7 Principles Of Eco Gardening - Adam & Eve

While walking through an eco garden in Fagan Park in Sydney, NSW Australia, I came across this really great acronym for establishing a healthy garden based on the eco gardening principles shown below ...

Eco Gardening Principles

Eco gardening is based on 7 key principles often called ...

ADAM & EVE

ADAM

Aliveness

An abundant variety of life in the garden helps create vitality and increases the plant's natural resistance to insects and disease.

Diversity

Diversity is the variety in types of plants in your garden, the life you encourage above and below the soil surface. Diversity is the strength of every ecosystem anywhere on the planet.

Aeration

Gardens need to be aerated naturally. Garden worms do the best job at keeping the soil aerated and oxygen moving through the soil.

Moisture

All life requires moisture. We can make the most our of moisture in our gardens by adding mulch to the garden to reduce evaporation, improving soil filtration and increasing the organic material in the soil.

If you have ADAM you will have EVE

EVE

Energy

Use energy wisely by repairing and reusing everything that you can. Recycle anything that cannot be used.

Vitality

By increasing biodiversity and using less synthetic fertiliser you will keep the garden growing.

Everlasting

Everything is interconnected and dependent on other things for survival.

(Source: Fagan Park Eco Garden Poster by Hornsby Shire Council)

Great, isn't it? Put Adam & Eve to work for you and watch your garden grow beautifully and naturally.

more information about eco gardening

No Dig Gardening - The Grow Anywhere Option

You can garden anywhere when you choose to do no dig gardening.  No dig gardening is exactly what it suggests, gardening without digging.  In a no dig garden, you simply layer organic matter on top of the soil and plant your garden.  The garden is the compost that is feeding the plants.  People often refer to no dig gardening as raised bed gardening.  It is far from uncommon.

If you live where the soil might not be conducive to whatever it is you wish to grow, (the most common choice is a vegetable garden) or you have to grow on top of clay or a stony area, no dig gardening can be your answer.  Anything grows in compost.

Just like regular gardening, you must choose a site first.  The spot should be level and have no less than five hours of sun daily.  Don’t worry if the soil is bad or the weeds are invasive, this is of no consequence to a no dig garden.  Building right over the top of lawn or weeds will simply create more compost material in time, as long as you bury the vegetation from the light.  This is part of the delight of no dig gardening.

You will probably want to designate your garden space by bordering it.  For this, you can use old bricks, logs, stones, etc.  The raised borders hold the garden within so it doesn’t stray and nothing or no one can encroach.  Next, lay down a layer of lucerne hay (alfalfa) to a height of about 10cm.  Put a layer of organic fertilizer on top of that at a height of about 20 mm.  Add a level of thick loose straw on top of that to 20cm, another layer of fertilizer, and finish your no dig garden with 10 cm of compost.

Your no dig garden will be more successful if you plant seedlings rather than seeds.  Seeds have a tendency to disappear in the mix.  Seedlings are easier to keep track of and you can plant seedlings well in the rich mixture.  Try peas, beans, lettuce, tomatoes, broccoli, cauliflower, spinach, or sweet corn.  You should not try root crops until you have a more mature garden.  Besides, you’ll have to dig to remove those.

There are no size or shape restrictions in no dig gardening.  Make your no dig garden as large or as little as you want.  Try not to walk on it or in it, as this will compact the layers and impact your harvest.  Keep building your garden up because it will tend to settle down.  Use crop rotation when you re-plant, keep adding compost and be sure to mulch around replacement plants.

Remember that no digging means your garden is easier to make, but you will have to work at maintaining it if you want a nice yield for your efforts.  Always use only organic materials in your garden.  Never use chemical or man-made fertilizers or pesticides.  No dig gardening mirrors nature’s way of growing, so staying organic is important to the philosophy of no dig gardening.

Organic Gardening

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