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Lets step back and look at the main intention that guides us and our fellow citizens here in the US. I think it is safe to say, that money (cha-ching) and greed rule the day. And the results are, to quote Annie Leonard, that we are trashing the planet, trashing each other, and not even having any fun doing it. By flailing around in the hamster wheel system of money and stuff, at the end of the day, we have very little time, very little energy, very little community, very little beauty. In short, many of us are deeply impoverished. I think it is safe to say, that for the average citizen, our lives and our landscapes often do not bring us the deep joy and satisfaction that we crave in life. In focusing purely on the finite, superficial ‘material’ rewards or outcomes, we often neglect to listen and follow the infinite possibilities of our deeper passions, our yearnings and our dreams
To go back the discussion on vision and intention that I mentioned in Part I James Stark spoke about the importance of focus and clarity. To paraphrase what he said: “The Universe does not work with ambiguity. If you have ambiguity in your vision the Universe cannot give you what you want”. Now I don’t buy completely into some of these “mind over matter” ideologies, but they do bring our attention to the importance of focused vision. There are some very practical and very powerful truths that we bring forth when we define our intentions.
1) Clarity of vision will fire up that massively creative and powerful brain of yours and turn it towards finding the possible ways to achieve that vision. Choice can be psychologically overwhelming and even downright depressing (as is demonstrated in this episode of Radiolab). So by really getting down to the core of your vision and defining what it is you are seeking to achieve (in your garden design, life, whatever!) you are allowing your mind to discard oodles of irrelevant information and process new and old information in the defined context of your vision. Our brain is quite adept when it comes to analyzing, sifting and contextualizing data, so give it something to chew on and put it to work!
2) By giving our dreams more shape and definition, the steps we need to take become much clearer and leave less space for aimless wandering. Again, ambiguity may leave us with too many choices. If I go beyond “gardening with native plants” in my garden design and instead decide to try and revive plants that were native to the San Jose area AND highly valued by the Muwekma tribe for food, medicine or materials (of course these will overlap considerably, if not completely), my path becomes a lot clearer. I will need to get in contact with ecologists specializing in this region, I will need to talk with people within the Muwekma tribe to see if they are willing to share their lore and management practices, and I can explore books like Kat Anderson’s “Tending the Wild” (which I HIGHLY recommend). If there are gaps in the aesthetic or conceptual design of the garden, I can then readjust my vision and pull in choices that are not in that narrow focus, but are still compatible with the overarching vision of the garden.
3) When we focus and strengthen our vision, we will naturally gravitate towards the resources and communities that we need and they will naturally gravitate towards us. Others will share a a common vision or intersecting interests and will bring wonderful and surprising contributions. There is no real magic in this, it is simply the benefit that clarity brings. When your dreams are more clearly pronounced, it allows others to be inspired and find their own ways of helping you succeed. Often these beautiful intersections will be of mutual benefit to you and those who have come along side you.
4) We shape the world according to what we believe. Ghandi saw the possibility of a just world, Hitler saw the opportunity for supreme domination. Both of them believed so strongly in their vision that they brought mind-boggling changes to their world. It is important to acknowledge that the power of intention, cuts both ways. But it is also important to realize that within each of us lies the power to be the Ghandi of our generation (or another Hitler), but are we brave enough to use that power? Even in the context of landscape and garden design…..can we be bold enough to let our yards and our lives be everything we want them to be?
My hope is that we find the gumption to just do it, and that we take the time to deeply contemplate our motives and focus our intentions on bringing in rejuvenation, joy and abundance to ourselves, our communities and our earth.
But that’s enough philosophy….next post (I promise) will be about bringing these lofty ideas down to earth and I’ll talk about some ways of letting the creative juices flow and internalizing our intentions so that we start to achieve our dreams even in our sleep…(yes, really!) Stay tuned.
