Start of Season workshop 2018

It was the start of Spring 2018, time for a Food Garden Group’s Start of Season workshop.  The topics of this year’s presentation by Christina Giudici were propagation, seed raising mixes, potting soils, rooting hormone and biochar. This blog post documents some of what Christina covered in her workshop.

With every subject Christina looked after beginners and more experienced food gardeners, and with her pleasant and open presentation style she encouraged everyone to ask questions throughout the morning. Christina’s information was really practical, and always with reasons why, based on her own practices, experiments, failures and successes.  It made her info very authentic and valuable.

Christina discussed the various components of her favourite potting mix, put the required quantities in a large bucket, and then mixed them thoroughly by pouring the content from one bucket into another bucket eight times.  Here potting soil was made according to the following recipe:

Potting Mix (from June 2016 FIMBY Newsletter)
For a 50-litre batch mix together

• 40 litres of composted potting bark
• 10 litres of potting sand
• 50 – 150 grams of lime (mix of dolomite, ag lime, gypsum)
• 150 grams of Osmocote
• 10 – 30 grams of ferrous sulphate (a moss killer) 
• 15 grams of micro nutrients (or worm castings) up to 20% of volume

Christina then demonstrated the use of a soil blocker (see photos below and above). A soil blocker is a soil-former used for making cubes of potting mix. Some make a dimple on top of each soil block for the seed. The advantage is twofold: No plastic pots are needed, and transplant shock is reduced because the cube of soil is later on planted in a bigger pot or garden 'as is' rather than disturbing roots.

The soil used in soil blockers needs to hang together well, so the blocks don’t fall apart when they come out of the soil blocker. Below is the recipe for the soil Christina made and used when demonstrating the use of this tool.

Soil blocking mix 

• 2 parts of coco peat
• 2 parts of sifted compost
• 1 part of worm castings
• ½ part of sand or perlite
• a sprinkle of lime
• water or worm juice

Christina recommended Allsun Farm (see https://www.allsun.com.au/Allsun_Farm.html ) as an internet supplier of soil blockers (on their site look under Catalogue). Hollander Imports near the Brooker Roundabout in Hobart might also sell soil blockers. 

Christina also discussed sowing in modified milk containers. She removes the top and bottom of a plastic milk bottle, fills it with potting soil and sows in this 'pot'.  Then, when the seedling is big enough to be planted out, she puts the plant with plastic sleeve in the hole, then slides the sleeve up, so it sits above soil level around the seedling. The sleeve now protects the seedling against snails. She removes the sleeve when the plant is big enough to be safe from snails, and uses it again. 

Christina showed us rooting hormone made from willow twigs (see the jar in the photo below), and shared the simple way in which it is made.

Cut young willow branches into a handful of small sticks that are up to the height of the jar you are going to put them in (the sticks in Christina's jar were a lot shorter). You may like to take the leaves off, but this is not essential. Put the sticks in the jar, then fill the jar with boiling water. Leave this some time to steep (until the water has cooled down; half an hour?) before using it. Put cuttings you want to strike in the jar for a few minutes, then put them in soil.

Honey is often used to strike cuttings. Honey has antiseptic qualities, but the rooting hormones in willow tea also actively encourage the cuttings to form roots.

After morning-tea the subject was biochar. Christina showed a Powerpoint presentation on the subject and discussed her own experiences with making and using biochar (see photo below).

 

Biochar in its simplest form is the charcoal left over after burning a wood fire that is then treated as described below. Christina also described how to create a fire specifically for the purpose of making biochar.

Christina compared charcoal to supermarket shelves. The honeycomb structure of charcoal provides the opportunity to store great quantities of nutrients that can then be accessed by micro-organisms and plants.

Biochar is charcoal ‘with nutrients on its shelves’.  It is best not to add charcoal to your soil or compost heap without first ‘filling its supermarket shelves with food’, otherwise the charcoal may extract nutrients from its surroundings, and that is not the best way to use it. 

Here is a simple recipe for making biochar:

• Remove as much ash from the charcoal as you can
• crush the charcoal into small bits (don't overdo it ; we don't need dust)
• Immerse the dry charcoal in ‘a bucket of nutrients’. This can be a bucket of water with fish emulsion, worm wee, compost tea or chicken poo, whatever nutritious plant food you have at your disposal. Now ‘the supermarket shelves are filled’. 
• Drain the liquid off
• Apply the biochar (still wet or when it has dried) to your compost heap or garden soil. Use small quantities over a period of time, rather than a large quantity in one go.

At the end of the session Christina invited people to ask questions, and a lot of valuable information was shared then about a whole lot of food garden subjects.

Thank you very much Christina for your very interesting and valuable information. Beginners, intermediate, and advanced food gardeners present, all went home with things learnt.
What more can you ask for, at the start of a new food gardening season.