GardenFork – Eclectic DIY

Author: Eric

How To Repair a Rice Cooker – GF Radio

A Broken Rice cooker, and how to fix it & how baking powder works are the main topics of this GF Radio show, but of course we veer into other subjects as well. We’ve posted the Rice Cooker Repair ,What is Baking Powder and Free Leaf Compost articles that started this topic for Rick, and we started a new category here called Rick’s Column. Rick talks about how a rice cooker works and how he fixed his rice cooker. You can buy inline fuses at Radio Shack, bring the old one with you, or search online.

Eric made a how-to video about making leaf compost, and here is a neat GardenFork.TV video about how to make a simple compost bin out of a few easily available materials. Rick plans on working the leaf compost into his vermiculture system, aka worm composting system.

BTW, to make baking powder, use 1 part baking soda to 2 parts cream of tartar. You can buy Cream of Tartar online instead of paying a fortune for a small amount at the store.

For those of you interested in working at GardenFork, here is the link to our internships page. We need a hand, and if you’d like to get some great experience, check out our internship page and see what its all about.

photo by Besela

November 2, 2011
Harvest Honey with a Bee Escape – GF Video

Here’s how we use a bee escape to harvest honey. When you harvest honey from your beehive, you need to get the bees out of the honey super ( the box of frames that has honey it it, usually the topmost super ). You can do this several ways; commercial beekeepers remove the bees from the honey super with a blast of air, you can use a fume board, which you put on top of the honey super to drive the bees out of that super, or you can use a bee escape. Watch our video how to harvest honey using a fume board here

A bee escape is basically a one way door that you slide in between the honey super and the top brood super. You leave it there for a day or two, and when you take off the honey super, it will be empty of bees. Watch our video here on how to remove bees from a honey super using a bee escape

I have found that leaving the bee escape on the beehive for 2 days is better than overnight. You will always have some bees still in the honey super, but that is a lot easier than removing a lot of bees from the honey super. Some hives will start to draw comb if you leave it in too long.

It isn’t shown here, but in newer versions of this, I added a 5/8″ upper entrance hole to the escape to take the place of the entrance on the inner cover, which we have covered in tape.

Here is the double three way bee escape I made. I based it on several on the internet. The hardest part is cutting the angle cuts of each piece of wood. the cut are either 30 degrees or 60 degrees, depending on how you set up your saw. The gaps between the sides of the triangle are at least 3/8′ wide. I used regular window screen to cover this. The outer pieces of wood are 12.5″ long, the inner pieces are 7.75″ long.

Questions or comments? Let us know below, we’ll answer to the best of our ability. thx.

November 1, 2011
Homemade Garlic Planting Tool Makes Planting Seed Go Faster

This homemade garlic planting tool helps if you are planting more than a few rows of garlic. Planting a few rows of garlic in your home garden is pretty straightforward. To plant garlic for a market grower is a bigger deal. I was asked by a neighbor who sells garlic to help him plant seed garlic before the coming snow storm. The storm dumped 20″ of snow on this field a few hours after we finished planting garlic. Watch our How To Plant & Grow Garlic video here.

While we were planting garlic I took photos to show you all how a market farmer plants garlic. This garlic field is not large enough for heavy equipment, so while the garlic is planted by hand, this homemade garlic planting tool might help small farmers reading this.

All the seed garlic bulbs are broken apart by hand, I don’t know of a mechanical method to do this, though I’m sure a machine exists for large scale garlic growers.

Seed garlic broken up by hand

First of all, the field is tilled with a small disc several times to turn over all the weeds and cover crops, then the rows of garlic are staked out with string. Each row is 5 plants wide, then there is a 24″ wide space between rows. This space should be the width of your rototiller, so you can till under weeds that grow on the walking paths between the rows of garlic.

disc rig gets the garlic field ready

The holes the seed garlic is placed in are made by this homemade garlic planter rig built by the farmer. It has 5 metal tips on it, with two pieces of wood jutting out perpendicular for proper spacing between rows. Two people move the garlic seed hole maker along the row. When pressing the rig into the soil to make the holes, each person places a foot on the rig to make the holes. The rig is rocked back and forth to firm up the walls of the holes.

