And for my first trick

I run the bare root room by myself for three hours and see how that turns out. A week or so on the job should be enough to have absorbed every bit of botany knowledge ever, right? Right. I got this.

Grapes

Fun fact = When growing grapes, you want no more than 12 leaves per cluster of grapes on a tendril and should actively prune the shoot at that point to prevent shading (shaded leaves function at only 6% of their capacity) from more leaves to channel growth into grapes themselves, rather than the foliage.

Summary: 12 leaves per grape cluster, any more and you give the ol' choppy choppy.


Oh, and Happy Easter ya'll!

The 'beetus

What a weird thing to have an EAT RIGHT NOW OR DIE response activated in your body on the regular. And then not be able to sleep again because aforementioned body is too dumb to recognize that there is actually food in the system for about 20 minutes. Yay 'beetus.

Hydrangeas are in.

120 Gallons of sap collected and going strong. Starting up the boiler tomorrow, PUDGY PIES AND S'MORES, HERE WE COME!

In other news, Haskap (blue honeysuckle) are pretty much the coolest. And apparently taste delicious! (not to mention loaded in vitamin C and antioxidants!) Now available at your local Jungs Garden Center!

Flash of Brilliance

Epileptic... Diabetics... EPIBETICS!

Quite proud of that one.
#justplainsmart

Shhhhpring!

Has arrived! And with it, the torrential sap downpour! An hour and 35 gallons of sap later, large can number 1 filled! (Dear mom, dad, and Wellings, we're installing sap line tubes down the hill to do our dirty work for us before next year. Just an fyi. xoxo, Matt)

Minions are arranged to do some work (shout out to Nico) tomorrow and with Ariel home, this week should be rocking!

The doldrums of winter have passed, the snow is melting; BRING ON THE SPRING.

PIMPED OUT!

TO THE RIGHT, TO THE RIGHT, EVERYTHING THAT'S COOL IN THE BOX TO THE RIGHT!

But really, you can subscribe by email now, so you can be given LIVE UPDATES on the happenings of my life. Just in case you don't actually want to have to remember to type in this url. God knows I forget to come here often enough.

There was also the option of putting up rotating pictures of cute puppies, but I don't think my blog could handle all that awesome in one go. Mayhaps sometime soon. For now, orchids!

And in lieu of a lame side bar pic, here's a cute Husky(ish) pup.  

Midweek Vacation!

It's no Trinedad and Tobago, but a Wednesday off! Time to catch up on my 'Wherever You Go There You Are', hopefully get some sap going (if it starts flowing!?) and maybe even do those pesky taxes. And hey, let's shoot high - clean my room, finish memorizing Canon in D, and apply for at least two more jobs while I'm at it. Right? Right. I'll get back to you tomorrow on those ones!

In other news, (more recent) perks of Jungs employment, I now have ~150 of Verbena Blue Lagoon/Apricot Sprite Sweet Peas/Impatiens flowers that are "expired" (ok, I'll take a slightly lower germination rate.. but expired? Oh please!) Don't worry mom, I'll have the garden looking like this <---- in no time!) and a free orchid, courtesy of a temperamental child who ran around taking all the tags off.

This is going to develop into a bad habit, I can tell already. (Samantha, go go gadget guerilla gardening campaign?!)


In OTHER news, what you SHOULD be doing right now is googling "Axel Erlandson" Basically, he's the coolest. horticulturalist ever. He grew trees into chairs, ladders, all sorts of ridiculous shapes. Check out his wikipedia page and do a google image search for his name and you can see a lot of his work. (Or shoot me an email, I'll be jumping ship for Gilroy Gardens, CA shortly!) Trees. So cool right now.

Grown, grafted, and LOVED.
Axel was the bees' knees.
Also, swedish/american.

Sap's a risin'!

Add two feet of snow and it's a scene straight from our woods.

VACATION! Why not go to Trinedad and Tobego in the middle of sap season, right? (ahem mom and dad, I'm looking at you here!) Hunkered down with the house to myself (and the ocassional wifi stealer.. err, I mean sister ;) ) and some gorgeous temperatures to look forward to, bring on the sap! Ran the lines once today and got 10-12 gallons and I think it barely broke 34 all day! Hopefully we can make up for last season! 

Go go gadget, boil-down! 

Maple Sap Season

Spring is coming, winter goes
Melting February snows.

Warm March days, cold starry skies
Make the maple sap to rise.

Daytime thaw and nighttime freeze
Draw the sap up in the trees.

