Update with Pictures - Square Foot Gardening

Looking back at my first experiences with gardening, I never thought so much could be grown in such a small place. Thanks to all the people who are sharing their experiences and tips, otherwise it would take sometime atleast 7-8 years for a newbie with no prior gardening knowledge to achieve what you see in the pictures. All the knowledge about preparing the soil, spacing the plants, when to grow what, how much to grow, deciding which plants to grow together, how to enhance soil microbiology, compost tea is available at the fingertips.

This is how I started in mid May



This is where we are today for the second harvest. (First harvest for Broccoli, Spinach, Radishes, Coriander, Carrots, Basil was back in June)
^
Side view on the slope where you can see cherry tomato, okra, bush beans, carrots, onions.



Some more pictures

Vegetable Seed mat for Square Foot Garden

Usually for home gardeners, the packets of seed is contains more seeds than what can be realistically used for 3-4 growing seasons. Moreover, we grow more variety of vegetables than a farmer, and we plant and harvest continuously throughout the growing season. A simple solution to optimize and make efficient use of seeds would be to have vegetable seeds mats 1 x 1 Foot with appropriate spacing. All you would need to do is put soil on top of it and water. No buying, handling and wasting of seeds. It would be a good business opportunity for seed companies to produce this innovative solution for square foot gardener.

A carrot seed mat might look like this with seeds embedded in the thin dry growing media. As soon as it comes in contact with moist soil the germination process starts.

This would be a lettuce mat with appropriate spacing for lettuce to be placed in one square of a SFG.

In fact there exists if you search seed mats, but they are meant for traditional row farming.

Organic Container Gardening 101

If I were beginner and would like to grow vegetables in container, this are the steps I would follow:

1. Start Small: Human mind is quite irrational when it comes to making some decisions and starting a garden is no different. Its wise to start small with 3-4 containers and then adapt based on your interest and time rather than buying everything based on a new book.
2. Only grow what you will eat: With som many varieties around, it is easy to get carried away with beautiful pictures on the seed catalogues. Once you decide what you want to grow it will dictate size of the container.
3. Placement of your containers: Most vegetables need ample sunlight (8 hours), so be sure to choose appropriate location. Also after you build them it would be difficult to keep moving them around. So choose the location carefully.

We will talk about self watering containers in a later post, which is an efficient way to save time and still get the best harvest. Some of the vegetables which can be easily grown in the container are: Tomatoes,pepper, egg plant, squash, spinach, cucumbers, cabbage, onions and lettuce.

Some tips on how to save money with container gardening:

• Choose plants that are native to the area and are resistant varieties.
• Collect rainwater to water the plants.
• Start a compost pile to save on fertilizers.

Here is one picture showing imagination has no bounds when choosing containers for your garden.

Square Foot Gardening in Srilanka

I am reading very interesting account of a beginner starting vegetable gardening with Square Foot gardening method in Srilanka. I was particularly interested in knowing how Mel's mix was prepared, since these ingredients (Vermiculite, Peat Moss and Compost) might not be readily available in some countries.
And amazingly it says people have figured it out that Peat Moss can be replaced by the dust that holds coconut fibre together! Vermiculite was available that the pool supplies store. Thus, SFG can be practiced in all of south east Asian countries (India, Thailand, Indonesia, China, etc.) and other coastal areas with local ingredients. Here is my account of setting up SFG in Switzerland.

Here is picture account of assembling and setting up the SFG.

After 3 weeks.

I will be following this log.

Why organic gardening and some tips

People give many reasons for organic gardening:

1. It is without chemical fertilizers or pesticides


2. It is healthy and more nutritious with trace minerals


3. Better tasting


4. Less maintenance since there are fewer pests and disease.

For me it is more about sustainability, since you team up with nature to do what it does best. With compost and microbes you build up a micro ecosystem where plants naturally thrive.

Tips for organic gardening:

For beginners there are few factors which should be taken into consideration before you embark on vegetable gardening

1. Knowing the weather in your area. See previous entry to estimate approximate growing season if the information is not readily available. Also check any other obstructions which influence sunlight.


2. Check the soil for any major nutrient deficiency. If you plan to do container gardening and prepare own soil you can use 1/3 Peat moss, 1/3 Compost, 1/3 Vermiculite (Mels Mix)


3. How much space you have and plan y layout


4. Mulching: There have been quite some studies which stress the importance of mulching not only as conserving water, discourage weeds but also in increasing yields.

Mulching

Here is some mulching techniques you could use. These have been gathered from various sources on Internet.

