Terroir Seeds’ foundation is in soil, as most of you know. That is one of the main reasons for our choice of name for our seed company. Through personal experience and learning from those who have much more experience, we have seen time and time again that those who take care of their soil have better health and productivity, along with more pest and disease resistance than those who don’t.
In organizing some old magazines, Cindy ran across an article we wrote for Range Magazine way back in the spring of 1996 after attending a Public Rangelands Grazing Conference at Arizona State University. This was the start of our learning curve, when we were seeing wildly different philosophies about how to best conserve and improve our arid Western soils. The standard approach was exclusion and rest, thinking that the cows were the enemy- while the up and coming thought pattern was managed, short-term intensive grazing followed by appropriate rest for the grasses to recover.
Allan Savory was introducing Holistic Resource Management to the US at this time. There was a wide range of responses, both from private individuals and public officials. Most of the government officials were skeptical, while many so-called “grazing experts” were outright condemning the ideas even while acknowledging that they had no knowledge or experience in how HRM worked, only that “it couldn’t”.
Almost 20 years later, HRM is now known as Holistic Management (HM) and has quietly proven itself across the world in many different climates and ecosystems to simply work. We have seen it work in our part of central Arizona and have used some of its philosophies and approaches to help improve and maintain the health of garden soil.
We wanted to share one of the foundations of Terroir Seeds with this article we wrote almost two decades ago!
“The Way I See It”
Unequal Representation
By Stephen & Cindy Scott
Minutes after the opening of the 1996 Public Rangelands Grazing Workshop at Arizona State University last winter we heard Steve Johnson say that it’s not possible for cattle to improve the land. Johnson, presented as “a noted author/lecturer,” claims in his biography that “adding domestic livestock to our public rangelands exacts a price from a living fragile landscape.”
Johnson, the workshop’s keynote speaker, helped set the tone and used several labels, including “welfare ranchers” having a “farce lifestyle.” Ranchers, he said, are “laying siege to the public lands” and going for “total control of the western lands.”
The workshop’s stated focus was to educate people on participating in Forest Service or BLM public rangelands grazing activity. There were no ranching interests represented on the panel of speakers and the main topic, with a few notable exceptions, was the removal of all cattle from public lands. Emotionally charged, most presentations were confrontational and throughout the day, ranch- and cowboy-bashing was openly accepted.
Ranchers were portrayed as evil, welfare dependent, and lazy. Comments from presenters included cowboys are “always in the coffee shops” and “only see cattle twice a year.” A majority of the speakers seemed to applaud a newly accepted racism in the West. Unrealistic expectations were advanced during the workshop, such as the removal of all cattle from the western rangelands. What to do with the cattle was never addressed.
Dr. John Brock from ASU presented most of the alternatives – rotational grazing, deferment and rest. He discussed historical impacts of cattle, along with man’s impacts on arid desert ecology – i.e., Phoenix. Dr. David Brown, presenting a rare and balanced view of the benefits and problems of grazing –showed a personal 33-year perspective of grazing lands that had improved.
Holistic Resource Management and Allan Savory were both misquoted and twisted into new meanings. HRM was made to look foolish, even by those who admitted they knew little or nothing of the concepts. Many other authors were quoted out of context and used to support anti-grazing.
Of the 125 attendees, 30 were top environmental/grazing activists. Only one rancher was known to be present and he remained silent. It was apparent that ranchers need to attend these workshops to prevent misrepresentation by the ignorance of others. If they don’t, no resolutions will ever be found.
For too long now “word wars” and “range wars” have dominated the West. It is time to stop blaming others – generations, cultures, lifestyles and educations. Common ground and solutions must be found through communication, not by fund-raising confrontation. To assure positive changes, all viewpoints must be represented at the forums and workshops. We need to learn the facts, so that we can properly manage our lands, both public and private.
Stephen and Cindy Scott are environmental studies students who did not appreciate the imbalance of the 1996 Public Rangelands Grazing Workshop at Arizona State University.
From the Summer 1996 issue of Range Magazine, page 39
https://underwoodgardens.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/The-Way-I-See-It.jpg262759Stephen Scotthttps://underwoodgardens.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Survey-Header.jpgStephen Scott2015-05-01 14:43:172024-04-30 17:34:00From The Range To The Garden
Growing a surprising amount of food at home with aquaponics can be very simple, but there are a few basic things to know before getting started. We want to introduce you to the techniques of seed starting and how to keep the growth cycle continuing so that you get the most out of your system.
You can grow most vegetables that you enjoy eating in your aquaponics system. Vegetables that grow the best and easiest are those that grow above ground, such as herbs, greens, tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, cucumber and squash as examples. Please realize that this is not an entire listing, as there are over 300 different types of vegetables that have been grown in aquaponics systems over the past 20 years!
The major foods that are not suitable for aquaponics systems are corn, wheat, soy and rice. Root crops can be a challenge, however a lot of people have grown delicious carrots, beets and radishes after gaining some experience, but they are not recommended for a beginning aquaponics grower. It is best to gain some experience on the easier vegetables, then work into the more challenging ones.
Getting Started
So where to start? Once you have the system assembled, you need to get the system to start “cycling” or converting the raw nutrients from the fish into a form that is available to the plants you’ll be growing. Don’t worry, this isn’t difficult! It might be a bit different than what you are used to, but is easy to understand and monitor. The cycling process will happen automatically in almost all cases, and the testing needed to monitor the process is minimal, only taking a couple of minutes of time.
Cycling begins when the fish start adding ammonia to the aquaponics system through their waste. Ammonia is made of nitrogen and hydrogen (the chemical formula is NH3) and is not easily used by plants. Untreated ammonia is toxic to fish unless it is either diluted to a non-toxic level or converted into a different form of nitrogen.
The presence of ammonia attracts two naturally occurring bacteria in the air that will populate the surfaces of your system. The first bacteria, nitrosomonas, convert the ammonia into nitrites (the second curve in the chart below). This is the first step in the aquaponics cycling process. The presence of nitrites attracts the second naturally occurring bacteria, called nitrospira (the third curve in the graph below). These bacteria convert the nitrites into nitrates, which are generally harmless to the fish and excellent food for your plants. You can see the progression of nutrients in the water, from ammonia to nitrites to nitrates in the chart below, as well as the time frame needed. Click on the photo to enlarge it.
