Gardening

Maximize organic matter production: Intercropped green manure/cover crops (gm/cc's) can produce from 50 to 140 tons per hectare (green weight) of organic matter with very little work: no transporting of material and no cutting up, layering or turning over of compost heaps. In fact, sometimes, because of the gm/cc's control of weeds, net labor costs decrease. And soil quality often improves visibly each year. Possible gm/cc's: Velvetbeans (Mucuna pruriens), cowpeas (Vigna spp.) and jackbeans (Canavalia ensiformis).+

Keep the soil covered: Mulches of crop residues and fast-growing gm/cc's drastically reduce the weed problem. sow into the plant residue rather than tilling the soil. This does not appear to apply well to grass. Experiment found that grass will grow up through the crop plants and that cutting and leaving it simply accellerated spread. Grass can be killed by baking with plastic cover (which also bakes everything else) or just pulled out. Additional control of weeds: Use a few layers of large leaves (banana, etc..) or carboard left on top of the areas between desired plants. It won't kill the grass but the grass can't grow where there is no light. Use slits to allow sun around your crop, poke holes thru and place transplants, put a small pile of dirt on top of an area with holes under it to start seeds. Fowl herds may also be usefull in weed reduction if they are discouraged from eating the crop plants by a physical barrier. ^{1 chicken weed labor}

Use Zero tillage: start by planting the cover crop. Cut the plants off in the spring, leaving the cuttings on the soil to serve as a mulch. Then plant the tomatoes or other crops right into the undisturbed roots without tilling or adding fertilizer. Additional mulch might need to be added after planting if any soil is left exposed. If the soil must be disturbed and immediate crop planting is necessary use kelp or composted seaweed to treat the soil. Rinse seaweed to remove salt and leave the stuff in black garbage bags in the Sun for several weeks to compost it quickly. http://www.google.com/search?q=no dig garden

Maintain biological diversity: avoid diseases and insect pests by fighting fire with fire. Do NOT use incecticides. Use bird seed to attract "insect removal squads." The better quality seeds will not contain grass and so will not start a weed problem. Wagner brand is excellent. Although good seed will minimize damage, protect plants that the birds seem to want to eat by encloseing them in nets.  For smaller pests, buy ladybugs and release at night. For aphids on trees, use tangle foot because most aphids are farmed by ants inside "barns" made from leaves curled up by the ants. Use Milk to kill fungus or mold. Use diatomaceous earth to stop catapiliers and snails.

Plant more than one crop in the same bed by finding good pairs.

• squash, peas, and corn
• tomatoes and basil
• tomatoes and asparagus
• head lettuce and peppers
• peas and last years eggplant
• rows of onions, one row of squash,
• corn drives Carpophilus beetles from sunflowers, sunflowers protect corn from fall armyworms.
• corn meal is said to keep ants at bay.

Combine tall, narrow plants with wide leafy plants to stop weeds.

• Lettuce with peas
• Squash and buckwheat
• Strawberries with blueberries

Avoid bad pairs:^

• Black walnuts have long been known to interfere with garden plants like tomatoes, eggplants and corn. The trees’ roots emit a chemical called juglone, which is toxic to many deep-rooted plants growing nearby
• When planting broccoli in your garden, make sure that you practice good crop rotation since broccoli can leave behind residue that lettuce and cruciferous crops (cool weather vegetables and have flowers that have four petals so that they resemble a cross) can’t tolerate.
• Some plants, like alfalfa, seem to exhibit a remarkable type of allelopathy that interferes with the germination of their own seeds.
• Garlic and onions are believed to interfere with the growth of beans and peas, but seem to be compatible with most other garden denizens.
• Mint and onions where asparagus is growing
• Pole beans and mustard near beets
• Anise and dill are said to make bad neighbors for carrots, but this hasn't been proven.
• Cucumber, pumpkin, radish, sunflower, squash or tomatoes close to potato hills. Tomatoes and potatos are attacked by the same blights, so when they’re right next to each other, the diseases spread more easily.
• Any member of the cabbage family near strawberries or grapes is trouble according to lore.
• Cabbage, cauliflower, corn, dill and potatoes near tomatoes

Use all the plant. Many traditional root plants have edible leaves:

