Modern Pioneer

12/03/2026

Hey. This is Jason's wife. Mrs. P.
Some of you have been following this page for many years, particularly when he used to blog and video his antics in the garden!

Jason is very sick in icu right now and could really do with prayer and positive thoughts and light. He came to ER a week ago with a severe allergy reaction but is dealing with many complications.

For those who might want to support him, his business is The Metal Peddler and our amazing staff are keeping it going in our absence. Orders might be slower, but they are working hard.

Thanks so much!

P.s. check out this pic of him! That shirt!

01/03/2026

26/02/2026

During a rotation of stock from my long term food storage, I found a bag of potato slices that I stored in 2007. I put in O2 absorbers, along with silica packets inside and stored them in a 64F temp.

When opening them, they were dry, yet a brown color. I use a break in the sealing to separate those packets from the food. So I know they didn't directly effect the quality, stored in mylar.

Upon closer inspection, the mylar bags I used were cheap and thin. But I vac packed and used the mylar over the vac bags and so I thought I was good.

A small blister from the edge of a potato slice, while sealed in the vac bag, pierced the mylar and made a puncture in the vac bag that didn't show up in the 3-4 days I waited before I stored them in mylar.

26/02/2026

Your thoughts?

10/02/2026

This time of year always gets me thinking ahead a bit. Maple syrup season is one of those things you don’t want to plan at the last minute. Weather, timing, setup all matters more than people think.

Anyone planning to tap this year?

02/02/2026

Carrots always are one of those root veggies that so many folks hate. When a new recipe is offered, they inhale, and try them again. Mark me safe from the Ranch Dressing craz.

But, cooking them in Maple Syrup, Butter and Cinnamon is the way to eat them....

01/02/2026

I used to dig this "w**d" out. It's not a w**d at all. This is calico aster, a native in our area that blooms in late summer through fall. On this day, I walked past it and it was literally moving - so filled with various bees and wasps that I had to sit and watch.
It's a prolific re-seeder, so I'll be pulling some so it doesn't block out my early bloomers!
My phone camera caught some of the insects.

01/02/2026

Potato Gnocchi is a very shelf stable, long term storage food looked over by many. This is two pounds of Gnocchi dehydrated in my Excalibur today, 7 hours @135 degrees, now 3 ounces of dried product. These are temporary jars, these will be vac packed with oxygen absorbers tomorrow and put into Mylar bags for long term storage.

There is 4 servings here, and split it into 6 servings as I will add 2 servings of dehydrated traditional spaghetti sauce with each one. Each pack will need 2.5 cups of water to re-hydrate, and I will add one of my dehydrated onion and mushroom packs to the meal package.

This meal has a 10+ year shelf life and makes a great hiking meal.

01/02/2026

Last January & early Feb, I was winter sowing lots of native flower and shrub seeds. My most successful seeds were the New Jersey Tea (ceanothus americanus) and wild columbine (aquilegia canadensis).

A few species just didn't germinate and that was a head scratcher. I left them out all year to go for a 2nd winter, and I am eagerly waiting to see if they pop up this spring.

Winter sowing is an outdoor method that is a great way to replicate nature's method of germinating seeds of hardy perennials & shrubs, while protecting them from being washed away or eaten by birds, giving us a higher success rate.

This year, I plan to sow some low growing edible wildflowers, like self heal (prunella vulgaris) which also has medicinal properties as the common name suggests. I like to put these into my flower beds for a natural "mulch". Native beds can handle dense planting.

If you're interesting in learning about winter sowing, hit like or comment below and I will create a few posts about it!

31/01/2026

I'm organizing my seed collection from last year's harvest, but to be honest, it wasn't a great year for my garden. I'll be browsing seed catalogs and maybe checking out some local seed swaps soon. Jan 30 is national seed swap day!

How's your seed collection looking? Planning any swap days? Shopping catalogs?

31/01/2026

We measured about 15 inches from the last snow fall. Then 2 more over night. Enough to make shoveling a full body workout and turn the yard into a wintertime postcard scene.

How are you doing in this weather?❄️