Aquaponic Ammonia Cycling Levels
Using a readily available aquaponics water sampling kit, once you detect nitrates in your water and the ammonia and nitrite concentrations have both dropped, your system will be fully cycled and aquaponics will have officially begun! This is the best time to transplant your seedlings, as the nutrients needed by the plants will be fully available to feed them while they filter and clean the water for the fish. This mutually beneficial relationship is what makes aquaponics unique.
Now you are ready to start your seeds! One caution before we begin – don’t plant all of the available space in your system at once. You will need a graduation of plants to absorb the nutrients and filter the water for the fish. If all of your veggies are ready for harvest at once you will nutrient load the water when the veggies are removed, causing stress on the fish as the new plantings begin to establish their roots. You want a mixture of veggies and maturity levels in your planting. Some fast growing, some medium and some slow. You will only plant a few of the slower growing ones such as herbs, tomatoes, peppers and eggplant, with more of the dark leafy greens like kale and Swiss chard, with more of the faster growing lettuces. Using succession planting, or planting a few of a fast-growing green every 2 – 3 weeks, allows for them to mature and be harvested while newer ones are growing and coming in behind.
What Your Seeds Need for Germination
Seeds have everything they need to continue their species built right into them. All of the accumulated adaptations, the wide range of environmental and seasonal conditions that they have encountered and grown through are encoded into their genetic material, their DNA. Everything they need to remain dormant, and then sprout when the time is right is built right inside their shells.
Within that hard seed coat is enough food energy to help them break dormancy and carry them into their first several days as seedlings. All the enzymes they need to convert the stored energy into food is there as well; they have all of the fats, carbohydrates, protein, enzymes and hormones needed to get the seed off to a great start. As home gardeners, our job is to provide those proper conditions to ensure maximum germination into strong and healthy seedlings.
What does a seed need for germination? Moisture and temperature are the two most important aspects for vigorous seed germination, followed by a few other factors. Let’s take a closer look!
Moisture must be at a constant level for the seed and young seedling as they have no moisture reserves in themselves like a mature plant does. A mature plant can go without moisture for a short period of time, sometimes up to several hours, but a seedling will die if it loses its critical moisture level even for a few minutes. The seed needs enough moisture to soften and split the seed coat during germination; but not too much as to prevent oxygen from reaching the seed, as respiration increases dramatically. Water initially starts the process by softening and splitting the seed coat, then activates nutrients, enzymes and hormones to convert stored foods into energy. Finally it serves as a means of transporting nutrients to all parts of the newly emerging plant. When starting seeds in a tray, watering from the bottom is the best method of keeping the moisture levels more consistent. Misting can help correct smaller areas that aren’t quite moist enough. Many seedling trays will have a bottom tray to help water the soil or grow cubes.
The soil or grow cube temperature where the seed is must be correct to initiate the germination process. The key is the temperature at the seed, not the surrounding air. A room that has an air temperature of 70F may have a seed temperature of 60F or less, as the moisture acts as an evaporative cooling medium, reducing the seed temperature below what is needed. At too low a temperature the seed remains dormant, often for an extended amount of time. Not only the ideal temperature is needed, but for the correct amount of time. This prevents the seed in the wild from germinating too early and being killed by the next frost or cold front that moves in. If the temperature swings too much from the daytime high to the nighttime low, the seed will not germinate, or do so very slowly. A constant temperature for a week to 10 days will have almost all vegetable seeds up and going well.
The relationship between temperature and light changes as seeds germinate. Seeds need a high moisture and warm environment to germinate. Both moisture and temperature levels need to be pretty constant to get good germination. If the temperature is high during the day and cooler at night, the germination will be delayed. Ideally, tomatoes and peppers need 85F seed temperature to sprout. Most cool season vegetables we eat today need a seed temperature above 70F for best germination, with varieties like carrots and cauliflower needing 80F. For more specific temperature needs, refer to our Seed Germination guidelines.
Seed Starting Techniques
Now that we’ve covered some basics of seed germination, let’s look at specific ways to start the seeds for your aquaponics system. There are 3 main ways of starting seeds – broadcasting them, using a support system like paper towels or cotton balls, and seed starting media for those varieties that do best being transplanted after they are a little bigger. Here’s how each of them work:
Broadcasting the seeds is just like it sounds, taking a small quantity of seeds in hand and sprinkling them around the grow bed. This technique is obviously used with a clay or gravel bed, as it has the nooks and crannies that will support seed growth. This technique works well for lettuce and other leafy greens, as well as herbs and would probably work for other small seeds that are typically planted in the early spring and are adapted to being very wet. You can choose to randomly scatter the seeds across the entire grow bed, or just in certain areas like along one side or in a corner. Be aware that the broadcasting approach can have lower overall germination rates than the other approaches, as the seed is likely completely covered in water for a significant part of the time.
Support systems like paper towels or cotton balls work well with slightly larger seeds that germinate quickly such as beans, peas, melons, and cucumbers. This method can also be used to start the smaller seeds mentioned above – experiment and see what works best for you. Some people like to broadcast some seeds, while others prefer to plant individual seeds or seedlings in specific spots in their systems.
Planting these larger seeds directly into the bed sometimes doesn’t work as well, as they don’t reliably germinate there and are longer lived plants with more food production, so it pays to focus a bit more on where they will be located in the growing bed. They will usually germinate and grow very quickly given some support, they don’t need the added work and material of the grow media. One approach is to wad up a small piece of paper towel or part of a cotton ball and place it in the grow media where it will be moistened by the flow of water. Another is to fold a paper towel in half to crease it, unfold it, then place the seeds about 1 – 2 inches apart just above the fold. Refold it, moisten it and place it in a plastic Zip-lock bag. Check the moisture level and germination daily. You should see moisture droplets on the wall of the bag when you pull the towel out to check germination. When you see a 1 inch or longer root, trim the seedling out of the paper towel and place the root into the grow media where it will get a good flow of water.