[simage=73,288,n,left] Finally, I can sit down at home, take a breath and look around me. It has been a really intense couple of weeks. I feel it in the tightness and weight of my body which is slowly unwinding as I rest and tend to my neglected household. Over the past two weeks so much has happened: my grandmother passed away after a long battle with Parkinsons, I began full time work at my old job, shot up to Grass Valley for Grandma’s funeral, spent a sad yet wonderful July 4th weekend with family and friends, and then that Sunday my wife and I had to get up at 5:00am and hit the road so I could make it to the Regenerative Design Institute (RDI) in time to start a four day intensive course on Advanced Permaculture Design with Robyn Francis. So yes, things have been tumultuous and amazing all at once. Fairly symptomatic of this whole year when I think about it: full of a lot of uncertainty and unpredictability not only in my own life, but in the entire world as we face huge shifts and changes all over the planet.
Since I’m just returning from four days of intense immersion in Permaculture study, I’ve got patterns on the brain. One of the beautiful things about Permaculture design is that so much of the broader discipline is a discussion of general patterns in the world around us. Through thoughtful observation and wise application of these patterns, we can start to bring harmony and abundance into our lives whether it be in our relationships, in our career or….(dun, dun, dun!)…. in our garden.
On the last day of my design course, James Stark (co-founder of RDI) and Robyn Francis held a wonderful discussion on the realization of dreams and the power of intention. There were many threads in the discussion that connected with insights that I have been discovering in my own life as I make preparations to start my landscaping business. I have found these ideas very helpful and inspiring, so I would like to use this post to continue teasing out these ideas in the context of garden design.
The best place to start is by acknowledging the importance of imagination and creativity. Let’s sidestep the obvious, cliche discussions about tinkering with aesthetics, or artistry, or layouts, or structures, or whatever because I think I lot of people tie ‘creativity’ to intelligence, cleverness, artistic talent and who knows what else. Instead how about we go straight to the core. At the heart of things creativity is both fearless and dangerous because it has very little respect for what currently exists in the world. What the creative mind does then, is imagine and bring into consciousness concepts that have never existed in the material world before. Now that might sound a little crazy and far out, but the beautiful thing is, everyone single one of us is creative. If you have the slightest doubt, just ask the most unimaginative person you know to tell you what they dreamed last night. Our brains are WILDLY creative, so much so that our dreams can range from absolute absurd abstraction, to terrifying or sublime realism. Unfortunately, upon waking our culture, habits, relationships and our own internal monologue start to box that wildness in, contain it, strap it down with a list of do’s, don’ts, can’ts, shouldn’ts and so on. The most creative people I know are those who simply allow their imagination to roam free and have the courage to follow some of the outlandish ideas that result. The courage to follow an unusual or novel idea is the hardest part, yet it is a skill that can be learned. For some of us, it might just start with something very small like a flower arrangement, and from there we can work ourselves up towards the more ambitious creative thought and large scale creative action whether it be in garden design or in our career choices, it doesn’t matter. It just requires the resolve to start allowing our imagination to play a greater role in our lives.
Our imagination is powerful and incredibly versatile, and our brain can be very creative with pretty much anything that we hand it. As dreamweavers, we have amazing potential to bring wonderful designs into the world. Yet within our creative brains also exists the potential for utter chaos and lack of direction if we don’t focus on something. That is where intention and clarity of purpose start to play a crucial role in the design process. Without clarity, our imagination and our actions tend to meander and may not yield what we really want to accomplish. In our designs, whether they are for ourselves or others, it is crucial that we clarify the intentions surrounding the design so we can harness and guide the powerful forces of our imagination.
In the next blog post I will take these ideas a little further, touch on some practical ways to focus and tap into our imagination, and on top of it I’ll throw in a little neurology and theory to spice it up!
On Saturday, June 20th Veggielution celebrated the groundbreaking of our new acre. Amie Frisch, Mark Mederos and Lisa Benavides have done an amazing job of showing what sheer determination, passion and enthusiasm can accomplish in a short amount of time. With the help of an incredible number of volunteers, many generous organizations, the Prusch Foundation and the City of San Jose, they have grown Veggielution from a backyard farming project into a full blown 1.5 acre community farm at Emma Prusch Park in South San Jose.
