Tag: Gardening

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Living

How does your garden grow?

Cat Thrasher transformed the front yard of her Kellytown home into a large urban garden, where she says she’s been “trying ‘square-foot gardening’ in the form of planting some things very close together.” Photo: John Robinson

Outdoor options may be limited this summer, but gardening is definitely having a moment. Whether you’re a veteran dirt-lover or a total beginner, there’s never been a better time to dive in and cultivate some earth (or even a window box) near your home. Here are some ideas to spur you along.

Dig in: Tips for veggie-garden novices

Along with bicycling and bread-baking, these homebound pandemic times have seen a rise in another kinder, gentler pastime—gardening. It’s being driven not only by all the extra hours at home, but by a certain amount of uneasiness around food supplies. Lots of us are eyeing those unused corners of our lawns, wondering if they could become more productive.

Starting a garden for the first time is both simple and daunting. Plants have only a few basic needs: good soil, water, and sun. But, for newbies, it can seem like there are a thousand ways to go wrong. If you’re a beginner, here are a few tips to help break it down.

Select your site

The ideal site is well away from trees (which compete for water and nutrients), well-drained, well-lit, and not too compacted—i.e., not a place where cars have been parking or people have beaten a path. But that ideal spot doesn’t always exist. You may have an excess of shade, a problem with swampiness after it rains, or just limited space.

The good news is that a garden doesn’t have to be large to provide food. Think small at first. Can you squeeze in a couple of tomatoes along the front walk? Is there space for a trellis along a south wall for pole beans to climb? If you already plant petunias or other annual flowers, could you intersperse them with lettuce or herbs?

If you really can’t put plants in the ground, think about containers. They can do very well on a deck or even a windowsill, as long as you water faithfully.

Prepare the ground

Raised beds have become so popular that you may think they’re a requirement. But they make it harder to start a brand-new garden—you have to get involved in carpentry before you can plant anything, and then you have to obtain soil. All this can get expensive and time-consuming. At my house, we’ve found it much easier to plant in the ground and focus on improving the soil we have.

When we want to establish a new bed, we first remove the sod with a mattock. This tool makes it easy to just peel away the grass by the roots, but if you don’t have one, you could also use a shovel or spade. Then we loosen the soil with a spade fork—again, a shovel will do in a pinch. Finally, we mix in about three inches of compost. For a small garden, you can buy compost in bags. Horse manure works well too, and stables are usually happy to give it away.

Choose your crops wisely

It feels good to succeed in a garden, so start with things that are relatively foolproof, like green beans, basil, and mint. The next tier of crops would include stuff like salad and cooking greens, tomatoes, peppers, summer and winter squash—these are not difficult to grow, but they do sometimes get hit by pests or disease. The trickiest crops, in my experience, are broccoli, onions, carrots, and cabbage. They’re well worth the space if you have room to spare, but success is far from guaranteed.

Photo: John Robinson

Timing

It’s nearly June, too late to start most veggie crops from seed. (Greens, tomatoes, and peppers get planted indoors in early March.) What you can do now is buy most crops as starts, at a garden center or direct from a farmer. And it’s not too late—in fact, it’s the perfect time—to direct-seed heat-loving crops like beans, squash, corn, and okra.

It’ll feel counterintuitive, but in the height of summer—mid- to late July—you can try planting seeds of cool-weather fall crops: kale, collards, lettuce, spinach, and beets.

Plant carefully

Find the healthiest plant starts you can—vigorous, not too “leggy” (that’s the term for plants with gangly stems)—and put them in the ground when the soil is moist, but not wet and clumpy. Loosen the soil all around where you’re making a hole for your baby plant, and dig deep enough that when you place the plant in the hole, the potting soil will sit slightly below ground level. Water daily for the first few days.

Make provisions for deer

If you’ve ever seen a deer in your yard or neighborhood, then you’ll want to think about protecting your plants. Deer can do more damage in one night than any other pest; they especially like leafy greens, but they’ll hit tomatoes and peppers too. If a tall fence is not in the cards for you, you might consider buying or mixing up some organic repellent spray (there are recipes online).