Seed starting media is best used for seeds that are sometimes harder to germinate in an aquaponics environment (like spinach or chard) or need a little more time and care (tomatoes, peppers and eggplant) before going into the grow bed. There are different types of seed starting media, such as rock-wool or a peat based “sponge” material. Rock-wool is the most common, is inexpensive, sterile and is the easiest to find. It can be broken into smaller chunks for smaller systems or to use less material. The media is pH balanced by wetting in water that has been adjusted to between 5.8 and 7.0, then the seed is inserted into the media and kept moist, much like above. Make sure to use some sort of marker to keep track of what it is you’ve planted! After the seedlings reach about 1 1/2 inches tall, they are transplanted into the grow bed, rock wool and all.
When transplanting the seedlings and planting the seeds for the first time, it is best to add liquid seaweed for some nutrients to get them established. As the growing progresses, adding a small amount at regular intervals will help keep the trace elements and micro-nutrients in balance, producing better vegetables.
After the initial excitement of getting the system cycling and converting nutrients, then planting the initial selection of vegetables and herbs that you want to grow, don’t stop! Now is when you can harvest the first of your home-grown veggies and start the succession planting process to make up for their removal. As you harvest the lettuce or Swiss chard, watch for openings that will be good for another variety. This way you can have a continual harvest year-round of the tastiest, freshest and most nutritious food possible.
Like anything truly worth having in life, a garden requires some work. It is a continual project, an experiment. Always evolving, growing and expanding. The results will amaze and humble you, as the vibrant, rich colors show themselves. Then the aromas and flavors arrive, stunning with the depth and intensity of the garden show. The deep-seated sense of accomplishment resulting from a job well done lasts, urging you back to the work of succession planting new varieties. Each new year is familiar, yet entirely new.
Approaches to keeping furry and feathered critters out of the garden
One of the biggest questions we are often asked is what to do about furry and/or feathered critters that want to snack on our gardens. There are a lot of approaches, and we realized that our customers have more experiences to share that can help more folks, so we put out the question of what has been successful in helping to deter critters from your garden?
We received some great replies that we’ve included here. We’ll start off with perhaps one of the most challenging garden conditions in the US – at the South rim of the Grand Canyon national park. Here elk and other wildlife are protected, and there is a short growing season to contend with.
Deb from AZ writes – “Since we are in Grand Canyon National Park, wildlife is our #1 challenge…we have to have an 8 ft. fence around our garden to keep the elk out. Rodents are also a huge problem here: gophers, mice, voles, and chipmunks/squirrels. I feel like we have become pretty skilled at working around them!
Here’s what we have learned to do:
Move the compost far from the garden: our three-bin system had become a rodent motel and led to a population explosion. Once we got rid of that, things calmed down a bit.
We also use the hardware cloth under some of the beds and it works great for the gophers. Low hardware cloth fences stop them from digging in paths and peeking over into the beds to nibble. This also stops the voles, who can’t really climb. For beans and squash and tomatoes, we use a little hardware cloth ring around each plant in the early season until they get big enough to be unpalatable.
For climbers like squirrels and chipmunks, we use “deer netting” over the top of our low fences to prevent climbing in.
To stop mice and voles from eating seeds and sprouts, we lay sheets of metal window screens on top of the soil after planting. Once they sprout, we switch to the low fences as mentioned above.
This sounds like a ton of work, (and it is), but once you make all of these structures it doesn’t take too long to install them, and it really saves your crops from being decimated. Even the smallest critters are creatures of habit, so if you take the time to observe what they are doing you can often work around them or plant more attractive plants in less trafficked areas.
Most importantly, we have learned to be a little more Zen about the whole thing, and now just expect there to be some losses from critters. We always keep enough extra seeds of short-season crops to re-plant areas that are compromised!”
Regina from NC says – “Last year I planted a garden in a different area and found the deer just loved my cabbage, broccoli green beans – all my first plantings were eaten to a nub. I consulted a local expert (94 year old gardener) and was told the following:
Plant a wide row of green edibles outside the perimeter of your garden and then put a border of yellow ribbon tape (the type used at a crime scene) and leave it a little loose so that it moves and twists in the breeze.
I planted oats and clover outside the garden area and put the yellow ribbon around the garden. The deer ate the stuff outside the garden area and left my garden alone.
The expert advice from the seasoned veteran worked like a charm.”
Jim in IL found – “No exaggeration…last spring I would see 50 rabbits running around within a 1/2-mile radius. They were everywhere! Many times I would see 5 or 6 running/playing together. This obviously is a bad thing when you have a veggie garden! I have 8 raised beds (5×20′) which I also cover with row covers. The rabbits would even crawl under the protective covers and nest under my plants. I had to do something fast!
This past fall I put up a 4′ chain-link fence around my garden (approx. 35’x85′) which was really only to serve as a frame for the 1″x1″ (24″ tall) vinyl coated wire mesh fence I installed inside the chain-link. I buried the mesh 6″ deep to hopefully prevent the vermin from digging under. This spring will be the true test for my efforts.
I’m not sure if the chipmunks can squeeze in the 1″ holes, but just in case, I have traps for them. Last season I nailed 35 of them. Aggravating to do all this work only to have the critters get in for a free meal!”
Diane shared – “I wanted to share that after years of the birds and lizards destroying much of our newly-planted raised bed gardens, my husband has built some screen covers over our raised beds. He used 2 inch x 2 inch redwood posts for a frame, and attached wildlife netting to the frames. These are slightly larger than each raised bed’s opening. He placed the screen-covered frames on top of the raised beds, and no more early garden destruction! Our early Spring garden is thriving!”
Mary Lou in IL has learned – “The best trick I have is to put aluminum foil around small plants that I don’t want the chipmunks to dig up. They hate the aluminum foil and won’t dig up my new transplants. It is actually funny to watch their reaction when they try to dig and get the foil instead of dirt.”
Linda in NE shared – “I have found Aztec Marigolds work really, really well at keeping the bunnies away from my strawberries. I usually leave them in the ground till spring, but for some reason I pulled them all at the end of last season and have noticed a huge increase in the bunny population in my yard throughout this past winter. Next year I’ll leave them in till spring.
