The Dirt Dude

First day in China

2009-05-14T23:00:00.001-07:00

Ok, so really all we've done is walk around, eat, and explore our immediate surroundings. But here are a few photos of the market and a food stall.

First, select the kind of noodles you want, then they add the ingredient. She was nice enough to ask if we wanted hot stuff. I did, but just a little.

The stove is heated with coal briquettes.

Which chicken would you like for dinner?

Pickled garlic. Emma would go crazy for these!

The largest sunflower seeds I've ever seen.

Did I mention that the gov't took our temperatures before we left the plane? They're on the lookout for swine flu. They also gave us all thermometers when we got to our dorm rooms last night. We have to record our temperatures morning and evening for five days. If they think you have it, you get quarantined for 13 days!

Arrived in China

2009-05-14T18:15:00.000-07:00

Finally arrived in China after an epic 30 hour journey! Haven't seen much yet, but we had a great dinner last night.

Finally arrived in China after an epic 30 hour journey! Haven't seen much yet, but we had a great dinner last night.

I'm here to take a 3-week plant breeding class at Northwestern A&F University, in Yangling, Shaanxi, about an hour outside Xi'an, in central China.

Today i'll be exploring, trying to find things i need (a mattress, pillow, food, a dictionary, etc.). Thankfully, we have Lilly-Anne, who speaks Mandarin.

How to set up irrigation

2009-05-02T14:21:00.000-07:00

A couple days ago, I spent most of the day setting up irrigation for the Community Garden.

First, put a pressure reducer on the water tap. This reduces the pressure to 12 psi.

Next, hook up the hose line to a jimmy-rigged construction of various PVC fittings to allow a connection to the "lay-flat".

This is a roll of lay-flat. It is the central distribution line for irrigation in the field.
It must be kept in a straight line so that it won't kink when it fills up with water.

The end of the lay-flat. When you reach the end of the field, cut off the roll, leaving 2-3 feet extra so that you can fold it twice to seal off the end. Then cut off about a foot or so, which will slide onto the folded end to make a cheap cap to the end of the lay-flat.

Stuff the twice-folded end into the sleeve to form a (mostly) water-tight seal.

Next, hook up the field lines. This is done by piercing the lay-flat with a piece of polytubing. The polytube should insert all the way into the lay-flat so that it doesn't pull out when the lay-flat inflates with water. Then slip the polytube into a connector, in this case a stopcock that will allow me to shut off certain lines when i want to.

Drip tape is below the plastic mulch. Our drip tape has "emitters" that allow a drip every 12 inches.
The stopcock slides into the t-tape and seals using a screw.

The field lines.

But the end of the drip tape still isn't sealed!

This year, i wanted to put some extra land into production for growing corn. Plastic is too expensive to use on corn, so i will just grow it on bare ground. My plan is to hook up extra drip tape over the bare ground and grow the corn at each emitter.

In this case, i connect more drip tape to the end of the field lines using a connector.

The end of the drip tape can be sealed by using a cap, or more cheaply by simply folding the end and sliding it into a sleeve, as we did with the lay-flat.

A view from the north end of the field.

Turn on the irrigation, and the lay-flat balloons into a giant pressurized cylinder.

The wetting pattern can be seen here. The hoe is for scale. The advantage is that we can inject fertilizer and water directly to the crop roots, instead of broadcasting fertilizer, which will also fertilize weeds!

We can also reduce disease by keeping the leaves dry while irrigating. Overhead irrigation gets the leaves wet, which invites fungal disease. Additionally, we can reduce the amount of fertilizer and water applied since we are applying it over a smaller area.

Once the ground is wet, go ahead and start planting!

Yesterday, we planted the entire corn field, 3 rows of tomato seedlings, and 2 rows of squash, thanks to our wonderful volunteers!

Tilling the garden

2009-04-30T13:15:00.000-07:00

Tillage of the corn field is happening as I write! Been in the field all day hooking up irrigation. More on that soon.
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Soil mapping

2009-04-17T06:51:00.000-07:00

I've been helping out with soil morphology labs this semester. We spent the last couple of weeks on a soil mapping exercise.

