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Creating Bridges:
The Spiritual & Philosophical: |
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Organic Gardening |
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by Frank and Vicky Giannangelo |
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Is it Winter?
It is always surprising when December 22 arrives and suddenly winter is declared to be “official”. Considering the fact our low has already been a minus 14 degrees F. and the ground is white with snow, having the “arrival” of winter announced seems anti-climatic. Dog and chicken water, ponds, and the birdbath have needed heaters to keep them free of ice for a few weeks now.
Our chores speak of a different season. The kindling box needs to be refilled with split cedar, the appropriate size of wood needs to be put on the porch for the wood stove and cook stove. Instead of tilling the garden beds, watering and weeding, splitting wood and shoveling snow is the order of the day. When we go to town, the decorations, music, and the greater number of shoppers tell us about a holiday more than a season.
We know it is winter when we can no longer just run out the door - now we need to sit down and put on waterproof boots, don vests, down jackets, gloves, hats, and scarves. The bird feeder seems empty all the time. With the cold and lower sun, the chickens give us fewer eggs. The pet food bowls need filling more often. We drive down our driveway in four wheel drive to get to the paved road. The weather channel is checked more often to see when the next system is coming in, and what we may need to do before it arrives. The smell of hot chocolate fills the kitchen. Sourdough pancakes are made on top of the wood cook stove.
Taking our dogs for walks provides new laughs as they run scooping snow into their mouths and then jumping and running, tossing the dry powder glistening into the air. Little prints in the snow remind us of how many rabbits and other smaller creatures there are - and every once in awhile, the abrupt stop of prints ended by the pattern of owl wings in the snow.
But, probably the surest sign of winter, which all gardeners share, is the sudden appearance of seed catalogs in our mail boxes. We have Mr. R. H. Shumway’s Illustrated Garden Guide: Good Seed Cheap, “A Business Built on Fairness, Honesty and Good Service,” with 150 additional new and heirloom seeds. At 10 by 13 inches, it is the largest catalog we receive. Seeds of Change and Johnny’s Selected Seeds with their high quality photos on glossy pages give each example a grower’s desired perfection.
They all have something new to try; a new variety, a recently found heritage seed, or a newly developed early bloomer. We seem to always think about trying one of each, even though most aren’t suited for our climate. Experience reminds us of what happened when we tried to grow 120 day melons in our 90 day season. But sometimes it does work - with protective cloches, mulch, early starting of seeds and transplanting - and all the other tricks we have learned over the years.
New varieties do not appear suddenly, they are bred by isolating desired qualities until the breeder is satisfied with the results of his harvest. The gardener harvests more than what is given by the plants, for the gardener plants himself along with the radish, lettuce, and carrot. Others can then benefit from that planting. The old standbys provide us with reliability, yet it is the combining of new and better traits that gives us the watchword of the universe - progress. As moves the part, so moves the whole. So, how can we become a new and better variety?
Just as we mulch, cloche, and provide care to encourage plants that need our assistance, we can help ourselves by nurturing our tolerance, understanding, patience, loyalty, honesty, gentleness, peace, love, and our faith in goodness. By encouraging these desired qualities in ourselves, we can become a better variety, moment by moment, adding these desirable traits until we become satisfied with the results of the harvest we have grown.
Copyright © 2004
Giannangelo Farms Southwest
"What is Organic Gardening?"
"Man is a part of nature, and his war against nature is inevitably a war against himself.”
Rachel Carson
ORGANIC GARDENING starts with good soil. When crops are deprived of basic nutrients they languish. Organic soil amendments and conditioners pay for themselves with increased plant productivity. Healthy plants grow more vigorously, taste better, store longer, and better resist insect attacks. They have greater resistance to the cold, heat, drought, and disease. Successful soil building best addresses the soil’s long-term needs by remedying deficiencies organically. Chemical fertilizers add unwanted nitrates or salts to the soil, as well as leaving chemical residues in the food. Organic gardening is growing without chemical fertilizers, naturally building the soil to support healthy plant life. Chemical fertilizers and additives will, over time, damage the soil's ability to provide what plants need to resist disease, insect attacks, and stress. Soil depletion of organic nutrients is one of the main causes of unhealthy plants and disease.
RECIPE FOR SOIL DEPLEATION:
Pesticides + chemical fertilizers = Infertile soil, stressed plants, and insect attacks.
RECIPE FOR SOIL BUILDING:
Organic fertilizers + microbial activity = Soil fertility, healthy plants, and resistance to insect attacks.
