Episode 2510

- [Voiceover] We're off to Long Hungry Creek Farm, where we learn that sometimes the best approach is to sit back and let Mother Nature do her thing. Plus, we tour a backyard garden with island beds, a vegetable garden, cool containers, and some favorite old plants. Join us. There are going to be those times when doing nothing is just the thing.

- Although gardening requires a lot of hard work, I have found that sometimes it's actually better to do nothing. Spring tillage is our first chance to do nothing. After winter, the soil holds the moisture for a long time, and this is a good thing. We'll need that moisture later on when it dries up in the summertime. But we forget how quickly the ground will dry up in April. But after a heavy rain in March, in may take a week for that ground to dry up. If we work the ground when it's too wet, we'll form clods, which will haunt us for the rest of the season. Don't overwork it. If you're using a rototiller, go over lightly, but don't keep going over and over the soil. What will happen is you'll make the soil so finely divided that when it rains, if you just keep working that ground and working it, you'll get it where it looks like good soil structure, but when it rains it'll compact like that right there and you'll have a crust and this real hard, cement-like soil. If you just work the ground and then do nothing, the soil microbes will start to work that ground for you, and they know how to do it in a much gentler way that will retain the soil structure, which is valuable for them too. Rather than working the ground too early in March, I spend my time making compost. Where the cows have been over-wintered and feeding offers manure and hay and some soil. Then we can add some garden refuse and old leaves and other carbon sources too. But instead of turning the compost a lot, I just let it sit for a year or two, and it turns by itself into this wonderful fertilizer. One of the reasons for turning a compost pile is to make sure that it gets air. But if we use enough hay and some cornstalks and ragweed and layer that into the pile when we make it, those act as tubes that bring in air. By spending a little more time at the front end and making sure our pile is built correctly with lots of access to air, then we don't have to keep turning it and turning it. I have never found that I can make compost that doesn't have weed seeds. I don't really want it to get super, super hot, because I want there to be the enzymes and life in the compost that might be destroyed by high heat. We can also spend this time getting the cold frames ready for starting the tomatoes, peppers, and the sweet potatoes. I like to put a load of horse manure down first, then wet it and compress it, so that it starts to ferment. This heat from below will warm the soil above so that our plants sprout quicker. After sewing, these cold frames are pretty self-sufficient. With rains doing most of the watering I feel like it's a lot less work than managing a greenhouse or a hoop house. A seed packet of carrots or beets will say to plant these in the spring as early as possible, as soon as the ground can be worked. I disagree. If I plant my carrots real early, it takes three weeks for them to sprout, and there's lots of weeds that will sprout and fill that land up with that I have to tend. If I wait until April 11th, I think is when these were planted, the carrots sprout up within a week, and I can get in there and till them so much quicker. We spent a little more time this year sewing the seeds very carefully so that we didn't have to thin them later. By the end of June, they're ready to eat, and they will certainly have caught up with anything that was planted three weeks earlier and required a lot more work. Insects aren't much of a problem in a biodynamic garden. When I see aphids, I think, oh, well, along come ladybug or lacebug soon and take care of them. Or with the hornworm we'll get these Trichogramma wasps, they'll take care of it. So I really don't anything to fight insects. This field of potatoes was an acre, and I couldn't find one Colorado potato beetle in it. But when I stepped out into the hay field on a horse nettle plant, I saw a Colorado potato beetle. Obviously, I hadn't built the soil up out there as much as we've built it up here. We manage for what we want, not for what we don't want. If we want to have healthy crops, we manage our soil in a healthy way, and then we don't have to do anything. Many times, a gardener will find this guy. This is a tobacco hornworm, or a tomato hornworm. It makes a big sphinx moth. It does a lot of damage. It denudes the plant, eats the leaves. We're tempted to take this off of the tomato plant, and just remove it, kill it. But I don't do that anymore, because I know that we have Trichogramma wasps around here that will come and lay eggs along the back of this worm, and then those eggs will kill the worm. They'll hatch out and make some more Trichogramma wasps, so that I don't have to go through and kill the worms. I get to do nothing and let the wasps take care of the problem for me. I was tempted to go through this potato field one more time to get the grass out and to conserve moisture. But I knew from past experience that I would be disturbing the potato roots. So I decided to do nothing instead. I used to plant strawberries in the spring, and then dutifully hoe them and weed them all summer long and not get anything until the following May. Now, I just plant the strawberry plants on a tarp in September, and I get a crop the next May. I was going to pull them out and plant something else, but instead I did nothing. Lo and behold, with just a little bit of weeding in late summer, the strawberries came back this year, and we got three times as many strawberries this year as we did last year. Herbs are famous for liking you to do nothing for them. These hops are minimally weeded in the spring as their coming up, and then I just let everything grow up. There's briars and grass and smartweed. But the hops grows up taller and gets above them, and seems to do fine. A lot of plants really don't like you meddling with them a whole lot. It will spread diseases and such. Herbs in particular like to just have a spot where they can take it over, and they grow well with very little care. They really like you to do nothing. Many gardeners continually prune and tie up their tomatoes all during the growing season. We've found that by just planting the tomatoes later we only had to hoe them one time. Then we cage them and mulch them, and then we do nothing the rest of the tomato season except harvest bushels and bushels of tomatoes. I really don't grow plants. I just get the conditions right so that plants grow easily. The real work happens in the off season with adding minerals like lime and wood ash, with composting and cover crops, and with deep fall plowing. Then I let nature, microbes, and the right season do all the work, and I try to do the hardest thing for a dedicated gardener to do, nothing.

