Organic Gardening How To Blog

This organic gardening how to is on pest control in your organic garden. It’s easy, safe, and inexpensive. In an earlier article on pest controls, we talked about making and using pepper spray. In this article, we’ll talk about using diatomaceous earth to control garden pests.

Diatomaceous earth is a 100% ecologically safe product to use to control garden insects. It is a naturally occurring siliceous sedimentary rock that is easily crushed into fine powder. Diatomaceous earth (also called diatomite, kleselger, or DE) is formed when fossilized remains of single-cell algae are mixed with silica. It is mined in the United States, Australia, Brazil, Libya, and Sweden.

DE absorbs moisture and is used for many things. It is used as a filtrtion aid, a mild abrasive, an absorbant for liquids, cat litter, and an insecticide.

As an insecticide, diatomaceous earth will kill any insect with an exoskeleton. The fine powder absorbs lipids from the outer layers of the insects causing them to dehydrate. Then, the insects in a sense “bleed” to death as the innards of the insect leak through their exoskeletons. DE will control beatles, fleas, ticks, ants, snails, slugs, and many other garden pests.

Diatomaceous earth is harmless to humans and animals. In fact, most all of us have eaten some of it. DE is often used in silos where flour is stored to control insects. So, if you have eaten any products made with flour, you have probaly also eaten some diatomaceous earth.

You can buy diatomaceous earth at many stores. Most garden shops carry it and many Lowes stores have it. Or, you can buy it online at Amazon.com where it is called GreenSense Diatomaceous Earth.

To apply diatomaceous earth to your garden, use one of these two organic gardening how to methods:

1. Using a garden hose, sprinkle all of your garden plants thoroughly. Make sure you get all of the parts of the plants wet including the underside of the leaves. Dust the plants with a fine coat of diatomaceous earth making sure you cover the entire plant (a tool called Dustin-Mizer by EarthDuster makes this really easy to do).

2. Apply with a garden sprayer. Mix one gallon of water with 1/2 cup of DE. Diatomaceous earth will not dissolve in the water – it will only be suspended in it, so you will need to keep your sprayer well agitated.

After a rainfall, you will need to check your garden plants to see if you need to re-apply. It depends on how hard it has rained and for how long. In our garden, I do not always have to re-apply.

To help you with this organic gardening how to, watch this video:

If you are new to organic gardening or you would like to learn more, try any one of these two great e courses: Organic Gardening Magic or My Organic Food Garden. Or, try them both! Satisfaction Guaranteed for your Organic Gardening How To needs, or your money back

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It’s the beginning of winter and you may or may not be growing an organic vegetable garden right now, but, eating organic foods is delightful all year long. Most grocery stores have an organic food section and one thing you can almost always find are organic cucumbers. Following is a really simple recipe for making organic dill cucumbers. My kids love to snack on these!

Aunt Mary’s Organic Dill Cucumbers

• 1 Qt. white vinegar
• 1 Qt. water
• 3/4 Cup sugar
• 1/2 Cup non-iodized salt
• 1 Bag of pickling spice
• 6 Lbs. of organic cucumbers
• 6 Wide mouth canning jars w/lids and rings
  
• 12 Cloves of whole garlic, peeled
• 12 Hot chile peppers (optional)
  

Fill the jars with water and place them in a large pan filled with water. Turn the stove on and bring the water to a near boil. You want to raise the temperature of the water inside the jars to 180 degrees. This will kill any bacteria that is on the jars. Do the same thing with the jar lids and rings using another pan of water.

In a third large pot, mix the vinegar, sugar, salt, and a quart of water together. Add the spice bag. Bring to a boil and simmer for 15 minutes. Turn the stove off and remove the spice bag.

If necessary, trim your cucumbers to size. When you put the cucumbers in the jar, you want to leave about 1/4″ space at the top of the jar. I also trim about 1/4″ off both ends of the cucumbers and I cut each cucumber into quarters (save the scraps to discard in your compost bin).

Carefully remove a jar from the hot bath that it was in and drain the water. Immediately put two garlic cloves and two hot chile peppers in the jar and fill the remaining jar with the sliced cucumbers. Pack the jar as full as you can being sure to leave a 1/4″ space at the top. Now, using a ladle or an empty cup, remove some of the hot spicy water that you prepared and pour into your jar filled with cucumbers. Continue filling the jar with the spicy water until the jar is filled within 1/4″ of the top of the jar. Remove one jar lid and ring from their hot baths and close the top of the jar. Hand tighten only.

Now, you have completed one jar of organic dill cucumbers. Repeat this process to complete the other five jars.

Organic foods are delicious and you will enjoy this one,too! Wait at least three weeks before eating. Watch the following video for some additional tips.