Morning sun will make it drop;
Evening cold will make it stop.

Dump the silver buckets gleaming.
Boil the sap and watch it steaming.

Cool it now and stir it quick,

It’s maple syrup, brown and thick.

Boil it more, the syrup’s thicker
Cool it, stir it, beat it quicker.

It’s maple sugar, sweet and good,
Best of all the Indians’ food.

–Marie Curtis

Workin' Man

So I work here now..     http://www.jungseed.com/

and it's kind of awesome! I am/will be learning so much about plants, it's ridiculous. Thus far every customer that has gone through has had a question and it's hard not to talk to them for extended periods of time. I can now tell you 3 different ways to take care of tomato blight (and here, let me direct you to our new grafted tomatoes section!) and can only imagine what I'll continue to learn.

Time to start the fun work in the bare root/back room actually playing with plants Wednesday. I'll get back to you on that one!

In other news Jen (and that Tom kid) visited this weekend and it was fantastic!

Livin' the good life,

Reverend M. Anderson

Let Sleeping Eggs Lay

Yay, time to go measure the sleeping brain of Messir Anderson again tomorrow.

Hopefully it'll be all sorts of awesome and there will be no Delta Wave Derping around (they're the dumb ones that don't quite do what they're told) this time. For now, time to make myself oh so sleepy!

Spiiiiindle.

Pretty much like this. But even less cool looking.

In lieu of a poem ( I was going to put a poem about epilepsy here in honor of the EEG  but as it turns out they're all kinda debbie downers!) I will leave with you a silly diabetic pickup line I found on the internet today:

"Hey girl can you check your blood sugar? Cuz I would love to know your number."  ;)

Vidjas N' Stuff

Video 2 from Anderson Productions, to be released to Julie Lassa (and other senators!) in the near future!
Help me feel popular, take a gander! TWENTY FIVE VIEWS OR BUST!

"Play on Words" 

He took all day to make the play 
and use all seven letters 
would not have taken near so long 
if not among his betters 

Play by play he lost each game 
and needed to save face 
Just this once he would strive 
to not be second place 

What was the word that he used 
to stymie his opponents? 
"ZOOLOGY" on triple word 
played in final moments 

Triumph made him jubilant 
with feelings so divine 
He trounced his college brothers, 
this little boy of nine 

-From someone named Steven on a weird dating site on the interblogs

Cribbage

Sometimes, when my mom is whomping me at cribbage and I'm sure to be skunked, she'll mockingly recite poetry at me.

 "To fight and to fight when hope's out of site, that's the best game of all! Mwahahahah!" - Sue Anderson



Here's the rest of the poem for your enjoyment. Happy Saturn, hope you folks in Madison enjoyed that fake tornado warning (snownado?!). I'll be down there soooon!

The Quitter When you're lost in the Wild, and you're scared as a child     And Death looks you bang in the eye, And you're sore as a boil, it’s according to Hoyle     To cock your revolver and . . . die. But the Code of a Man says: "Fight all you can,"     And self-dissolution is barred. In hunger and woe, oh, it’s easy to blow . . .     It’s the hell-served-for-breakfast that’s hard. "You're sick of the game!" Well, now that’s a shame.      You're young and you're brave and you're bright. "You've had a raw deal!" I know — but don't squeal,      Buck up, do your damnedest, and fight. It’s the plugging away that will win you the day,      So don't be a piker, old pard! Just draw on your grit, it’s so easy to quit.      It’s the keeping-your chin-up that’s hard. It’s easy to cry that you're beaten — and die;      It’s easy to crawfish and crawl; But to fight and to fight when hope’s out of sight —     Why that’s the best game of them all! And though you come out of each gruelling bout,     All broken and battered and scarred, Just have one more try — it’s dead easy to die,     It’s the keeping-on-living that’s hard. -Robert Service, Rhymes of a Rolling Stone

Quartermaster

February I was going to do one everyday.. got to 8. With this, I'm already at 2 for March, 1/4 of the way to A BRAND NEW 2013 BLOGGING PR.

Go team!

Here's a motivational picture for your day. If you're not starting your day off as awesome as this lil' guy, clearly you're doing something wrong.

Cowboy up!

Happy Birthday Mr. Geisel!

“Today you are You, that is truer than true. 
There is no one alive who is Youer than You!” 
― Dr. Seuss, Happy Birthday to You!



And some other inspirational words from the man himself:

“Poor empty pants
With nobody inside them.” 
― Dr. Seuss

Thanks Theodor, youda man!