To keep the neighbors cats away from my “bird garden” I scatter rue seeds amongst the beds. It keeps the cats away, but it makes it hard to get in there to cut flowers for bouquets.
For the never ending wasps I rub a bar of soap around all the areas where they like to hang out. When I see a nest forming I liberally rub the soap all around that area. And I try to destroy all of the nests I find after the first freeze. I know wasps serve a purpose, but if they want a place in my yard it’s going to have to be away from the house and shed.
Chrys in PA shares some wisdom – “My uncle taught me an effective way to keep the crows from “unplanting” your corn as soon as your back is turned. Poke a hole in the ground about 1/2 inch deeper than normal, drop in the corn and cover it with dirt. Then take your digging stick and poke a hole about 1/2 inch deep over the corn. Maybe the birds think that another bird already harvested the seed, but they usually leave it alone.”
Here’s some of the things we’ve learned in our own garden over time:
Gophers – In our area, there are colonies of gophers living in the vacant field next to our house and garden. They will mostly stay on their side of the fence, but occasionally come under and cause havoc to our garden. Our dogs love to dig up their tunnels, but so far haven’t been able to capture one.
When we were constructing our raised beds, we installed hardware cloth in the bottom of the beds before putting the soil in. The hardware cloth is stout enough that it deters the gophers from trying to dig through and has held up for 6 years now. The challenge is that they will still come up in the walkways under the wood chips where there is no barrier! We resort to gopher traps for this – the Gophinator is by far the best and most effective trap of several designs and approaches we’ve tried.
We don’t trap any gophers that don’t get into the garden. If they are on the other side of the fence we leave them alone.
Squirrels – We generally don’t have squirrel problems, but one summer had a rogue agent that was climbing the fence and dining on our garden. The solution was to borrow a live trap from a friend, capture the little bandit and release it into another area that was far from any houses. In this case, we were able to relocate it without harming it.
Do you feed wild birds? You may be bringing in unwanted visitors like squirrels, mice and possibly raccoons as they scavenge the seed dropped from the feeders. There are a couple of solutions to this challenge: stop feeding the birds – this removes the food source and will decrease the visitation of wildlife, or move the bird feeder to a spot that is the furthest possible distance from your garden and use a feeder design that minimizes the amount of seed dropped by hungry birds.
Javalina – These wild relatives of pigs have poor eyesight, but a very keen sense of smell. If you put fresh kitchen scraps onto your compost pile, you might be attracting these large and destructive critters. If you live in javalina country, don’t locate the compost bin or pile next to the garden, use leaves and manure with kitchen scraps aged for a couple of weeks in a bucket instead. This way it isn’t as appealing to them and won’t encourage repeat visits.
https://underwoodgardens.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/Rabbit-in-Garden.jpg800600Stephen Scotthttps://underwoodgardens.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Survey-Header.jpgStephen Scott2015-03-28 09:45:332024-04-30 17:34:00Critters In The Garden Questions
Fungus gnats are more of a nuisance than a real problem to most young plants and seedlings, but they can cause some issues if their population gets high enough. As you start your seedlings for this year’s garden, you will probably notice these tiny white flying insects that seem to infest some of the seedling trays. Sometimes they are everywhere, other times only on certain plants or sections of the seedling flats.
Fungus gnats are tiny mosquito-like insects (actually flies) that are small enough to be able to enter your home or greenhouse through the tiniest openings, but more often they ride in as eggs in soil that has been outside or in damp potting soil that has been exposed to the air for some time. If their population gets high enough, their larvae will cause damage to seedlings as they feed on the young, tender roots.
Fungus gnat life-cycle
The eggs are laid in tiny cracks in the soil surface, hatching within 6 days into larvae that feed on seedling roots, algae and fungi in the soil. After about 2 weeks of feeding, they pupate and a week later they emerge as adults, starting the cycle all over again. The emerging adults will be mostly females and they can lay between 100 – 300 eggs, so the population can increase rapidly. By the time you see the gnats flying around the seedlings, they’ve been active for at least a couple of weeks. The adults do not feed or bite, their only purpose is to reproduce in their 7 – 10 day lifespan.
There are a couple of approaches that we’ve found to be effective. Closely monitor the amount of water or moisture that is in the flats or cups where the seedlings are. Fungus gnats are highly attracted to moist and over-moist growing media, so they are almost always concentrated where there is a bit more moisture. Over-watering is one of the most common mistakes of all gardeners, new and experienced. This is understandable, as the seeds need a moist and warm environment to soften the seed coat and start the germination process, but afterwards they don’t need nearly as much water. This is where the over-watering condition sets in. It doesn’t take very much excess moisture at all to attract the gnats.
Treatment options
To detect and trap fungus gnat larvae, simply insert a small slice of potato just under the surface of the soil. The larvae will migrate to the potato and start feeding on it within a few days. After 3 – 5 days, remove the potato slice and look on the bottom side for clear to very pale white larvae feeding on the potato. This will tell you whether you’ve got the fungus gnats as larvae and how concentrated the population is. If you’ve got a large population of larvae, put a number of potato slices into the soil to attract more larvae, then remove, inspect and throw the slices away after about a week.
Yellow sticky traps are very effective means of monitoring and capturing the adult gnats. They will show up as black specks on the bright yellow background. This may be all you need to do, but if they persist there are a couple of biological friendly sprays that we’ve had success with. The first is from Safer products, is called “3-in-1″³ and is effective on insects, mites and fungi. We have found that one or two applications are effective. The other is Safer brand “Yard and Garden” spray with plant-derived pyrethrins that are highly effective on insects. Both products are OMRI listed as accepted for organic growers.
Overall, realize that fungus gnats are more of a nuisance than real problem, but serve as an effective notice that your seedling soil is a bit too moist. Decrease the soil moisture slightly, monitor and trap the larvae and adults and you’ll most likely not have any noticeable damage to your seedlings.
