Trevor Dalley Nurseries

January Newsletter

2009-02-06T00:44:00.000-08:00

Humus and Life.

Sooner or later every gardener, if he is a good gardener, becomes a Organic humus enthusiast. Humus, like chlorophyll, is one of the keys to the mystery of life. It presents problems still unsolved by the probings of science, although sufficient is known to indicate its vital significance. It cannot be expressed within the terms of a chemical formula, neither can it be reproduced synthetically, but it is the stuff that brings the soil to life, and makes it capable of supporting plant life. No humus, no fertility, no life.

In the simplest terms Organic humus is the final stage of decomposition, rot, or decay of all organic material, vegetable and animal. Humus is the state of matter in which the complex biochemical forms of plant and animal life, bereft of the dynamic principle of life itself are broken down into simple substances capable of being built up anew into plant structures. As such, Organic humus, by its presence, quality, and amount, determines the fertility of the soil.

Humus is all things to all soils. Its primary source is organic vegetable and animal refuse. This is converted into humus by the combined action of soil bacteria and earthworm. If produced on the surface, disintegration of the organic matter produces a light brown or brown mass, containing more nitrogen than carbon.

Decomposition within the top layer of soil produces a humus of black or dark brown colour, rich in carbon, and more active as a basis for plant activity within the soil. Humus acts as a weak cement to the soil. Added to light and sandy soils it serves to hold the coarse particles together. Added to clay and heavy soils it forms aggregates of the fine clay particles and makes its texture more open.

Physically humus is a colloid, with a colloidal property of swelling by absorption of water. In sandy, it improves the ability of the soil to hold moisture and the soil solution for plant roots. In clay, it pushes the aggregated particles apart, opens up the soil, and promotes better drainage.

In all soils humus makes aeration more effective, and oxygen is as necessary to plant roots and soil life as their counterparts above ground. Organic Humus also darkens the ground, enabling it to absorb the sun’s heat more easily and retain it more completely. It makes soils capable of sustaining plant life earlier in the year, and of maintaining a longer period of growth.

Humus betrays its presence by the texture of the soil. A soil well enriched with Organic humus is sweet smelling and elastic, and when squeezed feels like a sponge. It darkens the top soil. Lower down the soil is lighter in colour, owing to the absence of humus. Soils long enriched with humus develop the characteristic dark brown colour in depth.

Valuable as it is to the physical condition of soils, Organic humus is to be treasured even more for its direct and indirect release of plant foods. The raw materials of humus provide nutriment for all manner of soil inhabitants, but chiefly bacteria.

The chemical constituents of humus are highly complex. All we know is that in humus we have a mixture of the products of disintegrating organic refuse, more or less rich in carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen, and the numerous other elements in smaller amounts that make up the former organic and living structures. From the gardener’s viewpoint the essential of Organic humus is its condition.

Humus accumulated under conditions of poor drainage, hard soil surface, moisture, cold weather, and poor aeration, becomes peat-inactive, sour, and in itself infertile.

The best type of humus is produced under conditions of well-aerated cultivated soil, in which drainage is efficient, and a temperature around 45 degrees Celsius the ideal for bacteria activity. Such Organic humus provides the neutral colloidal material that appears to be the primary source of those subtle but vital elements of healthy plant growth, growth hormones, as indispensable to plant life as vitamins are to us.

Humus serves also to hold plant food made available in the soil in reserve, before completely disintegrating itself into nitrogen, carbonic acid, ect.

Unlike the mineral ingredients of the soil humus is exhaustible. Its formation and disintegration are hastened by the pressure of lime or calcium salts. These help to neutralize the acids produced in Organic humus-formation, and so speed decomposition. Humus vanishes fast in chalky, limestone, and gravely soils for this reason. They are humus-hungry soils, and we cannot replenish them with organic material too often or too much.

In all garden soils the act of cultivation serves to exhaust the humus content, and with it the fertility of the soil. Soil bacteria are always more numerous and more active in a cultivated soil, and the plants themselves draw extensively upon the soluble foods afforded by Organic humus and its derivatives.

Without humus living vegetation cannot thrive, and without humus the whole intermeshing activity of soil becomes suspended. Conversely, soil well enriched with Organic humus is well equipped to enable plants to withstand the vagaries of the weather. Being warmer, it permits an earlier start to gardening out of doors, and a healthy resistance to cold spells. Providing a reservoir for moisture and the soil solution of plant foods, it withstands hot weather and drought.

