Tag Archives: Green house

In Light of Earth Day, Watch me Point at Things.

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In light of Earth Day i am going to link a couple of videos that i made last Friday. I did tweet them so if you are a tweep and you already saw them then there is nothing new for you here. But if you haven’t seen them they are not bad.

The first one here is a little shaky but YouTube is “fixing” it as i write this so i hope that it wont be too bad for you soon.

Pre-Strawberries

Post-Strawberries.

Also the spinach has started to poke up in the purple bed and i did go ahead and fill the grey bed with peppers, yeah ghost Habanero. So much fiery goodness.

Gurobo Farm Update: 4.11.14

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So i am not 100% sure how it happened, exactly…. But now we have a bunny. A super sweet Angora Bunny. Which naturally leads to the next to pictures of the boys (Remmie and one of his friends) dissimbling some rescued pallets from work so i could cobble together the last picture. Aka, rabbit run for nice days outside.

So bunny.

So bunny.

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Yes my son is the one in red with the loooong hair and he is huge.

One Bunny Run

One Bunny Run

I hope it looks super rustic and cobbled together, because that was the look i was going for when building it. On the other hand i have gotten this (below Video) more or less ready.

Now i feel we are ready for the ducks to arrive in about a month. Might even put some fish in the duck pond for the summer. Not sure about that yet.

Stepping into the greenhouse lets do a tomato side-by-side.

I realize that the pick of the aquaponic plant isn’t so great but it was REALLY bright outside and i couldn’t see the screen on my phone… But it more or less looks like the ones in soil but bigger.

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About 4 inches tall.

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A head of Romaine we ate last week, placed in one of the dutch buckets. It is really taking off.

 

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Trying to hang a cucumber this year. My hope is it will climb the fence and help shade everything else some when it gets HOT.

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Swish chard is roaring back from its hard winter. So much so as it has been hot dog and brats buns for the last week or so. Along with a spinach and lettuce leaf. You can also see some of the straw berries plants, what you can’t see is that some of them are already fruiting.

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Grapes are waking up. The ones out side are still asleep.

 

 

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Garlic – Top – first year to try them. So far so good. Ghost and Devil Peppers – bottom – also first year. Not sure how they are doing yet really.

Last big news is we added our first fruit tree. It is a 4 breed monster cherry tree, i can’t remember the different kinds but there are 2 early fruiters and 2 late fruiters. We hope is that it will fruit this year (it should even if there will not be a ton) but if not this year it should next year. This weekend we will be getting some of those stone rings and getting it mulched real good.  I added like 8 or 9 eggs to the soil around the tree. I read an article how eggs are great time realize fertilizer as well as good eats.  I am testing that out with some tomato plants in the greenhouse as well but i wanted to go ahead and get some in hear as well as i really want to make this happen for the wife. Speaking of the wife now that we have one fruit tree she is thinking she might want another for the backyard. And the is more talk in the house about getting a lemon tree for inside. Think i might have made some growing monsters. 🙂

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The Cherry tree.

What are you doing this year garden wise? I know you have some room so don’t give me any grief on that one. Go plant something.

 

<3s.

 

Pepper: Aquaponic Vs Soil

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So today i just want to show you two pictures from the same kind of pepper plant planted about a week apart. Other then that week of time the only difference is the first is in my Dutch bucket (part of my aquaponic system and the other/s are planted in a bed.

Dutch Bucket Aquaponic Pepper

Peppers is the beds.

I realize the soil plants are harder to make out growth but that is kinda my point, they are smaller and not as far along then this one aquaponic pepper ever though i planted the peppers in the bed about a week before i started the Dutch Bucket.

Gurobo Farms Update: 6/16

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I got a tone of things to do today so I decided to do a greenhouse photo update for you all today. But before i get to new pictures i want to say two things real fast. One, got the rogue to 20 last night and in the next few days we will see how the build runs in epics slash how the gear up is going. Two, i think the full effect of the new growth is best if you go back and take a look at some of the older garden updates. Take a second and take a look at some of the older greenhouse updates!

Now some pictures.

Peppers! You can see the Banana peppers in the back. The 4 Jalapeno’s plants are rocking. If you have a real good eye you might be able to see the Bonnets and the Bells. Everything is fruiting super well.

Jalapeno close up. Count the flowers and think about how almost everyone becomes a fruit…. Many Jalapenos!