Damping-off is a soil borne disease that can attack almost all young vegetable seedlings. Home gardeners often first notice that something is wrong when the very young seedlings have a constriction around the base of the stem, some of the seedlings have fallen over or there are small flying gnats around the base of the seedlings. Damping off is caused by soil fungi and the right conditions to help them flourish.
If not taken care of, losses can be severe and results in the majority of a flat of carefully planted seedlings dying in 24 to 48 hours. Damping-off can happen before seedlings emerge from the soil. With this type of damping-off, fungi infect seeds as they germinate. As the infection progresses, seeds rot and do not germinate, leading many home gardeners to think that the seed quality is poor. Another result of seedling infected damping-off is poor or weaker seedlings that become apparent days or weeks later.
Even if some of the seedlings survive damping off and are transplanted, they are often stunted and have a twisted, constricted or off-color stem – called ‘wire-stem’ – and have health and production issues.
Not everyone experiences damping off, yet other gardeners in the same area fight with it yearly. Some gardeners buy seed starting mix every year, otherwise they suffer large seedling losses; while others (including ourselves) have mixed our own soil for years and have had very little problems. Just because your neighbor or gardening club friend has trouble with damping off, it doesn’t automatically mean you will also. We’ve created this article as a tool to help you troubleshoot and control how and why damping off happens.
Causes of Damping off
The most common cause of damping off is from soil borne fungi from three groups – Pythium, Rhizoctonia, and Fusarium.
Pythium thrives in cool, over-wet and poorly-drained soils and is often the result of over-watering and not maintaining a warm enough soil temperature for the seeds to germinate. Its symptoms are a damp, odorless rot in the root, causing it to be slimy. It may run up the lower portion of the stem and cause it to be black and slimy. Pythium can survive in soil for several years.
Rhizoctonia is present in all natural soils, coming to life when a soil is over-wet and hot. This is the most common occurrence of damping off, as the seedling will have the classic constriction on the stem right around where it touches the soil.
Fusarium thrives in acidic soils that are poorly fertilized and can remain inactive for long periods of time – years. Fusarium infects the seeds, causing many of them to fail to germinate and creating the ‘wire-stem’ appearance in those that do survive.
There are also seed-borne bacterial and fungal pathogens that can decimate seedlings. These are most often seen in seeds obtained from seed swaps or gardening clubs with poor sanitation and handling techniques in processing and packing seeds. If not recognized and corrected, seed borne pathogens will continue to infect future generations of seed that is saved and distributed.
Controlling Damping Off
Damping off may not be able to be prevented, but there are several easy and highly effective methods to control the outbreaks which will greatly lessen the severity of your seedling losses.
For seeds, the easiest method to control seed borne diseases is to source your seeds from a reputable, knowledgeable and experienced seed company or person. Don’t be afraid to ask questions and listen to the answers. An experienced company, grower or garden club member will be able to easily tell you what measures they take, for what varieties and why. If you are sourcing seeds from a local grower or garden club member, it will be very easy to ask around and determine their reputation.
For soil, the easiest and most proven method is simply starting with fresh, sterilized seed starting mix from established and trusted sources. There are a number of bagged seed starting mixes in gardening centers and big box stores, and often some reputable local sources. Simply buying a fresh bag, bringing it home and dumping it into your old faithful seeding tub is not the answer – you might have just infected the fresh soil! First you absolutely must thoroughly clean and sanitize all of your seed starting tools, otherwise you’ve only infected new material and brought the problem into a new season.
After cleaning and removing all of the soil residue, wash with warm soapy water, rinse well then soak in a weak bleach solution – 2 Tablespoons of bleach in a gallon of water and keep the surface wet for 5 minutes. Soaking hand tools such as trowels, hand hoes and such in a small bucket is the easiest, while spraying the potting bench and sink or mixing container works well. Spray as needed to keep the surfaces wet, then let air dry. After sanitizing, you are ready to open the bag of fresh seed starting mix and let the magic of another season of gardening begin!
A good seed starting mix will not only be sterile, but drain well and ideally have a little nutrition for the young seedlings so they won’t need transplanting right after they sprout. You can mix your own or buy a bagged mix from your local garden center or big box store. If you are interested in mixing your own, Seed Starting Media for the Home Gardenerwill show you what the different ingredients are and what they do.
Practical Tips
There are a couple of tools a home gardener has in their day to day gardening to minimize the chance of damaging fungi getting a toehold in the seed beds.
The easiest, most overlooked and most important is to avoid over-watering. If you notice, two of the three damping off fungi thrive in damp, over-wet conditions. This one mistake is responsible for most of the gardening woes today, both in the seed starting trays and the garden itself. It is best to bottom water seedlings using a standard seed starting tray and wicking seed starting pots. Paper pots have excellent wicking capacity, are easy to make and give the gardener control of how long the pot will last by how many wraps of paper are used to make the pot. Let the water sit for no longer than 20 – 30 minutes, then drain to avoid an over-wet situation. Water 2 or 3 times a day if needed to keep the soil moist during sprouting.
Over-seeding or overcrowding of seedlings creates a favorable environment for destructive fungi to flourish, so give the seedlings room to grow. If needed, thin the weakest seedlings in a starting pot or seedling tray with snips, not by pulling them out. Pulling the seedlings out disturbs and damages adjacent roots and causes more problems down the road. Planting fewer seeds in a pot or seed tray cell will lessen the amount of thinning greatly.
Air movement can significantly reduce the activity of the fungi, as a fan moving air helps to slightly dry the surface of the soil/seedling interface, making it harder for the fungi to get established. This works best in combination with carefully monitoring the soil moisture.
Daily observation is another easy to do, yet often overlooked tool. Catching the fungi in action early gives you a better chance to take corrective action and save more seedlings from an early death. Get in the habit of spending a few minutes just looking at the seedling trays, looking at all of the minute details and getting very familiar with what “normal” looks like. Then compare that each successive day to see if something looks out of place or not right.
Treatment of Damping Off
Now that you’ve got the knowledge and tools to minimize the chance of damping off happening, let’s look at some treatment options if and when it does show its ugly head.
Chamomile is one of the oldest treatments and is one of the gentlest to try first. It is high in sulfur and is a mild fungicide. Make a strong tea with 3 tea bags steeped for at least 20 minutes, then mist on the seedlings once cool.
