Garden Chat

By Carmon Frick           Sprouts Greenhouse           

With all the crazy things going on in the world like E-coli in spinach, and questionable chemicals being used to grow standard grocery store produce, it’s becoming more important than ever to know where your food is coming from and what went into it or on it before it reached your table. What better way to do that than to grow your own!

If you are so lucky as to have “room to grow” there are a few things you can do to create a sustainable environment in your own garden and avoid the need for harmful chemicals. Crop rotation is just one of those tools. It allows you to avoid a build up of soil borne diseases, as well as the accumulation of pests or nutritional depletion of the soil.

Having some knowledge of some special properties possessed by some very common plants can allow you to use them creatively to your advantage.

Start by making a simple drawing of your plot divided into 4 equal parts as the first step in creating a 4-year rotation plan. Then jot down which vegetables will go in which plot this year, keeping the tips that follow in mind as you do it.

Vegetables in the onion family which include leeks & garlic emit chemicals that thwart certain parasites, that can bother cabbage & their relatives like Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, Broccoli etc. so planting them in them the year prior to cabbage family group is a good choice. This same cabbage family are also heavy feeders, so planting legumes like peas & beans the following year makes good sense since they are able to fix their own nitrogen and will add nutrients back into the soil.  Plowing the spent legumes into the soil at the end of the season will also assist in this process.

Potatoes planted where corn previously grew, tends to increase potato yields.

Mustard & turnips tend to leave residues to help to rid the soil of pathogens that attack nightshade plants such as tomatoes potatoes & eggplant.

Vine type plants such as pumpkins, cucumbers and squash tend to smother weeds making root crops like carrots & beets easier to keep clean the following year.

Here is one last trick to leave you with. Try is planting the 3 sisters together – corn, beans & squash. Beans being a nitrogen-fixer planted at the base of a heavy feeder like corn, give it a nutrient boost, while the corn provides a trellis for pole variety of beans such as scarlet runner beans. Squash enjoys the bit of shade that the tall corn plants offer, so as you can see, plants can help each other in different ways, and you can reap the benefits with just a little planning.

If you don’t have room for a big garden plot but still would like a little home grown freshness, don’t despair. Check out Garden Chat next week for a few ideas to grow produce in small spaces!