Christian Braun is an instant legend for this

The satisfaction of eating food you grew on your own, in your own garden, is indescribable. There’s something basic and rewarding about producing your own produce – you know exactly where it came from, how it was grown, and what fertilizers and which pesticides were used. Plus they taste pretty damn good too. One way to make them taste even better? Rotation crop farming. Rotation Crop Farming: A Healthier and Smarter Garden Needless to say, home gardens are really cool: they are useful; they are economical; they are healthy for the earth and for you, the owner. But cultivating a productive garden isn’t as easy as throwing out some seeds, sitting back, cracking a beer and watching your bounty grow, hose in hand. If only it were. Agriculture is one of mankind’s oldest forms of science, and over the millennia we’ve developed a lot of tricks, tips, and methods for perfecting the art of farming successfully. The study is immense. One of the most effective tricks for improving your garden’s health and crop yield, is known as “crop rotation farming”. Crop rotation farming is, in a nutshell, the systematic approach to picking which crop to plant where, and how to cycle each from one year to the next. Before you get intimidated by that description, just hear me out: this form of farming is a lot easier than it may at first sound – it does require marginally more effort on your part, but the payoff is well-worth it. Crop rotation is not a new trick. It is not a trendy hipster secret or some kind of sexy life-hack. This is an ancient, tried and field-tested method for maintaining quality soil, healthy plants, and high crop yields. It goes back as far as Mesopotamian farmers, who employed basic crop rotation tactics over 8000 years ago! Anything that has been around for that long has to be pretty effective! Why Crop Rotation is SO Beneficial Well, actually I’m going to start by explaining why monocrop (or monoculture) farming is so bad. Monocrop farming is exactly what it sounds like – farming the same crop in the same field season after season without change. It's basically the exact opposite of crop rotation farming. Monocrop farming is bad for two main reasons: First and foremost, it's unhealthy for the soil. It doesn’t allow the soil any time to recover and offers no variation in nutrients – meaning that fertile farming soil dries out and essentially dies. And when your soil goes bad, your crops die, and when there’s no crops to hold down the soil, you get the Dust Bowl of the 1930’s. And nobody wants another Dust Bowl. The second reason is most easily explained by the old adage, “Never put all of your eggs in one basket.” If a particular type of parasite or disease breaks out and all of your crops are the same, you are vulnerable to losing all of your produce in a single fell blow, with nothing to fall back on. Think of Ireland’s Great Potato Famine… Conversely, crop rotation farming diversifies the soil nutrients, making a rich and highly fertile blend. This makes it easy to grow plants, which prevents soil erosion, and makes produce grow plentifully. It’s a win-win-win situation – the environment is happy, you're happy, and your crops are happy (until they’re eaten, that is). It also helps reduce problems with soil dwelling insects and soil borne diseases. The How To | You don’t need a degree in agricultural sciences to perfect the art of rotation crop farming – you just need to put in a little extra work (which pays off big in the end). You don’t even need that big of a garden, either. Size matters little when it comes to rotation crop farming – whether you have tens of acres of land you want to utilize solely for agriculture, you’re garden is just a small corner of your backyard, or even if you just have a handful of ceramic pots – rotation crop farming works on all scales. It is best to have separate beds for separate families of produce, but you don’t need to. You can just divide one bed into several crop areas and rotate them thusly. The only downside to this is that, if you do get a soil borne disease or parasite, it will spread much more easily from crop to crop. Familiarize yourself with the different families of produce. This is how you will group your rotation batches. Here is a general list of families to plant by: Nightshades (Solanaceous): Tomatillos, tomatoes, eggplants, okra, peppers, potatoes Squash, Melons,  and Cucumbers (cucurbits): Musk melon, cucumbers, summer squash & zucchini, watermelon, gourd, pumpkin Morning Glory: Sweet Potato Goosefoot (Amaranthaceae): Spinach, quinoa, beet, orach, chard, Sunflower (Asteraceae): Jerusalem artichoke, sunflower, lettuce, artichoke, endive Cole (Brassicas): Brussels