A healthy, organic garden produces strong plants that are able to withstand adverse conditions. The consistent traits and habits needed to make good soil can also help build fertility in our lives. Those things we do to create a healthy garden can become the tools needed to explore, change, and enhance our daily lives through:
Assessment - the plan of action
Decision – the choice to act
Implementation– the act itself, the doing
Success in the garden proves the efficacy of these tools, and as we use them to expand our gardens - the garden of our yard, and the garden of our soul - we expand all the aspects of our lives.
Organic soil amendments and conditioners can renew the life of your soil without adding unwanted chemicals. Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium are the basic providers of nutrients in the soil. Trace minerals provide the rest.
Soil can either be acidic or alkaline, or neutral – the soil’s pH. pH is the symbol for the logarithm of the reciprocal of Hydrogen ion concentration in gram atoms per liter. For example, a pH of 5 indicates a concentration of .00001 or 10-5 gram atoms of hydrogen ions in one liter of solution. Acidic soil has a pH range from 1 to 6.5. Alkaline soils have a pH range from 7.5 to 10. Neutral soil has a pH of 7. Lime, oak leaf mold, peat moss, rotted sawdust, and soil sulfur will lower the pH in an alkaline soil. For acid soil, add dolomite lime, or oyster shell lime. For the best results, add these amendments in the spring when soils are warming and microorganisms are active. Most plants grow well in a pH range of 6, but will tolerate a pH between 5.5 – 7.
Organic soil-building should include the addition of the following organic nutrients:
HUMUS - organic matter in various stages of decay. It increases water-holding capacity, modifies soil structure, stimulates plant growth, permits root penetration, and helps to correct soil imbalances. Some forms of humus are found in compost and animal manures.
NITROGEN - contains proteins and is a food source for compost piles (grass clippings, green vegetable matter), and it stimulates green growth in plants. Sources are blood meal, cottonseed meal, alfalfa meal, fishmeal, and fish emulsion.
PHOSPHORUS - stimulates root growth and promotes fruit and seed maturation. Good sources are soft rock phosphate or bone meal. Deficiencies are indicated by purple leaves, brittle roots, skinny stems and late fruit set and maturity.
POTASSIUM - promotes plant vitality and disease resistance. Sources are Greens and, also known as Glauconite, sulfate of potash, wood ashes, or Sul Po Mag. Deficiencies are indicated by an irregular yellowing of lower leaves, and poor root growth.
CALCIUM - important for plant cell wall integrity, root development and leaf growth. Low levels show up as deformed new leaves and branches, weak stems and roots. A good source for calcium is gypsum, which can also lower the alkalinity of the soil.
MAGNESIUM - essential for chlorophyll and green leaf development. Pale green leaves with green veins are a sign of deficiency. Adding dolomite lime to raise the pH in an acid soil often corrects this deficiency. In an alkaline soil you can add Magnesium Sulfate.
SULPHUR - used to lower pH in alkaline soil, and it is a stimulant for soil microbial life. Use sparingly. A good source is soil sulfur, or calcium sulfate – Gypsum.
TRACE MINERALS - found in compost, kelp meal, algae meal, and seaweed meal. These can provide boron, copper, iron, sulfur and zinc.
OXYGEN - one of the most important fertility components in the soil - it stimulates microbial activity and allows free root growth. Humus, peat moss, compost, and aged manure tilled into the soil help to increase the air spaces in the soil enabling plants to utilize the available nutrients. Soil should be loose and never walked on, which only compacts it. Tilling wet soil too early in the season can also destroy soil structure by compacting it, and squeezing out the pockets for air.
SUSTAINABLE GARDENING - one of the most important things about gardening organically is that the process can become sustainable over time. Sustainable soil building begins after the initial soil testing and the addition of organic fertilizers and conditioners, and continues by organically maintaining and improving the soil over time. Sustaining the soil means being able to replenish nutrients with what you have at hand – organic compost, beneficial microbes, enzymes, and earthworms. Ideally, once the garden is established it can be sustained with garden compost alone, using the microbes in your soil to inoculate your compost, which feed your soil.
WORMS - Vermicomposting uses earthworms to make compost. Worms can eat their body weight daily in organic matter and convert it into dark, soil enriching castings full of live micro organisms, growth hormones, and nutrients, humic acids which condition the soil, and a neutral pH.
