Don't get me wrong, I LOVE the satisfaction of growing my own food, and even more, knowing the food is safe, and all the money I saved. Come on, there has to be an easier way!
Well, there is ... put down your hoe ...
Ecological Gardening: When we think of organic gardening and permaculture we tend to conjure up images of leathery-skinned bearded warriors who dedicate their lives to working long days in their vegetable plots. Whilst this may be a wonderful way to live your life, it doesn’t suit the average suburbanite with a full-time job and a hefty mortgage.
Growing healthy food is typically seen as either an art form or darn hard work. It’s no wonder very few people do it on a serious level. But what if a technique came along that was so easy and so prolific that even the busiest corporate executive could grow a significant portion of their family’s food in less time than it takes to drive to the shops. Ecological gardening just might be the answer. In my experience, it’s the ultimate modern-day convenience veggie plot.
I didn’t have a light bulb moment that said, “Ah, so this is ecological gardening”. My vegetable garden was no different to anybody else’s for many years until I made a few changes. The first and probably most significant was squeezing far more plants into a given area. The second change was to never dig the soil. And thirdly, I upgraded my composting system. Once these simple strategies were in place I noticed the garden taking on a life of its own. Weeds virtually stopped growing in the beds and plants started living much longer. The garden could endure longer periods without water, I was yielding far more than I ever had and I could harvest every day of the year. I wanted to know what was happening at a scientific level and applied my university training as an environmental scientist to understand why I was getting such amazing results. I had to completely let go of all my preconceived ideas as a gardener and look at the plot through the eyes of an ecologist. After some time I realized that I had created an ecosystem made up of edible plants, and it behaved in exactly the same way as a natural habitat. I became more of an observer than a gardener and the role of head gardener was pulled from under my feet as nature took up the reins.
Employ Nature, she works for free
The wonderful thing about nature is that she works tirelessly, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Nature follows very simple laws and works in the same way, on any system, anywhere in the world. When we create an ecological garden we are creating a living, breathing ecosystem. By doing this we get nature working for us, and not against us, and her great stamina works in our favour.
Niche Spaces and why they are important
A pristine ecosystem is made up of thousands of living and non-living components all coexisting in a given area. Each living component occupies its own niche space and the role of the niche space is very important to understand when creating an ecological garden. Let’s look at an example. Imagine a giant rainforest tree crashing to the ground after standing tall for hundreds of years. Such a large tree would have filled an enormous niche space. Lying in the soil, hundreds of dormant seeds spring to life, desperately fighting for their opportunity to occupy the best real estate in the forest: the empty niche space. The niche space is quickly filled and harmony is restored.
When we look at a traditional vegetable garden with this type of insight, what we see is a very unnatural system. There is very little diversity and a lot of empty niche spaces. Nature enforces her will on vegetable gardens in exactly the same way she does a rainforest, and this means that empty niches spaces will be filled as quickly as possible. However, in a traditional vegetable garden there are no desirable seeds waiting to fill the niches spaces, so weeds fill them instead.
The solution is to create a garden that has tightly filled niche spaces so that weeds don’t have any opportunities. We can do this by planting the garden very tightly with a diverse range of plants of differing shapes and characteristics. The result is a dense jungle-like planting arrangement that can yield an unbelievable amount. The denseness also creates a highly protected micro-climate. This ideal growing environment causes your plants to last much longer. Greens don’t bolt to seed as soon as a hot spell hits and cold sensitive plants are more protected as well.
How to manage an ecological garden
Managing an ecological garden is different than managing a traditional vegetable garden. With an ecological garden, there is far less to do. As you become the observer and allow nature to take over as head gardener, you will notice that the garden is in a continual state of gentle change, just like a natural ecosystem. It can be difficult for the traditional gardener to stand back and observe as we, human beings, like to control things. To learn more: