Four Weeks to a New Garden - Week One

Vegetable gardening is all the rage – but not in a trendy sense. It has become a must-have for many people who are concerned with food security and safety. Today’s vegetables are often harvested before they are ripened and shipped across the country, even the world, ripening along the way. In fact many fruits and vegetables come from seed that have been genetically modified. The seeds have been altered to produce fruit or vegetables that will withstand the early harvesting and transportation.

Today people are growing their own so they know how the food has been nurtured. Starting a garden might seem like a daunting task, but tackling the work over several weekends makes the work load lighter.

September marks the beginning of the fall/winter planting season here in Phoenix. Not sure what to plant? Download a free Phoenix Planting Calendar at the Phoenix Permaculture Guilds website.

I’ll be sharing a week-by-week plan each Friday that even novice gardeners can follow to get their gardens ready to plant between now and the end of August, just in time for getting those seeds into the ground.

Week one:

Determine what you want to grow. Vegetables, flowers, or both? There are many vegetables that do well in our fall/winter/spring planting season. Beets, broccoli, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, cucumbers, all lettuces, peas, radishes and spinach can all be started by seed. Flowers can be started by seed or from transplants available at nurseries. Some of my favorites are carnation, hollyhock, nasturtium, pansy, petunia, snapdragon, sweet pea, verbena and viola.

• What kind of garden do you want. Raised beds, pots, or in-ground? Square, rectangular, spiral, key hole (u-shaped)? Each one has it's pros and cons. The available space will usually determine the shape. A spiral is good for small spaces since there is more vertical planting surface. Whatever you choose for an in-ground or above groung bed, make sure you can reach all area of the bedding area without walking on any of the soil. There are many possibilities.



• For hard ground, raised beds may be an easier option. Check out an easy way to get more garden in small spaces above ground with a concept called Square Foot Gardening.



• If you rent or live in an apartment with a sunny balcony, pots can be moved with you so consider a container garden.



• Make sure that the chosen spot has a convenient source of water and that your plants will get the light they need. Vegetables need lots of sunlight, at least six hours a day. A flower garden may need full or partial sun, or shade.




• If part of your yard is crushed granite or dirt, you may want to plant a wildflower garden to add color to an otherwise drab area. Wildflowers do well in full sun.



• Consider the full size of the plants you will grow and the amount of space they need. make the bed large enough so don’t overcrowd them when planting. Check out my blog post on August 6, 2009 for a cool garden design planning tool.



• Mark the borders of your garden using natural items like river rock, bricks, or trendy Urbanite (broken up concrete sidewalks) .


• Break ground if you like, turn the earth over, pulling out the weeds and grass and then take a break until next weekend rolls around.

If you are overwhelmed and need someone to guide you don’t forget to consult a Garden Coach like me!

Remember next Friday will be Week Two where I cover amending or building up the soil!

Happy Digging,

Doreen Pollack aka the Garden Goddess

Garden Planning - Design Tools

August – the dog days of summer. Yes, especially here in Phoenix, AZ. We just had the hottest and driest July on record (since late 1880’s!) and does my garden ever look like it! My water bill is up and at least my plants are alive but not much production from them.

That led me to start researching ways to increase the amount of food I get from my garden (also known as yield). Every gardener has a different way to do it and it differs from coast to coast. One thing I know for sure is I still have more research to do before I decide what I will do in my garden this fall.

I came across a cool software program that helps me determine how many of each plant I can fit in the garden bed. It has just about every vegetable, herb, tree (flowers, too) and the mature plant size. It also has botanical information on the plants.

All I do to start is put in the garden bed measurements and then drag and drop the plants, easily rearranging them until I get them just the way I want them. I can save the plan, start another one and play with it on the computer until I get one I like. Just think about how much time and effort this will save me when I go to plant them!

Here, you can check it out and play with it yourself for 30 days for free and then it is only $25 a year! Click on this link. GrowVeg.com

In Arizona we can plant 2- 3 time a year so this will pay for itself in no time. No more moving plants around and damaging the roots or break the delicate stems of the transplants. And if you are planting seeds and you crowd the plants or find out you put plants next to each other that shouldn’t be, you have to wait a few months until they get big enough to move. Why waste all that time when you can thoughtfully plan it on paper?

