#seed germination methods

[jgseeds]

The Essential Guide to Germinating Cannabis Seeds By JG Seeds

[balkanradfem]

Seeds germination report!!

First paper towel seeds germinated in only 3 days! I was too busy to post them immediately but I have proof it happened:

The first one is cantaloupe, other two are big tomatoes, and cherry tomatoes. I'm going to sow tomatoes first because the other one is going to need more resources.

That big tray of tomato seeds is the most important tray I'm sowing in the entire spring. This is going to be the most of my plants, and the most of my food. There's about 100 potential tomato plants in here, though I just need about 30. This is what's going to end up creating tomatoes I'll eat and cook into salsa and pizza sauce and other sauces, what I'll can all my other veggies in because the acidity will preserve them. I spaced a few rows of seeds evenly and then realized I had too many seeds so I just scrambled the rest and we'll see how they do! The smaller pot is cherry tomatoes; they're going to be my dried storage crop, I'll have sun-dried tomatoes from them! And they're likely to start producing earlier which I love.

Now the cantaloupes... I need 2 plants, so why did I germinate this many? Well. I wasn't thinking. My seeds are 3 years old, how should I have known they would have 90% germination rate? I don't have the unlimited soil it would take to grow all of these correctly, so I just stuffed them into a tray, and I'm cringing so badly just looking at this. They're going to grow so big, so fast, there's no way they could all fit in there, even 2 per pot is insane, they all need individual  large pots. We're just making do and I'll gift these to the plant lady she loves cantaloupes too.

* 2 days later *

I forgot to check my seeds yesterday, so today I found more germinated stuff!

These are early cherry tomatoes, orange and yellow tomatoes, and a germinated clementine seed! If you remember, I mentioned putting some clementine seeds to germinate and this one was first to activate, and it's sprouting two roots currently! Which I don't know what it means but I think it's whimsical and special so I love it. It makes me feel such a rush holding an tree seed that is activated because that one is starting a journey of becoming an actual tree, that can produce fruit, isn't that wild? In what other context can you hold a whole tree baby in the palm of your hand? Wild.

I'm slightly worried about those cherry seeds because I am slightly late in sowing them, you see how long these sprouts are? They're already in the phase where they're trying to get out of the soil and they're going to be disoriented now, they've chosen their direction and now I've messed it up. But at least a few of them will make it, I believe!

I didn't have extra soil to plant a whole tree so I got some already-used soil, I think it's going to be okay because the trees grow so slowly and I will fertilize this when it's time. I mean maybe I'm wrong but I'm about to find out if a little clementine will like this! Any time I tried to plant an orange tree it failed but I've never tried a clementine and I actually prefer the clementine taste, I love the acid.

And then in the last picture I actually caught a cantaloupe sneaking her way out of the soil! Even though I planted them so catastrophically I still love seeing them poke their lil heads out, ready to be soaked in the sun. They're going to turn into monsters and there's nothing I can do but for now they're my cute little baby monsters.

[wildwood-faun]

this season at work is funny because there are so many vegetable growers among us and we like to swap seeds so people will just be passing little paper baggies to one another in the hall or around the table at coffee and it never fails to look incredibly suspicious

[jensownzoo]

Hey look, some of the 10 year old extra-dwarf pak choi seed that I just threw into this earthbox has come up after several weeks.

It's a blurry pic, sorry. I counted 10 seedlings, so it was definitely worth doing. They seem to be clustered on one end so far (it IS where more sunlight hits in the cold frame) so I think I'm just going to shove some green onion ends into the other end to regrow.

Kale seedlings just mostly hanging out in their Tidy Cats bucket planter. Hoping this spate of warm weather will spur some actual growth.

The three transplanted strawberries from yesterday sporting their wire mesh trashcan to protect against wildlife digging until they're established. The goal is to fill that bed with strawberries so I need to look up how to encourage runners over berry production for this year. Alternatively i wonder how hard it would be to harvest then grow the seeds...

Decided I'd better remove the straw and burlap covering my two earthboxes of peppermint today and yep, I was right to do so. Will still leave them in the protected alcove on the ground so I can recover if needed. Probably will give them their spring sprinkle of fertilizer too.

Almost finished with pea planting, but that will be a separate post.