First you start with a map of the area of interest, and locate boring holes.

Once you reach the boring location, you use an auger to bore down to the depth of interest.

Each auger-full of soil is laid out neatly with stick to mark the depth of the auger bucket. Here, the top of the soil is marked with the leaf, and bottom depth is in the upper left.

Some of the soil horizons are clearly visible in this photo.

Each horizon is textured (for the amounts of sand, silt and clay), colored, and noted for other characteristics of interest.

This information will be placed into a GIS application, and a soil map will be made. Maps are then used to determine hydrology, yield potential for various crops, engineering properties, and many other applications.

Recent aggie photos

2009-04-08T19:07:00.000-07:00

Here are a few random ag-related photos that I thought might be interesting.

We went to the field yesterday, and the cattle thought we were there to feed them.

Actually, we were there to mark soil sampling sites for tomorrow's lab.

Meet Dr. Joe Kemble. He's on my committee. He's watering in lettuce seeds into "oasis cubes". They are made of pumice stone and are used for hydroponics.

One seed per cube.

This is a shaker. Here, I'm extracting some nutrients (specifically nitrate and ammonium) from some soil samples using 2 molar KCl. The clear tubes you see are blanks.

After extracting the samples, they are filtered. The filtrate is later analyzed using microplates. Tedious work, but better than studying for prelims!

Annual Plant Sale for the Local Food Bank

2009-04-06T16:56:00.000-07:00

I helped out at Evie Ratner's and Robin Jaffe's place today, as they get ready for the freeze tonight. They have a lot of plants, which they propagate themselves, that they sell every year for the annual Plant Sale to benefit the East Alabama Food Bank.

This is Evie. The plant sale has become so large that she and her husband cannot manage it by themselves, and they depend on volunteers to help make it happen. The entire operation and sale happens at their home. Everything you see here will be for sale on April 19.

Evie in one of her many greenhouses. She and Robin donate some of their leftover vegetable plants to the Community Garden, which I coordinate.

Their operation doesn't only occupy their entire yard, it also takes over their entire living space. Here you can see how they grow transplants.

More information about their plant sale and information on volunteering can be found here.

Local Food

2009-04-01T21:02:00.000-07:00

We went fishing last weekend out of Pensacola, Florida with our friends, Ben and Molly, and his folks.

Emma practices her distress call.

We killed the sheepshead.

On the last shrimp of the day, I caught a baby grouper, which had already swallowed someone else's hook. We did what we could for him before throwing him back.

Cleaning the fish. My job was skinning.

The filet.

And the potatoes.

Rotating composter

2009-03-26T10:49:00.000-07:00

The composter is finished. Next to it you can see my worm composter, which was my first attempt at composting kitchen waste. Someday i'll blog about it, too.

I had the door open downward so it'll stay open when you're loading in material.

Build your own rotating composter

2009-03-24T20:46:00.000-07:00

I've managed to build my own rotating composter for about $50.

I've always wanted one, but they cost about $300 commercially.

The idea is that a rotating barrel is easier to aerate by simply rotating the drum.
Aerobic microbes are much more efficient at composting,
so you get finished compost much faster this way.

I found the plans for one from the Rodale Institute. Rodale does great work in the area of sustainable agriculture.

The plans can be found here in pdf format.

If you're following the plans, I would recommend replacing the 28 wood screws, #10 x 1.5", with #10 x 2", cuz the shorter ones won't go through two pieces of 2 x 4.

A photo of the cross brace support. A jigsaw does this job wonderfully.

A shot of the top corner. Be sure to put the top horizontal piece on the outside of the legs.

The 0.5 inch notch in the top horizontal piece.

Cut a door in the side and attach a latch and hinges.

Close up of the latch that I used.

I made the bearings out of square pieces of wood. The larger bearing will be bolted to the barrel, and the smaller bearing is glued to it. The small side goes against the frame, i think to limit friction and so that the bolts don't catch against the frame.

Glue the little bearing to the bigger bearing.
You can see the piece of rebar that will go through the barrel and hold it in place on the frame.

The whole is drilled in the "exact" center of the barrel, so that the rebar can fit through and rest on the frame. I got the barrel from a friend for free.