Depletion of the humus factor depends on the type of soil, cropping, cultivation, and manurial policy. Regular renewal through the medium of organic manures and composts result in an accretion of fertility over and above the seasonal expenditure.

Under natural conditions all things organic origin decay to form Organic humus and enrich the earth. Soil bacteria and micro-organisms in themselves, by means of their dead remains, are no mean contributors of humus. In rich, healthy soils, where there activity is encouraged, they furnish as mush as 10 to 12 lbs per 100 square yards annually, of a kind particularly rich in phosphoric acid.

In the garden some discretion must be exercised. Tree trunks, as well as tree leaves, furnish humus, but there’s a great difference in their rates of decomposition. Bones distintegrate much more slowly than blood. All organic remains are of value, but to render immediate service to the cause of gardening, especially food growing, they must be easily disintegrated, and their food values rapidly released.

Every garden, no matter how small, has a constant supply of potential Organic humus in its own plant waste of leaf, stalk, flower heads, hedge clippings, lawn mowings, ect. Seaweed from the shore, spent hops from the brewery, scraps from the household table, stable manure and poultry run, or the rabbit hutch-all provide potential life for the soil.

Materials, slow to decompose in bulk, can be more swiftly disintegrated by breaking then up into small particles. Bones con be ground, twigs chopped, tough cabbage stalks crushes and bruised, and then pre-rotted before incorporated with the soil, by mixing them with finer refuse, and allowing all to lie in a compost heap.

If results are to be swift and gratifying organic matter should not be added to any soil fresh. The first stages of decomposition are essentially fungal, and lead to the production of acids and carbonic acid in excess. This interferes with the manufacture of soluble plant foods in the soil, and restricts the breathing of plant roots, and their growth.

Organic material, well rotted, fits into the scheme of soil activity perfectly, and introduces matter already rich in partially formed Organic humus. If green or fresh manure of any kind must be added, it should be incorporated with the soil when the ground is unoccupied by plants, and well ahead of sowing or planting time. This gives the necessary time for the material to be decomposed and take its place in supplementing the dynamic plant-sustaining functions of the soil.

Trevor Dalley has been growing and preserving his own fruit for 40 year, most of the preserves are sold in his Organic Farm Shops in Herefordshire England. Did you find those tips on Organic Food a way of Life useful? You can find out more at NEW! Guide to Organic Cooking! - The Healthy Way of Living!

December Newsletter

2008-11-26T01:46:00.000-08:00

The Good Earth.

The great constant in gardening is the good earth. It is the raw material out of which every gardener creates his kingdom. Of the four natural forces governing plant life, sunlight, rain, air, and soil, soil is the only one that comes under the gardener’s direct control and influence.

The good earth, at least our portion of it, is the one important resource in gardening with which we need to be on terms of the greatest familiarity. Our knowledge of its character, its potentialities, and its limitations cannot be too intimate.

Individual soils differ greatly in textures, composition, color, and many other qualities, but all true soils-good earth-capable of giving plants an anchorage and sustaining their life have five properties in common. They are constituted of (1) mineral ingredients; (2) the decayed and decaying remains of plants and animals; (3) moisture; (4) microscopic plants, bacteria, and animals in constant activity; and (5) soil air or atmosphere. Out of the interactivity of these five things arises the capacity to produce and sustain plant growth-fertility.

The basic character of any soil is largely derived from its mineral matrix. This consists of particles of widely differing sizes, formed from the original rocks by the constant chemical changes and mechanical pressures set up by the weather and other natural forces. Some soils are composed of mineral particles remaining in situ; others of particles transplanted by glaciers to their present positions-glacial sands, gravels, and boulder clays; others of particles carried by flowing water-alluval soils; and others of particles borne by the wind.

By their size and kind the soil particles greatly influence the capacity of the soil to support plant life. Although every soil has in its minerals particles an inexhaustible source of plant foods, the mineral fragments alone are incapable of sustaining plant life. To make their potential food available to feed roots the presence and co-operation of the remaining constituents of the soil-moisture, organic matter, micro-organic life, and air-are needed.

