London Community Resource Center Garden Tips from Beth Austin

PREPARING THE SOIL: Tools – shovel, culivator, trowel, kneeler. Nice for weeding is a hoe – scuffle my fav. I don't really like garden rakes. Find what's comfortable for you. Paint them a bright color. There's a lot of organic matter plowed under each fall at the gardens. Rotten tomatoes and pumpkin vines… over the years this has improved the soil in these garden plots. Two schools of thought about digging: current belief is that the less disturbance the better.

There's no need to dig and dig – soil structure is better left alone. Just dig where you need to level soil or create a good bed or a row for plants or seeds. It's very important to wait untill the soil is fairly dry. Never dig around in wet soil, especially if it's clayey. Don't even walk around on it.

My first trip in I'll mark out the basic plan, create some rows or squares by hilling them up 6"-8" and flattening them on top. I'll make a row about 18" wide or a square 4' on each side. Thames Garden is wet, and trenches between rows is helpful in early spring crops. The weeds take hold really early, so go back for weeding a couple of times in May before setting out plants.

PLANNING YOUR PLOT: I've done straight rows like a farmer and I've done creative plans. Biggest thing to remember is your reach. Think about being able to get in and pick comfortably. Things get really big. There should be 2' between rows. It's hard to reach in more than 4'.

I overplant to keep weeds down. Your plants will grow and shade the plot and choke out weeds. I shoot for a modified square foot gardening plan. This is a system you can read about online or in books from the library. It's a way of maximizing production in a small space.

When arranging your plan think about your taller and shorter plants and sun direction. You don't want your sunflowers to shade your tomatoes. Know where north is and put tall things on that end of the garden.

If you're growing corn, you'll do better with a box, rather than a row for pollination. Since I only have a dozen plants, I'll still had pollinate to ensure good results. I'll grab some pollen from the tassels and sprinkle it on the silks.

Do you want bush beans or pole beans? Let beans climb corn to save space. Pole beans require a structure to grow on. There are bush peas as well, that don't need a trellis. Bush varieties of peas and beans typically yield one picking and then one lighter picking. If you want a longer harvest, choose pole or climbing varieties or plant bush varieties successively. Easy supports for climbing varieties are constructed with poles or twigs. You can make teepees, or maypoles, with one pole and string down to the ground in a circle around it. Rows of peas can be lined on each side with 4' -5' twiggy branches. Or they can be fashioned into cages with the peas inside. Push your poles and supports at least 18" into the ground. Another source said to pick a stake 2/3 the height of the pea plant and push 1/4 of it into the ground. Sounds like a good rule of thumb for a lot of thngs.

There are smaller versions of cukes and zukes. Some structures can be made easily with bamboo poles and twine, or found twigs at the garden site. Look around the garden for good ideas to steal.

Some use limbs to stake tomatoes. Whatever you stake with, stake them at least 4 feet tall, and two stakes are better than one. Tomatoes eat those Canadian Tire store cages for a quick snack. Visit your tomatoes often to tie them up as they grow.

Keep a ziplock baggie at the garden full of twist ties or a cut up stocking. Know your tomato: determinate vs. indeterminate.

Determinate means the plant grows, then fruits once, then dies. Sometimes people have determinant tomatoes and they think they are sick and dying! Indeterminate means the plant bears all season – and is usually a bigger, more sprawling plant.

CHOOSING CROPS: One aspect of organic gardening can be the choice of plants and seeds. There are organic seeds fairly easy to find. I don't know about plants. Organic gardeners are concerned with preserving heritage varieties which haven't been hybridized. That may influence your choices. By contrast, choosing a modern variety that has had disease and pest resistance bred into it allows you to practice organic cultivation of these varieties and that's good too.

Buying seeds offers you so much more variety – so many types of tomato! Can buy some veggies as plants, but it's the tip of the iceberg.

The easiest crop? Tomatoes! Everyone loves tomatoes and they're easy to grow. Garden centers are stocking good varieties of types. Plant what you like to eat. Peas are delicious, but it takes a lot of peas to make a crop. Corn is tough – it gets vandalized and animals love it. But I have seen some very successful crops at Thames.

Look at your crop and whether it's suited to London. Melons are tough. Peppers are tough. Any hot weather crop with a long "days to maturity" is dicey.

Here we have about 150 frost free days of growing season. That sounds like a melon with a requirement of 100 days ought to work. But a lot of our days are cool. We just don't get the prolonged heat required. For peppers, I've heard cool nights keep them from setting fruit. Don't plant outside until over night temps are above 55 or 13 C. Choose early maturing varieties.

Starting seeds indoors is rather a whole other talk, but it's a worthwhile venture. It buys you time and gives you choice.

Count back from the date of last frost – May 10 to determine when to start. Given them lots of light.

What to plant as seed directly and what to buy as plants?

In general, the large the seed the better it does as a direct sow. And in our climate, anything that can be started early or purchased reasonably as a plant is worth it. You have to be prepared to babysit those seedlings – they are needier than larger plants.

A lot depends on luck and the weather. I had peas and lettuces wash away one year. I've learned to hill up my rows a bit. I have learned to plant pumpkin directly and let nature take its course, otherwise you get pumpkins in August. Pumpkins are one of the most vandalized crops. I hide mine under my corn. Also highly vandalized, but I grow small ears of popcorn that don't tempt thieves.

