Sunday April 26, 2026
– First Quarter Moon Phase – step out, take action, breaking away, expression
– Moon in VIRGO –
– Retrogrades – NONE – We are in the clear until May 6 when Pluto goes Retrograde in Aquarius
– Best Days (from the Farmer’s Almanac) – Apr 26th – 27th – Cut Firewood, Mow to Increase Growth, Dig Holes, Kill Plant Pests
– Planting Calendar (from the Farmer’s Almanac) – Apr 24th – 27th – Grub out weeds, briars, and other plant pests.
– Sabian Symbol for the Solar-Lunar Year: – 28 ARIES: a large, disappointed audience
– Aspect of the Aeon Sophia: (Wisdom): Kali – The Destroyer
– Aspect of the Aeon Thelete: (Will/Desire): Ian, God of the East
SUN – 07 TAURUS: a woman of Samaria comes to draw water from the well
EARTH – 07 SCORPIO: deep sea divers
When it comes down to it, the only knowledge that really matters is how to purify water, how to grow your own food, how to cook and how to build.
And funnily enough, we’re not taught any of that in school.
~ The Sefl Sufficient Backyard
Where Do We Go From Here?
If you read me often, you know that I often talk about preparing for the end of the world as we know it. And in the words of people less into REM (and much less crude) as when the Shit Hits The Fan.
As we have seen over the past 100 plus years, when the world has faced global crises like World Wars and the like, the men who hold high places make action plans to assure the continuation of our society. Or at least they did.
I came across a very good advertisement on Facebook. I have it printed in its entirety below. It follows an advertising strategy that I happen to adore – story telling. And I invite you to read it (the first 2/3s are awesome and very influential storytelling – the last 1/3 is all sales. I will warn you with a red headline and you can either proceed with caution or skip it).
ALSO as you know, I often write about gardening (thus the name Astrogardens). You may have seen my little statement at the top of Astrogardens.com:
Astrogardens begins in the garden – your home. It is a place you can connect with nature and prepare your home from the world around you. And this is a place where I can talk about my own adventures in my backyard – and where they lead. But more, Astrogardens is a place when I will be taking deep dives into subjects that dare to be explored. We will go down the rabbit hole to see what we may find. And we will go there with No Fear. There are enemies all around us. Their biggest defense is our ignorance.
It is Spring and in Eastern Pennsylvania, time to planting. Last week 4 out of 7 days had front warnings. I rarely plant before May 1st. I will be prepping my beds this week.
But anyways, back to the story/advertisement. I am not endorsing this company at all. I know nothing about them other than they wrote a good and effective ad. Enjoy and Pay Attention!
Victory Gardens
The first warning came in 1917. World War One. Europe was starving. America was told to grow its own food.
The second warning came in 1943. World War Two. Rationing hit. Twenty million families grew forty-two percent of the country’s vegetables out of their own backyards.
The third warning came in 2020. Grocery shelves went bare overnight. Seed companies shut their doors because they couldn’t keep up with demand.
Three times in a hundred years, the food system broke.
The first two times, the government showed up. They created commissions. Mailed out planting guides. Distributed seeds. Taught ordinary families how to feed themselves.
The third time? Silence.
No commission. No guides. No seeds. No one coming to help.
I didn’t learn any of this in school. Most people didn’t.
But once I started pulling on the thread, what I found changed the way I think about food, seeds, and what it actually means to be prepared.
Here’s what happened in 1917 that almost nobody talks about.
World War One was tearing through Europe. Farmland was getting bombed into trenches. Millions of farmers were pulled off their land and handed rifles.
Europe wasn’t just struggling. It was running out of food. Fast.
The US government looked at the situation and realized the only way to feed both Americans and their allies was to turn every available backyard in the country into a food source.
A man named Charles Lathrop Pack organized the National War Garden Commission. They didn’t just tell people to garden. They built a system around it. Printed instruction manuals. Taught families how to grow crops, how to compost, how to save seeds, how to can and preserve everything they grew.
In many cases, they handed out the seeds themselves.
Public parks got dug up. School playgrounds got planted. Empty lots turned into rows of vegetables.
Kids as young as eight were organized into groups the government called Soldiers of the Soil.
Three million gardens went into the ground in 1917. Over five million by 1918.
And the food those families grew helped keep an entire continent from starving.
Regular people. Regular backyards. Seeds in the dirt. And they pulled it off.
Then twenty-five years later, the whole thing happened again.