- I couldn't have scripted a better day to take a walk in a beautiful garden, a garden that has overcome slopes, sun, and shade. Beautiful plants for both environments. So I'm excited to take a walk. The gardener, Helga Browder. Good morning, Helga.

- [Helga] Good morning, Annette. Welcome to our garden.

- It's exciting. Right here we stand in the full sun. I see to your left, right here, you have done something with a plant we see at Easter.

- The Easter lilies, yes. Dewey gets me one every year, and so they go in the garden. Of course, they don't bloom at Easter. They bloom a little bit later. But we love them.

- [Annette] To full lily.

- [ Helga] They're beautiful, yeah.

- [Annette] Do you have any trouble with those continuing to come back, or do they do that faithfully every year.

- [Helga] They come back faithfully every year. I have them in several places, like behind you too.

- Tell me how this garden developed.

- Well, this particular one was a moon garden, I called it. It was an all-white garden. But all white is really tough to do. Then we changed it over to an Austin Peay garden.

- [Annette] Oh, hoo hoo hooray!

- [Helga] Red and white. My husband is a history professor at Austin Peay. We thought this would be nice to do. Oh, I love my Annabelles. As you can see I have them all over.

- [Annette] Let me ask you a question about your gardening technique with those. Did you cut those down very much this spring?

- [Helga] Yes.

- [Annette] How far down?

- To about this way, this much.

- Wow, isn't it amazing how in two months' time, that's four feet of growth.

- I know, I know.

- With the bloom. You know that is very encouraging, I think hydrangea for young and new gardeners, because it's so reliable.

- So easy to grow.

- [Annette] Over here, what you've done with a container. Do you use the same plants all season? Or do you change those out?

- No, they pretty much stay in there all season.

- The way you've elevated it so that it can be above. Some of the plants that you have over here, even though they're not blooming. In the front of that, is that an anemone?

- [Helga] It is, it is. Then in the fall they come out over the hedges. They've beautiful.

- [Annette] Oh, what color are those?

- [Helga] White.

- Again white. This garden is beautiful today, but I can see the promise for the future. If this is any indication of what's in the other beds, I want to go now. This is so pleasing, Helga, these colors. What is this cone flower?

- [Helga] That's a Sunset.

- [Annette] That is beautiful. Oh, and a beautiful bee on it.

- [Helga] Oh, they love it, they love it.

