Square Foot Gardening

Gardening for Life By Wayne & Connie Burleson

Ways to triple your food garden production

GO WILD! Ideas to Work Less and Grow More Long Box Gardens

Why Grow Your Own Food?

The E.A.R.T.H provides the answer

E = To capture free sunlight ENERGY

A = To help ALLEVIATE world hunger problems and

help improve your family’s nutrition – save lives R = To make use of you own local RESOURCES

T = To save TIME, money and less TRANSPORTATION

H = To grow your own HEALTH This method is based upon: Healthy soils produce - healthy plants - produce healthy people

All done with very little money, & with work less to grow more

Class Outline

You can do it!

• Introduction Class introduce themselves

• WHY SMALL GARDENS WORK?

• Prove it!

• Ownership, purpose

• Soils/compost (the foundation to success)

• Garden designs, location, layout, construction, shade trees, drainage

• Starting seeds, transplanting, controlling light, temperature, water

• Planting and plant spacing

• Garden care: watering ideas, weed and pest control, shade hoop houses

• Which vegetable to plant

• Small gardens are very easy to assemble and they draw crowds

• Simple. Anyone can do it. Anywhere in the world

• Requires very little water (safe to use waste water)

• Gardens are constructed without money or commercial fertilizers

• Very easy to take care of (less work, less weeds, less water, more food)

• Highly productive from very small spaces

• Can produce 45 kilos (100 pounds) of food from a 4’ X 4’ area

• Each home can construct several of these handy small kitchen gardens

• Literally help feed millions of people

• Also an evangelistic outreach – presents an opportunity to share the good news

• Empty stomachs have no ears

WHY SMALL GARDENS WORK? … Planting seeds for those in need …

These gardens are sustainable, lifetime, hand-up endeavors,

not a hand-out

Prove it!!!!!!

This one box is 4’ by 8’ (122cm by 244cm). It has 32 carrots per square foot = (32 carrots/sq (times) 32 square feet box = 1,024 carrots)

70 Days

The success has started as these boxes held together in several torrential rainfall

events (like several inches of hard rain in a matter of minutes). The miracle

happened, for soil amendment we ended up using several sacks of old chicken

manure mixed in with small wood chips that we added to each box. The native soils

are mostly hard clay, which is a poor growing environment. The wood chips became

a surface mulch and held the soil in place during the wind driven downpour. Strong

mulching is a great aid for any gardening efforts in the tropics. We thank the Lord.

The wood chip mulching protected the soil surface from rain drop impact

This is especially on sloping on hillside gardens

A Church Demonstration Garden

Small Village in Rwanda, Africa

Growth in 61 days

Success in Africa

Begin with the end in mind salsa, guacamole, chips

Economics of the Long Box

Long Box 4' by 40' = 160 sq foot

Each 40 days cut 3 bags greens

3 bags X 160 = 480 bags of

greens

Each bag sells for $3.00

$3.00 X 480 bags = $1,440.00

For a 40 day crop

Then you replant the Long Box

The potential for 4 crops/ year =

$5,760 Gross

Income in US$

Teaching with

photos helps

Step #1 Soils/compost (the foundation to success)

How to make your own Top Soil

Go On a Treasure Hunt - Searching for Hidden Resources

Step 1 Walk-about looking for then bag up the following?

•Old dry livestock dung

•Leave mold

•Black looking top soil under bushes

•Old dry chicken manure

•Anything looking like dark soil

Step 2 Dig up sod from garden plot 1.3 meter by 3 meters,

and then remove old plants and root for plot

African Cow House

= decomposed

organic matter

Mix with native soil

which makes great

topsoil

How to Make Good Compost

Ingredients needed:

Repeat all layers until

1 Meter high

Add small amount of wood ash

Add water to dry layers

Vegetable waste ------

Thin layer old manure -

Thin layer top soil-----

Green grass 30 cm ---

Dry grass 30 cm----

Bottom layer maze for air ->

Why compost? Compost is decomposed organic matter

that has turned into black colored humus that is called “black

gold.” Compost makes excellent organic plant food. Millions

of micro-organisms digest (eat) the dry grass and green grass

causing the pile to heat up. Compost does not feed the plants

directly. Instead it feeds the soil microbes which in turn

release insoluble minerals for the plants to feed upon

(fertilizers). This amazing process makes your garden a

sustainable food factory - if you keep adding compost to your

soils.

