Self-Suffiency Through Home Home Gardening: Part 2

Choosing seeds and plants can be daunting. The most important consideration when choosing seeds is to plant what your family will eat! If they won't eat broccoli or lima beans, why plant them? There is no right or wrong. If you don't like the variety you planted this year, try a different one next year.

You will find two types of seeds to buy. Heirloom and open-pollinated seeds are old varieties. This only matters if you are saving seed from your garden to share or plant next year. They are the seeds I choose because, in my opinion, their flavor is superior to hybrids. The other type is hybrid seeds that have been cross-pollinated with two or more varieties to improve taste, or insect and disease resistance. One example is sweet corn with the super sweet gene. They are available to buy in the produce section of the grocery store and will taste sweet even when the ear is past its prime. But they will not grow from seed into what you originally planted. Remember that long season crops like tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, cauliflower, broccoli and cabbage should be planted as started plants, available at the greenhouse.

You can plant in straight rows widely spaced or in blocks of plants with wide spaces between blocks. I prefer to plant in blocks because the plants shade the ground, keeping weeds under control. The information you need for planting is on the seed packet. Seeds should be buried twice as deep as they are big. Tiny seeds like lettuce and carrots should be planted ¼ inch deep and will germinate better in fine soil. Big seeds like corn and beans should be planted 1 inch deep and will germinate in soil that is a little coarser. Be sure to tamp the soil down before watering so there is good contact between the seed and the soil. After seeds germinate, thin to the recommended spacing.

Mulching your garden is important to control weeds and save moisture. I use old hay from our feed lot. Other options are compost, straw, newspaper or cardboard and grass clippings. You should let your grass clippings dry out before adding to your garden. If you have sprayed your lawn with herbicide, wait at least 2 weeks so you don't transfer it to your soil. If you just planted your row of seeds, keep the mulch pulled back until the seeds germinate and get established.

The rule of thumb is to water your garden one inch per week. Adjust accordingly if it rains. To determine how much your sprinkler is putting out, place a shallow, straight-sided can (a tuna fish can works well) where your sprinkler sprays. Use your ruler to measure what's in the can and adjust accordingly. If your sprinkler system sprays for 15 minutes every day, you are promoting shallow roots. During a hot spell, your plants are at greater risk of drying out. Watering twice a week, 1/2 inch each time, will be better for your vegies and your grass. Some gardeners prefer to fill furrows with water and let it soak in. This is an excellent option because there is less evaporation. Evening watering will promote mildew so try to water in the morning.

Working compost into your soil and mulching with it is the best fertilizer you can find. Manure is most likely too high in nitrogen and if care is not used, you will "burn" your plants. It also seems to come with plenty of weed seeds, no matter how old it is. Commercial fertilizer comes as small bits. I like to side-dress my vegetables with this when they are 1/3 grown. I sprinkle it sparingly a few inches away from the stem, rake it in and water immediately. In our short season, I find one supplemental feeding is sufficient. Fertilizer packages come with 3 letters: N-P-K; nitrogen, phosphates and potassium. Read the package directions for suggested rates of application. Nitrogen encourages leaves and stems to grow. Phosphates help the roots. Potassium encourages a good crop of flowers and fruit. Look for a balanced fertilizer such as 10:10:10. If the numbers are big, you run the risk of burning your plants from over-application. There is also water-soluble fertilizer such as Miracle-Gro. This is helpful when you transplant or for watering seedlings. It only feeds the plants until the water dries up and will becomes labor-intensive and expensive if you fertilize with it often.

I am a proponent of organic gardening. Every time you add chemicals to your garden or lawn, whether for insects or weeds, you are adding them to your food and to your body. Even Roundup has been proven to cause cancer. Children are especially susceptible because of their low body weight. If you have recently sprayed your lawn and set up the sprinkler for your children to run through, they are absorbing that chemical. When I find an insect, I look it up first. Many insects eat other insects and are considered beneficial, including centipedes, ground beetles and spiders. If it's an undesirable insect, I go out with gloves and hand pick them, dropping them into a jar of soapy water. A little diligence will go a long way toward keeping a healthy garden. I also don't use pesticides on my trees, especially fruit trees. Birds that eat poisoned fruit or insects will sicken and die too. By not using chemicals you will encourage birds to take up residence. And in return, they will eat your problem insects. Other ways to protect your plants are to spray them with soapy water, wash bugs away with a strong stream of water from a hose or use a physical barrier such as a floating row cover or screen. But remember that by keeping all insects away, you are interfering with pollination and your crop will suffer.

Malta definitely has a deer problem. Years ago, during a particularly bad winter, the deer discovered that living was easier in town. But when winter was over, the deer didn't leave. And every year there are more and more. There are many suggestions for keeping deer out including using bloodmeal, hanging smelly soap or bags of human hair, hanging CD's, leaving a radio in the garden to play all night. And they might work for a while but not for long. The only sure way to keep deer out of your garden is to build a 7 or 8 foot tall fence. This is not very practical for most of us. If you put a one-wire fence about 24" outside of your garden fence, they won't jump it because deer will not jump into a space they can't jump out of. It's worth trying the at least.

There is a lot of satisfaction in filling your cupboards, freezer and pantry with food you grew and canned yourself. If you are interested in learning more, ask a gardener or consider joining a garden Club. Don't be discouraged if you don't know a lot about gardening; remember, you only have to learn one thing today. Then tomorrow you'll learn another thing. Before you know it, you will be an expert!

Publisher's Note: This is the second of a two part series in which Malta's Kathy Waters talks about gardening. The First can be found in the April 12 issue of the PCN.