Garden planning and preparation

Redfield beauty, 2012, Jeremy Sandrik

I'd like to start this week's post by offering my sincerest gratitude to Mollie Ruth of Students for Environmental Sustainability of Michigan Tech, her friend Abe, and my housemate Ray for the help in raising the greenhouse walls on Saturday.  Mollie snapped a few photos, and I'd be happy to post them here in a later post if I may.  Further, many thanks to my good friend Blair Nelson, without whose framing nailer the greenhouse would most likely still be in pieces on my deck, my fingers would be battered and bruised, and my joints would be far sorer for all the hammer swinging.  Blair does some gorgeous remodeling work in the Keweenaw, and I'm constantly impressed with his vast array of pro tools.  Email me if you're looking to have some remodeling done, and I'd be happy to send Blair some work.

Some friends from over at Facebook have been requesting pictures of the greenhouse's progress (hi Leta), and they're forthcoming in the next post.  I'll ask, dear reader, that you bear with me as progress moves a bit ahead of my weekly-or-so posting here.

Last week, I talked a bit about peak oil, the value in repurposed materials, and detailed my planning process for the garbage greenhouse.  This week, I'd like to briefly look at an issue closely related to peak oil, that of food security, and move on to discuss the preparations I'm making for the backyard garden, including an approximate timeline for various jobs to be done before the seeds and seedlings go into the ground.  For the experienced green thumb, I invite you to share your successes and pro-tips in the comments.  If you're a gardening novice, a category in which I squarely find myself, maybe there's something to learn here.

The veggies at the grocer sure look secure to me

Our universe is both dynamic and interconnected, at both macrocosmic and microcosmic levels.  The global economy, with its complex webs of supply chains and resource flows, is no exception.  We've all witnessed what happens to the price of a gallon of milk when corn, which is unfortunately used as cattle feed in industrial agriculture, is diverted into the raw material for liquid transport fuel.  The age of cheap, abundant, highly concentrated energy for transportation is coming to an end.  As such, we would do well to rethink where everything we consume originates.  When oil tops $150 per barrel, good luck affording a Costa Rican banana at either the chain or local grocer in the Keweenaw.  Of course, even the market price of a banana shipped 45 degrees in latitude fails to account for the true cost in terms of pollution and carbon emissions generated in producing and shipping the banana, but I digress.

Beyond energy shortages, there are other reasons for individuals and communities to grow their food locally.  Every year, you don't have to look far for a food recall due to contamination of one sort or another.  In recent memory, spinach, peanut butter, ground turkey, mad cows, and eggs have been recalled.  Invariably, the culprit in such recalls is the centralized food production and distribution system, whereby a contaminant in one slaughterhouse or farm potentially impacts the food supply nationally and beyond.  In 1920, roughly 30 percent of Americans were farmers.  As of 2007, the USDA reports that number at less than 1 percent.  The centralization and industrialization of food production was, of course, aided by the petroleum boom of the post-war era.  Regardless, as a matter of safety and health, the current setup is a poor model for feeding a nation.

This discussion could go on to talk about the damage we're doing in this country to our soil with the prevalence of monoculture farms, application of petroleum based fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides, but I'll wrap it up with a final reason to grow your own food.  Frankly, it feels good.  Jeffrey Andreoni wrote the following for an Adbusters piece in April 2010.

The brain is also programmed to derive a deep sense of satisfaction and pleasure if physical effort produces something tangible, visible and necessary for survival . . . Apparently the key factor in the effort-driven-rewards scenario is the use of the hands. Our hands are so important that moving them activates larger areas of the brain’s cortex than moving much larger parts of our bodies, like our back or legs.

We're wired to feel good when we work with our hands on something that helps us live.  In addition to the material explanations for the warm fuzzies associated with gardening, I'm interested in the more spiritual relationship between myself and the planet that provides for my needs.  Not only do I receive the bounty of wholesome, healthy food as a reward for my hard work, I instill in myself a sense of kinship with and stewardship for the ground beneath my feet.  I know I've got to feed the soil good food in the form of decaying plant matter if I'm going to expect to continue to reap that yummy food.  I tie myself to the cycles of the world, and in so doing, can't help but be grateful for them.  In my book, grateful's not a bad way to live.

