Surviving the Middle Class Crash

Carrot Seed Production

P.W. Simon, USDA, ARS, Department of Horticulture, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI 53706 USA

---

Production of carrot seeds is a two-year project making it much more difficult than seed production of annual crops. Sound roots must first be produced (first year), these roots must be either harvested and carefully stored in a refrigerator or left in the field (if your winters are not too severe), these cold-treated (vernalized) roots must be grown and supplied with pollinating insects when flowering, and seed harvested. Carrot seed must be produced where no wild carrot (Queen Anne’s Lace) is growing.

---

Procedures

 

1. Grow vigorous plants.

Grow plants at the same time of year and the same way you usually would. Weak or diseased plants are subject to storage loss during vernalization and they set few seeds. Plants with pencil-sized roots may be large enough, but larger roots are preferable.

2. Vernalize roots.

Carrots require 6 to 8 weeks cold treatment (2 to 5°C) for floral induction. Cool growing conditions can reduce the cold storage requirement. Roots can be vernalized in two ways. If carrots are a summer crop in your area, you can simply leave roots in the field over your winter season if your climate provides at least 10 weeks of temperatures below 15°C but where temperatures are not so cold that roots will freeze to death. Early in the growing season plants should be thinned to at least 5 cm apart. Dead or dying leaves must be removed and tops can be cut back at your usual harvest time to 5 cm to reduce transpiration and covered with mulch if necessary. When warm weather resumes, remove mulch if necessary and leaves will regrow and after several weeks a seed stalk will appear. This is the “seed-to-seed” method of carrot seed production. Losses are often very high with this method and off-types of roots cannot be eliminated since roots are not harvested and visually examined. The “root-to-seed” method is more reliable. Harvest roots when you usually would and discard off types. Trim tops back to 2 to 4 cm, air dry until no surface moisture remains, pack in paper bags with an equal volume of wood shavings, and place paper bags in closed polyethylene bags at 2-5°C. Puncture plastic bags after several weeks when water droplets accumulate inside the polyethylene film. Better storage survival is realized if prior to refrigeration, lateral and fibrous roots are removed, soil is removed by washing gently, and senescing leaves are removed. Even with these precautions carrots are often very susceptible to pathogen infection during storage. In commercial production, roots are dipped in fungicide before vernalization but this practice is not advised without extreme caution.

3. Grow vernalized plants.

For the “root-to-seed” method, plant vernalized roots when you would plant seed in the spring, taking care to keep plants well-watered but not in standing water. Seed stalk development will be evident in 4 to 6 weeks. Control of microbial (Alternaria, Cercospora, aster yellows, motley dwarf) and insect pests (aphids, spider mites, lygus bugs) is essential to assure seed production. It is very difficult to produce carrot seed where warm humid climates favor microbial growth. Note: Carrot seed can only be produced true to type if wild carrot (Queen Anne’s Lace) is not growing nearby since wild carrot will intercross and yield white-rooted plants.

4. Pollination.

Pollination is best performed by introducing bees or flies for pollen transfer during the period of receptivity. Natural populations of bees and other insects will sometimes be adequate. As an alternative, pollen movement is possible by hand or brush but seed set will often be low. Within 4 to 6 weeks after pollination the developing seed turns brown. Harvest (before the seed shatters) into paper bags to dry completely. Late-season rains can reduce seed yield drastically. Remove spines from dry seed by rubbing. Seed is now ready to plant since carrot has no seed dormancy. Store dry seed refrigerated in a moisture-proof container.

By Dr. Mercola

American health officials declared a public health emergency as cases of swine flu were confirmed in the U.S. Health officials across the world fear this could be the leading edge of a global pandemic emerging from Mexico, where seven people are confirmed dead as a result of the new virus.

On Monday April 27th, the World Health Organization (WHO) raised its pandemic alert level to four on its six-level threat scale,¹ which means they’ve determined that the virus is capable of human-to-human transmission.

The number of fatalities, and suspected and confirmed cases across the world change depending on the source, so your best bet — if you want the latest numbers — is to use Google Maps’ Swine Flu Tracker.