sprouts, broccoli, cauliflower, kale, cabbage, radishes, collards, kohlrabi, turnip, rutabaga,  mustard Onions: Onions, chives, leeks, garlic Peas (legumes): Runner beans, garbanzo beans, peas,  fava beans, bush beans, peanuts Grasses: Millet, corn, rice, wheat, barley, rye Parsley: Carrots, parsley, parsnips, celery, cilantro/coriander, fennel You can have as many different families in rotation as you want, but generally, you need at least two to flip-flop crops. Then, after each season, when the crops have yielded their bounty, rotate all of your crop families to a new bed when you’re ready to replant. Rotation crop farming is like musical chairs for a garden! It is also highly encouraged to keep a bed/field “fallow” each season. That is to say, leave one bed/field unplanted so that the soil can truly rest and recuperate. If your land is large enough, many farmers keep livestock (like chickens and sheep) on their fallow field, because the animals aerate and fertilize the soil even more, so that when you do plant there next season, the soil is extra fertile and super healthy. If you don’t have livestock, you can plant a “cover crop” on the otherwise fallow field/bed – like alfalfa, white Dutch clover, or rye – to add fertility and improve drainage. That way you still get some use out of an otherwise empty bed. Do It the Right Way | If you’re planning on starting a garden, or already have one and want to improve upon it, crop rotation is the most effective method for doing so. There are no drawbacks to it – only positive effects and benefits for you and your environment. This video posted by GrowVeg makes crop rotation simple: As I mentioned, there’s something truly, genuinely good about growing your own food. But it isn’t always easy, and there are a lot of tricks and methods for it that can sometimes get confusing. That doesn’t mean they are unachievable though! So whether you are growing produce in a tiny greenhouse, in your backyard, or on a decent sized farm, you might as well do it the right way – with crop rotation. You will be surely glad you did. Do you have any more ideas about crop rotation? Let us know in the comments below. Looking for more gardening ideas? Check out these 5 easy gardening tips that'll have you grow plants like a pro Follow us on Instagram, twitter, pinterest, and facebook!

Two glass onion bottles that survived 300 years under the waters of Florida’s Atlantic coast have been successfully liberated from marine encrustations and returned to shininess. Conservators at the Florida Division of Historical Resources Bureau of Archaeological Research’s Conservation Lab were able to salvage these rare surviving examples of 17th century glass by cleaning them of thick concretion layers and consolidating the fragile surface. The bottles were recovered from the wreck site off the coast of Indian River County in 2021 and 2022. The specific ship could not been identified, but it was part of the 1715 Spanish Plate Fleet, the convoy of gold, silver, gemstones, tobacco, chocolate, spices and indigo transported from the New World colonies to Spain. Eleven ships from that fleet were destroyed by a hurricane off the coast of Florida. Onion bottles were made using the free-blown technique: molten glass inflated by the glassblower through a blowpipe rather than made with a mold. Every piece produced with this technique is unique in shape, size, thickness and weight. They were used in trade for their contents as well as utilitarian objects. On the ship, these bottles likely held an alcoholic beverage drunk by the crew and passengers. This type of bottle is fragile and rarely survives intact. They were usually broken in the wreck of the ship, and if they did somehow manage to reach the seabed in one piece, they would be constantly subjected to rough treatment by tidal forces. As they were buffeted about, they also crusted up with sand, shells and other assorted marine creatures. Over time, the concretions and constant exposure to sea water would cause the glass surface to delaminate (ie, thin shards of glass flaking off). It took conservators seven months of painstaking work to clean and stabilize the fragile vessels. With meticulously slow cleaning and drying, the bottles remained intact and were then consolidated with Paraloid B-72, an acrylic resin based consolidant typically used in glass and ceramic conservation. Several coats of this stabilized the remaining glass flakes that were flying off and gave the bottles that shiny appearance you can see in the after-treatment photos. The newly-restored onion bottles are now available for exhibition at local museums through the Florida Division of Historical Resources’ Artifact Loan Program.

