Organic Gardening - A Beginner's Guide
One of the great benefits of organic gardening is that it not helps to conserve natural resources but it saves your financial resources as well because you are doing things the natural way that nature loves.
Table of Contents
- Natural Fertilizers
- Organic Gardening Books
- Mulching The Natural Way
- Organic Mulching Books
- Organic Gardening Pest Control - The Natural Way
- Natural Pest Control Books
- Xeriscaping or Low Water Gardening
- Xeriscaping Books
- Organic Gardening Blog Posts from Google
- Organic Gardening Systems
- Care To Share Your Organic Gardening Tips?
Natural Fertilizers
Fertilizing an organic garden is easier than most people think.One of the best fertilizers you can use in a garden is compost which is, of course, made with all natural, organic materials such as grass clippings, shredded leaves, and even shredded newspapers. You can also toss in fruit and vegetable matter from the kitchen to help your compost become even more rich and fertile for use in any area of your garden.
Besides compost though, you can actually just put certain plants into your garden area to help fertilize the soil, and provide additional nutrients your plants need.
Alfalfa for instance, is a wonderful hardy plant which can survive in almost any conditions, yet it's very high in a large number of vitamins and minerals that are beneficial to your soil in general. Alfalfa will provide your soil with nitrogen, iron, magnesium, phosphorous, and potassium for instance, plus it's long strong roots will help break up hard, rocky, clay like soil too.
German Chamomile is an annual growing herb which will reseed itself each year if you leave some of the flowers unpicked each season. This herb helps contribute calcium, potassium, and sulfer to your soil. It's also excellent for improving the taste of cucumbers, cabbage, and onions. A perennial version is the Roman chamomile, and it will grow in almost any kind of soil with full sunlight.
Clover is an excellent addition to any garden. It has long been considered a source of "green manure" and can be a companion plant to almost anything. In fact, it's particularly useful for increasing the soil fertility of grapes. Clover will attract many beneficial insects to your garden too.
Organic Gardening Books
The Organic Gardener's Handbook of Natural Insect and Disease Control: A Complete Problem-Solving Guide to Keeping Your Garden and Yard Healthy Without Chemicals
"This book is our most helpful resource on pest control. It's the first book we turn to for solutions."--Terry Gips, President, International Alliance for Sustainable Agriculture
"Every year, we review hundreds of books on how to manage soils and pests organically and how to reduce the use of toxic materials. We're excited at the quality and completeness of The Organic Gardener's Handbook of Natural Insect and Disease Control and recommend it to our clients."--Bill Wolf, President, Necessary Trading Company, New Castle, Virginia
Amazon Price: $16.29 (as of 07/12/2009) 
The New Organic Grower: A Master's Manual of Tools and Techniques for the Home and Market Gardener (A gardener's supply book)
This amounts to the 'bible' of organic growing. It is informative and inspirational in equal measure. While the approach Coleman takes is particularly suited to market gardening, it is also eminently suitable for smaller-scale gardeners who simply wish to feed their family.
Coleman writes, 'The premise of this book is that you can make a good living on 5 acres or less of intensive vegetable production. Thus it is those acres that concern us most.' (p16)
In a nutshell, Coleman's approach is to:
- plan and market effectively
- develop the healthiest soil
- grow the most valuable crops
- extend the growing season to the maximum
He show just how to do this in 334 pages with 28 chapters and four appendices. There isn't space here to offer a contents list, but here are some highlights:
Chapters addressing the question 'why do it?' - Agricultural craftsmanship', 'a final question'
Chapters on 'season extension', mobile greenhouses and 'the winter garden'.
'Plant-positive' solutions to pests.
Chapters on marketing strategy and marketing.
However, 'The New Organic Grower' covers far more than this - in fact everything you could need to start successful organic vegetable production! Readers living in cool/temperate climates may also want to check out Coleman's other popular book, 'Four Season Harvest'.
Amazon Price: $16.47 (as of 07/12/2009)
Carrots Love Tomatoes: Secrets of Companion Planting for Successful Gardening
This gardening classic was first published in 1975, and now a second generation of gardeners who prefer pest-resistant planning to chemicals will find a place for it on the shelves. Not only does it tell what to plant with what, but also how to use herbal sprays to control insects, what wild plants to encourage in the garden, how to grow fruit and nut trees, how to start small plots or window-box gardens, and much more. It's one of the most practical books around for any gardener of edibles, no matter how serious or casual.