Under natural conditions the mineral plant food values of soil particles are being trapped continuously by the action of these agencies. It is a slow process, conditioned by the constitution of the soil as a whole. Where the mineral particles predominate in a soil its fertility is low. When its balance in relation to the other four constituents of good earth is improved, its fertility increases. To bring this about is the objective of all good gardeners.

By their size the mineral fragments frame the physical texture or mechanical condition of the soil. They determine its inherent ability to hold water without becoming stagnant or waterlogged. They determine its ability to drain away surplus water. They determine its ability to absorb the sun’s rays and warm up to the temperature at which plant growth becomes possible. They determine the heat-retaining qualities of the soil.

The largest particles of soil are stones, pebbles, or gravel, but even a stony soil contains many particles as small as 2 millimetres diameter. Soil of a coarse mineral foundation are sandy or gravelly. They are called light or hungry from their ability to absorb and quickly digest organic material. Soils of a coarse mineral foundation are sandy or gravelly. They are called light or hungry from their ability to absorb and quickly digest organic material.

Sand offers great resistance to the actions of water and weather. Composed of tough rock fragments it resolves to soluble salts slowly, and gives up little to the plants. Its particles vary in size from 2 millimetres, and are irregular in shape, refusing to pack closely together. This makes for large air or pore spaces, through which soil moisture drains rapidly, taking dissolved food material with it.

Clay lies at the other extreme. It is composed of very fine particles of pulverized rock, less than 2 millimetres in diameter. These particles of pulverized rock huddle closely together, and tend to adhere. Pore spaces are small, water can only move slowly, so slowly that in dry weather it evaporates and the soil cracks more easily than it drains.

Trevor Dalley has been growing and preserving his own fruit for 40 year, most of the preserves are sold in his Organic Farm Shops in Herefordshire England. Did you find those tips on Organic Food a way of Life useful? You can find out more at NEW! Guide to Organic Cooking! - The Healthy Way of Living!

November Newsletter

2008-11-16T03:11:00.000-08:00

Garden Friends and Foes.

In the insect world, vegetarians, and therefore plant foes, largely outnumber carnivora, the gardener’s friends. Wireworms, the tough yellowish grubs of the click beetle, are troublesome pests, especially in newly turned-over meadow-land. They have a 4-5-year life cycle in the soil, and can therefore do much damage. Cultivation, trapping with baited pieces of potato or carrot, and soil fumigation thin their ranks.

Millipedes are often found in association with wireworms. They are blackish or pinkish, move slowly, and curl up when touched. They should not be confused with the quick-moving reddish-brown centipede, a tireless worker in the garden’s interests. The brownish or grayish caterpillars of various moths that live in the soil are known as cutworms. They attack roots, tubers, and stems, and may often be picked from plant stems when feeding at night. The whitish-yellow grubs of the cockchafer are often turned up in digging, and may be left to the birds.

The gardener has a number of friends among the beetles. One of the best known is the ladybird, which not only feeds voraciously on aphids, but lays her eggs among them. On turning into larval form the insect feeds actively for 5 or 6 weeks on the plant lice, rendering a great service to the garden, before pupating. The handsome, slender, long-legged tiger beetle is constantly on the hunt for insect food, and its grub is no less helpful.

Ground beetles from a large family, fleet in movement and nocturnal in habit. Preying on insect life, they are among the gardeners friends. The deep orange, small, slender solider and bluish sailor beetles feed on the small insects which infest flowers and leaves, while the beetle known as the devil’s coach-horse spends its life searching for insects, slugs, and worms to eat.

Among flying insects the hawk or hover fly is very helpful. These flies are not unlike wasps, and are easily recognized by their habit of darting about and hovering over flowers. They lay their eggs on aphis-infested leaves, the larvae feeding upon these as soon as hatched. Another flying insect of similar feeding habit is the lace-wing fly, belonging to the same order as the dragon-fly.

Ichneumon flies belong to the same family as bees, the Hymenoptera, and are of great service to the gardener, from their habit of laying their eggs under the skin of other insects. The resulting larvae feed on the tissues of their hosts, and are the cause of death to countless caterpillars and aphids. There are thousands of types of ichneumons, varying in size, but characterized by large round head, long thin antennae, and long slender waist.

