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PostPosted: Mon Mar 06, 2006 9:10 am 
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Location: Mansfield,TEXAS
I am interested in starting an organic garden. I am new to the natural way and would appreciate any advise on how to develop my soil for planting. I have an area of 568 sf.

Long Live the Natural Way


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PostPosted: Mon Mar 06, 2006 4:44 pm 
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If you have reason to think you might have recently killed off some soil microbes, then you might need to apply compost. How might you have killed the microbes? You might have applied a fungicide like any commercial fungicide, or sulfur, or baking soda. These are the biggies. Or you might have some other sort of chemical spill. If so, please write back and explain so we can help specifically with that. Otherwise, you probably don't need any compost to get you started. I know, I'm a heretic.

The big thing with organic methods is to avoid using any synthetic chemicals for fertilizing, insect control, weed control, or disease control. Synthetic chemicals have names that are hard to pronounce. Names like ammonium sulfate, paradichlorobenzene, and others. Organic materials have names that are easy to pronounce like corn, molasses, alfalfa, seaweed, coffee, and many others. One exception to this rule is the mineral, glauconite, pronounced GLAW-ko-nite. Since it is hard to pronounce we call it greensand, because it is a green looking sand.

How do you get started? My personal opinion is that you do not till anything into your soil. If your soil is "compacted" (and most soil is not), you can soften it with a very slow application of water for a week. I'm talking about stretching out 50 feet of black plastic soaker hose and turning the hose on to a drip-drip-drip, less than a stream; and leaving it for a week. That slow application of water simulates a long term rain and develops a herd of beneficial fungi in your soil. Next, after you have soft soil, or even before depending on the speed with which you wish to start, dust your soil with an organic fertilizer like any of the commercially bagged ones or, my favorite, ground corn meal like the stuff you eat. You can find feed grade corn meal at your local feed store for a lot less than the food grade corn meal sold in groceries. The application rate is 10-20 pounds per 1,000 square feet. In your case shopping at the grocery store might be fine. To plant your veggies I promote anything that doesn't disturb the soil. Poke a hole into the soil with a spike to plant seeds. Dig a small hole to plant rooted plants.

This is only to get you started. Once you get started, you will have a lot more questions. Feel free to write back, or even to comment/question what I've said. I'm not the all-knowing-master of this stuff. These are my opinions. Howard will suggest buying greensand, dried molasses, and lava sand, but I don't see the need unless you have specific issues. Just start feeding the soil with real food (like corn meal), and everything will improve dramatically.

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PostPosted: Thu Mar 09, 2006 8:16 am 
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I have been in my house since '02 and have done nothing in regards to my landscaping. In that time period I have been concentrating on developing my lawn organically. My neighbors (on both sides) have major lawn problems and it has taken me a few growing seasons to get my lawn under control. I am proud to say that the organic program works brilliantlly. The first season I started out with synthetics and nearly destroyed my back yard. On my way to church, I heard the "Natural Way" on the radio and figured it was worth a try. I have a very healthy lawn (with the occasional weed) but it came at the sacrifice of my landscaping. Since I only have to maintain my lawn I would like to concentrate on my landscaping this season.

Right now I have some ground cover (Cedar Mulch) on top of some weed screen. I also have some shrubs (that I cannot name). I placed the weed screen down last growing season to keep the weeds and grass out until I was ready to start working on my landscaping.

I can find out what shrubs that I currently have planted, I'm not concerned with that and they for the most part are healthy. I tried to plant flowers a couple of times and had no success. I believe it is because I have done nothing organically to the landscape areas of my house. I just want to start with something pretty generic until I develop my confidence and knowledge on landscape/gardening.

1. I have no weeds or grass in the landscape area. 2. Do I need to develope the health of the soil. 3. What do I use to develope the health. 4. What is the best time frame to start planting. Again, I'm not picky as to what to plant. My main concern is the health of the soil.

Can you help me?


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PostPosted: Fri Mar 10, 2006 10:30 pm 
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Location: Carrollton,TEXAS
Hi David,

Thanks for the simple advice on amending the soil. I have about 100 sf of soil I need to amend before I start planting, and I was getting a little confused on what product I need to add. After reading the info on this site, I figured I need to add molasses, expanded shale, greensand and cornmeal. However, your advice seems so much simplier. However, what kind of cornmeal do you mean? Is horticultural cormeal the same?

I also just got my soil tested and the results are sandy-loam soil, alkaline ph 7.5, low in nitrates, phosphorus, calcium and poor in iron, manganese, and zinc. Will cornmeal be enough as an amendment?

I want to plant roses, cammilas, rose of sharon and maybe some azales. Are these plants good to group together? Do they require acidic soil??