Keep an eye on water and weeds

Now comes the patience part. The plants won’t need much from you except a regular check-in, preferably once a day. Keep soil moist and pull out the bigger weeds. If you see insect pests like tomato worms or squash beetles, you can pull them off by hand.

Fertilize

That compost you added will feed your plants all season, but you can also boost their growth with organic fertilizers. Garden stores have lots of options, from blood meal (really!) to fish emulsion. And here’s a nice fact: Rainwater contains nitrogen, one of the main nutrients plants crave. So watering from a rain barrel is an extra advantage.

Enjoy the process

That daily check-in is not only for the plants’ sake, it’s a ritual that feeds the gardener’s soul. The growth of plants is a salve in times of stress, and paying attention to your garden’s progress—maybe taking photos or notes—is half the fun. Keeping a garden journal, if you intend to garden again next year, is also a helpful way to track info—things like planting dates, timing of the harvest, and when you fertilize.

Enjoy the bounty

The other half of the fun is eating what you grew. If you’re lucky, you’ll be overwhelmed —drowning in cucumbers, or unloading zucchini on your neighbors’ doorsteps in the dead of night. But there’s a lot of satisfaction in successfully growing even one tomato—one perfect, plump, tangy-sweet, deep-red tomato. Savor it!

Photo: John Robinson

Digging deeper: Local permaculturists design gardens for the longterm

If you’ve gardened in the past and have a handle on the basics, you might be eyeing the next-level approach to growing food. Maybe you suspect that you could get more bounty out of the same square footage, or you might be looking to do things in a more sustainable way. For a lot of folks, that means permaculture—a system for designing gardens (and, more broadly, homesteads and communities) that’s gotten a lot of traction in recent years.

The word is a contraction of “permanent” and “agriculture” (or just “culture”). The name implies long-term resilience. Christine Gyovai, who with her husband Reed Muehlman owns the Charlottesville firm Dialogue + Design Associates, first studied permaculture in California at the turn of the millennium. Since 2007, the couple has lived on a nine-acre homestead in western Albemarle, where they designed and built a straw-bale house. “We knew going into it we wanted to use permaculture principles here,” she says. “It was helpful that we took at least a year to observe the land before we did anything.”

That’s one of permaculture’s first principles: observing natural conditions (like water flow, sun, wind, and wildlife), and designing in a way that protects and mimics those systems. For example, in nature, plants don’t grow in straight, uniform rows, surrounded by bare soil; they form more of a multi-layered mix. Gyovai and Muehlman have a “forest garden” that uses that structure: trees over shrubs over ground-level plants.

Christine Gyovai, who co-owns Dialogue + Design Associates, abided by one of permaculture’s first principles before building a straw- bale house in western Albemarle: observe natural conditions like water flow, sun, wind, and wildlife. Photo: John Robinson

“It has an upper story including apples, pears, and pawpaws,” she explains. “Then there’s a shrub layer with nitrogen fixers”—those are plants that make nitrogen available in the soil for other plants. Among many other plants, “we have New Jersey tea, baptisia, false blue indigo, and comfrey, which is a dynamic accumulator. It draws nutrients up from deep in the soil and makes them available for plants on the surface. Once a year or more, we do chop-and-drop mulching”—cutting down the comfrey and laying the leaves on the ground as a nutrient-rich mulch. Strawberries and other plants form the ground-cover level.

Permaculture suggests dividing a property into “zones” based on how often you’ll frequent each area. Most people usually stick close to their dwellings, so gardens will get more attention if they’re in that zone one or two. Gyovai and Muehlman cultivate a kitchen garden for veggies, intentionally sited very close to their house. “They are largely keyhole-shaped beds designed to maximize growing areas and minimize pathways,” says Gyovai, adding that the compost pile is also in zone one, right next to the kitchen garden. “It’s easy to run outside and pop things in the compost. That fosters energy cycling and recycling.”

Further-flung zones include things that need somewhat less attention—like beehives and larger-scale compost—and wilderness space that only gets visited occasionally.

