Gardening tips

The following gardening tips address the growing conditions in our specific area.

Sun

As you may have noticed, we live in the desert. This means that your garden will have to be watered constantly. In the summer, you’ll have to water every day to keep plants healthy. Some gardeners even choose to water twice a day during the dry heat of July and August. In the winter when it’s gloomy, and maybe even a little wet, you can probably get away with watering every other day.

Plants should be monitored year round for signs of stress caused by under watering – dry or brown leaves, and wilting are the most obvious signs.

Soil - what comes out, must go in

The natural soil quality in the PV garden is poor (again we live in a desert). And some plots haven’t been amended by previous gardeners. This means that you’ll probably have to provide soil amendments before you can expect much production.

There are several good ways to improve your soil initially. Simply spreading compost and top soil (especially Amend, a top soil with gypsum intended to help break down clay soil) over your plot is the simplest method. Mixing compost and topsoil into the current soil takes slight more work – the clay isn’t soft – but will allow plants to root deeper and start breaking apart the clay for you. The hardest, and most successful, method is soil replacement. You may want to build a box filled with good soil. Or simply dig out your clay and replace it with something better. (It should be noted that soil should not be disposed of in the garbage, please contact garden leadership to learn about proper methods of soil disposal.)

Soil amendment, however, isn’t something you can do once and be done with. Every time you grow vegetables and remove them, you are removing essential nutrients from your soil. What comes out must go back in, or else soil quality will swiftly drop. Along these lines, you should be adding nutrients back into your garden every year.

Green composting

One way to do this is to simply reincorporate green waste you’ve grown (or collected elsewhere) into your plot. Layer plant cuttings down and allow them to decompose, or bury green matter (and perhaps worms) so that it can break down under the ground and out of sight.

Purchased compost

The garden will buy a yearly supply of compost to be used liberally by all gardeners. This compost will be manure based. Gardeners should be careful not to ‘burn’ plants as the manure initially breaks down. Buy more as you like.

Worm composting

You may want to start a worm composter on your stoop. This is simply a container where you throw food waste and allow worms to eat it. The ‘castings’ are excellent for soil. Worms can be purchased at the Irvine farmer’s market, or obtained from club officers.

The garden’s compost

Many members bring veggie waste down and put it in the compost bins by the shed. Please feel free to do so, but abide by the posted rules. (No trash, or non-vegetable waste.)

Egg shells and coffee

These two household items are excellent for soil quality. Spread your coffee grounds and crushed eggshells everywhere (and especially on your tomatoes). Starbucks and other coffee shops are often happy to provide lots of coffee grounds for those who don’t drink the stuff.

Organic fertilizers

Organic fertilizers are available for purchase in many gardening stores. These are a good way to add nutrients to your soil during the growing season.

Crop rotation

Be sure to rotate crops regularly to allow the soil time to recover from the particular needs of a certain crop. This is especially important considering the year round planting cycle. Co-planting (see below) can help mitigate this problem.

Pests

There are a number of pests that will undoubtedly torment you. Below are a list of some of the common ones, and some methods for defending your plants.

The terror from below

Are they groundhogs? Gophers? Ground squirrels? We can’t decide, but these burrowing rodents can decimate a garden in no time, and are very common here. The best solution is to lay down some sort of wire mesh (with very small holes – no chicken wire) under your plot. Mesh can most easily be attached under boxes, but some gardeners have also successfully placed a layer of it under the entire area of their garden. You can also purchase a sonic rodent deterer. Their effect is debatable, but these battery-powered devices are purported to drive away rodents.

The terror from above

Mice, rats, rabbits, and squirrels, the little sneaks, will eat your beets and carrots, and chew up your tomatoes and cantaloupe. Peppermint, oregano, and marigolds are supposedly good surface rodent repellants. Try planting a perimeter. There are also motion-sensing sonic devices meant to drive away above ground pests. And most importantly, keep your fence in good shape. One baby rabbit can destroy an entire planting of pretty much anything in one feast. Some take the extra step of putting cages over vulnerable plants to protect them.