Thank you


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PostPosted: Wed Mar 15, 2006 2:23 pm 
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If there is a way to do organic gardening easier than I do it, I'll switch. I'm all about the "No-Hassle Way." I can see you've been reading Howard. He's all about selling products. If you used everything from his catalog you would be doing something all the time. I don't have time for that.

Corn meal: The corn meal from the store is food grade. The corn meal at the feed store is feed grade. The difference is in how the grain and ground grain is stored after it is harvested. Either one is good for your lawn. There is a similar material called corn GLUTEN meal. This is the result of "wet milling" some of the carbohydrate off of the corn kernel to make corn starch or something. The material left over is called corn GLUTEN meal because it has more protein in it relative to the overall weight. So CGM is a high power version of corn meal. It costs more, too. CGM has been researched at the University of Iowa where they found if you use enough of it (about 2-3 times more than you need as a fertilizer) then it will help keep seeds from sprouting and growing into plants. So CGM is thought of as an organic preemergent material. U of I patented this idea and they collect royalties off of every bag marked as a preemergent, so if you can find CGM that does not have the pre-em marking, that bag will cost at least $15 less than another bag.

Is corn meal enough: While your soil might be weak in the nutrients, organic fertilizers have them all. Why? Because they grew up in soil where the nutrients were and they are stored in the plant. So even the micro-nutrients are in there. But to continue, corn meal is probably not enough. Why do I preach corn meal all the time? Well, there are people using chemical programs right now who are considering changing to organic. If they read that you have to use corn, soy, cottonseed, alfalfa, and milo to fertilize, they would be turned off. Corn meal is fine. If you want to get a little more exotic, it really does help to feed your microbes a variety of proteins. You can try corn meal this year to start and move to alfalfa next year. Then try soy or cottonseed. They all work, but I think a mix is better.

Some of the plants you have picked will not thrive in your soil. I believe camellias and azaleas like more acidic conditions AND more neutral-to-acidic water than you can give them. The number 1 rule of gardening is to plant plants which are adapted to YOUR [soil and climate] conditions. If you grew those in pots of acidic soil and used water treated with apple cider vinegar to get the pH down into the high 5's to 6's range, then maybe you could grow them and be happy. To me that's a lot of extra hassle.

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PostPosted: Thu Mar 16, 2006 1:17 pm 
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Speaking of simple, adding humate to the cornmeal is a bangup and inexpensive thing to do. Like Dave, I am all for the easy methods of maintaining organically managed lawns and gardens. Each time I fertilize, I add cornmeal and humate at a 50/50 ratio and they make up about 30% of what I put on my soil. Everything gets the same mix and all the plants seem to love it, from the turf to the herbs.

Why not just use the organic fertilizer? Because starting an organic program or remediating a neglected or "weed & feed" abused area takes a little more. This is the least expensive, easiest and most effective thing I've found to do.

Hope that helps! :D
Kathe


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PostPosted: Thu Mar 16, 2006 1:37 pm 
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Another tip: If you can get hold of a Texas SmartScape CD, it will help a lot in your plant selection. Go for perennials for less work and long lasting enjoyment, and a variety of color and foliage.

Check the sun exposure, water needs, and soil type before you buy.
It will help if your plants are appropriate for the locations you plant them.
Good luck and I hope you have fun!
Kathe


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PostPosted: Thu Mar 16, 2006 10:29 pm 
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Kathe Kitchen,
You said why not to just use an organic fertilizer, I thought cornmeal is a fertilizer. I thought any kind of grain is a fertilzer, so I chose cornmeal because it has antifungal property also. What is in organic fertilzer anyways ?Thanks.


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 Post subject: Fertilizers
PostPosted: Fri Mar 17, 2006 2:36 pm 
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Organic fertilizers contain a wide variety of materials, including composted poultry manure, fish, seaweed, other composted materials, humates, trace minerals, molasses, etc. They are derived from many materials, from sludge to all kinds of organic sources I've already mentioned and because of this they offer a wide variety of nutrients.

Cornmeal or other grains do offer some nutrients but they cannot offer the wide variety that formulated organic fertilzers provide. Liken it to putting yourself or your animals on just one food - even if it is relatively nutrient packed, eating just one food will leave gaps in your overall nutriton program and it is the same for plants. Each has basic nutrients required for life, as well as naturally derived nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium (NPK) as is listed in the three numbers on the label of all fertilizers - mistakenly identified as the only "necessary" nutrients for healthy plant growth over a century ago. Because they are derived from a more broad source, organic fertilizers also have zinc, copper, molybdenum, calcium, iron, and compounds that are needed for health and growth in turf, trees and plants of all kinds. That is true for life in general. Make sense?

You will note that most long time organic gardeners vary the types of fertilizers they apply, or supplement with other materials from time to time. That's because they know this to be a truth. As I always say, the final proof is in your own experiment. Try it and see what happens.

Hope that helps!
Kathe :D


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