Chelsea Green Blog
Farming & Homesteading
The Importance of Planting Cover Crops
If you want to improve your soil, one of the most important things you can do is to plant cover crops. But they need to be selected with a purpose.
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Weeding: Work Smarter, Not Harder
Weeds are the bane of every farmer and gardener’s existence. Before you go crusading against the weeds in your garden follow these tips and tricks!
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Preserving Veggies: Tips for Freezing Vegetables
Try your hand at preserving veggies by freezing them! Freezing vegetables is a quick, simple way to preserve them for winter meals.
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All About Cows: What has Four Legs, Says “Moo,” and Could Save the Planet?
Cows can help rebuild soil and restore land to its rightful state—improving carbon sequestration, natural water cycles, and soil fertility and nutrient density.
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Arid Agriculture: Strategies to Reduce Heat Stress in Crops and Livestock
Become more resilient when the temperatures are on the rise to reduce heat stress and produce food in even the most arid environments.
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A Guide to Great Compost From Eliot Coleman
Compost is the key to an abundant garden. Learn the basics of making compost from gardening expert Eliot Coleman, and enjoy the joy of growing your own food.
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How to Save Tomato Seeds
As your favorite variety of home grown tomatoes start ripening on the vine this summer, be sure to save those seeds for next year’s planting. It takes a bit of care to get the seeds out of the gelatinous tomato goo they’re suspended in, but once you’ve done it you can use those seeds to…
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Focusing on Soil Remediation with Fungi
Nature does what needs to be done if we let her. The fungi and the plants will sing this soil redemption song for us. As the fungi and the plants always have.
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Biodynamic Farming: Unlock Fertile Fields with Cows & Compost
“An immediate halt to chemical fertilizing and returning to the use of compost instead would turn degeneration into regeneration.”
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The Art of Grazing: What Is “Good” Silvopasture Grazing?
If you’re not familiar with silvopasture, you should be. The integrated system offers both the promise of land regeneration and economic livelihood.
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Capturing the Crunch: How to Harvest and Store Cucumbers
As the weather heats up, now’s the perfect time to grow and pick cucumbers! With these easy tips and tricks, you’ll be prepared to successfully harvest and store the cucumbers you grow until they’re ready to eat. Unless otherwise noted, all photographs copyright © 2017 by Andrew Mefferd. The following is an excerpt from The Greenhouse and…
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Land Degradation: The Secrets of Fixing the Soil with Biochar
Some of the world’s most productive and resilient soils contain significant quantities of “natural” biochar. Author Kelpie Wilson challenges us to “change our perspective from ‘too much carbon in the air’ to ‘not enough carbon in the soil.’ We are good at being miners and exploiting resources, so let’s mine the air and stash the…
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Don’t Bawk: The Wild and Wonderful Chicken Tractor
Aside from the sheer pleasure of telling your friends, straight-faced, that you maintain your garden using something called a “chicken tractor,” there are a slew of other benefits to working the land with a few of your animal friends. Getting rid of pests without chemicals, for one; letting them do the work of weeding and…
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Perennial Veggies: The Benefits of Perennial Vegetables
Think about how much work your perennial flower beds take compared to your annual vegetable garden. In a busy year, your perennial garden largely sails through despite neglect. Once your perennials are established, and if they are suited to your climate and site conditions, they can be virtually indestructible. An annual vegetable garden, as we…
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Can’t Find the Perfect Garden Tools? Make Your Own
Is hoeing hurting your back? Is your trowel cramping your wrist? Are the tools at your local hardware store just not cutting it? Gardening can be such laborious work, but what you put into your garden is what you get back. With a few simple do-it-yourself modifications you can find and alter your tools to…
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Top-Bar Beekeeping: A List of Pros and Cons
Beekeepers are facing tremendous challenges, from pests such as varroa and tracheal mites and from the mysterious but even more devastating phenomenon known as Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD). Yet in backyards and on rooftops all over the world, bees are being raised successfully, even without antibiotics, miticides, or other chemicals. More and more organically minded…
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Drill, Plug, Wax, Wait: 6 Simple Steps to Growing Mushrooms Outdoors
Mushrooms: they’re versatile, they’re delicious, and they’re extremely simple to grow in your yard or garden. We have a mushroom growing method that’s so simple, you have no excuse not to try it out. All you need is a log or tree stump, some mushroom starter, and a couple of basic tools. And you will…
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Make Way For the Queen! Natural Queen Bee Rearing
Queen Bees are essential for a hive. No colony can truly “bee” successful without one. How do you get this almighty queen? It’s all in the honeycomb. Below is a formula for natural queen bee rearing that will help you run a productive hive. Unless otherwise noted, all photographs copyright © 2023 by Eric and…
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Plant Spotlight: The Joyful Juneberry
All hail the joyful juneberry! While these rich and sweet berries taste wonderful when they’re fresh, you can also preserve them, use them as a substitute for blueberries in dessert recipes, and used to make wine, beer or cider. To create these delicious dishes, you first need to find and harvest juneberries. Get ready to set…
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Grow Mushrooms on Your Jeans. Seriously.
Do you have an old, worn-out pair of jeans in your dresser? Instead of throwing them out, try to grow mushrooms on them. Follow this simple step-by-step outline to start growing mushrooms in the unlikeliest of places…on your pants! The following is an excerpt from Organic Mushroom Farming and Mycoremediation by Tradd Cotter. It has…
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A Cluckin’ Good Time: Why Chickens Rule the Roost
If you’ve ever wondered what your life is missing, the answer is probably chickens. These feathery friends can help fertilize your soil, mow your lawn, and even lay the eggs you eat for breakfast. What could be better than that? To celebrate our favorite member of the poultry flock, we’ve rounded up some wisdom from…
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What’s the Buzz With Beekeeping?
For all the beekeepers and future beekeepers out there, this one is for you. The benefits of bees are numerous: honey, beeswax and let’s not forget pollination. Raising honey bees increases pollination of flowering plants and honey bees are the heroes of pollination efforts for modern agriculture. Anyone can master the skills necessary to be…
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Getting to the Root: Growing & Harvesting Carrots
Curious about carrots? There is no better time than now to get to growing. Before you get started, check out these insights on growing & harvesting carrots from gardening expert Will Bonsall. The following is an excerpt from Will Bonsall’s Essential Guide to Radical, Self-Reliant Gardening by Will Bonsall. It has been adapted for the…
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What is Biochar and How Does it Work?
Some of the most productive and resilient soils in the world contain significant quantities of “natural” biochar. Like many human discoveries, biochar has likely been invented, lost, and reinvented multiple times. It’s the oldest new soil enhancer that you’ve never heard of! Biochar is a stable solid that is rich in carbon and is made…
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Are you Team Duck or Team Chicken?
Thinking about adding a laying flock to your backyard, but having trouble deciding between ducks and chickens? Agonize no more. Ducks are easy to herd, have routine egg laying hours, and are superior to chickens in terms of pest control. Chickens are more readily available, usually cheaper to purchase, and are a better confinement animal,…
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