A Victory Garden

Offerings for the birds

This morning, as I was picking blueberries, I heard my neighbors drive off to church. I was already in my church, dropping berries into my big colander as the sun finally climbed over the trees, listening to the birds singing, my cat Robin Hood twining between my feet, my chickens grabbing the berries I dropped.

I believe that a balanced and healthy relationship with Nature is essential to a balanced and healthy life. I believe that a greater Consciousness, of which we are a part, creates physical reality and we are co-creators, part of a web of existence, not separate from it.

So today, after picking another couple of gallons to freeze, I will pull the bird netting off of the blueberries and allow the birds to finish off the harvest. There are still quite a few berries on these bushes, both ripe and unripe  – I could get at least another gallon if I left the netting on – but it’s important to me to share with the birds, to give them a gift that is the result of my labor planting, growing, pruning and fertilizing the blueberries. After all, they give me so much -- their songs and beauty, not to mention the insect control. I acknowledge the web of life with this gift, and I'll offer a prayer and a song to the spirits of the land as well on this fine morning.

 Here’s an interesting article on how food gardening is taking off in Britain.

Back to my blueberries!

Growing blueberries

I’ve been promising to answer some of the questions I had gotten about blueberries from my previous post, and then this morning I found that one of my favorite bloggers (and singer/songwriters!), Christine Kane, had been taken to task for not giving enough information about blueberries in a post she had titled “A Crash Course in Blueberries” (which was really about taking delight in life – and blueberries) But it certainly seems that more info on blueberries needs to get out there, so here goes…

Blueberries are pretty easy to grow, especially here in the Eastern US, where the soils are naturally somewhat to very acidic. Depending on the variety, the bushes (and I’m discussing the more common highbush blueberry here) are anywhere from 2 to 7 feet tall. They are pretty, and turn a lovely color in the fall, so they work well as a hedge as well as a food crop. I suggest planting several varieties with different maturity dates, so that you have a longer harvest. You can plant pot-grown plants at any time during the growing season, but spring is best. You can get a head start on site preparation now. 

First, you’ll want a location that gets full sun, with well-drained soil that has a pH low enough for blueberries (between 4.8 and 5.5). If rhododendrons and azaleas grow well in your soil, you’ll probably be fine, but a soil test is always a good thing, courtesy of your local agricultural extension agency. If your pH is too high, talk to your extension agent about how to lower it, but you’ll need to delay your planting for about a year while you do that. Good drainage is also important.

Blueberries like a soil that is high in organic matter, so dig in plenty of compost, leaf mold or well-rotted manure. If you are not too impatient, I’d suggest tilling the area now and planting a cover crop of oats or something else that will grow quickly and winter-kill reliably in your area to add organic matter and get a head-start on weed control. You can also just throw down a few inches of fairly fresh horse manure right on top of the soil now and let it rot over winter. But don’t plant until spring if you do this. 

When you plant, dig a hole twice as big as the root ball, and plant a bit deeper than the plant grew in the nursery. Plant 6 to 8 feet apart. Don’t put fertilizer in the planting hole! Backfill with soil about halfway, then give it a good soaking to settle the soil around the roots. Finish by filling the rest of the hole, watering really well, and mulching. I use brown cardboard or newspaper under wood chip mulch. Wet the cardboard/newspaper before putting down the wood chips. The mulch is important, as blueberries are shallow-rooted and sensitive to drought. 

I find blueberries don’t need much fertilizer. I throw down some compost and a bit of bloodmeal or some Holly-tone in the spring before renewing the mulch. Newly planted berries should be fertilized about a month after planting. 

You won’t need to prune out anything except weak or broken canes for the first 4 or 5 years, then you’ll want to prune out the old canes (gray with peeling bark) and weak shoots. I’ll write more about pruning them in late winter, which is the best time to prune. 

Now, I still owe you that peach/blueberry cobbler recipe, and I promise I won’t forget!

Getting serious about food storage

Sharon Astyk has an excellent post today on the need to store at least 3 months of food. Read it here

She makes an very good case for stocking up NOW.

Water, water, here and there….

We are in the middle of a drought here in the Southeast. My friend Byron gave me a rain gauge a few weeks ago, and I’m loving it! I now know, for instance, that we accumulated a whole inch of rain over the past 3 days (for a change!), and I don’t have to water my garden this week. I’ve been guessing/intuiting or digging down in the dirt to check how much water is needed for so long, it’s fun to go out there and check quickly and accurately without leaving my front porch.  It’s also a great relief to get all the rain that is currently needed for the garden from the sky alone.

