007 Feed Your Soil, Not Your Plants

Show Transcript

Farmer Fred  0:03  

Welcome to the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. If you're just a beginning gardener or you want good gardening information, well you've come to the right spot. 

farmer Fred

Hey, quit fertilizing your plants feed your soil instead. Here in Episode Seven, we go deep into what makes for a successful plant. If you think plant roots are sucking up that liquid or granular fertilizer that you're pouring on them, Well, you better think again, plant roots aren't straws. Instead, there are billions of microscopic beneficial fungi and bacteria in the soil that are converting those fertilizers into a usable form for the plant and delivering the finished product to the plant roots. And the better you treat those beneficial critters, the healthier your plants will be. It's all about the soil. Here on Episode Seven. We talk with Giselle Schoniger of Kellogg Garden Products about how this process works and actually how easy it is to improve your soil and your plants. We talk with a soils expert, Steve Zien, about why you should spend your money on a chipper shredder instead of a rototiller; and, how that rototiller can damage your soil.

Perhaps yourcool season vegetables like broccoli and cauliflower are starting to bolt. They're turning bitter and uneatable and sending up seed heads. Well our in house college horticulture Professor, Debbie Flower, explains why this happens. But there's a very beneficial side to all that bolting it's a result that can actually reduce your garden pest problems. It's all on this week's Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. And we're going to do it all in less than 30 minutes. Let's get started.

Farmer Fred  1:51  

Hi everybody, Farmer Fred on the road at Eldorado Nursery and Garden in Shingle Springs. It's Planta-Palooza here, and one of the speakers that is appearing here today works for Kellogg Garden products. And she is a big advocate of doing things organically and also building up your soil. Giselle Schoniger is their organic teacher at Kellogg's.

Giselle Schoniger  2:12  

That's right. Thank you so much for having me on your show. You're  such a delight. You know, I think that my background is, as I've shared with you in the past, actually is in the use of chemicals. I went to a production agricultural school. And about 16 years ago, I transitioned over to organics. And I've helped build three different brands of organic products. I've been with Kellogg's for 11 years. And I tell you all my soil and fertilizer classes made far more sense when I started working with nature instead of trying to control her. And, you know, I think that when we look at fertility of of how we feed plants, most of us that are using chemical fertilizers to feed plants. Truly, that is what we're doing. We're feeding the plants, but at the expense of the soil.

Farmer Fred  2:58  

What a lot of people don't realize is, you should be feeding the soil, not the plant. If you feed the soil, you will be feeding the plant because that's how the plant gets its nutrients.

Giselle Schoniger  3:07  

Absolutely. When we look at chemical fertilizers, and  this is just part of the story, it's not just about N-P-K, nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. But when you see a 30-30-30 N-P-K or 20-20-20 or a triple 16, that material is a chemically formulated product. It's salt, it's a salt based product. It forces that plant to grow and it creates a plant with very thin cell wall then leaves, stems and flowers. That plant is like an attractant to insects and diseases. But the damage is what we're doing below the soil. And those salts kill off beneficial life. And when you kill the good guys off,  you have a proliferation of disease-causing pathogens. Organics work in the opposite fashion. An all purpose fertilizer might only be a 4-4-4 N-P-K. But it's about feeding the life in the soil, as you just said. So when you build good life in the soil, the natural good guys will always eventually out-compete the bad guys. And above ground, the plant has thick cell walls, thick leaves, stems and flowers. That plant now has more of a resiliency. It has a better immune system, if you will, from insect and disease attack.

Farmer Fred  4:18  

What are the key words on synthetic fertilizers that would indicate it contains salt?

Giselle Schoniger  4:24  

Actually most people wouldn't know that on a fertilizer, you wouldn't really understand what the component is when it goes down through the soil profile. Chemical fertilizers, very much like, let's say steer manure, you know, 50 years ago steer manure was a good product. But when you think about how confined the animals are, how regimented their diet is, it's they're not grass-fed often. So it's high in salt. Those fertilizers are also high in salt. When you add a salt material to a clay soil you are only going to compact that soil further. But back to your question, really, anytime you see material where the N-P-K is higher than, let's say, a 12, a triple 12. And you see something like urea or ammonium, those are the kinds of things that should really alert you to the fact if you can't really read what what the words are, like on a lot of the food that we eat today. Pretty much those are going to be materials that are artificially formulated.

