Week 4 – Co-Curricular Community Gardens Stewardship

Collaborative Community Garden

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I’ve noticed this week in particular how my community garden time and POF shifts have a certain synergy to them. Caleb mentioned, rightly so, that this is a natural consequence of working with the earth and the ebb and flow of growing food. This week, transplanting leaf lettuces was a huge priority on the farm; these fast-growing greens are essential to keeping our farm stand stocked until some of our other early veggies come in.

I was excited to try some intensive intercropping with head lettuce and cabbage in two full plots; we arranged the cabbages in well spaced rows and added lettuce transplants to the arrangement in a diamond pattern. We also built two deeply trenched rows for potatoes, which we willed with fingerlings that Caleb saved from last season; after placing the potatoes in the trenches, we lightly covered them in soil and will bury them as they begin to form leaves.

“On the fringes of modern intensive agriculture, intercropping is important in many subsistence or low-input/resource-limited agricultural systems. By allowing genuine yield gains without increased inputs, or greater stability of yield with decreased inputs, intercropping could be one route to delivering ‘sustainable intensification’.”

Rob W. Brooker et al.: Improving intercropping: a synthesis of research in agronomy, plant physiology and ecology

I’ve also enjoyed watching all of our seeds sprout: Dragon carrots, hakurei turnips, phacelia, scarlet runner beans, white clover, and flax. I don’t know much about flax, so I hope to spend some time in week five studying it’s cultivation and uses.

As our beans will require good support, I’m going to donate two large wooden trellises to our project. I reclaimed these trellises from discarded queen sized box springs, and have used them several times, but this year they are sitting against the fence waiting for a job.

My excitement last week for water was met with irrigation problems today; a section of the line had to be dug-up and replaced on the farm, causing us to lose water for a couple of days. Caleb came prepared with 5 gallons of water, which we used to try out the fermented plant juice we made last week. We’re expecting rain all weekend long; how lovely for our transplants to get a good drink.

I took a moment to stop by the herb garden during my POF farm shift. I’ve enjoyed watching the space transform, and have started enjoying my breaks on one of the benches there. It’s amazing haw cut-off from everything I feel behind that hedge.

It’s also a plus that I can stop by and say hello to Le’Allen and Alegra as I’m passing by. On days where I miss community garden time because of scheduling conflicts, I still feel very connected to the work.

Do’patsa Makihi’kě: Four-Vegetables-Mixed

Ashley and I met at the garden on Monday afternoon and worked for about four hours prepping our garden plot. We started double digging from the west end of the bed, moving east and squaring off the edges as we went. Due to the squaring, we’ve added another foot to the width of the bed.

After removing the occultation tarp, we were greeted by several garter snakes. I’ve enjoyed seeing them so much; in POF, we were moving a tarp to a new field the other day and there were 7 of them under my corner of the tarp. My group spent and few moments picking them up by the tail and moving them to safety before dragging the tarp. As we were working, the biggest garter snake I have ever seen crawled right by me and into the sunny compost bin.

In taking a closer look at our surroundings, we discovered a lovely little apple tree being choked by weeds behind the greenhouse. The tree was nearly parallel to the ground, but in full bloom. Ashley and I took a bit of time to reclaim the tree; we found a metal frame to hold it upright, cleared the weeds, mulched over it with comfrey, and watered. Nearby, behind the compost bin, we took a closer look at an overgrown raspberry patch and made plans to reclaim it. We also discussed the possibility of adding another garden patch to our project, possibly to the direct east or south of our current plot.

Ashley brought two large bags full of dirty duck bedding: perfect to add a little nitrogen and retain moisture in the soil as mulch. As we choose a design, build mounds, and prepare to plant, we will rake back the straw as to not combine it with our soil, which could tie-up the nitrogen.

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