I have been with the organization since January and it gives me great hope as I look towards what the future holds for the Bay Area. The whole organization has been run from the start by volunteers, who are dedicated to getting back to the land, reinvesting in community and seeking out just and beneficial ways to grow and provide food for ourselves and the San Jose communities. For me, seeing the large number of volunteers of all ages that show up for the work days shows a shift in consciousness within our community, especially amongst college and high school students. Their are a lot of young faces, which I hope means that the planet will be in better hands in the years to come.
In the continual effort of every supporter and every member of the organization I see the desire for an alternative way of providing sustenance for ourselves. In the helping hands that turn the soil, plant the seeds, and harvest the fruits are simple actions that show that life does not need to be all about nickels and dimes. It can be about people, about life, about food, about community and it can be about hope.
So viva la Veggielution! May we continue to grow and prosper as we work our way towards sustainable, regenerative and joyful living.
Around this time last year my yard was besieged with house flies. I would walk out on to the lawn (ok, more honestly, the mowed weed patch) and a hum would erupt around my feet as flies would swarm up. Needless to say it was not that appealing to be outside when the flies were in full force. I tried some pathetic attempts with DIY fly traps, disposed of dog waste rigorously, but it only resulted in a minor reduction in the fly population.
I couldn’t do much more about it without resorting to chemical warfare or importing some bacterial fly pathogen as a ‘natural’ control. Rather than imposing my will on my yard, I have chosen to follow a ‘wait and see’ policy to observe how a pest cycle changes within my yard over time. I prefer to create general habitat to support my predator populations, such as perennial plants, a constantly open water source, and regular nectar sources in the yard. I am not yet so specialized in Integrated Pest Management that I know how to attract certain pest predators, but so far this approach has worked in keeping my yard aphid free (ladybirds usually follow the arrival of any aphids). So I simply waited, watched my yard and tried to ignore the flies.
In general, I noticed the insect population increasing in quantity and diversity over time. Tiny wasps hovered amongst flowers and foliage, spider visits in our house increased, (much to my wife’s dismay), and by Fall small birds seemed to be using our yard more frequently. So it appeared that the food chain was becoming both more complex, but also more balanced. In particular I noticed one black headed visitor who seemed to be very happy in our yard snapping up bugs with acrobatic aerials and sharp clicks of the beak. As Spring rolled around she had become a fixture and was soon joined by a mate. I noticed very soon that the fly populations were drastically lower than they were last year. Curious, I did an Internet search and it didn’t take me long to discover my yard was being graced by pair of Black Phoebe flycatchers. In March they brought their chicks to our yard, and for a couple weeks our yard was the main source of food and fly catching instruction for the youngsters.
In “Edible Forest Gardens” the authors discuss functional diversity, and I watched it in play with the phoebes. I never planned to have varied fence heights in the yard, but through one thing and another there is now the 5 foot perimeter fence, the 3 foot garden fence and a decorative bamboo fence at that stands 2 feet tall. I wonder if this is one of the reasons the phoebes liked my yard so much. The tall perimeter fence provided safety from humans and dogs, yet they tended to feed mostly from the 3′ fence, and occasionally from the 2′ fence. Non-functional diversity would have been fences of different materials and construction, but of the same height, or fences that were either too high for insect catching or too low for safety. It was purely random that I managed to pull off ‘functional fence diversity’, but it was one of those happy accidents that provided part of a preferred habitat for the phoebes.
The rest of the family has since moved on, but nearly every afternoon I still have one phoebe that comes back to snack for a couple hours. Their are only a few house flies now, and every time I see her, I am grateful that we have found ways to benefit each other.