• Radishes

Cut—or harvest—a portion of these crops without harvesting the entire plant.^

• Lettuce grows as a head or loose leaf. Unless you’re aiming for a perfect head, you can continuously harvest leaves until the plant goes to seed.
• Kale grows taller and taller as you harvest leaves, and can last for months in the garden, offering an ongoing source of food.
• Celery is easier to store in the garden than the fridge. Simply use a knife to cut outer stalks as you need them.
• Swiss chard is harvested similarly to celery. Cut the outer stalks and use the leaves and the ribs. One of the easiest vegetables to grow, it also works well in a pot. The stalk is sweeter than the leaf, but tastes more like dirt...
• Green onions can be a source of flavor almost all season long. Just snip off the larger stalks and leave the more immature ones in place.
• Spinach and bok choy are two different kinds of greens that offer up the option of cooked or fresh greens. Simply cut the outer leaves as you need them.
• Purslane is considered a weed by many, but it’s a great addition to salads. Just snip off branches as you need them.
• Broccoli is a borderline cut and come again vegetable. Harvest the main head, leaving the plant intact and you’ll find that smaller side shoots develop.
• Cilantro goes to seed quickly, but it’s easy to grow. Harvest by simply cutting off stems a few inches above the ground. New growth will follow.
• Basil just keeps coming during the hot summer months. Pinch leaves off from the tips as you need them.
• Potatoes aren’t exactly cut and come again, but you can carefully dig under the plants to harvest small “new potatoes” before the plant is ready to be pulled and the potatoes harvested.

Feed plants through the mulch: When soils are hostile to plant growth, feed plants by adding the fertalizer on top of the mulch. Rabbit dung is probably the best. Worm castings are great when available. Chicken poop is too hot, but goes well into the compost bin.

Water from the bottom: Use tall, unglazed clay pots with a lid held on with a rock, or plastic milk or soda containers with holes punched in the bottom; buried in the bed with the top just above the mulch. Fill with watering can or use drip irrigation tubes. Roots will grow down to reach the water (rather than along the surface) reduceing compitition and allowing dense planting. Also, the deep soil has minerals and retains water so plants are less likely to dry out. Also, you need less water and weeds on the surface will not start. If you don't till the soil, the surface can be covered with weed seeds and nothing will grow except your plants. Check this out!

• http://pathtofreedom.com/peddlerswagon/garden/water%20savers/olla/olla-pumpkin.shtml An ancient watering technique that conserves and delivers water direct to the roots. The use of buried earthen jars for watering plants has been used for thousands of years. The hand-thrown unglazed pot is buried neck deep into the soil, fill the pot with water and it slowly seeps into the soil to be absorbed by surrounding plants (not for use around wood plants such as shrubs and trees) Designed from nature, handmade in the USA.

You can get continuous production by planting one new row of seeds every week or three. Plant close together and thin by moving or eating overcrowded seedlings. Lettuce / spinach / etc... will continue to produce if you peel a few leaves at a time from the outside of each plant.

Disease Diagnosis / Treatment

See: https://www2.ipm.ucanr.edu/diagnostics/

• New leaves with yellow between veins: Add Zinc.
• New leaves all yellow or with dark blotches: Add magnesium.
• Bronze or red leaves: Potassium or phosphorus.
• Older leaves brown at edges: Potassium.
• Yellow leaves near bottom only: Nitrogen.

Also:

• My families attempt
• Free eggs! My families success!
• Back Yard Fish Farm Ponds +Another folly in the future
• Earthworms +
• Benifical Insects +
• Greenhouse Gardening +
• Automated Gardening
• Grow Lights for Gardening +
• Ponds
• Pumpkins
• What to plant in California and when +
• Rotating Offset Anchor Stake Loosens It for Pulling
• PUUF Veggi Garden

See also:

• https://sympathink.com/vegetables/ Very nice looking site which helps you find the best veggies to plant, and goes on to schedule, help combat disease, and offer advice.
• http://www.flairform.com/hints/nutrient_deficiency.htm Excellent and detailed chart and graphic for diagnosing nutrient deficiencies.+
• http://growfood.com/shop/the-mittleider-gardening-course/ Very well regarded gardening system with exact instructions. Follow to the letter for best results.+
• http://seawatergreenhouse.com/process.html Seawater is evaporated at the front of the greenhouse to create cool humid conditions inside. A proportion of the evaporated seawater is then condensed as fresh water that can be used to irrigate the crops. Excess freshwater created in the Seawater Greenhouse can be used to irrigate additional crops grown outside the greenhouse. The air going into the greenhouse is first cooled and humidified by seawater, which trickles over the first evaporator. This provides good climate conditions for the crops. As the air leaves the growing area, it passes through the second evaporator over which seawater is flowing. This seawater has been heated by the sun in a network of pipes above the growing area, making the air much hotter and more humid. It then meets a series of vertical pipes through which cool seawater passes. When the hot humid air meets the cool surfaces, fresh water will condense as droplets that run down to the base where they can be collected. The cool and humid conditions in the greenhouse enable crops to grow with very little water. When crops are not stressed by excessive transpiration, both the yield and the quality are higher. The simplicity of the process imitates the hydrological cycle where seawater heated by the sun evaporates, cools down to form clouds, and returns to the earth as rain, fog or dew.
• http://www.motherearthnews.com/organic-gardening/organic-pest-control-zm0z11zsto.aspx Organic pest control+
• http://organichomegardener.blogspot.com/ A good blog.
• http://lifehacker.com/5229896/gutter-gardens-grow-produce-without-taking-up Planting shallow root crops in a standard rain gutter mounted to the side of your house conserves space, keeps the pests out of the crop, provides some temperature stability and protection from the wind. Try to find unpainted copper or stainless steel gutters, or line them with food safe rubber or plastic. Make sure they are mounted absolutly level to keep water from pooling at one end, or use a layer of sand at the bottom to wick the water evenly. Since there is very little soil to hold water, regular attention will be required to keep them from drying out. Gutters can also be mounted to a line of stakes for a vertical garden away from a wall, but watch out for over watering from rain. Drain holes near the bottom of the gutter may help, but again, there is little capacity for holding water, so drainage will increase the need for watering between rains.
  