I've also filled an ice cube tray half full in preparation of using the "ice cube method" for sowing poppies. Tomorrow after it freezes I'll sprinkle the seeds on top of each cube, fill it the rest of the way up with water, and stick it in the freezer again for 2-3 weeks to cold-stratify. Then you just plop the ice cubes where you want to grow poppies and push them into the earth slightly and wait. I've never had success sowing poppy seed in the fall, so it'll be great if this works. I got the seed for free by asking a nice gardener if I could have one of the seedheads off their poppies while I was walking to the library. I always carry a supply of small ziplock bags with me everywhere for exactly this reason. I get so many free seeds this way.

Other garden tasks for today include chopping the old leaves off the liriope before the new leaves can get in the way and pulling the little metal tower cage/obelisk out--it needs a wire brushing and rustoleum painting before the clematis covers it because it's rusty and flaky and not in an attractive interesting way.

[farmerstrend]

Spinach Farming in Kenya: Everything You Need to Know for a Thriving Crop

Spinach is one of the easiest and most profitable vegetable crop to grow in Kenya. Whether you are farming on a small plot at the rear end of your house or on commercial scale, spinach can reward you with consistent returns, quick money, and a ready market. But like any other crop, the success does not come automatically. You need the right information, correct timing, and hands-on expertise to…

[ooglywooglies]

couple weeks ago i tried an experiment to germinate some strawberry seeds i ripped off the strawberry in like a closed container with a wet paper towel and only one germinated (the rest got moldy) so i put her in my husbands parsley plant to see if she survives (a baby sister)

[reasonsforhope]

"One of the least respected but most important ecosystems on Earth are seagrass meadows, and a pioneering robotic solution is helping marine scientists restore these underwater gardens.

The ReefGen Grasshopper can plant dozens of seagrass seeds per minute. Not only is this faster than a human diver, but much safer as well.

It works by injecting a tiny slurry of sediment wrapped around the seagrass seed into the seafloor. After covering a growing plot of four seeds, the robot ‘hops’ about 30 centimeters away and starts again.

Despite covering a minuscule portion of the seafloor, seagrass meadows are estimated to hold 35-times more carbon than terrestrial forests—amounting to around 18% of the total carbon stock of the world’s oceans.

ReefGen’s founder Tom Chi dreamed up the idea after watching the degradation of coral reefs on his home island in Hawaii. The first iteration of the robot set coral ‘plugs’ onto existing reefs to help regrow them, but the technology was prohibitively expensive for wide-scale use.

Now however, broader selections of off-the-shelf parts have driven down the costs of manufacturing and maintaining underwater robots, according to Chris Oakes, CEO of ReefGen.

“Manual planting works, but robots are really good when things are dull, dirty, dangerous, or distant—the four Ds,” Oakes told CNN, adding that at the moment, Grasshopper is piloted with a controller by a human on the surface.

“Right now, we’re focused on the planting, the biology, and the mechanical aspects, once we’re confident that that’s all designed the right way, we will overlay more semi-autonomous features like navigation, so you don’t actually have to pilot it,” he said.

ReefGen has been able to not only expand into restoration of seagrass meadows, but also see its robots used in oceans around the world. This July, Grasshopper planted 25,000 seeds in Wales. In October, ReefGen teamed up with the University of North Carolina (UNC) Institute of Marine Sciences to test various seed replanting methods out on the state’s declining seagrass meadows.

Oakes says that as cool and “flashy” as a robotic solution might seem, the most important factor in its success will be the long-term monitoring of the fields it’s replanting. Are they growing to maturity, are the seedlings dying off before then, will they live long enough to seed and germinate fields of their own, how do fields it plants compare to fields planted by hand??"

