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World Naked Gardening Day

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Did you know that Saturday September 9th, 2006 will be the 2nd annual World Naked Gardening day? I didn’t either.

The organization is calling for all gardeners, young or old to step into a garden and tend to their plants naked on the 9th of September.

Why garden naked you may ask? Well, the organizations’ site has an explanation for that it seems:

Why garden naked? First of all, it’s fun! Second only to swimming, gardening is at the top of the list of family-friendly activities people are most ready to consider doing nude. Moreover, our culture needs to move toward a healthy sense of both body acceptance and our relation to the natural environment. Gardening naked is not only a simple joy, it reminds us–even if only for those few sunkissed minutes–that we can be honest with who we are as humans and as part of this planet.

What’s that, sun kissed minutes? You mean if I participated I’d have to do it in daylight? But, but, I’m more of a moonlight gardener myself.

Here I was thinking that if I wanted to say that I had participated I could sneak out my back door just after midnight or in the very early morning hours and pick some strawberries or something. Certainly I wouldn’t be tangling with my roses naked. I think I’d end up in the emergency department with a very embarrassing story as I tried to explain my various injuries.

I don’t know that there’s any hard and fast rule that you must participate during daylight hours but if there is it would certainly make it interesting for my neighbors if I tried it.

You see, my backyard abuts onto another neighbors’ – who lives on the adjoining street – driveway. He and his family could easily see me from their yard or any window on that side of their house. Then, I have two neighbors on either side of me. One of whom could see me from their back windows or back porch, and the other who could see me from any window and or through the chain link fence in her yard. There are two other neighbors next to my “chain link” neighbor who also have low fences who’d be able to see me.

I suppose it would only be fair if the people on yet another adjoining street could see me, since I accidentally see them whenever they have a shower at night. Get some curtains people! If I’m out watering in the dark, not being able to see much of what I’m doing, I tend to look around at my neighbors houses and yards. Unfortunately the people on the other adjoining block usually have their bathroom light on at night and they tend to have showers in the evening. Like a moth I’m drawn to look up at the bright light shinning from their window. Occasionally I see human skin toned blurry shapes pressed against that window, sometimes more than one human shape. Now I don’t stand there and stare, but even if I did I can’t see much. Still, I wish they would get some curtains.

Anyway, I guess if they looked out while having a shower, and saw me running around the yard tending to my garden it would only be fair, since I’ve seen their blurry naked forms often enough. But as for the rest of my neighbors … I don’t think they deserve to see me in all my glory. If I participate I’ll do it after dark, and probably when I think most of my neighbors might be sleeping.

Chicken! LOL

If anyone else plans on participating let me know how it goes, and do avoid the prickly plants!






Stinking brew! Alfalfa Tea

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Oh my. I did something this evening that I have to do under the cover of darkness. No, I’m not doing something illegal or trying to hide some big gardening secret from my neighbors.

No, nothing quite as simple as that I’m afraid.

You see, I’m quite sure that my neighbors are well aware that something is going on when I do my sneaky deed.

It’s the smell that gives it away.

Remember sometime near the beginning of July I posted that I was going to brew a batch of Alfalfa tea? Yup, well I did. It brewed and fermented, and I stirred it and tended to it and the herbal grow juice was more than ready to be poured onto my garden beds.

I used two large garbage bins. Added 6 cups of alfalfa pellets to each bin and filled them to within 4 inches of the top. Then I added 1.5 cups of Epsom salt to each container as well. The alfalfa contains a natural growth hormone that the plants respond to very quickly, plus the alfalfa gives them a nitrogen boost too. The epsom salts add some magnesium to the mix. Just for good measure I also added some Iron Green. Read the directions on the bottle to figure out how many capfuls of iron Green to add per litre or gallon of water. I followed the directions but I can’t remember how much I added at this time.

When I was done preparing the mixture I gave it a good stir with a big stick and then put the lids on the containers. I stirred it two or three times a day for most of the last three weeks. It was ready after about one week but we were going through a heat wave here so I wasn’t ready to use it.

Oh, I also added about a cup of molasses to each container on the third day. This feeds the bacteria that is developing and aids in the fermentation process.