Metal Tips on Garlic Planter, note row spacers sticking out side of rig, just above hole making tips

Garlic Planting Tool In Action

holes made by garlic planter rig

The seed garlic is put in each hole by hand – be sure to use knee pads – you’re on your knees a long time in this process.

The rows are then raked over, the soil filling up each hole.

I bet there are a few planting rigs farmers have made to automate this process more, my friend likes it this way, and his garlic field is not huge.

Raking soil over seed garlic

raking soil over seed

Do you have some tips for planting garlic? or better ways to plant garlic? Let us know below:

October 31, 2011
Steve Jobs and I : GF Radio

John Federico and Eric talk about Steve Jobs and his impact on their lives, and his impact on the world and business. Eric talks about a Fresh Air Interview with Steve Jobs’ biographer, here is a link to that.

A quote from Steve Jobs sums up a lot of what Eric and John talk about in this GF Radio

“You can’t just ask customers what they want and then try to give that to them. By the time you get it built, they’ll want something new.” from Wikiquotes

John and Eric then talk about how to make an iTunes audio podcast, and what tools they use to make their podcasts.

photo by Nacu

October 26, 2011
How To Grow Garlic, It’s Not Rocket Science – GF Video
Watch our video on how to grow garlic, then go out and plant your garlic! There are a few keys things that we go over below.

Wondering how to grow garlic?

Its not rocket science, as even Eric can grow garlic. Its is easy to do, garlic does not have many diseases or pests, and its pretty low maintenance. Our how to plant garlic video steps you through the process.

Couple of key things to keep in mind:
- For most northern climates, you plant garlic in the fall
- Order seed garlic as early as you can, most garlic growers sell out.
- I don’t mulch my garlic bed, you can if you want.
- The garlic may start to grow in the fall, that’s ok.
- And learn how to harvest and how to cook garlic scapes in this video here.
You can buy seed garlic, which is basically the largest bulbs of a particular strain of garlic from Filaree Farm, you can also find them at your local farmers market. Buy the largest, healthiest bulbs the farmer has.

Garlic is broken down into a few varieties, Rocambole, Purple Strip, Porcelain, Artichoke, Silverskin, and a bunch more. We plant hardneck garlic here in New England, softneck Italian style garlic does not do well here.

Maybe one of your neighbors already grows garlic and you can get a few heads of garlic from them to plant. I’ve heard stories of families who have brought garlic over from Russia or Poland, and keep the variety going in the backyard. Getting garlic from the local farmers market means those particular bulbs will grow well in your area, maybe ask the farmer, I’m willing to bet they’ll talk all you want about growing garlic.

How To Grow Garlic, Start With Soil Prep:

First of all, you can grow garlic in regular garden soil, nothing special needs to be done. Plant in the fall, before frost, when the leaves are starting to drop off the trees, rather than the spring. Break apart the cloves a day early, if possible, and let them dry a bit. The flat end of the clove goes into the bottom of the hole. Space the garlic about 6″ apart in rows 12″ apart.

It is possible to plant garlic in the spring, but the yield will be much lower. I have never done it.

Mulching your garlic is a personal think. I don’t think its necessary, and i’m all about simple.

The garlic may sprout before winter, this is OK. Just leave it alone. The grow tip will wilt in the snow, and then the plant will start to grow again in the spring.

In late winter, this same growth and wilting from cold weather may happen again, its OK. The weather will warm and the garlic will kick in soon enough. Let the plants grow, however harvest the scapes in early summer, and then harvest the garlic plants when the stalks start to go brown at the base.

What have been your experiences with growing and cooking with garlic? Let us know below, be great to hear from people!
October 25, 2011
Largemouth Bass how to fish for them by Mike GF Radio

How to fish for bass, bass behavior, and how to catch largemouth bass are the topic of Gardenfork Radio. Mike is a former tournament bass fisherman, and tells us how to find bass in a lake, and largemouth bass behavior throughout the year. Mike gives bass fishing tips and goes into largemouth bass behavior.

