Quick Gardening Tip:  We planted a bunch of small oregano plants along the edge of our stacked limestone retaining wall several years ago, and they have come back every year.  Even cooler, they got down into the crevices between the stones, and we now have a huge wall of oregano anytime we need it.  It spreads like wildfire, flowers beautifully and smells great!  I never guessed it would work like this, so I wanted to share the info.  So if you have a similar area, or can create a freestanding circle/square of stacked stones filled with soil, you might end up with a similar result.  Super easy.

Remineralizing the Earth...

In regard to questions about how we're fertilizing our garden, I've mentioned that we've been into a worldwide movement to "Remineralize the Earth."

You can read about it here:

www.remineralize.org

www.chelationtherapyonline.com/articles/p15.htm

www.bioenergywiki.net/index.php/Remineralize_The_Earth

Remineralizing of the soil is believed to result in:

• Higher product yields

• Increased resistance to disease, insects & parasites

• Decreased need for chemical fertilizers

• Improved frost & drought tolerance

• Enhanced flavor & shelf life

• Increased nutrient density

As far as our garden goes, I did a bunch of research on remineralization when we began to build our boxes. One reason remineralization seemed like such a good idea for us is because minerals are vegan friendly and organic. Rock dust and sea minerals (salts) were our minerals of choice -- specifically, Summa Minerals (which we got from a place called Bio Green here in Wauconda, Il), and a product called Sea-Agri (sea mineral salts that come from the ocean).

http://www.seaagri.com/

http://www.remineralize.org/resources/

The application rates are very small for both of these, so a bag of minerals/salts will last you for years if you have an average size garden.

For the sea minerals, we were instructed to add 1 lb per 100 square feet of soil, and incorporate it into the top 6 inches. Our garden boxes are 16 square feet each, and we have twelve of them -- for a total of 192 square feet of soil. This means we only need about 2 pounds of sea minerals for our entire garden. We purchased a 50 pound bag and had it delivered within a couple days for around $70. We applied 10 tablespoons to each box.

For the Summa Minerals, the application rate was the same (1 lb per 100 square feet). In order to figure out how many tablespoons to add to each box, I took the number of tablespoons in a pound of flour (64), multiplied that by 2 (we need 2 pounds for 200 square feet), and then divided by 12 (boxes) to get 10.6 tablespoons per box. To apply it, we used a small mesh kitchen strainer to sift it onto the soil evenly -- then used a rake to work it in a bit. It's the same consistency as powdered sugar -- but with a beautiful rich red clay color.

Now we just have to wait and see if we get any super amazing yields from our garden this summer!

Higher product yields

• Increase resistance to disease, insects &

parasites

• Decrease chemical fertilizers

• Reduce pesticides & fungicides

• Improve frost & drought tolerance

• Enhance flavor & shelf life

Let's talk about gardening, shall we?

People have been asking me all kinds of questions about our garden, so I've put together an Q & A to answer some of them -- and also to explain some of our choices around techniques, products, materials, etc.

Q:  What is a raised bed garden?

A:  A raised bed garden is basically a container garden that sits ON TOP of the ground soil.  It can be done in many different ways, but our method involved building 4' x 4' boxes out of untreated 12" wide cedar planks.  Our boxes do not have bottoms, but they are lined with weed block out landscaping fabric.  This keeps them isolated from the ground soil, so no weeds can grow up through the boxes.  The boxes are then filled with a special lightweight "ORGANIC" soil mix recipe I created from several different ones out there.     

Q:  How is it that your garden is vegan?

A:  Our approach to this garden is "vegan" because we did not want to use animal products of any kind.  No manure.  No fish emulsion.  No worm castings.  This was tricky, because the bulk of products out there use some or all of the above.

Q:  What is in your garden soil?

A:  We used three main ingredients in equal parts (2 cubic feet each per box).  Peat Moss, Coco Coir, and Compost.  In the future, we would eliminate the peat moss and just use Coco Coir and Compost.  It turns out that there are environmental issues with Peat Moss (it is not a sustainable material).  It also breaks down five times faster than Coco Coir, and they essentially function the same way -- keeping the mix airy and soaking up water like a sponge and delivering it to the plant roots over a longer period of time.  

