AdAgrA 2021: Hidden Treasure

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AdAgrA: Adventist Agriculture Association

Home Gardening

Paul Dysinger

Edwin Dysinger

01 The Backyard Garden Blueprint

Hello everyone, we are so excited to be able to share with you today Our seminar series here is called the backyard garden blueprint I'm Paul Disinger and I'm really excited.

I've invited my dad Edwin to come and join me for this seminar series.

He has just a huge wealth of information and knowledge and it's a real joy and privilege.

Actually, we do quite a bit of teaching together, don't we, dad?

It's an honor and a privilege for me to get to work for and with my son.

And so we are very excited to be able to walk through some of these basic principles of building your garden.

We're going to be going through 6 sessions here.

The first 1 here is on planning your garden, because we really want to set a foundation.

And having a good plan really is at the base of that foundation.

Then from there, we're gonna move on into building healthy soil and getting into other aspects of your garden as well.

And I guess maybe we should just give a quick little introduction to us for anyone who doesn't know us.

So we've had a garden ever since I was born.

I mean, I feel like my mom is an avid gardener.

And so everywhere that we went, we always planted a garden, always growing things.

But it wasn't until a bit later that my dad ended up partnering with his brother John on Bountiful Blessings Farm in Tennessee.

And we grew commercially for several for many years.

And I worked with the family farm for several years.

I didn't work with the farm, the farm for 10 years, but you were doing the commercial farming for 10 years.

I came in and I guess I worked for, it was a good number of years with you guys too though.

Yeah, then I branched off and started my own business, teaching people how to grow their own food.

And we kind of focus on more of a home scale, homesteader scale, and just gather from that experience growing 50 to 70 different varieties of vegetables, herbs, berries all year round, summer, winter, gardening, and just kind of gather from that experience and pull it together.

And our goal is to try and make things as simple and as easy as possible for you to be able to go and implement this in your garden.

Awesome, let's go ahead and get started here.

So the Backyard Garden Blueprint session 1, planning your garden.

And we're gonna go through 3 parts in this particular session.

That involves choosing what you're gonna grow in your garden.

And we'll give you some tips and tricks on that.

That includes mapping it all out and making kind of an actual visual plan for your garden.

That includes creating your planting calendar, which can be a real blessing.

If you have a planting calendar that's put together in an intelligent and simple way.

It can really take a lot of overwhelm off of your garden plan.

We've got something really exciting we're going to share with you for that part as well.

So, but let's go ahead and jump right in and start with part 1, which is choosing what to grow.

So here's just some basic tips and tricks that we want to give you to make it hopefully make it a little bit easier for you to get started with planning your garden.

Number 1 is we encourage you to make a list of what you would like to grow and it may sound like a very simple and basic task right there, right?

And we're gonna be giving you in the resources for this class, there is a garden planning worksheet that actually just breaks this down and makes it very simple.

There's a column where you can just write a list of what you wanna grow.

And when you're doing that, we encourage you to be as specific as possible.

So when it comes to growing cucumbers, do you want to grow pickling cucumbers or do you want to grow slicing cucumbers?

When you're going to marry tomatoes, do you want to grow cherry tomatoes or do you want to grow beefsteak tomatoes?

The more specific you can be, the better it is.

And because when it comes down to it, you're going to make this list of the things that you want to grow.

And then you're going to need to choose the specific variety that you're going to grow of that crop.

And so if you know that you want to grow pickling cucumbers, then you can easily go to the pickling cucumber section of the seed catalog or wherever you're gonna purchase your seeds, and it'll narrow those options down for you when you're trying to pick a specific variety.

So then once you've made that list of what you would like to grow, then the next step is to choose those specific varieties like we just talked about here, right?

And so when it comes to, you know, cherry tomatoes, Do you want to grow a Sun Golds cherry tomato or, you know, some other kind of cherry tomato?

And here's where, you know, it can get a little bit, you know, when you open a seed catalog and there's 50 different varieties of tomatoes, you know, It can be a little overwhelming to try and figure out which 1 should I grow.

So we're going to give you a few tips and tricks that can help narrow those options down for you.