Bees render inestimable service in the garden, being among the chief pollinators of flowers and blossom. Wasps are generally given short shrift. Yet they destroy numbers of injurious insects to serve as food for their young during the early part of the season. It is when they turn their attention to ripening fruit that it is time to destroy their nests with care.

Ants are seldom a serious menace in the garden. Their habit of maintaining aphides, however, is often responsible for constant plant infestation with these insects, and when ants become numerous it is better to banish them. Moles create havoc by burrowing through the soil after insect grubs and worms, but their work is ultimately beneficial. Shrews are helpful inhabitants, feeding on insects, larvae, and worms. The hedgehog, although omnivorous, cleans up slugs, snails, and grubs.

Toads are good friends, living exclusively on insects, slugs, and grubs, and in wet situations frogs and newts lend a hand in reducing the harmful population. Every gardener will find firm friends among the birds. With few exceptions, all birds which frequent the garden are partly if not wholly beneficial. Some of them at certain seasons do harm by taking a toll of buds, fruit, and seeds, but in their destruction of insect pests and the seeds of noxious weeds they are irreplaceable allies.

Rather than scare the birds from the garden all the time it is more sensible to take precautions in those localities, and at those seasons, when they indulge their destructive tendencies. Fruit-loving birds can be checkmated by the fruit cage, or netting. Against their depredations at seed-sowing time black thread strung over the sown area is efficacious. On balance, it is very evident that the high cultivation of the garden would be soon reduced to nothing were it not for the birds.
In the December Newsletter we will be looking at in more detail THE GOOD EARTH.

October Newsletter

2008-11-16T01:41:00.000-08:00

Let us Spray.

The sale of remedies for garden infestation and disease is probably is only surpassed by the sale of remedies for the household medicine chest. The newcomer to modern gardening may be forgiven for thinking the spray gun is mightier than the spade. In truth, however, garden health, like human health, is far more a matter of hygiene, nutrition, and the maintenance of a healthful enviroment than a quick response to the exhortations of the gardening magazine advertisements – LET US SPRAY.

Bus and fungi are no respecters of gardens. Even though a gardener gives every attention to right manuring and proper technique, he is still at the mercy of his neighbor’s neglect, not necessarily next door, but many doors away. Fungus spores, aphids bearing microscopic viruses, and insects may wing their way over huge distances from their initial point of action. Then there’s nothing for it but prompt chemical control, though the less use we make of it the better.

Sprays are 100-per-cent selective. In their destruction of the enemy in the open, insects that are the gardener’s friends are also destroyed. That nicety, the balance of nature, is upset, with the result that relieved of its natural checks; a new scourge arises, demanding a new technique of control.

For instance, when science introduced the virtues of the tar-oil wash many years ago as a simple control for aphids and fruit-tree pests, it also gave us a weapon against minute anthocorid spiders. These anthocorid spiders are the natural enemies of red spider. The tar-oil-washed orchards thus becomes a happy feeding ground for the sap-sucking red spider.

Chemical controls can seldom be rigidly confined to where they will do appropriate damage in application. The soil and undergrowth receive a portion of the spray, and its poisons are often destructive to helpful soil life and the more tender plant structures. The tale of many controls is one of declining efficiency. Each year some of the pests survive to become the progenitors of offspring possessing a growing resistance, which in turn results in an immune generation free to multiply once more.

With these facts in mind the intelligent gardener approaches the question of spraying with caution, balancing the long-term drawbacks with the short-term advantages of saving a vital crop. The choice between chemical spraying is largely one of expense and convenience. In certain cases it is preferable to spray selectively. All chemical sprays include the essential poisonous ingredient.

The more important controls are the preventive ones, applied before attack develops. Dusts can be applied to carrots; onions, cabbage and other crop plantings liable to infestation by fly before the first generation of the insects begin to lay their eggs.

It is in the orchard that spraying reaches its greatest perfection, though garden practice lags behind the eight or nine spray programs of the commercial grower.
For more information on safe spraying or if you wish to go completely Organic please email us at tgdnurseries@hotmail.co.uk

September Newsletter

2008-08-31T00:42:00.000-07:00

PEST PREVENTION IS BETTER THAN CURE

Not counting stray dogs, curious cats, of the neighbor’s children, there are more than 100,000 pests, fungus or insects which a gardener may have to face, although the varieties in the average garden may not run to above 500, and the majority of these may be present in insignificant proportion.

