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Welcome to the Community GardenA quick guide from seed to eating healthy.
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Start digging right here.
Dig deeper.For more information about community gardens, follow this link:
http://communitygarden.org/learn/starting-a-community-garden.php
2Community Garden | A quick guide from seed to eating healthy.
The biggest reason is that it’s often hard to find good, healthy, delicious fruits and vegetables at affordable prices. And eating lots of fruits and vegetables helps you and your family live a healthier life.
That’s because fruits and vegetables contain natural nutrients that help prevent disease. Also, when you eat fruits and vegetables, you’re eating less junk food that directly contributes to diabetes, heart disease and obesity.
A healthier life is good all by itself, but along the way you’ll discover
other reasons.
You’ll save money by not having to buy fruits and vegetables at the supermarket. You’ll save even more by avoiding fast food at restaurants or snacks at the gas station.
Gardening strengthens all the muscles in your body. Digging, planting and weeding are good exercises for people of all ages.Lifting, bending and twisting help keep muscles strong, and strengthen hands.
Gardening is good for your soul. It eases stress and improves your mood. It’s creative and fun. It’s rewarding to watch something you’ve planted grow. You’ll be proud you’ve grown your own food. It even does something that’s hard to put into words, connecting you to the land and to life.
There are many reasons
to join a community garden.
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You’re not born with a green thumb. You learn it.
Table of Contents
Planning .....................................page 5
Planting ......................................page 7
Growing .....................................page 9
Harvesting ..................................page 11
Eating .........................................page 13
Preserving ..................................page 15
4Community Garden | A quick guide from seed to eating healthy.
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Here it is by steps.
Odds are good that the community garden you join will have full sun and raised beds. If there aren’t raised beds, it’s easy to make them by mounding the soil 8 to 12 inches above ground. Raised beds are easier on your back. The soil warms quicker, remains warm longer, and drains better.
Prepare the soil by mixing it with compost, peat moss or processed manure to act as fertilizer. The community garden you join will probably have its own compost heap, so you won’t have to spend money fertilizing your plot.
Choose the crops you’re going to grow. Choose vegetables your family will eat and that will grow, mature, and yield a good crop where you live. If you’re not sure of the best variety, call the County Extension Service, or buy your seeds and plants from local companies. For judging how much to plant, here’s a chart for a family of four.
Even if you like to just rush in and do it,
a little planning is essential for a successful garden.
Planning.
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6Community Garden | A quick guide from seed to eating healthy.
Finally, make a layout. Tall crops like peas, beans and corn should be planted on the north side of the garden so they won’t shade the rest of your crops. Plant medium-sized crops, like cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, tomatoes, squash and pumpkins, in the middle. And low-growing crops, like radishes, carrots, beets, lettuce and onions, at the south end.
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Dig deeper.Go to this site for great information for beginners on planning a garden, including quick advice on which plants yield the most food.
http://urbanext.illinois.edu/tog/planning.cfm
Type Spacing For a family of 4 Seeds needed
Asparagus 9" to 12" 32 plants 32
Beets 4" 60-foot single row 180
Broccoli 24" to 30" 12 to 15 plants 15
Bush Beans 4" to 6" 80- to 120-foot single row 360
Cabbage 24" to 36" 12 to 15 plants 15
Carrots 2" to 4" 40-foot single row 240
Cauliflower 18" to 24" 12 to 15 plants 15
Corn 8" to 12" 140-foot single row 210
Cucumbers 8" to 36" 6 to 8 plants 8
Green Onions 1" to 2" 10-foot single row 120
Leaf Lettuce 12" 20- to 30-foot single row 30
Peas 2" 120- to 160-foot single row 960
Peppers 18" to 24" 6 to 10 plants 10
Pumpkins 36" to 48" 3 plants 3
Radishes 2" 20-foot single row 120
Spinach 12" 10- to 20-foot single row 20
Squash 36" to 48" 3 plants 3
Tomatoes 24" to 36" 10- to 15-foot single row 15
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Planting.
Got your seed packets?
Let’s do it.
Seed packets contain important information about helping the plants grow. Tape or tack them to sticks planted at the end of each of your rows. That way they also serve as markers for what vegetable is planted where in your garden.
Deep, wide, thick, thin.
It’ll tell you how deep and how far apart to sow the seed, and whether to sow it in a furrow or on a hill. As a general rule, seed should be planted to a depth not more than 3 or 4 times seed size, and fairly thickly to allow for seeds that don’t sprout and seedlings that die.