Bass:
Ice-out and spring:
After ice out, the bass are still very lethargic. They are cold blooded animals. However, as the water temperatures start to rise, they begin to move and feed after a long sleepy winter.
Places to look in the spring:
Northern sides of lakes, ponds, and backwaters. The sun is lower in the sky, northern sides of lakes get more direct sun. This is especially true where there are large trees, hills, and other tall obstructions on the south side of the lake.
Wind. In short, wind from the north is cold. It cools the surface and pushes it south. Wind from the south is warm. It warms the surface and moves it north.
Shallow water warms faster than deep water. Especially when the bottom is dark.
Stones. Stones on the shore will pick up heat from the sun and hold it. This is true of sea walls and bridges made of stone as well.
Late spring / Early Summer:
When the water gets up to around 57 – 60 degrees, Bass will start their spawn cycle. Some areas will close fishing to allow for the spawn to happen. To sustain a fishery, fish need to have a chance to reproduce.
Male fish will take up residence in shallow water, typically with a harder bottom, and they will use their body to clear out a circular nest on the bottom. They will become territorial around their nest and will do their best to keep it clean.
During this time, females will stage in deeper water adjacent to the nesting area. They will join the males in the shallower water, laying their eggs, and then moving back to the deeper water. Males will fertilize the eggs and stay with the nest until the fry are hatched. For a while, the male will aggressively protect the fry and will eventually leave the small fish on their own and recede into deeper water.
Usually, it’s during the spawn and in the post spawn where fishing will die off some as the fish are not up to chasing food because they are spent from the spawn. Any fish caught during the spawn are usually males and it’s usually a territorial and protective strike, not one for food.
Summer / Late Summer
Bass move into their summer patterns after the spawn. The summer pattern really differs from lake to lake, but there are some generalities that you can work with in order to identify the patterns on your lake / pond.
Oxygen is less soluable in warmer water. Backwaters that are shallow and baked by the summer sun have lower oxygen levels, so fish will avoid them.
Deeper lakes (20’+ usually) will stratify over the summer. Warmer is water is less dense and it remains at the top, cold water, heavy and oxygen depleted sinks and stays at the bottom. There’s a structure known as the thermocline. It’s where the water changes temperature drastically within a foot or two. On depth finders it will show up as a line. You can feel it when swimming in a lake. The oxygen level below the thermalcline is very low and you should spend your time fishing above that line.
Bass are averse to bright sunlight. If there is an area of clear water with no cover, it’s best to avoid that area.
Bass relate to things. The things could be trees in the water, stumps, rocks, underwater dropoffs or other topographical changes, and weed lines.
Weed lines form because plants require sunlight to live. The depth of a weed line will vary with water clarity. Muddier lakes have shallower weedlines and clearer lakes have deeper weed lines. Some times you can follow them in a boat visually. Usually a depth finder will be needed to identify the line. Once you gain experience, you will be able to do it by feel.
Bass will feed in the early morning hours and at sundown, when the sun is low in the sky.
Fish will prefer areas where there are shallow flats near deeper water. They can stay in the deeper water during the day, and easily move up to the shallower flat to feed.
During the summer, I will work the surface early in the morning. As the sun rises, I will work 3 – 5 feet in depth, and then move out to the deeper weed lines during the hot noon hours.
Fall
The sun starts to get lower in the sky, the days are shorter, and the air cools. The water begins to cool as well. Spring patterns begin to re-emerge, but without any of the spawn problems. Fish become aggressive, feeding for the winter.
Weedy cover begins to die. Where there may have been 100 acres of green underwater vegetation, you now have 50 acres of dead grass, 30 acres of green grass, and 10 acres of bare bottom. The bass will concentrate in the 30 acres of green grass making them easier to find — if you know where the green grass is.
Then there is the fall turnover, reuining fishing everywhere. The lake that stratified over the summer months changes. The surface water becomes cold and heavy. It sinks to the bottom, pushing warmer “middle water” to the top. Eventually this convective current makes it’s way to the bottom. The lake “turns over”. The thermalcline dissapears and water temperature is uniform, top to bottom. However, all of the crud from the bottom rides the current to the surface.
The lake becomes cloudy or muddy and the fishing suffers until the turnover is complete and the sediment settles again.
Fish become more and more lethargic as the water cools. You will find them near warm water and green vegitation.

photo by Jusben

October 22, 2011
Slow Cookers, iPhones, & Dogs : GF Radio

Monica and Eric talk about using slow cookers in the fall, and what phone eric should buy, and who is your favorite dog, all on GF Radio this week. Plus zen thoughts about being busy.

photo by crass

October 19, 2011
Fermentation Sauerkraut How To update

Inspired by Daniel Gasteiger’s new book Yes, You Can! and Freeze and Dry It too book on canning, freezing and more, we are now fermenting cabbage into sauerkraut.