The project should be finished in a day or two, once the glue dries. I'll post photos of the finished product.

New Kawasaki 500 Vulcan

2009-03-20T18:01:00.000-07:00

Ok, it's not soil related, but here's a photo of my beautiful wife on my beautiful new bike. It's a 1996 Kawasaki 500 Vulcan. In the background you can see my 1980 Kawasaki 750 LTD, which my brother gave me a couple years ago. All three of them are beautiful in their own way.

Snow in Alabama!

2009-03-01T12:10:00.000-08:00

We had an amazing snowfall in Alabama!
The onions didn't mind the snow...

And neither did the garlic...

And the peas seemed to love it! They're just germinating...

Mom's Peach Tree Planting

2009-02-23T06:58:00.000-08:00

Planted a peach tree at Mom and Jack's cabin for her 60th birthday. Happy birthday, Mom!

I chose a Redhaven variety, which requires 950 chilling hours.
The NC extension office recommends varieties that require over 700 chilling hours because of common late freezes in the area.

I amended the soil with mushroom compost and 20-20-20 slow-release starter fertilizer.

I hope it produces many delicious peaches for years to come!

600 Seedlings

2009-02-15T17:42:00.000-08:00

Actually, only 544 in the flats above:
65 super sweet chen basil
135 opal (purple) basil
96 genovese basil
8 arugula
8 slicing tomatoes
8 king of the north bell peppers
8 cherry tomatoes
70 bolivian rainbow peppers
40 hidalgo chilis
50 sunrise orange bell peppers
40 italian flat leaf parsley

Me and my arugula, onions, and garlic.

A closer shot of my garlic patch.
I interseeded with Nantes coreless carrots today.

Onions, which i started from seed probably last September. They take forever.
These I also interseeded with carrots, Danvers 126.

Ever seen rosemary in bloom? It's bloomed the last couple of years, i have no idea why.

Seed saving from last year's Bolivian Rainbow peppers.
I left them on the plant all winter, so they went to seed.
I'll give the seed away or grow more transplants.

Soil morphology

2009-02-12T13:53:00.000-08:00

I'm teaching the lab portion for soil morphology this semester. Just got back from the field now.

This is what we call a soil ped. "Ped" is a great scrabble word, btw.

We use peds to describe the soil structure using terms such as "subangular blocky", "granular", etc.

The ped above is weathered parent material, or saprolite, and can be found in the lower soil horizons, which in this case we would probably describe as a BC horizon.

When we go to the field to describe soils, we look at the soil profile. Sometimes the soil horizons are easy to pick out, most of the time they are not. They are difficult to see in this picture. But what you can see is the moisture deficit in the upper 10 inches of soil due to the last three years of drought and the well-drained nature of this soil.

Here are some students coloring a soil ped using a Munsell color chart.

Maxed out on striper today

2009-02-07T12:20:00.000-08:00

Went striper fishing with my major professor today. We just maxed out so now we're heading in for a cold one!
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Winter harvest

2009-02-07T10:36:00.000-08:00

We harvested 496 lbs of produce from the community garden the other day!
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I've been referenced!

2009-02-02T09:57:00.000-08:00

I was surprised to see my name referenced at the poster section during the conference I'm at. It's the first time I've been referenced to my knowledge!
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About to set sail

2009-01-03T07:51:00.000-08:00

We're at the port now, about to embark on the MS Noordam.
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Last trip to the field!

2008-12-13T20:33:00.001-08:00

Had to get back out into the field today, on a Saturday, to get a few photos of the organic matter accumulation in my fields again. Here's a shot of an armadillo "throw" which buried my organic matter with about two inches of soil.
Emma came with me too! She just can't resist pulling soil samples! Notice how the weeds are in rows, the same rows in which we grew collards. That's because we tilled those rows. Where we didn't till, there aren't weeds. This shows that no-till suppresses weeds, a major conclusion of this experiment.Just can't resist another photo of our organic matter accumulation after three years of no-till in a productive agricultural field in Alabama. Here we have a full inch of organic matter, which accumulated in 3 years!