Cucumbers. I know it is hard to tell but there are 3 in this shot. One big boy that is a little older then the other two but they are all doing really well.

Keep in mind that the cucumber shown here is about 4 inches long.

More peppers. There are 2 different kinds but both are super hot. I wonder were i put the habaneros? They were great last year.

This is one of the most impressive plants in my eyes. This is the watermellon. Yep i have it climbing on a heavy duty cage and i think it is doing really well. It even has a few flowers…

This is the other most impressive of the plants to me. This is the punkin. Again i wish i had some kind of scale… That box it is on just to keep the grass down under it is about 4 foot tall and those larger leaves are about a foot across. BIG PLANT.

Here is a shot of the west side of the greenhouse. Most of the other plants are blocked from view by the ground cherry but this tray also has a few okra plants that are really fruiting and a cluster of strawberries that are going mad. If you look carefully you can also see the grapes climbing the walls. 

Oh hey, a few other things in that last photo. The wife’s caves and the two buckets of carrots.

Even more peppers on the left and some sweet melons on the right. The melons are kinda freaking the wife out with their burst growth each day. She swears that she waters in the morning and they are X big and then when i get home after work we go water and they are MUCH bigger. All i know is i hope to have some melons soon.

Don’t think i can have an update with out showing you the tomato “bush”. I don’t really deal with the tomatos but i know there are 5 or 6 on my kitchen counter and at least 4-5 more about ready to harvest and 12s that are still growing.

Here is a shot of the most southern tomato plant, and as you can see he has 3 easy to see fruits ripening on sunday when i took these pictures.

One of the Eggplants. And yes it is fruiting already.

An Eggplant that is not fruiting…. yet.

And here are my new Blue Berry bushes. I am hoping that they will do really well on the south side of the greenhouse. I could use a nice wall of something to hide the lack of trimming and how i haven’t got the pavers laid around the base yet.

 

Gurobo Farm Update Apr 22

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In light of today being Earth Day I think I will do another Gurobo farm update with some pictures and what not. But first I want to add a little something to my wish/Bday want list, a sos solar oven.

A few months back I got all saving energy crazy. I tried to make my own solar food dehydrator which got a little out of my skill set at the time and dropped that project for now. But at the same time I got a little crazy for solar cooking. I made myself one of the cardboard/foil ones that I haven’t really tested out yet but I will try and use it one of these clear weekends.  But what I thing I need is this guy: SOS solar oven.

I have been watching lots of videos on cooking with solar and everyone seems to really love this guy. So lets all just send my wife some cash to get it for me. 🙂

Okay lets look at some pictures.

Tray 1 2 tomatoes, a bell peper, lettuce, mint and some other herb…

Want to say Tray one is looking good. But this tray seems to be going a little slower then tray 2.

Tray 2, lettuce and spinach

We added some romaine this weekend and you can see in the very top left one guy hanging out on his own flanked by a salad ready to go… I think i will try and go out and prep a some greens for salads with dinner this week.

Tray 3, cucumber, romaine and more herbs.

Here is the rest of the romaine we added this weekend along with my cucumbers that i started from seeds and a single plant i bought at the store this weekend as they are so little i am afraid mine from seeds are not going to make it..

Strawberries and Bee catchers!

Last year we bought these pre made hanging baskets of strawberries and i just kept eating them right off the basket. This year we decided to get even more but so far we have only found 2, but i have room for more. 🙂 Also we have added flowers. One of the issues with a green house can be the lack of bees. So in hopes of getting some of the little guys to pop in from time to time we added a few hanging baskets. This one is Red and yellow in honor of my ❤ for Iron man.

 

More flowers!

 

These guys round out my flower needs. I have added the frame of a covered swing that a wind storm we had at last week just destroyed. Lets me hang things in the middle of the Green house and lets the  wife reach them for watering. I also moved the tomatoes on the ground to sit under these so they will get some shade durning the heat of the day to help prevent sunburn.

Tomatoes!

Speaking of the vile evil things here are the other tomato plants, they are about 6-8  inches taller then when we planted them. So they are growing strong.

You know what is on the left or you should by now but the right is a watermelon.

This is my first watermelon. I am not 100% how it will do so it gets its own pot and a ton of vermiculite mixed into its soil to help keep it watered so we don’t end up over watering… I have big plans to make square melons. :0

Thinking Christmas already!

