Our April gardening challenge: take preventative action against pests in your garden this year!

Pest Prevention:

After growing food in a few different regions of the country, I actually think that we get off relatively easy in the PNW when it comes to pest problems.  There are some heavy hitting bugs out there on the other side of the Rocky Mountains that we don’t want any part of.  That being said, insect and animal pests drive me crazy and they cause enough problems to drive a man to drinking (not that I need an excuse…)

We spend a lot of time each year, preparing for the problems that we know are inevitable.  I think all west coast hippies will agree, just like preventative medicine practices (regular tooth brushing, biking to work) reduce your chances of spending time in the hospital, preventative pest management reduces your chances of mid-season emotional breakdowns in the garden.

I guarantee that your time and effort will be repaid later in the season.  These techniques may not solve all of your problems outright, but they will reduce pest damage and even save the lives of otherwise doomed plants.

Primary Culprits and Prevention Techniques:

1.  Aphids:  These small, sticky bugs make their appearance in the garden early in the summer, and hang around until the fall (and can live all winter in greenhouses or covered beds).  There are a lot of different varieties of aphids; some focus only on very specific plants and others will spread out across the garden from crop to crop.  Aphids are a truly remarkable animal, reproducing at a rate that seems impossible.  When the insects are born; they are already impregnated with the next generation!

Many people will suggest using “trap crops” like nasturtiums and dill to attract aphids.  The idea being that the bugs will flock to those sacrificial crops and leave your other plants alone.  More often than not, we see trap crops working more like aphid nurseries, giving the bugs a place to reproduce until they reach critical mass and then spilling over into the rest of the garden.  If you plan to use trap crops, make sure to keep an eye on them and remove them from the garden once they have become infested with aphids.

In my opinion, attracting predator insects to the garden is the most effective long-term solution to aphid problems.  Below is a list of some annual and perennial flowers that you can plant in and around the garden to attract bugs that like to feed on aphids.  If you start establishing an area for these flowering plants this season, each subsequent year you will build a larger population of local predatory insects (just like putting out bird feeders brings birds to the neighborhood).  The effectiveness of your insectory will improve each year…so get started this spring.  Primary aphid predators are ladybugs and lacewings, so look for flowers that appeal to those bugs.

Flowers to attract aphid predators:

Cornflower

Alyssum

Cilantro (let some of your cilantro bolt and flower…it wants to anyway)

Cosmos

Sunflower

2.  Birds:  Fortunately, not everybody has problems with birds in their gardens.  Unfortunately, birds can do a lot of damage when they want to.  Generally speaking, birds are attracted to sweet crops.  You usually won’t have an issue with your broccoli or summer squash.  More likely, you will see birds go after your corn and strawberries.

Lets face it, nobody likes the way bird netting looks…but nobody likes the way they look with braces on their teeth either.  By far the most effective way to protect your crops from marauding birds is to net the crops.  The good news is that you really only need to cover the plants during the short period of time when the fruit is ripening.  You will need to keep an eye on your vulnerable crops and make sure to cover them just before they start to reach maturity.  Getting to know the seasonality of each crop will give you an idea what time of year to expect your harvest and make sure you don’t miss the start of the ripening period.  Although ripening times change each year based on the weather, they are usually consistent within a few week period.

Crops that will benefit from netting:

Blueberries

Cherries

Corn

Figs

Peas (especially newly planted pea seeds)

Plums

Raspberries

Strawberries

3.  Cabbage Loopers/Imported Cabbageworms:  In my opinion, one of the most annoying insect pests in the universe.  Cabbage loopers and imported cabbageworms are small, bright green caterpillars that are attracted to pretty much any plant in the Brassica family.  The caterpillars are the immature form of the white moths that you see fluttering around the garden each summer.  They are most interested in broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbage and cauliflower and less interested in kale, mustard greens and turnips.  There are a few organic curative sprays (like Spinosad and Bt) that help mitigate caterpillar damage, but far better is to try and prevent large populations from becoming established.  If you don’t mind keeping your beds covered all season long, a floating row cover over the crops will prevent the moths from landing on your plants and laying eggs.  Otherwise, like aphids, you can attract predatory insects to your yard and let them help manage the caterpillars for you.  The primary predators are parasitic mini-wasps and tachinid flies.

