Struggling With Seedlings This Will Help Organic Gardening Q A

Alright, this is John Kohler with growingyourgreens.com, today we have another exciting episode for you. Today I'm answering your guys' questions. If you have a question that you would like me to answer, you will post it on my post tab on my main channel page at growingyourgreens, and it may get answered in an upcoming episode. In any case, let's get on with this month's questions. First question is from Trevor Lahey, hey John my name is Luke and I'm from Kentucky, I've been thinking about growing peanuts but I've never tried, I'd also like a few pointers on how I can grow better potatoes, thanks for everything Luke. Alright Luke, so I mean I've grown peanuts from some peanut plant stores I bought at the nursery, but I mean peanuts in Kentucky should be a no-brainer, you should just take raw peanuts and just put them in the ground, they'll sprout and then they'll kind of vine out and they'll grow. I don't really know much about them, they didn't yield a whole lot for me so I tried once or twice, you know in a raised bed situation, you know maybe try that as an understory crop and then maybe have plants growing up and over them, because I mean they seem to take up a lot of space and you know I don't know if you're going to actually yield a lot. On the potatoes, you know potatoes are actually a new crop for me, I started growing it actually like about two years ago, and last year I ramped up a lot because the first time I grew potatoes it like, it kind of did pretty good, and the next year I rolled out and planted more, and now this last year I actually just got done planting several pounds of potatoes and I basically just plant them, and what I do because I just plant them in raised beds I kind of forget where I planted them, because you got to dig them up and I don't like disturbing my raised beds, I put little irrigation flags right where I planted every potato, and also that tells me once it starts to get growing, then I'm going to basically mound up organic compost on top of the stem as it grows up too. So this will help keep me to know where I'm going to have to mound up more soil on top to get a better yield, and of course when you are growing potatoes I recommend having really good soil right, of course my soil is amended with things like compost, rock dust, biochar, worm castings, all the best stuff, also doing a foiler feed of like a kelp at least every two weeks, as well as doing a compost tea every two weeks as well and you should get some phenomenal potato growth. Of course I also recommend you guys grow the purple potatoes, they're a lot more nutritious than the standard russet potatoes. Next question is from TheRealMelB, John I want to support your channel, what's the best way I can do that, I don't see super chat, can you post what avenue we can utilize to show our support of your hard work and efforts to reach people to grow, eat healthier, thank you, keep up the good work. Alright Mel B, so the best way to do that is to join my Patreon, I'll put the link down below, it's patreon.com slash growingyourgreens, I have different levels listed, if you join at the $11 a month or more level, you'll actually have access to my unpublished YouTube videos right, I have at least a half dozen that I have not published yet, they will come up in air at one point publicly on my channel here, but you'll get access as soon as I film and my editor gets them done, I'll throw them up there for you guys to preview and watch before I even watch them to make sure they're edited right. So yeah, so thank you for your support for those of you guys that'll do that. The next question is from MarthaLeone584, my question is when should I put the asparagus plants in boxes, they have such huge roots when they're one year old, sold in boxes, I like starting seeds, also do you sell your veg to other countries that can't grow much veg because of their cold climate, Sweden, Norway, Finland, etc, I always think of them because my great grandma was from there, there's a new video on packing tomatoes in wood ashes to preserve them for months, plus apples, eggs, etc, ancient secrets, with the technology today you can sell to all those countries, that preserving technique may be good for a whole lot of vegetables, thanks for all your wonderful educational videos. Alright, so when to plant asparagus, so actually I just bought some asparagus roots from my local nursery, of course they're purple asparagus, and after you buy them, when to put them in the garden, as soon as possible, you don't want to leave the roots out of the moisture, they will dry up, they will fail to grow later, so as soon as you buy them and get them, get them into the ground, as long as you can work the ground, if the ground is frozen, then I would pack them in a pot with soil to kind of keep them moist but not overly wet, so they continue to live because if they're just outside and just expose to air, they may succumb and