Increase your vegetable yield with organic soil amendments.
A former history teacher for the last 40 years, Steve Solomon has built his reputation around gardening. The author of "Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades" and "Gardening When It Counts," as well as other books, Solomon's advice for care for your vegetable patch is so sound that Cornell University Cooperative Extension offers his recipe for homemade organic vegetable fertilizer as one of its fact sheets for home growers. His concoction is the result of more than 30 years of research and personal experience growing vegetables to feed his family.
Instructions
To Prepare
1. Place the seed meal, agricultural lime, gypsum and dolomitic lime in a bucket.
2. Add the bone meal and kelp meal to the bucket, if using these optional ingredients.
3. Mix all the ingredients together.
To Use
4. Plan three different vegetable beds to group the plants according to their demand level for nutrients, as follows:
High demand: asparagus, Italian broccoli, early Brussels sprouts, Chinese cabbage, early cabbage, cauliflower, celery, Asian cucumbers, spring kohlrabi, leeks, spring mustard greens, bulbing onions, large peppers, spring spinach and spring turnips.
Medium demand: artichoke, basil, cilantro, sprouting broccoli, late Brussels sprouts, late cabbage, cutting celery, sweet corn, cucumbers, eggplant, garlic, giant kohlrabi, fall kohlrabi, lettuce, fall mustard greens, okra, potato onions, top-setting onions, parsley, root parsley, small peppers, sweet and Irish potatoes, pumpkin, summer and winter radish, rutabaga, scallions, fall spinach, squash, tomatoes, fall turnips and zucchini.
Low demand: Jerusalem artichoke, arugula, beans, beets, burdock, carrots, chicory, collard greens, endive, escarole, fava beans, most herbs, kale, parsnip, peas, southern peas, rabb (rapini), salsify, scorzonera, French sorrel, Swiss chard and turnip greens.
5. Incorporate manure or compost and the fertilizer you prepared in Section 1 into the soil at the following rates for each bed:
High demand: 1/2-inch layer of manure or compost and 5 quarts of organic fertilizer per 100 square foot
Medium demand: 1/4-inch layer of manure or compost and 5 quarts of organic fertilizer per 100 square foot
Low demand: 1/4-inch layer of manure or compost and 4 quarts of organic fertilizer per 100 square foot
6. Plant your vegetables at their required depth and spacing. Keep them consistently irrigated.
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