Week 6 – Co-Curricular Community Garden Project

Week 6 theme: No-till bed prep, nutrient cycling, transplanting, living-green mulch

(Remember to check the weather on a regular basis to stay informed on what’s comin’ up!)

NOAA – click for weather

AGweatherNet – click for weather

Readings for the Week:

• Chapter 7 – (pp 69-74) – Building Soils for Better Crops

1:1 Planning and Preparing (what’s coming up?)

We have just entered the glorious month of May and perhaps the time of flash frosts and turbulent weather is nearly an after thought. Checking an online farmer’s almanac will show you that the last frost date, on average, is May 4th, and for growers, this means that we can begin to think about prepping the fields for the crops that don’t enjoy colder temperatures. Since we are planting outside, without any season extension/weather barriers, I have planned on waiting until the middle of May – at the earliest – to consider transplanting crops like tomatoes, eggplant, or peppers.

With Summer around the corner, and all of our prepared beds occupied with growing crops, it is time to prepare more planting space. The open space that is remaining in our garden plot was never tilled, but rather covered with a black plastic tarp, in hopes of knocking back existing foliage. Without having checked on the soil condition in a few weeks, I imagine that we will be following a very similar method for preparing our beds as we have been following since the beginning.

The grass, comfrey, and morning glory that exist underneath the tarp will have been bleached and will be long and scrawny, as it has had nearly no direct sunlight since February. As long as the soil isn’t holding too much moisture, I expect that we will just have to turn the topsoil, remove noxious roots/plants, add some compost, and use the broad-fork to reach to the deeper horizons.

Once we have built a few more beds, there are more transplants that are ready to be thrown in the ground!!

~Tuesday (5/4)~

Once we arrive on Tuesday, we will start by pulling off the tarp and looking at the state of the plants and soil. After we have determined that the soil isn’t too wet, we can begin digging and removing the weeds. Depending on the state of the already-planted beds, we may need to task someone with weeding them clean of that obnoxious kale!!

And lastly, after the great kale slaughter of May 1st, there is also a massive pile of kale trees that will need to be relocated from where it is sitting at this moment.

~Thursday (5/6)~

Thursday will be much of the same, but we will hopefully get to begin by transplanting some frisee and collards. It may be ambitious, but it would be incredible if we could finish building all of the beds by the end of this coming weekend! Here’s to some long hard days of shoveling!

1:2 Tending and Management (what we did)

I think that there was something in the wind, or in the rain this week, that brought on some hard times to everyone that I had talked with. There are just some weeks of the year that seem to be harder than the others, and this was one of those weeks..

That all being said, I was glad to have my peers around, and I am glad that we were able to all step out of our minds for a bit and play outside, in the dirt. After-all, the weather was very agreeable, if not a little turbulent (suits me just right), and the garden space is looking vibrant and alive. Through it all, we were able to get some good progress accomplished in our plot!

I’ve said it before, and I will say it again: the frequent shifting from warm rains to cloudless sun is paradise (our weather over the last few weeks) for spring crops. The garden has been thriving, and the growth of the crops is palpable; peas have doubled in size, turnips are starting to enlarge, salad mix is nearly mature, and we haven’t even filled our entire space yet!

On Tuesday we added another bed and did some weeding, as well as spent a good time, quite necessarily catching up and checking in. With several students unable to make it to the meet-up time, we were left with a skeleton crew, and it felt good to move slow and take in the garden more mentally than physically.

Thursday was the truly productive day of the week – we had everyone at class, the morning was mild and beautiful, we had some great looking transplant ready to go into the ground, and I personally felt very ready to get a lot of work done.

By the end of Thursday, we had added 2 more beds, making 3 total for the week. The untilled ground is definitely more difficult to work with, but it just means that we all have to more a little more slowly, breaking up the surface clumps of roots. We also got all of the beds nicely weeded, making the planting rows look clean and tidy, with the carrots receiving a very necessary weeding.

Lastly: into the new beds we prepped, we transplanted collards and curly endive into one, and Kohlrabi, spinach, and arugula into the other. This leaves one more bed that I will transplant onions into either this weekend, or on the next Tuesday with my peers.

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And finally, a little parting gift for this week in a photo that I took of some a wedge of soil that I pulled up with my spade; Dock (red root crown) and Buttercup (purple root crown). I find the contrast of colors in this shot to be stunning.

1:3 Shishito Pepper Trial

I have been patting myself on the back this week as I begin making plans to enter the trial field and prep the ground for the peppers. This self-congratulation comes from the fact that I have already done much of the time consuming work that usually preludes planting at the Evergreen Organic Farm. Back in January, following the conclusion of last year’s radicchio field trial, I cleaned up the plot of all existing weeds/crops/supplies/unwanteds, and covered the field with an occultation tarp. Being covered for this extended period of time (especially during some warmer months), once the tarp is removed from the field, I will have a clean, warm, and active soil that will require little work to prep.

As the peppers begin sending out the first of their true leaves, I anticipate the coming field prep , sometime in the next two weeks. My plan is to add some compost to the field and turn the top layer of soil with a power harrow. Since this harrowing will surely bring new weed-seeds to the light, I want to give ample time for these to germinate so that I can eradicate them before transplanting the peppers into the field. If all goes according to plan, I may even have time to sow a living green mulch (white clover??) at the time of transplanting.

With the Seedlinked app up and running, I have been able to start recording the info for the trial up to this point!!

1:4 Mentorship Reflection

This week was ever-so tough and troubling; I seemed to have buckled under the weight of some personal tribulations and thus needed to take some time to break down so that I could stand back up. Although the time spent working with my peers, and working for my credits was miraculously still productive, I had to persevere through some heaviness that I wasn’t expecting.

I know that I am not alone in this. From what I could observe, this week was a tough one for many of the people in my life. I think that isn’t uncommon for hard times to visit many people at similar time, especially in a small community of individuals that surround themselves with similar drives and energies. At the very least, we are able to stand in solidarity through these hard times, supporting each other at some, and giving space at others.

Through it all, I pushed myself to rise and show up at the level that I could allow for, while attempting to give myself some grace towards the pressure that I normally put on myself. What I mean by this is that I normally erect some sort of façade when I am talk to a group of people that are looking to me for explanations. This façade isn’t fully sustainable but I feel like it is my way of keeping myself on my toes when I am put into vulnerable situations such as this. This week, however, I didn’t have the energy to put up these protective barriers, and I didn’t have the confidence that I normally conjure in these moments of public speaking. And yet, without these barriers and confidence, we were still able to accomplish a good amount of work.

As I write this, I am realizing that there must be a middle ground between this idea of carrying on with a façade week by week, and not having the willpower to fill my rolls and responsibilities. I want to get to a more natural rhythm where I am not having to get myself into some unsustainable headspace to get up and talk to a group of people – but as I learn, practice, and get me sea-legs (if you will), I know that there will be times where I don’t entirely feel like my natural self and I am calmed by this thought.

Practice makes habit,

butter and Jam on hot rolls.

Work like a rabbit.