Some generalities that can be made regarding color are
1) silver repels aphids,
2) Blue attracts thrips but has been very effective in greenhouse tomato production and
3) Yellow attracts insects. There also appears to be some reduction in disease pressure with crops grown on specific colors.
Mulching of specific vegetables:

• Tomatoes responded to red mulch compared to black.
• Peppers responded more to silver mulch compared to black, with an average 20 percent increase in marketable fruit yield and fruit size over a three-year study. Lowest yield or marketable peppers were harvested from plants grown on either white or light blue mulch.
• Eggplant appeared to respond more to red mulch compared to black with an average 12 percent increase in marketable fruit yield over two years.
• Cucumbers and summer squash seemed to responded more to dark blue mulch compared to black, with an average 30 percent increase over three years in marketable fruit yield for cucumbers and 20 percent for zucchini.
• Basil Leaves developing over red surfaces had greater area, succulence, and fresh weight than those developing over black surfaces. Basil grown over yellow and green surfaces produced significantly higher concentrations of aroma compounds than did basil grown over white and blue covers.

Frost Dates and Growing Season in Switzerland

If you pickup any gardening book, then the planting schedule is always given in terms of Last Spring Frost Date and First Fall Frost Date. And usually it is available for the most of US cities. However, I could not find information about any of the Swiss cities. The probability of frost or freeze is greatly affected by elevation, the direction of sunlight (north, south, east or west), prevailing winds and other factors.

I searched some information to come to a likely number for the frost date in switerland. Below is the average weather conditions in Zurich. (BBC Weather)

Next we look at sunrise and sunset during the summer months. (Gaisma)

Also to have the optimal placement and orientatiion of the garden, we need to know the path of the sun. This is help in finding the best location in your house so that it is not shaded by some obstructions.

As you can see in the summer months the sun rises north east (about 30 degrees) and then follows the curve. It us never overhead.

Next looking at the insolation recieved, average temperatures and rainfall we find that compared to other locations at the same latitude zurich is comparetively warmer and has more rainfall.

Looking at all this data, one could say the average last spring frost would be around Apr 25 and average first fall frost would be around Oct 20. This gives us nearly 180 days i.e. 25 weeks of growing season. This also means that some of the plants cannot be sowed directly outside in the soil, you have start the seed indoors or buy transplants from the local nursury.

Garden Log - Seed to Maturity

As I started to grow more vegetables in the 30x30 cm squares, it became a little difficult to remember what I was putting where and when it would be time to harvest. So I created a little spreadsheet to manage this.

It is a simple tool to keep track of what is growing where and when will it be ready. I also kept additional information regarding where I bought the seeds or transplants and what was mentioned on the seed packet so as to know which seeds are growing best.
When you open the file, it calculates based on today´s date how much time is remaining for harvesting.

You can use this spreadsheet here.

Here is the picture showing these sqaures and the plants. Square 1 starting from top left.

Testing the soil pH, Nitrogen, Potassium and Phosphorous

There was an area in the garden where I had concerns that the soil is deficient in some nutrients because of the slow growth. This pepper plant for example was growing quite slowly compared to the one I had in the pot (with different soil) and had only one pepper till now.

Based on observation and reading the books, it could be following of two things:

1. The soil was acidic and therefore nutrients could not be easily absorbed.
2. There was nitrogen deficieny, as indicated by slow growth and yellowing of the older leaves at the bottom.

I used the following kit to test the soil. It provides pH, and NPK tests in a easy way. I sampled the soil as written in the instructions. The soil needs to be mixed with water and the solution is transferred to these test and reference chambers. The test was quite fast and following were the results. The pH indication was neutral, P and K were adequate where as N was deficient.

You can see it from the colour of the solution after the powder in the capsule was mixed.

Based on these results I decided to move the pepper plant to a different area.

I will check in few days if the plant recovers or not.

Building Sqare Foot Garden in Switzerland

Here I would like to share some tips on finding material to build the Square Foot Garden in Switzerland with locally available material from different shops (Migros Do it, Coop Bau Hobby, Jumbo, Landi etc)




Click on the rectangle beside the slide number to see in larger window.

Some pictures - First experiences in container gardening

Here are some pictures of the pots.

I did not expect the tomato plant to grow so big. Now I know it is of indeterminate type and will not stop after reaching a certain height. The good thing is it gives continuous yield once it fruits.

Now the container looks a bit small for this. The roots are coming out of the holes at the bottom.

The one below is white radish. I planted them 7 cm apart according to the guidelines given in this book, but it seems these are bigger radishes. Probably the spacing is meant for the smaller round red radishes which are more common.

Wait and see what happens when they mature.