- [Annette] He's a good pollinator. One of my favorite perennials are the lilies.

- [Helga] Oh, yes, they're beautiful.

- Well, Helga, we're further up in the long island bed here. Although the slope is somewhat exaggerated here, I'd say on a scale of 1 to 10 you're up to a 3 in elevation here. You're standing next to undoubtedly a most beautiful.

- I love my hydrangea. This is an old Mophead, and it's old. But it doesn't bloom every year. This year we're so lucky, and I just love it.

- [Annette] Well, you know what? I was looking at it, where it's sited here. It is underneath a cedar tree. The needles and all of this acidity there underneath this tree could have something to do with this continuing to stay blue because--

- Oh, I believe so, yes. I believe so.

- They like sour.

- They do like it, yeah. You see a few pink ones in there, but for the most part it is

- It's just such an example

- blue and very acidic.

- Of a mophead, look at it. Some people call this the florist hydrangea. But I believe it's macrophylla?

- [Helga] It is.

- [Annette] All of those names are appropriate. But nothing describes it more than beautiful. The first to arrive on the scene for summer, perennials. Wonderful day lilies. You've got a lot of variety of plants packed into here. You really do have some elevation to deal with in here. But you've placed rocks, haven't you?

- Yes, yes.

- That's a good idea, because that definitely stops that downhill erosion. I think one of my favorite things up here are your daisies.

- [Helga] These are Beckies. I love daisies. These are the Killian daisies. They're just a tad different.

- [Annette] Don't you like the Penstemon?

- [Helga] Oh, I do. This has really grown this year.

- [Annette] A lot of things love what we've been given for a growing environment, don't they? Well, I see up here on the back side you have Coreopsis. This is nice, what is this?

- [Helga] That is semolina.

- [Annette] That's winter hardy?

- [Helga] Yes, it is. It's been in there for about three years.

- It's an herb, isn't it? And I bet it likes, a lot of our herbs like the limestone that comes out of these blocks.

- They do.

- So then this is nice.

- I like that one, yes, I really do. Now this one I hybridized.

- [Annette] Oh, you're into that.

- [Helga] I call it Ooh La La. That's for my sister.

- [Annette] Well, let's not go any further Ooh La La. Well, it has it's purpose, erosion control.

- [Helga] Right.

- Weed control, and you can see it from your garden room.

- True. Actually I put this in because it would be so hard to mow. It's quite a hill. So I decided to make a rockery out of it.

- Now, I'm about to embark on some stepping stones. Where were these from?

- The grandkids painted all of those. We had a big art project when they were all here one time and they did that for me like about, oh, I would say it's been 10 years.

- [Annette] They've grown, but these are still here.

- [Helga] They've grown but the stones are still here.

- [Annette] That is wonderful. Now, we are standing underneath these beautiful trees. You have a tradition with your trees. What is it?

- The oaks are named for the grandsons, and the maples for the granddaughters.

- I think that's ...

- Like that's Nicholas, that's Phillip. This is Eric. There is Katy. That one over there is Jessica. And then Lauren is the gingko.

- Well, you've done well because you called them right out. Sometimes I do have to call the roll. I can see you have ostrich fern, and Japanese painted fern.

- [Helga] Cinnamon fern.

- [Annette] The ginger.

- [Helga] Yeah, I have sorts of them. I love them.

- [Annette] Now, in the spring before leaves even come out you've really got a lot of excitement in this bed, then don't you?

- [Helga] I do. It's really my spring bed. I have daffodils, and they kind of snake through here

- [Annette] I can see that.

- In a pattern. Then I have the wildflowers. I have some bloodroot. I have ginger.

- [Annette] Now this plant right here.

- [Helga] That's goat's beard.

- [Annette] Oh, okay.

- [Helga] It took quite a while to establish. It was all bright white a couple weeks ago, but it turns kind of greenish as it gets older.

- [Annette] It's a great upright plant. Even this color blends in with your Coleus and the Dinner Bell pot back there.

- [Helga] It is awfully hard to plant in here. I like to put ferns in because they don't have much of a root system.