Gardens – vegetable gardens, at least – need at least an inch of rain per week to thrive. You can shave that a little with heavy mulch, but only a little. Most veggies are between 80% to 90% water – they just can’t do without it. Today I put a bit of fertilizer down today here and there just before the rain. When plants are flowering and beginning to form fruit is usually a good time to give them a bit of fertilizer as a side dressing (in other words, scratch it into the soil near the plant), and let the rain carry it to the roots. I am partial to Vegetables Alive from Gardens Alive.

 Soil crusts over when it is dry and little seedlings have a hard time breaking through. This is one of the reasons I’ve always found carrots to be somewhat daunting – I plant them too deep, or I don’t keep them watered enough (they are sensitive to soil crusting), or I don’t thin them enough. Since organic carrots are easy to find in supermarkets, I’ve only planted them occasionally and experimentally, but this year I’m working on growing my own  --  or at least a few of my own!

I just planted some last week, and put a layer of burlap over the bed to hold in some moisture. Of course, I need to watch carefully and remove it as soon as the little seedlings start popping their heads out of the ground. I also planted in rows instead of broadcasting, to make thinning easier, AND I planted on a waning moon, the best time to plant root crops. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Oh, and I had blueberry questions to answer…but I don’t have time now. Next post!

Quote of the day...

"The $1.2 billion the World Bank says will solve the food crisis in Africa is a $1.2 billion subsidy to the chemical industry," said Vandana Shiva, an Indian physics professor and environmental activist speaking at the forum in Modena.

"Countries are made dependent on chemical fertilizers when their prices have tripled in the last year due to rising oil prices," she said. "I say to governments: spend a quarter of that on organic farming and you've solved your problems."

Read the whole article here: 

I'll be back tomorrow with answers to some blueberry questions and my latest carrot experiment...

More evidence of our communal insanity...

There are options. We do not need all these pesticides to grow food. Continuing to foul our nest like this is insane!

Home-grown veg ruined by toxic fertiliser

And, of course, if the manure is contaminated, it's likely the animals are too. And anyone who eats food grown or raised on that farm.

Raspberries!

I’ve been away for a few days, and when I wandered out this morning to pick some raspberries for breakfast, I was able to pick several pints. What I didn’t eat went in the freezer.

Rasps are easy to grow, but be sure to buy certified virus-free stock. Plant them in full sun (though they’ll still bear if they get some shade). I prefer to plant where I can mow around them, as they spread quickly. If you do some research, you can find lots of ways to fuss with spacing, pruning, fertilizing, etc., but I prefer to keep it simple. I put them in well-drained soil with plenty of organic matter, make sure they get at least an inch or so of water a week during the growing season, and throw down couple of inches of compost or well-rotted manure in the spring. I mulch when I plant them, but after the first year or so, they are growing so thickly they don’t need the mulch.You are supposed to prune out the old canes but I never bother and always get a good crop.  That’s about it. 

Most rasps bear in the spring/early summer. Some are fall-bearing. The spring/summer ones fruit on canes that are in their second year. The fall ones fruit on canes that have sprouted that year. Some do both, giving a small fall crop on first year canes and then a main crop on the same canes in the spring. The fall-bearing ones can be mowed down each year, since they fruit on the current year’s canes. 

You know the berries are ripe when they slip easily from their core. Also, be aware that wineberries, a wild type of raspberry, are quite invasive. They grow wild in much of the eastern U.S. in the same ecological niche as blackberries. They don't really taste like cultivated raspberries, but are quite edible. They just don’t have the same great flavor.

Blueberries and Changing Times

I have 6 blueberry bushes that I planted about 6 years ago, 2 I planted about 2 years ago, and 2 I planted this year. The 6 are amazingly productive – I just picked 2 pints off of one plant before it got dark, and they are just getting started. The others are coming in, too – I’ll need to do some serious picking and freezing soon.

Blueberries freeze well and easily. Just pick, put in a freezer container, label and freeze. (Always, always, always label the container with contents and date before you put anything in the freezer. Really. You’ll thank me later.) Sometime this winter I’ll publish my recipe for peach/blueberry cobbler made with frozen peaches and blueberries.

I’m going to be pretty busy for the next few days. I’m participating in a 2 year program with Malidoma Some on African Indigenous Spiritual Technologies, and our next meeting is this week. So I’ll leave you with a few articles to read between now and my next update:

Turning Your Lawn into a Victory Garden Won't Save You -- Fighting the Corporations Will
Which does not, of course, mean you should not plant a victory garden, It means you should become aware of the corporatocracy that is masquerading as our increasingly fascist government.

