Ducks 4 in '24

[ducks4you]

Couldn't think of a better name for this year's thread.
My gardening New Year's resolution? No more online seed buying!!! (for this year's growing season)
I have determined that anything else I need to buy I can get at a box store.
I did make one more 2023 seed purchase, from Victory Seeds. They sell rare seeds, if you didn't know.

Victory Seed Company

Offering a wide variety of modern and heirloom/open-pollinated vegetable, herb, and flower seeds.

victoryseeds.com

I am intrigued about growing iceberg lettuce. I will let you know...

Order summary​ Pennsylvania Broadleaf Tobacco × 1 $4.49​ Iceberg Head Lettuce × 1 Packet $2.95​ Subtotal $7.44​ Shipping $4.61​ Taxes $0.00​ Total $12.05 USD​

 

[ducks4you]

Happy problem. Beef lady is shipping steer on January 5th. That means we are picking it up around January 15th.
I am scrambling to repack 2023 beef into 3/4 respective freezers to make room!!
I will document my solutions, which includes putting last year's leftover hamburger into a box that housed an office chair shipped for a Christmas present. You gotta have Some way of easily telling apart the older meat from the newer!
I already started to remove bags of turkey bones to make into broth. I pressured canned 3 quarts yesterday, started 1/2 a bag of turkey bones yesterday, strained off the bones and meat, threw out the bones, returned the meat AND the other 1/2 of bones/carcass to the crock pot. I may wear my crock pot out this month bc there will be other packages that need to be cooked down/canned in order to make room.

 

[Rhodie Ranch]

I get so many carcasses from DD, and always boil the bones to make broth. Do you have an electric canner? Wonder if that would be easier than dragging everything up from the basement every couple of weeks.

 

[ducks4you]

I am thinking about bringing my other crock pot upstairs this week and using the stove top for that one.
My solution to not have to haul up and down the stairs is to house the pressure canner AND the water bath canner under my kitchen table, which sits against the wall with 3 tall chairs. We sit in the DR.
I have given an electric canner a thought. Do you have one?

 

[heirloomgal]

Couldn't think of a better name for this year's thread.
My gardening New Year's resolution? No more online seed buying!!! (for this year's growing season)
I have determined that anything else I need to buy I can get at a box store.
I did make one more 2023 seed purchase, from Victory Seeds. They sell rare seeds, if you didn't know.

Victory Seed Company

Offering a wide variety of modern and heirloom/open-pollinated vegetable, herb, and flower seeds.

victoryseeds.com

I am intrigued about growing iceberg lettuce. I will let you know...

Order summary​ Pennsylvania Broadleaf Tobacco × 1 $4.49​ Iceberg Head Lettuce × 1 Packet $2.95​ Subtotal $7.44​ Shipping $4.61​ Taxes $0.00​ Total $12.05 USD​

Iceberg lettuce (crispheads in general really) is one of the best types of lettuce out there IMHO; it takes the heat, the leaves have substance and are not prone to getting bitter like so many others, they can last nearly all summer long. The pale colored iceberg lettuce that is synonymous with fast food joints is a far, far cry from home grown icebergs. Only challenge with them, for me anyway probably would be different for you, is getting them to go to seed.

 

[ducks4you]

G;ad tp know it's growable!! I had heard that it's hard to grow, so I have been avoiding it.
What is the taste difference?

 

[ducks4you]

I am SO grateful for the seeds that several of you mailed me last year!!!
I have them all saved in my seed cabinet.
I HOPE to save some seeds this year and 'pay it forward," too.

 

[heirloomgal]

G;ad tp know it's growable!! I had heard that it's hard to grow, so I have been avoiding it.
What is the taste difference?

I'd say it might even be easier than other lettuces, because of the hardiness. Hard to desccribe the flavor.... The leaves are not bruised so easily as other lettuce types, they taste less watery. I've harvested certain leaf lettuce varieties from the garden, rinsed them and then spun them dry in the lettuce spinner and they were all bruised up from that jostling and looked terrible. But the icebergs/crispheads are so much more resilient. More substance. I've grown Reine de Glace, which was fabulous and also Great Lakes which was super fantastic too. They don't grow as fast as other lettuces, but they also last much longer too.

 

[Rhodie Ranch]

I broke down and ordered the Carey/Nesco. I watched Rose Red Homestead reviews (she's a retired scientist) of the Presto vs the Nesco. I chose the C/N for $110 on Amazon. It gets here tomorrow. Its for small batches and so that I don't have to have hubs haul up the All American and the millions of supplies from the basement.

 

[ducks4you]

Give me reviews, pls!