Amazon Price: $9.72 (as of 07/12/2009)
Burpee : The Complete Vegetable & Herb Gardener : A Guide to Growing Your Garden Organically
Burpee has created a truly encyclopedic, but non-intimidating, guide to organic vegetable gardening that can be used and appreciated by anyone, whether or not they've ever stuck a seed in the ground. All the essential information is here--how to condition the soil, how and where to plant, sprouting schedules, what kind of yield to expect from each plant variety, and harvesting tips--in beautiful, bountiful, illustrated detail; the book's largest section, "Plant Portraits," contains explanations of the many cultivars of each vegetable and herb. If you're a novice vegetable gardener or new to organic gardening and can only afford one gardening guide, this may be your best value.
Amazon Price: $26.37 (as of 07/12/2009)
The Elements of Organic Gardening
For twenty-six years, the Prince of Wales has passionately honed the organic practices used at Highgrove, Their Royal Highnesses' family home in Gloucestershire, as well as in his other gardens at Birkhall in the Scottish Highlands and Clarence House in central London. Now, alongside Andrew Lawson's elegant photographs and with Country Living gardening editor Stephanie Donaldson, the Prince's vivid elucidation of his techniques for maintaining healthy soil, planting varieties, and sustaining an ecosystem "in harmony with the natural laws and rhythms of the universe of which we are an integral part" offers a wealth of wisdom to delight and inspire any gardener. His practices, based on a deep respect for nature, can be adapted to almost any garden, large or small. The Prince is hands-on in his gardens, and it is this passion that reveals itself intimately to be at the heart of The Elements of Organic Gardening. 200 full-color photographs.
Amazon Price: $23.25 (as of 07/12/2009)
Mulching The Natural Way
Many new gardeners don't often understand how important it is to use mulch around the base of their flowers, plants, shrubs and trees. It doesn't matter what kind of gardening you're doing mulching your garden plants and flowers will help you conserve water.By covering the ground around your bushes, flowers, trees and other garden spots, you're able to help protect your plants from the strong, hot sunlight of summertime, and this helps keep the soil around them moist for longer periods of time.
There are a wide variety of materials which can be used for mulching your garden. An excellent organic material is wood chips, shavings, or bark. Since wood is an organic material, it will slowly break down and be mixed into your garden soil, providing more vitamins and nutrients for future years.
Grass clippings or dried leaves which fall from your trees each fall are also excellent natural materials to use for mulching your plants and flowers, as is straw and hay. Since these are also organic materials, they will contribute to the overall richness and fertility of your soil as they breakdown too.
Some people prefer to use mulch materials which will last for many more years at a time though, and some popular ones include plastic, and rubber material made from recycled tires. These often come in the form of circular rings for placing under trees and bushes easily.
Organic Mulching Books
The Organic Way to Mulching
Amazon Price: (as of 07/12/2009)
Organic Gardening Pest Control - The Natural Way
One thing that new organic gardeners become confused about, and sometimes even frustrated with, is figuring out how to control pests and bugs in their gardens. It doesn't matter if you're growing roses, annuals, perennials, bushes, trees, vegetables or something else... all plants have one or more bugs which seem to like to feed on either the plant leaves and stems, the flowers themselves, or both.The most natural way to control pests in your garden is to simply hand pick the bugs off of leaves and flowers as you find them. This is a time consuming process for large gardens though, and many people do not like controlling pests this way alone. Thankfully there are many other things you can do to help with the process naturally though.
A natural way to control pests is through planting itself. By planting certain herbs and flowers around your garden, you can naturally control and even repel a wide variety of common garden pests.
Planting chives around your apple trees for instance, will help prevent scab. And if you plant chives around your roses, they help prevent black spot.
Elderberry is a plant which can be used to get rid of garden moles. Just stick branches and leaves from this plant down into the mole holes, and they'll leave the garden. You can also make a tea or wash with the leaves from this plant, and it will help repel aphids, carrot root fly, peach tree borers, and cucumber beetles too.
Garlic is another wonderful, all natural repellant for your garden too. The flavor of garlic can be abosorbed by other plants though, so don't plant it near any vegetables that might taste bad with a hint of garlic flavor in them.
Lemon Balm is another wonderful, all natural herb which works excellently as a repellant for a variety of things. You can sprinkle lemon balm leaves throughout your garden to repel a number of different bugs and pests, and you can even rub the crushed leaves on your skin to prevent mosquitoe bites too.