-via Good News Network, December 24, 2024

[kisanofindia]

बीज अंकुरण परीक्षण (Seed Germination Test): खेती की कमाई बढ़ाने के लिए बुआई से पहले ज़रूर करें टेस्टिंग

बढ़िया पैदावार और उन्नत बीजों के उत्पादन के लिए इस्तेमाल होने वाले बीजों का भी उम्दा होना बेहद ज़रूरी है

किसानों को बीज अंकुरण परीक्षण के बारे में बारीक़ बातों को ज़रूर समझना चाहिए क्योंकि यदि किसानों को सही वक़्त पर बीजों की गुणवत्ता का भरोसा नहीं मिला तो खेती में लगने वाला सारा धन-श्रम आख़िरकार घाटे का सौदा बन जाता है। बीजों की अंकुरण क्षमता की सही जानकारी होने से बुआई के समय बीजों की सही दर को तय करना आसान होता है।

बढ़िया पैदावार और उन्नत बीजों के उत्पादन के लिए इस्तेमाल होने वाले बीजों का भी उम्दा होना बेहद ज़रूरी है। ये पता लगाने के लिए कि इस्तेमाल होने वाला बीज वाकई में उम्दा भी है या नहीं, उसका अंकुरण परीक्षण किया जाता है।

बीज अंकुरण परीक्षण के लिए भारतीय कृषि अनुसन्धान परिषद की ओर से ��नेक मापदंड तय किये गये हैं, जिसके अनुसार, चयनित बीजों की प्रयोगशाला या खेत में जाँच की जाती है।

बीजों की अंकुरण क्षमता का महत्व

जबलपुर स्थित जवाहर लाल नेहरू कृषि विश्वविद्यालय के विशेषज्ञों के अनुसार, किसानों को बीजों के अंकुरण परीक्षण के बारे में बारीक़ बातों को ज़रूर समझना चाहिए क्योंकि यदि किसानों को सही वक़्त पर बीजों की गुणवत्ता का भरोसा नहीं मिला तो खेती में लगने वाला सारा धन-श्रम आख़िरकार घाटे का सौदा बन जाता है। दरअसल, बीजों की अंकुरण क्षमता की सही जानकारी होने से बुआई के समय बीजों की सही दर को तय करना आसान होता है। यही नहीं, पिछली फसल की कटाई के बाद यदि उसका कुछ हिस्सा अगली फसल के बीज के लिए सहेजा जाने वाला हो तो भी बीजों के अंकुरण परीक्षण की अहमियत और बढ़ जाती है। यहाँ तक कि बाज़ार से उम्दा किस्म का बीज खरीदने के बाद भी यदि किसान उसका अंकुरण परीक्षण कर लें तो इससे भी उन्हें खेती की कमाई बढ़ाने में मदद मिलेगी।

अंकुरण क्षमता की जाँच से पहले सावधानियाँ

सबसे पहले फसल की कटाई के बाद यदि उपज की बीजों के रूप में सहेजना हो तो उसे ख़ूब अच्छी तरह से साफ़ करने के बाद ही भंडारण करना चाहिए। सफ़ाई के दौरान क्षतिग्रस्त, रोगग्रस्त और अन्य फसलों के बीज की छँटाई ज़रूर की जानी चाहिए। सहेजे जाने वाले बीजों में नमी की मात्रा 10-12 प्रतिशत वाली सुरक्षित सीमा से ज़्यादा हर्ग़िज़ नहीं होना चाहिए, क्योंकि इसका बीजों की जीवनदायी क्षमता पर बेहद प्रतिकूल प्रभाव पड़ता है। ज़्यादा नमी वाले बीजों में कीटाणु के पनपने की आशंका बहुत बढ़ जाती है। अंकुरण परीक्षण के लिए जो थोड़े से बीज चुने जाते हैं उन्हें भंडारित या ख़रीदे गये बीजों की कुल मात्रा में से निकालने से पहले बीजों के सारे स्टॉक को अच्छी तरह मिला लेना चाहिए। ऐसा करने ��े अंकुरण परीक्षण वाले बीजों का नमूना बिल्कुल सटीक साबित होगा।

और पढ़ें......

[gallusrostromegalus]

I'm highly considering getting some pumpkins, carving them, and tossing the pumpkin guts in our kind-of compost (just where we've been throwing yard clippings) and to see what happens.

If it goes the way I hope, my husband will want to murder me come spring / summer :D

Protip: Get those super-tiny pumpkins, they're called Jack-be-Little I think?

They've got a lower germination-from-seed rate so you'll only have a couple hundred seedlings instead of a couple million.

They also mature early so come like, late august, you can start picking the first mature fruits and cooking them as single-serving squash dishes.

One is a perfect amount of vegetable for a side to steak or turkey, two make a pumpkin pie.

