Do You Want to Garden Organically and Just Don’t Know Where To Start?

Have you always wanted to transition your vegetable gardens to all organic methods? It’ s the new thing, you know. All those wannabe crunchy people out there have had some small realization that all these chemical laden foods cannot possibly be good. So maybe some of you are suburbanites that have plotted out a small garden and bought some soil and fertilizers and some seeds. Maybe you had good luck and grew a few pounds of tomatoes and cucumbers. Somehow, it just isn’t enough to make a dent in your food bill and on your lifestyle of McDonald’s and Subway. It’s a small step and that is really good. But transitioning your life to becoming more organic may have to be a lifestyle. Where do you start? Well, I can tell you how I started and maybe you will get some ideas on what would  be right for you and your family.

I moved to the country about a year ago. But until then, I was a suburbanite searching to minimize my carbon footprint, reducing our grocery bill, and transitioning into a lifestyle of self-sufficiency. Where did I get the idea? Well, I realized I had no idea how to sew. I had no way of growing my own food. And I was a clueless American that just bought everything at the store even though I had a little voice in my head that said those stores and the endless supply of money may not last forever. So I read a lot of books. I looked at other people’s websites. I learned how to make my own soap. I learned to make laundry soap for a fraction of the price. You know what happened? It was like a drug; learning all these old- timey skills made me realize that our generation was lost and if anything like an economic collapse occurred, we would all become crazy zombies that had no idea how to take care of ourselves. To make matters worse, I was noticing all the online articles that highlighted the adverse effects of high fructose corn syrup and processed foods. So let’s just say it took me close to 10 years to get where I am today. Furthermore, there are varying degrees of crunchy that you can achieve and maybe I am a little too much for you.
Let me just say that there are varying degrees of “organic” to me. There are those people that buy everything organic- food, clothing, soaps, shampoos, etc. I am not one of those people. I have contemplated the organic movement and I just think its crazy to think something is perfectly organic when less than 100 years ago we thought asbestos was a great idea. There was probably a chemical plant built in the spot that my 90 year old house is now standing on; or even more possible is a farm that probably used formaldehyde as a fertilizer. So am I truly organic? Probably not. Do I buy all organic crap? Not really. I just make an effort to do most of everything myself and in the process most of the products I use are “all natural.”

You have your plot marked out for spring. You have your non-GMO seeds and your soil has been tilled. Now what? Well, your first crop that you plant in that spot will most likely do alright. However, without properly feeding your soil, you will ultimately fail to produce good quality food in successive years. As the vegetables grow, they will take the nutrients from the soil that will help them grow properly. Therefore, if you grow great tomatoes in that spot, next year when you plant in that same spot the soil will be void of those necessary nutrients. You will need to continuously build your soil to continue to grow crops of any nutritional value. And something else VERY important; I mean, you need to imprint this next sentence on your brain or you will just get sucked into buying chemical laden crap for your garden when it starts to crimp.

YOU MUST GIVE YOUR SOIL NUTRITION FOR IT TO PRODUCE NUTRITION FOR YOU

I hope you understand this. You will have to feed your plants nutritional food for them to produce nutrition for you. Healthy plants will also fight off bugs. When your garden gets invaded by crazy little bugs that want to destroy all your precious plants, it is because they are not healthy enough to fight off pests or disease. Healthy plants, just like healthy people, will fight off all the diseases and pests that come their way. The bugs are not stupid! Just like bacteria, they will invade those plants that cannot fight back. So you must continually build your soil so that it is strong and healthy. Here are some ways that you can do this:
1. Compost- compost anything that you possibly can. Throw all your vegetable and fruit craps in a pile in the corner of the yard and the bugs will do the rest. We have a tumbler ( that I got from Craiglist for dirt cheap) and a few different wire fence enclosures that we put any degradable items that would do well in the garden. This includes chicken poop, rabbit droppings, fruit and vegetable scraps and peels, and garden leftovers. No meat, dairy, or processed food scraps go in there.
2. Vermicomposting- This is really easy to do. Take a couple of tupperware bins and drill holes into one of them on the sides and lid. I put a brick in the bin that has no holes. Then set the other bin with the holes on top of the brick and inside the other one. Then I bought a bag of red composting worms from Ebay or somewhere for less than $15 with shipping. I used newspaper and whatever other shredded paper bits I could find, put it in the bottom and wet it down. Put the worms in there with the paper. Then place a layer on top of fruit and vegetable scraps. Voila! Those little guys will create the most nutritious soil you have ever known. So fertile that it should only be mixed into the soil in small amounts.
3. Get chickens, rabbits, and any other animal that may create droppings perfect for your soil- You will have to decide this for yourself. I have chickens and pigs and because I dont feed them a meaty diet, I can use their feces in my garden. No dog poop cant be used! When I lived in suburbia, I used to go to people’s farms and clean out cow and horse stalls for their poop. I let it compost for several months and then spread it on the garden. Free compost! If your really adventurous, those animals can eventually become another food source.