And another thing is that we also are giving you a resource in the resources for this class as well, download that you'll have a list of our favorite varieties of vegetables.

So you can either use some of these tips to pick your own variety, or you could go and you could just try growing 1 of our favorite varieties, which is kind of cool too.

And when it comes to choosing your specific varieties, 1 of the first things to make note of is the different types of seeds.

There are different, how many of you have heard of different types of seeds like heirloom seeds, GMO seeds.

There are many of you that have seen or heard of these different types of seeds.

When you open a catalog you're gonna see these different labels on them, right?

So let's talk a little bit about these different types of seeds and what is involved with them.

First of all, good seeds and good soil really are the 2 pillars of a successful garden.

Without high-quality seed, all other activities are moot.

That's a quote from Elliot Coleman in the New Organic Gardener.

So what about GMO hybrid, open pollinated, and heirloom seeds?

Dad, do you want to give a quick definition on what a GMO seed is?

Yeah, a GMO seed is basically a seed where the genetics have been modified in a laboratory and gene material from some outside plant, some other species or some other source than the parent plant has been transferred into the genetic material of the parent plant.

So anyways, the key thing is that it's done in a laboratory and it does not happen naturally.

An extreme example of this would be they have taken a gene from spiders and put it into the glands of goats so that when they milk the goat, spider silk will come out with the milk.

I mean it's just really weird crazy stuff.

In agriculture a more classic example of it would be where they have taken a gene from bacteria, soil-borne bacteria called bacillus thuringiensis, BT, and they have biologically inserted that gene into corn so that if worms eat the corn.

They're inserting the bacillus itself actually.

I mean, sure makes you feel really good about eating that corn too, doesn't it?

So the good news is that when it comes to GMO seeds, they are not readily available for home gardeners.

Because they are patented, farmers that use them have to have a contract with the company that patents them, et cetera, et cetera.

That being said, we do highly encourage picking seed companies that take what's called the safe seed pledge.

But basically that means that they will not sell any genetic, knowingly sell any genetically modified seeds and I believe that they even try and make sure that the seeds that they sell have not cross pollinated or anything with genetically modified seeds.

And these are the offspring of a cross between 2 or more varieties, usually of the same species.

So, a great example of this is if you cross a golden retriever with a poodle, what do you get?

02 The Backyard Garden Blueprint

Okay, we're going to be talking about soil health and this is something that's really exciting to me.

We are in a real learning phase ourselves on this topic and we're very excited about it.

Soil is something that it seems like it's an endless frontier.

Like there is so much that you can learn with soil.

So yeah, like Dad said, we're very excited.

Okay, we're going to talk about the basics Soil and plant nutrition basics and and then 6 soil health principles and we're in this session we're going to get into those 6 soil health principles but we're not going to finish them, we'll finish them the following session after that.

An ideal soil is going to be roughly half minerals and organic matter.

You don't normally think of air and water when you think of soil, right?

But for a good soil to function it needs air and water.

We're going to talk more about that coming up.

So each of these components plays a significant role.

So you know it's not like air and water are just kind of ancillary, they're just there, they're needed in the soil.

And soil health and fertility is a function of all of these components as well as a lot more.

And by the way this is kind of where conventional agriculture just kind of hones in and focuses on right?

Yes conventional agriculture tends to focus on the composition of soil and we're finding out that there's a lot more involved than just what the composition is.

So your minerals, and again I think traditional agriculture tends to focus on the mineral and maybe the organic content of the soil.

But in your, most all soils can be divided into 3 components.

You have clay, this is the smallest and finest component in soil.

You have to use an electron microscope to see a clay particle.

Silt is larger, but it's still fine particles.

So sand are the largest particles in a good soil.

Now your soil might have stuff that's bigger than sand.

Some people are blessed with gravel and rocks and boulders in their fields too.

Can I give a quick demonstration on the sizes?

Okay, so just to wrap our minds around the different sizes of the soil, so let's say that clay is the size of a beet seed, beet seed is pretty small.

So if clay is the size of a beet seed, get this.

So that's a pretty big difference there, right?

Another way to demonstrate it is if you take a teaspoon of sand and spread it out flat, 1 layer thick, it would be about the space of a silver dollar or a quarter.

