Monday, October 15, 2012

Mulberry Bushes

Thanks to my Internet friend "Southernokie" on AgTalk, I have identified my notill trees.  It is the Mulberry.   It looks be the specie Morus rubra.  It was here when we moved here but it spread wildly the last 9 crop years.

It really likes my notill, cover crop and fertilizer program.  It must love the balanced fertilizer program I have spread of Calcium, Phosphorus, Potassium, Boron, Manganese, and Zinc.  The tiny bits of magnesium and copper I have used didn't hurt it, either.

The Newman boys have been taking my Mule out to the field and dig and cut them out.  We take a spade, dig deep beside the roots, pry it over and the other guy takes big pruners and cuts it off.  It gets a dose of brushkiller directly on the fresh cut root.

I did that a couple of years ago but not near enough.  They have brought in several Mule beds full of cut Mulberry that I let dry and burn once a week or so.

I have a nice new crop of maples from the seeds that blow from trees in every direction of the field below the house, too.  They are easy to control and I don't worry about them too much.  The next thing you know though I will be writing about trying to kill my Maple tree crop!

I watched a PBS program on The Stock Market Crash of 1929.  We are still doing what they that led to that crash!  I think that might make a good blog topic.  I heard a talk about Debit versus Credit cards and the problem with credit cards is only 30% of users like me have the discipline to use them as cash and pay them off monthly.  The average credit card debt is around $8,000 and 20% of card holders only pay the minimum amount.  That means you will never get out of debt!  Kind of like our country's situation, isn't it?

I also watched the Dust Bowl documentary on PBS again.  It's a great reminder of the importance of minimum tillage and reducing soil erosion by wind and water.  Cover crops and winter crops are key to healthy soils that don't blow or wash away.

I passed my CSP spot check so we are good for another year.  We had zero rain on last week's rain report so thank you Good Lord and maybe could we have just another one or two to get this harvest work in?

Happy Birthday to Finnegan who was 2 yesterday and hope to see you soon!

Ed

2 comments:

  1. I thought mulberry trees were all native from Asia but I see I'm wrong. Never saw the red mulberry yet. We still have some white and black mulberry trees alongside country roads in the South West of France (I marked the spots on my local Ordnance Survey map at the time). The black mulberries are pretty tasty, the white ones less so, but still good, with a hint of honey. You must have a red mulberry tree around you can make some jam or jelly from instead of letting it sprout its seeds in your field!

    I never understood how this credit card debt was ever allowed in the first place. Maybe that's one area the government should have regulated, even for those against federal interventionism.
    But that's a small part of the whole personal debt issue: Both credit card debt and student loan debt are about 1 trillion dollars each, but the mortgage debt is 13 trillions. In total, personal debt nears 16 trillions. I can't help thinking there's some form of parallel between the personal and the national debt, it's like we elected a government that behaves just like we do on an individual level.
    http://www.usdebtclock.org/

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  2. My partner thinks these seeds came from a load of fertilizer. There were a few bushes along Martinsville Road when I moved here but nothing like what I have today! Maybe I got them both ways? I think they just spread from the original plants but they did blow up all of a sudden.

    That's a great point you made on those debt numbers. There definitely seems to be a parallel.

    Ed

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