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garden:intro:philosophy

Gardening philosophy

Mentors

I attempt to emulate gardeners who have a consistent success growing healthy organic vegetables over a period of time - and who have revealed the factors of their success.

My primary mentor is Steve Solomon, founder of Territorial Seed, via the later editions of his book Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades and The Intelligent Gardener. In The Intelligent Gardener he presents a broader philosophy applicable to just about any land suitable for growing vegetables. I am adapting my practice to follow Solomon's suggestions for creating remineralized soil that grow nutrient-dense food.

A second mentor is Carol Deppe, a seed breeder and gardener in Oregon, who has written a couple of books about her philosophy and practices. I pick and choose ideas that appeal to me. In particular, I value her experiences making gardening work easier. Because her gardening environment is similar to mine, I pay a good bit of attention to what she does and says.

Opinions

I've noticed that in a gathering of gardeners discussing any issue there are at least as many conflicting explanations and solutions as there are gardeners.

Partly this comes from each person having a specific set of circumstances (soil, elevation, sunlight, habits, biases, personal interpretations, history, etc.) that is different in significant ways from those of others. Often it seems that one gal's approach doesn't work in another gal's garden.

So perhaps “Truth” of gardening is specific to the garden. My litmus test for any technique or practice is can I make it work where I grow.

garden/intro/philosophy.txt · Last modified: 2019/01/09 14:35 by davidbac