It’s very important to stir the mixture at least once a day to add some air into the fluid that brewing away in your driveway, or backyard. If you don’t it will smell even worse when you decide to use it.

But I digress. I stopped to tell you my recipe for alfalfa tea in case you want to try it on your own garden. You might not, by the time I finish my story, but let me testify that it works. No matter how bad it might smell you will get results and you’ll get them very quickly. Honest, I wouldn’t lie to you.

I guess, to my neighbors, this might seem like a big garden secret because I only pour the stuff on my garden late at night when most people are inside their homes. Then they see that my garden is lush and full of new growth on all the plants and that I have lovely blooms on all of my flowering plants.

But I don’t pour it on the garden at night because it’s a secret. No, I’d gladly share my recipes with them. No I do it because it smells terrible. Like a cross between poop and vomit. Really disgusting. Well, this batch was anyways since I’d let it go to long thanks to the heat wave.

I’m sure anyone around can smell it for several blocks.

My husband helped me. He pre-watered the garden beds so the alfalfa tea wouldn’t just roll off the mulch when I poured it around the plants. I, of course, had the nasty job of filling watering containers with the nasty brew splashing myself in the process as I walked back and forth from the flower beds to the brewing containers.

Whenever a bus would go by and stop at the corner we’d try to hide ourselves in case someone walked in the direction of our home. If we saw someone walking down the street and knew they would pass our house we’d stay out of sight then too. The job is so nasty that you just want to get it over with and you don’t want to stop and talk to neighbors inquiring about the awful smell.

Chris went over the areas that I had applied the alfalfa tea to and did a normal watering of the area. This helps soak the alfalfa tea into the ground and, well, it cuts the smell down a lot too.We had to shower when we came in to get the smell off of us, but I think my hands still smell.

I wouldn’t do this if the results were nil to mild. Uh huh, it wouldn’t be worth it. The results are spectacular! I started using alfalfa tea last year. I think the garden got at least four doses of the stinking brew. Within days of each application new growth could be seen on most of the plants. The roses would start to grow basal canes, and other plants would start to push out flower buds.

You’ve seen pictures of my garden on this site, and if you’ve been cruising around you’ve also seen my plants on Tricia’s Musings and Breath of Life, that should be proof that it works and that my garden is healthy. I don’t use any chemicals in my garden. Everything is natural.

If you are daring, and you’d like a lovely garden, take my advice and make some alfalfa tea. It stinks but it works. You’ll love it. Oh yes, you might want to apply it to your garden when your neighbors aren’t around just as I do, otherwise I’m sure those around you will have something to say about it.

More information on alfalfa tea:

Fertilizing roses – Alfalfa Tea

What are the Benefits of Aerated Compost Teas vs. Classic Teas?

Enjoy!

2006 garden winter protection

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I haven’t really begun to work on this site. I had planned to write in it daily and I do still plan to do that, but I’ve been busy with securing the domain name that this site will be placed under and I’m still looking for a good theme that I can convert into a wonderful garden layout.

It’s been cool this week so I haven’t been doing much with the garden. After last weeks blast of heat, then rain and now the slightly cool weather the garden has really taken off.

Actually since we had a very mild winter with very little damage to the plants I’d say that the garden is about a month ahead of itself. Many of the roses are already 6 or 7 feet tall. I’m used to having to prune many of the winter damaged branches down to one or two foot stubs but I didn’t have to do that this year.

Ironically, this past winter we winter protected better than we ever had before. We gathered leaves from our neighbors as we usually do but this year we must have gathered twice as many as we normally do – perhaps 50 bags of leaves! The garden beds had an approximately 3 foot cover of leaves on them. On top of that we had mounded soil around the base of the roses as usual, and we put up a long burlap fence that surrounds the garden beds on either side. Overkill even in a very cold winter.

When we uncovered everything in the spring the strawberry plants were already green, the rose branches were tall, green and only a few had slight damage. The rest of the plants were doing well too. It was amazing!

Well I must go and see if I can muster up some energy to get into the garden and do some work or else keep working on finding a nice theme for this site.

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