not make it, so that's the most important thing, and of course I do recommend planting them in, if you're going to do a container, a tall container, so I have some asparagus in like 25 gallon pots that are like this deep, they do alright, but they do even better yet in a raised garden bed, the deeper the better, so that's what I'll tell you, and then I haven't seen videos on packing tomatoes and wood ashes to preserve them, but everything I grow in my garden is for personal use, I don't sell it or ship it or do anything, on occasion friends come over and pick my greens or I share greens and food with other people, I do end up freeze drying a lot of it and then share it and take it to people, but I think that there are amazing preservation technologies out there, such as freeze drying that then you can store your food for up to 25 years and then ship it literally around the world, so that's what I'll say. Alright, next question is from Crystal C2809, what zone is Las Vegas, because it used to be 9B, and now it's 8A, also can you make short videos on what to plant each month, that would be cool for Vegas growers, thank you. Alright, so here's the thing, so like I'm in a Vegas zone 9A, right, depending on where in Vegas you live, the zones have recently changed due to the USDA and due to the climate research and how things are getting warmer, and the climate is changing, so go figure, so here's the thing, what I'll say is that depending on where you live and all the more readings they've done over the years, they'll see the trends on what is happening, of course the USDA zones only tell how cold it gets, not how hot it gets, so at elevation in Vegas like where I am, it could be a 9A if you get to a higher elevation, because as Las Vegas grows, they keep moving up the hill, like literally, so some areas are moved up the hill so much, maybe those are the richer, nicer homes, they're up the hill so much, they're like an 8B because of the elevation makes it so high, so it does get colder, of course at the bottom of the valley, think Las Vegas airport, right, it could be like a 9B, so it's even better and it's even less likely to frost, so you know, it really depends on where in the Vegas metropolitan area you live, and of course just look up the USDA hardiness map, put in your zip code, your exact street address to find out your specific USDA hardiness, right, even in my zone 9A, I'm able to keep things like Moringa that goes dormant over the winter to come back every spring, my Chaya trees, basically dormant, they don't like it, but then they come back, I keep my longevity spinach that is against the wall that stays warm, alive all winter, which is a tropical, of course, tropicals that don't like it too cold don't make it, so then I just start new ones every single summer time, alright, link down below to my video on all the tropical greens I grow in the summer that love the heat, but hate the cold, alright, oh and then also make a short video on what to plant each month, so here's the thing, for me personally, like while I do plant all year, I have two main planting seasons, I have like a fall winter planting season where I pull all my crops out from summer, which usually happens maybe starting late September, November, December, sometimes into January, and I'm planting all my winter crops, which are everything that most of the country would plant, like all lettuces, kales, sugar snap peas, you know, broccoli, cauliflower, kohlrabi, parsley, cilantro, also I do flowers like violas and pansies, that's all my winter garden, and then also, and then I flip, so right when it starts getting hot and we no longer have a freeze, which maybe is in March or April, then I work on planting my entire summer garden out, which is basically all Asian tropical greens, as well as things like peppers, eggplants, okra, I plant a few tomatoes, but they don't really perform well in Vegas, so it's like I don't want to waste the space, so yeah, so those are the main times I plant, you could plant all year, although, you know, if you want actually a specific planting guide, I don't need to do that, because you can go to the master gardeners of Las Vegas, or Clark County, and then you can download off their website PDF files of what you could plant in what month, and they have better, better guides than me, because all those master gardeners, they know a lot more than I do on all these specifics, I just plant like two main seasons and get it done with, and, you know, and I just don't even pay attention, I'm like, oh, let's plant this then, if it's a warm season crop, I'll plant it all summer, and it could be in the middle of July or August, in the middle of the heat, and I don't care, I'll still plant it and see what happens, man, so we should not be constrained by these guides, we should always try and experiment and see what you can get away with, right, I mean, actually, in my flood table, I have a tomato, because it was so warm in, like, December, it, like, sprouted and started growing, and then, like, and then I'm like, man, this thing's going to get screwed, and then we had a 26 degree day, boom, it turned black, but then now that we warmed it back to the 70s, like, even though the stem mostly croaked, like, it's now shooting new growth out, and I'm like, man, that tomato will want to live, so that one's probably going to perform well, so yeah, always experiment, man, keep it fun, don't stick with guides to the rigid thing, because you could always do other things that may still work to some extent, alright, next question's from Steve Gorowski, 3246, over the years I've collected garden tools and supplies, what options, if any, do you use for storage, alright, Steve, so, I'll be the first to tell you that I'm not the storage master, I'm kind of, like, a little bit disorganized, I mean, here's the thing, like, right by my door that comes out to the backyard, I have one of those big Costco NSF racks that have, like, wheels on them, and then I got some of those big boxes that, like, strawberries come in at Costco, those big tray boxes, and I have three of the tray boxes sitting on each shelf, and then basically I have all the stuff sitting in those tray boxes on, like, one big steel rack, and I have, like, four shelves just filled of, like, garden soil, tools, like, mycorrhizae, fertilizer, seeds, like, all kinds of stuff, like, on one shelf, so, I mean, that's how I do it, I don't know how you want to do it, the tools that I use the most are kind of just sitting out in the garden off to the side, so I always know where they are, because I always use them, but other tools kind of sit on that shelf, all my, like, garden clips and everything else on that shelf, irrigation supplies, I have, like, a little bin box, or a larger box for everything, alright, hope that helps you out there, next question's from Dr. Green Thumb 6535, John, I grow day-long onions, zone 5, how many hours should my seedlings have? I know the long days produce bulbs, I've been struggling with them in the early stages, once I set them out, they produce, but I feel if it didn't stress them out, they would be even better things, alright, so number one, I will say I never grow day-long onions, because my days are not super long here, because I'm not in zone 5, I'm in zone 9, so I don't have the too much experience, but here's the thing, you know, especially when a plant is a seedling, if it is shocked or damaged, it will bolt quickly, it will not perform as expected, so you want to give that seedling a really nice time through its baby growth stage, so what I'm going to recommend are just some gardening basics, guys, number one, provide it a nice life during its, you know, little seedling phase, you want to keep the temperature the same, you want to keep it between 65 to 75, because that is the temperature that they like, and also when you get them out in the ground, that's the temperature range and the day times they're going to mostly have, so you want to kind of get them to the temperature now, instead of, you know, growing them too cold, get a heat mat if you need to, right, number one, of course, at night time, right, you want to drop the temperature on them, you don't want to keep them that warm, you know, just at night, like when the sun goes down it gets colder, you know, when the sun, when the lights go off on the lighting cycle, they should also get colder, I don't know, maybe 10 degrees, I think would be reasonable, maybe 10 degrees colder, maybe down like in the, I don't know, maybe range 55 to 65, you know, maybe 50 at the lowest, you know, I wouldn't be like super concerned, like, you know, you just want it not too cold, you don't want to shock them, get it too cold, and they keep flipping out, right, temperature's important, number two, lighting is important, you want to duplicate the lighting they're going to get when they're out in the ground, because in nature, you know, they wouldn't be starting in a garage, in nature the seeds would be in the ground, when the daylight comes out and they have full hours, they'd be getting the weather, the temperature, and the light for the number of hours, right, full day, what's a full day, 16 hours of light is what you want to give them, 8 hours of darkness, right, that's what you're going to need to do, so you want to do 16 hours of light, also while that light is on, you want them to be between 65 and 75 degrees, and then when the lights go off for 8 hours, you want them to cool down a little bit, not too much, right, also, right, you want to keep a nice moisture level, nice and moist, not too dry, not too wet, very important, most plants like it not too dry, not too wet, also of course another thing is give them some nutrients, right, don't flood them with nutrients, maybe give them a half strength dilution of some fish emulsion or, you know, compost tea, every 2 weeks, right, every 2 weeks, so yeah, go light on that, the other thing very important is when you're