Grow Your Own Magazine

Just out of interest i was wondering who grows completely organic, who grows non organic, and who grows partially organic and why you choose to grow using your chosen method.

I would have posted a poll too but i cant work out how to do it

Wren

I try to grow organically......use NO weedkillers, no pesticides use organic fertilisers and methods of growing (lots of muck!) but don't buy organically grown seed, onlly the seed I keep myself is organic!

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My Majesty made for him a garden anew in order
to present to him vegetables and all beautiful flowers.- Offerings of Thutmose III to Amon-Ra (1500 BCE)

Here is the FAQ that tells you how to post polls
Grow Your Own - Growing, How To Grow Tomatoes Growing Fruit & Veg - Recipe Advice, Organic food Gardening, Chickens, Seeds for Sale

I want to grow healthy crops in healthy soil with no chemicals added - if that's organic, then count me in.

My reasons
- it just makes sense to me
- I have no aspiration to grow bumper crops of perfect fruit and veg, I'm astonished and amazed to get anything edible at all!
- by inclination I prefer to work with nature rather than trying to bend her to my imperfect will
- I don't want to fill the coffers of chemical manufacturers!
- and more of a personal / spiritual one I suppose, as just the idea of spraying chemicals on the earth would feel very wrong to me, at quite a deep level.

Even so, I think we probably all have to compromise somewhere (at least those of us with day jobs to go to!)

For me it's not so much chemicals, it's more about where I get things from. Stuff can be got the earth-friendly way (beg, borrow, steal, recycle, rescue from skip, make, mend, tinker, rig, fix up) or the easy way (buy new) - I've done a bit of both, and also used lots of plastic which certainly isn't very earth friendly... We do what we can do, I guess.

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Warning: I have a dangerous tendency to act like I know what I'm talking about.

Even "organic" fruit and veg are allowed certain chemicals.

We do our best to maintain a no-spray policy.
Between choosing varietes best suited to our local condition and with good disease tolerance, by encouraging beneficial insects as predators, by removing damaged or diseased material promptly, and by accepting a moderate loss to pests and diseases, we do OK.
As a rough guess, with our no-spray mentality, we lose perhaps 20% to pests -with another 20% slightly damaged and unsuitable for storing- which would be devastating to a commercial enterprise - they'd be loss-making every year.

FB

i like to think wat i grow will be organic the only thing i will use is slug pellets (not sure if still classed organic or not but hope so) the reason being is that i have said 4 years that what we eat has affected the population 2day, thugs, little sh***, an so forth, i truely believe that the food we put in2 our childrens mouths has a lot 2 answer 4

am organic but do use plastics/imported canes/ & unfortunately have had to use pellets sparingly & carefully this year as the slugs are taking over

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The love of gardening is a seed once sown never dies ...

hey demeter im wiv u i lived in wales 4 4 years an they had no council recycling services wat so ever and i used to save mine up till got car full an trool round the recyclin places to get rid of it, they all thought i was mad over there an i always think buying second hand u get a bargain i very rarely buy new only essensitials if u grt my drift lol

I use organic methods and have for years in several gardens with mixed results,as someone said , if I was doing it for a living,I'd be bankrupt.I stopped using slug pellets after someone(could have been the RSPB) said they were linked to the loss of Song Thrushes,don't know if it's true.I believe there are "safe" pellets available now,but I'll stick to not using them.

We're partial, I'd say; no chemical fertilisers & no sprays, and use predator insects where possible. But, we do use slug pellets occasionally, under netted areas, because our main problem is snails not slugs and the nematode thing doesn't work on them at all I've stopped buying plastic weed membrane, and use cardboard plus I've got a roll of degradable stuff to try out. We do seem to use a lot of plastic related things; nets, cane clips, pots etc, but hopefully reusing them a lot will minimise the impact?!
As someone said above, you do what you can, and take responsibility for yourself rather than climbing on a soap-box or getting too self-righteous

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Sarah

http://www.hypermobility.org


“Tell me one last thing,” said Harry. “Is this real? Or has this been happening inside my head?”
“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?”

I try very hard not to use chemicals at all, the only pest repellant I use is Garlic Fire Spray, I use nematodes for slugs, and if snails become a big problem I do use the organic pellets or bran. Chicken coop sweepings are put on my compost as an accellerator, and I'm using farmyard manure on the allotment. Yes, I use plastics in the form of netting and weed-suppressant stuff, but like others have said I'll be re-using it for a long time. I don't particularly go for organic seed but grow them on as organically as I can.

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Always look on the bright side of life
View my blog - http://chooksandveggies.blogspot.com/ updated November 1st 2008

Hello Wren, I'm organic in my way. I don't spray anything, compost everything I can, but I do use slug pellets sparingly and responsibly and won't let the blighters just munch their way through my crops.

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From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.

