Healthy soil and sustainable growing

[dhondt <dhondt@eircom.net>]

I have over the years grown more than 250 different vegetables. Quite a few of them far from traditional in Ireland where a generation ago people ate potatoes and cabbage and little else. Some of my neighbours, people in their 40's had never eaten an onion or a tomato before very recent changes came in and more foods became acceptable.

Generally speaking most root crops have always performed very well except of course for the sweet potatoes that need a lot more heat than we can give them. And Andes plants generally do well here. We have found Ireland very good for growing quinoa, not so good for drying the seeds which makes quinoa rather labor intensive.

Small fruit especially black currant, goose berries and blue berries usually do well with black berries growing on every boundary wall and being very important for ourselves and all wild life. Top fruit like apples, pears and plums suffer severely from wind , cold and rain until you get a shelter belt around them and we found before that you need a shelter belt to grow a shelter belt.

We have never been able to get a ripe tomato or cucumber outside. They need the protection of  a poly tunnel or a glass house.

But pumpkins can do well. I think we averaged around 10 kg per square meter last year. And the same for squashes.

\it did not freeze last night and the weather forecast is for a week of cloudy, wet conditions so we planted out some 200 5 '' tall maize plants, Carol Deppe's Grex beans, salsify 50 plants, 12 pack choi and some 100 so called edible burdocks. Makes for a bit of room in the green house and we will be sowing quinoa and other things in trays in the next week.
John

On 01/05/16 17:30, herb farmer wrote:

57262F28.40404@lobo.net" type="cite">
living in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains (Colorado) now, I'd like to know more of your varieties in Ireland. April wintry nights have neighbors saying spring is only a suggestion ... lack of sun now for seedlings is a surprise.

paul

On 4/30/2016 4:57 PM, dhondt wrote:

On 29/04/16 16:51, herb farmer wrote:

Best Staple Crops for Building Food Self-Sufficiency
http://www.motherearthnews.com/organic-gardening/garden-planning/staple-crops-zm0z13jjzsto.aspx?newsletter=1&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=04.29.16%20MEN%20GFSS%20eNews&utm_term=GFSS%20eNews

there's room for opinion on this...
BTW Carol Deppe was a favorite source of John Jeavons

We evn grow some of Carol Deppe's varieties in Ireland. And then of course we don't sit still. We try to make them better for our local conditions. Which now means continuous strong night frost.
John

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