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Showing posts from March, 2018

How to Grow Edible Asparagus in a Raised Bed

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Asparagus is rich in vitamins A, B2, and C and contains iron, calcium, and potassium (Ingram, 2002). Asparagus is a perennial vegetable suitable for all zones. Asparagus requires a lot of water and full sun. Plants reach full production in 2 - 3 years and continue producing for 10 - 15 years. PLANTING WHEN: Early Spring (cold climates); Fall and Winter (warm climates) WHERE: Sunny location; 8" below ground level; 12" apart HOW: Fill raised bed with loose, rich soil to 8" below the top of the bed Form 2 rows of mounds spaced 12" apart  Drape roots evenly over mount C over with 2" of soil Soak with water (During the 1st season Only)- Fill the bed as the shoots appear until you reach the top of the bed NOTE: Do not cover growing tip! GROWING Cultivate, feed and water heavily. BLANCHING White asparagus form in the absence of sunlight. To achieve this, in spring, mount 8" of soil over the row of a...

Forests Forever

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We use forest products every day. Its estimate the average American uses six trees worth of paper per year. [1] Forests provide us with building materials, fuel, and paper products. Our forests also provide ecosystem services in the way of filtering the air we breathe, facilitating water exchange between soil and air, and provide habitat. Because of our high reliance on forest products, there is a high demand for them. Worldwide it is estimated that an area the size of a football field is cleared every 3-seconds. [2] The reality is we will not stop using forest products. So, what we can do is reduce our impact on timber extraction. There are steps we can take as consumers to reduce the impact on our forests. 1. Recycle paper products 2. Make 2-sided copies 3. Reuse old office paper as scrap paper 4. Use email instead of print mail 5. Store information as digital copies instead of printing copies 6. Purchase forest products (timber and paper) with...

Microbeads, Microfibers, Microplastics, Oh My!

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Have you heard? Glitter is not only a difficult to clean-up, it is bad for the environment. (Don’t worry – there is an eco-friendly alternative – keep reading to find out.) Glitter is made of microplastics (tiny bits of plastic about the size of a sesame seed). Glitter is not the only source of microplastic, microbeads (found in cosmetics and toiletry products), pellets used to make larger pieces of plastic and microfibers (used for rope and fleece). 1 How? Microplastics end up in our waterways through a variety of methods. One way is washing microplastics (glitter and microbead face wash) and microfibers (washing fleece) down the drain. These small particles can easily pass through water filtration systems. The other is from the breakdown of larger plastics debris that have washed in the waterway. It is estimated that the accumulation of microplastics in the oceans range from 15 – 51 trillion 2 with approximately 8 trillion microbeads entering U.S. waters daily. 3 Additiona...