Thursday the 27th

Today was not as productive as we had hoped, but we did feed the plants in the Rosengarden pretty well. Mixed up way more "complete organic fertilizer" than we actually needed (don't worry, it's dry under the tarp) and side-sowed it liberally around everything there, especially the unhappy-looking lettuces. Also applied "Sluggo" organic slug repellent around the bok choi, Naomi's recommendation (don't do this more than 3x/mo.). Whatever fertilizer recipe we were using before this morning was some weird variant on Solomon's (no lime at all?), but what I used was nearly exactly what he recommended: 4 parts alfalfa meal, 1/2 part lime, 1/2 part "mineral mix," and 1/2 part kelp.

Purchased lime, straw, minerals, compost with Gabe. Didn't get rocks to border beds. Still would like to have them.

Piled up some straw around the happy-looking potato plants to encourage tuber production. (Why is the rhubarb still so small?) The peas in the Rosengarden are doing really well, but the ones in the middle are only a foot high and flowering already. Not sure whether it's good or bad for such short little pea plants to be fruiting already. Lucien and I are conducting an experiment to see if we can persuade the plants to grow a little bigger before making more flowers, by removing the flowers we found today on one of the three middle rows of peas. The other rows are being allowed to flower and fruit to their hearts' desires. Strung up some more trellis for them to climb, should they be so inclined.

Once we had done all this, it started to rain and thunder and we decided to call it a day, come back inside and do some planning. (Yes, the NPS-style signs are a good idea. We'll make some classy ones once planting season is over. See picture at the top of this post for Laura's interpretation of what kind of classy sign we're looking for, from the Grassi Lakes Trail in Alberta. Photo from Trent University Trail Studies Unit. Why am I not majoring in this?) Still need to get those tomatoes & peppers in the ground at South Campus. Perhaps this morning (since of course I write these posts the next day). Brief gardening hiatus to come as Lucien and I truck up to Seattle for my brother's production of Beauty and the Beast, but Lucien has made it clear that he'd like to take advantage of my raw planning energy to put together some proposals for various garden structures this weekend, so it's not entirely lost time. More dirt under his fingernails starting Monday.

Wednesday the 26th: SoCamp update

This was the first day I managed to put a few useful hours into the garden. Lucien and I added roughly six wheelbarrows full of compost into bed 7 on South Campus, stirred it in as thoroughly as we could stand, and mulched paths leading to the beds so future composting projects would be easier. Bed 7 will receive bell peppers and tomatoes.

Brief notes on the day:
- Worried about soil quality under the strawberries (no compost at all). Keep an eye on them.
- Serious predation on the Kentucky Wonder beans (west half of corn section). Scarlet emperor beans doing much better. Neem oil, or just switch out the Kentuckys? Some bleaching on individuals of the scarlet variety. Corn doing all right.
- Yellow beetle: creature of concern?

Looks like the squash are starting to germinate in the east half of bed 1. Facilities is planning to plow the remaining grass and favas into the entire North half of the garden, so we don't have to. Tasks for tomorrow (today, actually): Get hay, lime, neem oil, border rocks, and a little manure with Gabe at Naomi's. Amend bed 7 with lime and "complete organic fertilizer," then plant tomato and pepper starts. Side-sow "complete organic fertilizer" in Forest.

Check out some pictures taken today.

Projects

Link to Sketchup design of greenhouse concept, courtesy of John-Karl, a Google SketchUp user who posted this design for friendly folks like us to use. (The sketch to the left looks a lot like the structure we'll build, but this one is from ATTRA's handy Solar Greenhouse Resources Page.) We're planning to build this thing on the western edge of the South Campus garden, modified to work well on a hill by relying on cement-encased 4x4s (as per Roger Marshall's recommendations in "How to Build Your Own Greenhouse") instead of cinder blocks as foundation. The base of this structure will end up looking like a deck on a house, with as much open space beneath the floor as the slope of the hill demands. We will likely use a big ol' cistern to store rainwater during the winter, which will then supplement municipal water for summer irrigation. The cistern will be stored in the greenhouse and will help maintain a constant temperature inside the structure (high heat capacity of water and all that). More on this project to come.

Welcome!

Hello Readers,

Welcome to the newly created blog, Venerate the Plow. As you may have guessed, the purpose of this blog is to record the history of the student-run gardens at Lewis and Clark college. My name is Lucien, and I'm a sophomore biology major. I'll be taking care of the gardens this summer, along with many volunteers. I'll start off by saying this - I am a worm. By this, I don't mean that I'm a slimy, spineless, soil-dwelling creature. Instead, it is my hope that I'll be able to digest the events of the summer into a usable format, much like my wriggling compatriots.

There are two student-run gardens. The first was created only last year, molded from an unused volley-ball pit. This is the smaller of the two gardens, ~350 ft^2 in size. It is referred to as the 'David Rosengarden' (or just Rosengarden) because David Rosengard, the Area Director of Forest, was instrumental in the garden's creation. The other, larger garden (~2500 ft^2) is located on the edge of campus, near the Graduate School of Education and Counseling, or 'South Campus.' Accordingly, this garden is referred to as the 'South Campus Garden.'

The Rosengarden is the better maintained of the two (right now, at least). It is almost entirely filled-up right now. I'll try to post a detailed planting map and pictures of it soon. The South Campus Garden has become overgrow as of late. However, with some help, I've managed to create and plant one 150 ft^2 bed (detailed below), and another should be on its way soon.

My vision for these posts is to start with a section written in prose, and then give a typed version of the notes I take, supplemented with pictures. Currently, I'm a little backlogged with notes/pictures - I'm hoping to start chronologically from when I began working (the weekend of 5/8) and catch up to the present. With that said, the weekend of 5/8 was a busy one. School had just ended, so there were still some garden friends around to help work. Below, you'll see pictures of Adrian Guerro and Nicola, two of the leaders of Garden club, pitting themselves against the forces of entropy and creating the beginnings of the 'Three Sisters' plot. I'll post more on this later.

Gardening Notes

Corn/squash/beans bed at the South Campus Garden

o ~ 150 ft^2

o Double dug on 5/8 – 5/9

§ Added 25 lbs of chicken manure and 1 wheel barrow of compost to top layer

§ Split plot into two halves with path

§ Formed six mounds/half, total of twelve mounds

§ Added ~5 wheel barrows of compost, mostly between rows

o Transplanted ~ 60 corn plants on 5/9

§ ~ 6 inches tall

§ Added 1 handful of Naomi's mineral mix and alfalfa/linseed meal to each mound, stirred throughout

§ Sprinkled kelp

o Seeded Scarlet Runner beans on 5/9

§ 4 beans/mound, 2 bean/location

· Total of 48 seeds

Finished Plot as of 5/9