Winter Gardens

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Permalink Reply by Susie-Q on January 30, 2008 at 12:40pm

Thanks for sharing your winter plans! The homemade cold frame looks attractive and easy to build. I live in the desert Southwest and we plant similar items here for winter.

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Permalink Reply by Charlotte Anthony on February 6, 2008 at 8:25pm

Hi John thanks for putting up this winter garden discussion. We now have 20 winter gardens here in Eugene including one roof garden. See our web site www.victorygardensforall.org, hopefully lots of pictures will be on there soon. The victory garden project is using a plastic covered wire tunnel system. (We got a football field worth of plastic donated by the Ducks.) Some people's plants died when there was a heavy snow because people took the tunnels off to clear the snow. I left everything alone until it unfroze on the ones I maintain and some of the plants were compressed but they all survived including the very young seedlings. In parts of Eugene we have a particular heavy clay soil. We are using microbes from EM, google effective microoranisms and mycorhizzal fungi from fungiperfecti.com with a little compost. A lot of people in this area are using aerobic compost tea made from earth worm castings, but it requires a pump to circulate air, and these other microbes work just fine. The soil is transforming within a month when we can water without chlorine (without city water or by filtering the city water). All this will be on our web site one day soon. The ideal situation for winter gardens (small ones anyway) is on the south side of a house or outbuilding.

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Permalink Reply by John Meiser on February 7, 2008 at 3:12am

Charlotte,

Regarding microbes from EM, google effective microoranisms and mycorhizzal fungi from fungiperfecti.com, where are buying them from and who has the best price?

Glad to see you in the discussion group!

JM

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Permalink Reply by Charlotte Anthony on February 8, 2008 at 9:01am

I have never had a problem with fertility after using these
micorhizzal fungi and EM - effective microorganisms. I believe they
help bring nitrogen in from the air as well as freeing what is fixed
in the soil, but read about them for yourselves. Fungi perfecti
states that they do not work for brassicas (brocalli etc) but my gardens
brassicas have grown much stronger (greener, taller) with their
application.


I used the two of them on an area which was pure orange clay
subsoil. The person whose land it was had scraped the area with his
front loader, so it was also compacted. I had to wet the soil to dig
a trench to plant corn squash, etc. Within one month of the application I had 6
inches of black, friable, topsoil. The corn that I had planted grew
to be 10 feet tall. Carrots which were planted by broadcasting seeds
on this clay, and covered with good garden soil, grew to be long and
straight. I did inoculate the soil from my last years garden (5
gallons to 4 x 50 bed) to bring in a full range of soil
microorganisms and I did add an equal amount of lama compost.

Another great thing these products have done for me is stop bind
weed, witch grass (crab grass), and thistles. I do not know how
they work, maybe the job of these weeds is to stop soil compaction
and these microbes aerate the soil so the weeds are no longer
needed. I usually weed thoroughly after one month. As the soil is
nice and friable because of the microbes, the weeds are easy to
pull. The thistles, bind weed and witch grass have not come back
after that first weeding.. Instead lambs quarters, amaranth and
other "fettility indicating weeds" appear.

Micorhizzal fungi

This is the way I use them. There are different directions on the
package.

I got these from fungiperfecti.com. People tell me there are
slightly less expensive sources but I want to support Paul Stamets.
I want to support local but the local sources as as much as 10 times
for expensive. Maybe I can encourage them to get supplies from
Fungi Perfecti.

Fungi Perfecti have different packages, the one I get is called soluble myco
something and costs $5.95 per oz. The one I get has both endo
and ecto, and they suggest it for edible varieties.

One of the main things the fungi do is attach themselves to the root
systems of the plants and trees, thereby expanding them by thousands
of times. This leaves the soil quite friable and the nutrition
available and lessens the need for water. I believe they are the
solution for the difficult to work clay in the Eugene area.

I use about 1/6 of the 1 oz. package mixed in water. I use
filtered water or else leave the water out maybe as long as 48
hours to get the choline out of it. Choline damages living
organisms.

It is water soluble and mixes readily. (The spores are not soluble
but this way allows them to be distributed through the water.) Put
the fungi mix in first and then add the water into a waterering
can. Or if you want to let it sit for a couple of days and then add
the fingi mix then you need to stir it up. I actually mix the fungi and
EM and add about 1/4 cup of black strap molasses per 2 gallon container.

I would put this on once and then again in one month. The fungi are
attaching to the plants and theoretically do not need to be applied
again if no new plants and I am not a "two different trials person"
so I cannot say if this second application is needed, but
intuitively this is what came to me and it works.

Effective microorganisms (EM): You can find this product on the
internet by googling EM. Go in with your neighbors as 1 quart will
do I believe they say at least 5 acres and you can brew it up to make
20 times as much.

These are digestive bacteria (anaerobic) and digest unbroken down
components in the soil, which works well for me as I do a lot of
sheet composting.