Natural Pest Control Books
The Organic Gardener's Handbook of Natural Insect and Disease Control: A Complete Problem-Solving Guide to Keeping Your Garden and Yard Healthy Without Chemicals
"This book is our most helpful resource on pest control. It's the first book we turn to for solutions."--Terry Gips, President, International Alliance for Sustainable Agriculture
"Every year, we review hundreds of books on how to manage soils and pests organically and how to reduce the use of toxic materials. We're excited at the quality and completeness of The Organic Gardener's Handbook of Natural Insect and Disease Control and recommend it to our clients."--Bill Wolf, President, Necessary Trading Company, New Castle, Virginia
Amazon Price: $16.29 (as of 07/12/2009)
Natural Pest Control Revised Edition
"I am actually enjoying an ant free summer thanks to this book! All without any chemicals using Dr bronners Peppermint soap! wow!"
Amazon Price: (as of 07/12/2009)
Environmentally Friendly Pest Control
Since elimination of a species is not possible, nor responsible, reducing pest problems to an acceptable level through natural means is the goal of this publication.
Amazon Price: $14.99 (as of 07/12/2009)
Xeriscaping or Low Water Gardening
Xeriscaping is the act of creating naturalized gardens using plants, flowers, shrubs and trees which are acclimated to the particular area you live in. Xeriscaping is becoming very popular, because when you create your garden based on flowers and plants which grow naturally in your area, you end up needing to water and care for them much less.
Xeriscaping is particularly useful for creating gardens that need little to no watering, and it's used the most in the desert southwestern area of the United States, because water is quite scarce in those areas.
When most people start thinking about how to create a garden which uses little to no water other than natural rainfall amounts, they immediately think of creating a cactus garden. And cactus gardens can be quite beautiful in and of themselves, but this is not the only way to create a beautiful garden which doesn't need supplemental watering from you.
One excellent way to help reduce the amount of water your plants need for instance, is to buy special water crystals to add to your garden soil. These crystals are designed to absorb and hold water for long periods of time - usually about two weeks - so that you can water your plants less yet still have them be healthy and beautiful.
The water crystals absorb water each time you water your garden, then they slowly release that water to the plants over time. You can buy potting soil which already has these crystals added, or you can buy the crystals themselves and add them to the existing areas of your garden they're needed most.
Xeriscaping Books
Xeriscaping: Planning & Planting Low-Water Gardens (The Wayside Gardens Collection)
"You'll find detailed descriptions, illustrations, and invaluable knowledge for figuring out which plants are suited to your low-water gardens....Excellent design tips...help gardeners create gardens that look beautiful."-The Nursery. "A wonderful variety of plants...water-wise gardening, as well as the steps involved in creating a successful dry garden."-Gardening Life.
Amazon Price: (as of 07/12/2009)
List Price: $17.95
Creating the Prairie Xeriscape: Low-maintenance, Water-efficient Gardening
Amazon Price: (as of 07/12/2009)
List Price: $34.95
Organic Gardening Blog Posts from Google
- Spray, baby, spray: an organic gardening thread
- We have tried mostly to plant native species (much of the orchard came from an organic place down in...
- Organic gardening 101: Vermiculture, or raising worms for garden ...
- Worms are squirmy, slimy, and ugly (although beauty is in the eye of the beholder)...and crucial for...
- Five tips on starting an organic garden
- Ms. Roth, 36, an optician, started educating herself about organic gardening soon after graduating f...
- Clean detox and the Denver organic gardener
- Denver organic gardeners will be glad to know they are already involved in a partial clean detox. Cl...
Organic Gardening Systems
This article is courtesy of Wikipedia.org
Care To Share Your Organic Gardening Tips?
Please share your tips and hints for a successful organic garden by eaving your comments below.
Music-Resource wrote...
Top shelf Organic Gardening lens. I love the Pest Control section :) Great info. ~Music Resource~
Posted March 07, 2008
Graceonline wrote...
Excellent and comprehensive guide to organic gardening. Thank you so much! I can attest to the value of companionate planting. I planted chives, garlic and marigolds between the roses in an established rose garden. Together with a praying mantid egg case and lady bug larvae every spring, our roses were beautiful and mostly aphid-free. While they were small, our children played safely all summer without worry that they might ingest harmful insecticides.
Posted February 27, 2008