Cinnamon is a potent natural fungicide that should only be used once. Lightly sprinkle infected soil with finely ground fresh cinnamon if the chamomile doesn’t work in the first day.
Canadian gardening guru Doug Green has found that homemade garlic spray is also very effective against damping off, as garlic is a potent anti-fungal. To make, crush or blend several garlic cloves into a quart of water, then simmer over low heat until the garlic is softened and the essential oils are released. Cool and strain, then spray on the seedlings, making sure to get the stems. If using as a soil drench, straining isn’t as needed.
Now that you’ve got the knowledge to be pro-active in controlling damping off, as well as some tips and tools to treat it when it shows up, you should have a great start to a prolific garden this year!
https://underwoodgardens.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Damping-off1.jpg300500Stephen Scotthttps://underwoodgardens.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Survey-Header.jpgStephen Scott2015-02-13 17:40:012024-04-30 17:34:00Damping off – Causes and Control
Cucamelons can act as a perennial if you are lucky enough to live in a climate where they can produce tubers, or radish-like roots. The first year they will produce as normal by starting to fruit around July until the first frost stops them. As they start to slow down, search around in the soil by gently exposing some of their roots to see if they have produced tubers. They will be a white to off white color and look something like radishes. If you see them, you can store them in a protected area over the winter and replant them next spring for extra early and larger harvests of cucamelons!
To store them, gently lift them out of the soil and stored in very slightly moist compost or potting soil in a cool but frost-free area. Next spring, wake them up by transplanting into pots early to mid-April in moist compost or potting soil and place them in a well-lit, sunny room. Plant in the garden into warm soil after the last frost date. These second year plants will take off sooner, producing flowers and fruit much earlier, giving you a longer season and greatly increased harvest.
If you live in an area that doesn’t get much frost, then you can overwinter the roots in place by insulating with 6 – 8 inches of straw mulch and lightly moistening it. They will be able to survive temperatures down to freezing with this approach. To ensure that the roots are less likely to rot in the cool moist soil, make sure that there is plenty of sand in the soil to allow the excess moisture to drain away.
If desired, the roots can be gently uncovered and transplanted much like above after overwintering in place to increase your yearly harvest.
From The Range To The Garden
A Look At The Foundation Of Terroir Seeds
Terroir Seeds’ foundation is in soil, as most of you know. That is one of the main reasons for our choice of name for our seed company. Through personal experience and learning from those who have much more experience, we have seen time and time again that those who take care of their soil have better health and productivity, along with more pest and disease resistance than those who don’t.
In organizing some old magazines, Cindy ran across an article we wrote for Range Magazine way back in the spring of 1996 after attending a Public Rangelands Grazing Conference at Arizona State University. This was the start of our learning curve, when we were seeing wildly different philosophies about how to best conserve and improve our arid Western soils. The standard approach was exclusion and rest, thinking that the cows were the enemy- while the up and coming thought pattern was managed, short-term intensive grazing followed by appropriate rest for the grasses to recover.
Allan Savory was introducing Holistic Resource Management to the US at this time. There was a wide range of responses, both from private individuals and public officials. Most of the government officials were skeptical, while many so-called “grazing experts” were outright condemning the ideas even while acknowledging that they had no knowledge or experience in how HRM worked, only that “it couldn’t”.
Almost 20 years later, HRM is now known as Holistic Management (HM) and has quietly proven itself across the world in many different climates and ecosystems to simply work. We have seen it work in our part of central Arizona and have used some of its philosophies and approaches to help improve and maintain the health of garden soil.
We wanted to share one of the foundations of Terroir Seeds with this article we wrote almost two decades ago!
Successful Aquaponics Seed Starting
Growing a surprising amount of food at home with aquaponics can be very simple, but there are a few basic things to know before getting started. We want to introduce you to the techniques of seed starting and how to keep the growth cycle continuing so that you get the most out of your system.
You can grow most vegetables that you enjoy eating in your aquaponics system. Vegetables that grow the best and easiest are those that grow above ground, such as herbs, greens, tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, cucumber and squash as examples. Please realize that this is not an entire listing, as there are over 300 different types of vegetables that have been grown in aquaponics systems over the past 20 years!
The major foods that are not suitable for aquaponics systems are corn, wheat, soy and rice. Root crops can be a challenge, however a lot of people have grown delicious carrots, beets and radishes after gaining some experience, but they are not recommended for a beginning aquaponics grower. It is best to gain some experience on the easier vegetables, then work into the more challenging ones.
Getting Started
So where to start? Once you have the system assembled, you need to get the system to start “cycling” or converting the raw nutrients from the fish into a form that is available to the plants you’ll be growing. Don’t worry, this isn’t difficult! It might be a bit different than what you are used to, but is easy to understand and monitor. The cycling process will happen automatically in almost all cases, and the testing needed to monitor the process is minimal, only taking a couple of minutes of time.
Cycling begins when the fish start adding ammonia to the aquaponics system through their waste. Ammonia is made of nitrogen and hydrogen (the chemical formula is NH3) and is not easily used by plants. Untreated ammonia is toxic to fish unless it is either diluted to a non-toxic level or converted into a different form of nitrogen.
The presence of ammonia attracts two naturally occurring bacteria in the air that will populate the surfaces of your system. The first bacteria, nitrosomonas, convert the ammonia into nitrites (the second curve in the chart below). This is the first step in the aquaponics cycling process. The presence of nitrites attracts the second naturally occurring bacteria, called nitrospira (the third curve in the graph below). These bacteria convert the nitrites into nitrates, which are generally harmless to the fish and excellent food for your plants. You can see the progression of nutrients in the water, from ammonia to nitrites to nitrates in the chart below, as well as the time frame needed. Click on the photo to enlarge it.
Aquaponic Ammonia Cycling Levels
Using a readily available aquaponics water sampling kit, once you detect nitrates in your water and the ammonia and nitrite concentrations have both dropped, your system will be fully cycled and aquaponics will have officially begun! This is the best time to transplant your seedlings, as the nutrients needed by the plants will be fully available to feed them while they filter and clean the water for the fish. This mutually beneficial relationship is what makes aquaponics unique.