Farmer Fred  5:29  

Now you mentioned steer manure and the amount of salt it has. And I imagine a lot of people are asking themselves now Well, wait a minute, steer manure, isn't that an organic fertilizer? Wouldn't that be good for the soil?

Giselle Schoniger  5:39  

A lot of people use steer manure. Let me put it this way. It is better than not using anything. But it is truly high in salt. So it's a value product. I mean, of course, people use it. And everybody's watching their pocket book, which we all have to do today. So if that's what someone chooses to use, but just know if you're adding it to a clay soil that's already compact and dense, you're truly making the soil more compacted and more dense, by adding that salt. So we have other types of manures we have some chicken manure, we have a product called the Gardner and Bloome line. We have a product called Harvest Supreme, it does have 15% chicken manure in it. It has mychorrazae, it has earthworm castings, kelp, we add a whole host of organic nutrients into that material. So we have a whole breadth of product lines. We have worm castings, worm castings are awesome to add into either raised bed or in ground plantings, and are not going to be as high in salt.

Farmer Fred  6:41  

And you don't need that much worm castings for it to be effective, either.

Giselle Schoniger  6:45  

I love worm castings. I tell you, if people would really start using worm castings or get a worm bin, which I love. It's like a science project the first few times you do it, but once you get the hang of it, you realize you're really not doing anything except feeding them. The worms are doing all the work. And you can have some fun with some of these materials, especially in raised beds. You know this has become the new trend  over the years. Instead of dealing with our hard pan native soil if we build a raised bed now. And as an aside, I taught gardening therapy. I worked as a horticultural therapist for 10 years in convalescent homes. At that time, you know, it was really for people in wheelchairs. But when we look now, why not raise the garden up to us, we're getting older Fred, it's nice to have that raised bed. But the beauty is we get to layer in the kind of materials that we need. If you find that it's getting compressed down, fluff it up with some materials, are soil building compost is great for adding. I look at it that product as a fiber, just like we need fiber. Now this is a little bit of a stretch. But just like we need fiber to keep our system functioning properly, the soil needs fiber as well to aerate it, to open it up, to help with drainage, to allow the beneficial aerobic microorganisms in the soil to allow them to breathe. Because if it's too compacted, that life in the soil can't breathe, which means the roots can't breathe, which means water can't percolate through the soil. So raised beds are fantastic. And you can have some fun by adding in different types of materials as you go through the season. You know, it's fascinating, this whole movement that we're seeing, it's almost like the back to the earth movement finally arrived from the 60s in the 70s. And I think because we're so high tech, we're so involved with technology, people are on the road more, our lives had become so hectic that this idea of of growing our own food, and slowing down a little bit has really become part of our culture today.

Farmer Fred  8:52  

It boils down to if you feed the soil, you're feeding the plants.

Giselle Schoniger  8:55  

That's right. It's a totally different approach. You know, we took a detour in the early 30s and 40s when we started using synthetics, really in the early 1940s right around World War Two and we started creating a lot of these synthetics. We were using minerals. You know,  a farm then was like a closed system. All that organic matter got added, all the manure got composted and put back into the earth. But when we started focusing on production,  it's really sort of a misnomer that we created more food, because what we really did is we destroyed the soil system. We farmed the very life out of the soil. And in over maybe a decade from the 1940s into the 50s. We had to triple and quadruple the amount of chemical fertilizers we were using to try and get the yields that we were getting in the first few years. So it's really truly a misnomer to say that we increased yields. That was a short term, temporary result. And you're right Fred. It's about feeding the life in the soil. Have the organisms in the soil secrete enzymes that break organic matter down. I mean, if we didn't have all this biology in the soil, the Earth would be full of debris, but they're cycling these nutrients back into the soil and roots. They pull from the soil what they need when they need it.

Farmer Fred  10:16  

All it takes is mulch. All it takes is compost. Maybe a cover crop or two. And you can have healthy soil, as well. Giselle Schoniger, from Kellogg Garden Products. Thanks for spending a few minutes with us and telling us about our soil.