And we are shooting a video on how to make sauerkraut. Above are the two jars we are fermenting for the video. I did one batch with just green cabbage, carrots and caraway seeds, and started a second batch of sauerkraut with a mix of red cabbage and green cabbage. From what i’ve read, it seems best to use an earthenware crock or plastic container; i used two large glass canning jars.

we are fermenting cabbage into sauekraut and making a how-to video on making sauerkraut

The fermentation jars are covered with a towel and sitting on the kitchen counter, I check them every day, and watch these bubbles come out from the cabbage. You can see some bubbles in the jar of red cabbage in the above photo.

I asked on our Facebook Page for suggestions on what ingredients to put into sauerkraut, and got some great responses:

Thom: I make two types, one with just cabbage,onions and salt and the other a spicy type with cabbage,onion,garlic,carrots,radish or daikon,pepper flakes,fresh ginger,dill and salt.

Dennis: love making sauerkraut, apple and cumin is a good combo!

Woodwife: Green Just cabbage and salt.

Josh: cabbage salt and sugar to sweeten it up a bit

Michael: Juniper berries

Joe: I all ready made mine for the year its canned and put up. I canned 12 quarts I use just salt and a little sugar and a few apples.

Janet: I haven’t made sauerkraut yet, but I plan on it. I listen to your radio show podcasts on Itunes and recently purchased the book “Yes You Can”. I can’t wait for it to come in the mail. Thank you for everything that you do!! It is truly inspirational and entertaining. Keep up the good work!!! 🙂
Sunday at 6:41pm · 1 person

Claudia: you wanna get Gundelsheim or Midlessa Sauerkraut, put a McIntosh apple (cut up), bay leaves and Juniper berries as well as sugar and a beef boullion cube and let it cook for about an hour, Oh yeah, cut up an onion and put it in there as well
Sunday at 10:58pm

Gerald: We do 3# cabbage to 1 tbsp salt. Pack it down til brine forms (maybe top off) Weigh it down so the cabbage stays under the brine. Cover and wait. Sometimes we add caraway seeds, but plain ol’ kraut is best. This year we used 80# cabbage total.
Monday at 8:02pm

Gerald: I have also used the lacto-fermented brine in your artisan bread to make it sourdoughish.

Neat, all sorts of ideas here. next batch will have apples in it. I’m curious about canning the sauerkraut afterward, does that reduce its health qualities? Let me know what you think below:

October 12, 2011
How to Hunt Deer for Food GF Radio

How to hunt deer for the beginner, what kind of gear you need to hunt deer, where do you hunt deer? Author Jackson Landers., author of The Beginner’s Guide to Hunting Deer for Food (Beginner’s Guide To… (Storey))
talks with Eric about hunting deer for food.

“Hunting deer is the most inexpensive, environmentally friendly way to acquire organic, grass-fed meat. Even if you’ve never held a gun before, author Jackson Landers can show you how to supplement your food supply with venison taken near your home. He addresses everything a new hunter needs to know: how to choose the correct rifle and ammunition, how to hunt effectively and safely, and what to do if something goes wrong. He includes chapters on field dressing and butchering after the kill, recipes for using the meat, and a chapter on the politics and psychology of hunting. Whether you hunt to be more self-sufficient, to eat the safest and most nutritious meat possible, to protect the environment, or to save money, this book is the perfect guide.”