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This little blip from Seeking Alpha calmly states that global food production will be reduced 20 to 40 percent due to droughts in the world’s bread baskets. As a resident in one of those dry breadbaskets, I find it hard to fathom the abstract tone of that very brief article. When food supplies are restricted, disorder follows. Governments are horrible at bringing about the appropriate measures until crisis becomes severe or becomes a full blown disaster. The federal and state governments should be pushing hard for conversions of lawns into vegetable beds and food forests, for drought resistant landscaping and water catchment systems, for greywater irrigation and water conserving sewage systems. But no…at first they will restrict water use and then as time progresses and it gets worse they’ll restrict more, and then a year or two later they’ll actually start making the necessary implementations way after they are needed. We have no idea how long this global drought will stretch out, but the wise thing to do would be to plan like this was how it will be for the foreseeable future. We have destroyed so much vegetation, interrupted water ways and caused major disruption to many if not all of the earth’s natural water cycles. So it might be a looong time before the heavens are once more generous. Healthy water cycles require abundant healthy forests, rivers, lakes, soils and oceans.
So, that is a long way of saying “there’s a bad moon on the rise”. but…rather than panicking about it, why don’t we………
PARTY!!!!!!
(woot)
It really is up to each one of us lowly citizens to make this world a better place because at the moment Uncle Sam is at best incompetent and at worst downright destructive when it comes to promoting a healthier world. So we are going to be forced to get down, get busy and celebrate our way through this challenging century. This last Saturday (June 6) I went over the hill to Santa Cruz to hang out with Devin Slavin and take part in the Gardens of Gratitude weekend. I’m not sure what the ultimate garden count was, but several Grow Food Party Crews were assembled and we hit the town, hung out, designed and planted gardens to help move Santa Cruz towards becoming an edible oasis.
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Our Party Crew designed and planted Snap Pea Garden and it was awesome to see everyone who came out and volunteered their time and energy to make it happen.
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Garden “Snap Pea” Before
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Garden “Snap Pea” During
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Garden “Snap Pea” After Day 1
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Garden “Snap Pea” Completion (will post a pic in a month or two with the ‘final’ result)
The industrial agriculture system is reaching the bottom of the barrel and will not be able to function like it has over the last half century. But there is great hope and possibility beyond the industrial system. The Dervaes urban homestead is an excellent example of how ultra-local, hand worked food production can be far more efficient in the use of space, water and energy than the industrial machine. However, that is only one house out there in Pasadena. We need whole neighborhoods overflowing with edible plants.
Implementing the necessary changes just as an individual can be daunting, expensive and exhausting. With Grow Food Party Crews though, it becomes a celebration, a fun event where many hands come together to make light work and do something positive. We need a whole country full of Grow Food Party Crews to step up, have fun and start to bring positive change. The powers that be and the naysayers will be no help, and may try to get in our way (especially if Big Ag starts to get their toes stepped on), so we have to look after ourselves. Through biointensive vegetable production, perennial food crops, edible food forests and edible landscapes we can take steps towards making our world so much more healthy and beautiful.
So….let’s do it!! If anyone is interested in getting together for Grow Food Party Crews in San Jose or the greater South Bay Area shoot me an email at “info” at “porchsideecology.com”. Or if you are interested in getting your own garden creation and celebration movement going, I would recommend contacting Devin Slavin for ideas and suggestions on how to organize these kinds of events.
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The author, sporting the magnificent “Victory Mullet” (front and side shots for your viewing pleasure).
When I was a kid our family just didn’t do radishes. In fact, we avoided a lot of the mustard family in general, no radishes in salad, no horseradish sauce, no mustard greens. On very rare occasions, wild harvested watercress would venture into a plate or two. But that was about it. Well…things changed for me last year. I read how Tobi Hemenway uses daikons to improve soil aeration and I also saw a video about Sepp Holzer in Austria and was inspired by his enthusiasm for the lowly radish. I’m quickly warming up to this spicy little vegetable. It has some great qualities!
