This summer reached an all time low in CELSS productivity for me. Not many blossoms survived the late spring freezes this year. We had about a dozen strawberries, a dozen cherries, a dozen blackberries, no peaches, one plum, and three asian pears. Got a couple dozen pea pods and really straggly lettuce. None of the beans, squash, peppers, cucumbers, spinach, kale came up.
Most likely this is because it went from freezing to baking hot in June, and my irrigation system stayed off until mid July when I finally got a chance to fix some of the leaks. It seems like we were scarcely home this summer.
Due to health concerns over the creosote containing railroad ties making up my 90% completed wicking bed, we had the ties removed in May. I haven't had the heart or time to rebuild with anything else so far.
Black soldier flies got a slow start as well. Ordered three batches, two came DOA due to the heat and postal stupidity. Quail composter keeps flooding. I managed to rid my mouse infestation, but looks like they are back this last week. Planning to harvest quail before winter, so I don't have to deal with it during the cold season.
I did install a solar panel for circulating the quail water, but the four 12V batteries I had were all bad. Unfortunately, that was the extent of my so-called "Summer of Solar".
On the bright side I did make some progress on my reading list, and got to meet Paul in person, when he stopped by on his travels eastward. In addition to setting up a new Osmobot for beta tesing, we killed a bottle of lousy wine and traded some stories.
Also on the positive front, I have found my Mars wonder material and am developing it for potential commercial use. Perhaps more on this at a later time.