Contents

The Lewis School Garden
Planting Fruit Trees
Community Growing
A Dream that Healed the Earth
Beauty in the Garden
Certainties
Gardening in the Summer of 2011
A Personal Garden Vision
Gardening for a Purpose
Garden Observations are a Bonus
Gardening with Natural Principles
Community Growing
Hidden Places for Growing
Still Learning as Always
Connecting Gardeners, Community, and Opportunity

Saturday, August 20, 2011

Gardening in the Summer of 2011



A Personal Garden Vision
My garden is designed to grow food for my husband, myself, friends, and family as well as for beautiful views of flowers from our windows and cut flowers to put in the house. The total effect is patterns of leaf and flower in a range of vibrant colors with the movement of birds, insects, and wind while the constantly changing angle of the sun strikes the leaves and blossoms. Pairs of goldfinches visit the sunflowers chirping all the while. Hummingbirds visit blossoms. Woodpeckers work in the surrounding Oakwoodlands. Scents fill the air.

Included among the vegetables and fruits are plants that increase the well being of the garden. These plants provide food and shelter for a variety of insects. This insures a balanced insect population that eats only tiny bits of the veggies and roses---not enough to be a bother. The plants that increase the well being of the garden include the honey scented alyssum which attracts an insect that preys on aphids, the tall airy Verbena bonarensis with its small flat flower clusters which make perfect landing pads for a variety of insects, the wonderful monarda that attracts humming birds, and the healall that bees love. There are also scented beautiful plants like lemon balm, caledula, marigold, feverfew, lavender, and rue that are essential to a healthy plant community. Some of these probably contribute by repelling harmful insects with their strong smells. In fact, the one potato plant in the new orchard garden with no insect nibbles is the one with a little feverfew plant that volunteered right next to it. Being newly established, this garden does not yet have a variety of established beneficial plants like feverfew to keep the insect population balanced. Here most potato and early bean plants were nibbled..

Being a teacher gave me the summer to correct and refine my garden infrastructure and practices. For example, I built compost bins that will better hold moisture in our dry summers, and the new orchard garden is terraced, has double-dug beds, and is layered with mulch. The materials that I used in these projects were left over from home improvement projects. I have completed gardening projects that will keep myself and the plants thriving as I go back to teaching for the school year. I recycled materials that would have otherwise been landfill.

Gardening for a Purpose
This is the summer when my gardening became part of my life in a unified way. Just as I create an interweaving of plants that do well together, my garden integrates all parts of my life. I no longer leave unfinished tasks undone. For example, vines are tied up before they sprawl over other plants blocking sunlight. There are no neglected tangles of weeds and vines taking extra time to correct. I am planting a year-round garden so seeds are sown most months. I do not just sow a summer garden, water it, harvest it, and wait till the next season. I found that there is always something to harvest. For example, greens can be harvested when small or when mature. If I harvest them when small, I am giving nearby plants more room to mature. This worked well with the cabbage which I am still harvesting. My cooking is inspired by fresh vibrant produce coming from the garden.

Gardening gives me hope. I know I can grow food and increase beauty by growing plants in harmony with nature. I am inspired by the natural processes that I work with and ever changing life-cycles of the plants in my care. I sense that our lives and the life around us are like small concentric rings connected to larger ones expanding and blending. Sometimes these rings also blend from the past into the future.

As a child, I felt nurture in the homes and gardens of my great aunts and my grandmother Florence. Their homes were clean and orderly and their gardens and farms were lovely. I knew that I wanted this nurture in my life. I wanted to be able to create this nurture for myself and my own family. These women were my models for how I wanted to be. Now I can see that I have this nurture in my family relationships, my garden and my home. It feels good.

“I do not yet know why plants come out of the land or float in streams, or creep on rocks or roll from the sea. I am entranced by the mystery of them, and absorbed by their variety and kinds. Everywhere they are visible yet everywhere occult.” Liberty Hyde Bailey



Garden Observations are a Bonus
This summer was different as I paid more attention to what the plants needed since I was more attentive. After the summer plants were in the ground, I made compost and turned soil, all the while paying attention to the needs of the plants as they grew. I planned a year-round garden, so by July, I was starting plants for winter. I often hand watered the vegetable beds. “The foot steps of the gardener is the best fertilizer,” is a quote from the ancient Chinese farmers. It is so true as being in the garden allows me to see what is needed. While watering I sometimes pull a weed, notice a squash that needs to be picked, train a pumpkin vine to stay inside the protective wire deer fencing, and see what tomatoes need more staking. I don’t think that I spent more time in the garden this summer but my time was spent in better ways. I was able to do small tasks like getting out weeds before they got to be big and competed with the vegetables for food, sunlight, and water. Enjoyment of a well growing garden was my reward as I spent time on priorities that insured healthy plants. I was able to learn to prioritize tasks by what was most needed by the plants.