The presence of pests to the extent of interfering seriously with the success of the garden is at once a challenge and a criticism of the gardener’s skill. Biologically it suggests that some phase or phases of gardening operations are being neglected.

The best resistance to human disease is a state of vigorous robust health. The ideal conditions of pest prevention and control are established by the cultivation of the essentials of a healthy environment in the garden. We are a long way from understanding why Nature lets loose her plagues upon us, but it is certain that inviting conditions must be present before they do descend.

Cleanliness both in the soil and on top of it, at all seasons, is the garden’s best pest repellent. Insect pests, fungi, and viruses all like extreme amounts of rubbish. Fungi over winter in diseased plant material. Their spores rest in the soil. Insects reside in and below weeds, around hedge bottoms, and in the soil. Old stick and rotting wood, give cover to slugs, snails, millipedes, and woodlice.

The soil itself harbors many types of fungus spores, insect eggs and larvae. But for their survival these pests need non-disturbance. Cultivating the soil as much as possible before planting, and regularly after planting, exposes the soil to sunlight and its sterilizing rays, and uncovers insect eggs and grubs to the attention of birds notably the ROBIN, who will devour anything you have to offer. Hoeing and weeding during crop growth weakens the pest’s foothold by their constant disturbance.

Aeration plays its part in controlling pests. Damp still air fosters mildew and blight. Proper spacing of plants allows air to circulate, and lowers ground humidity, with advantage to growth. Many pests and plant diseases detest sunlight. Its sterilizing rays are of infinite value in checking blight. Proper spacing, cutting back high hedges, and careful pruning of trees should ensure that every part of the garden receives a daily quota of sunlight.

The wise gardener is alert to the progress being made in the long-term policy of eradicating plant trouble by the breeding of disease resistant strains of seeds and plants. Some varieties of vegetables have been bred resistant to disease common to their kind. Certain types of seeds are more resistant in some soils than others. Study of the seed catalogues is amply repaid when it leads to the selection of seed most likely to sprout into healthy seedlings and vigorous plants.

The final recourse of the gardener in his fight against the unending plague of garden pests is to get out the spraying machine and go into action with destroying insecticides and fungicides. Chemical methods of pest control provide only part of the answer to our problems.

September Tip
Every grower has room for stick or runner beans in their gardens, these beans are best picked small and fresh about 6-7 inches in length not long and stringy. The growing of stick beans has long fascinated me. We have grown them in all areas of our farm in Herefordshire trying to extend the time we can pick for sale through our farm shops for many years.

About 12 years ago I hit on the idea to extend the growing and selling time of these lovely vegetables, this process is not new it was used in the 1940’s and 50’s by market gardeners until the cheaper alternatives started to arrive from many of the Southern African Colonies, but now with the rise in delivery costs hitting all Countries the price for imported none G.M. crops is about to go through the roof. You have the means to extend the growing of not only Beans but all vegetables. The method we use for Beans is late in September cut the bean stem to about 6 inches from the root, stripping away any old leaves, then let the plant sit for about 2 weeks.

The area where you removed the old leaves new shoots will start to grow, when the shoots are about 1 inch long the whole plant should be lifted and potted up, the plant will have a large root system so a 9 or 10 inch pot will be needed, the plant or plants can be left outside until the middle of October and then brought inside where the frost can not penetrate, let the plant grow on, staking when necessary. By around Christmas you will be picking Beans again, after Christmas there may be a need to pollinate by hand but we have found this was not needed. Using this method we are able to get the highest prices at market of around 6 pounds per Kg.

More on spraying of garden plants next month, if you would like to receive an advanced copy of our next article entitled ‘LET US SPRAY ‘ please go to :->

Newsletter August 2008

2008-07-24T06:03:00.000-07:00

Please Bookmark this Page.

This month I would like to review the demise of the Herbaceous Border, It is a sad reflection upon us the modern gardener that we cannot find the time to do all those things in the garden we should. This is in spite of reduced working hours and the skill of many tradesmen and technicians, who continually produce labor saving accessories to make life very much easier for us. The leisurely pace of the last 20 years has been lost to the gardener who has not produced that wonderful display of Herbaceous and Perennials somewhere in there garden.

