A bountiful harvest without the use of pesticides, herbicides or synthetic fertilizers. Photo by Amanda Jarrett
Why Grow Your Own Food? - Being a Veggie Gardener - Simple Rules - Things to Look for When Planning Your Garden -
Start Small - Not Enough Room to Grow Veggies? - Grow vertically
Start Small - Not Enough Room to Grow Veggies? - Grow vertically
Why Grow your Own Food
Homegrown tomatoes taste so much better than store bought.
According to research done at Stanford University, pesticide levels were 30% lower than conventionally grown food. Washington State University's Center of Sustaining Agriculture and Natural Resources, found organic produce is 20 to 40% higher in antioxidants than non-organic. And I really do think they taste better.
A bountiful harvest - all grown without the use of chemicals.
|
There's no need to spray for pests when there's just a few holes.
|
Growing organically is also kinder to the environment. It benefits the soil food web, which nourishes the earth and our planet and all its incredible life forms. Besides, growing organically is less maintenance. All you have to do is allow nature to do its own thing, which encourages the soil food web.
Freshly dug, home-grown shallots.
|
With trips to the grocery store getting costlier every year, it’s smart to grow veggies. Quality and health concerns are other issues. We don't know how the produce has been grown, treated, handled, stored and transported. Growing your own produce, even if it is just in a container on the deck, eliminates the chemicals used to preserve freshness and to control insects and diseases. Most commercial produce is harvested while unripe as they transport better. That’s not a problem with homegrown goodies as they are picked and used at their peak ensures the best flavour and the most antioxidants and vitamins.
|
|
Being a Veggie Gardener
Growing veggies is a wonderful experience, but it also can be a test of anyone’s patience especially if you are new at it (and sometimes when you’re not!). Don’t be discouraged when things go wrong just learn from your mistakes. Keeping a journal and taking pictures certainly helps. If you need answers, go to plant nurseries and ask questions and don’t forget to look things up. No one knows everything. If you desire perfection and ultimate control, you are barking up the wrong tree. Plants are living things with oodles of variables, then there is the weather. It plays a major role in gardening success, ask any farmer.
|
You just can't beat the taste of freshly harvested veggies.
|
Avoid mass planting of one crop, instead fill garden beds with numerous crops.
Working in the garden not only is good exercise and provides you with delicious food, it also exposes you to a good bacteria (Mycobacterium vaccae). This beneficial bacteria increases serotonin that relaxes and increases IQ, (Dr. Dorothy Mathews, American Society for Microbiology). This is why many people get hooked on gardening. They get the ‘gardening bug’, so to speak.
Getting down and dirty with nature is basic stuff. When you get to the nitty gritty, growing your own food is very rewarding physically, mentally and extremely delicious! Just make sure you rinse off the slugs from the lettuce before you eat it - unless you want the extra protein.
Getting down and dirty with nature is basic stuff. When you get to the nitty gritty, growing your own food is very rewarding physically, mentally and extremely delicious! Just make sure you rinse off the slugs from the lettuce before you eat it - unless you want the extra protein.
Tips, Tricks & Techniques
Covering crops with a cloche works to keep butterflies and other adult flying bugs from laying their eggs on crops.
|
Sow cover crops. like this crimson clover, in fall to protect beds during the winter and to build soil.
|
Four foot wide raised beds allow access from both sides and make gardening easier.
|
- Grow what you like to eat.
- Plant the right plant in the right place. Know the conditions your crop likes and plant accordingly. Do your research. Read the back of the seed packets and seed catalogues; they provide a wealth of information. WestCoast Seeds is a great resource for seeds and how to grow vegetables. Plant disease-resistant varieties.
- Start small as huge beds are quite daunting and time consuming.
- Raised beds make planting, weeding and harvesting much easier.
- Provide veggies with at least 6 hours of full sun per day, preferably 8.
- Provide rich, organic soil with good drainage. Replenish soil with compost annually.
