SubscribeLay Out Plot Tutorial for Plangarden Vegetable Garden Design Software
Higher quality video at: www.plangarden.com Learn how to lay out your plot before you populate your garden with veggies! This orientation shows you the different features available in the “Lay Out Plot” tab in Plangarden.
Vegetable Garden Fall Garden – Part 3
Vegetable Garden Planting cabbage and Lettuce in the fall vegetable garden. Visit The Bayou Gardener in Cajun Country in South Louisiana at www.thebayougardener.com
Herb Garden Information for Personal Home Use
Since ancient times, people have grown herb gardens. Peoples of ancient China and Egypt left written records of their use of herbs. Medieval documents and references within the Bible show people used herbs for perfumes, cloth dyes and medicine as well as cooking. Today, herb gardens are useful for supplying people with herbs for cooking, tea, medicines, potpourri and for controlling pests.
Herb gardens can be specialized for the plants’ use, culinary here, medicinal there, or mixed for aesthetic reasons. Herbs can be planted directly in existing landscape with flowers or vegetables, or contained in pots or a raised-bed garden. A four foot by six foot garden plot is all the space a small family needs for an herb garden. Many herbs can be grown together with other species in the same container. Herbs can be grown indoors or outdoors.
Gardeners new to herbs usually gravitate toward familiar herbs used in cooking, but many herbs are grown for the appearance of their foliage and flowers or for their aromatic properties. Culinary herbs, used in cooking, can be used as flavor-additives or as garnish, and may be used either fresh or dried. The portion of the herb plant used may be the leaves, stems, roots or seeds, depending on the herb and the intended use.
As with other garden and landscape plants, herbs vary from small shrubs to trees, and can be annuals, perennials or biennials. Plant herbs in well-drained soil. Heavy or clay soils will need to have organic mulch mixed in to break up clumps and allow water passage for the herb garden’s roots. Fertilizer is not needed for most herbs. Perennial varieties may appreciate fish fertilizer every other year or a dose of Osmocote.
Full or partial sun is required for most herbs, although some herbs prefer full shade. Group herbs by their sun and water requirements for ease of care. Insect pests and diseases rarely trouble herbs, but aphids can attack herbs such as anise, caraway, dill and fennel. Mint can get rust, and red spider mites can attack low-growing branches of herbs in hot, dry weather. Grow your herb garden from starts purchased at a nursery, or grow your herbs from seed.
Watching an herb plant develop from a single tiny seed can be an empowering experience. While it lives, an annual herb provides your family with taste, smell, sight, texture and emotional experience as well as adding nutrients to your diet. How many garden plants can do all that? Herb seeds need a shallow container of light, well-drained soil. Plant seeds in the late winter indoors. Bury the seed no deeper than three times its width and keep the soil moist but not saturated until germination. Virtually all herbs can be purchased as seeds and started in this way.
Transplanting seedlings is risky, and some herbs are not suited to this practice. Anise, fennel, dill and coriander prefer to be directly sown where they will grow. Some herbs may be considered noxious weeds and will be listed with the local extension office, so check listings prior to planting medicinal herbs. Your local nursery may have information on this as well.
Herb gardens are easy, fun and rewarding. From a single small pot on the kitchen windowsill to a full herb garden with perennial shrubs regularly harvested, your discovery of herb gardening has just sprouted. You have much to learn and understand about herb gardens before you get started, read on!
September Field Trip – Growing a Vegetable Garden
Join us on the September Field Trip which includes spot watering vegetables to conserve water. Visit The Bayou Gardener in Avoyelles Parish Louisiana – Cajun Country at www.thebayougardener.com
Hay Bale Gardening
Hay bale gardening technique is a low-cost and convenient way of growing flowers and vegetables. Growing vegetables in a hay bale garden is similar to the technique used to grow vegetables in a raised bed garden. If you are just getting your bales, give the bales a thorough soaking, and let them begin to break down before you plant your vegetables. Hay or straw bale gardening is another great way have your garden if you have limited space, terrible soil, a bad back or those who are confined to a wheel chair! So much time is saved by not having to weed or hoe or even water as often as well. This project was first researched by a Dr at the University of Minnesota Extension says, “Hay bales provide a well-aerated, disease free growing medium that is perfect for growing vegetables. The popular method of hay bale gardening is getting more popular in town, a friend told him how to get prosperous crops using nothing but wheat straw, potting soil, a little fertilizer and some tomato plants “Every fall I get some bales and let them sit out all winter to get good and soggy, I plant a few every year and I’ve had real good luck. Another friend who was in the landscaping business showed him how to use wheat straw to garden “He had all kinds of crops including cucumber, squash and green beans, you can raise almost anything except corn, because it’s too tall and the bale will fall over . Bales first should be situated in a full sun formation, with twine and wire ties kept in tact. Since bales may be used two seasons, synthetic twine can be used to provide the most durable binding. For optimum root penetration and plant growth throughout gardening months, bales should be placed with strings wrapped horizontally and straws set vertically. The next step is hydration, the key to successful hay bale gardening. A form of hydroponics, the hay bale is like a sponge, and you can’t let them dry out, or your crop just does not work. While watering the bales twice per day, fertilize them every other day for six days with one-half