The gardener of today just has to be practical, and any feature which reduces ultimate labor will meet with a favorable consideration. And now we come to the herbaceous border. Here we have a feature both eye catching and practical, the border is laid down with some degree of permanency and destined to become even more splendid as the years go by.
If you choose only Hardy Plants, the gardener avoids wintering problems but manages a continuity of color and cut flowers throughout the season. After the initial expense of purchasing the Herbaceous roots there should be no great expenditure of time or labor.

The Herbaceous Perennial is a plant with an indefinite existence, the difference between the Herbaceous Perennial and the Annual or Biannual is the Herbaceous Perennial will keep returning each year, the Annual or Biannual are in the category of plants that dies back to the ground each year.

We should not think that Trees and Shrubs come into the Herbaceous Perennial category because they do not die back every year, these plants are a completely different cultivars altogether. Most gardeners will exclude Trees and Shrubs from the Herbaceous Perennial border mainly because they can cast a large shadow and reduce light.
Bulbs are classed as Herbaceous Perennials but most gardener will exclude them from the Hardy Herbaceous Border mainly because with the use of a border folk the gardener might unwittingly disturb the over wintering bulbs, if the bulbs are kept to a specific area their should be no objection. The spring bulbs such as Daffodils and Tulips are particularly most valuable in extending the overall season of flowering.

Tip of the month:->

if you have purchased a new home with an established Herbaceous Perennial border, don’t be to quick to start digging around on it through the autumn and winter, their just might be a few little gems ready to pop there heads out in the spring, if you start ‘forkin-around’ with your garden fork, or digging with your spade there is a chance you might just kill them off. Also do not remove any leaves that have fallen from the Herbaceous Perennial border plants, these leaves should be left on the Border throughout the autumn and winter, I know they look unsightly but the worms will carry them down into the ground and make compost of them, ready for the plants to feast on in the spring and summer, plus the leaves help to retain moisture.

Best of luck from the shed by the pond,

P.S. I think the buzzards have had all my baby ducks.

Newsletter JULY 2008

2008-07-24T02:02:00.000-07:00

Newsletter JULY 2008
Please Bookmark this Page.

THERE'S an old gallic saying:'To be happy an hour, get drunk; to be happy three days, get married; but to be happy for ever, become a gardener.' And the happy gardener has two precious gifts; first, Faith-faith in the seasons,faith in life itself-and secondly, Understanding.This letter cannot give its readers faith-they will get that delving, observing and pottering-but it will, i hope, guicken their understanding of the ageless forces of the earth (approx 6.8 billion years)and of plant life that makes it possible for gardening to succeed and to become an ever-renewing source of happiness. It is my belief that in our awareness of the unseen immutable energies at work in the garden we gain mental relaxation and spiritual refreshment. If this letter and letters to follow stimulates this awareness in you, it will have achieved its greater purpose in helping you not only to garden more intelligently but more happily.In the newsletters to follow we will be entering extracts from my mentor which he wrote in 1943 while he was a homeguard sargent ready and waiting for the invasion of our wonderful land. In his note books he will open our eyes to the growing of plants back then, which i must say the growing of flowering plants has not changed much, the major change is in the growing of veg. PLANT ANATOMYIt is possible to garden without knowing much about the mechanics of plant growth. Probably, certainly many of his descendants do so to-day. But the gardener who takes the trouble to gain a basic knowledge of plant anatomy and funtion can go to work more intelligently, achieving better results. The great majority of garden plants have a well defined anatomy-root, stem, leaf, flowers, and seed that withholds few structural secrets from the microscope of man. In the knewledge we have of the functioning of the machinery of the living plant there are gaps, mysteries that at the spice of speculation to our gardening. It is significant that the first part of the plant to emerge from the seed is the root. A plant lives standing on its head. Not only are its roots its mouth, but they display an amazing degree of intelligence. Roots discharge two duties: they anchor the plant to the soil, and they act as absorbing organs for the water and plant foods that the soil supplies. Root systems of individual types of plants are as different below the ground as their foliage and forms above. Plant roots tend to grow downward vertically. They are geotropic-sensitive to the pull of gravity. this tendency is modified in hteir search for food. They feed on simple chemical substances of inorganic origin which they find as salts dissolved in the moisture of the soil.

2008-07-23T23:39:00.000-07:00