the garden

THE GARDEN
this weekend i met a new gardener
who will be planting her first new garden
at her new home

she has two raised beds probably about 8-10 ft x 4 ft

i of course offered a lot of advise on what to do

i told her today i would post a blog on my garden
including pictures
hoping this information will be useful to her
and
maybe to you

the life blood of a garden is its soil
all my soil was originally started by laying down cardboard
and or newspapers on the ground
building my frames for the beds with limestone blocks
dont use treated wood
then going to the natural gardener in austin buying their
hill country soil which has everything in it you need to
get vegetables to grow

what i noticed though was the veggies did well but in the
heat of the summer they didnt do as well as i wanted
later i figured out it was my soil depth

so
i dug out each bed added at the bottom tree branches limbs
trunks cardboard newspapers leaves compost soil in layers
so that i now have a good 2-3 feet of soil
it makes a difference in this dry hot climate we live in here
since all that stuff in the soil helps hold moisture

each time before i plant
i add 3 inches of compost now i make my own
i add a sprinkling of a good organic fertilizer
i use ladybug brand 8-2-4 according to directions on the bag
i then sprinkle a light dusting of cottonseed meal as per the bag
then when i plant a plant i add a small amount of earthworm castings
thats worm poo

then i plant it
im lazy so i dont even mix it all up i let nature do it

after things get growing i start adding mulch
i use pine straw when i can get it
when not available i use leaves

then i just water them making sure the soil doesnt get all dried out
usually thats once a week based on the weather and rain
i do the finger test
sticking my index finger down to the second joint
if its not wet it needs watering

plants commonly dont do well
either from not watering enough or watering too much

i dont use any pesticide or nonorganic products in the garden

if you see worms and ladybugs in your garden then thats a good sign

in my garden now

here are my garlic almost ready to pick and let dry out for two weeks
then i hang them in braided chains
these i plant in november

here are my potatoes red lasodas
i will dig some in a few weeks to get some new potatoes
but will dig up the whole plant when the plant starts dying back
these i plant in late january or early february

here are my onions which are mostly 1015 ones
these are eaten as green onions when needed
they are harvested in may or june
when the stalks start falling over
these are hung woven together until we need them
these were planted in late january

here are my tomatoes this row has 6 plants and another row has 4
this is the right amount for us to take care of
i planted them in late to early march
being careful to keep them covered when things got cold
these tomatoes do well in my garden
juliette sweet 100s early girl celebrity several heirlooms
such as cherokee purple arkansas traveler mortgage lifter brandywine etc
some will make it through the summer and produce well this fall

we will also replant tomatoes in july for the fall

we have a summer garden bed that consists of
basil peppers bell banana mild jalapeno poblano
egg plant clemson spineless okra red german okra
these will produce until it freezes this fall

we have a bean garden made up of
asian long beans that are best eaten in salads
bush beans that are eaten in salads and grilled
we dont do any shelling beans thats too much work

this is a tatume squash a heirloom that is like a zuchinni
but is more round and runs in a vine like a cantaloupe or pumpkin
it isnt affected by the squash borer which wipes out zuchinni
and yellow squash after awhile

this is a armenian cucumber
its long and narrow and seems to grow well here
the white stuff is diatamaceous earth to stop the pill bugs
we dont pickle or put any of these up
we just eat them raw
the cucumbers not the pill bugs

its planted in my keyhole garden thats in an old water trough
it will grow up pvc pipes ive added that go over the trough

you need 8-2-4 ladybug fertilizer or an equivalent organic fertilizer
cottonseed meal sold in small bags
worm castings

i use liquid seaweed to water in my new seedings to get them started
i use johns liquid fertilizer once or twice a month to water my plantings
when i think of it
it has fish emulsion seaweed and molasses in it

a good compost
the best is the one you make yourself
ladybug brand farm style compost is an excellent one

other companies and nurseries have their own brands and are good

for insect control
i use a hand vac to suck them off my plants and then i dump them
in a bucket of water
diatamaceous earth to dust around the plants at times to slow down
the pill bugs and the slugs
bacillius thuringienesis or better known as bt to control caterpillars
spinosid for insect control
seaweed for insect control
a good book is the texas bug book by malcom beck and howard garrett
ladybugs

