Update: Ecoversity's Garden 2009

At Ecoversity this year we started an experiment in gardening a plot that according to the 'old timer' neighbors has not been in cultivation for certainly more than 80 years. Yet, standing in the 3 acre field one can one can detect remnants of farming. It is shaped as a fairly flat terrace, and on one side one can see the now dry acequia earthworks running along the field, while on the other side it is bordered by an arroyo.

 The fall before, in October 2008, we had a couple of mules disk the field and Leonardo, Alexandria, Bon and a bunch of other children had spread winter wheat and winter rye seeds. This attracted flocks of birds over the winter, but surprisingly enough in the spring what was left did come up and covered most of the field beautifully.

Regardless of what the benefits of the cover crop may have been, the soil tests conducted earlier this year 'in house' by Peter Prandoni were brutal: barely any nutrients in a very alkaline soil without much structure. Really poor soil, very similar to so many places in New Mexico (and over the world).  Together with our interns Maribou Latour and Michael Meade we decided on a multi prong strategy to remediate the soil conditions and then implemented them.

-enclosed a 30 by 45 feet area with strawbales
-inoculated these strawbales with oyster mushroom mycelium
-added about 25 cubic feet of peat to area
-double dig one side of garden
-11 wheelbarrows of coffee compost
-worms
-inoculated sawdust for mulching with shitake mushrooms
-kept ground covered with straw and agricultural cloth after deep watering.

We did make some mistakes: We added some (though little) sulphur salts to the ground in order to get the ph more acidic. That was before Michael Melendrez instructed us on the drawbacks of adding any salts, and so I wouldn't do it again. Like Melendrez says: the whole idea behind long term soil remediation is to create conditions for humus generation. Anyway --look at the interview with Melendrez if you are interested in this humus subject here: the secret to the terrestrial biosphere.

Maribou and I visited the 'free seed day' at the Seeds of Change ranch close to Espanola to pick up a good quantity of seeds of lettuces, radishes, corns, sunflowers, tomatoes, cucumbers, bush and Lima beans and squash and a bunch of different flower seeds as well. What a great free initiative of this growing company Seeds of Change under the leadership of Marc Cool (....how cool is that ?).

Peter Prandoni instructed us how to plant potatoes (plenty of straw and mulch in layers). We also tried some areas the Fukuoka way, which means no digging, just barely rake in some seeds, with mixed results  (probably this takes a multi-year approach). Due to limited availability and also limited volunteer time, we watered sparingly, though for awhile intern Michael Meade was really keeping up with the garden. Luckily we had some good rains at crucial moments, and the plants did ok. We had a very good crop of tomatoes (probably a little over 150 pounds), potatoes (also over 100 pounds), a little bit of this and that (like squash, eggplant, chicory, etc.), and enough lima beans to collect seeds for the next year.

Though I didn't see any oyster mushrooms growing, the mycelium did inoculate the straw bales fully, and now we can use those for mulching next year. The best result really was how the soil had changed within one year. Be nice to do another soil test now. Upon inspection the soil had structure, held moisture and there was a good extend of mycelium penetration and worms. Clearly with communal effort, and grace, we can do much more next year building upon the experience we gained from the growing season this year.