Giselle Schoniger  10:28  

Thank you, Farmer Fred. It's been a delight. Thanks to all of our customers and all our listeners out there. Thank you so much for your support.

Farmer Fred  10:39  

Here on the Garden Basics podcast, we want to answer your garden questions. A couple of ways you can do that, give us a call 916-292-8964 That number again, 916-292-8964. You can either leave a message, or you can text that number as well. Be patient. There are a lot of rings before we pick up. Another way is email, send your garden questions to Fred at farmerfred.com. That's Fred at farmerfred.com. One benefit of email is you can attach a photo of a bug or a plant that you're trying to identify. We're looking forward to hearing and seeing your questions. And thanks for listening to the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. I appreciate all your support and all your comments.

Farmer Fred  11:33  

Here on the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast, we like to answer your questions. And I always like to get a little help doing that. So we bring in retired college horticultural Professor Debbie Flower. And Debbie, we have a question from Katrina, who put this question on the Get Growing with Farmer Fred Facebook page. 

She says, “my broccoli is still growing well from last year's garden. Can I keep it going through this year? Or do I need to plant a new crop this year?”

Broccoli now, here in California, it is a cool season crop. And I should even specify that even more than that. It's a cool season crop here in the Central Valley. On the coast of California, you could grow it year round. Yes. And in other parts of the country, I would imagine its limitations would it would have to be from spring to fall, I would imagine, right?

Debbie Flower  12:26  

 Because it would freeze in the winter places. Yes.

Farmer Fred  12:33  

So it's not unusual here for plants to overwinter. But eventually something will happen to it. Either weather related or, you explain it. Why do these perennial plants become annuals in effect?

Debbie Flower  12:51  

Well, they are becoming annuals, but for instance, I have chard in my garden right now. It's spring right now. And it's bolting. So bolting, let's define that first. Bolting is when the plant goes into flowering, we don't want of chard to flower or lettuce or cabbage, if we want to eat it, because the part that we eat is the leaf. In the case of broccoli, we're eating the flower buds. But we don't want them to actually open up and  show their lovely yellow flowers inside.  The term bolting, I suppose, comes from the fact that the plants get taller and thinner. I had a cabbage go from being round to being sort of pyramidal in shape. Broccoli will similarly go from having sort of a round top to the plant to to having many stem sets, grow tall and and stick out. So the height, the additional height, and often narrowness occurs, and there's flowers at the top of that. So the plant has reached its maturity. It's doing what it is programmed to do genetically, which is to flower and make seed and have offspring. And then it dies.

Farmer Fred  14:11  

So that is basically why bolting happens. The plant is under stress and says, “Oh dear God, I gotta make babies.”

Debbie Flower  14:19  

It's either stress or it can be stressed due to temperature. Too much heat, too much cold. Although I don't know that I've ever seen things build due to cold but too much heat. It's very common that's the reason. The other that controls the process is something that we really can't as humans.  We can't influence night length that the plant in the garden experiences. Longer days shorter nights or in some cases plants  experiencedshorter days and longer nights. it varies from plant to plant. But the broccoli and the chard and the cabbage are going to bolt as days get longer and temperatures rise. And they are going to flower. And so there's not a lot we can do about that. 

The leaves of the plants tend to get very bitter when they go into bolting. I'm still harvesting from my chard, it hasn't actually produced flowers yet, but I keep tasting it before I spend the time and effort to harvest the chard. Because I don't want to eat a whole lot of bitter chard. It hasn't gotten bitter yet, but it will at some point, the whole chemical makeup of the plant will have changed. And so at some point, those leaves will be bitter, and I won't want to eat them. And so it's just a natural process that we can't control. And so it was with Katrina. She will not be able to continue harvesting from this broccoli, she'll need to get a new plant for this year. And it will probably produce for her over the summer, live through the winter. And she'll get some more broccoli out of it come next spring and then it may bolt again. So it's a it's just a natural process.

Farmer Fred  16:02  

If I may offer a defense for bolting plants, the beneficial insects will love those flowers, those flowers that develop on the plants that bolt, and I like keeping cilantro, for example, around through late spring and early summer, and broccoli because of those flowers. There’s a number of hoverflies, which is a beneficial insect, large numbers of  hoverflies. It's kind of like a little bee. 

Debbie Flower  16:31  

Which we find here.