Deer Hunting can be an emotional topic for some of us. My thinking here was to allow you all to get into the head of a hunter who is very grounded. Jackson hunts deer to put meat on the table for his family, teaches deer hunting classes, and has been featured several times in the New York Times, and has been hosted by Slow Food groups to talk about deer hunting, and how to cook venison.

photo by matthew hull

October 10, 2011
Toad In A Hole Recipe in a Outdoor Cast Iron Dutch Oven – GF Video
A Toad In A Hole recipe cooked outdoors, how cool is that? Watch the video and read on for the recipe and thoughts.

Here’s an Toad In A Hole recipe from the UK that we cook in our cast iron dutch oven outdoors. You can cook this in your kitchen, but its more fun to use this using fireplace cooking, outdoor cooking, or campfire cooking. Perfect for those urban homesteaders who want to take their cast iron outside, build a fire, and cook comfort food. We were introduced to this dish by our friends Barbara and Chris ( who are English ) and visited us at our CT house. Chris made this for us one day. Toad in a Hole is supposed to be for dinner, but I think its great for breakfast, especially after a night out imbiding.

I changed this up a bit from the standard by adding cheddar cheese, which seemed perfectly acceptable seeing that Cheddar Cheese is from England, and cheese tastes good with eggs already, so why not mix them into the recipe?

I make this recipe in a dutch oven, and its super fun to bake the Toad In A Hole outdoors. In the cooking video, we used charcoal to heat the cast iron dutch oven, but you can make this in a fireplace or in a campfire as well.

Want to bake Banana Bread the same way? Watch our video here.

Buy a Dutch Oven here, and an chimney charcoal starter. This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but I earn a commission from. Thx!
Toad In A Hole Recipe in a Outdoor Cast Iron Dutch Oven – GF Video

Recipe Type: Dinner

Cuisine: English

Author: Eric Rochow

Prep time: 15 mins

Cook time: 30 mins

Total time: 45 mins

Serves: [url:1][img:1]

Making Toad In A Hole in a Dutch Oven outdoors is really fun. Go make this and let me know how it came out.
Ingredients

4 sausages sliced in two and then halved. I used sweet italian sausage from our local butcher, but most any sausage you like will work.

1 cup of flour – all purpose works fine, but use what you’ve got.

1 tablespoon coarse salt

Herbs of your choice, rosemary, chives, oregano, tarragon, whatever you have and like, chopped coarsely

1 cup milk

3 eggs – i’m a big fan of local eggs, so try to get some, help out your local farmers.

2 – 3 tablespoons of good mustard, brown, spicy, deli – whatever you like.

1 cup grated sharp cheddar cheese
Instructions

Fire: This recipe takes about a chimney starter full of charcoal. we used about 10 charcoal briquettes on the bottom of the cast iron to start the cooking. if you are cooking this in a fireplace or campfire, be careful not to get the dutch oven too hot.

Take the sausages that have been cut in half and then sliced open lengthways and put them in the dutch oven to brown.

While the sausaged are browning, take the other charcoal or wood coals and pile some on the lid of the dutch oven to preheat it.

Beat the 3 eggs together, then to it the flour and salt and milk and herbs.

When the sausages are browned on both sides, pour the egg batter mixture into the dutch oven and cover.

Place more coals on top of the dutch oven and bake for 30 minutes. If it smells like it is burning, open the cover and check. you may have to move the dutch oven to a cooler part of the fire, or remove some briquettes.

The dish is done when the batter is yellow with brown patches, you will know when its done. It will smell great.
Notes

Use a chimney starter to start the charcoal briquettes. You can also use chunk charcoal, but the square ones are easier.

3.5.3208
October 3, 2011
Venting Your Crawlspace & ifixing your iMac – GF Radio

Today on GardenFork Radio, Rick decides iFixit.com should sponsor GardenFork.TV and GF Radio, after Eric tells of how he has used the iFixit.com site and the products they sell to repair his iPhone and replace the hard drive on his iMac . Getting that damp smell out of your crawl space or basement also takes up a lot of this week’s show with Rick. How to use fans to vent your basement, do dehumidifiers work? What’s a vapor barrier? Rick asks what is the right thing to do when trying to vent your crawl space and get rid of the humidity.

How do they figure out where the break is in a sewer line? Rick and Eric are amazed by the technology used to find leaks in sewer and water lines. Rick had a new line installed into his yard, and they used what is called a Pig to ram the pipe through the yard.