COMPOSTING - Billions of decaying organisms (25,000 bacteria placed end to end equal one inch) feed, grow, reproduce and die, recycling garden waste into an organic fertilizer and soil conditioner. Composting is the ultimate recycling process – improving soil structure, increasing the soil’s ability to hold moisture, providing soil aeration, fertilization, and nitrogen storage. It buffers pH, releases nutrients, and provides food for microbial life.
PLANTING COVER CROPS - this "green manure" is grown for the sole purpose of being tilled into the soil to add organic matter. It will help keep moisture from evaporating, regulate the soil temperature, keeping it cooler in summer and warmer in winter. By providing an insulating blanket, microbes and earthworms will thrive. The more worms in your garden, the more they can break up, fertilize, and aerate the soil. Beneficial insects are also attracted by cover crops; alfalfa can attract parasitic wasps, lady beetles, damsel bugs, big-eyed bugs and assassin bugs. White clover can attract Tachnid flies, ground beetles and parasitic wasps that prey on aphids, scales, caterpillars and white flies. Most grains will attract lady beetles. Clovers and vetches can attract minute pirate bugs. Fava beans and buckwheat can attract predatory and parasitic wasps, syrphid flies and bumblebees.
CROP ROTATION - Crop rotation also helps to prevent soil deficiencies. By using different plants in different beds, you can avoid depletion of nutrients because each plant has different needs. Planting a legume after a heavy feeder such as corn, will replenish the nitrogen in the soil. Rotate your root crops, leafy crops, heavy feeders, and cover crops. if you keep a garden journal you can keep track of what you planted, and where and when you planted it.
PROVIDING GOOD DRAINAGE - Good drainage is essential to soil health. Too little drainage makes a soggy soil which prevents root growth, nutrient absorption, and compacts the soil. A perk test is an easy way to determine water drainage through your soil. Dig a hole six inches across by one foot deep. Fill with water and let drain. As soon as the water has drained, fill it again. Time how long it takes for the water to drain. If it takes more than 8 hours, you have a drainage problem. Add sand, gypsum, chopped straw, vermiculite or perlite to increase the drainage. Too much drainage can be determined by a water test. This will tell you if you soil drains too quickly, leaching nutrients and causing plants to be watered more frequently. Water well a small portion of your garden. Two days later, dig a hole 6 inches deep. If the soil is dry to the bottom of the hole, your soil drains too quickly to promote good plant growth. Add peat moss, vermiculite, perlite, composted manure and mulch well to prevent evaporation.
"When the planes still swoop down and aerial spray a field in order to kill a predator insect with pesticides, we are in the Dark Ages of commerce. Maybe one thousandth of this aerial insecticide actually prevents the infestation. The balance goes to the leaves, into the soil, into the water, into all forms of wildlife, into our selves. What is good for the balance sheet is wasteful of resources and harmful to life.”
Paul Hawkin from The Ecology of Commerce
COPYRIGHT (c) 2002 by Frank and Vicky Giannangelo
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Frank & Vicky Giannangelo
Registered Organic Gardeners
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Frank and Vicky Giannangelo have been gardening organically for 30 years and are New Mexico Registered Organic Gardeners.
Giannangelo Farms began in 1986 on San Juan Island, Washington - an island off the coast of Washington State, 10 miles from the bottom of Vancouver Island, British Columbia.
After creating formal, patterned, raised bed, sustainable organic gardens, starting a business, and expanding as much as we could handle without hiring anyone, we sold our business in 1993 and moved to Arizona, where we spent three years creating and coordinating the building of a large formal herb and vegetable garden for a private community.
Since 1997, we have lived in northwestern New Mexico in an area presenting many challenges, altitude, erratic spring weather, a short growing season, and a 7,300 ft. high desert environment - which is allowing us to use our experience and creativity to establish Giannangelo Farms Southwest.
There are formal gardens, pools, and ponds surrounded by a hay bale stucco wall, garden beds with rock retaining walls, three pergolas for private formal teas, a labyrinth, garden trellises, and greenhouses - all of which are open to the public year around.
We give a series of spring and fall "You Can Grow!" Workshops on how to do basic rockwork, build hay bale stucco walls, and how to create sustainable organic gardens - with an emphasis on the problems of growing in this area.
In the summer we sell organic herbs and vegetables to a coop market in Gallup, and participate in a local Saturday's farmer's market. Sustainable Organic Gardening CD ROMs are available on our website:
NEW on our website:
CREATIVE GARDEN DESIGN:
avant-gardening.com
/design.html
TAKE VIRTUAL PHOTO TOURS:
avant-gardening.com
Our newsletter is now published monthly in a new online magazine:
avant-gardening.com/
grow.html
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