Flowers to attract caterpillar predators:

Alyssum

Cosmos

Parsley

3.  Cutworms: These are a true garden nemesis.  Cutworms are soil dwelling caterpillars that chew through your plant stems and/or roots.  Cutworms are most troubling to young transplants, killing them outright. They can mow down entire rows of crops overnight.  We have the most trouble with cutworms early in the year when they like to go after members of the Brassica family (Broccoli, Brussels sprouts, Cabbage, etc).  Fortunately, there are some simple ways to fight back.  First, when you are preparing your soil in the spring, remove and kill any cutworms that you might dig up.  Once you start looking for them, you may be surprised how many there are.  More importantly, we plant our spring Brassicas in “cutworm collars”.  A collar is a physical barrier that is set into the soil around your plant to prevent the cutworm from reaching the plant stem.

You can use just about anything to build a collar:

A plastic plant pot with the bottom cut off

Aluminum foil

Toilet paper rolls (our favorite, since they decompose in the soil as the plant grows)

6.  Root Maggots: These can be even more frustrating than cutworms, and harder to control.  Like other maggots, these are simply the larval stage of certain species of flies.  These flies cruise around in your garden and lay eggs at the base of your plants. When the eggs hatch, the maggots burrow into the soil and consume the roots of your plants.  What fun!  Like cutworms, root maggots can destroy otherwise young, vigorous plants.  Maggots also feed on larger, mature plants, but well-established plants can usually survive a little root pruning.  Younger plants may end up losing their entire root systems.  The goal is to discourage root maggots from landing next to your plants by creating an environment that is less desirable for egg laying or prevents the maggots from burrowing into the soil.  We have tried applying all manner of materials for these root maggot barriers.

The most effective solution is to build a hard physical barrier, such as covering the soil in black plastic mulch, or covering the entire bed in floating row cover.  For many backyard growers, this isn’t always the most appealing look (and you end up creating a lot of garbage at the end of the season when you use plastic mulch).  We usually opt for organic based mulches, even though they are not quite as effective, since they will decompose and they keep the garden looking a little nicer.  After planting the young plant, we put down a ring of mulch in a 3” radius around the base of the plant.   Sometimes we lose a few plants during the spring, but if we are diligent about checking in on the garden, we can replace these plants quickly and still get a great harvest.

Root Maggot Deterrents:

Sawdust Ring

Bark Mulch Ring

Cardboard Ring or Square

Diatomaceous Earth

7.  Slugs:  What are we going to do about slugs?  To a certain extent, we are going to put up with them…but, there are also a few other helpful things we can do.  Slugs are most active in the spring while temperatures are cooler and the soil and plants remain wet.  Their activity level and ability to damage your crops (a few bites from a slug is way more damaging to a young plant than to a mature one) decreases considerably during the summer.

While I do think that the traditional beer trap does work, they seem to get diluted and fill up with rainwater (imagine that!), so we have been trying to figure out other “best practices”.

1. During the summer is important to water the garden in the morning so that the soil surface can dry out a little bit before nighttime when slugs are most active.

2. If you have chickens and can manage them easily, letting them free-range or using a chicken tractor, putting them in the garden during the off-season certainly helps reduce all sorts of pest populations.

3.  If you can remember to check on it once or twice a week, setting a wooden board in one of your garden pathways, will create a slug haven.  After being out all night, they will head under it in the morning and you can pick it up during the day and collect all them for disposal.

4.  Iron phosphate based slug baits are organically approved and can be very helpful.  Apply around young crops in the spring and fall.  The pellets will dissolve in the rain, so re-apply as needed.  If you are shopping for slug baits, make sure to read the label, it should say that it is safe around children and pets and is made only from Iron Phosphate and inert filler material.