on the radio klbg590am on saturdays and sundays from 8-1100 am
and
ktsa550am on saturdays from 530am to i think 900 am
have excellent organic garden shows

i hope this information will help you have a successful garden
ive learned the most from my failures

the organicgreen doctor

potpourri

POTPOURRI
if you have not used the khan academy website to tutor your child
you should try it
some schools are using this site as homework where the
students do a lesson on this website then work on it the
next day in a large group
eg
how to do an algebra problem
the academy teaches the students online then the next
day the whole class works on the lesson
the kids seem to learn better this way

the website is www.khanacademy.org


a sugary drink a day increases the chd coronary heart
disease risk by 20% as well as the risk for diabetes
think about that when you grab your coke pepsi moutanin dew
or big red
just try h2o yes good ole water
a great non calorie drink that the body requires to survive


in texas a study followed a large group of eight graders until 6
years after graduating from high school
only 19.9% received any type of degree within that 6 years
thats no bachelors associate or certificate
that doesnt look very good does it
even ut researchers were shocked at their findings
were going wrong somewhere
maybe college degrees arent what the kids need

i will admit that i got my bachelor degree 8 years after high school
yes it took me awhile but i finally made it
i got my medical degree 14 years after graduating from high school
so the stats didnt fit my situation as being a bad thing

you would think though that with all we are investing or not investing
in our educational system that more kids would have their degrees
by 6 years post high school or at least a 2 year degree or certificate
so this means our work force is mainly only high school educated


teens are texting more and calling less
the average teen texts 50 times a day
dang
how do they get anything done
if i did that many texts i never would get all my honey does and
country n work done
heck some older teenagers average 100 texts a day
only 39% of teenagers even make phone calls

i know its easier to communicate with people using texts
i find myself using it more and more every day
even my motherinlaw is a texting feen

yesterday i released the hounds
these are lady bugs being released in my garden
they were released late in the evening after watering my  potatoes
so they could have moisture to drink
heck theyve been cooped up in a bag in the refrigerator for awhile
and were thirsty and hungry

now they will go out and attack and eat those bad aphids and other
bad bugs

the organicgreen doctor

how does donepezil (aricept) work, lady bugs

HOW DOES DONEPEZIL (ARICEPT) WORK
donepezil (aricept) works in the brain by inhibiting the
enzyme acetylcholinestrase that breaks down the chemical
acetylcholine
thus it is called an acetycholinesterace inhibitor

acetylcholine is is a chemical that helps many brain functions
such as memory, attention, reasoning, and language
(doesnt help me remember names-long time problem)
(does make me more attentive-know now what people with
add feel when they get on medication so they can focus and
be productive)

in alzlheimers there is a destruction of the cells that produce
acetycholine  so the levels of acetycholine drop

by inhibiting the enzyme the levels of acetycholine go up in the
brain and remain up for a while
this helps to slow the decline in memory

however its effects are short lived-a few months to
a few years

it is not a cure for alzheimers
it does not slow down the progression of the disease

the problem with alzheimers is that the diagnosis is usually
made too late to slow down the symptoms much

it is important that an early diagnosis be made (as is in my
case-very early diagnosis) so that medication can be
started (donepezil-aricept) and
testing can be done (labs, genetic tests, spinal tap anaylysis,
mri and pet scans ) and
life planning can be done

then when this medication doesnt work any more another
medication is usually added-most commonly used is exelon

www.alz.org (alzheimers association web site)

LADY BUGS 
on a lighter note
add lady bugs to an organic pest control program
can buy and release them in your garden
every one loves lady bugs

demonstrated that once in the clinic
we developed a problem with aphids and flies on
the plants in the clinic
i did not want them to call a  pesticide
company to come in to drop some toxic bomb
in the clinic to kill the insects so
i bought a bag of lady bugs and
released them everywhere in the clinic

people and patients dont like spiders, ants, other bugs
but they love lady bugs
we had lady bugs everywhere

they were on many of the plants going to work
they love aphids

kids would let them crawl on their arms and some
took them home even the adults and elderly enjoyed them

eventually they all disappeared but hopefully the kids
and employees learned something about green gardening
from the lady bug exposure

the organicgreen doctor