Farming on "New Ground"

The term new ground refers to an area that has not been previously cultivated or has not been cultivated in several years. New ground can be former pasture, brush land, timberland, or even non chemically treated lawn. New ground had major benefits as well as some serious challenges. We will cover both.

If you talk to any old timers they may tell you about new ground that has been in cultivation for years. What they really mean is it is the newest ground they have.

Benefits of New Ground

Most of the time new ground has not been contaminated by chemicals. As I said before this may not be true if turning a section of lawn into garden space. The chemicals approved for use on lawns are way more harsh than most approved for food production.

Most times new ground will be extremely fertile. Leaves or grass clippings are often left to decompose wherever they fall. This of course increases the organic content in the soil, which invites earthworms and a whole host of beneficial microbes.

New ground can be very mellow. It may not have ever been impacted by tillers or heavy equipment. Mellow ground is easily worked, holds water well (needs less irrigation), and is just easier for your plants' roots to get around in.

New ground has most likely not been contaminated with diseases. New ground normally has a wide range of biodiversity which inhibits many vegetable diseases and helps control many pests.

Challenges of New Ground

New ground is very labor and time intensive. Getting my area to the point is is now has taken me 10 months. This has been me working on it a little at a time, an hour here and 6 hours there. All but about 5 hours were done completely by hand. A buddy of mine brought his tractor over for half a day. Everything else was done by hand.

Weeding new ground in the first year is a beast. It does not matter what the ground was before, there are bound to be hundreds of seeds and roots waiting to grow in the middle of your vegetable patch. This can be a constant fight, and can turn into a battle of the bramble if you will.

When you have wonderful, fertile new ground, you will want to at least keep it as healthy as it was and hopefully make it healthier. Direct sunlight to soil can kill the top levels of beneficial insects and microbes. Many plants take nutrients from the soil. The answers are simple mulching, composting, rotational planting, and if needed organic fertilizers. I will provide links for each of these topics, as this is beyond the scope of this post.

My New Ground

My new ground started out covered in privet and honey suckle. It took me nearly a year to get it to the point where I could plant anything in it at all. I cut even with the ground anything I couldn't pull up. Burned all of the brush that was too large to go through my chipper. Raked everything I could and am constantly pulling what feels like thousands of honey suckle and wild blackberry roots.

I am out in the garden everyday hoeing to stop any weeds from getting too far. As the plants I want get bigger I will be putting down cardboard and mulching with a mixture of pine shavings, wheat straw that was at the bottom of the chicken brooder area, and compost. This will go a long way to stopping the weed invasion, will prevent moisture loss, and will breakdown and actually improve the soil.

By taking in this new ground I increased my food production area by a little over 3 times. I am hoping to provide updates in the months to come.

For more information related to this topic you can read the following articles.
The Lowdown on Compost
Chinese Privet Homestead Hero or Villain
My Experiments with Hugelkultur and No Till
Lasagna Gardening
Instant Garden

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Choosing The Chainsaw For You

Another name for Fall could be chainsaw season. It does not matter if you cut wood as a primary or backup heating source or prune trees or shrubs. Just being ready to deal with fallen branches or trees- a chainsaw makes a lot of jobs easier. 

This brings me to my topic of which chainsaw should you own. I have helped people choose a chainsaw many many times. When I have helped these people I see two distinct groups. Group one are the people who want the biggest, most powerful chainsaw they can afford. Group two are the people who want the smallest, cheapest chainsaw they can get. Which one is right? Would you be surprised if I said neither? I didn't think you would.

Before you decide on which chainsaw to buy figure out what kind of work you will really do with it. I use my chainsaw a couple of times a week. We use wood as a secondary and backup heating source. We have a solid chord and a half of wood waiting on cold weather. I am of the opinion that wood heat is going to grow in popularity in years to come and I am not alone. As other energy resources continue to get more expensive people are going to return to wood, in fact there are tax credits available for those who use "approved" wood stoves. Wood heating is a personal choice and I am not trying to talk you into wood heat, but if you are thinking about it that will be a factor into what type and size of chainsaw you need.

There are lots of choices. Several name brands and multiple sizes of each name brand. The first chainsaw I ever operated was a Homelite with a 6 inch bar. It was my first job to cut off small limbs after the tree had been fallen. As I got a little older I was allowed to run my dads McCulloch. It had a 20 inch bar and was very heavy. I used to own a Homelite with an 18 inch bar, but I lost it in the April 27th tornadoes (actually I was told that it was looted before I got to my business where I had it stored). I have also run a Sthil and a Husqvarna and currently own a Poulan, and they have all done their jobs well. So I believe as long as you take care of your chainsaw, name brand is a matter of preference.