4. Make rainbarrels- Again, I got some off of friends and online for cheap. My handsome hubby put spigots in them and positioned them under gutters and eves. We filtered the water from the roof with a wire mesh that we got from the local hardware store. That would also keep mosquitoes from breeding in them.
5. Slowly grow your garden space each year- We went from a small raised garden area about 12 by 12 feet and just before we moved to Maine the area had over taken the front and back yards. I was planting all edible plants that would grow well in our zone. I even planted some edible flowers that provided both pretty landscaping but would taste good in a salad. Once you get going, you will learn that even with less than a quarter of an acre, you can grow most of your own food. There is a family in California that not only produce all their own food on .10 of acre, but they also sell some of it in order to buy supplies that they cannot make themselves. If you look at their gardens, you will see that they employ a permaculture approach. This is just a fancy word for using a multitude of different plants and animals in a way that prevents pests and diseases from overtaking the garden. It also uses the thinking that if one crop fails, you will have many other food sources to fall back on. Our current monoculture approach in the United States where one crop is grown over thousands of acres creates a habitat that requires pesticides because the bad bugs can grow and thrive all in one spot.

These seem somewhat simple to do. However, unless you know how to compost very quickly, it seems like forever before the compost actually turns into something usable. That is why you will have to be creative and try to get free compost from local farmers or have animals that will create it for you. Otherwise, you will end up spending allot of money buying fertilizer products that may not be the best for you and your family.

However, the rewards are absolutely amazing! Once you make a meal that you grew and raised yourself, you will be addicted to finding more ways to grow and do things for yourself! Have more questions? Send me an email or a facebook post and I will tell you how I do things. It may not be the best way, but I have probably been there and done that! Blessings!

DIY Worm Composting

It may sound gross or weird, but making a worm composting bin is quite easy and inexpensive. For apartment dwellers or someone who cannot have an outdoor compost bin, this is nicely placed in a corner of the house or basement. The purpose of a worm compost bin is to have the worms process kitchen scraps and as a result, the castings or “worm poop” makes a very rich fertilizer. The “fertilizer” as we will call it is a rich dark soil but is relatively low in nitrogen so when mixed with soil or sprinkled on top of your plants, it will not burn your plants. It can be mixed with soil up to a concentration of 20% (Mother Earth News, http://www.motherearthnews.com/diy/make-worm-bin-ze0z11zhir.aspx#axzz2wdvfss6L). Additionally, there are drainage holes in the bottom that allow excess moisture to collect in the bottom of the 2nd bin. This can be further diluted with water to make a liquid fertilizer.
It takes months for any results to really show. The worms do a great job; for me, it seems that they work faster than my compost tumbler. But, they can only eat so much, so if you have a large number of people in the house they will not be able to eat all the scraps. You can make multiple bins if this is the case. I don’t recommend larger bins because if you have to move it, it may be really heavy once its half or three quarters full.
I have 5 people in my household. The materials I used for this project include:

• 2- 18 gallon plastic bins purchased at the big box store for $6 each. They have many styles but I chose cheapest. They dont like light so if you’re thinking about a clear bin, I would say that your results may not be as good. If there is too much light they won’t reproduce or go near the sides of the bin.
• Cordless drill. Any will do. You can use any tool that can put a hole on the bin. The drill made a nice clean hole. I used a drill bit that made a hole big enough for a pencil to squeeze through.
• Newspaper- this will be shredded into pieces for the worms for their “bedding.” I will explain more later
• Red worms- I bought 1 lb from an online retailer here in Maine. You can dig them out of the ground if you want, but I’m not touching them!
• Kitchen scraps- Includes fruits, veggies, peels, any peels, non-dairy and non- meat foods. Coffee and the filter can be added as-is to the bin. Plants scraps can also be placed in there. They love egg shells (they reproduce in them).
• scrap wood, a few bricks, or something that can raise the top bin 3 to 4 inches from the second. They will fit into each other, but the bottom bin will hold water and you wont want the little wormies to sit in the water. They will drown.

Start by making holes in one of the lids. These are air holes so the worms can breathe. If the holes are too big, you will have some of the little wormies try to escape out the lid. If you want bigger holes, put screen over them so they can’t get out and flies or other bugs can’t get in.

Next drill holes in the side top of the bin for additional air circulation. As long as you aren’t over-feeding them, the bin won’t smell. How do you know if you are overfeeding them? The bin will smell of course! Drill holes in the bottom of this bin as well, so water and fluid can drain out. They like it moist, not wet. I put about 10 or 12 holes. Again, if they are too big, they will escape and drown.