Now you are ready to start your seeds! One caution before we begin – don’t plant all of the available space in your system at once. You will need a graduation of plants to absorb the nutrients and filter the water for the fish. If all of your veggies are ready for harvest at once you will nutrient load the water when the veggies are removed, causing stress on the fish as the new plantings begin to establish their roots. You want a mixture of veggies and maturity levels in your planting. Some fast growing, some medium and some slow. You will only plant a few of the slower growing ones such as herbs, tomatoes, peppers and eggplant, with more of the dark leafy greens like kale and Swiss chard, with more of the faster growing lettuces. Using succession planting, or planting a few of a fast-growing green every 2 – 3 weeks, allows for them to mature and be harvested while newer ones are growing and coming in behind.
What Your Seeds Need for Germination
Seeds have everything they need to continue their species built right into them. All of the accumulated adaptations, the wide range of environmental and seasonal conditions that they have encountered and grown through are encoded into their genetic material, their DNA. Everything they need to remain dormant, and then sprout when the time is right is built right inside their shells.
Within that hard seed coat is enough food energy to help them break dormancy and carry them into their first several days as seedlings. All the enzymes they need to convert the stored energy into food is there as well; they have all of the fats, carbohydrates, protein, enzymes and hormones needed to get the seed off to a great start. As home gardeners, our job is to provide those proper conditions to ensure maximum germination into strong and healthy seedlings.
What does a seed need for germination? Moisture and temperature are the two most important aspects for vigorous seed germination, followed by a few other factors. Let’s take a closer look!
Moisture must be at a constant level for the seed and young seedling as they have no moisture reserves in themselves like a mature plant does. A mature plant can go without moisture for a short period of time, sometimes up to several hours, but a seedling will die if it loses its critical moisture level even for a few minutes. The seed needs enough moisture to soften and split the seed coat during germination; but not too much as to prevent oxygen from reaching the seed, as respiration increases dramatically. Water initially starts the process by softening and splitting the seed coat, then activates nutrients, enzymes and hormones to convert stored foods into energy. Finally it serves as a means of transporting nutrients to all parts of the newly emerging plant. When starting seeds in a tray, watering from the bottom is the best method of keeping the moisture levels more consistent. Misting can help correct smaller areas that aren’t quite moist enough. Many seedling trays will have a bottom tray to help water the soil or grow cubes.
The soil or grow cube temperature where the seed is must be correct to initiate the germination process. The key is the temperature at the seed, not the surrounding air. A room that has an air temperature of 70F may have a seed temperature of 60F or less, as the moisture acts as an evaporative cooling medium, reducing the seed temperature below what is needed. At too low a temperature the seed remains dormant, often for an extended amount of time. Not only the ideal temperature is needed, but for the correct amount of time. This prevents the seed in the wild from germinating too early and being killed by the next frost or cold front that moves in. If the temperature swings too much from the daytime high to the nighttime low, the seed will not germinate, or do so very slowly. A constant temperature for a week to 10 days will have almost all vegetable seeds up and going well.
The relationship between temperature and light changes as seeds germinate. Seeds need a high moisture and warm environment to germinate. Both moisture and temperature levels need to be pretty constant to get good germination. If the temperature is high during the day and cooler at night, the germination will be delayed. Ideally, tomatoes and peppers need 85F seed temperature to sprout. Most cool season vegetables we eat today need a seed temperature above 70F for best germination, with varieties like carrots and cauliflower needing 80F. For more specific temperature needs, refer to our Seed Germination guidelines.
Seed Starting Techniques
Now that we’ve covered some basics of seed germination, let’s look at specific ways to start the seeds for your aquaponics system. There are 3 main ways of starting seeds – broadcasting them, using a support system like paper towels or cotton balls, and seed starting media for those varieties that do best being transplanted after they are a little bigger. Here’s how each of them work:
Broadcasting the seeds is just like it sounds, taking a small quantity of seeds in hand and sprinkling them around the grow bed. This technique is obviously used with a clay or gravel bed, as it has the nooks and crannies that will support seed growth. This technique works well for lettuce and other leafy greens, as well as herbs and would probably work for other small seeds that are typically planted in the early spring and are adapted to being very wet. You can choose to randomly scatter the seeds across the entire grow bed, or just in certain areas like along one side or in a corner. Be aware that the broadcasting approach can have lower overall germination rates than the other approaches, as the seed is likely completely covered in water for a significant part of the time.
Support systems like paper towels or cotton balls work well with slightly larger seeds that germinate quickly such as beans, peas, melons, and cucumbers. This method can also be used to start the smaller seeds mentioned above – experiment and see what works best for you. Some people like to broadcast some seeds, while others prefer to plant individual seeds or seedlings in specific spots in their systems.
Planting these larger seeds directly into the bed sometimes doesn’t work as well, as they don’t reliably germinate there and are longer lived plants with more food production, so it pays to focus a bit more on where they will be located in the growing bed. They will usually germinate and grow very quickly given some support, they don’t need the added work and material of the grow media. One approach is to wad up a small piece of paper towel or part of a cotton ball and place it in the grow media where it will be moistened by the flow of water. Another is to fold a paper towel in half to crease it, unfold it, then place the seeds about 1 – 2 inches apart just above the fold. Refold it, moisten it and place it in a plastic Zip-lock bag. Check the moisture level and germination daily. You should see moisture droplets on the wall of the bag when you pull the towel out to check germination. When you see a 1 inch or longer root, trim the seedling out of the paper towel and place the root into the grow media where it will get a good flow of water.
Seed starting media is best used for seeds that are sometimes harder to germinate in an aquaponics environment (like spinach or chard) or need a little more time and care (tomatoes, peppers and eggplant) before going into the grow bed. There are different types of seed starting media, such as rock-wool or a peat based “sponge” material. Rock-wool is the most common, is inexpensive, sterile and is the easiest to find. It can be broken into smaller chunks for smaller systems or to use less material. The media is pH balanced by wetting in water that has been adjusted to between 5.8 and 7.0, then the seed is inserted into the media and kept moist, much like above. Make sure to use some sort of marker to keep track of what it is you’ve planted! After the seedlings reach about 1 1/2 inches tall, they are transplanted into the grow bed, rock wool and all.