On October 26, J.D. Vance, the Republican vice-presidential candidate, marked a distance with Israel on the escalating situation in the Middle East. On the Tim Dillon Show, he acknowledged Israel’s…

In her closing spiel at the Ellipse on Tuesday night, Vice President Kamala Harris was flanked by giant banners with the word FREEDOM. Harris returned to her Democratic National Convention theme,…

No matter where you stand on the issue of abortion, there are two items of broad consensus: First, that unrestricted late-term (up to the point of birth) abortion should not be legal, and, second, that…

Foreign Affairs J.D. Vance Says a War With Iran Is Not in the U.S. Interest The vice-presidential candidate’s comments are the latest evidence of the gravity of the GOP foreign policy realignment. Credit: Ive radin On October 26, J.D. Vance, the Republican vice-presidential candidate, marked a distance with Israel on the escalating situation in the Middle East. On the Tim Dillon Show, he acknowledged Israel’s right to defend itself, but cautioned that “America’s interest is sometimes going to be distinct [from Israel’s]. Sometimes we’re going to have overlapping interests, and sometimes we’re going to have distinct interests.” He clarified further that the U.S. interest “very much is in not going to war with Iran”. Such a war, Vance emphasized, “would be a huge distraction of resources; it would be massively expensive to our country”. These remarks are significant for several reasons. First, they are said in the midst of a tightly fought presidential election, with most polls suggesting the Harris–Trump showdown is a toss-up. When it comes to Israel, especially during an election, what most U.S. politicians typically offer is the boilerplate of platitudes on Washington’s “ironclad” commitment to Israel’s security and efforts to out-hawk each other on the “pariah states” like Iran.  As Responsible Statecraft’s Kelley Vlahos noted, commenting on the debate between Vance and Governor Tim Walz, trying to outgun a Democratic opponent on Iran rhetoric is what a more hawkish Republican candidate, like Nikki Haley, would have done in Vance’s place.  It is true that Vance did sound some conventional lines in that debate, such as a need to stand by Israel, but what is noteworthy is that he did not seize on the opportunity to burnish his aggressive credentials, even though the CBS anchor Margaret Brennan made it easy for him to do so by framing the only foreign policy issue as a question of whether the candidates were ready to preemptively strike Iran (a nation, lest we forget, not at war with the U.S.). Vance did repeat allegations about the Biden-Harris administration easing some $100 billion to Iran; when reminded by his opponent of Donald Trump’s withdrawal from the nuclear deal with Iran in 2018, however, he said that “diplomacy is not a dirty word,” suggesting a potential openness to talk to Tehran. Second, those skeptical of the Republican Party’s shift to a foreign policy restraint have often alleged that that shift is opportunistic and selective—namely, implying that the only war the Republicans did not like was the one in Ukraine, as it is seen as a Democrats’ war fought for “liberal” causes.  It is true that Vance lamented some “Americans leaders’” propensity to identify a “good guy” and a “bad guy” in that war, which led to a firestorm of accusations of cozying up to the Russia’s President Vladimir Putin—ignoring the fact that Vance did condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The point he was making, though, was that the war has exhausted both countries and it was now “time to stop killing.” Coming out against a war on Iran—a highly unpopular country in the U.S. (and for good reasons)—gives some credence to the notion that the GOP’s fresh restraint could be more than just an opportunistic partisanship. This impression is reinforced by statements of other influential Republicans like Elbridge Colby, the former high-ranking Pentagon official and a strong candidate to be the Trump II national security advisor, who has confessed himself to be an “‘iconoclast’ to the idea of a hyper-aggressive, wildly expansive foreign policy that would get us in to a lot of wars—and lose them.”    Conversely, neoconservative luminaries like William Kristol and Robert Kagan, who resigned from the board of the Washington Post over its failure to endorse Kamala Harris for presidency, are migrating to the Democratic party. Both Kristol and Kagan are unrepentant cheerleaders for the Iraq invasion some 20 years ago. And Harris found a common cause with a key architect of that war—the former vice president Dick Cheney and his hawkish daughter, the former representative Liz Cheney (R-WY).  None of that, of course, means that there is now a clear-cut divide between an ostensibly pro-restraint GOP and the pro-war Democrats. It’s more complicated than that. Some hawkish Republicans are reportedly being mulled for key national security positions in the hypothetical new Trump administration, such as Ric Grenell, the former ambassador to Germany and acting national intelligence director, Arkansas’s Senator Tom Cotton, and  Mike Pompeo, the former secretary of state and now a lobbyist for a Ukrainian telecommunications firm. At the same time, there are pro-restraint Democrats, such as Vice-President Harris’s foreign policy adviser Philip Gordon, tagged for the top national security jobs should Harris win. Drawing from his own extensive executive experience, Gordon wrote a sensible book about the futility of regime change wars in the Middle East.  What matters, however, is the trajectory. That the influential ascendant Republicans like Vance and Colby (not to forget the self-styled Nixonian realist Vivek Ramaswamy) oppose “forever wars”, while the Democrats embrace hawkishness, is indicative of where both parties might be heading in terms of foreign policy.  That may make a difference after November 5. As the outgoing Biden administration put the THAAD anti-missile defense system in place in Israel and sent Americans to make it operational to deter possible Iranian attacks—without restraining Israel’s own escalatory actions—it is “gambling with American lives in a manner that may leave scores killed from retaliation by Iran or Iraqi militias,” warns Trita Parsi, the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft’s executive vice-president. If the Trump-Vance ticket wins, it will have a chance to show leadership by following up on Vance’s remarks on Israel and Iran, and act to ensure that no U.S. soldiers are killed, as Parsi put it, “in a war they did not fight for America and that Congress never authorized”.  The post J.D. Vance Says a War With Iran Is Not in the U.S. Interest appeared first on The American Conservative.