Radishes are pretty tough and very easy to grow, I simply sowed a few varieties around the property and many of them germinated and grew through this year’s dry winter without any inputs on my part. A good portion of those abused radishes were really bitter, but in their defense, they grew where many other vegetables would have just given up and died. The best flavor came with those that received consistent water. I’m currently enjoying my late spring batch of French Breakfast radishes. They have a mild heat to them, but it is not overbearing. I also find the red and white contrast of the root to be striking. A great way to add visual interest to a salad.
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Radishes germinate and grow extremely fast. Even the large daikon radishes only take 45 days till maturity and varieties like French Breakfast can be ready in three weeks. For the edible landscape, they can be valuable for filling in a space quickly and are great to mix in with slower germinating, slower growing plants. While the slower plants are getting started, the radishes will already be off to the races, putting down shallow roots, shading the soil and providing green filler for bare areas. In the picture below I used the classic radish and carrot combination, which is very effective for providing a constant harvest, yet also keeping leaf cover in an area over a few months. The trick is to keep the area evenly and consistently moist while the seeds are germinating in order to get an even ‘carpet’ of radishes and carrots. For this combination, I will top dress the sown seeds with coconut mulch, when I see the coconut mulch is dry, it is time to give the area another shot of water. While it can be tedious, your initial vigilance will yield a nice visual and edible pay off over the next few months.
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If you let them, or forget about them, radishes also have small but pretty flowers that grow between 2 and 3 feet tall. I had some Minowase daikons that didn’t set great tubers, and I kind of forgot about them until they burst into flower and continued to flower through the month of March. Radish flowers are edible: the flavor reminds me slightly of kale with floral tones. It is not a very strong flavor, but they are definitely a great garnish for salads or soups!
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Another thing I discovered is that young radish seed pods are delicious! I let my Minowase daikons go to seed and found that I actually preferred the taste of the young seed pods to the radish itself. They still had the spiciness of the radish, but with some additional flavors from the seeds and seed pod that I really enjoyed. The seed pods were prolific, and I am kicking myself now for not eating more. Once the pods started to mature, both the flavor and texture suffered. Right now I am letting different varieties of radish go to seed now to see what the seed pods of other varieties taste like. The pods themselves look interesting initially, but for my daikons, as they matured the pods grew heavy and caused the whole stem to droop towards the ground. I’m going to save the seeds and pray that they didn’t do some crazy cross with a wild mustard in the area. Guess we’ll find out next year…should be interesting.
Radishes can have multiple uses throughout their brief growing period. Their flavor is not for everyone, but I think more people should give them a try. Make sure you try a young, garden-fresh radish to be sure you get the full experience. And for those who might be on the fence about radishes, try this simple raw radish herb spread that I whipped up recently. It is really good on toast (prepared like you would garlic bread) or as a last minute addition to a stir fry. I imagine that it would also be a good seasoning for roasted or BBQ beef dishes, but I have yet to test that theory. Anyway, here you go. Enjoy!
Radish Herb Spread – makes about one cup
1 bunch of garlic chives
2 large garlic cloves
5 or 6 medium radishes (I used French Breakfast)
1 or 2 tsp white vinegar
2 tbsp olive oil
Combine all ingredients in a food processor and chop until the vegetables are nicely minced. Let sit for an hour to let the flavors set, then use wherever you might use minced garlic. The oil and vinegar should preserve the ingredients for at least a week if refrigerated.
Well, I suppose there are plenty of excuses I could find for not having been a more consistent blogger. As this is the height of the planting season, it HAS been busy both in my own garden and at the Veggielution Emma Prusch farm. Veggielution has been expanding its growing capabilities and with the addition of a new 1/4 acre plot and a whole additional acre (yay!!) it looks like the months ahead will be pretty intense. I’ve also been working finalizing the PorchSide Ecology business plan. So…I have definitely been busy, however it has always been my intention to write more consistently. One thing specifically that I wanted to be doing was a continuation of my Plant Profiles content. My intent from the start was to showcase the aesthetic qualities of common herbs and annual vegetables in the garden, and to introduce more rare perennial vegetables and native food crops of California. I fully intend to pick up on the Plant Profiles posts, my next one (coming soon) will be on radishes. I have also been doing some excellent reading on perennial vegetables and food forests, both works giving me some great ideas and a lot to think about. And both, by the way, I highly recommend. “Perennial Vegetables” and “Edible Forest Gardens Vol I and II” are both authored by Eric Toensmeier (Edible Forest Gardens was co-authored with Dave Jacke).