World War Two. Same crisis. Rationing. Bare shelves. Families handed booklets telling them how much meat and butter and sugar they were allowed to buy that week.
The government rolled out the Victory Garden campaign. Same approach. Planting guides. Seed programs. Community plots.
Twenty million families answered. They grew over ten billion pounds of produce. Nearly half of every vegetable Americans ate came out of a home garden.
Twice in one century, the food system buckled. And twice, the answer was the same.
Not a government bailout. Not a corporate rescue.
Seeds. In the ground. Grown by families who made the decision that they weren’t going to go hungry.
Then 2020 hit.
Grocery shelves cleared out. Meat plants shut down. Supply chains cracked in places nobody expected.
Seed demand blew up so fast that Baker Creek and Burpee had to stop taking orders altogether.
Millions of families wanted to start growing food. They couldn’t even get seeds.
And this time there was no War Garden Commission. No planting guides showing up in the mailbox. No government seed programs.
Nothing.
2020 proved two things I haven’t been able to shake.
First, the food system is still fragile. One disruption and it buckles. That hasn’t changed in a hundred years.
Second, you’re on your own now. Nobody is showing up to hand you seeds and teach you what to do.
The families who had gardens going in 2020 weren’t standing in empty aisles. They were outside planting.
But here’s the part that ties all three of these warnings together, and it’s the part almost nobody realizes.
The seeds those War Garden and Victory Garden families planted were fundamentally different from what you’d pick up at a store today.
They were heirloom seeds. Open-pollinated. Seeds that reproduce true to type, generation after generation.
You plant them. You harvest. You save seeds from the strongest plants. You put those back in the ground the following year. Same crop. Same quality. No extra cost.
The government taught families to save seeds because that was the entire point. One season of planting could set a family up for years.
But today, most seeds on the rack at garden centers are hybrids.
Hybrids give you one harvest. Then they break down. Try to save those seeds and plant them next year and the plants come back stunted. Weak. Deformed. Barely producing.
Scientists call it F2 breakdown. The genetics fall apart after a single generation.
Which means every spring, you’re back at the store. Buying new seeds. Starting from scratch.
The War Garden families never dealt with that. Their seeds were an asset. The seeds most people buy today are an expense.
That one difference changes everything.
Once I understood that, I went looking for a source I could trust. And most of what turned up was disappointing. Small packets with a few seeds in them. One variety at a time. Nothing for someone who was starting from zero.
Then I found Garden’s Pulse.
They’ve put together a complete heirloom seed vault.
16,000+ seeds. 35 varieties. Every single one non-GMO, non-hybrid, open-pollinated. The same kind of seeds that carried families through two world wars.
What stopped me was the math. Over 16,000 seeds for roughly what you’d spend on a couple of dinners out. Less than a penny per seed. And unlike the packets at the hardware store, these don’t expire after one season. You save them. Replant them. Build on them year after year.
They include two free bonuses. A Beginner’s Planting Guide that takes you through every variety step by step, even if you’ve never grown anything before. And a Garden Planner that tracks your planting dates, harvest windows, and seed-saving schedule so you’re never guessing about what to do next.
The vault. The guide. The planner. The same kind of system the government used to hand families in 1917 and 1943, except this time you’re providing it for yourself.
It comes with a 90-day guarantee. Plant them. Test the germination. Watch them come up. If you’re not satisfied, you get a full refund. You keep the ebooks regardless.
47,000+ families already have theirs.
The food system has broken three times in a hundred years. The first two times, somebody stepped in. The third time, nobody did.
There’s not going to be a fourth warning. There’s just going to be a day when it matters whether you planted or not.
Right now it’s 50% off
https://gardenspulse.com/…/gardens-pulse-seed-vault-kit…
P.S. — In 1917 and 1943, the government printed the guides, distributed the seeds, and organized the whole thing. In 2020, families were on their own and most of them couldn’t even find seeds to buy. Garden’s Pulse is the closest thing to what used to show up in the mail from Washington — the seeds, the planting guide, the schedule, all in one kit. Except now it’s on you to get it before you need it. 47,000+ families already have theirs. If the link still works, the spring price is still active.
https://gardenspulse.com/pages/listicle1
P.P.S. — If you’re still reading this, the vault is still in stock. Three warnings in a hundred years. There won’t be a fourth. The only difference between the families who ate in 2020 and the families who panicked was whether they had seeds in the ground before the shelves went empty. Don’t wait for the next one to find out which side you’re on