Remember, it takes about 500 years to build an inch of soil under natural circumstances, but here we can obtain food while simultaneously improving soil quality. I will definitely be showing this slide at my next conference!

Building Organic Matter in Alabama

2008-11-22T08:14:00.000-08:00

This is an uncommon site in Alabama!
Actual soil organic matter in an agricultural field!

You can see the dark, rich organic matter in the top 2 cm of the soil profile. This is the result of 3 years of no-till with high biomass cover crops and organic mulches. Though it might not seem like a lot, keep in mind that it take about 500 years to build one inch of soil...

This is what can happen when you don't till your field. Tillage turns plant residue into the soil, accelerating decomposition. In Alabama, our climate is usually thought to be too hot and humid to allow for appreciable organic matter accumulation in agricultural fields, but if you grow lots of biomass and stop tilling, you can get some good organic matter accumulation.

Taking a soil sample...

...and fractionating the sample by depth.
The samples will be analyzed for nutrient content, microbial respiration, nitrogen mineralization rates, and aggregate stability.

Collard Harvest 2008

2008-11-19T18:08:00.000-08:00

Today we harvested about 3000 lbs of collard greens
from the final harvest of my experiment in Tallassee, AL.

The collard field, about 0.3 acres.

It was about 28F (-2C) the night before.
By the time we started the harvest, there was still ice on the collards.
It was cold,
but they say that collards taste better after a good freeze!

But it didn't take long to warm up.
This is Jordan, a student worker, hand-harvesting.

This is the smallest truckload we brought to the Food Bank.
We donate almost all of the produce to the East Alabama Food Bank.
Today, we donated approximately 2300 lbs of fresh collard greens,
a TON of collards -- literally,
just in time for Thanksgiving!

Off-loading the collards at the Food Bank into large cardboard "totes".

Weighing the collards at the Food Bank by forklift.
All the donations get weighed.
Each tote has a net weight of about 300 lbs.
We filled more than 7 of these totes.

The Food Bank will be busy distributing the collards to needy people throughout East Alabama
over the next several days.

Tailgating vs GA

2008-11-15T10:28:00.000-08:00

It's freezing out but we're still tailgating against Georgia! Note the heater on the table and the game in the back. And we're actually winning! War Eagle!
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Planted Onions and Garlic Today

2008-11-09T21:14:00.000-08:00

Finally got around to amending the soil in my raised bed this morning.

I used the worm castings from our worm farm,
and lots of bags of manure, compost, topsoil and peat.

Here's the flat of onions that I produced from seed.
I've been trying to kill them for about two or three months now,
so I'm glad to finally have them in the ground.

It's hard to see the onion transplants here. I'll post a better photo when they get larger.
Also planted garlic today, too...
Some exotic variety from Seeds of Change.

Hand-Made Pasta

2008-11-09T21:04:00.000-08:00

We went over to some friends' house, and was surprised to see them making pasta...
By hand!

These photos are in reverse order.
Sorry bout that.
Blogspot needs to make it easier to edit blogs.

Collecting cow pies

2008-11-01T07:53:00.000-07:00

We're collecting soil under cow pies this morning. We'll see how the nutrients move thru the soil profile
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Billy Beer!

2008-10-12T11:30:00.000-07:00

Found this unopened can of Billy Beer in Opelika, AL. It was brewed for Billy Carter, Jimmy's kid brother. Bit of history in every can!
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Collard mulching experiment

2008-09-30T13:22:00.000-07:00

The mulching treatments can be seen in these photos. This experiment is part of my PhD work. The mulches are mimosa, lespedeza, straw and a control.
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Last cotton count

2008-09-26T07:29:00.000-07:00

McCain might not show up today but I showed up for our final wilt count. I'm always glad when the cotton season is over.
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TP shooter

2008-09-06T13:51:00.000-07:00

How to maximize tp
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Auburn wins!