There were also other bonuses to hand watering besides the fact that the sprinklers don’t water the garden edges well. Once while I was hand watering at dusk, I noticed a turkey high up on an oak tree branch and wondered why her wing was out from her body in an unusual position. I paid attention to moving the gentle rain of water onto the soil between the zucchini and cabbage. The next time I looked up, the turkey had flown down the hill leaving behind five little ones on the branch about 30 feet up in the tree. I was amazed that these little ones had flown so high up to roost in the tree. I watched as one by one the little ones flew down to their mom to find another safe place to spend the night. I was sorry that my watering had disturbed them but glad to have seen how a momma turkey keeps her babies protected at night when the predators are most active.

Gardening with Natural Principles
My understanding of many natural principles increased. For example, plants want to make a protective cover over the soil. I plant seedlings close enough so that the mature plants cover the soil. I use mulch to cover bare spots. This cover protects the soil, keeps moisture from evaporating, and keeps weeds from sprouting. The mulch also provides food for the earthworms to mix into the soil. I also let dandelions and small grasses grow in paths, giving me fresh greens for the chickens. Another path had healall growing in it. In the summer the blossoming stems get about a foot high so I hoed out a narrow five inch pathway. I found that the bees loved this stand of blossoms. I walk through this narrow pathway slowly so I don’t hurt or disturb the bees while they work. I have not been stung, and I go through this area daily. I encouraged pursulane to grow between the corn plants which improves the corn. The plants are protecting the soil in many places in my garden.

Plants place their vitality for growing into tiny seeds which the gardener brings to life. I found this principle of nature a joy to work with. From big nasturtium seeds to tiny viola seeds, baby plants began their life under my care. Some volunteered like the violas and columbine in the soil under the parent plants. These I carefully moved to bigger quarters in nice pots of freshly mixed soil. The results have been a nearly constant parade of sprouts becoming beds of vegetables or decorative plants. Friends have benefitted from my extra plants.

I benefitted from the extra seedlings of a new friend. I partnered with Diane who had not grown much outdoors but grew indoor gloxinias from dust-like seed. Last spring Diane had extras of these baby plants which mature into tender house plants with flowers up to four inches across. As I type this, sitting next to me are several of these plants, one with a luscious wide-opened white bloom with red dots in a beautiful scalloped pattern of denser dots near the petal’s edge and another with intense purple blooms that look ruffled. Another gloxinia that has finished blooming was a deep red. It is in the greenhouse as it goes dormant to sprout again later from a tuber of stored energy. These wonderful plants have the added bonus of being perennial.

“Feed the soil, the soil feeds the plants, and the plants feed you.” This is a quote from my friend Pat who gardened for a year learning from Alan Chadwick, the gardener who introduced French Intensive/ Biodynamic Gardening to North America. Last year my summer and winter squash plants were small and produced little. They were growing in a new garden with very poor soil. In fact, a soil test revealed that my garden soil tested low in nitrogen and potash and medium in phosphorus. This planting area had only been gardened for a few years with my chicken manure compost added in only the last two years when I started raising chickens. My improved compost was added in the spring, and this year I noticed that my squash plants look healthy and vigorous. It takes years to build good soil with compost, and I needed more soil nutrients than I had been applying. I have continued adding purchased compost as a mulch throughout the summer, and these large squash plants are continuing to thrive.

Community Growing
My friend, Diane, and I gardened together every week this summer. Diane helped me prepare plum grafts and shell bell beans. I helped her double dig her first bed in the back yard. She gave homes to some of my extra plants like tomatoes and rosemary as we landscaped her wild front yard. I learned how to follow another person’s garden vision as I paid close attention to her garden plans.

My friend had not imagined she could turn her soil into planting beds. After observing me double digging the soil, she plans to get a fork for herself.

We were both very proud of our results. Her front yard shows off some of her favorite lilies and morning glory vines as well as existing shrubs and new tomato plants. Her back yard has its first planting bed. I have three fig tree starts from under her fig tree in my greenhouse and we await the results of the plum grafts which will be evident next spring. We were both pleased and got compliments on her front yard from a homeless man who often walks by her house.

Community growing was definitely a success for us and we have more gardening planned when our work schedules allow. Of course we will keep each other informed of the growth of our plants and the ripening of the figs.


Hidden Places for Growing
The path by the raspberries filled with the low growing mint ground cover, healall, is like a bee sanctuary. It is wonderful how many things you can grow in a path when you get over the idea of all paths needing to be free of plants. A sign saying "Walk slowly, bee sanctuary" would be nice if anyone used that path besides me.