• http://www.attainable-sustainable.net/growing-carrots/ Seed your row of carrots and water them in well. Place a 1? x 4? board over the row. That’s right, right on the ground on TOP of the row of newly planted seeds. Check on the row daily as you water and as soon as you see sprouts, place bricks under each end of the board so that it’s not directly atop the new sprouts, but still shading them. Once the seedlings are tall enough to touch the board, you can take it away. Keeping the seeds moist and shaded as they’re getting situated in the garden is the ticket.
• http://www.cleanrivers-pdx.org/get_involved/downspout_disconnection.htm Disconnecting your down-spout and directing the water into mulch or barrels for storage.+
• http://www.fastonline.org/CD3WD_40/CD3WD/INDEX.HTM An AMAZING volumn of information on the subject of food.
• http://www.millennium-ark.net/News_Files/Hollys.html
• http://www.minifarms.com/ Ken Hargesheirmer+
• http://www.banana-tree.com/cart.cfm?category=13&function=1&product=560&package=2&quantity=1
  Golden Crispy Japanese Melon: Eat like an apple: small golden skinned melons with white flesh. Fruits
  develop 30 days after prolific flowering. May be started indoors in colder
  climates. Bbob says they are excellent and not available in any market. Seeds are available for $3.50 per 100
• http://www.countrysidemag.com/issues/4_2002.htm#article1 No-till, Permanent Bed Farming
• http://www.yougrowgirl.com/garden/dripsystem.php Pop bottle drip irrigation+
• http://www.davesgarden.com subscription site but very nice. $15/year or $5/bimonthly as of 2003.09.30 Some christian bias.
• http://www.pathtofreedom.com The site for suburban sustainability. Huge garden, huge production in a small space.+
• http://www.i4at.org/surv/pest.htm Pest Control+
• http://www.backwoodshome.com/articles/polachic49.html Use old newspapers to make your starter pots
• http://www.allwoodwork.com/tips/potatotower.htm Each time your potato plants show leaves, raise the sides of the bed about 6 inches and bury them again. Repeat 4 or 5 times then let it grow till harvest time. Each layer of leaves will produce more potatoes.

Input:

• Fertilizers: seaweed, sludge, bone meal, blood meal, cottonseed meal, soybean meal, transplants, manure, sulfur, fish meal, rock powder, lime, gypsum, compost, guano, worm castings, Sul-Po-Mag, alfalfa meal, limestone, rock phosphate, oyster shell lime, banana peels, egg shells.
• Fungicides: cornmeal, baking soda, milk
• Natural Insecticides: neem, pyrethrum, citrus rind, flour.
• Natural Herbicides: corn gluten meal, ants, field mice and birds [eat seeds]
• Beneficial insects: (insecticides) bats, snakes, bees, lizards, birds, wasps, frogs, ladybugs, lacewings, flies, bumblebees, butterflies, toads, milky spore, beneficial nematodes, Bt, praying mantis, barn owls.
• Compost: hulls, bagasse, coffee, food waste, newspapers, sawdust, grass, leaves, tree trimmings, gin trash, cotton burs, manure, sludge Vermicomposting.
• Foliar sprays: seaweed, manure tea, fish emulsion, compost tea, molasses Natural Pesticides: garlic, oil, Neem, peppers, molasses, peppermint, citrus oil, soap, citronella, baking soda, diatomaceous earth, vinegar, tobacco
• Irrigation: Ollas, DIY drip, soaker hose, pitcher
• Season extension: crop rotation, companion planting, shade cloth, trellis, row covers, cages, intercropping, no-till, Wall O'Water
• Mulches: compost, hulls, hay, sawdust, leaves, straw, newspapers.

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