Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["Tradingpost" <tradingpost@lobo.net>]

GROWING FOR PROFIT & SUSTAINABILITY
from Old World Gardens
Paul & Barb tradingpost@lobo.net

To be sustainable, growing must first sustain the grower. Market growing must 
be profitable and practical, or few will be growing - sustainably or 
otherwise.

Growers profit most with a combination of best practices, by producing more 
and using garden space more efficiently, and doing it with less work and 
lower cost without machinery. These methods make it more practical on a 
commercial scale.  Beyond organic soil building, this includes permanent 
mulched beds, intensive planting all season, and season extension techniques. 
Some of these are time-honored techniques developed in the gardens of Old 
World countries and brought to the U.S. long before the modern organic 
movement.

The best yields and lowest costs are gained with:

1. permanent beds that use space much more efficiently than wide-spaced 
tractor rows, remain uncompacted by footsteps or machinery, and concentrate 
amendments, mulch, water, and labor in growing beds instead of walkways
2. deep, humus-rich soil that doesn't need annual tilling, absorbs rainfall, 
retains moisture, drains excess, and cuts irrigation costs
3. intensive succession planting that keeps something growing in all beds all 
season, reduces losses to pests and shades soil to reduce weeding and 
conserve moisture
4. no-till (or minimum tillage) that reduces need for weeding, protects soil 
biology, earthworms and structure, and eliminates the cost and labor for 
tilling equipment and moving drip lines
5. permanent mulch that continually fertilizes by sheet composting, reduces 
weeding and conserves moisture
6. drip under mulch or other irrigation that reduces evaporation
7. season extension techniques  that further increase production without 
raising annual expenses, such as transplants, row covers, hoop houses

POINTS TO REMEMBER

        We can transition from rows to permanent beds gradually by starting 
with a bed or two. Beds don't have to be raised or framed with most soil 
conditions.

        The highest production gains with beds are with the smaller plants 
that typically go in six inches apart each direction, such as beets, turnips, 
spinach, onions, garlic. Carrots are even closer and more efficient in 
intensive beds. Beds can hold twice the plants of tractor rows in the garden 
space. Double the production, double the profit. However, larger vining 
plants in beds also benefit from not walking on the beds, from the ease of 
permanent mulch and drip, and the other cost and labor savings over row 
planting. Overall production can be far more than single row growing.

        The cost of initial setup of soil, beds, and drip actually creates a 
fixed asset that grows in value and pays for itself each following year in 
much reduced costs and labor. This is still *very low* startup capital 
compared to conventional production, and far more realistic for startup 
growers. The cost of tillers (don't need it), land (less land), and labor 
(you have to pay your own time) can be cut drastically to turn a profit the 
first season.

        While this system offers market growers a better living to stay on 
the land and produce healthy food, it's also ecologically sustainable. We 
stress that this system reduces water use and fossil fuel use beyond simple 
organic growing, and builds topsoil instead of depleting it.