I grow as organically as I possibly can, in as much as I use no herbicides or pesticides after sowing or planting out. The only fertiliser I use is animal manure (year 1 cattle, this year, pig slurry, next year, chicken sh*t ).
However, I do have to spray my potatoes for blight as I am surrounded by commercial seed potato merchants, and the man from the Department, he say Spray !
Cam I just point out that where your canes originate from, or whether you use plastic items etc does not mean you are non-organic. Less green maybe, but not non-organic. Do not get the two confused - the Soil Association recently tried to have organic food imported to the UK by air stripped of it's organic label - why ? Just because it is imported by non evironmentally friendly transportation does not make it non organic. Don't get me started on the Soil Association

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Rat

British by birth
Scottish by the Grace of God

Blog updated Wednesday November 13th

I use Dithane for blight but now't else. I do use the organic slug pellets but they aren't touching the slugs so next year it's nematodes. All the fertilisers I think are organic, but what does that really mean??? I use coffee grounds from *bucks as they give it away but I have no idea where the original coffee came from. I just try not to let unorganic stuff on the plot or the garden; as much as possible. but not at the risk of losing a year's worth of potatoes and tomatoes.

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Andrea :wavehello

http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/gra...logs/zazen999/

moon trials completed:
tomatoes
[46% increase in crop per seed sown and 10% increase in crop per plant]

currently underway:
calabrese
garlic

http://linearlegume.blogspot.com/

I am doing my very best to grow organic, I get all my sprays from Just Green : www.just-green.com : Natural Home and Garden Products - Just Green and the pack I just bought is supposed to be organically approved which is good as I have aphids on some of my plants.

i use home made and organic fertilizers and pest deterrents, and home made compost, feed slugs to the blackbirds on escape proof trays.

however i also use grow bag compost (cos it's cheap) which presumably has chemicals in, slug pellets to stop the slugs escaping the compost heap, (covered) and the other day i had some fungus stuff on my rose bush and it was developing dodgy leaves so i sprayed it.

i'm growing food to eat not for the slugs or caterpillars, so although i don't want to use too many chemicals, if my veg are at risk of being overrun and eaten, i wouldn't think twice about spraying ....... no point being organic if it means you have no food for yourself.

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http://teachy.myminicity.com please visit my town and make it better

http://quiz.ravenblack.net/blood.pl?biter=teach_me please sign up to be a vampire, i get 10 pints of blood if you do, and it's fun as well ....... i have an interactive map if anyone wants it.

Organic seems to have a meaning now that is so complicated, and so tied up with rules and regulations about what is or is not "allowed", if you claim to be or want to produce organic food you have to do X, Y and Z but it's perfectly fine if you do Q or W... Personally, rather than sign up (even notionally) to a set of rules that someone else put together, I prefer to take things one at a time, make decisions about what I personally feel comfortable with, and hope it all works out more or less OK in the end...

I aim to work in as natural and earth-friendly a way as I can, within my many limitations (not least inexperience!) and to me that is a broad thing that does include the environmental cost of everything, not just what actually goes onto the land... But as you say, while all that is (to me, anyway) important and interesting, it isn't technically a part of being organic. Maybe it should be!

But I suppose this is why I don't call myself an "organic" gardener, I use some other description for preference, or qualify what I say with "more or less" or whatever. I think I read an article recently suggesting that we should all stop saying "organic" and start saying something else, I think it was "earth friendly" that was suggested, for all these sorts of reasons. I guess that's where I'm coming from

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Warning: I have a dangerous tendency to act like I know what I'm talking about.

I buy as many organic products as I can: fertilizers (love the Growing Success range), compost, farm yard manure, and seed whenever I can, although I hate the fact that many I have seen are F1 varieties. I am trying companion planting too. I've used nematodes for slugs for two years in a row. I try to encourage insects, birds, and frogs in my garden by giving them homes, plants they like to eat, and water.

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http://marigoldmemoirs.blogspot.com

I use slug pellets, but sparingly and in wildlife proof traps. Everything else is organic, unless grey water from the washing up bowl counts as chemical.

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A Year in the Veg Plot

I garden organically, using organic seed too when I can get it. I tried the 'allowed' slug pellets this year, with some success and didn't spray against any blighters. BUT I lost many more potatoes to slugs this year, so next year will use Nemaslug on the beds.

Also need to put in a small pond to encourage more natural predators.

All the compost is either home-made or bought in organic and the mulches are grass clippings - we get lots and lots of these!

BTW I have used seasweed spray on all the veg this year - what a fantastic product that is.

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Growing in the Garden of England http://www.kentvegplot.blogspot.com

At home I am organic, I use organic slug pellets but that's the only thing I'd class as dodgy!

I work as a gardener too and am very non organic as I use all sorts of weedkillers, fettilizers and herbicides, unless I am requested not to! Most people I work for are more concerned about how their garden looks than what goes into it!

hi,
i'm organic....but i started using the safe for wildlife slugs pellets as slugs wiped out my direct sowings in spring but apart from that i don't spray or fertilise with any chemicals...i use organic compost for my patio veg and my own compost for the allotment beds. i did buy organic seed this year tamar organics (very reasonable)...but next year i'm going to use mainly heritage varieties(hopefully organic where i can find it) so i can learn about seed saving.
the motivation for all this is that we were spending a fortune on supermarket organic veg- never again!!!!! as i have a 2 year old daughter and frankly once you know about organaphosphates and the like its really hard to feed her that stuff.
the other reason being that i really want to learn about growing naturally by long term soil improvement and encouraging predators to deal with pests so in the longer run - no more slug pellets! i think its much more rewarding even though you have to reluctanly share some of your produce so its not going to look like the supermarket stuff but wow! the taste is out of this world. particularily our sweetcorn as i'd never eaten it straight off the plant before this weekend- fantastic! and it's a huge bonus that there's no hidden nasties in there for us all.