With that, I will get back to work and I promise to return with more content very soon!
I think I have finally reached enough equilibrium between me, my garden and our two dogs that I can confidently write a post about it. While I focus on my dogs because that is where my personal experience has been, this is also a story about the process of working through a particularly difficult and demanding design problem in the garden.
But first, a word of advice for would-be-dog owners who are considering allowing a dog to enter your garden domain: get a really stupid, predictable, lazy dog. Anything else and you are in for spending a lot of time on either training or fencing, probably both. [simage=38,320,y,left]Unfortunately, I can’t follow my own advice on getting low maintenance dogs since I love dogs with energy and high intelligence. In our house we have a three year old female Jack Russell, Thandi and a one year old male Border Terrier, Sam.
The arrival of Sam last year was a mixed blessing. He brought a lot of energy and enthusiasm into the household mix and provided Thandi with a companion (i.e. someone to beat up), which greatly improved her mood and health. He also brought carnage and mayhem to our backyard with his eagerness to dig, a passion for knocking over any plant that stood in his way and a highly active brain, which, when combined with the ability to jump over 3′ vertically and strong jaws, meant that many of my cheaper DIY fence attempts and plant protection schemes failed miserably. As a result, many plants were harmed in the making of this post.
Sam’s persistence in destroying almost anything I tried to do started to bring out my dark side and caused a lot of tension between us. It got to the point that he was nervous about going outside with me because there would always be something he had destroyed and I would get mad yet again. Despite my best attempts to stay calm and a strong desire to be patient with him, I often could not keep the frustration from boiling to the surface. The situation was further complicated because dogs will not link correction or scolding that is happening now with an action that was done several minutes ago. So rather than learning not to damage plants and to stop digging everywhere, Sam learned that he should avoid me while I was looking at damaged plants and glaring at dirt holes.
One of the repeated lessons that life has been handing me lately is to look at the structural issues behind a conflict, so I began to view Sam as an indicator of design flaws and to observe more closely the interactions that my dogs have with the garden. The road to a more dog friendly design scheme was bumpy as my two furry quality engineers were very quick to exploit any weakness and make me pay for it. But with time, thoughtfulness, persistence and occasional ‘why me!?’ moments, things are starting to look better.
What changed?
I started closely observing my dogs habits and kept my eyes open for information on the instinctual behavior of dogs
We can learn so much by simply paying attention! I know it’s a novel concept, but from the overabundance of bad design that surrounds us, it is a very simple practice that we often fail to follow. My dogs instructed me on where they preferred to dig, what soil types, textures and moisture levels were most appealing to them. They taught me where they preferred to run and showed me that many interesting critters run along the fence and hang out in the corners of the yard. They want as much access to these places as possible. They also showed me that they prefer to run either directly through the lawn area or right along the fence. Any plants put in these pathways would be identified and destroyed immediately. Other plant free zones are the warmest spots in the yard. These are best reserved for dogs and not for plants. Any plants that attempt to make use of the sunning spots will find themselves quickly squashed and chewed on.
