Care for the Earth by caring for your earth
Want to get your own vegetable garden started? Here are some tips to help you plan for success:
Your patch should be sunny and open, yet sheltered from prevailing winds, with good drainage. If your site is against a fence or wall, radiant heat may be reflected. This can cause sun scald in warm climates but reflected heat can be used to advantage in cool climates.
The size of your vegetable garden depends on how much time you are prepared to spend on it, and what you plan to grow. For example, a pumpkin requires 2 square metres, a lettuce 20 square centimetres. To avoid walking on the soil, the bed size should be 60-90 cm wide with paths of 30 cm.
If you keep animals such as chooks and ducks or have herbivorous wildlife around, you will need to fence your patch with chicken wire or use row covers. Young vegetables and seedlings are mighty tasty!
Raised beds are kinder to your back, and are necessary in poorly drained areas or where the soil has organochlorine contamination. This contamination has been widespread in gardens created before 1987, as now banned persistent chemicals were used to control termites around houses and fences. Raised beds are filled with clean topsoil and compost, then mulched. But watch out - the good drainage means they easily dry out.
No dig gardens eliminate digging and weeding. The method developed by Esther Deans is to create a low bed with bricks or boards, lay a thick layer of newspaper over existing lawn, cover with biscuits of lucerne hay, sprinkle with organic fertiliser, cover with 20 cm of loose straw, add another sprinkling of organic fertiliser, and then plant into 10 cm deep circles of compost.
The traditional garden at ground level has lawn removed, the soil dug over and compost added. The soil needs continual cultivation to remove weeds instead of using mulch to control weeds. It will need more watering due to evaporation.
Always use mulch to increase soil carbon, improve soil structure, conserve water and reduce weeding. Mulch tends to attract snails so you will need methods to deal with them, such as beer traps (a jar half-filled with beer and set into the ground will attract and trap marauding slugs and snails).
Trying to grow vegetables outside their natural season will only end in tears. So plan what vegetables to sow according to the season and your climate zone using our Monthly Gardening Guide.
Backyard Biodynamics is a place where you can learn, share and be engaged by biodynamic gardening in your own backyard. 