The recommendation is for about 1 tsp (not tbs) per 2 gallons. I
put it in the same watering can as the micorhizzal fungi.

The micorhizzal fungi attach themselves to roots of plants so you
the whole concoction should be aimed at plants in place, or new
seeds. Using this at the transplanting stage is highly recommended.

The EM is breaking down what is in the soil so it can be aimed
at "empty earth."

It is recommended that this be sprayed out. 2 gal in a watering can
treat as much as 100 x 4 foot area -- meaning you can use
sparingly. More will not hurt though.

The recommendation is for this to go on once a week for the first
year during the growing season. They believe that it will only be
needed once or twice in subsequent years.

When I was doing bioremediation in New Orleans (practices taught by
Star Hawk and others from the Common Groud Bioremediation Team) we
brewed up aerobic bacteris to add to this mix. Many people here
seem to know about this. Earthworm compost goes in a small
permiable bag, the contents of a barrel are mixed with an air pump
(used in aquariums) for 48 hours plus or minus and then spread out
on the land.

Microbes are the real basis of fertility in our soils. I am not claiming that these
few additions will themselves make the fertility difference, but that they will
catalyze the rest of the microbes.

I have never been much for soil tests, I promote observing the soil friability, smell etc. You
begin to know when the soil has what it needs.

In New Orleans we added all these things along with tons of compost to the permaculture demonstration plot that I was working on. Still the soil had no earth worms, or friability. I went to a lecture where they talked about more than 50% of the soil life becoming extinct since 1950 and one of the major cause was floods. We were in a flood zone. I immediately went and got 4 5 gallon buckets of other peoples garden soil that had not been flooded and added it (homeopathically) to our plot and within a week, earth works, song birds and the beginning of friability.

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Permalink Reply by Afriendof B on February 7, 2008 at 5:04am

We have heavy clay soil here in our part of Ohio too. I have had good luck improving tilth and plant health by getting the calcium levels back in balance. William Albrecht did some great (though hard to read) work in this area. I recommend a good soil test from a lab that uses his principles. ATTRA has a good list http://attra.ncat.org/attra-pub/soil-lab.html. Look in the mineral part not the organic matter part. I like www.agrienergy.net myself. I've found their recommendations easy to follow and have seen real results.

Getting the mineral balance right has made my garden more drought tolerant, and my plants less susceptible to insects and disease.

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Permalink Reply by Afriendof B on January 31, 2008 at 6:34am

I've found the book Four-Season Harvest by Eliot Colman very helpful as I try to extend the growing season here in the gray, chilly Midwest. He has some good information on how much cold protection you can expect from different types of cover, kinds of vegetables that do well in the winter, and advice on timing your plantings. All of it is easily scaled to any size garden.

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Permalink Reply by Kim Ridley on January 31, 2008 at 8:22am

Right on. Eliot's website is www.fourseasonfarm.com. What he's doing is truly remarkable. I visited him last month for an interview for a Maine magazine. It was about 15 degrees outside and snowing hard, but inside one of his greenhouses--heated only by the sun--lush beds of spinach, lettuce, tatsoi and claytonia were flourishing. Two keys are cold-hardy crops and fabric row covers at night.

In addition to showing home gardeners how to grow crops in the winter, he also has written a book for larger scale growers and sells fresh produce at our co-op all winter.

Another interesting aspect of his greenhouses: most of them are built on runners so they can be dragged with a tractor to protect tender crops in the spring and again to protect other crops in the fall to extend the season. His latest design is built on wheels used on industrial gates so it can be moved by two people. Moving the greenhouses also helps maintain soil health.

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Permalink Reply by Afriendof B on January 31, 2008 at 10:34am

"The New Organic Grower" is Eliot's other book. I've been running market gardens or CSA's for more than 15 years now and I still find new things in that book. It is a bit more than most home gardeners want to take on, but there is some really great stuff in there on building soil, crop rotation, and succession planting.

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Permalink Reply by Susie-Q on January 31, 2008 at 12:09pm

Anna Edey offers designs of greenhouses that require no electricity. They are warmed by rabbits and chickens!

There is no waste in her system. Everything from the excrement and breath of the animals to the oxygen emitted by the plants is used. I find it fascinating. Visit her very green website,

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Permalink Reply by Kim Ridley on January 31, 2008 at 1:17pm

Thanks--intriguing website! And what an integrated approach. I look forward to learning more.

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Permalink Reply by Afriendof B on January 31, 2008 at 3:27pm

Anna Eddy is great!!! I love her book. We are incorporating many of her design ideas into our micro-farm. I think she has some ideas that should be part of every home, urban, suburban, and rural. Her book, Solviva, should be on every eco-gardener's shelf (well worn of course).

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Permalink Reply by J.T. Hessert on February 17, 2008 at 7:55pm

http://www.backyardbeauties.com/, cool link to a maine-based year round commercial greenhouse...

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