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It’s winter and an ideal time to talk about cold frame gardening. Building a cold frame can be an easy organic gardening how to.

You might be asking what a cold frame is. A cold frame is a simple structure you can build to create a micro-climate for raising and growing plants and vegetables in the dead of winter. With a cold frame, you capture the warmth of the sun during the day and it helps to maintain that warm temperature during during the cold nights.

The only thing I would do differently is that I would not use the glass unless you were able to hinge it to the frame of the cold frame. An easier cover to put over the top of this cold frame would be just to use a sheet of plastic. It’s inexpensive and much easier to do.

If you do build a cold frame, some other suggestions I would have for you are:

1. Insert a remote temperature device inside the cold frame so that you can monitor the temperature inside the box from the comfort of your home. Cold weather plants like temperatures betwen 45-65 degrees Fahrenheit.

2. On real cold nights, cover your cold frames with blankets or floor mats. This will help keep the cold out.

3. Use untreated lumber to build your frames. Treated lumber can release harmful chemicals into your soil.

4. Install a small light bulb inside your cold frames to help provide some heat on really cold nights. You can install these bulds by using an extension cord.

5. Suggestions for some vegetables you may want to grow – Kale, Mache, Lettuce, Green Onions, Radish, Cabbage, Spinach, Parsely, Swiss Chard, and Carrots.

With a cold frame in your garden, you can enjoy fresh organic salads all winter long. They are easy to make. I hope this organic gardening how to will help you enjoy your garden during this long winter.

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It’s December and we are approaching Christmas. If you are an avid gardener, why not decorate your organic garden? It’s fun and will sure put you in the holiday spirit.

If you have any vertical frames in your organic garden, they are probably bare at this time of the season. Perfect for decorating. Put some red Christmas bows on these and perhaps a few Christmas tree branches. You can also turn these vertical frames into bird feeders during the winter months. Just take some pine cones and sprinkle some bird seeds into the interior of these cones and attach to the vertical frames. It’s pleasant to see lots of birds around your decorated gardens.

If you have any raised beds in your organic garden and if they are empty this time of year, you can cover them with Christmas colored cloth or plastic to make them look like a large Christmas present. Put a large red bow on top.

You can also place up-right stakes in the ground and place an assortment of Christmas decorations on them. You might even want to paint these stakes a bright red or green. We tie transparent string (such as fishing string) between stakes and hang Christmas ornaments on these. It really adds Christmas spirit.

Another great idea is to place Rudolf and several other of Santa’s reindeer in your organic garden. You can make these using unsplit firewood and small tree branches. Watch this video and you will get the idea:

Hope you enjoy your decorated organic garden. Merry Christmas!

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It’s the first of December and I thought this would be a good time for the Organic Gardening How To Blog to discuss raised bed gardening. After all, many of us have extra time on our hands because of the cold weather, so this would be an ideal time to construct raised beds for our organic gardens. After all, spring is not that far away.

First off, why do we want to do raised bed gardening? Among the benefits are:

1. Raised beds have less soil compaction. The roots of plants need some air to remain healthy. Raising the beds usually mean that you are not walking in them so the soil stays looser.

2. Raised beds drain water more effectively. Once again, this helps the roots of plants to breathe. Some garden soils have so much clay in them that it’s difficult for the soil to naturally drain. Raising the bed especially helps in areas with this type of a problem.

3. You can better control soil conditions and types in raised beds. You have to fill these beds with soil and you can choose the type of soil and condition it the way you want. Make sure the soil has plenty of organic matter in it such as compost (see Compost for Your Organic Garden).

4. Don’t crowd the plants, but with raised beds you can place the plants much closer together. This will increase your yield per square foot. Studies have shown that raised bed gardening can increase your yield from 20% to 90%.

5. Raised beds can extend your gardening season. As spring approaches, the soil in raised beds will get warmer much more quickly than soil in the ground. As an added tip, when spring approaches, put black plastic over the top of these raised beds and you will add several weeks to your growing season.

6. Less bending and stooping is required with raised bed gardening. This is especially helpful for the elderly and handicapped.

7. Properly thought out and well built raised beds are pleasing to the eye.

8. Not only will you have fewer weeds in raised bed gardening (because you have been able to plant your plants closer together), but also when you do have to weed it will be much easier.

Keep your raised beds to a 4′-5′ diameter so that you can reach the middle of it from all sides. For construction, use untreated wood to keep out contaminants. Cedar or redwood are ideal choices.

Below are two excellent videos on constructing this Organic Gardening How To. The first one is by Patty Moreno and the second one is by Dave’s Garden. Enjoy both of them!

That’s it, from the Organic Gardening How To Blog

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