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Remember Your Grandmother’s Garden?
If your grandmother was anything like mine, she had quite a garden. Grandpa said, "she could make a broomstick bud and put out roots." Like many working-class people of her time--for my Grandmother--gardening, canning, and maybe having a few chickens, was just what most folks did.
In the working-class neighborhoods where she lived, she grew to know people of every race and country. Like her, many were from a European rural or peasant tradition. Other families had moved down from French Canada, or north out of Appalachia or the Deep South. Like every other women on her street of worker row-housing, she kept a garden to stretch her husband’s small weekly paychecks and, as she would say, “keep the wolf from the door.” These immigrant women traded seeds, shared produce, and put each other’s kids to work.
The 'Wolf' came knocking for thousands of Americans in 1929 with the stock market crash that heralded the coming of the Great Depression. Almost overnight factory orders fell and layoffs began. By 1930, Grandpa had joined the hordes of jobless men riding the rails or hitch-hiking to that next rumored harvest or government construction project, while Grandma and the five kids shared a coldwater, shotgun, walk-up in Brooklyn. In the midst of a sprawling and desperate city, wedged between tenements, Grandma found a patch of ground and sunlight and made it come alive with greens, pole-beans, root crops, and her beloved tomato plants.
With four cents, she could get a pound of chicken necks from the butcher, with which--simmered with carrots, celery, beans, and other garden blessings--she made many a meal for her family. In the country, in the street-car suburbs, and in the cities, many Americans of that generation remember the garden as a practical necessity and a saving grace. In the early 1930s, Scott & Helen Nearing moved to Stratton Mt., Vermont to begin their experiments with the 'Good life,' and economist Ralph Barsodi created his School of Living in Rockland County, New York. They all practiced sustainable gardening as a mainstay of personal and community self-reliance.
By 1943, my Grandmother and her neighbors had appropriated a trash-strewn lot, which they’d divvied up for Victory Gardens. With three sons overseas, wartime food rationing, and posters suggesting that every home-garden was a nail in Hitler’s coffin, Grandma kept doing what she’d always done. Like most Americans, she had a personal relationship with the practice of gardening, but also perfectly understood it’s broader effects and implications. She also was not so proud, that she wouldn’t undertake a small thing that might do a little good.
A funny thing happened in the 1950s. Grandma’s garden went out of style. The country rode a wave of post-war prosperity. All the kids were working, married, and starting families. With their army savings, the boys had gotten Grandma and Grandpa into a small house. Naturally, she had a garden, but the kids asked her, wasn’t she getting too old for that? "Mom, you don’t have to garden any more!" They bought her a refrigerator and a television, and frozen vegetables were cheap and easy to prepare. But Grandma still kept to her frugal ways. She still lived within her means, still counting her change at the grocery store, and still tending a garden.
Nevertheless, growing a vegetable garden in the 1950s and 60s, in the midst of all that plenty, when agribusiness seemed triumphant and America was feeding the world, well, someone who did that was kind of a kook! Children and grandchildren were increasingly cut off, just like their parents, from the realities, responsibilities and satisfactions of food production. Kids got used to eating vegetables and fruit that was uniform in size and color, and came without spots or blemishes. Their parents got used to opening a carton or popping a frozen tray into the oven. Vegetables fresh from the garden, well, they looked like they’d been in the dirt!
Historians say that the loss of farms, from the Depression to the 1950s, coincided with a new 1960s generation’s dissatisfaction with their parent’s suburban lifestyles and rediscovery of a rural ideal. Uncertainties about Nuclear weapons, the Cold War, the Vietnam conflict, and so much else, fueled a wave of interest in cutting loose from the greater society and creating a simple and sane alternative. Abandoned farms were inexpensive for young college students, who could pool their money and were used to city property values. Home-owner versions of labor-saving tools, such as chainsaws and garden tillers, brought country living within the range of what an individual or couple could undertake. Youthful exuberance, naiveté, and strong, young backs took care of the rest!
