Growing Plants is Like Raising Kids

It occured to me the other day that growing plants is like raising kids - sort of. You plant the seeds, watch them emerge, water and feed them, protect them from the cold, talk sweetly to them, ohh and ahh when the grow or produce a flower, take care of them when they get sick (aphids!) and mourn when they die or are just done for the season.
That's what I have been doing this past month. It seemed like the garden went through so many changes with all the rain we got and then warm days. I have eaten all of the broccoli already and the cauliflower matured all at once so I gave some away. Now I am looking at the openings in the garden and planning what to plant for the warmer months.  So far I have planted eggplant, tomatoes, more herbs, basil, dill, parsley, red onions, edamame and of course marigolds!

If you are just getting your veggie garden in - don't worry. There are still things to plant and eat before it gets really warm here in AZ.  Some of you may have gardens still covered in snow, so you may be starting the seeds indooors in a sunny wondow.  I love to recycle materials for that like toilet paper and paper towel rolls for the tiny 'pots' and the clear plastic carry out containers as mini green houses.

The wildflowers are are blooming at my house too! The wild areas of the desert should be beautiful this year. Where is your favorite place to see wildflowers in the wild?  I will also be getting out to one of my favorite places here in the Valley of the Sun - The Desert Botanical Gardens.  They have a fabulous wild flower trail!  What are you doing to get ready for the next growing season in your neck of the woods?

I am dressed to get out and mow the grass again, top dress the garden beds with Soil Secrets to feed the soil micro organisms before we get another winter rain this weekend.

What are your gardening plans for the weekend?

Happy Digging,
The Garden Goddess
http://www.down2earthgardens.com/

Rain in the Desert - Finally!

Rain in the Desert - Finally!

The last time it rained at my home was August 13, 2009 and I got 1/2 an inch of rain. I remember well because I lost almost all the rain from my barrels - you can read all about it at Mourning the Loss of the Baby Rain Drops.

This time I was partially prepared for rain, at least I had the faucets closed! It rained for most of the day on Saturday, September 3, 2009, three weeks and 3 days after the last rain. I checked my rain gauge when I got home on Monday and there was .4 of an inch and two full rain barrels. They looked like they over flowed, but unfortunately I did not have the overflow diversion tubing hooked up!

I wasn't even home to witness this glorious event. I was out of town for the Labor Day weekend in Sedona hiking and visiting a friend. It rained about 30 minutes after I finished my morning hike and put a damper on my hot tub time to ward off sore muscles. Then it continued to rain all day long in Sedona so I at least got to spend a rainy day reveling in the coolness and wonderful smells of pine and creosote.

Even though I didn't have a chance to plant the rain where I wanted to with the overflow diversion, I am still happy it rained. The grass seemed to have grown an inch over the weekend so I know the plants were very happy for the rain.

And I am too - now if it would just rain again SOON! But not before I install the Barrel conversion kit for the third barrel!

Happy Rain Harvesting,

The Garden Goddess

Down 2 Earth Gardens, LLC

Mourning the Loss of Baby Rain Drops

Well it FINALLY rained at my house in Phoenix, AZ last night - and into the morning. We had a real honest-to-goodness thunderstorm. By the looks of the yard it was pretty windy, too.

I was very excited to see how much rain I got and how much I collected in my 55 gallon rain barrels. I have three barrels and although it is only 165 gallons of water - I reuse that water over the span of a few weeks to water some of my gardens. Rain water is SO much better for the plants than city water. It has less chemicals, especially salt and chlorine, in it.

I stumbled out of bed and directly into my sandals and headed outside about 6 AM. It felt cool and certainly smelled like the desert. Although I live in an urban neighborhood, I have a creosote bush in my back yard that smells heavenly when it rains.

I immediately looked into my barrels. I could hear the water trickling down the gutter and into the barrel. I went to the closest one and was surprised to see so little water in it. Scratching my head I looked down and saw water trickling out the tap (spigot) near the bottom. I had forgotten to close it the last time I drained it! So I turn the handle closed and went to the next barrel. Same thing! Darn! I wondered how much I actually lost.

Then I remembered, I still have one barrel I have not tapped yet! I went around the side of the house and checked it knowing it would have water in it and I found it half full! Woo Hoo! Now it is heavy with water. I will be leaning into it to dunk the watering can to get the water out. After it is empty I better get busy and install my new Barrel Conversion Kit.

Next I checked the rain gauge in my garden and it measured 1/2 an inch of rain - that is a lot of rain for a storm in Phoenix!

As I sat on the back porch sipping my morning tea and watching the cats play in the wet grass, I reflected in my loss of all those baby rain drops. Frustrating? Yes! but I was very happy overall that we got such a nice rain for the first time this summer!

Happy Sloshing!

The Garden Goddess

www.down2earthgardens.com

Three Sisters Garden – Monsoon Planting

Sustainers of Life

In a Three Sisters planting, the three partners benefit one another. Corn provides support for beans. Beans, like other legumes, have bacteria living on their roots that help them absorb nitrogen from the air and convert it to a form that plants can use. (Corn, which requires a lot of nitrogen to grow, benefits most.) The large, prickly squash leaves shade the soil, preventing weed growth, and deter animal pests. The Three Sisters also complement each other nutritionally.

To the Iroquois people, corn, beans, and squash are the Three Sisters, the physical and spiritual sustainers of life. The three vegetables composed the main food supply of the Iroquois. These life-supporting plants were given to the people when all three miraculously sprouted from the body of Sky Woman's daughter, granting the gift of agriculture to the Iroquois.

