Verbum Farm

More Tropical/Subtropical agriculture in Southeast Michigan - from Verbum Farm LLC 🌴

Today was sugar cane planting day. Although I've grown it successfully for about 8 years now, this year I bought some fresh stock from a Florida grower. Very exciting to a weirdo like me 😆

Unlike many annuals or perennials grown in temperate areas, many tropical staples are grown from cuttings like this, not from seed. In the case of sugar cane, as you can see, the typical planting method, whether by machine or hand, is to lay them down horizontally in a trench. It looks altogether funny to the Yankee eye, but this is very much like they do it everywhere from the Deep South, to the Caribbean, to Central and South America, to Asia and the Pacific.

The new shoots (it's a grass) will grow from those little "nodes" next to my hand in that photo. Incredibly, our climate is good enough to attain 4-6 foot (1.3-2 meter) mature plants by frost. That's quite small by sugar cane standards, but big enough to have a crop.

Look for sales of the mature canes, or "rattoons", by November, God willing!

Still blows my mind these puppies will end up as HUGE squash! And don't they look lush?

This is one of those "rediscovered" regional squashes, North Georgia Candy Roaster, seeds courtesy of my friend Helen Rau. They are a C. maxima, differing from the usual squash species that form the typical American garden pallete, which are usually C. pepo.

Look out for fresh squash and their pure seeds this fall from Verbum Farm!

Had a very special lil' helper this week with planting, my little 2-year-old Daniel 😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍

Planting cotton - yes cotton - this week in Adrian Township, Michigan.

Why? Well, a large portion of my farm revenue is actually seed on eBay and Etsy, and it does well! That is the aim here.

While to***co continues to be my best seller by far as a niche exotic (and organically grown, for that matter), experiments like this cotton often pan out to new product lines in the seed department. We shall see...

"You can't grow that here!" Cute. I hear it all the time and laugh for a lotta different exotics - to***co, sugar cane, lemon tree seedlings, etc. After a quick show around of the field (or pictures in the off season), I usually get people to see that great things like these ARE possible with good old hard work and attention to detail!

The flowering and mature pics are from other years where, yes, I was able to get cotton bolls with actual cotton in them, just not enough to sell. Onto the larger quantities, now.

And see? It's not too hard after all 😄

You know, I may no longer be practicing as a civil engineer, but I'm still designing and building infrastructure!!!!! 🤣🤣🤣 The structures just carry livestock and not vehicles or pedestrians, that's all! 🐖

GO TECH! Michigan Technological University