I cut them into wedges, toss with olive oil and garlic/herb seasoning and bake them on a sheet at 420 for ten minutes, flip, and then another 10 at 420 and it's only a 50% chance if they actually make it to the table.

If you end up with more than you can eat (Likely, with the compost method) they keep extremely well pretty much until next spring when the next round sprouts

[path-of-grass-and-leaves]

Bioregional Magic: Sustainable Ways to Work with Native Plants

Note: Post Contains Personal Anecdotes and UPG

As someone with a nature-based practice, I completely understand the desire to work with native plants. Many of us are deeply compelled to foster a connection with our land spirits and the local flora and fauna.

But with the normalization of consumption in witchcraft spaces paired with unethical wildcrafting and foraging practices, it's important to be careful. We don't want to harm the native plant populations and the wildlife that depends on them in our quest for a more localized practice.

Learning which plants are safe to harvest

By safe, I don't mean safe to handle or consume, though this is also crucial knowledge for anyone harvesting wild plants in general. I'm specifically referring to whether or not the collection of native plant matter will make a negative impact on the local ecosystem.

Think of it this way, if your practice is spirit-focused. Will the collective spirits of certain plants really want to assist you if you're devastating their population for your own gain? IME the answer is a hard no.

Take a look at a field guide and start identifying some of the native plants in your region. Are some of them listed as endangered, threatened, or special concern? Now you know which plants you should never disturb or collect materials from.

If not threatened, are some species generally harder to find? Are they present only in a certain type of environment? Do they take a long time to mature and/or have a very specific method of seed dispersal? Proceed with caution.

Example:

Common Blue Violets are one of the first plants to bloom in my garden during springtime. I also consider them very important in my practice and like to harvest them for certain rituals. But like I said, they're one of the first native plants to bloom during spring. Which means there are going to be pollinating insects, songbirds, and small mammals which rely on these plants for food. And predators who rely on those animals.

Since this is a hardy plant that usually grows in abundance, it's okay for me to harvest some from the garden for personal use. But I still need to leave enough to serve as a resource for wildlife and allow it to reproduce for the following year.

On the contrary, I never touch my wild Bloodroot. I only have two or three plants in the garden, their seeds have double dormancy germination requirements, and they take 2-3 years to reach blooming size. I have only ever collected seeds for propagation, and even then do it rarely because I know that the ants do a much better job at this than I could.

So when we can't harvest materials to use for tools and ingredients in workings, how do we utilize these plants in our practice?

Physical Representations and Symbolism

Images, objects, and symbols representing the plant can be used to substitute organic matter that you would otherwise collect and use for workings. Consider art pieces or photos, sculptures, sigils and seals, paper cut or folded into the shape of leaves or flowers, etc.

If the plant is your main component or energy source, consider designing the working to cater to this. For example, if I'm petitioning the spirit of milkweed, I might want to incorporate aspects of air and wind, since this is how their seeds are distributed. Or I may want to add some lunar energies knowing that this is the planetary correspondence for milkweed. This is would completely depend on my intent for the specific working and which physical or spiritual aspects of the plant I choose to work with.

If you're seeking a more long-term effect, try getting crafty and using symbols of the plant to decorate your own tools. I'm talking homemade oracle cards, painted jars or boxes for container spells, decorated offering bowls, ritual jewelry, and so on.

Working with Living Plants

This one is for the spirit workers. While it's entirely possible to petition plant spirits, especially collectives, solely using imagery, working carefully with a living plant can help establish a more direct spiritual connection.

This can be done by conducting your working outdoors, inviting the spirit of the plant into your space, and asking for assistance. During this time you would leave an offering, usually fresh water, but you can also offer things like soil or compost. Obtaining a working knowledge of certain plants can help inspire ideas for more creative, species-appropriate offerings, giving your spells and rituals an extra boost.

Now if this were a plant that was on a special concern or endangered species list, I would avoid offerings and actions that could potentially disturb the plant in any way. I may work within a few feet of the plant and present my offering in a bowl, removing it at the end of the working. I would definitely avoid touching it or say, pouring out water over the soil where it grows.

