This January, as pests and disease visit your garden, do your best to stay relaxed. It helps me, in these moments, to remember that everything is temporary – your garden is constantly evolving.
As trees and plants grow, roots stretch out and biology builds. Flowing on from this, weeds and pests change, as will your crops. There is such a lot going on in natural systems! So many cogs in the wheel of life, each impacting the other and always it keeps turning.
Our best bet is to inhabit a place of calm observation + gentle wondering. A generous side serving of letting go helps immeasurably. If nothing is permanent, why worry?!
You may as well be easy. Because try as you might, you will never control nature. You can butt up against her–and boy do we ever–but she will always be the boss. The weed you pull, it comes back, you pull, it comes back. The pest you spray – same thing, it comes back (this time with its cousins!), you spray, it comes back again and again.
Though its tempting to find quick fixes and silver bullets, there are none that play out as well as the laying of a strong foundation. The answer is long term – its the coming together of many things – a healthy soil + no artificial fertilisers, pesticides or herbicides + a diversity of well suited plants + animals, if you can + loads of trees + perennials. As this base establishes, a diversity of above + below ground life comes calling, and with it comes all the things you seek – low pest numbers, not so much disease and great abundance – your little garden has arrived! Its not as tricky as you think and is such a thrill to witness and be a part of.
We are surrounded by wonder. Slow down, my friends. Open your eyes so you don’t miss it.
Yours in the earth
❤️
Hi Kath,
Happy New Year to you.
No spraying – How do you (or did you) handle Convolvulus and Tradescantia?
Regards,
John Wilkinson
Happy new year to you too, John! Great question, and just so happens I have a blog about both those tricky weeds here https://www.ediblebackyard.co.nz/smart-weeding-no-spraying-required/. Hope it helps. K x
Hi Kath,
Thanks for your lovely post and Happy New Year, mines going to be a gardening one!!
Have you had any past discussions about cicada damage in fruit trees. I’d love to avoid damage that seems to take my three year old trees back to square one each year..thanks
Jaynie
Cicadas are one of those things I get along with – its next to impossible to manage them, or rather I’ve never found a way other than, diversity diversity diversity and eventually, there in comes the balance – watch and see!
Came home from a week with family to discover my tomatoes thriving (in a glasshouse, liberally mulched with straw) but the pepper a nd chilli, which were the best I’d grown, had aphids. GRRRR!!! Not being keen on sprays for things we are going to eat, I tried the old soapy water spray, trick, in the hopes that a lady bird infestation might follow, to sort the problem, as it does with roses (I never spray them). Unbelieveably, when I went out to open the door in the morning, there were two ladybirds on the door, reporting for duty!!! So far, since then, hardly an aphid in sight. Love getting your posts every bit as much as I have enjoyed your book.
Great story Lorna! Follow your gut – thats all there is 🙂
Hello I use your book and live at Waikawa Beach. However I am moving to Alexandra! Can I keep using your book or should I gift it to my friend who lives here ?
Worried about gardening with those varying temperatures! I am looking forward to the summer fruits!
Thanks!
Hey Amanda, you’ll need to find a new rhythm for sure, but you can still use my book! Up to you. Its about matching the needs of the plants (I’ve got their fav temps/ conditions alongside each individual crop) with whats happening and I do suggest timings for cooler places too. So fun to garden in different climates, and oh yes – apricots and cherries!
Hello!! I have managed to grow some beautiful butternut this year & am just noticing the beginnings of powdery mildew. I have taken off the leaves effected but know full well there will be more! Would apple cider vinegar or Naturally Neem help with this or would I be spraying in vain? Any advice appreciated, I don’t want to lose my plant to this if I can manage this naturally somehow!
Thank you!!
Oh yum – butternuts! Yes lets save them!
First of all – be sure to be encouraging towards your plants. Rule number 1 🙂 – don’t send them panic. Tell them they’re doing great and that they’ve got this. Its just a little mildew, no worries.
Check in with the soil at the base of the vine where the roots are – should it be dry (hard to imagine this summer), then give it a lovely soak to restore moisture.
Once nicely moist, mulch beneath the butternuts and around the plant roots – if you have some rotten woody mulch this is epic, otherwise any other fungal rich mulch like rotten leaves is great – go forage!
Continue to pluck off the worst affected leaves.
Spray weekly with milk (raw is best or atleast a whole, organic one) at a dilution of 9 water to 1 milk. Spray generously all over the foliage. Baking soda or ACV are also good but in my experience milk is the best – plus you cannot overdose the milk whereas too strong of a brew of BS or ACV burns the plants.
If you have EM to hand, https://www.ediblebackyard.co.nz/my-2-ingredient-biological-liquid-feed/ make a biological brew up with liquid seaweed and tip over the plants roots once a week. Go gently with the seaweed – use slightly less than the recommended rates as too much feeds the fungi, you want some in the mix as the EM needs it.
If your squash plant is alone out there, then its not too late to sow a mixture of cover crops alongside and around the squash vine – phacelia, buckwheat, alyssum, cosmos, borage for example. https://www.ediblebackyard.co.nz/introducing-guilds/ Plants support each other in times of stress and keeping the ground covered in a diversity of plants is 80% (or maybe more!) of the key to keeping our gardens well.
You’re going to learn heaps Jo – thanks to the powdery mildew. It will steer you towards building a strong foundation – guilds, biological feeds etc. Watch what happens in response to your actions – its the simple things that have the biggest impact. And most of all enjoy!