Politics Kamala’s “Freedom From Freedom” Hoax Don’t be fooled—the Harris campaign promises old-fashioned government paternalism. In her closing spiel at the Ellipse on Tuesday night, Vice President Kamala Harris was flanked by giant banners with the word FREEDOM. Harris returned to her Democratic National Convention theme, along with the “joy” and “positive vibes” motifs that marked the launch of her campaign after President Joe Biden’s defenestration. Tuesday night’s theme echoed her website pitch: “Vice President Harris and Governor Walz are fighting for a New Way Forward that protects our fundamental freedoms…” But Harris is offering a vast expansion of federal power cloaked with a venerable ideal. Traditional American freedom rests upon the constitutional and legal rights of American citizens—rights that restrain government officials from domineering citizens’ lives. Kamala Freedom requires unlimited interventions to deliver whatever benefits politicians decree. Speaking almost in the shadow of the White House, Kamala again promised to give Americans “freedom from gun violence.” The Second Amendment of the Bill of Rights pledged in perpetuity that Americans’ right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. But Americans won’t have “freedom from gun violence” unless government controls every trigger in the land. Harris previously supported banning private ownership of pistols, warrantless searches of people’s homes to inspect their firearms, and confiscating the most popular rifle in America. Disarming Americans will leave them in total dependency on the same politicians who lied to confiscate their guns in the first place. In a speech last Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Harris promised to safeguard “freedom from fear, violence, and harm.” Pledging “freedom from fear” entitles politicians to seize power over anything that frightens anyone. People who sound the alarm about excessive government power will be guilty of subverting freedom from fear. Would the Biden-Harris administration justify its false claims on a decrease in national violent crime rates to provide “freedom from fear”—even if it were a delusion?  Kamala Freedom depends on politicians having unlimited sway to decree who pays what—or who pays nothing. Harris bragged, “President Biden and I are removing obstacles to financial freedom. We have forgiven $167 billion in student loan debt for more than 4.7 million people.” Biden and Harris have trumpeted their contempt for rulings by the Supreme Court and other federal courts striking down the student debt forgiveness schemes as illegal. But fidelity to the Constitution is a paltry benefit compared to letting politicians scatter benefits and buy votes across the land.  Kamala will deliver “freedom from inequality” by seizing boundless sway to determine who gets what. Her Opportunity Economy will deliver “equity,” which Harris defines as equal results: “Some people need more so we all end up in the same place.” How much more? It’s a secret. Which groups receive more? You’ll find that out after you elect Harris. (No wonder she dodges interviews where she would be pressured to explain how she will use the power she seeks.) Harris endlessly proclaims: “I believe in the fundamental freedom of Americans to make decisions about their own bodies and not have the government tell them what to do.” Unless, of course, politicians want to forcibly inject citizens with experimental vaccines. Harris has shown no remorse for the vaccine mandate that Biden decreed after he falsely promised that the vaccines would prevent Americans from getting or transmitting Covid.  The key to Kamala Freedom is that government victims don’t count—they simply don’t exist for official scoring. Thousands of women were wrongfully fired for refusing to comply with Biden’s illegal vaccine mandate, which he issued in September 2021 and which the Supreme Court struck down in January 2022 (except for health care workers). But, unlike the women who oppose limits on abortion, those who lost their jobs due to illegal vaccine mandates have been totally ignored by Harris and other politicians.  A Harris campaign video promised to deliver “freedom from extremism.” In Washington, anyone who doesn’t worship government is considered an extremist. Distrusting the federal government is extremism at its worst. So Americans won’t have true freedom until politicians forcibly suppress any idea they label as immoderate. Harris is hellbent on giving Americans “freedom from misinformation,” regardless of how many people must be muzzled. In her first presidential campaign in 2019, Harris vowed to crack down on social media companies that refused to kowtow: “If you don’t police your platforms, we are going to hold you accountable.” Her Vice Presidential nominee, Minnesota’s Gov. Tim Walz, bluntly declared, “There’s no guarantee to free speech on misinformation or hate speech, and especially around our democracy.” But the First Amendment explicitly bans any federal Ministry of Truth. Harris effectively ignored the federal court decisions condemning the sweeping covert censorship by the Biden administration.  Harris has also promised Americans “the freedom to simply be.” Does she intend to provide new subsidies for psychobabble? Will Harris appoint a “Simply Be Czar”?  Harris promises liberty via unleashing Leviathan. And there is no danger to freedom because Harris is the best friend and protector that any citizen could want. Well, at least any good citizen—defined as people who submit and live as they are told. But how can doubtful citizens have “freedom from fear” that their rulers think they are garbage, as President Biden said of all Trump supporters on Tuesday night? Kamala Freedom is simply a new label for old-time paternalism. It presumes that citizens will be better off forced to rely on political promises rather than inviolable legal and constitutional rights. And if Kamala wins, any cavils about the wisdom of that switcheroo could vanish very quickly. The post Kamala’s “Freedom From Freedom” Hoax appeared first on The American Conservative.

