Want to Grow your own Vegetables?

Here’s Some Local Online Resources to Help You

During this time of Staying Home, Staying Healthy, the posting last week from the Master Gardeners had a lot of good advice on how to get started gardening at home.  This week’s posting from the Food Action Team provides local online resources to help you garden while staying home.

First is the booklet from our Team that has loads of information about local sources for your garden.  If you don’t already have a copy of it, you can access it online.  The link is

https://sustainablecorvallis.org/action-teams/food/garden-resource-guide/

It will help you gather knowledge about growing your own food, getting what you need for your garden, even where you can find a place to grow fruits and vegetables, what to do with your bounty once you’ve harvested it, raising ducks and chickens in your backyard and even how to keep bees. 

Second are three nurseries around Corvallis:

Garland Nursery  5460 NE Hwy. 20 – 541-753-6601

www.garlandnursery.com

Shonnard’s Nursery  6600 SW Philomath Blvd.  

541-929-3524  www.shonnards.com

Home Grown Gardens   4845 SE 3^rd Street 

541-758-2137   www.homegrowngardens77.vpweb.com

Third are the resources of a world-class university and its online resources

for gardeners such as the following book for beginning gardeners: 

Growing Your Own

https://catalog.extension.oregonstate.edu/em9027

as well as other publications in the OSU Extension Catalog. 

Food Action Team – Edible Garden Group

Get your new Garden Resource Guide

The latest edition of the guide is available at the 12 noon Tuesday Gearing up for Gardening Master Gardener events at the Corvallis-Benton County Library on February 11, 18, and 25;  as well as Town & Country Realty; Garland Nursery; Shonnard’s Nursery and the Benton County Extension Office, Master Gardener desk.  Stop in and get one today.       

                                                                                                                         

Make a Fresh Start

It’s a great time to start planning your spring garden, gathering your seeds, and getting ready to start growing seedlings to put in your early spring garden. 

Using toilet paper roll centers that you’ve collected (quickly!), prepare little individual pots that will go straight into the garden when it’s time to plant and decompose after being planted there.  This is an easy and economical way to get a jump on the season.

         

Remember to start your early greens, chard, kale, and broccoil in a sterile seed-starting soil mix.  Put some kind of light over the tray to give your plants a good warm start in life. 

Garden Resource Guide and Resiliency Planning

January means Garden Planning

If you’ve ordered seeds by mail, then you probably have many seed catalogs.  Before you dive into them, take some time to walk in your garden now that much of it has died or been cut back.  Make decisions about what vegetables you’ve raised before and what new vegetables or varieties you want to try this year as well as how you will rotate them in your beds this year.

To help you with your garden dreaming, get the latest copy of the Garden Resource Guide “hot off the press” either online or at Gearing up for Gardening lectures Tuesdays at noon in January and February at the library.  Updated for 2020, this guide will provide you with information on where to learn about food gardening, gathering what you need to get going, places where you can garden with others, and what to do with all your garden bounty.

and Resiliency

Food Sustainability is about more than growing your own food.  It’s also about building a neighborhood that can take care of its members in an emergency.

Individuals, families, and neighborhoods will need to prepare and store supplies of food and other necessities of life for themselves and others.

Please check these sites for more information:

Unprepared: An Oregon Field Guide Special, OPB

Food Storage for Emergencies, OSU Ext.

Storing Food for Safety and Quality, OSU Ext.

Essentials of Home Production and Storage,

LDS

The Joy of Gardening Moves Indoors

December is the month to enjoy your winter garden, a warm cup of tea, and the new seed catalogs that grace your mailbox among the many holiday cards and catalogs.

Also consider starting members of the onion family like chives, leeks, onions, scallions or members of the rose family like alpine strawberries indoors with added light and heat so they will be ready to plant outside in early spring.  Ind

Or maybe you decide to start some slower-growing flowers like geraniums, snapdragons, yarrow, or violas to transplant under a cloche in late March.

Invite Wildlife into your Garden

Provide water not only for birds, but also for predatory insects.  A shallow bowl with rocks in it helps both birds and insects get a sip.  In the winter, check the water every morning and thaw it out with warm water if it freezes.

Provide shelter for wildlife.  Bird houses are lovely, but a rotten log, stump, or snag can be a home for birds and insects, too.  Don’t clean everything out of your garden over the winter; a bit of grass, a pile of rocks can be a home for insects.

Provide habitat.  Plant natives and berry shrubs in your garden along with vege-tables, herbs, and flowers.  This provides a habitat for both birds and insects.  As a bonus, the birds help you out in summer by eating pest insects.

Harvest Solutions from the Food Action Team, Edible Garden Group

Have More Food from your Garden

than You Can Eat or Put Up?

Consider donating your surplus to one of the follow programs:

Community Outreach Inc.  865 NW Reiman Ave., Corvallis. Shelter and food pantry. 8 am-7pm Mon-Fri. Call ahead to donate • 541-758-3000 

Jackson Street Youth Shelter  555 NW Jackson Ave. 

Open 24/7. Call ahead to donate • 541-754-2404

Jammin’ for the Hungry  Fresh or frozen fruit only. 

Call for locations and times. Sara Power • 541-231-6772 

Marys River Gleaners at Pioneer Park(south of Philomath Blvd between 15th St. and downtown exit). Fri. 8 am-2:30 pm, Sat. 9:30 am-1:30 pm. Cookie Johnson • 541-497-9019 

Neighbor to Neighbor (Philomath)  College United Methodist Church (Social Hall), 1123 Main St, Philomath.  Dinner: 5:30-6:30 pm Glenda • 541-929-2412 or 541-929-6614 

OSU Emergency Food Pantry  Call ahead to donate and for directions. 541-737-3747 or 541-737-3473 

Don’t Waste Food

Forty percentof all food is wasted in the United States. Think about the energy waste that goes along with that!  What’s more, much food waste can be eliminated. 