2008-09-06T13:30:00.000-07:00

Toomer's corner just after our win against Mississippi.
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Emma's new bike

2008-09-04T10:58:00.000-07:00

Emma being fitted for her new Trek 1.2 bike, suitable for commuting, training and racing! Shimano shifters, brakes and deraillers, carbon fork, aluminum frame... I wish I had me one!
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Switchgrass sampling

2008-08-29T13:10:00.000-07:00

This morning we went to the field to collect samples of switchgrass. There is a lot of interest in switchgrass at the moment for use as a biofuel. It is a native grass to the area and grows quickly. There are also big bluestem plots, also native.

This is for a fertilize trial; we will develop fertiler recommendations based on this study. Hopefully it doesn't need any, but I think this experiment will show some response to fertilizer. You could get lost in those plots!
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Counting cotton

2008-08-07T05:06:00.000-07:00

Counting cotton for a fusarium wilt study.

Blogging straight from the field. P
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Root knot nematodes

2008-08-04T10:10:00.000-07:00

This is an infestation of root knot nematodes in my garden tomatoes. I will pull the area out of production and sterilize the soil using solar radiation and clear plastic for 4-6 weeks. Then I'll add more organic matter and directly plant my fall crops.

Nematodes can be a deadly but common problem here in the south, although there are beneficial nematodes too. They are small worm-like parasites that feed on roots.

The galls on these tomato roots are indicative of root knot nematodes.
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Fish TV

2008-08-01T21:41:00.000-07:00

We may not have a TV, but we do have a fish tank, now with even more channels!

We more than doubled our fish population yesterday, thanks to a local Moroccan fish dealer we heard about through the grapevine. We now have about 9 zebra denios, 6 neon tetras, an albino bottom cleaner (we call him Moby, he's our favorite pet), an algae eater, and a guarini (he's called Labowski, or "The Dude").
Not soil related exactly, but worth a post anyway. I think i watch them as much as some people watch TV!

Conservation tillage tours

2008-07-30T17:31:00.000-07:00

I'm at a conservation tillage conference here in Tifton, Georgia, USA at the moment. Today I went on a conservation tillage tour and saw some pretty cool operations.This is "twin row" peanut. Planting peanuts in twin rows is a common practice, although it is just as often planted in single rows. The idea is that twin rows fit more plants per acre, and therefore increase yield per acre, but it requires special (and expensive) implements.

This was the coolest thing I saw today on the tour. This is the same twin row peanut as the first photo. It's worth clicking on the photo above to see what i'm talking about here.

To the lower right, the black tube is called drip tape. It delivers water directly to the plant roots, thereby increasing water use efficiency (no evaporation loss), which is particularly important during these times of drought and high energy prices (running the pumps more = more $$$). You can also inject fertilizer directly to the roots as well.

But that's not the coolest part. These are PEANUTS. That means they need to be dug out of the ground. Imagine spending all winter installing this system, not to mention the boatloads of money, only to hook one of your drip tape lines and rip the system up! Pretty scary if you're a farmer. So this drip tape is buried at about 12 inches, while peanuts will be dug at about 8 inches. That leaves a 4 inch margin of error. Imagine if you had a few inches of erosion, or if you sunk a tractor wheel a few inches while digging...

In order to make certain that you dig in the same exact place year after year, you need GPS RTK technology on your tractors. (More $$$.) GPS on your tractors allows you to exactly maximize your land use, as well as apply variable fertilizer rates across the field as the crops need it (after downloading satellite data to determine which parts of the field need what rates of fertilizer), and a bunch of other "precision agriculture" applications.

Does it work? If you look at the photo, you'll see the roots of the peanut actually tend toward the drip tape. Remember, we're in a drought here in the southeastern US, for the third year in a row. So where there's water, there's roots. Roots are amazing like that. They'll "search out" favorable conditions, whether it's a better pH, or more nutrients, or, in this case, water.

Water is the best fertilizer!

This is conservation tillage peanut. Conservation tillage is defined as having at least 30% soil coverage after planting, which helps increase organic matter content in soil.This photo shows conventional till cotton on the left, and conservation till on the right. Easy to see the difference here.Center pivot irrigation, in case you've never seen it before.

The hanging water spigots here gets the water closer to the ground, thereby limiting evaporation (it gets hot here) by getting the water closer to the ground. Profits are so slim as a producer, every cent per acre is money in your pocket.