This is the chainsaw I currently own.

All of the affordable chainsaws have 2 stroke engines. This means you must mix 2 cycle oil with the gas. Depending on brand and age of your saw, your saw may require 32:1, 40:1, or even 50:1 gas to oil ratio. Be sure and read your manual to get the mixture right. If you do not mix the oil with the gas your saw will not last long and you will burn up your saw. If at all possible find a place that sells 100% gasoline. Most older chainsaws are not designed to run on ethanol blends. Ethanol greatly reduces the lifetime of your saw. You will also need to make sure to have bar and chain oil.

If you use wood as a heating source and are planning on cutting all or even most of your own wood, I would say a 16 inch bar is the smallest size I would consider and is the size that I own and use very often. The reason I like this size is it is very maneuverable, not very heavy, powerful enough to do everything I need to do, and I can cut almost any tree that I want with very few exceptions. I wouldn't mind having an 18 inch bar, but for me it was not worth the extra cost.

If you are only going to use a chainsaw for the occasional dropped limb or for pruning of a few fruit trees I know a lot of people who have chosen a battery powered chainsaw and are quite happy with the results. These are small, very light, and have a limited time of operation, but are very maneuverable and easy to operate. Note: You will still need bar and chain oil. Of the people that I know the most popular battery powered chainsaws is made by Black & Decker, pictured below.

The most popular battery powered chainsaw around here.

Another option for very small properties and small jobs are the electric plug-in chainsaws. These are very light, but you are "tied" to the cord so there is not as much flexibility. Most still need bar and chain oil. I only know a few people that have this type of chainsaw, but in their situation most are happy with their choice.

A chainsaw can be a very dangerous tool. I am not going to cover safety because there are hundreds of videos on youtube.com on the subject. If you have never operated a chainsaw before, please read the manual and learn about the safe operation of this tool.

Many times you can find good quality used chainsaws in the local classifieds, craig's list, or fairly often at a local pawn shop. Being frugal is always a good idea.

The more you can do for yourself the better off you are. Always Remember to.....

Keep It Rural

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Chinese Privet Homestead Hero or Villian

I am in the process of trying to reclaim a strip of our homestead back from Chinese Privet. Chinese Privet is a highly invasive and quick growing species. On an interesting note, while trying to do research for this post I looked up this plant on the US Department of Agriculture site and it was not operational because of the government shutdown. HA HA.

Chinese Privet (Ligustrum sinense) is an evergreen shrub- even though it can reach a height of over 25 feet. Privet is propagated by seeds which can be spread by birds, by cuttings, and by new plants growing from the parent plants roots. Chinese Privet is a member of the olive family and is considered toxic to many animals. I have, however seen cows, horses, goats, and deer eat this plant with vigor and no negative results. When this plant is in bloom it is often covered with honey bees. I read in one place that privet blooms produce a bitter honey, but I have not found this to be the case.

 I am trying to clear a strip about 10 feet wide and 110 feet long or 1100 square feet. That is a good bit of ground no matter the size of the area you have. If you are like us and are working with a 1/2 acre homestead 1100 square feet is a huge part of your land. I have some plants that their trunks are close to 6 inches in diameter. The area is very thick with privet so there is a lot of biomass that will be accumulated. I cannot stand the thought of that much of a resource going to waste.

 I have used dead privet for wood in a camp fire, so that was my first thought. After a very brief internet search I found I was not the only one. In fact, it is reported that privet burns hotter than hickory. So the larger pieces can be used for firewood. I also thought about maybe using privet for carving. It cuts fairly well when green, but clogs anything other than straight edged tools. I do not suggest using a rotary tool on privet while green. Privet dries solid and hard. Based on my experience I would say it dries almost as hard as dogwood and is not easy to work at all.

Now we are down to just having to deal with the tops. We had a wood heater when I was a child and we never had enough small wood so I cut firewood to a much smaller diameter than a lot of people. What I have left to deal with is generally only a little larger in diameter than my thumb. Enter the small electric wood chipper. I had been looking for a wood chipper for a while, even tried to borrow or rent one and no one had one. I finally found one used. I will have a link to one that is very similar to mine at the end of the post. With the wood chipper I am able to turn what is left of the bushes into a very nice mulch/compost ingredient. As of right now I have 2 fairly large piles of wood chips waiting to be assigned their new duties. As I said above,privet dries hard and I have found that my chipper has a much easier time of grinding what is left while it is still green. It will take me a while to get it all done but I have figured out a way to use every part of the bushes I am taking out.

Here is the link I promised to an electric wood chipper. As you can see they are fairly affordable.

In everything you do try to minimize waist. In everything you do remember to...

Keep It Rural

By Gregg Carter