Connections to the community beyond one’s property are part of the philosophy, too. Danielle Castellano and her family live on a permaculture homestead in Fauquier County, where they attempt to produce quite a bit of food—this spring, for example, they’ve been busy inoculating logs with 2,000 mushroom plugs. Still, she says, it’s important to ask, “How can we be supporting farming friends and neighbors? We’re not trying to produce absolutely everything.” She sources eggs, meat, and raw milk from other farms as a way of strengthening ties within a “larger ecosystem.”

Gyovai has taught permaculture design for years, designs professionally, and helps run the Blue Ridge Permaculture Network. If you’re interested in learning more, check out that group’s Facebook page, or sign up for this fall’s permaculture design course through the Shenandoah Permaculture Institute.

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Abode Magazines

The DIY backyard: How to install a home landscape that’ll make you proud

A wall covered with clematis vines provides a buffer, while the garden bed below—defined with cinder blocks and planted with blueberries and strawberries—anchors one end of the yard. Photo: Virginia Hamrick

We have all seen the perfectly groomed gardens on TV house-flipping shows and in magazines, including this one. Pinterest is a slideshow of landscapes that are intended to inspire creativity but often just lead to feelings of inadequacy. It’s as if these picture-perfect settings were chia pets—just add water and watch them grow!

The truth is grittier. Few homeowners can afford to hire professionals—designers, stone masons, carpenters, gardeners—to make the magic happen. Instead, with a great sense of urgency, they rush to the local Southern States or Lowe’s, where they pick up bags of mulch and topsoil, concrete pavers, potted plants and saplings, and, oh, that beautiful shovel—gotta have that too.

Shaded by tulip poplars and sweetbay magnolia trees, a galvanized tank from Southern States serves as a plunge pool on hot summer days. Photo: Virginia Hamrick

The plan is to spend a few spring weekends getting dirty and sweaty, a small sacrifice for the tidy and colorful yard that will soon materialize.

Hate to break this to you, but no. That old saw about Rome not being built in a day applies to your own half acre. But a yard that works for you, looks good, and provides a sweet spot for you to hang out with friends and family? A place where you can admire the cardinals and monarchs, and curse the mosquitoes and the squirrel that raids your bird feeder? You can have all of that, without maxing out your credit card, if you just slow down.

As an example I present my sister Julie’s yard. It has taken four-plus years to achieve its current state. It has required a lot of hard work—mainly by her, our sister, our niece, and me, but with some professional help. Yes, we have worn out the pavement between her house in town and Southern States and Lowes, and also taken occasional trips to far-flung nurseries for deals on plants and trees. We have paid with strained backs, sore muscles, smashed fingertips, and patches of skin rubbed raw beneath our gloves.

But we’ve come a long way (a garden is never done but rather always evolving), and we intend to stay the course—whatever it may be, because we make a lot of stuff up as we go along and Julie has a restless mind.

Julie estimates the total investment in materials and professional help at about $10,000. And, full disclosure, all of the design work has been free, because she’s a landscape architect, both a UVA professor and private practitioner in the field. Her professional status has also earned discounts at nurseries and garden centers, so I suppose that the total cost without those savings would be about a thousand bucks higher.

A tiny greenhouse—nothing more than a folly—provides a focal point at the end of the concrete-slab path. The pavers rest in a raised bed filled with stone dust. Photo: Virginia Hamrick

But even without those advantages, I believe that anyone with some imagination, a lot of determination, and a vision of how she wants her yard to look and function, could create a similarly pleasing place. The primary requirements are patience, a willingness to make mistakes, and a tolerance for imperfection. Plus, once in a while, a day spent toiling on something that has to be completely redone.

That’s when you crack open a cold beverage and retire to the porch or the air-conditioned living room, and complain about how much your damn back hurts. It’s all worth the effort, I swear, because there are few things greater than the satisfaction of imagining something and then making it real.

Here’s what we did, and by “we” I mean mostly Julie:

Paid to have the yard graded, steps installed, and raised beds for tomato plants built.

When she moved in, the yard was a tumbledown riot of knotweed partially obscuring the ruins of a brick coal shed. Julie’s pal Zoe, a landscape designer and contractor, fired up the skid loader and created two flat spaces separated by a hill that stretches across the middle of the yard. She called in help to build raised cedar-plank beds to plant tomatoes, and cinder block stairs connecting the upper and lower levels. This was a big expense—$2,000 to $3,000—but necessary to establish the yard’s basic form and foundation.