Farmer Fred  16:33  

Anything that attracts beneficial insects in my mind, that's a good bug hotel. And I'm willing to sacrifice the space to have that for the time being and just be crowded by Something else.

Debbie Flower  16:46  

I agree. Because this is happening when other things are in flushes of wonderful new growth that are attracting things like aphids, and the beneficials need the protein that an aphid provides, but they also need the sugar that they can get out of a flower. And so if you can have  something flowering in your garden that is very attractive to them and these plants that bolt, their flowers tend to be very attractive to the beneficials. You're providing them a reason to come in. They'll have their sugar meal and then they'll go look for a protein meal and they'll eat the aphids off of your other plants.

Farmer Fred  17:20  

And what's nifty, too, is if you have those bolting plants all in the same area of your garden, say a three foot by three foot area, and they all bolt together and flower together, that's like a big neon sign on the side of the freeway that attracts the garden good guys, the beneficials and the pollinators. Have that big mass of color that they can see easily so they come in and and stick around for a while. 

Debbie Flower  17:45  

Yes, big masses is very important. Yes.

Farmer Fred  17:48  

So there you go. The bolted plant. It has all sorts of uses. Maybe not for eating, but still, you might want to consider just keeping it around for a while. Thank you very much, Debbie Flower always good to hear from you. Thanks for your help today.

Debbie Flower  18:02  

Yes, my pleasure. Thank you Fred.

Farmer Fred  18:10  

Here on the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. We'd like to offer up quick tips. Steve Zien is here with 45 years experience in organic horticulture and soil science. What the heck would he know about big garden toys? Well, let's find out because maybe you have a spare 1000 bucks and you want a good garden toy, so you can feel like a real farmer and you're thinking I'm gonna get a rototiller, because everybody needs to till their soil. Steve, people would be surprised to learn that there are much better ways to spend that $1,000 If you want to help out your garden 

Steve Zien  18:43  

Yes. When you till the soil is you destroy the soil structure and soil structure means that your soil has a variety of pore spaces. And that's really important, especially in our area, because we have a lot of clay soil and we have poor drainage and so we have only very tiny pore spaces and everybody thinks you till the soil and it loosens it up and creates a wide variety of pore spaces. But the problem is, is after you start irrigating, or where the rain comes to find clay soils that you loosened up with that tillage, the water starts to leach soil down through the soil and fills up and plugs up all those large pores. So in actuality tillage reduces soil structure and reduces the large pore spaces so it compacts, actually compacts your soil, in the long run.

Farmer Fred  19:36  

A lot of people don't realize that for a plant to thrive, besides soil and water, it needs air. And rototilling basically destroys those air pockets.

Steve Zien  19:46  

Yeah, it is absolutely critical to have  air in there as well. That's where the better soil structure is. You have more drought resistance. More spots for new soil biology, everybody, all  the roots and the microbes can all move through there. Also, the tilling kills a lot of the microscopic organisms and particularly the two major organisms that you find, as far as massive numbers. The two biggest guys in quantity are bacteria and fungi, and bacteria, little one celled critters, and they don't really get harmed too much by tilling, but the fungi, they're like long strings in your garden, and they get sliced to death with a rototiller. And what's interesting is when you till the soil by killing the  majority of the fungi, you change the ratio in your soil between bacteria and fungi increasing the amount of bacteria. And what kind of plants prefer living in bacteria dominated soil? Everybody's garden favorite, they're called weeds. So if you want to grow weeds, kill your soil.

Farmer Fred  21:01  

My heavens, I imagine, too, speaking of long stringy things in the soil, that a rototiller isn't doing worms any good.

Steve Zien  21:08  

Exactly. They're slicing and dicing. It's just very, very disruptive to the ecological system of the soil. And it really sets your soil back. The USDA, their healthy soils webpage, talks about that a lot. And it's mainly for farmers because they're trying to convince farmers to do less tillage. But it also applies in the backyard garden as well.

Farmer Fred  21:35  

Exactly. Now I have seen amazing things happen with my soil, just by mulching the top of the soil, adding three or four inches of mulch that was free, that arborists drop off. Chipped and shredded tree parts. And because they're all different sizes, they break down at different times. But it's amazing the earthworm activity that I've seen increase since applying three to four inches of mulch on the soil and just leaving it there.

