The Garden Begins

Happy Fall, y’all! I’m sure there’s a sizeable population that is despairing of the summer coming to an end, but this girl is all for fall. [Read: fall, not pumpkin spice.] So, what better way to spend the first day than by planting fruit trees?

Shortly after we moved in, I jumped on the chance to order some fruit trees. Like, how cool would it be to just walk out the front door and grab an apple right off the tree? We have 11 trees this fall, and I left room for more in the garden. I love apple cider and pie, so we have gala, granny, red delicious, and honey crisp. Ever had a cherry hand pie? Magic. We have a lapins and a sweetheart calling our garden home. Pears are the perfect sweet add to a salad or just by itself and we put a couple of Bartletts out in our budding orchard. Now, I don’t know about you, but I like the quirky things. So we have a couple of paw paw trees that are nestled in a lower spot away from the exposed garden. The leaves are big and tropical but a little more delicate up against the winds. Now, you might be asking yourself, “Jen, what’s a paw paw?”. It’s a native fruit to the States, a tropical looking tree that bears mango looking fruits and tastes like a mix of both bananas and mango. Since that’s a pretty solid smoothie combo in my mind, I just had to put a couple on the property.

When we visited our future new property for the first time, there in full front view of the covered porch was this beautiful and largely flat space that just screamed “grow a garden here!”. Once moved in, using our dear friend Dr. Google Earth, we were able to measure the approximate area of the future garden plot, and it came in at 1.5 acres. That’s a pretty large garden! So, before I just went and started ordering seeds, some thought had to go into this. Do I want raised or ground level beds? Till or no till? Seed types? There’s a lot of questions! Fortunately, I came into this with a pretty good idea of what I want: Heirloom, alley cropping, no till using the Back to Eden method. What a mouthful right?

So, what is all of that? Heirloom refers to the type of seeds that we’ll be growing. These are seed varieties that are at least 50 years old. Not the seed itself, as it wouldn’t germinate. But the seed comes from the original plant, whose seed was harvested and saved, planted the following season, and so forth. Could we get seeds from the local Bomgaars? Absolutely. But this isn’t so much about genetics, resistance, or modifications so much as these seeds are tiny little treasures from a time since past. And when you think about it that way, that makes them pretty cool. Plus, when you plant heirloom, you are more likely to grow some varieties that you aren’t going to see at your local grocer.

Alley cropping is basically planting rows of trees or tall bushes that create an alley way. Within that alley way is interplanting or cropping of other plants. As our recently planted trees grow and mature, their canopy will provide shade to vegetables such as lettuces, carrots, and beans that don’t require a full day’s sun. No till is pretty straight forward. We aren’t going to till the ground up to create long plots of open dirt to grow. Why? Weeds and soil health. Weeds are the bane of my gardening existence. If we aren’t tilling, how will we grow? Using the Back to Eden method is how we will ultimately create garden. This method relies on the principles of composting. I could wax eloquently (or not so much) about this, but we’ll save that for another blog. Using newsprint, compost, and wood chips through the entire garden space, we will layer these to cover the grass, smothering out the weeds, and creating a barrier to keep unwanted weed growth to virtually zero. In essence, what we are going to do is create an environment in which tiny microorganisms within the organic matter will thrive to help create a soil that is healthy and beneficial to our fruits and veggies.

This beautiful space will slowly but surely house not only our orchard trees, fruit bushes, garden veggies, and herbs but will also be home to some bee hives and chickens. The concept behind this space is a bio-community and not just a garden. Fruit trees and wildflowers will be pollinated by our bees who can get nectar to create honey. Our chickens will have an enclosed perimeter run around the garden to snack on pests and provide compost through their waste bedding. When the summer harvest comes to an end and the winter months creep in, we’ll be able to plant cover crops and allow a small herd of sheep to graze. It’s all interconnected and it’s such a beautiful picture that I can’t wait to bring it to life.