While we're on the subject of offerings, consider acts of service. Once again, we're going to use milkweed as an example. If I want to leave a nice offering for the spirit of milkweed and I know that Black Swallowtails feed on the nectar and pollinate it, I may offer a potted plant of dill placed in the wildflower garden. This is because Black Swallowtail caterpillars love to eat dill and will later pupate into adults, which will be beneficial for the plant. Consider different species and their relationship with each other. You may even get multiple spirit allies out of the deal.

Cultivation and Seed Distribution

Now, we've talked about ways to avoid harm when incorporating native plant species into our practices, but what about making a positive impact?

The Act of Growing Things is actually my favorite part of plant magic. Sure, I love harvesting my vegetables, fruit, and herbs to use in various recipes, and wild plants I find in the yard are excellent allies. But there really is something special about watching a tiny seedling grow into a full-sized plant, or seeing that delicate young native perennial thrive during its first year outdoors.

Whether transplanting or growing from seed, you're inevitably going to develop a strong relationship with that specific plant. You'll learn all about its growth rate, ecological benefits, soil requirements, and more. This will lead to folklore, correspondences, and later on your own UPG related to where this plant fits within your practice.

Another option, if you don't have the energy for more hands-on cultivation, is seed scattering. Disturbed areas like roadside ditches or even your backyard are perfect for this. Whether scattering or growing in starter pots, seeds can be charmed or enchanted with a specific intent and planted as a sort of living spell.

I use Prarie Moon Nursery for my seeds, but there are plenty of other affordable online vendors. You can also check out what's available locally. There are a few native-focused nurseries in my area that have a nice variety of options depending on the season.

[leonawriter]

What we KNOW Lobotomy Corporation was like:

Honestly, this is gonna be an ongoing list. Not comprehensive. Will expand with each Canto (if I remember to add to it).

Due to that, safe to say this will contain spoilers for all games.

-Their Singularity created Abnormalities within the main Facility through use of Cogito, in order to manufacture energy from them.

-L Corp would hire people based on the recruitment criteria that Carmen had set out (as per what KJH said in an interview once), which was more about whether they had trauma and not based on money, influence, or a person's place in the nest. Because of that, many people were hired from the Backstreets, such as Johann (as seen in the RCU Intervallo; Hohenheim would carry on hiring people from the backstreets as a knock-on effect.)

-According to some sources (Wonderlab; unknown if there are others since the artist cut ties with PM), the employees of other branches are compensated well for their work, with benefits to their families as well.

-Those employed by L Corp were equipped with defensive suits and weapons against the Abnormalities they were handling. The Managers of each branch may have had different methods, but the standards the Wing Director set were that keeping your employees alive is more cost-effective than sacrificing them to Abnormalities whenever possible.

-Employees are given doses of Enkephalin (a drug that inhibits emotional responses, causing some emotional numbness) to handle the work they are given. This may be seen as a bad thing, but it is also ensuring that said employees are able to maintain functionality - especially in the main branch, where it is literally impossible to resign.

-Ideal management of Abnormalities results in a minimal loss of life. While this is not always feasible, it is the aim and goal to keep abnormalities safely in containment.

-We do not yet know the taboos that L Corp would have put on District 12 - we can only assume that there may have been something about not looking into the Singularity, and not telling anyone of what the Singularity is, or not saying anything about what happens at work. Hopefully we'll get more information on this later, but if I'm right there, it'd have to do with preventing the Head from coming down on them again - and also, the prevention of civilian loss of life. -We currently have no proof that there was anything to the effect of the Taboo Hunters of Nests such as S Corp, or N Corp.

-We have not yet heard of anything like H Corp's "restructuring days" or U Corp's "accidental merging of two things, if you get caught between them."

-Incidents such as Kromer and Sinclair being able to sneak into a lab were entirely outside of L Corp's intent. They should not have had access to that key, which should not have been left lying around for a school-aged boy (nowhere near being an Agent-level to even see an Abnormality, and not wearing any gear) to handle.

-Ayin collaborated with T Corp, W Corp, and R Corp in order to create the TT2 Protocol, which was then used in other parts of the City, and the energy created by L Corp was used to accelerate the growth of other Wings' Singularities. However, this was all for the sake of the Seed of Light Scenario - with the idea that once it was fully germinated, people would become better in time.

