Bodhidog's Honeybee Ranch and Produce Farm

Bodhidog's Honeybee Ranch and Produce Farm Join me in the adventures of starting a small hobby farm. No produce for sale yet, but stay tuned!

09/07/2025

Let's start some onions!

This year I'm starting onions from seed I harvested earlier this year from onions I grew. Onions are biennial, meaning they grow the first year and then go to see the second. So basically I started these onions in the fall of 2023, harvested the spring of 2024, and used those onions for almost a year. I set aside about five or six onions that were starting to turn and replanted them spring of 2025. After 4 months I was able to harvest seed that I'm growing now completing the cycle.

It's important to know there are two types of onions, long day and short day. This refers to the amount of sunlight a day the variety of onion needs to form a bulb and not just stay a green onion. Being that I'm in the South, I grow onions in the winter time so I try to stay with short day onions. Packages of onion seeds generally won't tell you this, nor will they tell you this when you buy onion starts in the garden center. So, it's kind of a shot in the dark whether you have ones that grow better in the season you choose.

Happy gardening!!

Garden Update Post!🥒🥬🌶🥦🥕🍅🍉🍓🍌Not a lot usually happens in August in the garden around here. The only thing that really g...
08/03/2025

Garden Update Post!🥒🥬🌶🥦🥕🍅🍉🍓🍌

Not a lot usually happens in August in the garden around here. The only thing that really grows around here in August are things that are atypically southern, like okra, peanuts, sweet potatoes.... so let's talk sweet potatoes.

I'm trying an experiment. I had a bunch of sweet potato vines trying to exit the garden so I thought I would put them into a container and try to confine the potatoes that grow. Now sweet potatoes don't grow the same as regular potatoes. Regular potatoes have one plant that grows potatoes off the root, or Tubers. Sweet potatoes grow a Vine and wherever the root shoot down from underneath the leaf is where a sweet potato could grow. See pics.

So my idea was to take these Vines And put them in a container And see if I can just grow a bunch of sweet potatoes in a container Period Normally I dig up everything In the garden Around Thanksgiving And pull all the sweet potatoes that are hidden everywhere. I'll let you know how it goes.

The great mint harvest of 2025. I had to dig up the root mat because it's taking over the garden bed. I'll replant it ...
05/11/2025

The great mint harvest of 2025. I had to dig up the root mat because it's taking over the garden bed. I'll replant it elsewhere and/or give it away 😁

Gardening Friends! Let chat about permaculture! It is a method of choosing companion plants wisely. In this bed, i gr...
04/21/2025

Gardening Friends! Let chat about permaculture! It is a method of choosing companion plants wisely. In this bed, i grow peppers, sweet potatoes and squash.

I plant peppers first. Once they get taller I add sweet potatoes. The sweet potatoes grow along the ground under the pepper plants and create a thick ground cover. They are one of the few plants that grow well here in July-Sept (the slowest time of year for my garden. It's too hot for most plants).

Meanwhile, Instagram have squash started around the edges of the garden. I will train the vines grow outside the bed. The vines will attach roots to the grass, but don't need the good soil except for the original root system.

This year I am trying peanuts in the tomato beds. Starting them now, so they can take over as the tomatoes die back in July. They're another hot weather-poor soil plant that does good in the south.

I also planted marigolds, basil, garlic, onions for seed, wild onions and other things strategically around the beds.

I haven't perfected it yet....but it's am learning and experimenting (and having fun with it!)

Time to talk tomatoes again! I have a $$ saving tip for you. As your tomatoes grow out you will start to see branches ...
04/08/2025

Time to talk tomatoes again! I have a $$ saving tip for you. As your tomatoes grow out you will start to see branches forming. You can actually turn these into new tomato plants!

On the lower parts of the plant you'll start to see leaves growing out but also stems coming up from in between the 90° angle of the old leaves. The individual Leaf at the 90° angle will not grow tomatoes but that new Branch coming out of the middle at a 45° angle will. You can sniff these off and put them in water and they will root and produce new tomato plants! To go down to your local Lowe's, Home Depot or wherever you buy plants and just buy a six pack of tomatoes, then turn it into 12 or 24 plants depending on how many of these you can snip up when the plant is growing! I have several growing now but I'm going to leave them on the plant because I have nowhere else to plant tomatoes!