I trained where I could and designed structure into the garden where training was failing[simage=28,320,y,left]
There are some things you can train for, there are others that are just impossible to teach. One of my crowning achievements as a dog owner was training my dogs to stay out of the patio-side bed. There is only a three inch bamboo trim on the bed so there is nothing stopping them from jumping into it, but with patience I was able to train them to stay out of it. Amazingly they even respected the patio-side bed rules when we humans were not around to enforce them. However, just recently a new cat has moved in next door. This cat likes to sit on the fence by our patio. So in one fell swoop, she has destroyed months worth of training. The bed is in tatters, Sam has started digging in there and they both have trampled it relentlessly since the arrival of the cat. Which all goes to say, no matter how good of a trainer you are something will fail. In this case I have to surrender parts of that bed for cat access, anything else would be a huge battle between me and the dogs.
Another place where training failed was with the vegetable garden. I could NOT train them to stay out of there!! Sam particularly is obsessed with getting into the vegetable garden. He learned to stay out when we were home, but the minute we left the house he would find a way around my latest cheap fence attempt and would wreck something. So I finally had to build a three foot high fence which so far he has not jumped over, he can jump that high but I think he finds the fence intimidating so he hasn’t tried it yet (thank God).
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Despite the advice of various not-so-helpful online resources and books, Sam could not be taught to be satisfied with a “digging pit”. He would dig in his pit (or not) and then go on to dig in other, more interesting, places. This is further exacerbated by the fact that he mostly digs as an anxiety behavior when we are gone. Nor does it seem to matter how much we exercise him, in fact it seems that the better the exercise, the more vigorous the digging becomes once we leave the house. So, I noticed that he only really goes for bare earth, usually nice soft earth. He usually (not always!) avoids heavily mulched areas and areas that have plants covering the soil. So mulch, along with its other benefits, has also become a way to focus his digging away from certain areas. Of course when I freshly plant something, this is like throwing a big juicy bone out for him, so I have to protect fresh plantings either with heavy mulch or with some sort of encasement. [simage=34,320,y,none]
Waste not, want not
Our dogs will not dig where they poop. So, to turn that on its head, I would toss dog poop into any holes that they created and bury it. So, I am fertilizing and adding nutrients to the soil while at the same time discouraging a behavior that I don’t like. There are considerations that I have to think about with this approach. I take care to only do this away from edibles in order to avoid possible health problems. I think much of the information about human and animal waste is based on hype, bad design and misinformation, but it is probably better to be safe than sorry.
Gardener Dogs
Knowing that I cannot control their digging behavior (and boy have I tried!), I try to guide their movement through my yard, protect plants where I can but also acknowledge that ANY plant that is at their level is at risk. Rather than trying to protect everything, rather I have started to pick plants that can deal with root and foliage abuse, that work well in frequently disturbed environments and that grow quick and bushy. I have noticed that once plants get about the size of Sam, they start to respect it as part of the property and leave it (mostly) alone. A key in this is also using plants that are easily re-propagated at little or (preferably) no cost. One example in my garden is the use of California wild flowers which prefer to grow in recently disturbed or barren areas. They will reseed themselves, so if the dogs decide to dig in the wild flower bed, they are actually doing the wildflowers a favor. This experiment started late last fall and already Sam has been responsible for the establishment of a few seedlings.
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Go with the flow
The garden is beginning to flourish again because I have adapted my plant choices, built more dog friendly structures and layouts into the garden and built up strong barriers where necessary. The biggest lesson and blessing has been learning to work with my dogs rather than against them. It doesn’t hurt that Sam is moving out of puppyhood into dogdom, but even as mature dogs I have to respect their presence as forces and elements in our little backyard and household ecosystems. The results can sometimes be surprising. One of the darkest days between Sam and I was when he got into my box of seed packets and made a serious mess out of things. Granted, I was furious at first, but luckily most of my more treasured seed was untouched and the damage looked worse than it actually was. But now I had a pile of various seeds that had no packet to call home and that I could not positively identify. So I made “Sam’s Mix” and put it in the box with the rest of the seed packets. Later in the week Sam had been digging furiously in a certain area by the house, so I decided to try and toss some of his mix into that area and I laid a few bamboo poles down to discourage further aggressive digging. Miraculously he ignored it all, and the result has been some wonderful spinach that I am just now starting to harvest. I had tried to grow spinach in another part of the garden, but it has been struggling and tastes bitter. Sam’s spinach, however, is succulent, crunchy and growing vigorously.