-As far as an average citizen of the City would be aware, L Corp enabled many technological advances that made life better for everyone, as well as enabling those that would make life worse. It may have been seen as morally neutral in that respect - however, given the mentality of your average City dweller, "morally neutral" would equate to "there is no reason to fight against it, or overthrow it. It is better to leave it standing."

-In spite of us knowing where the energy was from, "clean" energy to the City was still energy produced at good rates to most if not all of the City.

-A great many people chose to fight on the side of L Corp on its rise, in the Smoke War. The old L Corp's business practices were alienating them from those who had to deal with them.

-Ayin himself would have been absent for the better part of ten years (to the eyes of the City). We do not know precisely how dwellers of District 12 perceived him in a general sense, but there are canonically those who revered him as some kind of saint (as seen in Gebura's story).

-There may or may not have been rumours of how people might go missing in relation to L Corp, because of those employed by the main branch never being seen again, not to mention those used to create Abnormalities. However, these people would have been left on record as having been "employed by a Wing," and it is possible that this would have been enough of an answer for most to be satisfied with.

-Although the Burial Protocol has been seen as a bad thing due to the way it affects survivors (which, understandable), it was also the most secure way to block Abnormalities from escaping, which would cause an untold amount of loss of life for normal City dwellers (as seen the introduction to Canto IV, when the Brazen Bull was attacking the streets of District 11's Nest).

-Clerks may be given guns that do hardly anything to the Abnormalities and are mostly for ending their own lives - however, compared to other Wings, and considering how Abnormalities can affect people, this could be considered a mercy. If one did not have a gun, then they would find some other way, or succumb to an Abnormality's influence for longer, which would endanger more people.

-Although Ayin was the one who suggested that the lab needed the resources of a Wing in order to germinate the Seed of Light, he was never, truly, after the power or influence of being a Wing Director. Therefore, L Corp's financial earnings would have been going into keeping the Company running, but not into the Director's pockets. We can only speculate where the rest of the money went.

-No one as yet has said that the streets of District 12 had anything near as bad going for them as the Backstreets of District 23 (known as the most dangerous place to live, and where there are cannibals) or District 9 (the Streets of Music, where the Pianist originated from).

[jasperthehatchet]

Speaking of indoor gardening, here are some things I've been recycling for my garden. I love garbage <3

(I started collecting most of these things after I started my garden. A lot of the pots actively in use are reused as well. The hydroponic jars I did have to buy specifically for gardening purposes because hydroponic supplies are a little more specific and a bit pricier but in my opinion it's totally worth it. Though you can use any large mouth glass jars you have and use coffee filters with cut out holes for the roots. Hydroponic gardening is my absolute favorite method of gardening and much more disability-friendly in my experience)

1. Coffee tins. I just need to drill a few holes in the bottom and I've got myself a tomato planter. My mom used to bring these home from work when her coworkers were done with them so I have a few more. Also I recommend looking into your local plant nurseries and looking for recycled pots, my local nursery has an area dedicated to plant pot recycling and you can probably get some for cheap. But you can always get creative and use all kinds of things so long as they've got drainage holes

[Image ID: a large red coffee can with black illustrations and big white text on it that says "classic roast coffee 100% Arabica ground colombian. My hand is in the photo because I'm holding it up and the gray wood floors are in the background. End ID]

2. Plastic spinach and muffin containers. As well as those plastic strawberry containers! You just need to poke holes in the bottom with an awl (if there are no holes already) and widen them a bit, and if it's got a lid that's perfect for germination! The bigger containers are perfect for seedling starter planters as well.

2.5. Egg cartons can be cut up and used for seed pots too, as well as those paper drink holders. Just make sure you poke holes

[Image ID: a plastic spinach container full of soil. There's a brown cardboard divider in the middle and a yellow gnat trap against the divider, sticking out of he soil. The container is on a metal shelf in my greenhouse tent. The next image shows a large plastic muffin container with cardboard toilet paper tubes inside. Next to it is a stack of egg cartons with the lids missing and a stack of drink holder cups cut in quarters so the cups are separate. These things are on a gray shelf next to the tent up against a window. End ID]