Several nations have imposed travel bans, or made plans to quarantine air travelers² that present symptoms of the swine flu, such as:

• Fever of more than 100
• Coughing
• Runny nose and/or sore throat
• Joint aches
• Severe headache
• Vomiting and/or diarrhea
• Lethargy
• Lack of appetite

Top global flu experts are trying to predict how dangerous the new swine flu strain will be, as it became clear that they had little information about Mexico’s outbreak. It is as yet unclear how many cases occurred in the month or so before the outbreak was detected. It’s also unknown whether the virus was mutating to be more lethal, or less.

Is This the Pandemic Health Officials Have Been Waiting for?

Folks, you can expect to see a lot of panic over this in the near future.  But I wouldn’t be too hasty — this isn’t the first time the public has been warned about swine flu. The last time was in 1976, right before I entered medical school and I remember it very clearly. It resulted in the massive swine flu vaccine campaign.

Do you happen to recall the result of this massive campaign?

Within a few months, claims totaling $1.3 billion had been filed by victims who had suffered paralysis from the vaccine. The vaccine was also blamed for 25 deaths.

However, several hundred people developed crippling Guillain-Barré Syndrome after they were injected with the swine flu vaccine. Even healthy 20-year-olds ended up as paraplegics.

And the swine flu pandemic itself? It never materialized. READ MORE…

 

 

 

 

By Ingrid Blank

Instead of blaming multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis on patients and their alleged non-adherence to the prescribed drug regime, it would be prudent to investigate and eradicate the underlying cause for multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis and other drug and antibiotic resistant infectious diseases first—namely commercial gene technology.

The disaster unfolding on a global scale is exactly the reason why the first genetic engineers called for a moratorium in the Asilomar Declaration of 1975. For decades, reputable and ethical scientists such as Dr. Mae Wan Ho and Prof. Joe Cummins have warned—substantiated by scientific evidence— that horizontal gene transfer, i.e. the transfer of genes by vectors (viruses and other infectious agents) designed to cross species barriers and thus enhancing the potential for creating new viral and bacterial pathogens, will result in the creation of superbugs and multi-drug resistant diseases.

According to these eminent genetic researchers, strains of bacteria “crippled” in the laboratory can survive in the environment and exchange genes with other organisms. DNA from dead and living cells persists in the environment and transfers to other organisms. 

Naked viral DNA (virus without its protein coat) is even more infectious and may well be taken up by mammalian cells including our own! In addition, viral DNA has been shown to resist digestion in the gut of mice, and enters the bloodstream to infect white blood cells, spleen and liver cells.

One such virus most commonly used as a promoter in genetic engineering is the cauliflower mosaic virus (CaMV) which, due to its recombination hotspot, is prone to break and join with other DNA to integrate into the cell’s genome, which could activate host genes and lead to cancer. In addition, CaMV is closely related to the hepatitis B and HIV virus and due to its ability to propagate in plant and insect hosts after recombination may also recombine with related hepatitis B and HIV to create a most powerful disease in a large number of people consuming large numbers of virus genes incorporated into crop plants.

In the South African setting, the number of people at risk could not get any larger, since our government unilaterally decided without the people’s knowledge and above all prior consent, to grow our staple food (white maize) in genetically modified form without adhering to the precautionary principle, thus violating our constitutional rights to healthy food.

For the reasons described above, it is therefore imperative to demand immediate implementation of mandatory labeling of genetically modified food products in compliance with our constitutional rights of informed choice and consent, participation in decision-making processes and above all the individual’s right to bodily integrity, the latter being the most significant provision of the Nuremberg Code, which sets forth legal requirements for human experimentation, i.e. “voluntary consent of subject is absolutely essential.”

Likewise, the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights declares bodily integrity central to both human rights and human dignity and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights unmistakably declares that “no one shall be subjected without his free consent to medical or scientific experimentation.”

By deliberately ignoring the precautionary principle and refusing to implement mandatory labeling of GM products, this government allows its citizens to be used as guinea pigs, sacrificing the nation’s health for corporate greed. There is no such thing as “substantial equivalence.”