Rick tells how to make a hot bed in a cold frame using manure, and where the term ‘hot bed of political activity’ comes from.

We then move on to Bees and Beekeeping, Rick tells of how to requeen a beehive with a new queen, and his travails in actually trying to requeen a hive with a new queen he purchased from White Oak Apiary . Key to requeening a hive is to have help doing it, eric thinks. then its Viewer Mail, YouTube comments and more.

photo by manimorff

October 1, 2011
How to can, dry, freeze, pickle, ferment preserve vegetables – GF Radio 223

Daniel Gasteiger, author of Yes, You Can! and Freeze and Dry it too; The modern step-by-step guide to Preserving Food, joins Eric on GF radio to talk about how to can vegetables, how to freeze food and vegetables, how to dry herbs and plants, and how to ferment cabbage and more neat stuff.

We talk about canning in a pressure canner and using the water bath method. Daniel doesn’t think the high pressure canning is that much more involved than hot water bath method. The pressure canner has a shorter canning time, but it takes a while to get up to pressure and you have to let it cool down.

We also go in to fermentation of vegetables. Daniel talks about how to ferment cabbage and other vegetables that you wouldn’t normally think were fermentable, like chickpeas.

I have on the to-do list of GardenFork shows and experiments, fermentation. Not just fermentation of beer, but I want to do sauerkraut, and it sounds like its very straightforward, according to Daniel.

Daniel’s blog is http://www.smallkitchengarden.net/ You can follow him on www.twitter.com/cityslipper You can buy his book here

Sandor Katz on Fermentation – GF Radio 316

September 28, 2011
Washing Machine Repair, Water Pump Replace GF Video
Washing machine repair video to fix a broken water pump. My washer broke, and I made a video of how to replace the water pump on your wash machine. If the washer is not draining, the water pump is probably broken. Water pumps on washing machines are not hard to fix, watch here and i’ll show you how to fix your Kenmore, Maytag, Whirlpool Sears washing machine.

Front Loading Washing Machine Broke? It happens more often than you think. With several models, a coin can get stuck in the drain pump, and the coin wrecks the impeller. The impeller is the round thing that looks like a airplane propeller, it pushes the water through the machine.

Washing Machine Repair isn’t always hard

This repair is usually easy to do. Make sure of the following:
- The washing machine is turned off and unplugged from the wall
- The water lines are turned off and disconnected.
- There is no wet laundry in the machine.
The washing machine pump, for most washers, is located in the lower part of the machine, and you access it from the bottom panel of the machine. You will tilt the machine on its back and work from the bottom of it. Take cell phone photos as you take the bottom access panel off, and put all the screws in a bowl or container. Keep a bucket handy, as there may be some water in the hoses and pump as you disconnect them.

Washing Machine Pump from a front loading washer.

Use a pliers to remove the hose clamps, you may also need a screwdriver, pay attention to how the clamps are situated on the hoses, and where each hose goes! You don’t want to cross the hoses, or the washing machine repair you’ve just done wont work.

There will be a power cord of some sort, this is usually a plug with a locking tang that plugs into the pump. Carefully bend back the tang with a screwdriver and pull off the plug. Pay attention to how the plug came out so you can put the plug back in the right way.

Let me know how your repair went in the comments below, always good to hear from you:
September 25, 2011
How to have a Yard Sale GF Radio

Learn here how to have a tag, yard, or garage sale, from Mike and Eric. Mike is having a yard sale, and tell us how to have a successful yard sale, and his techniques for bargaining with buyers. Then we talk about squash vine borer damage and how to treat them. You can watch our Squash Vine Borer T reatment Video here

How to seal your garage or basement floor is the next topic, Tyler is sealing sealing his garage floor, and we talk about how to seal your floor with epoxy.

We then talk about how to deal with squash vine borers and tomato hornworms. Eric gets confused about which is which, and we read viewer mail about alternatives to killing tomato hornworms.