3. Toilet paper/paper towel tubes. If you cut four slits at the bottom and fold them in on each other, you can close the bottom and make them into seedling starter pots. I put a few in a lettuce container (pictured above) and I plan to use it for veggie sprouts <3 these are fun to make too, just make sure you widen the hole at the bottom of each one for drainage. I still gotta do that. But those seedling starter trays online can be expensive so this is a way you can make one for way cheaper. It's not perfect but it'll get the job done :)

[Image ID: three images of a cardboard box full of toilet paper tubes and two images of a plastic lettuce container full of seedling starter pots i made from those tubes. All the tubes are cut at the bottom to make flaps and those flaps are folded in on each other to make a bottom for the pot. In to of the images my hand is visible because im holding one tube up to the camera to show how I folded it. The gray floors are visible in the images in the background. End ID]

[balkanradfem]

Okay, it's time. It's time to start the regular and the biggest wave of seeds. The middle of February is the best time to start if you live in a southern-ish country on the northern hemisphere that gets it's last from in the middle of April/start of May, if you're a bit more northern, then wait!

If you currently have a little bit of a backyard outside, with some grass on it, or maybe you have a nice balcony where you could place a little pot or two – you could do this too. If you're thinking 'oh but I don't have any containers' any plastic cup will do. If you're thinking 'oh but I don't have any seeds' if you have a tomato or a pepper from the store anywhere in your house, even if they're going bad, you can take seeds out of it and start them. Maybe you're thinking 'I don't have any soil' if you have access to go to a forest, or to a place with a lot of trees, you can find good soil underneath a tree that's been allowed to compost all of its leaves, it's usually forests that get to do this! You do need light and airy soil, because little seedlings wouldn't be able to push roots trough clay.

So if you have a plastic cup, a tomato or a pepper (or a hot pepper! or eggplant), access to some soil, you could grow a nice food plant! If you're worried you'd be bad at it – it's still so much fun, and you might be proven wrong, tomato plants are forgiving and vigorous. You might get free food out of this! And if you start multiple plants there's a good chance at least half of them will survive, and then you just put away the dead ones and it looks like you're an amazing gardener with 100% success rate. Lots of my plants die too! I put them away and look at my hundred live plants and feel pretty good about myself.

I'm gonna go with my 'tried and true' germinating method. I'm gonna put seeds on a paper towel, spray them with water, put a label inside, and then shut them tightly in a plastic bag. This way I can check in on them daily, and the conditions are ideal because the bag keeps all that dampness in, they cannot dry out! They usually germinate faster this way too, and then you get to plant only the ones who have already activated, so you're sure they're going to sprout.

Once your plants get big (in a month and a half), you'll need to get them adjusted to the outside conditions, they need a bit of time to adjust to being in the sun! This is achieved by giving them few hours in the sun every day, they'll grow darker green and more beautiful in the process, and each day you leave them for one hour longer in the direct sunlight. Then, if there's no danger of frost, you can transplant them outside, or in a bigger pot! If you don't have a bigger pot, do not fear. You can grab a bucket and use it. You can grab an empty container of a big laundry detergent or softener, cut out the top, and use it as a container. You have a big 5L or 7L plastic bottle? Cut the top and plant the thing inside. Plants just want to have access to more soil, they're not picky. Ideally your makeshift pot will have some holes on the bottom! But if not, you can just become a master at watering and water them the exact amount they need.

If you do have some backyard land, and you didn't plant on it before, now would be an excellent time to start gathering compost from the kitchen, and putting it outside on that piece of land. It won't have time to compost and create fertile ground in a month or two, but it will prevent the grass from growing on that spot by blocking the light, and if it rains, some of the nutrients from it will be transferred to the earth and your plant will get good food from it! When it's warmer outside, it will compost faster, and you can leave it on top of the soil for your plant to slowly absorb all that food. If some worms and bugs come along, they'll help it fall apart too, you love this, you love the wormies and the bugs. They'll even help your soil be more airy and easy for your plants to grow in.

There's nothing to lose in letting yourself try out a plant or two, and you might be surprised by how much food you can get from even a few plants! Try this awesome new hobby and hack the agriculture and food security with no budget and a lot of heart. And hey, if you don't feel like doing it right now, you can still do it during the entirety of March and April, you have plenty of time until summer.