doing the lighting on them, have the lights just 3 inches above them, you don't want to have the lights, you know, 2 feet above them, have the lights right above them, so you know, with all these tips you can use for onions or other crops where you're trying to duplicate what would happen when you plant them outside, right, there's going to be less transplant shock, they're going to be more having a nice comfy life like lying on the beach in Hawaii, you know, for your onion seedlings, and they should produce better for you, and of course, once you get them in the ground outside, of course you want to have good soil, enriched with compost, rock dust, you know, the worm castings, the biochar, things like the insect grass, all the things I like to use so that your plants can have all the nutrients they need to thrive, alright, so hopefully you get the best onions growing this year because of my tips, even though I've never grown them before, but it's standard kind of gardening knowledge, alright, to keep your seedlings happy, and actually that's why honestly I buy plant starts, because I'll let the nursery deal with it, because if I do plant starts, I mean, how I do plant starts is I throw the seeds out in the garden and let them germinate and grow, and most of the time they do pretty good, alright, Alright, next question is from Sunshine Day Z2172, how is your pot of Moringa doing today John? Alright, good question, so I did a Moringa planting in like a 15 gallon pot that was nice and tall, link down below to that video, I did that of course in the summer, in the summer that actually went on my front patio so I could see it every day and pick off Moringa leaves as I walk into my house, and it grew amazing in the summertime, up until it started getting colder in November, and then I'm like, you know what, I don't want to have my Moringa out when it's like too cold, so like, it doesn't really like below 50, so when like the nights were kind of getting below 50, I'm like bringing it inside, so what I did was, because I really suck, honestly, I suck at like indoor plants, I don't really take care of them too good, because like I let my irrigation system come on, the sun comes on, and like I can't deal with indoor stuff, so anyways I took it to a friend who has some indoor plants who does a really good job with them, and I gave her my Moringa to babysit over the wintertime, also she keeps her house a bit warmer than I do because I'm like really frugal, so I figured the Moringa would like it more, I did end up buying a light for her that actually extends up like, freak, like that light was like, extends up like 10 feet tall actually, doesn't provide like a ton of light, but provides some light, basically when it was in her care in the wintertime, it was getting pretty cold, the light would come on every day, right, basically it defoilated, and I'm like, oh man, she killed it, maybe watered it too much or something, I don't know what's going on, and then it got spider mites, and like, oh man, there's like nothing, there's just sticks coming up, right, and then probably like it went through that, I would say it basically molted, and then probably it was like, it just stayed dormant like that for like maybe 3 weeks, 2-3 weeks, and then now it's pushing new growth, every single, you know, stem has new growth coming out of it, so yeah, it's still growing, it has new growth, and then I'm probably going to wait about another month or so until I basically bring it back to my porch, until the nights basically are consistently over 50, that's the goal, it could have happened earlier this week, but now we're getting cold again, because we were in the 70s, like, man, almost time to bring my Moringa back, but it'd still be too cold, man, I don't want to shock it, so yeah, so it's still growing, so it's still good, this year maybe I'm going to experiment with like cutting some of the, you know, some of the plant stalks like in half, like literally and letting it shoot new, because some of it was getting tall and it was like hitting the roof of my porch actually, which was not good, so yeah, so that's been a successful journey, a little bit of a learning curve, didn't, you know, produce all winter like I thought, but hey, it's coming back, and it came back a lot quicker than my plant in the ground, which is still dormant, and actually it died back a lot more because it got a lot colder outside obviously, alright, next question from Nancy4u86, does anyone know where he got the black metal trellis he uses for his snap peas, if you look all the way to the back, there's a black metal trellis I got for my snap peas, they have like kind of cross diagonal things, so I got those at Target, when Target used to have a gardening center, like they had a gardening center on like most stores, many, many years ago, probably like 15 years ago now, they're on clearance for like 75% off, because nobody really gardens here, and I bought them all, and I'm glad I did, because