Steve Zien  22:05  

Yep,  those guys are your natural rototillers. But they really do an excellent job of tilling the soil by  creating air channels all the way to the surface. If you have some sort of mulch or compost on the soil surface, if that's there, they will come up every night, feed on that. And then when the sun comes up, they'll go back down. And so they're basically opening up drainage channels and root channels so that the water and the roots can move through your soil. the worms are also slimy. if anybody has ever by chance touched the worm, they're really slimy. That slime is food for all the microscopic organisms that help your plants grow. 

Farmer Fred  22:48  

well, there you go. But I still have this $1,000 burning a hole in my pocket. What can I spend it on to feel like a farmer?

Steve Zien  22:55  

A chipper-shredder. It is a tool that will create that mulch that you just talked about. 

Farmer Fred  23:00  

yeah, the chipper shredders vary in price from a few $100 up to several $1,000. But if you have trees on your property, or your neighbors have trees or shrubs or you're removing shrubs or portions of trees, why put it in the trash? Put it through your chipper shredder, and then put it on your soil. You don't have to dig it in. Just lay it on top of your soil. And voila, magic.

Steve Zien  23:25  

Exactly. The old school thinking was you  want to add organic matter into the soil and we used to recommend tilling it in, working it in.  I used to have a rototiller. But we've learned that it's very destructive to the soil and you're better off just putting it away.

Farmer Fred  23:45  

What's great is the more we're learning, the easier it's getting.  It works like a charm. Steve Zien, with 45 years experience in organic horticulture and soil science. There you go, folks, if you're going to spend 1000 bucks on a big garden toy, get yourself a chipper shredder, not a rototiller, you're going to make the worms and your soil and your plants very, very happy. Thanks, Steve.

Steve Zien  24:11  

You're welcome.

Farmer Fred  24:16  

Well, we're all anxious about the future. And you know, maybe we are going a bit stir crazy. Here in California shelter in place rules look like they're going to be going through most of the month of May with a bit of easing of some outdoor activities. Just don't go to the beach, apparently. Well, we all want things to get back to normal. But it looks like there's going to be lots of new normal, we just don't know what normal will be. One of the best things we can do in the meantime is how about spreading a little joy. Maybe it's sharing an extra tomato or pepper plant with a neighbor. Maybe it's just smiling more at others on your walks or bike rides through the neighborhood. And maybe it's just exercising a bit More patience with those around us. You know, we're all in this together. And by all, I mean the entire world, the entire world is battling this invisible enemy. This is a shared experience, unlike anything that has ever happened before in our history. And it's going to be a long battle. Things, though, will get better, it's just going to take a while. And just like starting a garden, the results are a long way off. And just like a garden, you have to pay attention to the little things to get good long term results, like making sure on a regular basis, maybe twice a month, or even every week, that your sprinklers and drip irrigation systems aren't broken, that they're in good working order, and giving just the right amount of water to the plants that need it. You're not watering the sidewalk. And in life, one of those little things just might be checking in on those who live alone, you know, knock on their door, give them a call, leave a note on their front porch. And maybe being a bit more generous with your smiles for others. You know, that summer garden that you're planting right now, I'll tell you what's going to happen in a couple of months, you're gonna get a bit neglectful, you're going to sort of let it skip. And that's when you really need to buckle down and watch out for pests, diseases and weeds. Well, we're now in month two of shelter in place and social distancing. And it's easy to get a bit thoughtless, angry, and even feeling sorry for yourself at this stage. Try to catch yourself if that starts to happen. think instead about what you're grateful for. Maybe get busy Creating, cultivating or inviting beauty into your life today. And how do you do that? Well, you could work in the garden, you could share a smile. That can go a long way to accomplishing something good. 

The Garden Basics with farmer Fred podcast comes your way twice a week. It's usually on Tuesdays and Fridays. I thank you for listening, and I thank you for subscribing. And thanks for sharing this with a friend

Farmer Fred  27:15  

Thank you for listening to Garden Basics with Farmer Fred. I appreciate you listening. Would you please subscribe? You can find the podcast at Apple, Spotify Stitcher, Google podcast attic. And hey Alexa, play the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. Thank you!