Garden Planning

As the snow starts to melt and daylight hours grow with each passing day, gardeners can begin to dream again of blossoms, growth, and glorious dirt. Whether a novice or veteran, garden planning can be a joyous undertaking and a deeply inspiring process.

Planning for summer's bounty and beauty is a great way to get the family together around a pile of seed catalogues and learn what is important to each of us, as we dream about what a garden could provide and how it might look. Starting small and choosing easy to grow varieties is a great way to ensure success. Check the number of ‘days to maturity’ when choosing your seeds to help you judge whether the seeds will have time to grow in our shorter season. By purchasing seeds that are produced in similar climates as ours, your plants will then have characteristics that will help them thrive. Seed catalogues that sell Canadian, heritage, & organic seeds support growers that care for the soils, and work to preserve seed stock. Seed companies and nurseries that sell heirloom and rare or endangered varieties of vegetables, fruits, flowers, and herbs can be found on the Seeds of Diversity Canada website: www.seeds.ca. This group is dedicated to saving and sharing seeds within its membership; anyone can join.

At the outset, the idea of planning a garden can appear to be quite a challenge. The exercise of mapping out a garden and assigning crops to specific locations and timeframes is an extremely useful tool that can be used throughout the year and increases your understanding of the possibilities at hand. There will always be surprises along the way; some good, some not so good. Crop failures are a fact of life in gardening and how we approach them can go a long way towards our satisfaction with our "plan". Stay flexible. If something is not working, try to figure out why. The beauty of gardening is that there are always lessons to be learned.

Consider all aspects of the environment such as water, soil, climate, and sun, and understand how these all work together to support a living community. Understand the requirements and characteristics of the plants you wish to grow. Remember that different species grow at different rates, but that ultimately, all plants are going to get taller &/or wider, and fuller. Nothing beats local knowledge - much can be learnt from talking with your neighbours, visiting the local community garden, and observing the many amazing gardens throughout the valley.

Careful observation in the garden is essential. In effect, you will be "designing" your garden on an ongoing basis. To be able to do this effectively, placement of the garden and placement of crops within it are important. The best rule of thumb is to plant the items that need the most attention close to your door, and those things that need a little less love farther away. This is one of the concepts of permaculture – an ethically inspired design system for sustainable living and land use. Mimicking the patterns and relationships you observe in natural ecosystems, permaculture is a process of consciously designing the place you live in to persist indefinitely.

Zone 1 is the area just outside the kitchen, a place for culinary and fresh tea herbs and a perpetual salad garden: here chives, oregano, and mint mingle with cherry tomatoes and a bed of spinach; all woven into a fabric of edible greens and flowers. This area requires the most care and will be harvested more frequently than any other area of your garden – that’s why it’s the closest.

Zone 2 is located a little farther away than Zone 1 and requires less intensive care and harvesting. This is where the "real food" grows; food that might be harvested every few days throughout the season, such as summer squash, slicing tomatoes, or green peppers. The far reaches of Zone 2 are reserved for storage crops like potatoes, onions, garlic, or winter squash that are happy with a little less attention. Heavy layers of mulch take care of most moisture and weed issues. On a good year, most of the work is thinning, harvesting, fertilizing, and dealing with pests through row-cover applications and hand picking. Rotate crops around the garden on a yearly basis, and don't plant too much of one thing in one place if you've got pests that you are trying to outwit.

Cultivating lots of flowers among the vegetables (known as companion planting) further confuses pests, helps keep a good ecological balance by supporting beneficials, and makes for an enjoyable, ever-changing stroll—during which you constantly observe for clues as to how to plan better next time. Watch how the sun and wind play out. Where does the soil stay moist the longest? What part of the garden goes into shade on late summer afternoons? Where does the wind blow and dry out the soil or damage less hardy plants? The more information you can gather, the better you can plan future crops. Again, if something's not working, don't be afraid to yank it out and try something else. Experimentation with the amazing diversity of plants available is part of the fun of gardening!

Maybe Zone 2 is as far as your garden will take you. Maybe a few containers on the porch satisfy your needs. But if you've got the space and time, you might think about perennial food crops such as apples and berries, or perennial cover crops for soil building and wildlife habitat. This Zone 3 area, a step further out from your home base, can take on a vertical dimension with shade-tolerant crops thriving under an over-story of fruit trees. Remember to be 'bear-aware' when caring for fruit crops in the Elk Valley!

Designing your garden with indigenous plants is another wonderful dimension to the gardening process. By including plants that occur naturally in the region, your garden will satisfy wildlife needs by providing the right kinds of food, shelter, and nesting sites. As well, native plants usually need less water, pruning, fertilizing, and other maintenance than exotic or imported plants. An excellent resource is available at Naturescape British Columbia: www.hctf.ca/naturescape/ resources.htm or visit the community eco-garden's native plants garden for information and ideas.

Of course, all of the above are only recommendations and each person's garden will evolve differently, reflecting needs and desires, as well as a unique aesthetic. Whatever scale and style your gardening endeavors take on, a plan built on flexibility and diversity, and informed by close and careful observation will enliven and hone your senses. The most successful gardens are those where careful, imaginative planning and design have been used. May your plans infuse and inspire your on-going design process for greater satisfaction and production.

Next month’s topic: Starting Seeds
-Include eco-garden logo somewhere in the article
-Include little blurb for end of each article re: Fernie Community Eco Garden
Since 2003, the Fernie Eco Garden has provided gardening opportunities and community education through sustainable organic projects. Inspired by permaculture principles, the garden was created by the community for the community, and enables members to utilize individual garden plots to grow & harvest flowers and vegetables. Located in Prentice Park, behind the Tom Uphill Memorial Home, and close to Fernie’s schools, this common green space features a Native Plants Demonstration garden, a Hummingbird/Butterfly garden, and a few shady spots to sit and enjoy the flowers.
The Eco Garden hosts a weekly volunteer ‘work’ party on Wednesdays, and has an exciting new series of ten workshops teaching everything from organic gardening to food storage. For more information please visit www.ecogarden.ca, or wander over and check us out.