they have lasted so long, and I really like the pattern, you know, if I couldn't get those, I'd probably just get like utility hog panel things from like, you know, tractor supply or something like that, because those work really well also, and I do like those, I like the ones with the 4 by 4 squares, but yeah, so you're not going to find those unless you find them used these days, because I doubt they're made anymore, a lot of those stores have these things once or twice, have once, and then they just never get them again, because they're probably made in China. Alright, next question from Aaron James, 3728, hi John, I'm looking to start a new garden here in Northern California, in the Sacramento area, and I was wondering if you would suggest any place to buy good quality compost in bulk, alright Aaron, so I have not been to Sacramento in some time, I know there's some nurseries up there that are pretty cool, I forget the name of it, it has like a big like, water tower in it, that's the one I've been to, but yeah, I don't really know the name, I forgot the name, so maybe check to see if they have bulk soil, now the other thing I know is that in most parts of California, they have basically green waste recycling, so everybody has a green bin, that people put their, you know, yard waste and food scraps in, that then goes to a municipal composting facility, in some counties you have to buy that compost back, but in some counties, you can go and get that compost for free, which is basically made from all the food scraps and yard waste, clippings, in many cases, but not all cases, that compost quality is very good, you know, so I would say, I know Sacramento gives out free compost certain times of the year, that's coming up in spring, when they're going to start giving out the free compost again, so check with them, I would say start off slow, so I'd say start off getting some compost, and then test growing in it, because of course, you may get, unfortunately when they get the inputs in there, maybe somebody sprayed like their trees with all this nasty chemicals, and then, while many will break down, there's some chemicals, you know, pesticides, that won't break down, even under the best composting process, you know, you're probably safe, but I would hate to have you get a whole ton of this stuff for free, and then your garden sucks, because it won't grow, so I'd say get some, test it, and then see, but then you're just testing that one batch, so probably what I'd say is get a bunch of it for free, and then test growing it, and at first, make sure things grow in it, and then put that in your beds to fill the beds, and then grow for real, so I'd probably grow something like easy, like radishes, that grow really fast, just to make sure things are going to be successful, I mean, that's probably what I'd tell you. Alright, so yeah, good luck with that, next question is from Birch RG24, when adding eggshells, homegrown chicken fed with garden yard scraps, should they be boiled before adding to soil, or just drop on surface and let sun do the work? Alright, so you know, here's the thing, like for me personally, I think that breaking things down into the smallest particle size will help it to get absorbed and utilized quicker, while you could just take the whole eggshells, crap them in your fingers and drop them on the ground, or put them in a compost pile, you know, those eggshells will now have to get weathered down into smaller bits, smaller bits until microbes could actually work in them, and then bring those nutrients in the soil, and then do the whole nutrient cycling thing. So what I'd recommend is putting a little bit of water in a blender, putting the eggshells in the blender with the water, blending it up, blending them up, so that you have basically like blended eggshell water, and then using the water, just putting the water in the ground, or putting the water with the eggshells ground up on your compost. Because you're creating more BSA, bacterial surface area, or more surface area, and of course they're broken down further, you know, they're going to get much more rapidly reutilized in the soil and in your garden. Alright, next question is from G. Jones, 5258, what are your thoughts on recycled soil for raised beds such as agro-min potting soils, thank you. Ingredients include peat moss, compost, pumice, ground, fir bark, sand, calcium carbonate, lime, gypsum. Alright, so I'm not familiar with Agro-Win, but I think Agro-Win is a company in like Southern California, I did look them up briefly, I think I had seen their products before in certain nurseries, and you know, I think that their stuff looks pretty good. I would question that whether you should buy their stuff in bags to fill a raised bed, because that's going to get very expensive, if you could buy their stuff in bulk, that'd be good. That being said, you know, I always like to kind of like custom blend my own mixture, because buying a potting soil for a raised bed