This phrase was coined by scientifically illiterate lawyers of the biotech industry and in 1992 written into law by G.H.W. Bush, who proclaimed GM plants to be “substantially equivalent” to their traditional counterparts and therefore did not need any special health safety study or testing. Ethical scientists and researchers consider this the biggest farce and fraud ever committed in the science field.

Contrary to what the corporate yarn spinners of biotech companies want the public to believe, not one single human safety study has ever been conducted. One does not need a Ph.D. in genetics to see the correlation between GMOs and the sharp rise in HIV infections and multi-drug resistant tuberculosis and other diseases. The decision-makers who keep violating our human right to bodily integrity by unleashing these toxins into our environment and food chain without our knowledge and consent must be held accountable.

 

 

By Barbara H. Peterson

Our nation has been on a collision course with simple, natural living for quite some time. People in cities are crammed into high-rise apartment complexes, working 12 hours per day, eating fast food as a daily staple, and getting sicker by the minute. What will it take to reverse this trend? Well, unfortunately, we don’t seem to be able to do this on our own. It is taking an economic crash, the likes of which pales the 1929 fiasco to get us thinking about going back to the basics of growing our own food. The truth is, for far too many of us, if we don’t start developing some basic survival skills, we simply won’t eat.

So how do we go about growing some of our own food and eating healthy if we live in an apartment? It’s simple. Create a Freedom Garden. There are several ways to do this in a limited space. One way is to grow your veggies in pots indoors near windows, or with grow lights. Another suggestion is to use balcony space and create vertical gardens in which plants are started in containers and trained to grow upwards on trellises, poles, or anything that encourages upwards growth.

Hydroponics gardens are another option, and can be made cheaply and easily. These require no soil, just nutrients and water. You can have fresh, organic tomatoes, lettuce, cucumbers, squash, and many other veggies right at your fingertips.

Start your project with something easy like squash, lettuce, spinach, carrots, or beets. I live in the high desert, and these veggies grow outside like crazy here, even with the harsh weather and limited growing season. Squash, lettuce, and spinach do not require much depth, but carrots and beets do, so remember this when creating your gardening space.

To get your Freedom Garden started, make sure that you get only Heirloom seeds. GMO (genetically modified) or hybrid seeds will not work if you plan to harvest seeds for the next crop. Once your veggies ripen, choose the best plants from your crops, and harvest the seeds for your next planting from them. If you plant GMO seeds, it is likely that your harvested seeds will not be viable. The same goes for hybrid seeds. Heirloom seeds are the seeds that go back for hundreds of years, and are pure. Their genetic makeup has not been tampered with through artificial genetic modification techniques, or cross breeding. Choosing only the best plants for your seed harvesting will ensure that future crops yield the best results. Also, be sure to gather extra seeds to create your very own personal seed bank so that you have something to fall back on just in case.

In short, one of the things that we cannot do without is food. To stay alive, we need to eat. If the shelves go bare, having a Freedom Garden in your apartment or backyard will be worth its weight in gold. So pick a gardening method, whether it is by indoor or outdoor containers, or hydroponics, choose your seeds wisely, and start planting for food freedom. This is the way to stay alive and healthy in today’s world.

Here are some handy links for starting your Freedom Garden:

1) How to Harvest and Store Vegetable Seeds

2) Where to Buy Heirloom Seeds in Bulk

This article appears courtesy of www.totalhealthbreakthroughs.com

Source: End Times Report

By Miles Stair

 

While we all want to do our best to prepare for a coming crisis, and many of us realize the city is perhaps the worst place to live, very few people are really prepared to pack up the old Winnebago and head for the hills. Most Americans, whether they’re aware or not, are going to stay in the cities.

This is not a hasty decision for most people. Most of us depend on the city for our livelihood, and we can be better prepared by continuing to live in the city, earn a good income, and make preparations for exiting the city at the appropriate time or by staying in the city and living off existing supplies.

This special report explains some of the most critical dangers of living in a city and presents some solutions to surviving them. If you are one of the people who has decided to stay in the city, you’ll benefit greatly from this information.  READ MORE…

A good option for gardening in a small space that requires no weeding, bending, or stooping, is upside down gardening. Several vegetables can be grown using this method. They are tomatoes, cucumbers, egglplants, beans, and peppers.