- Apply straw, fall leaves or torn newspaper as a mulch during the growing season. Follow up in fall by removing the spent plants and adding more straw, newspapers or a cover crop: fall rye, crimson clover. Don't let the bed be fallow (bare) throughout the winter as it depletes the soil of nutrients and contributes to erosion.
- Water! Without it, plants die and all your efforts are for naught. Water before they start to wilt and pay special attention when there is lots of sun, heat.
- Not all insects are bad so don’t spray with pesticides, that includes soap and water. Tomatoes, peppers, peas, beans, cucumbers, melons and other fruit bearing edibles need bees and other pollinating insects to produce their tasty crops. Using any kind of pesticides also kills the good bugs too.
- Try to work with nature. Insecticides, fungicides interfere with natural systems. The more pesticides you use, the more the garden depends on you, increasing your maintenance. Use barriers (cloches), squish bugs and/or hand pick if you are not squeamish or just remove the infested part. If all else fails, discard the buggy plant or use soap and water or a biological control such as Bacillus thuringiensis. It is a naturally-occurring soil bacterium that only kills caterpillars.
- Be a smart gardener. Practice companion planting and crop rotation to reduce diseases, pests and to assist in soil health.
- Avoid synthetic fertilizers. Build soil fertility with compost, SeaSoil, cover crops, and well-rotted aged manure.
- Experiment. It's a great way to learn. If you are not sure that a plant likes afternoon sun or morning sun, then plant in both locations and see what happens.
- Don’t forget to take pictures and write about all your experiments and all that garden intrigue.
- Be patient and accept imperfection. A few nibbles here and there is no big deal.
Ensure plants don't get so dry they wilt, like this Swiss chard.
Protect veg from caterpillars by growing them in cloches or spraying with Bt, Bacillus thuringiensis.
|
A ladybug feasts on aphids.
To prevent weeds and retain moisture, lay straw, fall leaves or torn newspaper as a mulch.
|
Don't confuse this ladybug larvae with a plant pest as it devours more aphids than the adult.
Any type of pesticides, including soap and water, kills bees and other pollinating insects.
|
Planning Your Garden
Map out your garden and have a plan before planting.
|
Keep your garden plans from year to year.
|
My plan for my potager garden, a French kitchen garden, was drawn to scale.
|
- Know your garden: exposure: east, west etc. Where is your morning sun? Where does the sun set? Morning sun comes from the east and is weaker than the afternoon sun from the west.
- Know your soil. Does it drain well? Is it too dry? Is it dark and rich in organic matter? Is it pale and unproductive? Are there lots of weeds or barely one in sight? Find out what kind of soil you have and amend it before planting.
- Place veggie beds near a faucet for convenience. Dragging hoses and toting watering cans is a gardening turn off.
- Place near the house, preferably the kitchen for convenience. You'll pay more attention to your crops and you'll remember to harvest.
- Avoid planting veggies at the base of large trees. Soil is dry, it's shady and there is little soil between tree roots to plant.
- Locate the garden where the soil drains easily: no puddles and soggy soil.
- Improve existing conditions by adding compost, SeaSoil and/or well-rotted aged manure.
- Soil no good? Plant potatoes to loosen up hard soil and make the soil more crumbly (friable). Build raised beds or place plants in containers.
- Avoid high winds as well as areas with stagnant, still air.
- No garden? Plant in containers on your deck, patio, windowsills, on the back steps....
- Make a plan of the garden and keep it for reference next year.