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My hope is that I can allow myself the pleasure of encountering more of the joyful surprises that are out there, patiently laying in store as I learn to work towards fostering better habitat for ALL of our household and garden inhabitants.
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Below are a couple more pictures of ways that I have protected plants while respecting dog paths and flow patterns.
I planted tons of garlic everywhere in fall to see how it’s narrow leaves contrasted with various herbs and foliage. These April pictures have some of the better results. Aesthetically, garlic seems to look best in small, tight clumps (two to four) interplanted with foliage that has a softer, broader and bushier look. Because of the sparseness of the leaves, large groups or rows of garlic look straggly and haphazard.
I loooooooove garlic, so even though I must wait for a while to harvest the cloves, I have been snipping leaves here and there and using them in everything from soups to sandwiches. The leaves are much more mild and have a, I don’t know, “greener” flavor to them. So, don’t hesitate to experiment and put your garlic to work early! Dang. I’m hungry now, I think I am going to make a bagel sandwich with cheese, garden lettuce, and stir fried mushrooms and garlic right after I post this.
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blooming sage interplanted with garlic
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garlic and blooming crimson clover. The clover is so beautiful, I decided to sacrifice nitrogen for flowers. A few months ago, I pulled up some clover and the white root nodules were prolific. Now that it is blooming the nodules have vanished. Is the nitrogen still present in the plant itself or has it been converted to something else for the blooms? Looks like I have some research to do.
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Herb medley with garlic in the background. In the very back are a few nasturtiums. I’m sure they are plotting their take over of this space as I type. I might try to grow them vertically.
So I pretty much just abandoned my garden for two weeks to fend for itself as I went off to the Permaculture Design Course and certification at OAEC. The course opening was unexpected, forcing me to throw some immature tomato and basil starts into the ground without much hope of their survival. The weather had been heating up and I returned to find much of what I expected, dried and cracking ground in some places (those without mulch or plant cover–go figure!), and most of the starts had indeed died or were eaten. However, out of about ten starts two tomatos remained. I’m pretty positive that those two will go on to do wonderful things because they have proved themselves to be tough characters: resistant to pests and able to handle an early planting. They are great candidates for seed saving.
One of the nice surprises was to find my garden flourishing in most other aspects. I am quite impressed by this wonderful show from my rapini (broccoli raab) plant. It has been going strong like this now for over a month. I’m sure if I keep cutting it back it will continue to flower well into early summer. The funny thing about the rapini is that it is way too bitter for my taste, but I kept it around anyways because I didn’t have anything planned for the area it is in and I enjoyed the first small blooms that it put out. Now I’m quite glad that I chose to let aesthetic win out over functional because it is a blast of color in a garden that is looking kind of drab right now. It requires no care and is providing function beyond the food that I would have liked to enjoy: pollinators have been visiting it, it is providing food for the soil food web and if I wanted to, I could also take advantage of its shade and cover to protect sensitive starts.
While I will still probably do a fair amount of coddling for certain plants, I have been leaning more towards the approach that I see patterned in the natural world. May the best plant win. While this might mean the loss of a lot of plants up front, ultimately I will have a garden that requires significantly less work yet yields roughly the same amount of food. This sounds so obvious when typing it, yet if you read pretty much any how-to-grow guide for vegetables, the coddle effect is in full force: fertilize, weed, pest manage, blah blah blah. This is where burnt-out gardeners and farmers are created, as they seek to serve plants that really probably shouldn’t be alive (did I just say that?). For me, I hope it becomes more of a dialogue as I seek to guide my garden towards being able to handle the semi-arid realities of my region. There will always be a few choice plants that I coddle because I love, but when droughts and water rations threaten, how nice it would be to sit back with the assurance that I will probably still have food because I have plants that survive through a broad range of conditions.