Saved the brick and other detritus, such as old plumbing pipes, to repurpose later.

One of Julie’s core ideas, with any landscape, is that you should use as much of the existing material on the site as possible. Minimize or even eliminate the stuff that goes to a landfill. It saves time and money, and it’s environmentally responsible.

Cinder block steps connect the upper and lower portions of the yard. In the sloping, densely planted beds on either side of the stairs, zinnias provide pops of color. Photo: Virginia Hamrick

Planted the hill to prevent erosion.

First, we grew radishes from seed. They’re cheap, spring up fast, and last a good long while. You can even eat them, and so can the rabbits. Another year we tried clover, which turned out to be a mistake—the roots grew deep and were tough to dig out the following year. On the up side, the plants loosened up the dense clay soil. In years three and four, we planted “zinnia hill.” The low cost and profusion of color turned out to be the epitome of cheap and cheerful, a favorite phrase of Julie’s. Bonus: She saves and replants the seeds the following year, and the butterflies and hummingbirds drawn to the flowers put on a show.

Installed a tree grove on the lower tier.

Sweet bay magnolias and tulip poplars planted in a cluster provide a visual and physical buffer. Julie says the trees “tuck in” the yard. They also block the view of the UVA hospital. The vegetable beds are situated on the other half of the lower tier, leaving open space to let in sunlight and let you see the sky.

Put in the lawn.

We splurged on sod from a farm in Somerset. Instant lawn! But over the years, what was once a perfect green carpet has become a mix of clover, crabgrass, and who knows what else. Who cares? It’s a flat patch of green that anchors the upper tier, and gives Julie’s little white poodle a place to leave fragrant little presents.

Planted the black locust grove.

This was a key move, and one that made me understand Julie’s basic organizing idea: Establish the middle and then “paint” around the edges. In this case, we put in 40 black locust trees along the southern fence line of the upper tier. We used whips, or bare-root specimens, ordered from a nursery in the state of Washington. We amended the soil with compost, peat moss, and mulch. Just one seedling died, and after two years the trees have created a green wall that sways in the wind, provides shade, and increases privacy. Talk about being “tucked in.”

Bricks, stones, and other rubble collected from the site line the bed of the black locust grove. Planted as short bare-root whips, the trees grew nearly 20 feet tall in just two years, providing shade and privacy. Photo: Virginia Hamrick

Created the rubble garden.

The bricks and other “junk” that we’d moved to the side? We lugged them up the hill and scattered them at the base of the locust trees. Saved a lot of money (no need to buy mulch), though all of the lifting and schlepping and brick tossing made me hit the Advil hard.

Realized the dream of a plunge pool.

It’s just a galvanized trough. Julie bought it at Southern States. We laid down a few wooden pallets to form a boardwalk that leads to the tub. It sits in the shade of the poplar and magnolia grove. After a day of working your butt off in the hot sun, a cold plunge is heavenly.

Anchored the north side of the upper tier.

We needed a counterpoint across the lawn to provide balance opposite the locust grove, soften up the northern edge, and add more buffering. The solution is a bed bordered by cinder blocks and filled with fence-climbing clematis, blueberry bushes, and strawberry plants—a tri-level composition. Didn’t get to eat a single blueberry, though. The birds beat us to it.

Paid to fence in the work yard, add stairs off the back porch, and install the outdoor shower.

This was another major move, one that Julie had been drawing (and redrawing, over and over again) for a couple of years. Our pal Don, a skilled craftsperson, built a fence along three quarters of the driveway and closed up the end with a galvanized steel gate. There’s still enough room outside the gate for Julie to park. But now the previously underused driveway has become a work yard, with a potting bench and plenty of room for garbage and recycling cans as well as gardening tools and other stuff. Everyone needs a place to put “stuff.” Don made the outdoor shower, using metal plumbing pipes and connectors, based on a simple design by Julie. She bought a solar water heater online. Don bolted it to a pallet. Next, Julie will make canvas panels to enclose the shower. The back stairs are made of concrete block to match those that lead from the lawn to the poplar and magnolia grove.

