Saturday, March 20, 2010

NYS POSSIBLE CROPS


Also, on the NYS Apple Country website, links to apple picking farms can be found. Some of these websites are actually pretty elaborate and give a sense of the yearly schedule and necessities that come with an orchard or any type of crops. One of the farms, Abbott Farms in Baldwinsville grow quite a variety of crops and offer in-store sales as well as pick-your-own methods. They have a pretty handy table that shows the crops capable of growing in Syracuse and their availability throughout the year.




For anyone considering planting an apple orchard, these two websites give good info:
In summary,
-Drainage is key; planting on raised terraces can be a good idea.
-For apple trees, pH of soil needs to be between 5 and 6.5.
-Ripening season ranges from June to October. Note that apple varieties that ripen early cannot be preserved for more than 2 to 3 weeks even in cold storage.




Saturday, March 6, 2010

Temporary Grain Storage


For anyone interested in bin interior grain storage:
Figure to the left shows artisanal plywood bin but manufactured steel bins are possible too.

Friday, March 5, 2010

WEBSITE TO ABSOLUTELY VISIT!



FOCUS ON FOOD
British website for governmental program 'Focus On Food'. This program touches on many aspects of food and food education, especially for children. It promotes healthy cooking and education on nutrition. They have their own system of mobile teaching kitchens (called the Cooking Buses) and many pictures and details on how these vehicles function in school/community environments.

GRAIN STORAGE TECHNIQUES

http://www.fao.org/docrep/t1838e/t1838e00.htm
I don't know if anyone's been on this website during their research on grain storage but I've found it pretty helpful. The focus is on grain storage in developing countries but still talks about the basic principles of storage explicitly.
The site is divided into chapters which makes finding what you're looking for a lot easier... Chapters 6 and 7 explain warehouse building and grain storage requirements as well as bulk storage methods. Those two chapters might be the sections that relate the most to our program statement but the entire site gives good insight on the life of the grain in different historical, geographical/cultural contexts.