8.  Voles:  Even though they are both burrowing mammals, there is a big difference between voles and moles.  Voles are tiny, mouse-sized animals that love to feed directly on your plants (in and out of the vegetable garden).  Moles are much larger and only damage the garden aesthetically (by making those large mounds of soil) or arbitrarily (by making a mound in the middle of your vegetable bed).   If you know or suspect that you may have voles in your yard, consider setting up wood-framed raised beds in your garden.  Raised beds have a lot of benefits (increased soil depth, better drainage, etc), and they also make it easy to create vole free spaces.  Before filling up new garden beds with soil, simply staple a sheet of ¼” or ½” hardware cloth to the bottom of the bed (hardware cloth is like chicken wire, but more rigid and with smaller holes, and you can get it at any hardware store).

If you aren’t using wood-framed beds or if your beds are already built, the best solution is to set up vole traps in and around the garden.  Voles will be easily killed in a standard mousetrap (baited or un-baited), but it is important to place the trap inside a box.  You can use a small wooden, plastic or cardboard box.  Simply cut a small, mouse-sized hole in two opposing sides of the box and put the trap inside.  The box prevents other people or animals from accidentally setting off the trap and it is an attraction to the voles.  Since the voles like dark enclosed spaces, they are prone to entering the boxes, thinking it will provide shelter and protection.  Check on the boxes regularly, empty traps as needed and reset.

I hope  you take the challenge to implement some or all of these practices in your garden this spring, and let us know how they work out as the season progresses.  Keep checking in to sustainable eats as the season goes on. At the end of the month there will be a round up post where you can leave a comment or link up a blog post about what you have done for a chance to win some great prizes.

After months of working in these new gardens spaces, most of which are devoid of plant matter, it is finally time to get out and start planting.  We do grow some crops year-round and have been starting seeds indoors for months, but now the gardens become a little more active.  It is time to start planting new perennials like fruit tress and berries and the early season annual crops like peas, potatoes, onions and salad greens.  Each spring, we get to head back out to many of the gardens that we have built over the years and help people get things going.  One of the best things about this job is that we get to work in dozens of different gardens, all over town.  Each garden has its own microclimate, its own soil structure, sun exposure, pest issues, and endless other variables.  It is an amazing opportunity to learn, watching how the same crops behave differently in so many different sites.  Of course, there are also challenges since it is our responsibility to keep all of the crops healthy and anticipate what problems may arise in each garden and take whatever preventative measures we can to ensure a productive harvest. Oftentimes other gardeners and landscapers question the logic behind our edible garden maintenance service…and its true that it might not be the easiest way to make a buck, but I know for sure that it has taught us all an incredible amount.  Managing dozens of different garden sites is about as intensive of a garden education that you could ask for.  You plant different crop combinations in each garden, the crops are planted on a different day in each location and each garden has its own unique attributes.  Since we keep good, dated records of the gardens, each season provides us with an unbelievable amount “data” and helps us make huge improvements each year (provided we get a little help from the sun…).

I’m not sure what my point is, except that I am glad that maintenance season is starting…

We like to start peas indoors, a few trays every week, starting in late January. We let the plants germinate and grow about 3-4” tall and then transplant them into the garden. At the same time we are transplanting the peas into the garden, we direct seed another row of peas so the harvest period is spread out over a longer period of time.

Peas are a nitrogen-fixing plant, which means that they actually add nitrogen to the soil while they grow. Nitrogen is a primary nutrient for plants (it is responsible for healthy vegetative growth) and most vegetable crops absorb a lot of it from the soil, so nitrogen-fixing plants are incredibly beneficial to the garden. Peas, and other leguminous crops are able to add nitrogen to the soil because they have a symbiotic relationship with particular strains of bacteria. Even though the atmosphere is almost entirely made out of nitrogen (78%), plants are unable to capture and use nitrogen in the atmospheric form. The Rhizobia bacteria live on the roof nodes of the plant and convert atmospheric nitrogen (N2) into a new form (NH3) that plants are able to absorb. Adding extra Rhizobia bacteria to the soil, increases the vigor and yield of your pea plants. Whenever we plant peas, we add an “inoculant” of bacteria (available at nurseries and seed catalogs). The most effective method is to make “slurry”, wherein you put your pea seeds and a little inoculant powder into a cup, add a little water and mix it together. The inoculant will coat the seeds and then you can plant them in the tray or directly into the garden (later in the season, you can also use this technique for beans).