Built a small greenhouse.

It’s kind of a folly, but it cost less than $125 in materials, including antique windows I found on Facebook Marketplace. I’m decent at carpentry, but it took a group effort to make the thing. I doff my cap and bow to Don, Julie’s neighbor Edward, and her friend and former student Karl Jon, who also created the CAD diagram so you can see how the greenhouse comes together. It now serves as a focal point at the end of the raised stone path.

Fed by a garden hose, an outdoor shower—with canvas walls yet to be installed—is made of plumbing pipes from Lowe’s and a solar water-heating tower anchored to a sturdy wood pallet. Photo: Virginia Hamrick

Oh, right—the stone path!

This took two or three weekends to build. We dug shallow trenches, installed a wooden border with one-by-six-inch boards secured by wooden stakes, and then filled in the base of the walkway with stone dust from Allied Concrete Co., on Harris Street. The treads were a gift from Julie’s old friend Alexander Kitchin, of Fine Concrete, who was unloading unused inventory before he moved his shop. Julie obsessively positioned the slabs and tapped them into place with a rubber mallet.

Added four more trees and pine straw as finishing touches to the upper tier.

As the school year approached, Julie turned her attention away from gardening to preparing to teach. Our last push really just took a couple of hours, planting four tupelo (also known as black gum) trees along the back of the house and covering the ground with long-needle pine straw. In time, the tupelos will provide shade and a partial shroud for the outdoor shower. After many years, they will grow to 50 to 60 feet, and the garden—including inevitable additions and revisions—will mature. In a decade, the landscape will have changed dramatically, but we’re in no hurry. We’ll be happy to witness its gradual transformation.

Greenhouse build

The tiny greenhouse took a weekend to build. It consists of a square base with a central floor support, slats atop the base, four antique window frames with six panes apiece, and sides cut from a single four-by-eight-foot sheet of 3/8-inch plywood. Construction requires a moderate skill level and a little help from your friends (who might handle a circular saw better than you do). All of the materials—from Facebook Marketplace and Lowe’s—cost less than $125.

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Magazines Unbound

Something wild: A native habitat grows in Free Union

Behind the house, a hill tumbles down to a dry creek bed, and then the land rises up to a hilltop that Amy Lewis and her husband, Reid Humphries, have turned into a vast tract of native plants. Photo: Virginia Hamrick

Sweat glistens on Amy Lewis’ brow as she cracks open a bottle of beer in the kitchen of her home in Free Union. It’s late August, and she’s just back from the 1,000-acre Albemarle farm where she maintains the grounds and gardens, her full-time job. At the wooden dining table sits her husband of 21 years, Reid Humphries, and at her feet lie their two Australian shepherds. A hummingbird hovers at the feeder hanging on the back porch.

“Everything you see here, we did,” she says, patting her forehead with a wadded-up paper towel. She sweeps her hand to direct my view out the glass-paned door. The land tumbles down to a dry creek bed and then climbs a broad hillside covered by a sun-drenched thicket of native plants.

Before the sun goes down, Amy Lewis tends to her multi-acre native garden for hours after leaving her full-time job—as the gardener at a 1,000-acre private farm. Photo: Virginia Hamrick

She’s sure they are native plants—with a few invasives to be weeded out—because she and Humphries put them there. They have been tirelessly creating their 11-acre “labor of love” (her words) since 2010. The landscape has become a showcase of cultivated wilderness and environmentally conscious living, so much so that the Piedmont Master Gardeners and Rivanna Garden Club chose it as a site this year in a series of tours of extraordinary domestic green spaces.

Lewis has lived in Charlottesville since 1978, when she moved here with her now ex-husband after he took a job at Georgetown Veterinary Hospital. Humphries, born and raised in Virginia, had been an itinerant carpenter—living and working in Manhattan, Colorado, and Nantucket—before landing in Charlottesville. He met Lewis 25 years ago on a job: She was installing a garden that included a water feature Humphries was building.