Finally: Don't forget to include some herbs and flowers. They're pretty, useful and contribute to pest management.

PLANTING OUT: Wait til after May 24. Pick some cool weather crops like lettuces, spinach, peas and plant those in the garden early May to keep yourself from getting tempted. Harden off all your plants, whether your own or purchased plants, for a few days at home, outside near the house, where you can drag them indoors if the nights are cool. Start them off gently, in the shade and build slowly.

With purchased plants, talk to the garden center and find out if they're being left out unprotected over night. If so, than that's less work for you, they're good to go. Conversely, have they just arrived fresh off the truck? If so they may still be sensitive to sun and cold.

On planting day pick a cloudy day. Water your plants, and water your hole! Leggy tomatoes can be laid out on their sides and their long stems buried. They'll root for a sturdier plant. Keep up with weeds while plants are young. Mulch!

Someone once said if you weed thru June you can take the rest of the summer off. That may be a little pie in the sky, but there's some truth to it. By July your plants will be shading the weed and competing with them for water.

WEED / PEST MANAGEMENT: I haven't had trouble with bugs or bunnies or raccoons in my experiences at Thames. It's amazing. My biggest headache is weeds. As mentioned before – overplant. Don't keep great patches of bare earth. Mulch with leaves or grass clippings from home. Use cardboard to line your paths or between rows. Pizza boxes are perfect! Weed often! The scuffle hoe is great – very comfortable. Or just let the grass come in the paths. Your foot traffic will help keep it down. It all gets plowed under to improve soil quality.

Bunnies: Try low wire fences – they don't like to jump. Make a spray of garlic and onion cooked together and strained. Use it often. It tastes bad.

Raccoons: Good luck. They're smart and fearless.

Insects: Best defense is a good offense. Plant things that attract good insects that will eat the bad insects or plants that will repel bad insects. When bugs get out of hand it means there is an imbalance. There are ways to get that balance back without using chemicals. These include dill and coriander (in bloom), chives, parsley Nasturtiums, garlic for aphids and squash bugs Onions keep carrot fly away.

Radishes in the cuke hill repel cucumber beetle

Beans repel Potato Beetle.

Interplant head lettuce and radish to repel flea beetle in radish

French marigolds kill nematodes in the soil and

repel other insects like the bean beetle with their scent. Plant with tomato.

Cutworms: Use an oak leaf mulch.

Herbs in general and some flowers will attract bees, butterflys, moths that will pollinate your veggies.

Follow crop rotations as well. Changing the garden plan year to year moves heavy feeders around to other parts of the plan and replacing them with crops that feed the soil. In general, cabbages, leaf veggies, cukes, squash and corn should be followed with beans and peas which add nitrogen to the soil with their roots. These crops should be followed by light feeders like the root veggies.

Now in community gardening, many of us move year to year anyway. Some gardeners swear by moving their tomatoes each year, I've found sources that say it's fine not to – that they like to stay put and get composted by their own stalks and leaves. If you get blight, definitely move them the next year and try to destroy (garbage) the remains.

Intercropping: several crops grown in the same space and harvested at different times. After the first crop is harvested, the second crop remains. This is a great way to manage pests and increase yields if 20 x 20 just isn't getting it done for you!

Sow carrot and leek together. Leek repels carrot fly, matures later, after carrot harvested.

Spinach and beans: Spinach shades beans. Cukes, squash, beans, like shade under corn. Beans feed corn peas and carrots.

There are some combinations that are bad due to chemicals excreted by leaves, roots, or by the balance of soil microorganisms that different plants influence. Peas or beans do badly with onion. Keep tomato away from cabbage family.

FEEDING: As I mentioned – after several years of having gardens on these sites, and the turnover of the garden waste each year, the soil is pretty good. If you want to give things a boost, there are some natural alternatives. Organic fertilizers need soil microorganisms to break them down, so the soil must be warm. It also takes awhile, so the nutrients may not be made available to the plant when it needs it. You also have to read the label, as some compounds are higher in some nutrients than others.

Packages are marked with 3 numbers – N, Phos, and Potassium, green, vegetative growth, roots and fruits, and overall plant health and vitality.

Blood meal supplies nitrogen and iron.

There are fish-based fertilizers, but they tend to be expensive. They too provide nitrogen and even better phosphorous.

Bone meal provides phosphorous and calcium which is good for tomatoes.

Potassium can be found in the seaweed formulas, as well as potash and wood ash (good, fireplace ash, not pressure treated or painted wood).

Banana peels and home compost provides phosphorous. Manures vary in the nutrient breakdown, depending on the animal.

They also build soil structure.

Epsom salts are traditionally used when planting tomatoes – it gives them a boost of magnesium and helps with blossom end rot.

Nothing should be added to the soil at the garden in significant quantities without a soil test. And I bet there's been very few of those. As I said, the soil in the gardens is good from good practices and the return of organic matter to the soil.

Mychorrizal fungi comes as a powder to stimulate developing roots. It helps the plant make use of nutrients in the soil. I tried it on half my tomato plants one year and noticed no difference.

WATERING: Hand watering is one of the best ways to practice conservation. The water reaches just each plant, not the rows and paths. You'll get a nice workout out dipping your can in the barrels. When I plant, I try to keep watering in mind by creating a little well around each plant to catch and keep my watering or rainwater.