Spring Gardening Update

Spring has finally arrived in full force. Fortunately, I am off from work for the next 2 weeks, which means way more time for the garden! Two consecutive days of 70 degree weather has done wonders for the garden. The ailing lettuce saplings, which had barely survived transplantation, is making a comeback. The main trunk of the plant, having been elongated due to being confined in the transplant pot for too long, as thickened considerably in the garden bed. Oddly however, the main growth of the lettuce now seems to be occuring at the end of the trunk not at the base of it. This may cause developmental issues later on in the plant's life cycle, but for now I think the coast is clear.


Of the 14 potato spuds planted, 11 has sprouted. This is a significant improvement over last year's results, where the spuds first began sprouting in mid-may. The early maturing Rotten Red variety had all sprouted vigoriously in garden bed 3. The middle maturing Kennewick potatos all sprouted in the containers, though not nearly as abundently as the earlies. The late maturing Yukon Gold potatos are just beginning to break the surface, some 3 of the 6 spuds have so far sprouted in garden bed 4. If all goes well, 4 successive harvests of potatos can be expected this year: early, middle, late, early. Along with the potatos, the chive plants are flourishing with emerald green blades going everywhere. The scallion seeds have also germinated, sending tiny shoots up through the earth. On the other hand, turnip seeds sown a month earlier had not germinated at all, I surmise that unpredictable weather over the last month was the culprit. In anycase, I set down some pole bean seeds into the turnips' area in garden beds 3 and 4.

I planted 2 tomato saplings of different varieties(Beef Steak and Early Girl) onto garden bed 2 several days ago. These seems to be doing very well and have even attracted some bumble bees into the midst. To support the growing tomato plants, I erected a scaffold and tied both plants to the scaffold via some hemp cordage. 5 of the 6 transplated lettuce plants had managed to survive the last 2 weeks. Around the tomatos and lettuce saplings, I set down an even mixture of Kentucky Wonder and European pole beans. I chose the 2 varieties to maximize genetic diversity(and provide increased protection against disease).

Garden Bed 1, the square meter garden last year, was sown densely with a mixed corn and pole bean combination. There were two varieties of corn(Mesoamerican and Chinese) and beans(Kentucky and European) Additionally, I transplanted 2 Eggplant saplings of mixed heritage (West Asian Black Wonder, and Japanese Round). The purpose of such diversity is protection against microbial diseases and insectile pests. By bring diversity of species, and diversity within species, pests would have a very hard time adapting to all the vareities available. Thus pest populations never reach the numbers needed to ruin the entire crop. In a permaculture garde, as in nature, even pests have a place, though not a dominant one.

The Planting begins!

This afternoon, I transplanted 4 potato buds into the 2 containers that had so recently served as my composting bins. I chose the early maturing Kennewick variety for the containers, a harvest should be ready by late june if all goes well. The usage of double cropping will allow these containers to produce two potato harvests this year. Additional composting from now until the end of summer will be done entirely in the leaf composting area that was constructed last autumn. I re-grouped the leaf compost heaps into 2 larger heaps. One such heap will be used for the hot/active composting that the bins were used for.


In addition to the potatos, I set down 2 rows of turnip seeds on Garden beds 2 and 3. The turnip is a wonderful crop, every part of it is edible. When the turnip seeds were sown, I decided to go ahead and plant out some green onion seeds in garden bed 3. An organic garden survives due to it's diversity of life, and diversity also means a niche for the pests. No bio-intensive food producing system can avoid losing a share of it's produce to pest species. The point is to develop a miniature ecology in such a system that is resilient enough to keep the pests under control through predation and disease.

A truly resilient garden system thus resembles somewhat that of a rainforest. You have tall crops(tree canopy analog) to provide shade and the necessary support structure for a complex ecosystem. Then comes the medium height crops(bushes/shrubs analogy) to grow alongside the tall crops, usually these crops somehow support other crops through soil enrichment or pest control. Lastly you have the low-lying crops(grass/flower analogy) , these crops are grown around the "canopy/brush" and fills up the garden bed. A typical set up is the "Three Sisters" combination: Corn(Trees), Pole Beans(Bush), and Squash(grass). I plan to turn Garden bed 1 into a trial bed for the Three Sisters combination.

And speaking of miniature ecologies, it appears that a very simple one has evolved within my sapling "jungle" indoors. The cabbage saplings have been doing extremely well and now towersabove the onion chive saplings. Upon a routine examination of these plants, a minature world was discovered. Apparently, the cabbage saplings have been serving as a canopy of sorts. Scores of tiny flying herbivores were ascending out of the chives to feed upon the lettuce leaves. Perched upon one leaf of lettuce was a mature soldier bug. One could see the simple hardwired logic of the predator as it climbed endlessly around the lettuce plant eating one flying pest after another. This is almost as entertaining as one of those nature shows on the discovery channel!

Seed Preparations and Garden Planning

On sunday, I began the process of preparing seeds and saplings for sowing/transplanting into the newly expanded garden. The turnip seeds, being rather cold resistant, were sown outdoors this morning. Next on the list were the onion chives and lettuce saplings. These little beauties have been growing indoors for a week and are now much bigger than when I first picked them up. The chive plants already show signs of emerging flower buds. The last spring frosts are supposed to be completed by mid April, so these plants will have to mature indoors for another week or so before the transplant. As an added benefit to early maturation, indoor growing pre-empts unnecessary damage by birds and pests. There really is much to be said about the saplings. These little biological machines assemble themselves out of thin air, powered only by sunlight. Since I used heirloom seeds, each sapling is widely unique from others of the same breed. This is in stark contrast to the supermarket variety of lettuce heads. There, nearly every head of lettuce looks very similar to every other head of lettuce in the same section. This level of uniformity is achieved due to their identical genetic structures, a very clever use of cloning!

Next after the saplings are the potato buds. I chose three breeds of Heirloom Potatos: Kennewick, Red Norland, and Yukon Gold. These breeds cover the range of early, mid, and late harvests, respectively. Potatos and Corn will be the bulk harvest of my garden this year. Thus hardiness and disease resistence were choosen as the most desirable traits in these buds. These potato buds were separated into three bags and kept near warm places to encourage sprouting. They will be planted into 2 garden beds and 2 containers next week for 3 successive harvests in June, August, and October. After doing some research on which potato breeds to plant, I learned some interesting facts about the modern potato industry. Currently about 2/3 of all potatos consumed in the U.S derives from a single breed called Golden Wonder(GM). This particular breed was originally selected for it's high yields. But at some point in the nineties, 2 important changes were made to it's genetic structure. Firstly, a small snippet of DNA from a certain fungus was inserted into this potato's genome. This little change resulted in a poisenous insecticide-like effect to potato beetles when they try to feed on these potatos. This change was fine and dandy,except that the FDA wouldn't allow a genetically modified crop to reach the market if it could potentially spread it's genes to other none-GMed breeds of potato. So as a result, they made another tweak. The growth inhibitor gene of the Golden Wonder potato buds was switched off, these potato plants became unable to reproduce as a result. Thus, when we go to McDonalds, those french fries that we're eating is, in effect, both part insect-killing fungus and also sterile to boot.

In anycase, perhaps it's best to take a lesson from Masanobu Fukuoka's Permaculture treatise The One Straw Revolution. The lesson is that the wise permaculturist should select in his/her crops the one trait which nature itself selects for: the ability to live on.