I forget which 1, a quarter or I think it's a quarter.

Be about the size of a quarter, 1 layer thick.

If you spread a teaspoon of clay out 1 layer thick on the ground, guess how large of an area it would cover?

It would cover an entire tennis court, 1 layer thick of clay.

So it's just a fun little demonstration to see the different sizes that you're dealing with and you want to have a good balance and mix.

Yes, your ideal soil would have a nice mix of these 3 components.

If you're heavy on 1 component and not on another, your soil, you know, for example, if you have a heavy clay soil, you're going to have drainage issues.

It's just going to be harder to work with.

If you have a heavy sand soil, you have drainage issues in the opposite way.

I visited a farmer in Florida and he had drip lines in his garden, but it wasn't working because the water only wet just a small area around it, it wouldn't spread out and so he finally said I just got to change something, he added clay to his garden and he said that made a big difference.

But anyways, this is where your minerals and nutrients are, is in these components.

Your organic matter is composed of dead plant debris leaves sticks roots Etc It's also composed of dead soil creatures, including the microbes that have died.

Actually an amazing amount of your organic matter in your soil is microbial.

Organic matter is also composed of living plant material that may be in the soil, mostly roots and living creatures that are in the soil.

Again, mostly microbes, but that would also include, of course, things like earthworms.

We mentioned the importance of air and water.

It's really important that your soil have poor spaces.

These spaces are essential for the air and water to move through the soil.

And why do you think the air and water are important to soil?

Okay, someone's saying there are living creatures in the soil.

We have a lot of microbial life in the soil that is necessary for healthy soil and those microbes need air and water, right?

What creates these poor spaces in the soil?

If you have sand and gravel, you know, larger material in your soil, that tends to help create poor spaces.

Then you have the activity of creatures in your soil like earthworms and even larger creatures.

You know as they're moving around in the soil they open the soil up and keep it aerated.

But we're going to talk quite a bit about this aggregates.

Aggregates are soil, little soil clusters that are kind of glued together.

And those, if you have a soil that has good aggregates, you're going to have good pore spaces.

So think about it like this, you have like 1 or 2 sand pieces that are kind of glued together with a bunch of silt and kind of some clay tacked on there as well and that kind of organic material yeah an organic material mixed in.

And while that is clicking here's a fun little thing with the life in the soil.

If you, can anyone guess how much life is in a teaspoon of healthy soil?

If you were to put it under a microscope and count those microbes, if you were to count them 1 every second, so you just like 1234, and you, so you're looking them under the microscope and you're counting all these microbes in a teaspoon of soil.

Do you know how long it would take you to count them?

Well, first of all, let me tell you how many are in there.

There can be easily over a billion microbes in a teaspoon of soil.

I mean, that's hard to wrap our minds around, so that's why I do it with the illustration of counting.

It would take 31 years to count all of those microbes in just a teaspoon of soil, in healthy soil.

So You don't think about it usually, but when you're walking on the ground, you're walking on life.

So aggregates are minerals and organic matter bound together in clumps that vary in size and shape.

And soil aggregates are a key visible indicator of soil health.

Planning Your First Garden

First of all, just before we get started, just so I have a little idea, how many of you were in the session for planning your garden that we did yesterday?

It looks like the majority of you were not.

So there is going to be some overlap because you know planning your planning your garden period and planning your first garden you know there is a little bit of overlap there as far as the process and doing it.

So but I will be pulling up our garden planning worksheet.

We've got a worksheet that makes planning your garden a lot easier and we're going to have a lot of fun going through it together.

How many of you, this is like literally going to be your first garden that you're going to plan?

So that just helps me get to know you guys a little bit better and where you're at.

So where I want to start out is, first of all, to give a big picture look at gardening.

And the way that we break it down is into what I call our gardening game plan.

And basically, this is just a simple way to break down the stages of the garden so that it doesn't seem so complex or overwhelming.

And so we're going to go through these just very quickly.

These are not so much like the nuts and bolts of planning your garden, but it's just to give you a big picture overview of what are the stages of gardening.

And then when it comes to planning your garden and doing other things in your garden, you can kind of have an idea, well, this fits in this area.

