I feel a little odd posting this, but I've been asked to post my mother's secrets to highly productive vegetable
gardening in this region. Over the last 30 years she's produced very successful gardens in pure caliche (geological survey says 1/4 inch topsoil) and pure clay (pottery quality). I've discussed it with her this morning and I think I can explain the basic approach.
First of all, prepare your soil. If you're one caliche pull out a pick ax and dig a pit. Fill that pit with all the organic matter you can and mix in all the soil you can scrape together. In pure clay, stir as much organic matter as you can as deep as you can. You'll end up with a raised bed. Organic matter can be pretty much in anything, leaves, wood chips, manures, finished compost, unfinished compost ingredients, fish heads, coffee grounds, I've seen her use them all.
After you've incorporated as much organic matter as you can into your soil, add an organic mulch. Start with a smaller amount of mulch when placing seeds and seedlings. Increase the depth of the mulch as the plant grows. You are aiming for a final depth of no less than six inches and no more than twelve. It is important to keep your mulch pulled away from young plants to avoid providing a direct path for insects while they're most vunerable.
Create small insect barriers out of toilet paper rolls. Mom cuts the rolls in half (lengthwise) and lines the top with vaseline then carries them out to the garden and slips them over freshly planted or sprouted seedlings. Learn to recognize and love your bugs. Most of them are going to be harmless or beneficial insects that add to the health of your soil and plants. Some insects you might need to go out in the mornings to hand pick (leaf footed bugs, stink bugs) but these are the exception rather than the rule. Be willing to sacrifice a few plants to the insects, If they're really loving one plant, they might leave the other parts of the garden alone, or maybe they'll just be easier catch.
Watering, do it late in the evening or early in the night. Most plants literally can't pull in water as fast as they're transpiring when the temperature gets over 90. If you water at night they have the maximum amount of time to drink it in. Water slowly and deeply. If you water too fast, or too quickly the water will run out of the root zone of your plants. A slow watering seeps deeper into the soil where your plant is actually growing. It also encourages the roots to grow away from the worst stresses of fluctuating temperatures. Be careful of bed edgings you use, some will actually wick water out of your garden. When my mom uses concrete or cinder blocks she seals the outside with decorative paint (often done by her grandchildren) to reduce water loss.
Follow the planting instructions on seed packets, or seedling pots for in row spacing. Ignore instructions about about spacing between rows. Provide
shelter to young plants. Heavy rains will wash them right out of the ground. Shade or cover during extreme hot or cold spells as appropriate to the plant. Make sure they're well watered before freezes.
Till/No till,
After that initial deep stirring of organic matter, don't dig. Keep organic mulches on the soil and use your hands to weed and plant as much as possible. If you're loving your bugs you've kept feeding them by continually layering a variety of food for them on top of your bed. Cut old plants at the root line and leave the roots to decompose in place. Compost, or bury your compost in the bed, on top of the soil but under the mulch.
Don't be afraid to fail. Plant a variety of plants, one of them will probably excel over all others, one will fail and most will just survive with acceptable returns. It will be different plants doing any of these things on different years. There will be early and late frosts. There will be years like last year when there was hardly any sun for all the spring rains. There will be years when there's hardly any rain. Always keep trying new things. Watering techniques, plant varieties, planting times, shading strategies, plant combinations. The more things going on in your garden the more opportunities you have to have that one perfect condition or plant for the freaky weather of this year. There will always be freaky weather.
Plant at least one plant that you absolutely love. If you're really invested in it's success it's a lot easier to drag yourself into the garden when the mercury climbs.
Plant the right plants at the right time. There are actually three distinct seasons here. Many of the plants that are grown throughout the summer in a cooler climate can be grown as a spring and a fall crop here (tomatoes, squashes, peas, most greens, onions) Most of the early spring crops from colder climates can overwinter and continue to produce throughout our winter. And then there's our true summer plants which can take the full brunt of the Texas summer. If there is any time of the year when your garden is completely unproductive it will be August/September. That's the time when you
should be starting seedlings for fall crops to plant at the first break in the summer heat. Start the seedling for summer plants (like tomatoes and squash) in January/February.
Rotate your crops. Try to have at least a couple of years between growing the same family of plant in the same bed.
Wow, I grew up learning all this. Didn't realize how complicated it looks when put together. I swear it's not as complicated when you actually do it. You probably already do 90 percent of this automatically already. I've tried to bold the absolute most important things. Hopefully this is clear.
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It took me years before I learned I should just dig out a big pit and fill it with organic stuff and plant on that. But I'm a super slow learner.
