Next year I will research corn and soybeans via ConcreteBlock. This year
I have
only tomatoes and watermelon and squash. Sort of bad because they roam
the
ground whereas corn and soybeans are more suitable for concreteblock as
upright.

I have these 5 varieties going:

1) Amish Paste-- oval red tomatoes
2) Jaune Flammee-- clusters of small orange-yellow fruits
3) Nebraska Wedding--deep orange fruits
4) Indian Strain--husk tomato
5) Tomatillo-- husk tomato round green fruit

And so far they are doing great. A few have become taller than the
hole of the concreteblock. Almost all of the tomatoes inside the blocks
have
survived. About 50-60 percent of the ones planted without blocks died.
The
shock of moving from indoors to outdoors was too much and also birds
prying out the peatmoss pots looking for worms.

Another great feature is that the block are great for watering in that
the water
stays confined inside the block.

And it appears that spiders like the atmosphere of the block holes and
so
many spiders are living inside the hole of the cropplant. One of the
problems
with wood mulches is that they attract ants and ants are usually
destructive
of cropplants. But the concrete block have such little surface area for
ants to
lodge that ants are never a problem.

And snakes like the warmth of the shiny surface of concrete block and
they
eat alot of insects.

Rabbits also like to rest along the south side of block. They are no
problem for
tomatoes for they seem to not like the taste. But they are a problem for
other
crops. I use concrete block as markers for small trees. Not that I have
the trunk
in a hole but a block resting along the northside of each young tree and
this
is where rabbits maybe a problem in that they rest along the block and
eat the
top layer of the young tree. Just yesterday I had a rabbit reduce my
Pepi Pear
tree in half. But I do not think block increase rabbit damage to trees
or crop
plants. On balance I think block increase the frequency of insect
predators
living inside the block and better control of the insects.

One thing I will have to observe is whether the edges of the block cause

wind damage to the stems of tomatoes and other crops. Whether the wind
swaying the stem across the edge of the block acts like a saw and
damages
the plant. I suspect not but will have to wait and see.

One thing is certain that the block provide more sunlight to the
cropplant due
to the high reflection of its whitish surface.

Archimedes Plutonium,
whole entire Universe is just one big atom where dots
of the electron-dot-cloud are galaxies