So, what's going in the garden this year?

2012 garden plan (each grid square represents 1 sq. ft.)

Without further ado, I'll get into what I plan to grow this year, and give a rough outline of the timing for all the plants.  First, let's have a look at the 2D plan (right) for the 13'x20' plot.  I'll note here that this plot has been tilled and had roots and rocks removed down to about 18 inches in past years.  I've been reading up a bit on no-till gardening, and would like to follow that method this year by adding compost and mulch to begin building up my soil for long-term soil health and decreased back-breaking labor.  However, currently there are a fair number of weeds, so I'll have to spade, rake, and pull weeds before planting this year.  Further, I only began saving compostables in earnest at the end of last summer, and don't have enough finished compost to begin to cover the area I've got.  However, I expect to have enough by the end of summer to cover the surface over winter.

You'll note that instead of simple rows of each variety of plants, I've got certain plants clustered together.  Companion planting has a number of benefits.  First, it helps maximize space versus planting in rows.  Basically, I can get more bang per square foot.  Second, plants like beans fix nitrogen in the soil that can be made available to other plants, like the dill and cilantro, that make use of it.  Third, some plants actually impart better flavor to companion plants around them.  Finally, some companions ward off insects, or in the case of basil, may attract pollinators like bees to pollinate nearby peppers and tomatoes.

I'll note here the software I used to layout the garden.  As with the greenhouse, I prefer to be able to make quick changes without erasing or scrapping paper plans.  Inkscape is an open source vector graphics package, similar to Adobe Illustrator or CorelDraw.  I'd originally downloaded it for designing t-shirts, as screen printers and distributors of plastisol transfers generally require vector graphic files, which can be resized up or down without loss of resolution, versus raster graphics like jpg, png, or gif.  For a simple garden plan, it's like using CAD to design a dog house, but I've grown accustomed to the interface.  As another example, this blog's header was designed in Inkscape.  Anywho, from the seed packets, I determined the minimum distance between plants, and made a circle with that radius for each plant.  It was simple to copy/paste to create multiple plants, and drag them around and plop them where I wanted them.

Now, a bit about my timetable for plants moving forward.  Some of this is already underway.  I'll proceed from here chronologically, then circle back to discuss special care I'm taking or plan to take with particular plants.  In planning, I'm assuming a last frost on about June 7 (maybe optimistic), and have planned backward from that date with recommendations from both the seed packets and The New Northern Gardener by Jennifer Bennett, available at Portage Lake District Library, or any library within the MELCAT network.

• Perennials already in the ground
• Lavender, oregano, chives, sage, and horseradish
• March 14
• Planted 4 seeds each:  chocolate beauty pepper, marconi red pepper, and jalapeno pepper in individual 6" pots (peppers do not like transplanting)
• Planted 8 seeds each:  large red cherry tomato, redfield beauty tomato, roma tomato in individual, reused 16 oz. plastic cups
• Planted 4 chocolate beauty pepper seeds in 2' pot, to be thinned to 2 plants and transferred to greenhouse
• Planted 2 marconi red pepper seeds in 1' pot, to be thinned to 1 plant and transferred to greenhouse
• Planted 3 chocolate beauty pepper seeds in 18" pot, to be thinned to 1 plant and transferred to greenhouse
• March 21
• Planted 15 yellow onion seeds in 1" starter trays
• April 1
• Planted ~40 spinach seeds in garden and 2' square pot outdoors, to be thinned to ~12 plants; possibly premature; spinach likes cold, but it may be too cold
• April 28
• Transplant onions to garden
• May 7
• Plant ~70 basil seeds indoors in sour cream tubs, small pots, starter trays, whatever containers are available
• Plant ~25 carrot seeds in garden
• May 21
• Plant ~18 lettuce seeds in garden, to be thinned to ~6 plants
• June 7
• Transplant to garden:  3 of each pepper, 4 redfield beauty tomatoes, 4 cherry tomatoes, 30 basil
• Plant seeds in garden:  pole beans, yellow summer squash, zucchini, pickling cucumbers, cilantro, dill

I'll note here that any plants started indoors to be transplanted to the garden (onions, tomatoes, peppers, basil) will be hardened off, starting about 7 days before transplanting.  Briefly, over the course of a week, the plants will be taken outside in their pots and placed in a sheltered spot, beginning with about 2-3 hours of sun.  I'll be careful to keep them out of strong wind and low night-time temperatures (>40°F for onions; >60°F for tomatoes, peppers, basil).  Over the week, they'll gradually be exposed to longer periods of sun and the elements (~2 hours more per day).