So ignition, and you can think of this kind of like a rocket taking off, right?

So when the rocket is getting ready to launch, 1 of the first things it needs to do is ignite, right?

So you have that ignition stage of gardening and that includes planning your garden, which is what we're going to talk about here this morning, and that includes choosing what to grow, choosing where to grow it, soil testing, ordering soil amendments, ordering seeds.

It's kind of those first steps before you actually plant those seeds in the ground and get things going.

This is your ignition phase and we're going to be talking specifically about like choosing what to grow, choosing where to grow it, and the timing of when to grow things.

So our session this morning is going to be primarily focused on this ignition stage, But I want to give you just the overview picture of the whole thing before we jump into those.

The second stage is launch and this is where you are preparing your garden beds.

You're getting ready to plant those plants.

You might be amending your soil or putting on mulches or getting that space ready for those plants to go in.

That's when you're seeding your garden, starting your plants, transplanting them out into the garden, composting.

Now composting is something obviously that you can be doing on a continual basis all the way through, but we just throw it in here in the launch section.

Grow is as those plants are growing, right?

As they are growing you're going to be watering them, weeding them, trellising them.

You're dealing with pest control if you have any pest problems, disease control, how do you do that in a natural way, harvesting, storing your veggies.

Unfortunately, we don't have time just in 1 session to go through all of these together.

Like I said, we're going to be focused on planning your garden.

But this is kind of the growing phase of those plants as they're growing up.

And then extend is kind of like when your rocket reaches like space, right, and it starts circling the earth.

Timing for winter gardening, protecting your veggies, growing in the winter, and etc.

You can actually extend your season earlier in the spring or later in the fall or grow through the winter.

So this is just, like I said, this is what we call our Born to Grow game plan.

And I am going to give you all a, let me see if I can get this to show up.

So I am going to give you all this mind map here.

And this is a mind map that basically just drills into each of these 4 sections.

So you have the ignition section and it talks about you know everything that's kind of encompassed in that phase of the garden.

Then you have grow and the things that are encompassed in that phase of the garden.

There's some cool things in here like we have include some of our favorite seed companies, some of our favorite gardening tools and stuff all in this mind map.

So that is an extra resource that you all can download and look through and hopefully can just be a little blessing as give us somewhat of a framework for your garden.

Does that make sense to you guys tracking?

Alright, so without following, without much further ado, by the way, 1 of the reasons why I want to give you that framework is following a system or following a game plan for your garden can really be a key to a success in your garden, especially if you're a first-time gardener.

Otherwise, it can be easy to get overwhelmed and be trying to figure out, what should I be doing?

What do I need to be focusing on at this stage in my garden?

So that's something that hopefully will be a little bit helpful.

Alright, let's go ahead and talk about planning your garden.

So, in this session, like I said, we are going to specifically be focusing on that ignition phase and specifically on planning your garden.

So we're going to cover 3 parts here together.

The first part is what to grow, and that is choosing what you're going to grow in the garden.

And we'll cover that in a little bit more detail.

Series

Home Gardening

06 The Backyard Garden Blueprint

Transcript

Parent Series

Parent Conference

Sponsor

Recorded

Attachments

Breakout Session 3

Fresh Produce in January

1h

Starting a Market Garden

5 Ways to Design Your Market Garden for Success

1h 14m

Level 2 Home & Market Gardeners

Bed Prep and Planting for Thriving Plants Part 1

53m

Breakout Session 4

Tools of the Trade: Tools and Techniques for Increased Productivity and Efficiency

52m

Home Gardening

Irrigation

45m

Home Gardening

Soil Preparation & Weed Management

58m

Home Gardening

Winter Harvest Secrets: How to Extend Your Growing Season

50m

Level 2 Home & Market Gardeners

Stepping into Hoophouse Growing, Should You Do it? Part 1

59m

Session 6

Irrigation for the Home and Market Gardener

1h 3m

Session 5

Eat Your Greens!

1h 9m

Starting a Market Garden

A Bird’s-Eye View of Market Gardening

1h 3m

Session 4

Season Extension: Low-tech Methods & Materials

53m

Sound Doctrine