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Gardening tips: The Helpful Gardener promotes sustainable gardening that
is safe for the local environment. Read all of our articles about Organic
Gardening and start improving your garden today!
Organic Vegetable Gardening
Creating a successful organic vegetable garden may take practice
and your practice may span over several seasons. Do not become discouraged!
Even one delicious homegrown tomato may make all of your work worthwhile.
Organic gardening is the oldest method of cultivation, it's good for your
family, and it's less expensive to do! You will find that organic vegetable
gardening may become the most rewarding hobby, or lifestyle, you have
ever undertaken.
Your personal organic vegetable garden may cover acres of land or merely
a few square feet. City dwellers can have successful roof-top or balcony
gardens in raised beds that are viable, fun and beautiful. Organic vegetable
gardening is not just for the leisure class or hippies!
How to start your organic veggie garden
The first step to ensuring a completely organic garden is finding organic
seeds or starts. Even if these are not available in your area, your dedication
to growing organic is admirable and worthwhile. Organic seeds may be purchased
by mail order. If using starts, you may have to give in and buy the non-organic
ones available in your local nursery, but ask around! Your backwoods or
backward little town may surprise you.
You will find that an organic vegetable garden is more sustainable in
many ways. By avoiding the use of pesticides and herbicides you will maintain
healthy soil for years of successful growing seasons. Because you have
not indiscriminately eliminated living things from your land, these creatures
will continue to thrive and to aid in your garden’s health.
Benefits of an organic vegetable garden
Homegrown organic vegetables are not just good for your yard, they are
good for you and your family. Would you feed your baby DDT? Would you
feed your family any pesticide or herbicide for that matter? Of course
not. The fact is that commercially grown non-organic produce is coated
in carcinogens and poisons that no human, especially a child, should ingest.
By growing your own organic produce you can be sure of exactly what is
going into your, and your family’s bodies.
An organic vegetable garden means a garden free of synthetic chemicals.
You will find, with minimal research, that all problems common to gardening:
diseases, pests, weeds and soil problems, can be fixed naturally. These
natural solutions are generally safer, cheaper, easier and on the whole,
more pleasant than their commercial counterparts.
Critters are good for gardens
You may want to pair your garden with some animals. Cows, sheep and goats
can provide natural crop weeding, pest control and fertilizer. If you
keep chickens, their guano makes an excellent addition to your compost
pile and they will eat the scraps that you do not put directly into the
compost pile itself. Furthermore, you can build movable pens and let your
chickens mow your lawn for you. If you have horses, or there are horses
nearby, look into composted manure as a cheap and effective fertilizer.
Organic gardening is economical!
While organic produce is sometimes more expensive in the grocery store,
this does not mean that organic vegetables are more expensive to grow.
You will find that organic gardening requires only naturally occurring,
local items which are cheaper and easier to acquire than synthetic chemicals.
Matching your vegetable species for maximum growth
In the years of single-crop commercial farming a lot of essential gardening
knowledge has been lost. Reading into Permaculture and natural gardening
may save you time and money with some long-forgotten tricks of the trade.
Try growing beans, squash or beans, potoatoes and corn together. Beans
can grow up the corn stalks instead of up purchased sticks or trellises
and the corn or potatoes will supress the growth of weeds. The corn plant
provides support for the beans and the beans acquire and fix nitrogen
from the atmosphere and feed the corn plants, eliminating the need to
purchase fertilizer!
The best time to grow organic beans is in the spring, once you are sure
that the last frost has hit (beans are highly sensitive to frigid weather
and frosts). Also, corn and tomatoes are best planted about the same time
as well. When it comes to organic squash sharing the same garden space
as the other plants, then plant them a couple weeks later. This will prevent
the leaves from shading out the new sprouts of its neighboring seedlings.
Organic soil
Your organic vegetable garden begins with the soil. You will find the
most effective nutrient-provider, pest-controller, and weed-combatant
is a well-cared for soil! When starting an organic vegetable garden, look
into beginning a compost heap and preparing your soil. If non-organic
crops have been growing there previously, it may take some time to work
the unwanted chemicals out of the soil.
Organic compost
Once you have read up on and prepared your organic compost, spread
it around your garden in a layer that is two to three inches thick. You
will find that this compost is nearly all of the fertilizer you need!
On top of enriching your soil, it will aid in creating the consistency
needed for good drainage and growth.
Starting seeds
If you are starting your garden from seed, you may want to start your
seeds indoors. Indoor seed starts have a higher success rate initially,
this is very important if you are working from seed you gathered yourself!
Plant seeds in an area with good lighting (grow light work really well)
and be sure not to over-water. Keep the soil at room temperature. Once
sprouts have grown two true leaves in addition to their cotyledons (sprouting
leaves), transfer them into larger, biodegradable containers and space
them two to three inches apart.
Organic gardening is not a fad or new in any way. Rather, organic
gardening is the oldest, cheapest and most practical means of growing
vegetables that exists. Organic vegetables are tastier, prettier
and healthier than their non-organic counterparts. Organic gardening benefits
not only you and your family, but your land, animals and the earth. And
you will find with fertile soil and healthy plants that insect herbivory
will actually decrease.
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