In addition to what's been accounted for in the garden, any remaining pepper and tomato plants will be transferred to the greenhouse as soon as the overnight temperature within remains above 60°F.  In addition to peppers and tomatoes, any and all available containers will be filled with basil, dill, cilantro, and parsley and grown in the greenhouse until I run out of space.

Lessons learned & special care

I've had that horseradish plant in a pot for about 2 years, then in the ground for another 2 before ever attempting to harvest it.  Then, last spring, we tilled the garden with a rototiller.  A funny thing happened then.  Smaller horseradish plants began popping up several feet from the large, central plant.  In reading Bennett's book over this winter, I discovered that any chopped up piece of horseradish root left in the soil will sprout a new plant.  In short, if you're not careful, horseradish will take over!  This spring as I was turning over dirt around the plant, I found myself digging 2 feet deep to remove every trace of horseradish root more than 2 feet from the center of the plant.  My gut tells me I'll be fighting it for years, now.  I plan to harvest every last bit of it this fall and never plant it anywhere near the main garden in the future.  It may find a home 1/4 mile away in the woods next year.

Also in Bennett's book, I learned that there's a difference between determinate and indeterminate tomato cultivars.  In a nutshell, determinate cultivars (Roma) are bushy, require little support, and no pruning.  Indeterminate cultivars (Redfield beauty and cherry) are viny, require a trellis or cage, and significant pruning.  Thus, all of the Redfield beauty and cherry tomatoes in the garden and greenhouse will be caged, and all of the Romas will go in the greenhouse in pots or upside-down planters, which may figure into a post of their own.

Further, I learned that I can keep my squash, zucchini, and cukes from sprawling all over the garden by training them to climb trellises.  To the east of my property lies a hunk of Houghton High School property, then beyond that the Tech Trails, which are full of downed limbs that could easily be lashed together to form trellises.  I plan to make a few pyramid trellises out of downed limbs, twine, and an old, disassembled, woven leather belt.  I'll detail that project in a later post.

Mini-greenhouses, 2012, Jeremy Sandrik

I want to give my peppers and tomatoes the most TLC, as they're very tender with regard to frost resistance, and need all the help they can get.  This week, I raided the recycling bins on Michigan Tech's campus and came home with a garbage bag full of 20 oz. plastic beverage bottles.  I've removed the labels, cut out the bottoms, rinsed the bottles, and created mini-greenhouses for the tomatoes and peppers already started.  Within days, the tomato plants grew so quickly that they outgrew their bottles.  Also, the tomatoes had all grown at least one set of true leaves, and were getting a bit leggy, so I transplanted them into cups identical to those in which I'd started their seeds, but buried their stems deeper up to about 1/4" below the seed leaves.  The stem will put out new roots up to the soil line.  Finally, when the peppers, tomatoes, and basil are planted in the garden, I'll give them a good start with some polyethylene row covers, another project I'll detail in a future post.

Roma before transplant, 2012, Jeremy Sandrik

Roma after transplant, 2012, Jeremy Sandrik

So, that's the plan for now.  I've got some desire to grow some potatoes in a barrel, but may not get to it this season.  All in all, it's going to be a busy season, right up to pickling and preserving, also to be detailed in future posts.

What about you?  What are your thoughts on food security?  Why do you grow your own food?  What are you planning to plant this year?  Even some fresh herbs in pots would be a great addition to your summertime meals.  Do you have any favorite garden fresh recipes?  Maybe you like planting a decorative flower garden.  Maybe you've got a spot in a community garden.  Tell me all about it in the comments!