[windvexer]

Hey chicken, I got hold of a pdf of scott cunningham " earth power" and "earth air fire and water " and something that confuses me in some spells is the method used relating to the goal. For example:

In one to help break bad habits, it says to write this bad habit in a a leaf, take it to a tree and bury close to the roots. Then put an offering for the tree in the same hole, cover it up and pour some water on the spot

But couldn't this action of burying and watering, be seen as "planting" the bad habit? And if you are planting it would grow...

Another one is for love/relationship, where with a burned stick you draw two hearts interwined in a piece of paper, visualizing a satisfying relationship and then put some rose petals in the paper, fold it and burn it in a candle or fire.

He describes that as it burns the power is released

But it makes me think that burning your wish in the paper would have an opposite effect, like destroying the wish

Idk. What do you thinks of those "mechanics" of spells? Am I overthinking?

Hi! I've never read those books and I'm not a Wiccan.

So I can only comment from my own perspective, which may be the incorrect perspective to accurately interpret what Cunningham is saying.

You are not over-thinking; you have stumbled onto a very important aspect of sorcery and one that is good to think about.

How is it that sometimes, a box is used to trap and bind energies, but at other times a box can be used to coalesce and radiate helpful energies?

How is it that a candle can both open portals and close portals? How can a candle both be banishing of spirits, and an offering to spirits?

How can burying something in the earth not only be destructive or even an aspect of curses, but also be a technique of prosperity and growth?

The reality is that burying something isn't magic and it doesn't do anything. Lighting a candle isn't magic and doesn't do anything.

"Doing magic" is not taking a leaf and writing things on it and burying it. A mundane person can do these things in a mundane way and no magic will occur.

Nothing is automatically happening; burying something neither automatically causes an act of banishing, nor an act of conjuring.

As the practitioner, it is you yourself who determines what happens. This is the vital and inexorable power of 'setting intent.'

The tree does not decide what happens to your habits leaf. The earth does not decide what happens to your habits leaf. YOU decide what happens to it.

No, it isn't strictly true that burying things is always an action of generative planting. A very popular form of cursing is to turn an apple into someone and then bury them to rot. But the Earth can also gently break things down through the cycle of decay. Or it can trap things, like a cave-in.

We see all of these things occurring in nature; of course you can plant seeds to grow strong. Of course if you bury a body it will rot. Of course leafs slowly decay and their particles return to nature.

All of these things are valid.

YOU decide which one happens. This decision is germinated with intent; it is gestated with technique. YOU are the creator god. The leaf is clay in your hands, and you can decide:

You are the body of the beloved that broke my heart, as this leaf decays their joy will decay.

You are the mustard seed that returns a hundredfold harvest, mightest among trees.

You are the leaf of the forest floor, breaking down and returning to nature, just as my bad habits break down and return to source.

It is not a leaf. It is not planting. It is a spell. You create the reality of what the leaf really is, and you dictate how it must try to interact with its environment.

It must be good with you, or it is not a good spell*.

So if you personally cannot get around the idea that burying something will always be an action of generative "planting," then you shouldn't do the spell like that!

It's not an issue of "wrong belief." You may be following valid intuition. You may be at a time in your practice where the Earth calls you to plant things to grow. You may be at a time in your practice where fire whispers sweet promises of destruction to you.

Explore what's around you and what you're feeling! Change the methods if you don't think they're right for you.

But it is also untrue to say that putting things into the earth is always an act of planting. It can be many things.

*This is not true but this is a post, not a book.

[jensownzoo]

Some of the pepper seed has already germinated in their ziplock bag greenhouses. It's day 4, so I'd say this method is still working for me! Got potting soil warming up inside to transfer them to pots later today.

I used way too much seed, but since most of it was seed-saved I wasn't sure what the germ rate was going to be. Looks like my method for collecting and storing work just fine for peppers.

[farmerstrend]

Moringa Farming: A Super Plant for Health, Agriculture, and Sustainability

The Moringa value chain in Kenya is a dynamic and growing sector that offers numerous opportunities for economic development and improved nutrition. Moringa, often referred to as the “drumstick tree” or “miracle tree,” is known for its nutritional value and wide-ranging health benefits. Every part of the moringa tree, from the moringa leaves, pods, seeds, and flowers can be harvested throughout…