- [Annette] Well, and see the maples do, and so does the pin oak.

- [Helga] All of them.

- [Annette] You've got all sorts of wonderful trees, overhead canopy. You know, Helga, I've known you for a number of years, more than I can remember. But this is the first time I've ever had the wonderful privilege of coming to your garden.

- [Helga] I know, and I'm so glad you're here.

- In the back of the property with Dewey, we've got about 800 square feet here, vegetable garden. Did you garden before you met Helga?

- [Dewey] I did, I grew up on a farm in Missouri, and so I'm familiar with it. Helga grew up in a farming village in Bavaria.

- [Annette] Well, just take off with me over here, and let's just look at things that you've got in here. You have tomatoes and beans and onions. You've got some green peas that you've been-- What's this in your hand?

- [Dewey] This is a salad that I love to grow. It's called corn salad. It's hard to find in America. But Burpees sells the seed, and a number of gourmet seed houses sell the seed. You plant it in September, and you begin harvesting normally around Thanksgiving. You can harvest up until March, and then you can have another planting, which is where this came from, that I put out at the end of February, first part of March. When it starts to warm up in May, it kind of has reached its end. But I saved this one just to show you.

- [Annette] Well, let me ask you this. Do you have to put a winter cover, a rug cover or anything over it?

- [Dewey] No.

- [Annette] It'll just take it.

- [Dewey] It's cold hardy. You can brush the snow aside and harvest it and eat it.

- [Annette] That's fun, and what good vitamins.

- [Dewey] Yes. It's got more iron than spinach.

- Dewey, this is a very well-organized garden. I know that you have it for eating and beauty, the way it's designed, and it's neat. Out of this overview here, what is your favorite thing to plant in a garden?

- Well, the real reason for the garden happens to be our potatoes. These are German yellow meat potatoes. They're called German butterball potatoes. I'm experimenting with a French variety called Laurette. But they're real buttery and yellow, waxy. They hold up well in salads.

- I'm just envious of what you've got in this little garden out here. You don't have to have a big tractor, do you.

- The secret is compost.

- Oh!

- Amending the soil with compost.

- [Annette] You're right, I know that. But there's only so many hours in a day.

- [Dewey] Right.

- [Annette] And my time is ending right here with you. Thank you.

- [Dewey] It's been a pleasure.