Like any other crop, there are numerous types and varieties of peas to choose from. We like to grow Sugarsnap, Dwarf Grey Snow Peas and Sugar Ann. Keep in mind that peas are vining crops and might need some trellising support. The Sugarsnap peas can grow up to 10’ and need a tall sturdy trellis to grow on. We typically set up a 5-6’ trellis and snip off the tops of the plants when they reach the top of the trellis. If they are not topped, they will grow above the support and eventually fall over and break. Cutting the tops of the plants encourages them to produce more flowers on the lower section of the vine and start flowering earlier. Shorter vines like the Dwarf Grey and Sugar Ann benefit from small stakes (2-3’ tall) but can be grown without any trellising at all, so they are great varieties if you don’t want to set up a trellis.

A few other notes:

If you are growing tall vine peas, keep an eye on them as they grow because you may need to help train them onto their trellis, adding pieces of twine to hold them in place or gently weaving them into the trellis. (very gentle, they break easily!)

Also, keep in mind that, in the Pacific Northwest, your peas will inevitably end up with powdery mildew in the early-mid summer (the vines will be covered in white powder). There are mildew resistant varieties like Super Sugarsnap, but we find that these varieties are less vigorous than the regular type and produce fewer pods so we continue to use the Sugarsnap variety and just plan pull them out once the mildew has completely overcome the vines.

Once they start to fruit (soon after the white flowers appear) plan to harvest the peas regularly so the pods do not become overripe and unpalatable.

Good luck!

Years later, potatoes played a pivotal role in my development as a gardener.  I remember very clearly the first time I harvested potatoes.  I was living at The Homestead and had only been helping out in the garden for a few months, so I had a limited idea of what was going on out there.  It was late fall, cold and there was snow on the ground.  Harvesting from the garden had virtually ceased during the past few months so I was a bit surprised when it was decreed that I should go out to the garden and dig up some potatoes for dinner.  The sun was setting, I was kneeling in the snow and I’ll be damned if there weren’t bushels of potatoes underground just waiting for me.  I am sure that I was inebriated to begin with, but now I was truly high on life.  I suppose it was a combination of the beauty of the garden, the prospect of eating a freshly picked crop and the audacity of the tubers to keep outside under the soil for so many months after the top growth had died away.  I ate at least a few tablespoons of potatoes that night and have loved them ever since.

I look forward to potato planting every year.  It is one of the first crops we plant in the spring, you really feel like you are doing something useful when burying the big chunks of “seed potatoes”, and if you haven’t done so already, it forces you to finish planning out your garden for the season.

This year we are planting a few different varieties to make sure we satisfy the need for yellow, red, blue and fingerling types.

To Grow:

The process of planting and growing potatoes is relatively easy.  Potatoes are almost always grown from parts of the tubers themselves.   You can buy “seed potatoes” from a plant nursery or buy organic potatoes from the store to use as seed.  Once you have your seed, cut them into pieces that are about the size of a golf ball and be careful to make sure that each piece has at least 1-2 eyes on it.  Dig an 8” deep trench.  Add about ¼ cup balanced organic fertilizer to the trench for every piece of potato that you are planning to plant and mix it in with a trowel. Then place the pieces of potato every 12” in the trench, making sure the eyes are facing up.  Cover potatoes with about 4 inches of soil, leaving the remaining soil in a neat dam to the side of the trench so that it can be added to the trench later as the potatoes start to grow.

Each plant will yield 1-3lbs of potatoes.

In addition to being delicious, potatoes are a great source of vegetable protein, vitamin C, B vitamins, copper, iron, and potassium.