Q:  What kind of compost did you use?

A:  In an ideal world, we would have made all of our own compost and had it ready to go this year when we built the new garden.  We needed 24 cubic feet in all -- 2 cubic feet per box.  That's a lot of compost!  Since we did not have the sense to make it ourselves (it takes time), we sourced out a brand called Purple Cow.  It's the closest to certified organic we could find, and as far as we know, it is vegan.  (www.purplecoworganics.com)  In the future, we would definitely plan ahead and make our own -- out of grass clippings, leaves and veggie scraps from the kitchen.  

Q:  What's up with worms and worm castings?  Are they considered organic/vegan?

A:  The whole worm thing is confusing.  We have no problem using worms to make compost, but we haven't gotten around to putting together worm boxes or buying worms yet.  We actually found a local person on Craigslist who sells the worms (red wigglers are what you want,  I think).  As far as commercially sold worm castings go, the problem there is that there's no telling what the worms have been eating -- so what you get in "organic worm castings" is not necessarily free from pesticide residue, hormones and antibiotics (from non organic milk products).  The deception out there right now comes out of the idea that just because the worms digest it and poop it out, that it's somehow free of all the bad stuff.  I have yet to find certified organic worm castings, but we have managed to source out "vegan" worm castings -- which basically means that the worms are only fed vegetable and organic matter.  At this point, we've just avoided worm castings altogether in order to get around these issues -- but if we ever get to a place of having our own worm bin, I'd use castings from it in our garden.  Worms are cool!

Q:  What are you doing to fertilize your garden?

A:  Fertilizing is a little tricky with an organic & vegan garden that uses a growing medium instead of potting/ground soil.  There are some good vegan options out there in liquid form that you apply while watering.  Just Google organic vegan fertilizer.  Other than that, we've been jumping on the "Remineralize the Earth" bandwagon -- which I'll explain in another post.  

FINALLY!!!

It's May 31st, and we just finished planting our OVRB (Organic, Vegan, Raised Bed) garden.  Late -- very late -- but well worth the wait I hope.  

Yes, this thing was a major bitch to get together... but we did try many new methods and techniques in the process, so it was a major learning experience as well.  I'll be sharing much more of that later -- when I'm not so dog-ass tired.  

Speaking of dogs, they were in some rare form today... helping us outside.   Tango was wonderfully behaved as usual, but Sofie and Olive ended up needing an enclosure to hang in while we worked -- after they kept roaming off.  But even in an enclosure, they still managed to get into trouble -- digging holes UNDER the barrier, and of course, got filthy in the process.  

Nicholas the cat helped too -- getting all high on fresh catnip and sort of chillin' in the middle of everything while we worked.  He doesn't look or act 20 years old!  He's amazing.

This was a very full day, which began with me re-mineralizing the soil in the beds.  I'll explain much more about this later.  From there, we got the beds all shored up and the growing blankets all stapled down (I'll be explaining more about this later too, what a GREAT product!) 

Finally, it was time to lay out the garden and use the information I researched on companion gardening -- which is basically about planting things together that are compatible.  Believe it or not, some plants do better when they are planted alongside with ones they "like."  And yes, I'll explain more about that later too...

After laying everything out, it was time to cut into the fabric of the beds and get everything in.  This took a really long time, and the sun was HOT today.  Following this, we had to sew lettuce and salad green seeds and then water all the new plants, write down the layouts on paper so we know what's what, and get everything cleaned up.  We have twelve 4' x 4' beds

Whew.

More later!

Our New Garden!

Slowly constructing and placing boxes in the new garden... getting things level is not easy on uneven ground!

Sketchup rendering of our garden box layout

Just for Fun

Meet Sofie & Olive

Our latest puppy mill rescues...  Sofie is pink with polka dots!  We think she looks like Woodstock from Charlie Brown.  Olive is her baby (we think), because she's definitely a puppy and they showed up at our house together -- pretty much starved and full of fleas and burrs.  But now they're the ladies of the house!  Before we got these two, we had all boys... Tango, Ike & Nicholas (who I'll be posting soon).