- Welcome to my big work in progress. This is an area behind my house where I'm putting in a sort of a big spring bed. It's going to have rhododendrons and azaleas. As you can see, I'm in the process of installing a bunch of those, although I'm going to get more than I've got here, but I've got a good start going. I thought it was a great opportunity to talk about how to plant these things. Everybody loves azaleas, who doesn't? And rhododendrons. But we have so much trouble here in Tennessee with our heavy clay soils, unless you're lucky and you're on a sandy piece. Most of us deal with clay, and that's not what they like. There's a good way to plant in this sort of setting, to ensure, or at least hopefully get a lot better results than just plunking them in the ground and hoping for the best. My soil is not bad. I'm luckier than some, in that it's a nice brown, not that red chirty stuff, although there's a good bit of rock in it, as you can see as you look around. But it is heavy. Check this out, I mean, that's clay. I have the same problem as so many people in Tennessee, which is how to make this the moist, well-drained soil that these sorts of plants want. You can see this is a 3-gallon container. I've dug a hole that's deeper than the container, the reason being that I want to put some big stuff in the bottom. This is pine bark nuggets. Basically, it's just the bark that's chunked off of the tree when they cut it down and take it to the lumber yard. This is great stuff because it's acid in reaction. It'll break down slowly over time. But azaleas and rhododendrons like a really acid soil, although some less than others. You want to make sure there's acid. See, there's some of that good water coming in there. It's a moist spring day. We've had some rain lately. But I'm putting this in case that bowl of clay, in case we have torrential rains, the water will percolate down and sit down, way down at the bottom of this hole, which is, I've probably got 3-4 inches of this stuff down here. The roots of my azalea will not be sitting in water. I am planting above grade. You'll see I'm not planting at the same level. They always say plant at the same level as is in the container, as the plant is occurring. In other words, dig a hole just as deep and plant just as deep. Huh-uh, not with these babies. Because they need air, they need a lot of oxygen around those little fibrous roots, and because they need a loose soil, and because they don't like to be stuck in this clay, you plant above grade. It's really important. I've got about a third of the root ball that's going to be above grade here. Notice also that when I plant, I want to tell you, I don't put fertilizer in the hole. I fertilize after I plant on top. Another thing about fertilizing azaleas is some people say that you don't fertilize until after they've bloomed because, I've heard it said, that that will cause the blooms to flush and go by quicker if there's fertilizer on them. That may be true. I doubt it. What I think is, in years where it gets really hot, really fast, that flushes the bloom, and makes them go by. The reason I doubt that that's true, although some of you may have different experience, is this, in the nursery business, every one you buy in a container has already been fertilized before it blooms, or just as it's starting. I mean, this is what they do to grow these things. It doesn't seem to have bothered them. It has more to do with air temperature, I think. However, because these roots, I want these little baby roots, there's always a little bit of transplant shock no matter how well you do something, I don't want any fertilizer to potentially damage any of the little root hairs that are going to be here. So I will just fertilize around the top of this after it's in. Here's the other thing you need to plant azaleas and rhododendrons. This is called soil conditioner. It's actually pine bark, just much more finely chipped up. Another name is pine fines. You can find it just about anywhere in bags. That's how I buy it. This is what I use to mix with the dirt that I've excavated from a hole. This is just to loosen it up. Now in terms of the size of the hole, I've dug it a lot deeper, like I said before, about twice as wide as the container, which means you'll have for, this is about a 1-gallon plant I'm about to put in, you know, the hole's about like that. Azaleas don't have humongous root systems that go all over everywhere, but they're particular about what they have around their roots. You can see I'm mixing this up. This is organic material that will gradually break down. But before it breaks down, and it helps keep the soil acid too, a good thing. Before it breaks down, it opens up the soil. See how nice and loose this is with this mixed in here. This was that clay I could press into a ball before. Now you've got your plant in, and I just snug this in. You've still got a third of the root ball hanging out. That's where the rest of the soil conditioner comes in. That becomes basically the dirt that covers up the rest of that root ball. This ensures good drainage down and away from the top of that root ball so there's not going to be any stuff sitting right around the crown of the plant and the top roots. It's going to ensure a lot of oxygen around those little bitty roots that they've got. Some people plant in raised beds, but because I want a kind of naturalistic garden going here I'm doing it in the ground. Basically you're sort of creating a little bit of a slightly raised bed around it. You can see that's how you would put it in. Now, I have left a little clearing. You'll see that this is the top of the root ball where it came out of the pot. What I've done is create a little volcano, if you will. You may have heard me talk about the badness of mulch volcanoes. But this is a good volcano. This is around the edge of the root ball, and it's made a little dam so that any rain water, or as I water this in the water will be directed down to the root ball and through it. Now that I've got this guy all planted, I'm going to put a little fertilizer around him. I like to use Holly-tone and Ironite, both of which are acid reacting. There are other brands out there. Just make sure that you get one that's formulated for acid-loving plants, blueberries, azaleas, rhododendrons, dogwoods, hollies, that kind of thing. After I've got that fertilizer on there, the last thing I do is top dress with pine needles. This is called usually pine straw, is the way landscapers refer to it. It comes in bales. This is really nice, keeps it light and dry. Slugs don't like it, which is something I like, because I don't like slugs. It breaks down into the soil gradually, keeps it acid, which is also what you want. I kind of like the look of it. It might not be as dressy as at the front of a house where you'd want a more formal presentation.

- [Voiceover] For inspiring garden tours, growing tips, and garden projects, visit our website at VolunteerGardener.org, or on YouTube at the Volunteer Gardener channel, and like us on Facebook.