repost: grow your own food (no matter where you live!)

In honor of the first day of Spring, I thought I would repost this entry I blogged back in December (not really a good time for growing anything at all unless you're overwintering greens) for those of you getting ready for your Spring/Summer gardens. 


I am soooo excited to find out that we have a community garden here in the town home community we just moved to and I just finished listening to a voice mail from the HOA treasurer who will be sending out an email this week about the garden. Apparently there are smaller plots to grow in but also space for a MUCH larger garden, which I hope to get dibs on and really go to town!!!! I am utterly thrilled!!!


Hopefully this post will be helpful and inspiring to you... if you have any questions just post up in the comments and I'll be sure to respond! Happy Spring!

first year's garden right before harvest (fall)

proud mama :)

Hey friends. Well, I am starting this post here on what is probably the last full day we will spend in our house. I am not so emotional about leaving the house - although I will miss many aspects of it, the one thing I am most heartbroken about is leaving my garden. The gallons of sweat I've spent, volumes of dirt and weeds I've moved, plants I've nurtured, etc... there is no way to fully document for you the investment of both time and heart that I will not get to take with me. It is desperately sad.

first year's harvest right before the freeze

I will be harvesting the remainder of my greens and lettuces currently growing in the garden tomorrow. I am hoping I can transplant some of my collards to containers so I can eat off of them throughout the winter.

harvest of SOME turnips and collards for  this year's Thanksgiving... (Thanksgiving morning)

Gardening is such a therapy for me. I love being in the dirt and close to the earth. I love seeing things I have nurtured thrive and being enjoyed by others. I love serving my family foods that I've grown from seed.

tomatoes and lettuce for salad served up with dinner

Let me assure you, though... I do not intend to leave this place without disassembling the square foot garden beds, scooping up and bagging all the soil, and tearing out whatever perennials I can! :o)

radishes

I've been wanting to share with you all a way that you can grow a little or a lot of your own food regardless of how much space you have. I use the square foot garden "technique" in my vegetable gardening, and I find it to be a smart, efficient, and very natural way to grow your food. Benefits that I have personally observed of this technique include:

1. the ability to control your soil and maintain it's quality
2. weed control - weeds are basically non-existent
3. excellent yield in a very small space
4. pest control - how you plant your different vegetables can aid in pest control
5. insecticide use is completely unnecessary
6. the quality of your crop is excellent (good soil - good fruits/vegetables)
7. you can make your beds as accessible as you need them to be - you can build one wherever you want to put a garden provided you have that square footage available (deck, patio, front or back yard, etc)

There are many resources out there that will give you more details than I could possibly give you here - specifically Mel Bartholomew's ("father" of SFG) website and book on Square Foot Gardening. Mel's book is a great resource. I have not personally read it. I learned about SFG through my friend and very knowledgeable gardener David Hulsey. I researched it an implemented my garden using the basic approach I will share with you today. 

cucumbers

I promise you that you will have a satisfying and productive garden if you try the SFG way. I have thoroughly enjoyed my experience with it and found it to be as effortless as it could possibly be to grow my own food. 

Here's what you need to know on how to get started:

I will say that there is some up front cost involved. I'd say we spent about $80 on materials and soil amendments up front but we did not really try to find free stuff. This past season since my soil needed a do over I just spent some time at my friend's horse farm shoveling manure into bags and used up the compost I'd been, well, composting, since last season. I saved a ton of money this way.

You can keep your costs down by reclaiming materials and getting free manure and compost like I did this year.

Also, it is totally unnecessary to buy plants. Just buy seeds and save your money. 

It is also IMPERATIVE to know your hardiness zone and what to plant when. 

Build your raised bed(s)

We built two beds - one 4'x4' bed and one 4'x6' bed using 2x6s and 2x4s to secure the pieces at the corners. (lumber). You can also use 2x12s - ask your local Home Improvement guy and he or she can help you. A husband with a drill and some deck screws would also be helpful. My husband built ours in about an hour. You need about 12" of soil, and the 2x6s stacked on end provided that for us. 

If you live in an apartment or town house/condo (where I'll be living come tomorrow) and you have limited space, you can build a 1'x4' box or 2'x4'... if you need your boxes to be narrower to fit on a patio or walkway, those dimensions will work. You just want to make sure they're whole feet squared. Feel free to be creative about what materials you use to build the walls of your beds...  Here's a good tutorial on building your own box.

Compose the soil

Mel Bartholomew recommends that your soil be 1/3 blended compost, 1/3 peat moss and 1/3 vermiculite. 

When I initally composed my soil I could not find vermiculite, so the guy at Pike Nursery recommended a different blend, and I used 1/3 mushroom compost, 1/3 peat moss and 1/3 cow manure. I had a great yield and no issues. The purpose of the compost is fertilization and the purpose of the vermiculite is aeration. I am not 100% sure about peat moss, except that it is partially decomposed sphagnum moss which is mined and somewhat increasing in the controversy of it's use. I would recommend researching it before using it, as I can tell you that it is not completely necessary to use it. You just need to make sure you have nitrogen rich, fertile soil that can breathe. This can be accomplished in many ways. This last season I used my own homegrown compost, horse manure from my friend's farm and perlite, which is similar to vermiculite, to aerate.

first year...

here's Shiloh spreading the free manure this year... (in garbage bags in background)

Mark off your square feet

This part is easy - after you've done the grunt work to build your box, fill it with your soil mix, you are ready to plant, except Mel recommends that you mark off each square foot with string or something so you can keep track of how much you're planting per square foot. This changes according to what you're planting and how much space it needs. A guide can be found here. 

I put nails in at each foot and strung basic twine or string across to mark each section.

Plant

This is the fun part. I'd advise you draw a graph that tells you where you planted what. Keep your seeds organized. DO NOT OVERPLANT - I know it seems hard to believe that one TEENY TINY SEED could possibly produce, on its own, a large, delicious vegetable to eat, BUT IT CAN. I would not put more than 2 seeds per hole and that's even pushing it. If you put more than one and they all germinate, you're going to be thinning, which can stress the roots of the plant you're saving. And you have to thin the seedlings, otherwise neither plant will grow to its full potential. TRUST THE SEED!! :o) 

I also prefer not to sprout the seeds first... too much work! Just put them in the ground!

Water daily until germination... 

Keep seedlings watered until they reach about an inch to two inches tall and then I think you can go to every other day or so. 

All you have to do now is sit back and watch your garden grow. Make a note when you plant of how many days until ready for harvest - should say on the back of the seed packet. I don't abide by these as strictly in fall but I do find that in summer when vegetables are subject to many environmental stresses it is important to take better care of them and get them harvested on time, or even early (green tomatoes will ripen off the vine) if appropriate. I kept a journal at first but found that to be unnecessary later. It's good for initial planning, though.

I'd love to answer any questions you may have about getting started. If you would like to ask me a question, leave it in the comments or email me at brooke dot m dot hammel at g mail dot com. 

turnip from this year

blueberries (not grown in SFG), squash, cukes and tomatoes from previous year

There is SO much more to learn about this, that I could not possibly have covered here. If you're interested I strongly recommend getting Mel's book, or you can email me and I will provide a human connection to the process!

Here are a few more pics:

gladioli

lantana in my garden being visited by a bee

Happy gardening!

Brooke