The tops of your upside down garden can also grow such things as radishes, herbs, lettuce, and spinach. Just make sure that the plants on top and the plants on the bottom have the same sunlight and water requirements.

Here are some simple instructions from Nikki Phipps for making your upside down garden, as well as a video from basicgardeningtips.com. The instructions vary a bit concerning the size of the hole and the newspaper at the bottom of the bucket, but these are personal preferences. So give it a try, and determine the best method for you.

Upside-down gardening is easy. All you need to get started are some large hanging containers, potting soil (amended with compost), and plants. Of course, with any type of gardening, it doesn’t hurt to have a plan beforehand. For instance, know what you want to plant, how much you want to plant, and where you want to hang it.

For larger plants and crops, such as your tomatoes and cucumbers for example, most people prefer using an ordinary 5-gallon bucket. Buckets are not only easy to come by, as most of us more than likely have one or two already on hand, but they are also sturdy and great for hanging. Alternatively, you can use large, plastic hanging baskets as well as smaller versions for smaller plants.

Once you have chosen suitable containers, you’ll have to drill a hole into the bottom. Typically, the hole needs to be about 2 inches for large containers and buckets and slightly smaller for others, depending on their size. It often helps to have a place to hang these containers while preparing your upside-down garden, as you’ll need to flip the container back over (right side up) for plant placement.

Before placing your plant into the container, locate something to place into its bottom, such as a small piece of newspaper, landscaping fabric, or a coffee filter. This will be used for anchoring the plant in place until it’s strong enough to hold its own. It will also prevent the soil from washing out through the hole during watering. Place a slit in the material for the seedling (or small plant) to maneuver through and then carefully guide the plant down into and through the hole, upside down.

As you hold the plant’s root ball in place, begin filling in around it with the soil/compost mix, taking care to tamp the soil as you go. Continue filling the container with soil just until you reach about an inch or so from its rim.

For additional interest and space, add some low-growing plants in the top portion of the container. This can range from small crops, such as lettuce, to a handful of herbs, like basil and parsley. You could also choose to place an attractive flowering plant, such as petunia, into the top as well.

Hang your upside-down garden in a sunny location and water it thoroughly, making sure it reaches the bottom. In fact, the water should run out of the bottom hole. Watering requirements for your upside-down garden will usually vary according to the types of plants used and your particular climate. Typically, in most places, especially during periods of hot, dry weather, your upside-garden will require watering daily, if not every other day.

Here are four simple ideas for making vertical gardening trellises. Not only will verticle gardening allow you to grow more stuff in a smaller space, but it will also cut down on weeding, and you can harvest with less bending and stooping.

This Sunday, April 19, 2009, I will be on the air with Dave Hodges. We will be discussing HR 875, Livestock Tracking, Homeland Security’s Stamping Out program, GMO, and Monsanto. You are welcome to join us in what should be a lively discussion. Here is the information: 

THE COMMON SENSE SHOW

The Republic Broadcasting Network

Host(s): Dave Hodges

Call In Number: 800-313-9443

Show Time: Sundays, 9:00 PM – 11:00 PM CST

Live streamed at http://www.republicbroadcasting.org/index.php?cmd=listenlive

Often referred to as Americas most independent talk show host Dave Hodges brings a wealth of professional experience to the RBN airwaves as an award winning psychology, statistics and research professor a college basketball coach a mental health counselor a political activist and writer who has published dozens of editorials and articles in several publications such as The Arizona Republic and Freedoms Phoenix. The Common Sense Show with Dave Hodges is a hard-hitting investigative journalism show which features an array of impressive guests coupled with an in-depth analysis of important personal, social and geopolitical issues which are largely unreported in the mainstream media. The wide variety of show topics range from the loss of constitutional liberties, to the subsequent implementation of a police state under world governance, to exploring the limits of human potential. The primary purpose of The Common Sense Show with Dave Hodges is to provide the listening audience with the tools necessary to reclaim both our individual and national sovereignty. Join us every Sunday night as we apply a Founding Fathers Common Sense perspective towards solving the dire threats that confront all Americans in these times of unprecedented challenge.

Barb