Something we never really thought about was growing a permeant inside Christmas tree. But we are going to try. It was the wife’s idea. And it happens that it will be all kinds of useful. This guy shouldn’t get much bigger then 4-5 foot tall. But i can use its pines for tea, it has editable pine nuts when larger and in a pinch i think you can even eat the bark… Why do we only have one?

Grapes!

We started training these guys to crawl the fence. Hope they do well. Lots of firsts this year.

And finally we also added a composting bin to the yard. I didn’t take a photo as it is more or less a box with holes in the bottom and side doors with a hinged top. Think everyone can use your imagination but i am going to make someone here at work very happy  as he bagges his grass clippings and i am going to go and steal them for my bin. 🙂 Going to call that win win.

 

Well for a post that is most images this has taken way to long and i have a pile of work to put off… I mean knock out.

<3s

 

Gurobo Farms Update Apr 16

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First of all if you didn’t see the new Clankenbeard art work of me as M.O.D.O.K. then look for a bonus post from last night. It is amazing as always. Really it is great. Thinking about asking if it is cool to make tee shirts with this on the back. I just need CTH to stand for something as cool/evil as AIM…

Okay lets hard break to the leaf of this post, Backyard Farm update. Last night as a fam we did some work/repairs on the greenhouse.  We had a few days of real strong winds where I realized that I had made a real error the placement of the door of my greenhouse. It is facing north. So right now as the seasons are changing we are getting a fairly strong north wind that is trying to blow my green house up like a balloon.  Meaning that this winter I will also have a cold wind attacking my greenhouse. Had I put the door on the south side then we would have been much better off. Live and learn I guess. I wonder if I could get 6 or 8 strong friends to help me pick the hole thing up and turn it around??? Maybe if we do a down time and empty the thing I can make that happen.

Over all things are growing well.

Grow beads 1-3

We have enough greens for a salad they are really going as you can see.  To the right we have some tomatoes and some herbs growing. And in the back of that tray the bell peppers are doing well.

Here is a close up of tray three where we have some more herbs growing and doing fairly well but toy can see the cucumbers just starting to pop up. These were all from seeds so I am happy to see them growing at all.

Speaking of seeds, the seeds I have right now are just from True Value, which is fine as most of my plants are from the same place atm. I don’t know the quality of these seeds or the plants they are going to be, but I did pick up some heirloom seeds from Underwoodgardens.com. They have a solid reputation and I have high hopes for them. And when they come in I will go into getting them started.

In tray 4 we have the peppers and they are rocking as they do. But here you can see my soil tmp, a nice warm 61.

Bead 4

 

Very over cast day. Also you see one of the new water tanks temporally set up as a rain barrel.

As you can see it was warm but overcast last afternoon. Want to say the air temp was about 54… And the tmp difference was great enough that the wife was annoyed anytime I wanted her to help me out side of the green house. J

Lets see two quick photos of one of the tanks in place.

Filling the tank with 175 gals of water… Oh the water bill this month might hurt.

Messy Samius.

When we first started to fill the tank I had the value open and made a bit of a mess. But you can see the basic plan. Big tank of water add fish and plants, grow both and win. But here is the thing; I really think I want to pump the water from the bottom drain, shit sinks right? And/or I want to be able to set things up to drain water out of this to water the plants with once and awhile so to both control and ammonia build up and as bonus fertilizer tee. I don’t think it would be all that tasty but the plants love it.

Soon I hope to have fish in the tank and my grow beads going real soon just need to get their supports in and setup.

Well better get moving on the day.

<3s

Anyone Else A Little Excited by Shit?

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Its okay, you can tell me. I won’t poke fun. Okay I will but just because this is not about scat play, although if is your bag… Right on. No I am talking composting… Yes, more gardening … J

Now that my greenhouse is 80% or more done and is in use I am already spinning down the line as to what is next… Looking at my plants right now things are good if spartan at the moment. I have lots of room but I am not sure how much of my room will be eaten up by my aquaponic system but I have to think I will have lots of room as my current plans are fairly small. So I need more rich amazing dirt and the best planting dirt comes from shit.

Also yesterday I went to take some temperatures in out side of the green house and inside over lunch. And while the temperature difference was impressive

Outside open air: 56

Inside open air : 85+ (closed up open things dropped to about 70)

Out side soil: 60ish

Inside soil: 71 which I hear is about ideal for most plants.