may get really expensive. I mean, while they do have the, you know, peat moss as a first ingredient, compost as a second ingredient, pumice as a third, you know, I would basically follow Mel's mix, which is one-third peat moss, one-third compost, and one-third vermiculite, actually. But if they have those three ingredients, it looks like it's pretty solid, and they're kind of balancing out with some calcium carbonate, lime, and gypsum. So yeah, I mean, it looks alright to me. I mean, also, you might just want to buy their compost, and then buy additional, you know, vermiculite or other ingredients like the other, like the peat moss, or even use a good quality coconut coir to see if you could actually save money by putting your own ingredients together instead of buying their pre-made mix. And then, of course, you want to also add in things that they don't put in, things like worm castings, things like rock dust, things like up to 10% biochar, as well as things like the insect frass, which you may be able to get free insect frass if you're in Southern California. Go down to Rainbow Mealworms in Compton, link down below my video on that. You know, if you're building raised beds and filling it up, you might as well put a couple sacks of those in there to mix it up, to make it more nutritious, and maybe prevent insects in the future years. Alright, next question's from btpuppy2john, have you ever had a kidney stone? I think he's probably seeing that because I grow lots of greens and eat lots of greens, and juice greens, and blend greens, and steam greens, and all these things. So, I personally haven't had a kidney stone. I'm aware that oxalates, for some people, can cause kidney stones. Generally, based on the science, I have seen it because you have previous, you know, health challenges. I am researching oxalates to make an upcoming video on my other YouTube channel coming up. I think that some people, if they have like, pre-existing conditions, especially like type 2 diabetes or other issues, metabolic disease, damage, messed up microbiome, or other things, you know, definitely check with a doctor before you start including high amounts of greens in your diet. The other thing I will tell you is that while I do juice things like kale and lettuce, it's a rare day that you'll find me juicing things like Swiss chard and spinach. It's rare that I juice foods that are high in oxalates because you're concentrating oxalates when you juice them. Of course, I eat my spinach raw, but do I eat spinach year-round like most Americans because they could buy organic spinach year-round at Costco? No, no, no. I only eat my organic spinach in season, which is right now, when I can harvest it fresh, and then I get it like in the winter time and then I basically don't eat it the rest of the year, right? I eat it either raw or usually steamed. It's rare that I'll juice it because it's just like a waste of juice when I have so much like other kinds of greens, including my tree collards, which I have in more abundance than my spinach, and I like to savor the taste of my spinach because it is so sweet and non-chalky like the crap you buy at the store, right? So, of course, things like collard greens and kale, very low in oxalates, things like chard, beet greens, even beets are high in oxalates. So, I think each person needs to figure out what is a sensible amount of oxalates for them and also check with their doctor to see if they have any pre-existing conditions so that they should not eat or juice or blend oxalates because there are case studies where people have lost their lives from it, but there's very few case studies on people losing their lives from oxalates, and it's people generally with pre-existing conditions. Also, to let everybody know that we create our own oxalates internally. Our bodies will create them, and our bodies can get rid of them. So, the issue is if you eat too many oxalates and your bodies can't deal with them, then you can get kidney stones. Then we can go on further and, like, yes, inside us we could have oselobacter formyges or something. In many ways, it's a beneficial probiotic that if you look in sub-Saharan Africa, people that live in Africa and eat all these wild greens, usually they're in the chinipodium family, have high oxalates. You know, Africans in Africa have high levels of these oselobacter, you know, that can digest oxalates, right? But if you look at an average American microbe, they don't have this bacteria to digest the oxalates. So, once again, if the bacteria is digesting oxalates, that means less is getting into you, that means less your body needs to get rid of, right? So, it's a complicated, multifactorial equation that just go see your doctor if you're concerned about, and definitely, like me, I don't recommend juicing or blending high amount of oxalate greens on a regular, consistent basis. If I do juice oxalate, high oxalate greens, including spinach and chard, it's like one week out of the whole year, or