There seems to be a misconception by all but a few onion "experts" that there is no such thing as a Short Day onion "SET". To set the record straight you can sow seed, transplant plants or set "Sets" to grow large bulbing onions. A "SET" being defined as a small dime to nickle size dry firm mature dormant onion bulb. A minature of a big dry onion. As mentioned above onion sets of the white,yellow and red long day onion sets are very available. You really have to search to find any Short Day Sets but they are out there. The set growers I am familiar with who grow and ship their "Granex Super Sweet Short Day Sets" to commercial growers in the South and CA are the Dutch Valley Growers Bourbonnais, Illinois. The Sweet Sets are actually grown by Dave Rietveld on his set farm near Kouts, Indiana. Below are a couple of websites to prove what we are talking about here. http:www.columbiapublications.com/onionworld/julyaugust2005/growingonionsets.htm www.dutchvalleygrowers.com onionworld.net Bunch Wholesale BWI lists them in their wholesale catalog as Sets-Super Sweet. Available mid September thru October only. www.bwicompanies.com Kenny A in Texas

Hi Turk, Although there is always an acidic taste with lactic acid fermenting the original flavor of the vegetable always comes through. I've grown several paprika types from Spain and have started a very highly recommended hybrid (Paprika Supreme) this year, but have not fermented any yet. I chose nylon tule for my weight bags because I believe it to be stable and food safe. And that is also the reason I chose the glass beads. A much more convenient solution to weighting would be a plastic bag with water and some air in it. More and more I find myself not using any weight whatsoever because the starters I use are so active. If your liquid kefir drink hasn't been pasteurized or treated with preservatives it should make an excellent starter. I would put a few ounces into a jar, add some whole milk and wait 3 or 4 days and see how it ferments. You should get a nice sweet, acidic smelling result. The grains (curd) will be very small for some weeks, but will gradually grow in size. They do not need to be large for the mixture to work as a starter. Both the curds and the more liquid whey work well as starters. I always use a mixture of both. For my sourdough starters I use 2 parts pure water to 1 part flour. There are some excellent sourdough threads on this forum. If you do decide to try fermenting, please let us know your results. Regards, jt

I always buy more seeds than needed. I found out the hard way that it is BAD to not have back up. What if the germ rate is only 60%? What if mice move in and dig the seeds out of the cells, or eat the tiny plants? What if my partner misses spots watering, and some plants shrivel up and die? We'll grow about 30000 plants this year - about 150 varieties. We start them in 72 cell plug trays, and eventually pot them up into 3" or 5" pots. I always start 1 flat more of 72's than I need. Seed ordering takes a long time. We are certified organic, so need to use organic seeds. If organic is not available, I need to document that I checked out 3 other sources for seed. I keep all this info in an excel sheet on my computer, as we will need to print it out and submit it to our certifier. To help with places like fedco (that list .6 grams, 1.4 oz, etc) I created another excel sheet that lists crops I grow, as well as how many seeds in an ounce, a gram, a lb, etc. It has really helped with ordering this year. Last thing, when I am done planting seeds, I mark the seed packet with how much I have left - If I plant 1 tray of 72's out of a packet of 500 seeds, I'll write 425 (a little room for error) on the packet. It has also been helpful.

Nothing NEW, but from the last couple of years experience at a small-town market, 30+ vendors, that gets a customer mix of local farmers/ex-farmers, "townies" and cottagers from the city, here are some of basic twists that have worked well for me: * fresh carrots w/ tops right through the season: not baby but picked quite young 5"-6". These go at way higher prices for a 1lb bunch, competing with quarter-bushel baskets of regular big mature topped carrots all around me, and they sell out. * fresh basil: sells well at a good price, and is great for the smell, which everyone notices walking by * heirloom tomatoes: Ours is not a trendy high-end market, there's a good mix of people as noted above, and heirlooms (as in big, "oddly" colored and shaped, sometimes "ugly", always tasty) still attract attention, and definitely get repeat customers from taste (and I guess the novelty helps). A basic like Brandywine is fine, and I had a several varieties last year with different looks and tastes (Green Zebra was a distinctive favorite), which helped even more. Curious people try one or two and keep coming back for more(!), and they were going for $1.50-2.00 a pop (12-16oz) - I just made up the price, since no one else had 'em at the market. *snap peas (edible pod): I was amazed by how many people didn't know these even existed! I'd go, "You can eat the pod" and hand 'em one and they'd automatically start shelling it. "No, you can eat the whole thing!" Wow! Child-like amazement :) They're also great to maximize the pea growing and picking effort because you can use 'em young as a snow pea, or mature, which gives more overall useful harvest time. You can maybe premium price 'em, but they're also good just for the word-of-mouth. *mesclun: I'm not sure what my various customers each think they're buying, the idea of mesclun has kinda trickled down to a real mainstream thing from a trendy idea. I sell a couple of mixes, one that's only lettuce (around nine lettuces), which I'll explain to anyone who wants to know, and of the various regular customers who buy a bag (1lb) a week, I don't think any of them really cared about the exact ingredients, they just like colorful, baby leaf salad mix, for their own individual reasons. At $5 a bag, a heavy seller. *spinach: This is probably more specific to our market, where there are several quite big local family farm growers that all concentrate on the basic carrots, potatoes, tomatoes, beans, peas, etc, (easier handling/storage), but not on the fresh greens. So this depends a lot on the other vendors, but here, mounds of spinach is a good thing to have (and other greens, like lettuces, chard, etc, are quick and easy and add to the selection). *radish that's out of the typical early season is quick and easy to grow, and attracts a surprising number of people when no-one else has 'em. *miscellaneous specialty stuff: I plant small quantities of tons of things and bring some in. They're all good for novelty and attracting attention, but (for me in this specific situation...), none most alone don't do much for the bottom line. Stuff like: Eight Ball zucchini (lots of comments), Lemon cukes (comments and some regulars), white icicle type radish, rainbow chard (like, Bright Lights), purple snap beans (comments, but people mainly like the green and the yellow...), and so on, I even sold a few daikon radishes... All fun to grow and present but no magic. Half the fun seems to be trying new things without getting buried in a lot of odd and unusual ;) stuff... The general strategy of growing out of season really does work. This is practical if you're small. Having the earliest stuff is great, and just having it when no-one else does to me is just as much of an advantage. Superfreshness is also great, and probably most easily done when you're small. I mean, extreme freshness: stuff cut/picked the afternoon/evening before, salad greens the morning of... People really notice that: "hey, I forgot your mesclun in the fridge for TEN DAYS and it was still fine..." Also, if you grow natural, even if not certified organic, all kinds of people you mightn't expect to respond to that... Hope that's useful stuff in their! (I've got lots to learn, but passing on the little I have noticed already is always FUN!!)