Gardening was central to this movement—the Back-to-the-Land Movement-- that is now a part of American history. A new generation looked with respect at their elders who still knew and practiced the crafts and skills of rural living, and which—in the Ozarks, Vermont’s North-East Kingdom, and many other areas—had not ever really gone out of style.
Newcomers to rural life faced a steep learning curve: For many, the appeal of country life faded before the realities of hard work. Yet, in the 1970s, this movement was tremendously innovative, even playful. Those who stuck it out were not afraid of hard work, but saw no sense in labor for labor’s sake. Nationally circulated magazines, such as John Shuttleworth’s Mother Earth News and Stewart Brant’s Whole Earth Catalog and Co-Evolution Quarterly, spread encouragement, philosophical validation, the gospel of self-reliance, and new tools and approaches. The test of a tool or strategy was in whether it worked: Doctrinaire approaches that did not meet the test—whether old country ways or new, faddish ones—fell by the way.
With a nod to traditional gardening right-practice, new blends of conventional and natural growing, cold-frame and greenhouse technology, alternative building and energy applications, and new kitchen and cash crops were experimented with. County Agricultural Extension Agents, who once spent most of their time on dairy herd management and modern, economy-of-scale approaches, were suddenly getting questions on non-toxic weed-control, raising oriental mushrooms, or hand-milking Alpine goats.
The OPEC Oil Embargo of 1973 spawned an energy crisis that fell particularly hard on rural communities. Long commutes, fuel prices, and fertilizer costs skyrocketed. Many families looked with new fondness at their gardens, pantries of canned goods, and their woodpiles. Many Americans who had left these self-reliance activities behind them as they moved to the suburbs and cities, looked for ways to take them up again. Perhaps they were thinking back to Grandmother’s garden (and Grandpa’s wood-pile), but in a new format, adaptable to their contemporary circumstances.By the 1990s those Sixties & Seventies 'newcomers' to rural living are not so new any more. Many are models and mentors to a new generational wave of ‘Do-It-Yourselfers,’ and contemporary urban, suburban, and rural gardeners who grasp the potential for local solutions to global problems They have families, have taken on community responsibilities, and—more often than not—are making an income away from their home. They have not abandoned their ideals, but are keen on finding ways to combine a healthy, 'Green' lifestyle with the hectic realities of family, work, and community life.
Today’s gardeners bring to their considerations a deep appreciation of family and regional tradition, a commitment to living in more sustainable ways, and a sense of the value of their own time and effort—really, a sense of their limitations.
Perhaps, you grow a family backyard garden for much the same reasons as your grandparents or great-grandparents. You, too, may feel the 'Wolf' at the door: A paycheck is larger now than in my Grandmother’s day, but the average working family still needs to stretch it. While she planted a garden everywhere she lived to help support her family, don’t think for a minute that she wasn’t engaged with making some small contribution to the greater good, be it leaving a bag of snap-beans at a neighbor’s door or doing her bit to strike a blow against Hitler. A garden is something most of us can do to live in a more healthy and self-reliant way, to reduce our own food expenses, and to contribute to the greater planetary good. I’m glad I got to see my Grandmother in her garden.
Got Mulch? The Garden Mats® Guide to Mulch and Mulch More
My dog-eared, thirty-five year-old Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary defines "mulch" as "a protective covering (as of sawdust, compost, or paper) spread or left on the ground to reduce evaporation, maintain even soil temperature, prevent erosion, control weeds, enrich soil or keep fruit clean."
Mulch inhibits weed growth by blocking sunlight and halting photosynthesis, which is how plants, including weeds--the plants you don’t want in your garden—make the food they need to live. Mulch also both moderates soil temperatures and retains heat to extend the growing season. It greatly reduces moisture evaporation and watering requirements, and stops macro-erosion due to run-off and micro-erosion due to heavy rainfall or over-watering.
In a nutshell, mulch helps your plants grow and cuts down on your garden work. If you use the right kind of mulch and apply it with some thought, your plants and vegetables will really grow, and you can drastically cut back on the time and effort it takes to garden.
A proper mulching system has all these primary benefits, and many secondary ones: Dark, moist, and somewhat bird-proof soil means lots of worms-- aerating, digesting, breaking-down particles of matter, and expelling nutrients. That’s a real good thing!
