Are you a landscaper?

This is an idea I came up with the other day that I am really excited about.  I am going to put together a database of lawn and landscape professionals!  I am going to start collecting information from all my friends online across the country about people that either are doing the work for pay, or people that have been hired to do work and what kind of job they did.

So how does this involve you?  Very simple.  If you are in the business of doing any type of work in peoples yard, i.e. grass cutting, gardening, landscaping, tree trimming, stump grinding, hardscapes, concrete, asphalt, decks/woodworking, etc.  I want to have you on my referral list.

If you have hired anyone to do any of these services in your yard in the past, I want to hear about it from you as well.

Send me an email services@thepigpin.com and give me as much info about yourself, company, and services.  If you do the work, tell me some stories about the jobs you have done.  If you hired the work, tell me who you are and give me the info on the company, and tell me what they did and how good or bad of job they did.

This will be a database that everyone can access, and it will be the most exclusive reference system for anyone across the country to know who does what and how good they are.  I am trying to do anything I can to help small businesses succeed in these hard times.  Let’s all work together and help everyone survive!

Hasen is a special material made in China

Several people have wondered what can be done about the early frost effecting their garden plants, when they have so many little fruits still on the vines.  Well I have talked about in a previous post about protecting your tomato plants in a late freeze.  Pretty much the same principles apply here.

If it is a light frost and it is just for a night or two, use a sheet to cover the entire plant to keep the frost droplets off of the plant.  If the sheet or blanket is too heavy, try putting an “A” frame ladder on top of the plant, then the sheet over the ladder.  That will keep the sheet from damaging the plant.

If you are getting a long cold snap, but know that you still have plenty of growing season left, you can invest a few dollars and get bamboo or flexible poles and arch them over the plants and get some clear plastic to cover the poles.  Basically what I am saying, is make a small greenhouse over the plants.  This can add days and even weeks to the growing season.  Just watch the daytime heating and air them out if necessary.

Happy Gardening

Mike, "The Successful Failure"

It is a little off the landscape topic today… but not by much.  I am so excited to be writing this blog today.  I had an “AH-HA” moment last night when I was listening to Mike Rowe live at the FFA National Convention.  If you don’t know, Mike Rowe is the apprentice on the show “Dirty Jobs” and the national spokesperson for Ford Motor Company.  I say he is the apprentice on his show because that is what he said he is.  He goes across the country letting regular people host the show to tell their story and explain their ‘Dirty Job’.  He talked a little bit about how he grew up with his dad who could do absolutely anything on their farm.  Mike said that he was always embarrassed because he could never do anything his dad could do and did not know for a long time where his place in life was going to be.  He somehow fell into the tv world and decided that he wanted to pursue that even further.  He had pitched his dream job to the “Discovery Channel” and they bought it.  Mike was out shooting for the opening season of the show, when he stumbled into interviewing these regular people doing the job that they love.   The Discovery Channel loved it and here he is today.  He is not doing what he thought was his dream job, but he is loving what he does (and is really good at it I might add).

I tell you that story to say that Mike saw an article calling him a “Successful Failure”.  Mike had his ‘Ah-Ha’ moment when he read that title.  He said that he has actually succeeded in life because he failed.  How many times he has failed is not countable at this time.

He then got into talking about at many of the factories he has gone to visit have that infamous sign posted everywhere “Safety First”  He started asking the manager people if that sign was true and applied to everyone.  Most everyone of them, after the cameras were turned off said, “Mike, Risk comes first, Safety second!”  They proceeded to talk about the fact that the employees, etc. had to understand the risk before they could understand the safety.  Without taking a risk, there is no need to worry about the safety part of things.

That lead into his story of being on a crab boat in the middle of the ocean in a massive storm.  Mike was up on some boxes holding down nets or something and the boat was just going everywhere.  Mike went to the crab boat captain and was asking what the captain was going to do about the roughage out there.  The shrimp boat captain said something that made Mike a different person for the rest of his life.  He said, “Mike, as the captain of this boat, it is my job to bring you home rich, not alive!”  Mike was like Ah-Ha!  He got it.  The risk is on him, not the captain.  Mike said when he went back to his post, he held on tighter, he positioned himself better and was more alert, knowing that his life was in his hands, not anyone elses.

In relating this to the landscape world.  You must take a risk in starting a garden or planting a plant.  You must start somewhere and take a RISK!  Don’t be scared, hold on tight and control what you can control.  Be a SUCCESS by having some Failures!

Happy Successes

Conseco Fieldhouse packed with Blue FFA Jackets

I am typing this blog on my little netbook while I am sitting in a ‘session’ at the FFA National Convention in Indianapolis, Indiana.  You might be wondering what that has to do with ThePiggPin.com.  I am really glad that you have asked that question.  In high school, I joined the FFA, and immediately found my place in life.  The FFA taught me leadership skills and mechanical skills that I would have not learned so early in life, and it put me on a journey in life that I was not expecting to go.  As I said in a previous blog, I had been cutting grass about all of my life, but did not know what ‘landscaping’ was.  I was put on the Nursery and Landscape CDE contest team for my high school.  I learned that landscaping would be a major love in my life and it taught me to that hard work CAN and WILL pay off in the end.  We barely missed winning the state contest so we could compete in the national contest!

Being up here in Indy, with 60,000+ FFA high school members is very impactful!  Knowing that most of these kids compete in all kinds of contest…public speaking, mechanical skills, plant and animal judgings, etc. is very encouraging to me.  These kids are taking classes at school anything from tractor repair, to vet science, to leadership, to floriculture, and my favorite, greenhouse management.  The vocational agriculture departments, in my opinion, are teaching our teenagers more about success than just about any other subject available to them.

Agriculture in the US, especially processes like milk production, is so far advanced that other countries are now coming here, asking for Americans to travel to their countries to head up their industries because they see the need for upgraded facilities.  It kind of makes me sad when I see people and groups try and hinder our abilities to practice agriculture and grow and expand our technologies in order to keep our country safe and fed. (sorry, that was my soap box for today!)

Happy FFA

FFA Jacket