Mother Nature or Robot Sprayer?

I have been out of town for a little over a week on a spring break excursion to visit my sister and family in Colorado. We spent some time in Boulder and visited the National Atmospheric Research Center. I highly recommend their guided tour. While there, we had a conversation with the guide about weather modification. For all of you who believe this is some sort of untrue conspiracy theory, I am sorry to burst your bubble but it is true. The guide explained that scientists are unhappy about the ongoing weather modification which includes the spraying of metal oxides into the atmosphere from airplanes. He said that it is an uncontrolled experiment that is being done mostly by private industries, especially hedge funds and huge agricultural companies, to make bets on weather related industries, such as crops. They call it cloud seeding and believe that they can produce more rain or  cloud cover in areas by spraying these chemicals. I believe it should be illegal. Not only is it unethical to modify the weather, it is unethical to poison the land and people with metal oxides of aluminum and barium. I am trying not to use my blog as a place to rant and rave but I recommend educating yourself if you haven't already. A good place to start is at this website:  http://aircrap.org/list-companies-engaged-weather-modification-related-patents/331939/

It is March 27th, the week after "spring break" and still snowing across the US. There is talk of firing the little ground hog that lied to us all. This time last year, we had warm spring weather and were able to start gardening outdoors with a few frost and cold tolerant crops. Not this year.  While we were in the Rocky's over spring break, it snowed 2 feet in one day and the weather dipped below 0F with windchill of -18F. It was an unusually cold spring weather event, even for the Rocky Mountain areas. The news in Denver was reporting it as a great thing because of their severe water shortage, every bit of snowfall means it will eventually trickle downhill and hopefully replenish their drought stricken area. It also kept the ski areas packed with business. On our way back home yesterday, it snowed in Kentucky. The ground was too warm to allow it to stick but it is still too cold to plant anything outside yet. The night time temperatures and frost will kill just about anything you try to plant right now. I have to wonder if it is Mother Nature or the Robot Sprayers. If it is the robot sprayers, then what is their objective this year? Drought, killing frosts, heat waves, water shortages, floods, hurricanes, wild fires. Who knows? I guess we need to watch their stock market bets instead of read the farmer's almanac nowadays.

Since the cold weather is so persistent, I am happy to have my greenhouse going. I already have broccoli forming heads and lettuce ready for harvest. Several herbs can be harvested anytime too. My tomatoes and pepper plants are booming and will be a good size when the ground finally warms up enough to plant them. While we were away, a friend came by to water my plants and check on the animals. I had tried to set up some irrigation in the greenhouse before we left but I couldn't get it working right in time. Irrigation in a greenhouse requires a lot of tinkering with different nozzles, lines and devices. It also requires good areas for drainage. I believe in order to make it work well, I will need to build some benches that drain instead of using the plastic tables I have now. The tables are starting to sag with the weight of the plants and they hold water in the middle if I use the irrigation. I have a seedling heat mat under the tomato and pepper seedlings that are keeping the soil a comfy 75-80F. It is big enough to warm four trays and has a thermostat so that it doesn't overheat the plants. My greenhouse heater was also installed before we left so that the ambient air temperature can be set at 65-70F. I also have a fan and vent installed for when the greenhouse gets over 90F. It is nice to not worry about it being too cold or hot anymore. Once I get the irrigation worked out, I will only need to worry about fertilizing and checking for signs of bugs and disease.