of 36 trays, 12 each, or four trays per shelf. So, depending on the size of the … Read the rest
The grow racks are starting to fill up. First trays of eggplant and peppers, seeded yesterday, sit up top where it’s warmest. The lights run 14-hours a day, on a timer, with an extra hour or so of early morning … Read the rest
The seedling workstation… This high and narrow table is where I put seeds in cellpaks. The triple sink, a leftover from the dairy days when this was the sterile milk collection room, work out well for seed-starting, with all of … Read the rest
The new grow rack, lined up with its brothers, ready to go to work. The carpentry’s real rough, but it’s sturdy and tried-and-true functional. The addition of 3″ casters has created an unexpected PLUS: when the racks are rolled together, … Read the rest