Garden Management Techniques
The Betty and Jacob Friedman Holistic Garden follows the basic principles of organic gardening. The four tenets of organic gardening are A. Build the soil with organic matter so that it becomes a dynamic entity in maintaining healthy plants; B. Use natural methods of weed, pest and disease control; C. Avoid the use of synthetic chemicals; and D. Do not use techniques or materials that would damage the natural ecosystem. The garden also uses sustainable practices and employs many of the principles of regenerative agriculture.
The basic techniques used in crop production are introduced below:
Soil and Nutrient Management are critical to the Holistic Garden. Our soil, shaped in raised beds, is about 8 to 10 inches of sandy loam topsoil overlying a clay loam subsoil. The topsoil drains well but the subsoil does not. Organic matter management is a critical part of the soil, the garden recycles organic matter and the nutrients associated with it. When more nutrients are needed, for example at the start of most crops, organic fertilizer is applied at a rate based on the crop being grown. The orchard gets a booster shot of organic fertilizer a couple of times each year. Most natural areas are not fertilized or received a small amount of fertilizer when crops are being replanted. The garden produces a lot of compost and uses it to boost the organic matter in the soil. This, in turn, supports a wealth of beneficial organisms in the plant rhizosphere. The garden’s nutrient management system mimics the natural cycles that occur in nature.
Compost Production and Utilization is an integral practice in the Holistic Garden. Except for crops that have been harvested and sent to the serveries, no organic matter leaves the garden, it is all recycled. Aerobic composting is the more common system used in the garden because it is fast, it does not generate methane and can be done to reach a temperature that will pasteurize the compost.
Cultivar Selection takes time but is paramount to success in the Holistic Garden. New cultivars are being released all the time and established cultivars are being replaced. To keep up with this the garden staff spends significant time reviewing new cultivar availability. The garden uses hybrids when possible for their increased vigor and resistance to problems.
High-density Planting and Precision Spacing are used throughout the garden. The advantages are to get maximum yields and to use the crop as a method of weed control. Weeds need light and their growth and development is significantly reduced if a crop’s leaves are covering the soil.
Crop Rotation is used to help reduce soil borne problems, such as root knot nematodes and black rot. Plants in the same family tend to have similar soil borne problems and so they are blocked together and moved to areas that they had not been grown in for the previous year or two. For problems that die out in a year or two this greatly reduces the need for other control strategies.
Cover Crops and Green Manure Crops are used as interchangeable terms. Both used to add organic matter to the soil and to cover the soil with a crop in the off season to reduce erosion and weed development.
Water Management is critical for most garden plants. The natural rainfall pattern in Houston is approximately 50 inches a year, but is not evenly distributed. Drip irrigation is the most efficient way to apply water to gardens and is used in the Holistic Garden. Drainage is also critical since most garden plants cannot tolerate saturated soil. Various means, such as sloped terrain, raised beds and furrows and increased depth of porous soil are employed to move excess water out of the garden to allow oxygen to reenter the root zone.
Rainwater Collection System enables the garden to harvest rain from impervious surfaces and store it until it is needed. To illustrate this concept the garden has a 700 gallon tank fed by the rain gutter system on the barn. This stored water is used at times when the campus water system in inoperative during dry spells. The relatively small amount of water could not water the whole garden, but is reserved for plants in containers.
Integrated Pest Management (IPM) is an important part of pest and disease control. Teams of students learn how to scout for problems so that control strategies can be implemented as soon as possible. IPM also helps assess whether implementation of control strategies is needed.
Solar Greenhouse is a way to employ a greenhouse off the power grid. This greenhouse uses the energy of sunlight to warm it during the day, stores excess warmth in barrels of water to be released at night and uses and aerobic compost bin to produce additional heat at peak times for producing warm season transplants in cold weather.
Transplant Production, when possible, saves time in producing crops. Crops that can be grown as transplants and set in the garden at 4 to 6 weeks old help minimize reduce weed, pest and disease problems, reduce the costs of establishing crops, enable precision spacing and reduce the amount of time needed to grow the crops. The shorter the time that a crop is in the field, the less time problems can develop. Also, if four weeks can be saved in the production of three crops, the total of 12 weeks can be used for production of a fourth crop. Use of transplants also enables the use of more expensive hybrid seeds which have greater vigor and fewer problems in their production.
Precision Harvesting is done to assure that crops are sent to the serveries in prime condition. Harvesting at the appropriate time helps minimize unnecessary loss of produce.
Natural Areas, such as the pollinators’ garden, habitat for beneficials and songbird habitat, are essential parts of management of the garden. The natural areas with a preponderance of native plants attract pollinators, beneficial insects, birds, toads, lizards and many other small animals to the garden.