These are 3 pieces of untreated scrap wood that we put in the bottom. This will keep my little guys from sitting in any water. There bedding is dampened when put in there and any extra fluid will drain out.

I put burlap in a thin layer on the bottom just as an additional layer to prevent the little guys from getting out of the bottom. This is optional.

I used an electric paper shredder to shred newspaper for their bedding. This acts like soil, sort of. They will compost this as well. You will put the newspaper in, dampen it, place food scraps, then layer damp newspaper on top of that.
Here is our little bit of food scraps I was saving

Next we added the worms. They come in a ball of soil with all the worms stuffed together. We just dumped them in (gently). They know what to do next.

So place the bin with holes inside the bin with no holes. Make sure it is a few inches raised so they don’t sit in the water. You can place this anywhere that is 50-75 degrees. Basements are fine. My basement runs about 50 degrees. I have mine in the kitchen right now but when fly season comes about, I will put them in the basement. Our house may get hot (we dont have air conditioners) so the basement in the summer is the best option for them. They will die very easily if its too hot or cold. My worms cost roughly $30 shipped but I am adamant in buying from small businesses as close to home as I can.
Now comes the question; What do I do next? Well, after 6 months to a year (depending on the size of your bin) the bin will fill up. It is FULL when it is one half to three quarter’s full. They cannot handle living in too much of their castings. So how do you get the worms separated from the dirt? That is a bit of a project. They do not like light at all. So, on a warm sunny day, take the bin outside and take the lid off. Wait about 30 minutes and start scooping small amounts of the dirt out with a cup or garden tool. There will be worms all over the place so be careful not to grab too many. If its going on a large outdoor garden, I would just put the fertilizer on my garden with a few attached worms. If its in potted indoor plants, you will want to make sure the little guys aren’t included. It’s a bit of a messy job, but I didn’t mind digging through the bin with the worms. I moved the eggs as-is aside and out of the way because those are loaded with the little baby worms. Then I placed all my good fertilizer in a few empty plastic coffee containers (the big ones). I poked a few holes in the top in case there were straggler worms and I didn’t get out to the garden right away. I do this once a year and that seems to be enough. If you have a large family you may want to empty it twice a year. If it’s just you or you and a spouse, I would say to use a smaller bin and empty it once per year. Unless you’re a vegan or vegetarian, than you might need more bins!!

Starting Seeds on the Cheap

It’s March, and spring is amongst us, and well, it’s still cold and very snowy here in Northern Maine. A couple years ago, we would have already had plants in the ground because South Carolina sees pretty warm temperatures even as early as February. But this year, we will have to be somewhat creative. We do not have our greenhouse built yet and it’s too cold to start any cold frames. But that won’t stop me!
Because my hubby and I are quite frugal, we are reluctantly starting some grow lights. We don’t have the warm temperatures, even on our sun porch, to keep any seedlings warm enough to sprout. But, because we are so frugal, I think we can afford a couple florescent lights on for 8 hours a day( I say that until I get the next electric bill, right?). When it warms up enough though, out to the sunporch they go!
I am a firm believer in reusing EVERYTHING. So maybe I am a hoarder. When something is needed and we don’t have it, that’s even more frustrating to have to go and buy it then to look through some boxes of junk. So here are some cheap ways to start seeds this year if you haven’t already started doing so.

• Reuse egg cartons and plant seedlings in each of the little spaces
• Yogart cups work well- you can cut them down if they are too tall (this is what I used)
• Coffee containers, sour cream, any plastic containers (you get the idea)

I used the yogart cups and cut them down to about 3/4 of their full size. It still allows the plants to get pretty good sized before they have to be transplanted to larger pots or outdoors. I reused some of the trays that I had from previous years and poked holes in the bottom of the yogart cups for drainage. The seed starting mix runs $6 or $7 for a good- sized bag, but I mixed it with a little additional sphagnum peat moss because that is cheaper. You can make your own seed starting mix also (I read a good article on www.onehundreddollarsamonth.com) but because it is so cold outside, I opted for easy this time. Also, you can buy seeds really cheap in bulk off of Ebay from farmers that package the seeds themselves. I ordered a lot of “survival seeds” from one company and got a good selection of many seeds for around $20 shipped. There were somewhere around 30 different kinds of seeds and 25-50 seeds in each packet.

It’s not much but I think we have somewhere around 150 plants going. Some of them have sprouted so hopefully now that they are a bit warmer and have the lights, they will grow well. When you see your sprouts are spindly and thin/ weak looking, it’s because they aren’t getting enough light. Having the lights roughly 16″ from the plants gives them warmth and the light they need. I could probably keep the lights on 6 hours but I’m not real sure at this point how these plants will do. They went a little too long without enough sun and it was a bit too cold out there on the porch.
How did you start your seeds and how do you save money when you’re doing it?
Blessing,
From Away Farms