How a Shady Citigroup Subsidiary Secretly Makes Billions in the Oil Market
In case you were wondering if I’m being paranoid about corporate greed and control..

The Pesticide of Last Resort
Will someone please explain to me why a lawn is worth poisoning our children?

The Real Story Behind the Midwest Floods? Climate Change
Oh, those uncomfortable facts!

Farmers dealing with huge crop loss, erosion
Yep, food prices are going up! And you might consider sending prayers, magic, and/or kind thoughts for the folks who need it in the Midwest. Here’s an article on how you can help

How You Can Help The Midwest Flood Victims

Scientists warn of lack of vital phosphorus as biofuels raise demand
And let's not forget Peak Phosphorus

There is much here to consider, and denial gets us nowhere. Think about it – how are YOU going to cope with these changing times?

Planning The Winter Garden

The next step in starting a garden is planning. And the first step in planning is deciding what you like to eat! June is the perfect time to start planning for a winter garden, so get out your seed catalogs. Don’t have seed catalogs? Here are my two favorites – go to the the links below and sign up to get a catalog.

• Johnny’s Seeds
• Territorial Seeds ( Territorial’s Winter catalog is very helpful, because it has detailed culture instructions for winter crops.)

Now to the list: As you go through the catalog, make a list of the things you want to grow for winter, or to plant in fall for early spring. My list always includes: 

• Garlic (in most areas, plant in fall for early harvest next year)
• Spinach (make succession plantings through the late summer and fall, for harvest in fall and next spring)
• Lettuce
• Arugula
• Broccoli
• Kale
• Carrots
• Onions (fall for next year’s harvest)

 This year, I may try some Kohlrabi and Chinese Cabbage as well. I’ve not yet found the perfect cold frame (though I am looking at the Juwel), but first I’m going to see if some friends of mine can build me something like the plans in Eliot Coleman’s book Four Season Harvest from recycled materials. 

So, let me know, what’s on your list of things you want to grow for the fall? Do you have a cold frame? Have you tried winter gardening before? Leave a comment below, and if you have any questions, I’ll do my best to answer them. 

More about planning soon….

A Brand New Garden Bed

Last evening my neighbor came over to help me move the chicken tractors, as he has kindly agreed to do weekly. It takes about a week for the chickens to kill or eat all of the greenery in an area, and then they get moved to greener pastures, and I have the beginnings of a garden bed.

I garden in beds, not rows (and someday I’ll tell you all my reasons). Today, I’ll put down a kill mulch (keep reading, I’ll explain) on the place the chickens were last week, and use that space as a new garden bed next spring – or maybe even this fall -- without having to work too hard to get it in shape for planting.

 You don’t need chickens to do this, though. Here’s what to do: Mark out the place you have chosen for a bed. The width should be no more than twice your reach, and you should be able to access the bed from both sides. You can make it as long as you wish, but you also don’t want to step on the bed, so either make it narrow enough to step across, or leave a break for a path at regular intervals.

Now mow the area closely. Save the clippings, and any other grass clippings you have, or get some straw (use hay only if you enjoy weeding). You’ll also need some plain brown cardboard from shipping boxes, or plenty of old newspapers.

 If you have results from your soil test, you’ll know whether or not you need to adjust the pH of your soil with lime (to raise it) or sulfur (to lower it). Proper pH is key to nutrient availability for plants, and you’ll want to make sure you follow the recommendations from your soil test. (Don’t fertilize yet, though. We need to talk about organic methods of fertilizing, which I’ll do in another post). 

Lime or sulfur will eventually have to be dug in, but it will help to put it down under the mulch now – you can dig it in later. So sprinkle the sulfur or limestone. Be sure you are using finely ground limestone, NOT quicklime, slaked, hydrated or pickling lime. These substances are caustic. Dolomitic limestone is fine – it contains magnesium.

I also recommend putting down some Azomite, or another, similar product to help remineralize the soil. Throw down some compost or manure. If you don’t have a local source, buy a bag of composted cow manure at the garden center, or dig a couple of small holes and bury some kitchen scraps. This will help attract earthworms, which are going to do a lot of your work for you. Now water the area well, and cover it completely with newspaper (wet if first to keep it from blowing away) or cardboard. Then cover the paper/cardboard with grass clippings or straw.

 That’s it! Now you just have to wait for the earthworms and soil microbes to begin to incorporate all that good stuff into the soil while opening up little channels for air and water. The root systems of any plants that were on the area will decay, so when we do get around to digging, it will be a lot easier!

 Happy Summer Solstice!