After Lewis’ kids moved away—her daughter, 35, now lives in Washington, D.C., and her son, 32, in Denver—she and Humphries, who has a wry and slightly off-color sense of humor, bought the land in Free Union. He likes it because it’s secluded. “My definition of privacy,” he deadpans, “is that I can take a piss off the back porch and not get busted.”

Amy lets that line slide without comment but takes it as a cue to begin our tour of the property. The upper portion of the parcel, in front of the house, has a small orchard, vegetable garden, chicken house, and barn, all built by Humphries, who is a multi-talented craftsman. When their house was being built, they hit rock—dense sandstone—not far beneath the surface, and excavated a great deal of it. Humphries used it to build stone walls that bracket the house—the wall in back is 82 feet long.

Australian shepherds Ollie and Mo trot along the grassy paths and sniff out critters in the tall plants. Photo: Virginia Hamrick

For gardeners, the real show begins at the creek bed, where ferns, bulbs, Virginia bluebells, and woodland phlox have naturalized. Paths of packed soil and mowed grass lead up the hill and into the meadow, a scraggly but beautiful three-and-a-half-acre display of native plants: witch hazel, bee balm, St. John’s wort, plumbago, cedum, aster, prairie grass, coneflower, sumac, and the list goes on. Grassy paths criss-cross the meadow, the plants buffering the sound and providing a green embrace. Butterflies flit around, alighting on flowers. Songbirds provide the soundtrack.

Before the couple cleared that land, it was a livestock pasture that, once abandoned, became overgrown with non-native trees, poison ivy, rosa rugosa, and more. “It was a mess,” Lewis says.

To clean it up, Lewis and Humphries successfully applied for two federal grants to create the native habitat, one from the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, and the other from the Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program.

The funds enabled the couple to realize Lewis’ vision. “I wanted to contain the soil on the hill with natives that have strong root systems,” she says. “I didn’t want a landscape that was tied to plants that require a lot of water and can’t survive on their own.”

Today, the meadow—and most of the property, in fact—consists of plants that not only survive on their own but are deer resistant. They provide an idyllic preserve where birds forage and bees and butterflies thrive, fulfilling their natural duty as pollinators.

The work, usually initiated by Lewis, has been intense for the couple, and the property is always evolving. “She gets this look in her eye,” says Humphries, “and I say, ‘Oh, here we go.’”

“People ask, ‘What’d you do this weekend?’” Lewis says. “I say, ‘Oh, we gardened.’ We’re cheap dates. Our entertainment is built in.”

In the front yard, Reid Humphries, Lewis’ husband of 21 years and a skilled craftsman, built not only the barn but also the rock wall, which is made from stone excavated during construction of the couple’s home. Photo: Virginia Hamrick
Categories
Living

The instant gardener: Fifth Season makes it easy to grow your own

Experts install a four-by-four-foot raised cedar bed at your home, then fill and plant the bed with seasonal produce. Photo: Courtesy Fifth Season Gardening

No green thumb? No problem!

If you love the idea of having fresh veggies and herbswithin easy reach, but you don’t have the time or inclination to plant a garden, Fifth Season has the solution: Garden in a Day. Experts install a four-by-four-foot raised cedar bed at your home, then fill and plant the bed—et voila, instant garden. Fifth Season is taking orders now for the early-spring greens bed, which includes lettuces, kale, sorrel, arugula, and more. The offerings continue in May and September, with plantings of vegetables, herbs, and greens suited to the season. The initial installation costs $379, and customers may choose additional plantings for $99 apiece, or all three for $568. For more information, go to fifthseasongardening.com, or call 293-2332.—Joe Bargmann

Sole owner

Local restaurant guru Will Richey has sold his interest in hot spot Brasserie Saison to co-owner Hunter Smith. The transfer “was always the plan after two years,” Richey says. Smith, who also operates Champion Brewing Company, will now be sole proprietor of the nano-brewery and Euro-style gastropub on the Downtown Mall. Richey will continue on as owner/operator of Ten Course Hospitality and its roster of about a dozen restaurants and service organizations.—Shea Gibbs

Hop to it

Potter’s Craft Cider is now pouring Azacca, a new cider flavored with the hops of the same name. Pressed from 100 percent GoldRush apples, the cider presents lemonade, clementine orange, and pine on the nose; the palate is grassy, slightly bitter, and dry. Azacca hops are named for Azaka Medeh, the harvest spirit of Haitian voodoo mythology, so it’s fitting that the hop oil is steam-distilled in the field, immediately after harvest. Get a taste at the Potter’s Cider Garden at The Bridge, 209 Monticello Rd., on Friday from 4-10pm, Saturday from noon-10pm, and Sunday from noon-4pm.—J.B.