The Iroquois agricultural system was based on the hill-planting method. The women, who were responsible for farming, placed several kernels of corn in a hole. As the small seedlings began to grow, the farmers returned periodically to mound the soil around the young plants, ultimately creating a hill one foot high and two feet wide. The hills were arranged in rows about one step apart.

Iroquois women mixed their crops, using a system called "interplanting." Two or three weeks after the corn was planted, the women returned to plant bean seeds in the same hills. The beans contributed nitrogen to the soil, and the cornstalks served as bean poles. Between the rows, the farmers cultivated a low-growing crop such as squash or pumpkins, the leaves of which shaded the ground, preserving moisture and inhibiting weed growth.

The Arizona version!

Three Sisters Gardens Should be Ready by Monsoon Rains

By early July, your Three Sisters Garden pits should be dug and filled with good compost, seeds should be in the ground waiting for the rains, and you should have straw ready to cover the soil once the seeds have sprouted. Consider planting other traditional crops, such as sunflowers or jerusalem artichokes (a tuberous perennial sunflower), around at the edge of the three sisters garden. Put them on the west side so they will shade your other plants during the heat of the late afternoon.

1. Plan and select a site. You'll want to plant your Three Sisters garden in a site that has direct sunshine for most of the day and access to water. Some afternoon shade is OK as the sun is so strong late in the day. Also having a water source nearby will make it easier to supplement the monsoon rains.

2. Prepare the soil. First, break up and rake the soil. Next, build a mound about 12 inches high and between 18 inches and 3 feet in diameter. Flatten the top of the mound and make a shallow depression to keep water from running off. The number of mounds you create depends on the size of your growing area. Mounds should be 3 to 4 feet apart in all directions.

3. Plant seeds. Soak four to seven corn seeds overnight and then plant them about 6 inches apart in the center of each mound. (You'll eventually thin to three or four seedlings.) Many Native people honor the tradition of giving thanks to the "Four Directions" by orienting the corn seeds to the north, south, east, and west. Also soak and then plant six pole bean seeds in a circle about 6 inches away from the corn. (You'll eventually thin to three or four bean seedlings.) At about the same time, plant four squash or pumpkin seeds next to the mound, about a foot away from the beans, eventually thinning to one. If you are planting a large area, you can also sow the squash in separate mounds (1 foot in diameter) between every few corn and bean mounds.

4. Maintaining your traditional garden. As corn plants grow, thin them out, weed gently around them and mound soil around the base of each stem for support. When the corn is knee-high and again when silks appear on the husks, "side-dress" by putting a high nitrogen fertilizer (such as aged manure or fish emulsion) on the soil surface near each plant. If beans aren't winding their way around the corn, help by moving tendrils to the stalks. (Keen observers may notice a pattern in the direction in which the bean vines wind.)

This concept of interplanting these seeds is known as companion planting. This is the concept behind the Three Sisters: put corns and beans and squash together and they help each other. Getting the right nutrients in the soil is essential to the success of any garden. These days we mostly rely on fertilizers to provide the right ‘food’ for plants.

But through companion planting, you can provide proper nutrients from one plant to another through the soil they share. In the three sisters, the beans, part of the legume family, take in unusable nitrogen from the air and produce excess, usable nitrogen to the soil for the corn and squash. But while beans are useful in many companion planting combinations, they are not good to plant around onions or garlic, which do not like the extra nitrogen. By using compost you are also adding nutrients and microorganisms to the soil which will act as a natural fertilizer as well.

So as you plant your own Monsoon Garden, think about our ancesters who planted in this method naturally. Consider that they were already 'green' and 'eco-friendly'. Today, we can learn a lot by following the simpler ways of our ancestors and the earth will benefit from it.

Happy Digging,
Doreen, The Garden Goddess
http://www.down2earthgardens.com/

Monsoons on the Way

I am sure my plants are enjoying the humidity along with the clouds more than I am. Well, the clouds are OK, but it is no longer a 'dry heat' in Phoenix. I know, I shouldn't be complaining with the high heat and humidity in Chicago (sorry Sis!) but I moved here for the dry heat. We went from Spring to Monsoon summer in less than a week.

Ok enough of the weather report. Let's talk garden. My vegetable plants are doing just OK this year. I bought and planted several heirloom s for the firdst time and I am just not that impressed with them. My chocolate pepper plant died after one puny pepper. One of the tomato plants is still pretty small - got a few cherry tomatoes off of it. But they were 'earth brown' and it was hard to tell when they were ripe. And when they said mini peppers boy they weren't kidding. They were smaller than a cherry tomato! Kind of hard to do much with them but nibble them off the stem!

But those Armenian cucumbers - another story. The latest is 18 inches long. They are hiding under all the vines and I didn't catch them until they are gigantic! Good thing they still keep their flavor. Now the vines are taking over the rest of the garden. YUMMM I can eat them fresh from the garden every day!!

Since this is the first summer in my new garden, I didn't plant a lot of veggies. I just didn't know how it would do - but I did plant lots of flowers and they are doing great. The sunflowers are popping up everywhere and attracting the finches and bees. In fact I have 4 plants standing sentry at the entrance to the garden from the street side.

The zinnia's make great cutting flowers for little bud vases. I keep one on my desk every day. See the garden gnome? He's almost invisible. I also planted a few seedballs made with corn, bush beans and I thought squash. The corn is about 10 inches tall, the beans not far behind, but no sign of the squash. That's called a Three Sisters Garden. The Native American's planted them together at the start of the monsoons and let the summer rains grow the crops. I'll post more about that next week.

It's fun to experiment in the garden and see what works and what doesn't. Now keeping track of all the results - a whole other blog post for sure!

Until then,

Happy Digging, The Garden Goddess

http://www.down2earthgardens.com/