The chickens are always interested in my activities when I come outside. They watch me from the edge of their pen. They are only distracted from me if I give them some greens or grasses to scratch through. I give them grasses from spring weed-eating done to minimize fire hazards. Any unwanted plant material pulled or trimmed from the vegetable and flower beds are theirs except for woody twigs and rose prunings which go to the garbage company for shredding and composting. I have a little pen within their enclosure that I sometimes use as a place to sow peas and vetch for the chickens to eat. They finish with that in a day. I am glad there are dandelions, burr clover, and grasses growing in the nearby paths to supply them with fresh greens. This also increases the vitamin content of their eggs besides keeping the chickens happily occupied.

Matching companion plants in beds together gives extra crops. There are carrots in between the tomato plants and carrots planted with green onions.

Starting the next crop among the finishing crop worked with a pea bed becoming a tomato bed. There is a bed of peas that had four tomato plants started in between them in May. Now the peas are decomposing under the mulch around the four foot tall tomato plants.

Several beds of potatoes are still growing. Adding layers of mulch to the beds probably encouraged the plants to continue growing. Most potato plants are still green and have not bloomed so the next crops for the cool season are in pots in the greenhouse waiting for the potatoes to finish. The greenhouse with pots is another hidden place for growing as growing in pots keep the beds available for large maturing plants. The potted plants will be ready when the mature plants are harvested. A continuous supply of food comes from beds in continuous production.

Invasive Plants as Healers
I have a patch of ground were the soil was once covered with chaparral. We cleared this area to protect our property from wildfire moving up the hill to our house. The slope faces south west receiving the hottest part of the sunlight. Over the years that we have lived here, star thistle has started growing here. This plant is considered an invasive problematic nonnative. I have tried over the years to pull it all out each summer, and the next summer it is still growing in the same place. This summer I read the book, Invasive Plant Medicine, The Ecological Benefits and Healing Abilities of Invasives which gave me an understanding of the job invasive plants do to remediate problem soils so I didn’t pull out the star thistle. I went to see how this area looked this summer and noticed there was only one star thistle plant and a whole patch of native bunch grasses perfectly arranged as if they had been planted with equal spacing between each one. Did the long strong roots of the star thistles make it possible for these plants to get their roots into this dense soil? Did I pull last year’s star thistle out before they made seeds and there were no seeds left in the soil from previous years? Has the star thistle finished its work so the native grasses can grow? I wonder what will grow there next year. I am going to continue to leave this place alone.

These quotes were taken from the book, Invasive Plant Medicine.
A quote from the great plantsman, Liberty Hyde Bailey. “All living beings have the right to engage in the struggle for existence.”
Many believe that invasive plants harm native plants. Here is a quote from Vermeij. “The evidence so far points to the conclusion that invaders often cause extinction on oceanic islands and in lakes, but rarely in the sea or on large land masses.”
A quote from Masanobu Fukuoka. “The living and holistic biosystem that is nature cannot be dissected or resolved into its parts. Once broken down, it dies. Or rather, those who break off a piece of nature lay hold of something that is dead, and unaware that what they are examining is no longer what they think it to be, claim to understand nature... Because [man] starts off with misconceptions about nature and takes the wrong approach to understanding it, regardless of how rational his thinking, everything winds up all wrong.”

Still Learning as Always
I am a teacher by profession and have found that teaching and learning are the same thing. I am curious about many things and want to share that with youth. I find that I am still learning about gardening constantly even though I have gardened since I was a child. Pairing up to work with a less experienced gardener gave me much to learn. It wasn’t so much that she learned from me but rather that we both learned different things from sharing gardening.

The wonderful thing about this is that each new season becomes a new chance to learn. My winter study of new garden practices and seed catalogues is always an exciting time of year for me. During this period, I am like a kid in a candy store as I envision next year’s garden. I often need to adjust my exuberant plans so they fit the space that I have.

Connecting Gardeners, Community, and Opportunity
Building a humane world where food is produced locally and sustainablly will heal ourselves and our planet. Currently about 75% of greenhouse gases come from food production and distribution worldwide. More land that is stewarded locally and sustainablly will allow gardeners and community to work together toward a humane world.

Imagine if the unused land between a suburban fence and a city street, the front yards currently growing only a monoculture of mowed grass, the forgotten easements, and unused back yards were beautiful kaleidoscopes of texture, color and form devoted to fresh local food. Children would view the wonder of the life in these places and be learning to appreciate and protect it. People would have more fresh nutritious food. People would work together to create something that would be a source of pride and kinship.

I have friends with a nonprofit organization who would be happy to sponsor food growing. Their website is Communityconnexions.org. I and other friends with gardening experience ranging from setting up community gardens to farming biodynamically would be happy to share our experience. I can be reached at marlenahirsch@yahoo.com. In my area of Sonoma County, California, there is igrowsonoma.org and the School Garden Network's group emails with helpful info for food growing. These are just a few of the many groups devoted to promoting local sustainable food growing.