History on the menu

March 23 offers a rare chance to have dinner prepared by one of the most respected food historians in Virginia. Dr. Leni Sorensen, former African American research historian for the Thomas Jefferson Foundation at Monticello, is hosting an intimate meal in her farmstead home featuring recipes from three centuries of Southern women cooks. One course will be prepared from a recipe in the 1770 cookbook Tomatoes for Winter Use, by Harriott Horry. Tickets and information at indigohouse.us.—Simon Davidson

Categories
Living

Lady of the land: Ira Wallace wants to save the world, one seed at a time

Categories
Living

Chips ahoy: The right way to mulch your beds this fall

You probably already know why it’s a good idea to spread mulch on your beds: In addition to keeping them tidy and helping to minimize weeds, a quality mulch also protects and feeds your soil.

But notice I said “quality.” The uniform orange or deep-brown mulches often seen decorating the grounds of gas stations and shopping malls are nothing more than dyed, chipped up wooden pallets. Pallets are often fumigated to prevent the spread of disease organisms when used in international shipping, and the mulches that result may contain older wood that has been pressure-treated with chromated copper arsenate, a known carcinogen. Far too often, what passes for mulch is actually a toxic substance that is highly detrimental to soil health.

There really is no better mulch for perennial beds than composted hardwood chips. They contain ample organic matter to feed soil microorganisms and maintain soil moisture, and they’re already well on their way towards decomposition, which means that they will help to build your soil. And, perhaps best of all, composted wood chips can often be obtained for free from local arborists.

Fall is the ideal time to mulch your beds; the mulch acts as an insulating layer that helps protect plants through the winter, and it’s the ideal time to tend to other tidying activities such as cutting down spent plant material, weeding, and leaf removal.

As you lay down mulch, be careful to avoid piling it around the trunks of trees. You want to avoid creating mulch “volcanoes,” which encourage the development of fungal diseases. Instead, be sure to keep the trunk flare free from mulch, while providing deeper cover further out over the root zone. Lastly, remember that wood chip mulch is really only suitable for perennial plantings. Annual beds, such as vegetable gardens, should be mulched with material that will more readily break down, such as straw, shredded leaf mold, or the best option, cover crop.

Fall-planted potatoes?

I recently received an interesting article on fall-planted potatoes. Typically, potatoes are planted in early spring (St. Patrick’s Day usually feels appropriate), but this method suggests digging deep and wide furrows of about 8 to 10″, lining them with rich organic matter (think grass clippings, home-
made compost, leaf mold, straw, etc.), planting seed potatoes at a spacing of 12″ apart, laying an additional thick layer of organic matter over the potatoes, and then covering with soil.

The biological activity in the organic matter keeps the spuds from freezing, and the resulting harvest is ready far earlier than a spring-planted crop. Supposedly, the plants are much hardier and disease-resistant. I’m planning to give it a whirl this season with a handful of homegrown Yukon Gold potatoes leftover from this summer’s harvest.

Guinevere Higgins is owner of Blue Ridge Backyard Harvest, which provides consultation, design, and installations for home-scale edible gardens. When she’s not gardening, she works in fundraising for the Center for a New American Dream.

BULLETIN BOARD  

Roses are red: Love nature? Can’t get enough couplets and sonnets? Check out Music and Poetry in the Natural World, an event hosted by the Ivy Creek Foundation and local artists, on Sunday, October 19. It’s free for all ages, and will begin at 2pm in the Ivy Creek Natural Center’s education building.

