Whoops, Connie forgot to mention that the most recent equinox was September 22, though from her diagram, some puzzle fans might deduce that it would happen about six months prior to the March 20 equinox.

If you you live up North and plan to extend your growing season, you need to get moving now (a month ago would have been better). The best reference on season extension that I’ve actually used is Eliot Coleman’s Four-Season Harvest. I have yet to read his new book The Winter Harvest Handbook, but it’s been getting good reviews, too.

And for all you hardcore permies out there, yes, we’ll be looking at perennials soon.  This first season Permyz has used annuals to get  a yield while building soil.

Oh, and watch for an unbelievably far-out new storyline next week…

–Kev

To learn more about seed saving, visit the aptly-named seedsave.org.

Aaand we’re back to the larger size!

OK, so some handfuls of soil have strep, staph, tetanus and a few plant diseases. But out of 10,000 to a million species, that’s not a whole lot of baddies.

You’ll find Gigi’s comment about bacteria throughout the soil science literature, but the first article I tracked down on the subject suggests that pristine soil can have up to a million species of bacteria (Gans, Wolinsky and Dunbar; Science August 26, 2005.  Vol. 309, pp. 1387-1390).

Answers to yesterday’s question: (1) fruit espalier along the fence and (2) planted in a guild with bulbs; (3) chicken tractor; (4) pool converted to a natural swimming pond, fed by (5) rooftop catchment (6) filtering through a constructed wetland; (7) potatoes growing in stacked tires filled with straw; (8) an herb spiral; (9) keyhole beds (10) polycropped with garlic and salad greens.