Funkentelechy
Well-Known Member
Yeah, dogs around chickens can get complicated, one day, when I first got chickens I was in my house washing dishes and one of my dogs ran in from outside and dropped a dead chicken at my feet. It sucked my dog was so happy, he thought he had done something good, he found a bird in the yard, killed it, and brought it to me.That's the goal, reduce, reuse, recycle as much as possible. If I do purchase its always organically as possible and in bulk if possible. I've been very intrigued by the idea of using homemade composted manure but I'm not sure if I want chickens or if there are alternatives to chicken as I own a dog who I love to death but just don't trust around anything other than humans and dogs. As for the comfrey, I was thinking of growing a patch of that and some alfalfa out this year. Have you grown either outside? I love your insight on the subject if possible. I've found plenty of kooky new grow techniques I plan on utilizing for my grows. I don't know if you've seen a topsy turvy tomato grower but i plan on running 2 plants in a little baby tent this year as a challenge from a friend so im excited to start that. Anything new you looking forward to popping?
I had to do some training with him, mostly sitting with him in the yard and explaining to him that these are my birds, not his, and for a while whenever he even looked at them I would have to remind him that they were my birds. Now I trust him 100%, he helps protect them for me, he roams around with the birds in the yard all day(I let them free-range during the day), and he would never hurt them.
The way I was taught to train them as a kid, and the method that is still common where I live is to tie the dead chicken around their necks until the chicken literally rots off of the rope that is tied to the dog's neck. After that, the dog usually doesn't want anything to do with chickens. But that's gross, and most importantly not necessary. And, if you built a fenced-in enclosed chicken run you wouldn't have to bother with any of that.
Composted manure and chicken manure, in particular, is high in sulphur, in addition to a ton of other nutrients of course. Sulphur is responsible for facilitating terp production. There are other natural sources of sulphur that you can buy and add to your soil, but they are mined in big pit mines and that's not what I would consider sustainable gardening.
Also, many amendments that are used for remineralization that are sourced through mining contain a lot of heavy metals like, lead, arsenic, and cadmium. Cadmium can be buffered with zinc to a certain extent, but I would rather not have to buffer anything. I prefer using compost and manure to remineralize my soil, the minerals come in a much more balanced form. Mother nature has been remineralizing the soil long before we existed, nobody ever had to apply CalMag to the redwoods.
I have never grown alfalfa(I buy organic pellets by the 50-pound bag), but I do grow comfrey outside. I have a big patch downhill from my compost piles. Comfrey has super long roots and it can pull nutrients up from the subsoil, some consider it a bioaccumulator for its ability to do this. My theory for growing comfrey below my compost piles is that hopefully, the comfrey can recover some of the nutrients that get leached into the soil when it rains on the piles. There are two main types of comfrey, I grow the Russian bocking comfrey.
There was a thread started on here about growing with a topsy turvy https://www.rollitup.org/t/anyone-grow-cannabis-upside-down.175002/
I am going to try growing some autos this year for the first time. A super cool and generous member here gifted me some seeds and I'm excited to try them out. Where I live the law only restricts the number of mature/budding plants that you have at a given time, so I'm going to try to grow autos and photoperiod plants outside this year. The theory being that the photos will finish long before my regular photoperiod plants become mature, thus staying within legal limits and getting two harvests outdoor. I'll post results.
As for photo plants I'm planning on growing some AK Bean Brains Skunk Quabbage bx4 and Purple Hindu Kush as well as some Bodhi OM4.
How about you? I watched your unboxing video on Youtube, very cool man, I enjoyed it.