this one time, and then I don't do it. And, of course, if you steam your greens or water cook your greens or even leach your greens and soak them in water, the high oxalate ones, you'll leach out some oxalates if you're concerned. And then there's a whole other different level of, like, if you're getting enough calcium, if you have enough calcium, you could handle a bit more oxalates. So, like, I'm not going to give you guys medical advice, go see your doctor, but I've never had a kidney stone, I don't expect to, because I'm smart about how I eat the oxalates. In traditional methods, traditional peoples around the world that have been eating oxalate-rich foods, how processed foods in traditional ways to keep the oxalate levels so low, plus they don't just eat spinach as their sole ingredient and do mono diets of spinach or high oxalate greens, they eat whatever they can find, all different foods near them, so they're taking in a little bit of oxalates that our bodies can deal with. Alright, hope that answers your question there, BT Puppy. Next question's from user LB9JH9GQ8Z. John, you are so into being the healthiest you can and be teaching us along the way to be the healthiest we can be, and I thank you for that, but why are you not concerned about cheap plastic around your beautiful home-grown healthy foods? It just seems like those plastics breaking down your garden and getting in your soil would contradict all the hard work you do to make your soil super nutrient and healthy. Alright, so here's the thing, this is not rocket science. I've always teached good, better, best, right? What side of my garden is my favorite? It's the side with my concrete stones or concrete blocks, so no plastic is touching my food except for my irrigation tubing. That's HDPE plastic, which is actually the safest plastic. So here's the thing, I want everybody out there to do the best they can, right? I don't grow in cheap plastic pots or I don't reuse polyethylene milk jugs or stupid containers from the grocery store to grow plants that are not designed to grow plants because those softer plastic leach. When I do grow plants in plastic, I do use plastic pots, guys. I get nursery pots that are generally thicker plastic that are HDPE plastic or other plastics that will put up with years of use and abuse. If they put up with years of use and abuse in the nursery industry, they're generally going to be safer, harder plastic that are less likely to leach. Now can they leach? Absolutely. Would I rather be growing in big ceramic pots? Absolutely. Number one, they're heavy, they're expensive, and they break, and I break all kinds of stuff, right? Number two, like I got all this plastic irrigation tubing line, right? Could I do copper? Well, they don't have drip systems made with copper. You could make your own. I could run copper piping through all this, but copper is expensive and somebody would probably break into my yard to steal all my copper and then I wouldn't have an irrigation system because in town people break into like street lights to steal the copper out. Plus that would be very expensive and very difficult to do. So you know, here's the thing, guys. Do the best you can. I encourage you to minimize the use of plastic in and around your garden, especially the cheap plastic, right? If you're going to use plastic, get high quality that's going to last a lot longer, that's less likely to leach, right? I mean, that's all I really could tell you. In an ideal world like my property in Puerto Rico, everything's in the ground and it's just on rainwater. There's like zero plastic there. So yes, in that environment, I'll be able to do more no plastic, but nonetheless, even our irrigation when piping does go in, it's going to be PVC and HDPE because it's less expensive. Of course, I do have filters in line to filter out what I can, but I encourage you guys to do the best you can. So you know, my goal is to minimize the use of plastic in my life in all areas, whether it's in the kitchen, which I've eliminated all plastic storage in my kitchen except for some vacuum bags that I use, but normally I store things in mason jars. So you know, I encourage you guys to have the minimum amount of plastic contact with your food if you do need to do it, especially or with your garden stuff, use good quality, you know, hard plastics that are less likely to leach. All right, next question is from Intergalactic Junk. All right, John, I'll be working on a one acre South Phoenix lot for a new home built and planting multiple trees. Planning to excavate large areas of the yard three to four feet deep. Wow, that will become tree and garden areas. We'll use the fill for lot leveling and grading. What would be the best way to amend large areas of fully excavated heavily compacted rocket soil to prep for future food forests? Currently creosote and ironwood trees are naturally growing without water supplementation. I'm going to call it native desert soil. I will have room to