A barrier that takes in water, but reduces evaporation, can save hundreds of gallons depending on where you live. For those of us that live in the country and end up with a sunny plot far from the faucet--or always seem to have a hose that doesn’t quite reach--this can translate into many, many less bucket and watering can trips.
Once a garden is planted though, the single most time consuming and effortful gardening job is weeding…and weeding…and weeding. If a mulching system effectively stops weeds, then—to me—the other benefits are gravy. If I can weed less, and barbecue on the porch or jump in the brook a few times more, and still enjoy fresh, bountiful peas and tomatoes--- that’s a good summer! And if I can go away for a week and not have to do hours and hours of catch-up weeding, that’s good, too.
In the battle to keep down weeds, gardeners have tried just about everything at one time or another. So, what works? All of the several materials and strategies currently in use have their advantages and disadvantages.
Home or store-bought natural mulching materials, such as leaves, pine needles, bark, saw dust, and straw can enrich the soil and improve soil structure as they decompose. They are temporary, and if available where you live, they are inexpensive. On the other hand, buying mulch by the bag is expensive: truck-loads are the better buy. Depending on conditions, saw-dust and finely-shredded materials can cake or mat to form a crust that acts as a water and air barrier. Also, decomposition creates bacteria, which will remove some nitrogen from the soil. The very best of these materials is straw mulch: It is light, holds moisture, is weed-free, easy to move or patch, and is pleasant to work with, and walk and kneel on.
The other home-made or store-bought natural mulch is compost, which again, is virtually free at home, but can cost a pretty penny by the bag. Your home materials must be completely composted and any seeds completely decomposed or you’ll just be seeding your rows with weeds! Quality compost both enriches the soils and improves soil texture—lightening clay soils and giving sandy soils nutrients and water-retention.
Synthetic, spun-fiber materials bought—off the rack—at the hardware store, seem to come and go, each year. Few that we’ve tried have made it through a growing season, and none are what we would call ”reusable.” All seem to break down toward the end of a summer. They lack UV protection and are flimsy and hard to work with.
Newspaper and cardboard are an old standby. If your local press prints with soy-based ink, eight-page layers of newspaper can survive through a season, with some patching--if you don’t have pets (or kids)-- and can be tilled into the ground in the fall. Newsprint isn’t a complete sun barrier and evaporative loses are moderate, but newspapers are close to free. The other problem with newsprint is that if soy-based ink is not used, the ink is full of toxic chemicals. Paper or cardboard has a lot of chemicals as well. So, if you can, avoid paper or cardboard as a mulch.
Cardboard boxes of the kind for shipping appliances may use formaldehyde and other preservatives. Some of us remember making forts out of refrigerator boxes as kids and coming away with a sore throat or watery eyes. Some cardboards form a water-proof barrier as well. None-the-less, there are people who make it work. We, on the other hand, have seen too many sheets of cardboard lifted off the ground by sprouting weed colonies.
Plastic mulch was for a long time an industry standard in commercial gardening. And there still are millions of acres of plastic-mulched row crops worldwide. Once laid down, slits or holes are made through which seeds and seedlings are planted. Tearing and UV degradation are typical issues, and re-use is limited. The biggest drawback though is that plastic mulch disposal is a huge environmental issue--unlike with natural mulching materials.
Since you are reading this, you know that we have given a great deal of consideration to the problem of mulching & weed-control materials. It is our business to know what works. We feel confident that we have created the best weed-control and mulching product currently available. To us, the proof is in our test gardens and our own experience of saving lots of time that would normally go into late summer weeding. But the generous testimonials and feedback we’ve received from practical, no-nonsense commercial growers is the best proof. As Commercial Organic Grower, Kevin Thompson, of Highland Gardens, wrote us: "I always recommend that people mulch. This type of groundcover produces the same results and is especially valuable if you have weed issues. I prefer the reusability and the permeability of Garden Mats® over the other agricultural products."