Aphids

Any gardener’s terror, the aphid multiplies like mad and can decimate the new, growing bits of most plants. Luckily, we have local ladybugs to help with the problem. Otherwise, do a daily smushing while they persist. The ‘juice’ of the smushed ones will act as a repellant for other aphids.

Cabbage moths and other caterpillars

Be vigilant for chew holes on cabbage relatives (and everything else). Search for caterpillars under leaves and hidden in the center of cabbages. Remove them.

Crows

These crafty birds probably won’t do too much harm, but may want to peck around and explore your curious new garden. We’ve put up scarecrows which, uh, maybe do something.

Molds, fungi, etc.

There are a few common local infections. And once one garden gets it, they all do. Watch out especially for ‘powdery mildew’, it will grow on your squash leaves and look like white powdery spots that keep expanding. Tomatoes are also very susceptible to fungi – which may do things like wilt them, spot them, brown them, and make the fruit rotten and squishy looking.

There are several solutions we recommend. Firstly, mix cornmeal into your soil to prevent fungal infections. It can also be sprinkled and sprayed directly onto plants.

For powdery mildew, try spraying with a half milk-half water solution directly onto affected and unaffected leaves.

Also, be sure not to water onto squash or tomato leaves, water at the base of the stem to keep fungal infections at a minimum. Watering at night is a bad idea too, the plants remain moist for too long and can get moldy or fungus-y.

Planting cycles

There is a year round growing season here, which will be unusual for many gardeners. This means you’ll do at least two plantings a year – spring and fall. It also offers opportunities to stagger and space out plantings so that you can harvest one crop for a few months etc.

Play with planting times until you develop a good system, though pay attention to which vegetables are usually thought of as summer, and which are thought of as winter, here. You may be surprised to learn that the summer is actually too hot and dry for many vegetables to thrive (onions, lettuces, and cabbage relatives do better in the winter). If you crave summer lettuce, you can still try it out, it’ll probably go, but watermelon, for example, won’t grow in January.

The veggies

You can probably grow and harvest more or less anything you want to here, but there are some plants that work particularly well.

Tomatoes are indigenous, so grow excellently in this climate. Strawberries and squashes, likewise, do very well. Other good garden crops include - peas, pole beans, bush beans, cauliflower, broccoli, cabbage, Brussel sprouts, kale, corn, peppers, onions, shallots, radish, turnip, beet, carrot, okra, raspberries, lettuces, melons of all sorts, and herbs of every shape and color.

Look online and research ideal planting times for your veggies. You can also find out what sort of soil they like and how much water they need.

Co-planting

There are many co-planting combinations that will boost growth and production. For example, basil, tomato, and peppers grow well together, and basil improves the taste of the tomatoes. The three sisters – corn, beans, and squash – are ideal planting partners. Some plants, strawberries and onion for example, will actually inhibit or detract from the taste of the other. Go online and look for lists of good co-plants before mapping out your garden.

Indoor sprouting

Although the cold doesn’t force us to sprout indoors, it can be a good idea nonetheless. Indoor sprouts may get a head start before exposure to sun, insects, etc. You can easily buy seed starters at any garden store (or Lowes). Or fill half eggshells with soil or peat moss and use them to start seeds, crack the shell before you plant, and it will nourish the plant as it grows.

One note of warning, indoor seeds without enough sun and/or wind disturbance can get leggy and die. Be sure to provide sun, and to blow on or run your hand over germinants each day.

Starter pellets

These excellent little fellows can be purchased at garden stores. They are good for indoor sprouting, or to place directly into the ground. The nutrients will give your seed an extra boost, and it won’t get washed away either.

Weeds

One year of seeding, seven years of weeding. It is important that garden members act as a community to keep weed growth to a minimum. This is especially key with blowing seeds that end up in everyone else’s plots. If you’re too busy to yank them up, then just chop the stems to at least prevent seeding.

Mint

Keep in mind while planting mint (and mint relatives) that these guys are almost impossible to remove once planted and they spread like wildfire. If you’d like to plant them, make sure you’re ready to control them.

Further resources

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