make large compost rows on property. Also have access to lots of biochar. Would mix in the compost. Was thinking of mixing in rock dust and perhaps some volcanic rock or wood chips into the mix for drainage. My worm bin creates castings but minimal for this scale of soil amendment. Planning to give mesquite, moringa, mulberry trees a year ahead start for shade before planting fruit trees. All right, so here's the thing, here's what I would do. Number one, I personally wouldn't excavate. To me, excavating and digging up the soil, digging up the top soil that's been there growing native, what did you say, native trees already, which is already creating some kind of soil microbiome that's in there, I think is literally demolishing the soil. Then you're digging down further, three to four feet, which you may need that soil somewhere else which is great, but now you're going to be growing in non-top soil, just basically bare soil. Maybe it's sterile and clean, but you really got to create a whole new microbiome in that soil now. What I would do instead is I would just heavily put compost and amend the soil currently that's there and then wood chip on top of that to keep all that in there to try to enliven what we have already. One of the worst things my friend Kailash did on my neighboring property in Puerto Rico, he had a bulldozer come in and clear his land out. While it did clear all the big trees and all these things which was good, he quickly found that things re-grew very quickly and then it was all these weedy things because something still wanted to grow there. To me, that was at the top of basically scraping all his top soil off and then losing all the soil microbiology that's in the top soil. We need to respect the top soil is my personal opinion. I would have a much different way of doing things. If you needed fill soil, I would bring it in from somewhere else, somebody else's property or something, but I would really want to grow in that top soil and try to build it up instead of just literally dig it all out. If you did have to create something from new, then I would say get some top soil, or if you are scratching off the top soil then dig out that other stuff and use it. Scratch off the top soil at least the first several feet, save that, put it aside, and then re-amend that with compost, worm castings in bulk, rock dust. I'd put some soil humates in there as well as insect grass as much as you can afford, maybe a little bit of sand. Mix it all up and then spread that on the bottom of your hole. I would want to have at least a two feet thick mixture of that. You're mixing top soil with compost and other things, but still it's not going to be the same because you disturbed the top soil, you dug it out, now you're adding that back in, but the thing is it's disturbed so now it's not the same because you've lost all the mycorrhizal networks. In South Phoenix there's probably less mycorrhizal networks because it's so dry, but you'll be amazed, once you start digging down the soil will be moist. So that's my personal opinion on it, I would do things a little bit differently, not sure if you can change your plans or do things differently, or maybe experiment in half of a smaller area and do what I'm saying in a small area and then do what you're thinking in another area and then see what happens and actually let me know because I'd be curious to see how it all works out. I'm sure different trees would like different locations with different soil, but to me I would not want to just start digging out, haphazardly land and trying to build new soil up from nothing personally, and also I don't use large equipment myself. So my Puerto Rico property I'm basically not using any large equipment, I'm just adding to the top, my soil's already pretty fertile there, chopping things down, chopping and dropping them, letting them break down, compost in place, and creating fertility instead of literally digging it out. That's why the middle of America is having all the problems because the topsoil is eroding, when the topsoil erodes, the subsoil is just not the same. So hopefully you guys learned a little bit in this month's Q&A, if you guys enjoyed this month's Q&A, hey please be sure to give this video a big thumbs up, also be sure to share this with other people you think it could help, also be sure to click that subscribe button right down below so you don't miss my new and upcoming episodes, I'll be coming in every 5 to 7 days, you never know where I'll show up, what you'll be learning on my YouTube channel, make sure you click the little bell so you don't get notified as soon as I post a new video, and finally be sure to share past episodes, past episodes are a wealth of knowledge, over 1700 episodes at this time on this channel that I can teach you guys all about how to grow your own high quality food at home. So with that, my name is John Kohler with growingyourgreens.com, we'll see you next time, and until then remember, keep on growing.