Plant potatoes to break up clay and hard-packed soil.
|
If you have no garden, grow veggies in containers.
|
Grow veggies anywhere, including your front garden. Just mix them in with the ornamental plants.
|
Start Small
Planting numerous plants together makes the most of a small space.
|
It is not uncommon for novices to start off with a huge vegetable garden as their enthusiasm gets the better of them. Consider your knees and back before you decide to supply the whole neighbourhood with fresh produce. Besides, it is a very daunting task to plant and sow, water, weed and harvest all those veggies. You don’t want to end up cursing vegetables, vowing never to hoe again.
|
Small beds are easier to wrap your head around, especially if they are raised. It just makes the whole experience easier. Generally the best size is 4 feet wide for a free standing bed. This is so you can reach in on both sides without walking on the soil. Stepping on the beds compacts soil, plus any plants that are in the way. If the bed sits against a wall or fence, make it 3 feet wide if as you won’t be able to reach to the back if it’s any deeper. Make it long as you want, but remember you will have to walk all the way around the bed to get to the other side.
Not Enough Room to Grow Veggies?
|
You can still grow vegetables if you don't have a garden or if the soil is not suitable. Place containers on the patio, balcony, back steps, or even on a sunny windowsill. When it comes down to it, you don't need a separate vegetable garden to grow food. How about planting some of your favorites in your regular garden beds? Many vegetable plants are quite attractive and look pretty good nestled among daisies, petunias and the like. Frilly, green lettuce leaves have their charm, but so does the deep red vibrant leaves of the Red Salad Bowl lettuce. If you love beans but have no room, grow scarlet runner beans at the base of a small tree. As they twine up the trunk their lovely bright red flowers stand out among the branches and are soon followed by tasty beans. No small trees? Then grow them up deck posts, railings, along chain link fences and trellises.
|
You don't need to have a veggie bed to grow veggies.
|
Bush beans easily fit into spaces between plants in the garden, plus they also add nitrogen to the soil. Carrot’s fern-like foliage look great along a border. Chives have great linear upright foliage and pretty pom-pom purple blossoms. They look adorable in the front of a garden bed and are make a pretty, edible cut flower. Eggplants and peppers also have colourful fruit on handsome plants, so mix things up a bit and don't feel bound by planting in vegetable beds.
Grow Vertically
A trellis made of bamboo stakes.
|
Peppers grow unencumbered as cucumbers grow on the fence.
|
Even if space is not an issue, growing plant up poles, arbours, bamboo teepees, trellises, deck posts and netting is a good thing. It maximizes space as plants take up less room when grown vertically. Instead of cucumbers and other vining plants sprawling all over the beds, they climb and cling to their supports. Now you have more room to grow other plants at their feet, such as lettuce or radishes. With the vining plants off the ground, their fruit stays cleaner as bugs and slugs have a difficult time feasting on them. Diseases are also reduced as the plants and fruit receive more light and air, which also speeds ripening. It’s also easier to harvest as there is no stooping and the ripened crops are easier to see.
A square lattice trellis with scarlet runner beans.
|
Cucumbers growing on a homemade removable trellis.
|
This inexpensive homemade trellis was easily made from dollar store items. To learn how to make it click on the picture.
|
But Wait....There's more...
Chive flowers partner well with Pride of London (Saxifrage sp.) flowers.
There's certainly more to growing veggies than this article. Check out the links below for more information.
- Spring Veggie Gardening
- Crop Rotation, Succession and Companion Planting.
- Taming Tomatoes
- Speeding Up Tomato Harvests
- Tomato Tips
- Tomato Troubles
- Tomatoes Seedlings to Plants
- Growing Potatoes
- Harvesting
- Winter Veggie Gardening
- Building a Potager (French Kitchen) Garden
- How to Build an Easy Veggie Garden Trellis
- Plant Pests Part 1
- Plant Pests Part 2: Controlling Insects
- Slugs & Snails
- Growing Seeds Indoors
- Growing Seeds Outdoors
- Soil Building
- Compost Tea
- Composting
- Fertilizing & Feeding Plants
|
|
Love plants, love to garden and to eat delicious home grown food.. yum..
Amanda's Garden Consulting Company The Garden Website |
Copyright 2017 The Garden Website.com, Amanda's Garden Consulting Company - All Rights Reserved