And here's a picture of some cotton flowers, in case you wondered what they look like. You can see that they are first a kind of pink, and then mature to a big white, beautiful flower.

Community Garden Harvest

2008-07-23T20:03:00.000-07:00

A few of our great volunteers working to control weeds the old fashioned way: by hand cultivation. In this age of Roundup and high labor costs, this time-tested technique is not seen too often anymore, at least outside of organic production.

And then the "fruits" of their labor! These will be delivered to the Food Bank tomorrow. Pink eye purple hull peas are seen in the crate in the upper left. There are also green tomatoes, cukes, squash, eggplant, and peppers.

Alabama Days at the garden

2008-07-03T09:39:00.001-07:00

Alabama Days, stringing up tomatoes at the community garden, while others hoe rows in the background.
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The Auburn Community Garden

2008-06-25T17:53:00.001-07:00

The Auburn community garden.

All produce goes to the local food bank.

This is my first blog by phone!

Late spring at the experiment station

2008-06-24T21:14:00.001-07:00

This is my main field experiment in S. Tallassee, AL.

This field of rye is the residue of my winter cover crop, measuring about 3.5 tons per acre.

It was killed without the use of herbicides using crimp-and-roll equipment, which is why all the rye is lying in the same direction.

In order to plant in a no-till field, all the residue must lie in the same direction so that the stalks don't clog up the tillage equipment.

This is a decomposition experiment.

Nylon mesh litterbags are packed with samples of organic mulches, then either buried (to represent conventional tillage) or placed on the surface (to represent no-till).

The bags are retrieved periodically and the contents are analyzed for mass and nutrient content.

Knowing the different nutrient release rates between conventional and no till will inform farmers about how and when nutrients are released from the mulches and available to the plants.

No-till is known to conserve soil by limiting erosion, as well as conserving soil moisture, which means less irrigation. Nutrients are also released more slowly when no-till is practiced.

Spring Freeze in Alabama

2008-04-16T20:03:00.000-07:00

Dianthus x 'Raspberry Swirl'

Just planted these about a month ago. They are doing great!

Lavendar

Planted last year, these plants are overgrowing their bed! My wife loves the blossoms. She dries them, sews them up in sachets, and puts them in with the clothes. Good stuff!

Some of the seedlings I started a couple months ago. Lots of different peppers this year. I am determined to grow peppers.

Hooding of the tomatoes. Temperatures dipped below freezing the other night, but I saved them!

Veggie Garden 1

2008-03-29T17:39:00.001-07:00

I have the earliest tomato blossoms in the area this year. I inherited 6 heirloom seedlings, planted in November, that were pot bound and P starved, but i resurrected them. I saw this week that they started blooming, so i decided now was a good time to put them in the ground.

A lot of old-timers around here say to plant on Good Friday, but this year it came a bit early, so i waited a week. Hopefully, we've seen the last frost.

If all goes well, we could have our first tomatoes in May!

This is our longleaf pine, a native species to this area. Oddly, the daffodils have not bloomed yet... And i saw some blooming just down the road, too. I must've got defective bulbs.

The soils in these parts are sandy and compacted, so I built these raised beds and amended the soil since we moved in. These are onions and garlic that i planted last fall. Sometimes they get a side-dressing of spent yeast from my beer fermentations...

Here are the tomatoes I transplanted today. They don't look so tall here, but it's a good idea to prune off the lower leaves and plant the stem deep. The stems will then produce roots, giving them a stronger root system.

I gave the plot some triple 13 (13-13-13) as a starter. I'm not going to mulch the bed this year because i always have cutworm problems.

I didn't want to put this photo in because there's nothing in it, but in the interest of completeness, i guess i have to show the bed pre-plant. I did put in 3 tomatoes, tho, but you can hardly see them yet.

Winter mortalities

2008-03-24T21:24:00.000-07:00

Well, winter killed a few of my landscaping plants, and if i don't replace them now, it'll be too late. The cold last night almost killed my tomato and pepper seedlings, and tonight it'll be just below freezing, so i had to move Alabama Days out of the bedroom to make room for our summer veggies-to-be. She'll understand come our first tomato harvest, i'm sure.