Planting in straight rows makes weeding, insect control and harvesting easier. But there are two other methods that make better use of small garden spaces: wide row planting, where seeds are scattered across a 4- to 24-inch wide band, and square foot gardening, where the garden is divided into squares 1 foot by 1 foot. Both produce more vegetables because of better use of sunlight, space and soil nutrients.
The seed packet will also tell you when, and how much, to thin the seedlings after they appear above ground. This is to give the plants growing space, air, light and water.
8Community Garden | A quick guide from seed to eating healthy.
Seeds and seedlings.
Tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, cabbage and some other vegetables take a long time to grow, so if you’re growing them from seed, it’s often a good idea to start them indoors in the early spring. Or you can buy them as seedlings from garden centers or greenhouses. Choose dark green, stocky plants over yellow, spindly ones. And however you get your seedlings, it’s a good idea to “harden” them to the outdoors for a week or 10 days, gradually exposing them to more and more sun, before planting in the garden.
Dig deeper.The links below are two articles on garden planting basics. Each has a really useful chart with a long list of vegetables that tells you when to start each one and how to plant it.
http://www.extension.iastate.edu/publications/pm819.pdfhttp://www.extension.umn.edu/distribution/horticulture/dg1422.html
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Growing.
Once your vegetables grow past seedlings, it's time for
watering, weeding, and controlling pests until harvest time.
It’s likely that the community garden you’re joining follows sustainable gardening practices. That means it doesn’t take more from the earth than it puts back in. It may have rain barrels for watering. And it may follow organic gardening principles, which forbid the use of chemicals to kill weeds or keep away pests.
Watering.
Gardens require about an inch of water per week if no rain falls. They prefer a good soaking once a week to lighter watering more often. Frequent sprinklings do little good. So keep track of natural rainfall, and plan to set aside the time to water if needed.
Weeding.
Weeds rob your vegetables of water, food and light. They can also hide diseases and insects that will come back to your garden next year.
So as soon as the soil is dry enough after rain or watering, it should be hoed or turned to kill weeds. You can also cover the soil with organic hay, straw or grass clippings, which holds in moisture and nutrients as well as controlling weeds.
Controlling pests.
There are many garden pests and many ways to control them. Your community garden will have approved ways for keeping away insects, and a fence for deer and rabbits.
Community Garden | A quick guide from seed to eating healthy.
If you want to go further, coffee grounds or copper wire are supposed to be good for repelling slugs. Ladybugs eat aphids. Strong-smelling soaps for deer; fox urine for rabbits, squirrels and skunks; and coyote urine for raccoons and deer are all supposed to work.
Dig deeper.The link below has a helpful article on controlling gardens pests without bad chemicals. It also has great pictures of what you’re trying to get rid of, so you’ll recognize it when you see it.
http://extension.oregonstate.edu/catalog/pdf/ec/ec1586.pdf
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Harvesting.
The biggest question
on harvesting your garden is “when?”
Pick your vegetables too soon or too late, and they’ll be too tough, too tender or flavorless. The first guide for when to pick are the seed packets still hanging on the stick at the end of each row. They will tell you the number of days from planting to picking.
And if the packet is gone, here’s a sample chart to give you a guide for some common garden vegetables.
The key word is average. Spring vegetables get ripe slower as summer approaches and the air warms. Summer vegetables get ripe slower as fall approaches and the air cools.
Part of the delight of a garden is eating crops like sweet corn and tomatoes a few minutes after you pick them. If you’ve planted a large variety of different vegetables, you’ll have fresh ones to eat every day from late spring until the first frost, and after. But you’ll also have huge numbers of extra ones.
Vegetable When to harvest
Beans about 2-3 weeks after bloom when seeds are still immature
Carrots when tops are 1" in diameter
Cucumbers for slicing, when 6" long
Peas when pods are still tender
Tomatoes when color is uniformly pink or red
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Community Garden | A quick guide from seed to eating healthy.
So here’s a chart that tells you how to store what you’ve picked so it lasts as long as possible.
Dig deeper.The links below are two excellent articles, with charts, on when to pick and how to store what you’ve picked.
http://www.extension.umn.edu/distribution/horticulture/dg1424.htmlhttp://www.essentialgardenguide.com/garden-harvesting-storage.php
Vegetable How to store Expected shelf life
Beans cold and moist 1 week
Carrots cold and moist 8 months
Cucumbers cool spot in kitchen (55°F) in perforated plastic bags; storage in refrigerator for a few days okay
1 week
Peas cold and moist 1 week
Tomatoes cool spot in kitchen (55°F) in perforated plastic bags; storage in refrigerator for a few days okay
5 days
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Eating.