Rollin’ on the river: It’s that time of year again. The Rivanna Conservation Society and Blue Ridge Mountain Sports (BRMS) have teamed up for the annual Rivanna River Sojourn, a journey down everyone’s favorite river. BRMS will provide transportation, guides, safety instructions, and gear, and lunch is included. For more information and to register, visit www.rivannariver.org.

Fun guys: On Saturday, October 18, Sharondale Farm in Keswick will host a workshop on growing gourmet and medicinal mushrooms like oyster, garden giant, shiitake, almond portobello, and reishi. Each participant will go home with an oyster mushroom growing bag. Check out www.sharondalefarm.com/product-category/workshop for more information.

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Organic Lawn Care is Good for Your Family and Your Community

For those who are environmentally conscious, we want to offer some “green” tips on how to keep your lawn healthy and be a good steward of our environment at the same time.

The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that as much as 80 percent of the water falling on lawns—from rain or sprinklers—doesn’t stay there.  Instead it runs off carrying fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides into our creeks, ponds, and rivers.

One tactic is to reduce the area of lawn. Take former Charlottesville mayor Kay Slaughter, for example. While she has a lawn at the rear of her home, her front yard is a cheerful symphony of easy-care perennials, flowering trees such as lilacs and white-blossomed fringe trees, and shrubs including azalea and butterfly bush.

“The oak leaf hydrangea are white with pinkish touches,” she says. “The early daffodils are followed by tulips, iris, peonies, cone flowers, daylilies, sedum, roses, and red bee balm.” She also plants herbs like basil and oregano as annuals.

Still, most people, including Slaughter, want some lawn area for a game of croquet or badminton and have that lawn safe for children and pets to play. An “organic” lawn is healthier and better for the environment.

“Organic lawn care is important for reducing pollutants in our environment,” declares Nancy Whitman, a Master Gardener with the Piedmont Master Gardeners chapter.

“That’s very important because what does in our water ends up in the Chesapeake Bay,” chimes in Master Gardener Penny Crisp. “Being organic might take a little more effort than using traditional methods, but if you start by seeding properly and keeping your grass healthy, you force the weeds not to show up.”

Where do I start?

“Your first step is a soil sample,” says Whitman. “We have little boxes people can come and get, fill with soil, and send off to Virginia Tech. VT will send back a report with feedback about what supplementation might be needed and information on changing the Ph, if necessary, to maximize your grass.”

The next step is to use seed that is well suited to your yard, most likely a mix of warm- and cool-season grasses. “You might change the ratio by region,” continues Whitman, “and it makes a difference whether you have lots of sun or shade.” Again, get information on the best grass for your area from your Extension Office.

Having a healthy lawn reduces the need for weed killers and pesticides. And if you have pests, you know whom to call. “Your extension service might have some organic remedies depending on what pests you have,” says Whitman. “Ground-up corn is one example. It can smother pests like grubs, but it won’t hurt your worms.”

Here are some other important tips:

Don’t mow more than 1/3 of the length of the blade of grass.

Leave clippings on the lawn or, if you have not applied herbicides, add them to your compost heap. This lessens the need for fertilizer, especially nitrogen. It’s estimated that leaving clippings on the lawn will reduce the need for nitrogen applications 20-30 percent after the first year and 35-45 percent after the second year.

Use a self-mulching blade on your lawnmower and mow 3 to 6 inches in height. This will capture and filter rainwater, slowing it from running off.  “Never mow your lawn bald,” urges Crisp.  “It puts too much stress on it.”

Fertilize when grass is growing and can actually use the nutrients. Choose fertilizers with 30 percent or more slowly available nitrogen.

Never over fertilize. More is not better.

An excellent way to keep your lawn healthy is to compost it 2 to 3 times a year rather than using chemical-based fertilizers. Compost includes nutrients like nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium, and often has trace elements you don’t ordinarily find in commercial fertilizers. Make your own compost or buy it.

Spread the compost evenly about 1/4 inch thick so you don’t smother your grass and the nutrients will enter the lawn more quickly. Water the compost in for 5-20 minutes. Mow only after a week to ten days.

Following these pointers will make your lawn green and “green,” too.

Glenn Pribus and his wife live in Albemarle County near Charlottesville where he leaves the clippings on their very small lawn when he mows.