Politics Why Florida’s Amendment 4 is a Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing Even pro-abortion voters should be leery of the abortion referendum. Credit: image via Shutterstock No matter where you stand on the issue of abortion, there are two items of broad consensus: First, that unrestricted late-term (up to the point of birth) abortion should not be legal, and, second, that parents of underage girls should be consulted and have the right to consent to their daughters’ obtaining of abortions. Florida’s proposed Amendment 4 up for vote on November 5 would both allow totally unrestricted abortion up to the point of birth and would remove parental rights around abortion. In just 39 words, this amendment legalizes late-term abortion, repeals parental consent for minors seeking abortion, and removes all safety regulations for abortion providers. Those in favor of unrestricted abortion might applaud the brevity, but this is no literary or legal masterpiece; its passage would be a tragedy and disaster. Brevity may be the soul of wit, but it is rarely the soul of legislation. The amendment’s vague language may make voters think they understand what they’re voting on, but the reality is this lack of clarity opens the door to dangerous consequences. The amendment states, “no law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability.” The question that must be asked is: What happens when you remove all penalties, delays, prohibitions, and restrictions on abortion? The answer is chilling. If this amendment passes, it will eliminate every single safeguard Florida currently has in place to protect women who choose abortions. Presently, abortions must be performed by licensed physicians. Amendment 4 would allow anyone to perform an abortion without licensing, training, or qualifications; that’s what happens when the government can’t “restrict” something. Under this new law, there would no longer be an ultrasound requirement before an abortion. Without an ultrasound, there is no sure way to know how far along the pregnancy is, or if the patient is even pregnant at all. Are you supposed to take the abortion provider’s word for it—that is, the word of the person profiting from the procedure? Since when does the healthcare system operate on the honor system?  What is the practical reason to remove these kinds of requirements? No one can claim with a straight face that it is to protect women’s health. We used to call abortions done by non-medical personnel without any training or licensing “back-alley abortions.” Under Amendment 4, we can start calling them constitutional abortions. This law makes women’s medical safety take a back seat to a radical pro-abortion agenda. Then there’s the matter of parental involvement. Under current law, parents must give permission for their minor child to have an abortion. Amendment 4 removes this consent requirement, replacing it with mere notification. Your 14-year-old daughter could be taken under coercion to an abortion clinic without your permission and all the clinic would have to do is notify you. You would have no power to prevent the procedure even after you are notified. Parental consent is erased entirely. If passed, this law will harm underage girls. The second part of the amendment is equally vague and dangerous. It allows abortion when “necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider.” But key terms like “health” and “healthcare provider” are left undefined. Could a massage therapist, for example, determine that an abortion is necessary to protect a woman’s mental health? The language is so broadly written that it invites this kind of interpretation. This vagueness opens the door for poorly regulated, late-term abortions—even dismemberment abortions—through all 40 weeks of pregnancy, with no clear legal boundaries. To recap: This 39-word wolf-in-sheep’s-clothing amendment would allow underage girls to have abortions without parental consent, open the door to unsafe, unregulated procedures, and permit painful, late-term, dismemberment abortions on fully viable unborn children. And none of this is necessary—Florida law already includes provisions to protect women’s health and allows for abortion in cases of rape, incest, sex trafficking, maternal health, miscarriage care or severe fetal abnormalities. Amendment 4 would take Florida from being one of the more pro-life states to one of the most pro-abortion states in the country and would make Florida a destination for abortion tourism.  No matter where you stand on the issue of abortion—whether you’re pro-life, pro-choice, or somewhere in between—if you care about women’s health, the safety of underage girls, and the protection of full-term unborn babies, Floridians should vote “No” on Amendment 4. The post Why Florida’s Amendment 4 is a Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing appeared first on The American Conservative.