cup each of a high nitrogen fertilizer. Working with the bales is much easier than working on a traditional garden. You’re putting your garden at eye level, you can see your progress, you can weed it a lot easier and harvest easier. (Posted by Denise in Creative Organic Gardening). Straw bale gardening is an interesting option for those who have either limited soil, limited space or have difficulty bending over. This is important if you intend to get two years possible out of each bale in your straw bale gardening efforts. Remember several things about placing your bales in your straw bale gardening layout. Straw bale gardening layouts can be placed end-to-end to create long gardens or grouped into traditional bed shapes or even set up as maze types of gardens. How crazy does it sound, growing tomatoes in bales of hay. I planted peppers, tomatoes, flowers and beans in the hay bales in different arrangements that were pleasing to the eye. Somehow I find it oddly interesting kind of like growing tomatoes upside down. In my garden adventures with hay bale and straw bale gardening I have tried several different gardening techniques. While I like growing melons and gourds in the bales both are heavy feeder so I created a hay bale/ straw bale square garden technique to use with these crops. Lay the bales out to form a square with an open section on the inside. Now it’s time to prepare the bales for planting. Straw bale gardening has many positive aspects. Valerie Everett I prefer straw bales as they contain less seed and last longer but straw is more expensive so my choice for the garden depends on the best buy I can get or which crop I am growing. For squash plants and gourds I use hay bales. First get bales that still have the string tightly around the bale. And if you know where you want your garden position the bales. For more information and tips on gardening go to www.Teegoes.org
October Field Trip – Growing a Vegetable Garden
Join us on the October Field Trip of the vegetable garden. Visit The Bayou Gardener in Avoyelles Parish Louisiana – Cajun Country at www.thebayougardener.com
Six Ingenius Ways To Have An Organic Vegetable Garden Without Giving Up Your Life
Tomatoes taken by fusarium wilt. Sugar snap peas eaten up by aphids. An army of slugs in the lettuce patch. Broccoli that never heads.
Sound familiar? If you’ve experienced any of the above, then you know how difficult gardening—especially organic gardening—can be to integrate into an already full schedule. Plants need care and careful monitoring when you’re avoiding chemical pesticides like the plague.
But there is a way to successfully plant and grow organic vegetables. Over the past couple of years I’ve learned some valuable lessons about how to manage an organic vegetable garden without having to devote all your free time to it. Allow me to share them with you…
1. Start small. I decided to plant a garden the year my son turned one. That would’ve been okay, if I’d stuck to a small lettuce patch and a couple of tomato plants. But, not knowing how much time and attention my son would require in the coming months, I bit off way more than I could chew. I ended up having an aphid infestation, diseased tomatoes, and generally an unfruitful harvest.
Another option for keeping it small is container gardening. Anybody can find time to tend to five potted plants per day, especially since container gardens tend to be close to the house, so you are more likely to remember to check them. Which leads me to the next point…
2. Make time to check on your plants at least every other day. Carefully checking each plant for disease and pests on alternate days won’t take very much time, especially if you kept your garden down to a manageable size. But the time you invest doing it will pay off big-time. You’ll be able to find pests and recognize the beginning stages of disease before they have a chance to completely obliterate your crops.
3. Set up an easy watering system. Underground irrigation systems, once installed, require the least amount of time and effort. However, the cost might be more than you’re willing to cover. If that’s the case, lay soaker hoses an inch or so under the soil where you’re going to plant. Being able to turn on a spigot and leave it for twenty minutes is much easier than lugging a hose around the yard.
4. Write down the fertilizing schedule in a calendar or daytimer you look at often. If you overfertilize, you end up with a lot of foliage and not much harvest. Underfertilizing will lead to pathetic looking plants and small fruits. Different crops have different feeding requirements, so getting yourself organized in this area of gardening will really pay off.
5. Spray with chemical-free pesticides and repellents every week or two as soon as the shoots sprout up from the ground. Bugs hate neem oil, which is extracted from a native Indian tree. It can also prevent or fend off certain fungi, like powdery mildew. Spinosad is odorless and safe for the beneficial insects, while it kills the plant-eaters. Orange oil kills any insect that it hits.
Be sure to rotate the use of organic pesticides. Too much neem oil can harm bees, and Spinosad is supposed to be used no more than once a month for most crops.
6. Consider raised bed gardening. Or, at the very least, mulch your garden heavily. Either way will save you a lot of weeding (I have practically no weeds in my raised beds). Raised beds are also much easier to dig into because of the loose soil.
Growing your very own organic vegetable garden, even if your days are full, is possible. Follow these tips, and you will soon find yourself surrounded by delicious food from a garden you have spent only a few minutes a day on.
Vegetable Gardening : How to Grow Sweet Potatoes
Sweet potato plants should be placed right in the ground about 2 inches deep, and they should be well-watered. Find out why sweet potatoes flourish in hot conditions with help from an organic farmer in this free video on vegetable gardening and horticulture. Expert: Jarrett Man Contact: stonesoupfarm.googlepages.com Bio: Jarrett Man created and runs Stone Soup Farm, an organic vegetable and fruit operation in Belchertown, Mass. Filmmaker: EquilibrioFilms Jenn