Snow peas 🫛 I planted these when they was winter time and they didn't come up. As soon as it got warm out three of them...
04/02/2025

Snow peas 🫛

I planted these when they was winter time and they didn't come up. As soon as it got warm out three of them came up. 🙄🤪

(I sprouted indoors, then transferred outdoors back in January)

Yummy 😋

Meet the new crew: Wylie, Levi and Ella Mae. Bodhidog's Honeybee Ranch is now Wylie & Co Farmstead! (Rest peacefully,...
03/25/2025

Meet the new crew: Wylie, Levi and Ella Mae. Bodhidog's Honeybee Ranch is now Wylie & Co Farmstead! (Rest peacefully, Bodhi. 😭 We miss you)

PSA: In my area, there seems to be a shortage of Jalapeno plants. I can find all other peppers, except Jalapenos. I w...
03/23/2025

PSA: In my area, there seems to be a shortage of Jalapeno plants. I can find all other peppers, except Jalapenos. I went to 4 stores to find two plants. If you're planning on planting them this year, go get 'em soon, even if you have to keep them indoors for a while.

Typically, I start my peppers and tomatoes from seed in January. With everything going on in our world, I decided to go buy some of my plants this year, mostly peppers. Now, I have only 3 jalapenos, one that regrew from last year and two I bought. Luckily, I have many canned from last year.

Gardening Friends 📣 today's gardening tip is going to be on growing ginger and tumeric. I grew some quite successfully...
03/01/2025

Gardening Friends 📣 today's gardening tip is going to be on growing ginger and tumeric. I grew some quite successfully last year. These are tropical plants, so if you're in a cooler climate, you can grow them indoors. (I haven't tried growing them indoors, but that's what I heard.) They do get about 2-3 feet tall, so make sure you have a big enough pot and space for them to grow upwards.
There are a couple pics in this post of what they look like when they start to grow.

Let's start with ginger. I just bought some ginger, one for use in soups and one for growing. In the pictures, I put them side by side. The thinner skin, one I will just grate down and either dry or freeze for use. The slightly darker, thicker, skinned, one is the one I'll use for growing. In my experience, when i've tried to grow the larger thin skin.One they just don't do well. If they're kept too moist, they just rod, and I didn't get anything to grow out of it. That's just my experience.

Now, when selecting your ginger to grow from the grocery store, you want one that looks like the second darker one. What you want to look for is the little nubs. That is where the plant will sprout. You also want them to be fresh and healthy.Looking like they will grow. See the pictures I made some notes.

I am growing a second kind of ginger, soap ginger. I'm sure you've seen buzz about this around the internet, but if not, you can google it. I'll have to do a post on it specifically another day.

Now the turmeric was super easy to grow. I started two years ago with store bought. I'm on my second year of harvest, where I just save some root for growing the next year.

Planting, the process is the same for both turmeric and ginger. Place the roots with the nubs, upward about an inch or two in the dirt. Keep it moist. I tried putting them in full sun and they didn't thrive. Now I have them in a spot where they get morning, sun and afternoon shade and it's made all the difference in the world. If you keep em in pots, you can move them around to where they're happy. Just experiment give it a shot!! They will be ready to harvest when the seasons change in the fall. The leaves will turn yellow on the plant will start to die back.

Gardening's about trial and error. No time like the present to get started!

Propagating wild onions all over the yard. We found wild allium (onion/garlic. .. Depends who you ask). These little b...
05/05/2024

Propagating wild onions all over the yard. We found wild allium (onion/garlic. .. Depends who you ask). These little bulbs will each grow into a new onion. You can see the greens already growing out of them before they fall off the plant. The neighbors have been so gracious to let us pick things in their yard, as this will all be cleared soon. So i'm spreading wild onion babies all over our yard!

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Jacksonville, FL
32226

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