Tomorrow

Little rows of tiny green plants reach toward the plastic roof of my greenhouse, jeering at my absence of faith.  It's too early to discount the possibility of miscarriages, but we just might be picking lettuce near the end of January.

"How's the compost bin?" says Virginia.

I still have high hopes for the warming effect of the compost and manure cage, but I'd better not forget to soak it now and then, as I did until a week ago.  All it was doing was drying out, snow everywhere and none inside the box, the christening of an indoor gardener.  I'm sure Will Allen, the man who said he uses manure in each corner of his 100-foot "Growing Power" greenhouses in Milwaukee, figured others would be smart enough to remember it rarely rains inside most greenhouses.  For more on manure-heated greenhouses, check out http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/strucs/msg1015481727287.html.

Note the naysayer who says "if manure worked, commercial greenhouses would use it," implying it doesn't work.  Nonsense.  White roofs help keep cities cooler, but painting roofs white has only recently begun to catch on.  Others say that before modern heaters, commercial greenhouses used "HM" (horse manure).  How did they do it?  We'll find out, and we'll do it better.  We're going to rediscover all sorts of things in the next 10 years -- despite the efforts of firms over-invested in products they want us to wastefully consume, such as oil heaters for greenhouses and black shingles.  More and more people are going to raise their own chickens and goats, gather eggs and make their own cheese.  Bet on it!