While we set out to make a product that was good in the garden, we also had the aim of cutting costs and energy use—not only by making home gardening more practical—but by maximizing product reusability. You can expect to get up to ten years of use out of earth friendly Garden Mats®. That’s because we want Garden Mats® in your garden, not in the landfill!
Meeow!
There is one other home-gardening issue for which Garden Mats® will provide a great advantage over composts, barks, straw, sawdust and easily torn felt fabric. Here, I am speaking not of the Garden Mat®, but of the garden cat! Many of the manufactured and shredded barks and chips have a close resemblance to—and one suspects, may have come off the same product run as --- some kitty-litter products. This can be a problem. If this is your problem, try our mats……. And we’ll leave it at that.
Soil Type Basics
Gardening is all about soil-- that loose top-layer of earth covering our planet. Soil results from the breakdown of rock over thousands of years through natural cycles of wind and water erosion, glacial activity, frost, and chemical interaction. The act of gardening and water erosion removes nutrients from the soil. In addition, some gardeners grow on land that has been worked over too much, and is depleted. Identifying the type of soil one has, understanding it’s particular characteristics, and taking steps to improve it is a large part of a gardener’s mission and—we would say—responsibility.
When gardeners use the word "soil," they are not only thinking of solid matter— particles of rock and decayed organics—but also of air and water that is present to varying degrees and the capacity of that rock and organic mix to hold air and water. Agriculture and soil science recognize six main soil types, organized by the size particles each is composed of. In addition to the six main types, there are composite classifications and regional variations.
- Sandy soil has large particles and a granular consistency. It makes room for water and air, due to the facets present in its larger texture. It tends to warm-up rapidly in the spring. However, the granularity and size that allows water in, also allows it out. In order for sandy soil to retain moisture and nutrients, it should be well mulched, and compost should be worked into it at season’s end.
- Silt soil can be extremely fertile because it mixes fine organic particles with rock and mineral granules. Soil enrichment by silting, through natural and artificial means, was among the earliest of farming techniques. Silt tends to drain well enough, but holds on to moisture and nutrients better than sandy soils.
- Clay soil is composed of smaller, more fine-grained particles, with less room to hold water and air. It is a dense soil, heavy to work when wet and very hard when too dry. It can become waterlogged if it sits low, because it does not drain well. Here, again, compost can be tilled in to ‘lighten’ it.
- Loam soil, a variable mix of sand, silt, and clay, tends to have the prominent virtues of the three cardinal soil types. It drains well, but holds moisture and nutrients.
- Peat soil contains an extreme amount of decayed plant matter and should be rich in nutrients, but—though composed of organic materials—full decomposition and release of nutrients is blocked by peat’s high acidity. Like clay soils, peat is prone to water-logging, and needs fertilization and drainage.
- Chalk or Limestone based soil is naturally alkaline, tends to dry out and needs lots of fertilization. Because the over-riding factor is generally a Chalk/ Limestone substructure, raised beds are often the best approach.
Probably, your soil is some combination of these six main soil types. A soil test, a look at your town or Extension Agent’s soil maps, and a talk with neighbors who garden, are good ways to zero-in on the type of soil you are working with. Most of the types—in combination—have their pros and cons. Most regions have a loam or silt combination that is well-known and considered the local gold standard. With a little luck, you might just have it on your property!
The Tomato Garden
An old man lived alone in the country. One spring, he wanted to dig his tomato garden but it was very hard work as the ground was hard. His only son, Max, who used to help him, was in prison. The old man wrote a letter to his son and described his predicament.
Dear Max - I am feeling pretty bad because it looks like I won't be able to plant my tomato garden this year. I am getting too old to be digging up a garden plot. If you were here, my troubles would be over. I know you would dig the garden for me. Love, Papa.
A few days later he received a letter from his son...
Dear Papa - I'd do anything for you Papa, except dig up that garden. That's where I buried the bodies. Love, Max.
At 4 o'clock the next morning, FBI and local police arrived and dug up the entire back yard without finding any bodies. They apologized to the old man and left. The same day the old man received another letter from his son.
Dear Papa - Go ahead and plant the tomatoes now. That's the best I could do under the circumstances. Love, Max
