Texas Summer
Garden Tips
One of the first
House CaaG classes that Alice and I taught was on summer gardening tips. Combined with Alice’s previous experience and going through
many issues of Mother Earth News magazine, we compiled this list of tips. These are by no means complete but offer a
good starting point.
As many in the
central Texas
hill country region know, most of the ground has a thick layer of bedrock
directly beneath the soil, wreaking havoc on fence posts and tent stakes and
pool diggers everywhere. The 9 acres
under House CaaG are no different. In
fact, the top soil is so shallow that it is often missing completely leaving
just barren and protruding rock. Because
of this we are forced to resort to raised beds, which is where most of the tips come from.
Starting a normal, un-raised
garden:
- Recommend
not having to disturb the soil
- Maintain
biome integrity and habitat of soil
- Tilling
destroys delicate surface habitat
- Slight
breaking of soil okay, i.e. light use of aerators or hand-tillers
- Locate
to get about 6 hours of direct sunlight
- Cover
ground to prepare area (kill weeds, etc) well before planting:
- Moisten
soil before covering
- Use plastic
tarp: remove before planting
- Or
use paper or cardboard: do not remove before planting
- For
planting, put down 3-5 inches of topsoil
Raised beds:
- Work with
what’s there; minimize disturbance of soil
- Divide it into sub-plots/planters
- Each
planter is surrounded with old, un-treated wood, rocks, or bags,
- Depth: topsoil and bed combined to render 10-13
total inches of soil
- Bed
sizes:
- Long-skinny
beds for small single-serving plants like carrots, garlic, onions; 2 rows
per bed
- Larger,
wider beds for bulky, larger plants like watermelons, cucumbers,
zucchini, pumpkins
- Wide,
long rows for single-serving larger plants like lettuce, cabbage; 2 rows
Planting tips:
- Use
transplants for slower-growing plants
- tomatoes,
peppers, broccoli
- Do NOT use transplants for those that don’t
transplant well or are easy to grow from seeds
- Carrots,
okra, beans, peas
- Soil-less
seed starting
- Thick
paper-towel or rag
- Soak
with water
- Place
seeds on top and keep covered (must be dark)
- As
SOON as they start rooting/sprouting, put them in a fertilized starting
solution (soil with fertilizer)
- Cooled
Chamomile water to feed seedlings; kills/prevents fungus
- Transplanting
from seedlings into garden:
- Introduce
to bright light and breezes gradually over the course of 1-3 weeks
- Sheltered
exposure on porch or in garden with gradual increases in number of hours
of exposure
- Don’t transplant in severe weather; water day
before with liquid fertilizer and again JUST before you remove them
- Push
out from bottom of pots, rather then pulling
- Pot
upside down in palm, plant poking through fingers
- Top
bottom to release plant
- Loosen
roots; if compacted then pry apart gently (fork or fingers); leave as
much soil attached as possible
- Handle
freed plant by root-ball without touching main stem
- Place
in new hole, use lowest leaves as handles, not main stem
- Drench newly-settled transplant to remove air
pockets
- Temp
shield new transplants from sun and wind for 2-3 days, or 3-5 if extreme
weather (sun, wind, cold)
Watering:
- Even
if had dripper/soaker hose, hand-water instead newly-planted seeds and
transplants until they root and grow
- Water
in evenings/dusk during summer, late morning during winter
Summer coolness:
- Many fruiting
and flowering plants don’t flower in heat (lettuce, tomatoes, peppers,
eggplants, etc)
- Cover
with light-filtering devices such as lattice, screen, sheets
- Some
directly underneath trees (get morning and evening sun)
Garden Layout:
- Perimeter:
along inside of fence
- Plant
climbers and those that need support, like beans, tomatoes, watermelon
- In
same beds, have ground-cover plants like parsley, cilantro, onion,
garlic, chives, mint, lavender, rosemary, etc.
- These
help keep pests and boars, etc, away
- Rotate
yearly to balance chemistry and nitrogen levels in soils
Weeding:
- Natural
herbicides:
- Vinegar
– spray around edge of garden 5-6% mix; most effective above 70 degrees
- Weekly
at first (early in season)
- Bi-weekly
after first month
- Corn
gluten – kills seeds, so only good with mature plants or around outer garden
- Mulching
(grass clippings, hay, woodchips, sawdust, etc) – make sure it’s
pasteurized:
- (dosen’t
have seeds or other things in it)
- Put
grass, etc, in black bag (with a few air holes) for a week in full sun
- Or
buy solar-pasteurized leaves or grass
- Having
raised beds
- Pull
weeds immediately and frequently
- Keep
an eye on edges, which is where weeds sneak in
Mulching/composting:
- Compost
- Mix
it in with soil, use with fertilizer; great for starting plants and
maintaining soil balance
- After
planting, make compost tea: fill bin with water and let soak for 2-3 days
in full sun; use water for irrigation asap.
- 20%
organic waste (wet), 40% fresh green grass clippings (green), 40% dry
leaves & grass (brown)
- Store
mix in dark, moist, aerated container
- Turn
weekly for 3-4 weeks
- Add
green (2 parts) and some wet (1 part)
- Healthy
compost gets hot (“pasteurizing”)
- BioChar
– organic matter burned slowly w/restrictive oxygen; stopped when hits
charcoal stage
- Works
only with compost and good soil
- Burn
wood, etc, until smoke goes from white to yellow to grey/blue and fuel
breaks into charcoal chunks, then dampen/suffocate with 1” of soil and
let smolder until out
- Can
also use charred logs
- Kelp-based
fertilizers or fish-emulsion sprays are cool – research further…
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