spring 2021
Organic Land Care & Garden Maintenance
Land Care Organically for Spring 2021
The name Eat MY Shrubs came from the idea that we can plant beautiful gardens that are completely edible!
Growing food does not have to be in a rectangular shaped, tilled-row garden. In fact, the best gardens are interplanted species, or polycultures.
This is because some plants are only there to benefit the plants that we really want. They may attract beneficial insects, or fool herbaceous animals away from other plants. Also, all this can be achieved without the use of harmful chemicals. Practices that destroy (what we now have come to realize is) the delicate balance of life in the soil, can also be a thing of the past.
Spending time outside on your property, no matter the size or setting, has a positive effect on your health and well being. Choosing to practice organic land care is not only important if your growing food. Ornamental gardens, meant to be a relaxing setting, can be anything but. Especially if your are spraying chemicals everywhere to make it look good and keep the mosquitos away.
Endless pulling of plants and spraying compacted ground is not going to keep the tap roots like thistle and dandelions away. But, relieving the compaction and improving the microbial life, that increase the water and air holding ability of the soil, that will. It just takes a bit of time.
Using organic, regenerative practices for Spring 2021
By using organic, regenerative practices, the soil begins to come alive once again. These rushed practices and instant remedies to our properties over the years have stripped most of the life away from the soil. There is endless evidence of this. However, every spring herbicides and pesticides, unnecessary fertilizers and enhancers, are sprayed and sprinkled all over the soil. Killing many beneficial animals, fungi, and bacteria. They then work all summer to recover their population. Freeze or go dormant in the winter, and be bombarded again in the spring with another dose.
Organic & regenerative gardening teaches that everything on the landscape is there for a reason. Once you realize what that reason is. Altering something in the land to discourage or encourage what we want, will be much less daunting, and deadly. We must then work with the garden to come to some sort of agreement. Give the microbes and fungi the food they need. And then deprive the microbes and fungi that we do not want of their food. Stacking the deck for the beneficial life to win. Then in turn, we get the results we desire, or some form of them.