The Essentials of Organic GardeningIncorporate compost compost into the soil to increase the soil's ability to retain water and nutrients. Avoid planting large blocks of the same crop, offering an easy target for pests. Protect soil from compaction with wide rows or raised planting beds. Organic vegetable production is a long-term process that is carried out in stages, rather than a single production practice adopted in a growing season.
Adopting organic production techniques implies a transition from conventional to organic gardening. The first step in this transition is to improve and maintain fertility or soil quality. Healthy and fertile soils are the basis for successful organic vegetable production.
Organic gardening
is all about gardening in the most natural way possible, without the use of synthetic pesticides and fertilizers.In addition to feeding your plants with liquid fertilizers, you feed the soil with homemade compost, manure and other organic matter to increase soil fertility. Instead of spraying pests, look for alternative ways to control them, for example, by growing complementary plants to confuse them and attract their predators, or using a jet of water to eliminate them from your plants, where you could have used a chemical spray before. Instead of spraying weeds with herbicide, weeds are removed by hand and mulch, sheets, and “Do Not Dig” methods are used to suppress weed growth. Weeding is not the only way to eliminate weeds.
You can use mulch to block light and suppress weed growth. Try placing cardboard on top of the soil and adding a thick layer of compost or well-rotted manure on top. On the plot or in the orchard, planting a green manure at the end of the growing season can prevent weed growth and increase soil fertility. At first it is difficult, but by relaxing at the first sign of pests, predators will more quickly come to deal with the problem.
So instead of looking for the soap spray or water jet, why not wait a while and see what happens? You may be surprised by what becomes a feast with the “pests” in your garden. Organic gardening means not resorting to chemical herbicides to control the inevitable weeds that will enter your garden. Instead, you'll need to rely on other methods to keep weeds at bay. These are the two main tactics used by organic gardeners.
The soil must be enriched and have a stable pH. If you're not sure what the soil pH is, self-made organic garden soil tests are affordable and available online or at a local garden center. Another option is to send a soil sample for analysis. Depending on soil reference levels, you may need to add a high-quality compost.
Household compost piles are a great resource, but if your compost isn't ready, adding a multi-purpose organic soil in the top centimeters is a good alternative. The benefits of organic gardening are widespread and go far beyond a season's crop yield. This will eliminate the headaches of plucking seeds and ensure that your garden starts off on the right foot with healthy and happy baby plants. Trap Crops Plant a less desirable plant close to the garden to lure insects away from important garden vegetables.
Growers who prefer to grow traditional varieties, have limited garden space, or produce vegetables in a tall tunnel or greenhouse should consider this emerging technique. Observing the garden and its paths can help you understand existing systems and can also help you spot problems before they become unmanageable. Instead of relying on synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, organic gardening relies on making the garden self-sufficient and sustainable. Potential crop yields could increase by about 12 percent for every 1 percent increase in organic matter.
While you can't stop a perfect organic garden, you can definitely give yourself a good edge. Cover crops add organic matter, reduce soil erosion, provide habitat for beneficial insects and spiders, provide nitrogen, suppress weeds, and loosen subsoil. You can use a garden hose for manual watering or set up a simple irrigation system with sprinklers, soak hoses, or drip irrigation. Your garden niche for your first season could be vegetable salad such as lettuce, kale, arugula and mustards.
Composting organic matter stabilizes nitrogen and kills pathogens and weed seeds, and allows the use of materials, such as raw manure and sawdust, that should not be applied directly to growing vegetables. Fast-growing cover crops, such as buckwheat, soybean, cowpea, and the Sudanese sorghum-grass hybrid, can be established during the summer (periods of one to two months between harvesting early planted spring crops and planting autumn crops) to eliminate weeds and add matter organic to the soil. . .
