Part VI · Homestead encyclopedia
Skills beyond the vegetable rows
The same season connects compost to soil, berries to pruning, herbs to the pantry, seeds to next year, and flowers to a longer homestead plan.
11 working references
Follow a question into the notebook
Each subject opens as its own chapter, but the entries remain tied to the same 2026 observations and experiments.
Composting
Five 58-quart tote batches: browns, greens, airflow, worms, fungi, moisture corrections, finished compost, and a Batch 5 correction followed by 102°F heat in an unventilated tote.
Open reference →02♧Berry growing
Raspberry cane cycles and continuing fall harvests, a variable first soil-pH pass awaiting repeat measurements, a nine-plant map with three probes per plant, healthy first follow-up after light blueberry shaping, visibly rooting strawberry runners, heat-day restraint, and pest checks.
Open reference →03❧Herb gardening
Nine herbs, rain-day airflow, heat-day watering, swallowtail relocation, contrasting lavender outcomes, water propagation, counted air-drying bundles, and three basil preservation rounds with finished and open steps kept separate.
Open reference →04⌂Food preservation
Curing, freezing, completed and in-progress drying batches, safe canning paths, and three basil rounds with completion tracked step by step.
Open reference →05✣Seed saving
Spinach maturity, ornamental meadow-sage seed cleaning, and the difference between green clusters and dry seed.
Open reference →06✿Cut flowers
A Central Missouri plan that now includes an eight-crop spring seed bench alongside dahlias, ranunculus, peonies, and tulips.
Open reference →07❀Rose recovery
Late-snow damage, careful removal, clean soil, and the return of six-to-eight-inch shoots.
Open reference →08❋Magnolia project
Gentle soil building around an established Zone 6 landscape tree.
Open reference →09✾Meadow sage
Ornamental—not culinary—sage, with dried calyces and very small seed separated through mesh.
Open reference →10⌇Seasonal recipes
Simple crop-to-kitchen paths for summer vegetables, berries, and herbs.
Open reference →11+Succession planting
Fall broccoli, lettuce, spinach, and a second bean crop show how released space and overlapping generations extend a compact season—and why browsing must be separated from planting-method results.
Open reference →How the system connects
Nothing stays in only one chapter.
Kitchen + garden scrapsbecome compost
Finished compostreturns to crop rows
Harvest surplusmoves into storage
Seed + propagationbegin the next season