What to Do

Food waste starts in the garden. 

·      Pick produce when it’s ready. 

·      When you bring it home, store it properly so that it doesn’t spoil. 

·      Keep an eye on what’s in the back of the fridge. 

·      Plan meals carefully to use up food before it goes bad.        

·      If you do have to toss food, put it on the compost pile or in the yard waste bin, if allowed, not in the trash. 

·      So either share food with your friends or donate it. 

More places to donate food will be posted next month.

Check out

https://nofoodleftbehindcorvallis.org

to find out more info!

Soil Testing and Crop Rotation

2019 Edible Garden Tours

Grow UP! – Using Structure in the Edible Garden

 

Offered by the Corvallis Sustainability Coalition’s Food Action Team’s 

Edible Garden Group and Bountiful Backyard

FREE toursfeature stops at local gardens and farms where gardeners exhibit their work.

Discussions are welcome.  Come get inspired with us!

bountifulbackyard.org/edible-garden-tours

https://sustainablecorvallis.org/action-teams/food/edible-garden-tours/

How Can You Make your Vegetable Garden More Sustainable

By June most of our seeds have been planted and are up and growing.  And yet we may be leaving bare areas in our garden for tomatoes or squashes to grow. We don’t want too much of that.

What we want in our garden is living soil.  Soil scientists tell us that most of the life in our garden is beneath the surface and needs plant roots in order to thrive.  We need to feed those micro-organisms around our plants’ roots by making sure there is little or no bare areas in our gardens. 

These little guys include -- but are not limited to -- bacteria, fungi, protozoa, nematodes, and micro-arthropods as well as earthworms.  Most of these soil organisms live near the roots of our plants.  As they eat, grow, and poop in the soil, they make it possible to have cleaner water, cleaner air, and healthier plants. 

So, what do we do with bare soil that is waiting for our tomatoes and squashes to spread over it? Several things come to mind: 

We can plant quick-growing plant seeds like radishes that will cover the ground until our crops fill in the space, preventing weed seeds from finding a home and giving food to the millions of micro-organisms in our soil, or plant flower seeds – both native and domestic – that also attract pollinators to our gardens. 

How to make your ideal Summer Vegetable Garden happen

What food do you want to grow in your garden this year?

Tomatoes, peppers, tomatillos, eggplant, corn, and melons?  These crops are more difficult to grow here in the Pacific Northwest.  They are native to parts of North and Central America with very warm day and night temperatures and regular summer rainfall.  They are difficult, but not impossible.  Here are some techniques that can help.

Cloches can help speed germination of directly-seeded plants like squash, cucumbers, and melons in May.  Our nighttime temperatures are usually rather cool for these warm-loving plants to get a good start.  Tomato starts can be planted out in May under a cloche also.  Using empty soda bottles, milk jugs, or even cake server tops help keep the garden budget modest for these garden assistants that can be used reused.  Cold frames or even greenhouses act like cloches, but can protect many more plants.

How do you introduce summer transplants into your garden?

Make the transition gradually from the greenhouse where transplants were grown to the garden with  direct sun in the day and cool temperatures at night.  Put the plants out for a couple of hours in the shade on the first day; two hours in a sunnier location on the second; perhaps four hours on the third day, etc., gradually working up to an overnight on the day before you transplant them into the garden.  Avoid the temptation to plant your tomatoes, eggplants, peppers and tomatillos in the garden until the last week of May or the first week of June. And remember to keep them well watered until they have adjusted to their new home. 

Food Action Team – Edible Garden Group

Seed Sources

Looking for Seeds to Plant?

Here’s Where to Find Seeds Locally

Adaptive Seeds, Sweet Home

Heirlooms and “rare, diverse, and resilient” seeds from around the world adapted for the Pacific Northwest.  www.adaptiveseeds.com  541-367-1105

Decker Rd. Seeds, Philomath

Vegetable, herb, wildflower, and cover crop seed.  

www.deckerrdseeds.com   503-250-2506

Fertile Valley Seeds, Corvallis

Varieties developed by Carol Deppe as described in her book The Resilient Gardener.  E-mail for seed list.  www.caroldeppe.com

First Alternative Co-op, South Store

Seeds from Territorial, Adaptive Seeds, Peace Seeds, Peace Seedlings, and other companies. 541-753-3115

HOUR Seed and Plant Swap

Held annually in the spring. hourexchange.org  541-224-7752 

Peace Seeds, Corvallis

Public domain plant breeders of many vegetables, flowers and Native American plants.  peaceseedslive.blogspot.com

Peace Seedlings, Corvallis

Public domain plant breeders specializing in Andean root crops and local varieties of flowers and vegetables.  peaceseedlingsseeds.blogspot.com

Territorial Seed Company, Cottage Grove

Large selection of seeds, seedlings, and supplies. Print catalog has detailed growing information for each crop.  www.territorialseed.com 800-626-0866

Wild Garden Seed, Philomath

(Frank Morton) Certified organic open-pollinated varieties adapted for the 541-929-4068 Pacific Northwest. www.wildgardenseed.com  541-929-4068

From the Food Action Team - Edible Garden Group (FAT EGG)