Try it and tell me how you like it

OK back to the drawing board – or computer screen that is!

Happy Digging,

Doreen aka The Garden Goddess
www.down2earthgardens.com

Eating from the Garden - Red Amaranth

Amaranth – a new edible for me!

Last summer I got some Red Amaranth seeds from a friend. I just thought it would be fun to grow something I never had before. I grew them – they are such a deep red color and really tall– almost to my hip. The flower looks like a bunch of seeds, not petals like most flowers and that is what actually dries into the seeds. I collected the seeds and stored them.

This spring I came across those seeds and threw them (literally) into the garden bed. I just watered as usual and watched them mature.

Well I found out on Sunday from a few of my Master Gardener friends that the leaves are edible! They can be used like lettuce in a salad, in a frittata or stir fried with other veggies. They have a strong taste like a micro-green.

The seeds are also very nutritious. There’s a great article on how to grow, harvester and cook with Amaranth from Seeds of Change http://www.phoenixpermaculture.org/forum/topics/harvesting-amaranth-seeds

But here’s what the article says about the nutritional value: “Nutritionally, amaranth is a very valuable food–higher in protein than the major cereal crops (13 to 18 percent as compared to 10 percent in corn and wheat) with a high level of the amino acid lysine, an essential amino acid that is usually deficient in plant protein. Amaranth is also a good source of calcium, iron, potassium, zinc, vitamin E, and B vitamins.”

I am excited to have another plant in my garden I can eat. I am going to start experimenting with everything in my garden. So many things that we consider ornamental or a flower are edible. I love foraging in my garden for food for my dinner. It is always an interesting mix of what is available.

What do you eat from your garden that is unusual?

Happy Digging,

Doreen aka The Garden Goddess
www.down2earthgardens.com

Do NOT Pull Out Those Tomato Plants

If you are like me you do not like to see half dead plants in the garden - nor water something that is not producing. I always give a plant several chances before I take it out of the garden.

Here in Phoenix, AZ we have had 18 days of temps OVER 110 degrees so far this summer and we have another heat advisory this week. The tomato plants have stopped setting flowers at around 95 degrees which was back on June. Any tomaotes on the vine are ripening almost over night. I like to leave them on the vine as long as possible, but lately they have over ripened and become bird and ant food!

Luckily, I came across a reply to a question about tomato plants on the Maricopa County Master Gardeners listserve this weekend. I wanted to share it with you so you could experiment and perhaps get a second crop this fall. I have not used or researched any of the products he recommends, so please do your own due diligence to be sure you are using a product in your garden you are comfortable using!

Here's the post:


YES... you CAN grow a respectable crop before winter!!!
If the tomato plants are "shaggy", give them a bit of a haircut.
Pick up some fertilizer; 10-24-8. Those "Jobe tomato fertilizer" stakes work okay.
Also, pick up some "Blossom Set" and begin spraying the plants (especially new growth) by mid August. When practical, examine your plants daily -- early in the morning -- watching for new flowers. Spray them so your plant will feel "sexy" and set fruit. :-)
Depending upon where you reside, you have until mid November in Tucson or Phoenix.
After mid November it's a crapshoot. Should we experience an early winter cold snap, harvest your prettiest specimens (with as much tomato stem and branch as
possible)and allow them to finish ripening indoors on the sill or near the window.
If you are growing "heirlooms", they will ripen more nicely and more flavorful indoors than "hybrid" tomatoes. For the remaining not-too-pretty tomatoes, cover with a frost cloth or an old, dark colored sheet... and remember to thoroughly water the plants the night BEFORE an expected frost. (Bill, keep in mind that tomatoes often suffer severe damage at temperatures of 36 degrees. At 32 they look pathetic.)

For anyone else interested in growing a late crop, check Lowe's, Home Depot, etc., for "Stupice" or "Yellow Pear" plants. Both are heirlooms, grow rapidly, and if an unexpected cold snap is forecast -- they will still taste better ripened indoors than anything you can purchase at the grocer's!

Genie -- Tomato lover in Tucson

I hope you find this useful - I am going to give this a try - I would love some more fresh homegrown tomatoes this fall!

Happy Digging, Doreen aka the Garden Goddess
www.down2earthgardens.com