You already know that most vegetables are delicious
boiled, steamed or roasted, then served with salt and
pepper and a little bit of butter.
Now here are three recipes for sauces that go beautifully with almost any vegetable. They’re easy, and if you know these three, you’ll never be bored with a vegetable again.
Vinaigrette.
It’s 1 tablespoon of prepared mustard, 1 tablespoon of vinegar and 3 tablespoons of olive oil, whisked together with a fork. Choose any kind of mustard and any kind of vinegar (or citrus juice) you like. That’s it. Vinaigrette is great on lettuce for salad and fabulous with every vegetable from asparagus to zucchini, hot or cold, cooked or raw.
Vinaigrette is low-salt, has no cholesterol, and the fat in it is olive oil, which is actually good for your heart. You can create variety changing out the mustards and the vinegars. And people who know how to make vinaigrette seldom buy bottled salad dressing ever again.
Cream sauce.
Melt 2 tablespoons of butter in a saucepan, stir in 2 tablespoons of flour, then stir for 2 minutes over low heat. Gradually stir in 1 cup of liquid, and continue stirring until the mixture thickens. Let it simmer for a few minutes, stirring occasionally. Add salt and pepper. The trick to a good cream sauce is constant stirring to prevent your sauce from lumping.
It’s the choice of liquid that makes cream sauce so versatile and delicious. You can make it with the water you cooked your vegetables in. Or with any of the following:
• chicken broth
• turkey broth
• beef broth
• lamb broth
• pork broth
• game broth
• mushroom broth
• white wine and broth
• milk
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Community Garden | A quick guide from seed to eating healthy.
Cream sauce is delicious poured over any hot vegetable. And you can also add any of the following to the hot sauce:
Grated cheese and a dash of Tabasco sauce make a cheese sauce that’s healthier, tastier, and cheaper than jarred cheese sauce. Cheddar, Swiss and Parmesan are all delicious choices.
Tarragon, dill or basil, all of which you can easily grow in your garden, make a delicately delicious, beautifully pale green sauce.
Mustard makes a spicy sauce that stands up to strongly flavored vegetables like broccoli or Brussels sprouts.
Tomato sauce.
Use the tomatoes you’re growing in your garden to make a delicious low-salt, low-fat, no-cholesterol sauce you can cook ahead and freeze in meal-size portions. Then defrost it in the microwave while your vegetables are cooking.
Heat a big pot of water over a high flame. When it boils, drop in as many tomatoes from your garden as you want. Leave them in for 1 minute, drain and rinse with cold water. The skins will slip off easily. Quarter
the tomatoes, and put them back in the now empty pot. Add olive oil, chopped fresh garlic, fresh herbs from your garden, lots of pepper and a little salt. Cook uncovered for 2 to 3 hours until it’s thick, then freeze in 2-cup portions.
It’s great on pasta. It’s great for making pizza. But you can also pour it over lightly cooked vegetables, sprinkle with grated cheese, and bake 10 minutes in a hot oven for a hearty one-dish meal.
Dig deeper.You’ll find more recipes than you know what to do with just by entering the name of a vegetable in a search engine. For a fun website that’s filled with deliciousness, try Epicurious.
http://www.epicurious.com
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Preserving.
If your garden is a success, and there’s no reason it
shouldn’t be, you’re going to have a lot more food than
you can eat before it spoils.
There are 3 ways of preserving your vegetables:
Drying.
Easy, and works particularly well for tomatoes, but it takes 8 hours in a very low oven.
Freezing.
The best way to preserve almost any vegetable is to freeze it.
Canning.
Takes some learning, and some investment in equipment and jars, but it’s the most practical way to preserve vegetables because the jars need no refrigeration.
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Dig deeper.Go to the following websites for more information about fruit and vegetable preservation.
http://www.uga.edu/nchfphttp://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/topic_preserving_vegetableshttp://www.uga.edu/nchfp/publications/uga/uga_freeze_veg.pdfhttp://www.canning-food-recipes.com/canning.htmhttp://www.extension.iastate.edu/publications/pm1044.pdf
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Notes
Community Garden | A quick guide from seed to eating healthy. 18
Happy gardening and healthy eating.
UnitedHealthcare Community Plan is pleased to have brought you this guide on community gardening. What does a health insurance company have to do with fresh fruits and vegetables? Absolutely everything. Our job is to help our members live healthier lives. And there’s no better, faster, easier, cheaper, more fun way to do that than to help them grow healthy food.
Now that you know more about community gardens, dig in.
www.UHCCommunityPlan.com
©2012 UnitedHealthcare Services, Inc.