But it made me think how am I going to heat this thing in the winter? Do I even try? Or do I just hope I have enough thermal mass and light to push through?

Then I remembered the shit and started some Goggleing. Did you know that while composting the piles heat up? In some cases to 160 in some rare cases if allowed to dry out too much they have started on fire…

So there is a chance I could use some of the natural materials and the chicken shit to get two birds with one stone by composting the right way.

Wow! This guy just used compost heat to power his shower for 500+ showers, the power of poop.

Look around for jean pain method for more info. Me I am thinking about a 55 gal drum on rollers but I will need to start it outside on the ground as to collect some earthworms???? I don’t know, more research. I might just be able to make an pile out side of the window use a tarp and some ducting and heat the thing? Lots of thoughts/information to fit into a working idea.

 

Well wish me luck, have a good weekend and I hope to have some DnD talk on Monday.

 

<3s

Research Mode: Bring on the Weed

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So the last couple of days I have stumbled on to another aquaponic system, Bato or Dutch Buckets. And as I do when I find something that might work well for me I hit research mode scrambling as hard as I can to learn everything about that thing. Some of you have seen the results of that research mode from me time and time again. In DDo that is different builds or gear setups and so on. In real life I have used this kind of information gathering on the health (peleo diet), biking (my trike), the green house and even my aquaponic systems which jumped started this conversation, one sided as it might be.

So Goggling around reading forums, watching videos and checking out various build/use results; all while doing my normal job and or doing DDo screwing off…

Like I said the last few days has been about these Bato/Dutch boxes and as I do I follow the information even though I think I have a solid grasp on the teck. And out of no were I realize that more then half of the materials I am reading or watching is for people to grow the wacky tobacky…

Not again.

I have to be on some kind of list by now. Every time I get in to growing almost anything I end up some how I end up learning from people that are using these skills for illegal uses.

When I was learning about growing my own mushrooms I didn’t even have to get very deep into it before I realized that these people were so adamant about their systems because they are growing makic shrooms. More then half of the auaponic research was from people that wanted to grow weed. Building a green house? About a third.

Guess that makes some sense, who has more passion for these things then those kinds of growers/users?  I do find it funny that those are the people that are making videos and posting details/sharing their building methods. It would be like researching how to commit a B&E and seeing a video by/from thief’s while in progress, which has happened. Normally those are the people you hear about winning a Darwin award…

Well if you want to know what a Bato bucket is here is a good basic blue print and I will take pictures and show you how I am using it once I get the tank in place.

Bato bucket blueprints

 

Hope you enjoyed your bonus post.

❤

Pew Pew

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So I haven’t had a ton of playtime so far this week as I have been busting ass working on the greenhouse. Last night we did a little planting even. I will add some pictures at the bottom.

Anyway as I said I haven’t had a lot of time in game, about 45 mins on Monday night and about 3 mins last night. But that was enough time to play some with now level 15 Samiusbot!

Level 15 on a pure arty is huge; Blade Barrier is up no more caster level checks on Reconstruct scrolls and the most important thing for my build eating a +4 dex tome just in time for level 16 and its bonus feat! Tasty, tasty dex tome allowing IPS…

Knowing that I had limited time Monday I decided to just relax and do some Vale explorer zone work.

I had a real blast. I moved my draw settings last week up a notch to very super special high and now I feel like those archers in the Sands. I can shoot you from waaaaaaaay over heeeeeeere! The Dps is not bad almost 50 on avg on the first number then blazing, good, icy burst, and rune arm for normal hits. I started wearing Wind Howler Bracers for the shrieking bolt and using a bold trinket when xp is not about to roll in…  Over all the dps is not bad at all assuming I can shoot at the mobs from a distance.

But now with BB on line I am ready to jump back into the heavy content again. Right now fairly ungeared they are hitting for about 300ish range crits are fairly huge think I can work in a spell power item fairly soon. Might have to work in a Spell Power item real soon…

Also I need to remember to move some rune arms around/farm up a Tira’s Splendor. It would be a permanent rune arm in my arty’s toolbox.

Well I think tonight baring Tobril having work issues again this week I should have lots of game time tonight. This long on for the Daily Dice roll and not much else is crazy…

<3s and a few pictures with plants in the ground.

 

Growing Begins!

Wife planting some Poison Fruit aka tomatos.