Step #2 Garden Construction; Garden location; Raised beds

2.64 Meters

1.32

Meters

Step #3 Planting/plant spacing

Why have a grid

How to Precisely Plant Your Seeds

30 Plants

Per

Square

Onion Seeds

Green

Onions

Small

Carrots 1 to 2 cm deep

Take your time and plant each seed correctly for good success

Mr Brite 16 Plants

Per

Square

9 Plants

Per

Square

4 Plants

Per

Square

1 Plant

Per

Square

Radish

Carrot

Onion Sets 2 cm deep

Pea

Beet

Bean

Spinach

2.5 cm deep

Lettuce

Swiss chard

Broccoli

Marigold 1.5 cm deep

Tomato

Pepper

Cabbage 1.5 cm deep

Cucumber

Cantaloupe 2.5 cm deep

Potato 8 cm deep

For 1 or 4 plants per square make a small dish shaped depression in the soil and place the seeds in the center. Water only where the seeds are located

These

Plants

Can also

Be started

from

Transplants

33 cm

33 cm

Mr Brite

Steps to make Crops in Small Plots

Step 1 Research which vegetables is there a demand for in your area and at what time of year Come up with a list of marketable vegetables that you could grow & sell.

Seed different block areas within a raised bed at different times for multiple harvests.

Step 2 Plan your harvest according to the market … hint: Have your crop ready before other people offer the same vegetables. Also think about adding value like cooking.

Step 3 Construct several raised beds and/or garden boxes with in your water limitations. Fill each area with your best soils & compost to at least 12 to 24 inches (30cm to 60 cm)

Step 4 Plant each raised bed with the correct plant spacing and timing for the market

Step 5 Harvest early when vegetable are young and prime. Hint: Share and/or trade for your other needs.

First planting

Third planting

Second planting

A Garden Box

Tomato

Pepper

Squash

Cucumber

Lettuce

Swiss chard

Radish

Beet

Cabbage

Spinach

Carrots

Beans

Which vegetables seeds to plant

What do you love to eat?

Step #4 Garden care:

Water, Weeds, and Ownership

Wise water use

This lady in Shone, Ethiopia, Africa is a

very good gardener as she knows how to

place valuable water on each seed zone,

which saves her much labor - hauling

hard to acquire water for her garden.

Ladies washing dishes and clothes in Malawi.

Look where the water is going!

Question:

Could you dump this waste water safely on a small

kitchen garden?

Re-cycled Water

Don’t let your soils see daylight

Mr Brite One smart farmer

Cool shaded soils = 22 deg C (72 deg F) = holds water,

Adds soil nutrients and slows weed germination

Hot bare soils - 55 deg C (130 deg F) = evaporates water fast,

Cooks and kills valuable microorganisms, no added soil nutrients and weeds can germinate

Why Add Mulch to Your Gardens

Don’t Weed Instead Cultivate

Step #6 Vegetable harvest and replanting

Add a scoop of compost and

replant harvested squares

Worms provide fertilizers

THEIR WORM CASTINGS AND they work for free

12-Day Compost To use as fertilize

Spread completed compost around the base of your plants

One Radish growing in Ethiopia

When you keep your soils healthy and look what can happen

Seeking information outside the box

Radish leaves have 3 times the nutrient

value as the roots

And taste great!

One Radish makes

a great salad

Think Holistically

from seed to stomach

Salmon River Pumpkin (A Winter Squash) From Seed to Seeds

A Life Giving Story

Seed saving techniques

Spinach Pick out the strong

plants and let them bolt

into a flower stalk and

go to seed. Pull the seed

stalks out of the ground

and let dry. Thresh the

seeds into a container.

Pumpkin

Cut ripe & mature

pumpkin open.

Remove seeds.

Wash with water.

Place on screen or

cloth to dry.

Pepper

Let ripe to full

color, no sign of

disease.

Remove seed

off core and

place on screen

or cloth to dry.

Cucumber

Let ripen past

edible stage and

turn yellow. Cut

lengthwise, scoop

seeds out seeds

and dry

Lettuce

Allow plant to bolt,

to form a seed stalk.

Cover to protect

from birds & rain.

Harvest seeds for 2

to 3 weeks. This will

require repeated

harvesting.

Onion

Let a few plants

form round

flower clusters.

When dry, pick

and thresh the

seed out.

Tomato

Pick ripe

tomatoes from

several plants.

Squeeze seed

out, wash and

spread on cloth

to dry.

Beets

Biennial as it takes

two year. Store roots

for several months,

replant to grow

seeds, harvest seeds

when dry.

Certain plant varieties will cross-pollinate with other members of their same family. If you

are raising your own pure seeds, only plant one variety within that family.

Visit www.seedsavers.org for more information

Sharing the harvest and teaching others

Gardens open the doors to teaching others & building life giving skills

Closing YOU CAN DO IT!

Planting seeds for those in need

Gardening for Life By Wayne & Connie Burleson

“Planting seeds for those in need”

A Humanitarian Effort