Mr I Love The Ants linked to some pictures of what kind of moth a squash vine borer becomes , and here are those links:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v735/mrilovetheants/Plants/WaspMimic3.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v735/mrilovetheants/Plants/WaspMimic.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v735/mrilovetheants/Plants/WaspMimic2.jpg

we end the show with more viewer mail and comments.

photo by ladyheart

September 17, 2011
Hurricanes, Gardening, & Beekeeping GF Radio

Today we talk about hurricanes, weather forecasting, and hurricane preparedness with Tyler, who is the CEO of Allison House, a severe weather data company you can learn more about Allison house at AllisonHouse.com ( a GF sponsor )
We continue with how to predict hurricanes and how the national hurricane Center creates different models using different algorithms make spaghetti patterns about where a hurricane is going to hit land or as they call it in the business, make landfall.
Do the TV networks over hype hurricanes rainstorms winter storms? Tyler talks about how TV networks and the media in general could do a better job informing us about hurricanes and severe weather.
It’s gotten to the point where people think the TV networks and media are just crying wolf, so many times a storm is coming and the media and TV networks make a really big deal out of it and then the storm doesn’t happen. Then people tend to become more skeptical and then when the real thing actually occurs they get taken by surprise because we’ve been numbed to the weather hype.
Next up is how to seal the concrete of your garage floor or basement floor. Tyler tells us how he is preparing the concrete floor of his garage for the epoxy paint sealer that he’s going to apply to the cement which is one of the last parts of his home renovation.
we move on to vegetable gardening and how to keep cabbage months from attacking your cabbage and what to do about squash vine borers and our squash vine borer video. Then how to mulch your vegetable beds with leaf mulch and how you can make leaf mulch and how you can use believes that people put out at the end of their driveway in the suburbs for leaf mulch and why we like raised beds . You can watch our how-to video on how to make raised beds here and we also have a video about how to make leaf mulch by clicking here
Next we talk about beekeeping and we are both harvesting honey this fall tyler talks about using a hot night for the first time and how long it takes to harvest honey. Tyler had a very large harvest of honey this year and Eric did not.
We’ve made a bunch of how to raise bees, we call it beginning beekeeping videos on garden fork and you can watch all of them by clicking here if you want to watch the video on how to harvest honey click here
Then Tyler tells us about his upcoming trip to Scotland Tyler recommends the website visit Scotland.com which is run by the Scottish tourism board. Eric would very much like to visit Scotland and looks forward to hearing from the Scottish tourism board. You do have a question or comment about garden fork radio you can call our listener voicemail line 860 740 6938.

photo by wallyir

September 11, 2011
Beehive Ventilation Beekeeping 101 GF TV

A new video in our Beekeeping 101 aka Beginning Beekeeping video series. We had a real hot summer, like everyone else, and honeybees can overheat just like we can. So when I went out to the beehives in the heat of the summer, I made a video about how a beekeeper can ventilate or keep a beehive cool in the summer heat. If you see lots of bees climbing around you hive, it may be that the hive is too warm. Watch this beginning beekeeping video to learn more

September 8, 2011
Honeybees landing loaded with pollen photo

We requeened this honeybee hive last month, and the bees are almost a pure yellow-gold color, its wild. This queen is a hybrid Italian honeybee queen that we bought from Warm Colors Apiary.

Right now the Goldenrod is blooming, and there is still clover in the fields, plus around here we have late season woodland asters. The honeybees landing on this hive have a bright orange red pollen on their legs.

Honeybees landing with pollen on their legs

you can see here the difference between the older bees from the previous queen and the younger bees from the new queen. The older bees have prominent black bands on their backs

©2011 eric rochow all righst reserved

September 6, 2011
The Tiny House Minimal Living Movement GF Radio

The Tiny House Movement on GF Radio

The Small House, The Tiny House Movement, The Not So Big House are all part of the Minimal Living Movement. I’m doing my best to reduce the clutter in my house, have fewer possessions, and I do live in a fairly small house, and I aspire to a Minimalist Lifestyle. But its pretty big compared to the Small House Andrew Odom is building for himself and his spouse. Today we talk with Andrew about Tiny Houses in general and how he came to start building his Tiny House.

Andrews blogs about living with less at his site, Tiny rEvolution on the Tiny House Blog

photo by wallyir

September 6, 2011