When transplanting the seedlings and planting the seeds for the first time, it is best to add liquid seaweed for some nutrients to get them established. As the growing progresses, adding a small amount at regular intervals will help keep the trace elements and micro-nutrients in balance, producing better vegetables.
After the initial excitement of getting the system cycling and converting nutrients, then planting the initial selection of vegetables and herbs that you want to grow, don’t stop! Now is when you can harvest the first of your home-grown veggies and start the succession planting process to make up for their removal. As you harvest the lettuce or Swiss chard, watch for openings that will be good for another variety. This way you can have a continual harvest year-round of the tastiest, freshest and most nutritious food possible.
Like anything truly worth having in life, a garden requires some work. It is a continual project, an experiment. Always evolving, growing and expanding. The results will amaze and humble you, as the vibrant, rich colors show themselves. Then the aromas and flavors arrive, stunning with the depth and intensity of the garden show. The deep-seated sense of accomplishment resulting from a job well done lasts, urging you back to the work of succession planting new varieties. Each new year is familiar, yet entirely new.
Critters In The Garden Questions
Approaches to keeping furry and feathered critters out of the gardenOne of the biggest questions we are often asked is what to do about furry and/or feathered critters that want to snack on our gardens. There are a lot of approaches, and we realized that our customers have more experiences to share that can help more folks, so we put out the question of what has been successful in helping to deter critters from your garden?
We received some great replies that we’ve included here. We’ll start off with perhaps one of the most challenging garden conditions in the US – at the South rim of the Grand Canyon national park. Here elk and other wildlife are protected, and there is a short growing season to contend with.
Deb from AZ writes – “Since we are in Grand Canyon National Park, wildlife is our #1 challenge…we have to have an 8 ft. fence around our garden to keep the elk out. Rodents are also a huge problem here: gophers, mice, voles, and chipmunks/squirrels. I feel like we have become pretty skilled at working around them!
Here’s what we have learned to do:
This sounds like a ton of work, (and it is), but once you make all of these structures it doesn’t take too long to install them, and it really saves your crops from being decimated. Even the smallest critters are creatures of habit, so if you take the time to observe what they are doing you can often work around them or plant more attractive plants in less trafficked areas.
Most importantly, we have learned to be a little more Zen about the whole thing, and now just expect there to be some losses from critters. We always keep enough extra seeds of short-season crops to re-plant areas that are compromised!”
Regina from NC says – “Last year I planted a garden in a different area and found the deer just loved my cabbage, broccoli green beans – all my first plantings were eaten to a nub. I consulted a local expert (94 year old gardener) and was told the following:
Plant a wide row of green edibles outside the perimeter of your garden and then put a border of yellow ribbon tape (the type used at a crime scene) and leave it a little loose so that it moves and twists in the breeze.
I planted oats and clover outside the garden area and put the yellow ribbon around the garden. The deer ate the stuff outside the garden area and left my garden alone.
The expert advice from the seasoned veteran worked like a charm.”
Jim in IL found – “No exaggeration…last spring I would see 50 rabbits running around within a 1/2-mile radius. They were everywhere! Many times I would see 5 or 6 running/playing together. This obviously is a bad thing when you have a veggie garden! I have 8 raised beds (5×20′) which I also cover with row covers. The rabbits would even crawl under the protective covers and nest under my plants. I had to do something fast!
This past fall I put up a 4′ chain-link fence around my garden (approx. 35’x85′) which was really only to serve as a frame for the 1″x1″ (24″ tall) vinyl coated wire mesh fence I installed inside the chain-link. I buried the mesh 6″ deep to hopefully prevent the vermin from digging under. This spring will be the true test for my efforts.
I’m not sure if the chipmunks can squeeze in the 1″ holes, but just in case, I have traps for them. Last season I nailed 35 of them. Aggravating to do all this work only to have the critters get in for a free meal!”
Diane shared – “I wanted to share that after years of the birds and lizards destroying much of our newly-planted raised bed gardens, my husband has built some screen covers over our raised beds. He used 2 inch x 2 inch redwood posts for a frame, and attached wildlife netting to the frames. These are slightly larger than each raised bed’s opening. He placed the screen-covered frames on top of the raised beds, and no more early garden destruction! Our early Spring garden is thriving!”
Mary Lou in IL has learned – “The best trick I have is to put aluminum foil around small plants that I don’t want the chipmunks to dig up. They hate the aluminum foil and won’t dig up my new transplants. It is actually funny to watch their reaction when they try to dig and get the foil instead of dirt.”
Linda in NE shared – “I have found Aztec Marigolds work really, really well at keeping the bunnies away from my strawberries. I usually leave them in the ground till spring, but for some reason I pulled them all at the end of last season and have noticed a huge increase in the bunny population in my yard throughout this past winter. Next year I’ll leave them in till spring.
To keep the neighbors cats away from my “bird garden” I scatter rue seeds amongst the beds. It keeps the cats away, but it makes it hard to get in there to cut flowers for bouquets.
For the never ending wasps I rub a bar of soap around all the areas where they like to hang out. When I see a nest forming I liberally rub the soap all around that area. And I try to destroy all of the nests I find after the first freeze. I know wasps serve a purpose, but if they want a place in my yard it’s going to have to be away from the house and shed.
Chrys in PA shares some wisdom – “My uncle taught me an effective way to keep the crows from “unplanting” your corn as soon as your back is turned. Poke a hole in the ground about 1/2 inch deeper than normal, drop in the corn and cover it with dirt. Then take your digging stick and poke a hole about 1/2 inch deep over the corn. Maybe the birds think that another bird already harvested the seed, but they usually leave it alone.”
Here’s some of the things we’ve learned in our own garden over time:
Gophers – In our area, there are colonies of gophers living in the vacant field next to our house and garden. They will mostly stay on their side of the fence, but occasionally come under and cause havoc to our garden. Our dogs love to dig up their tunnels, but so far haven’t been able to capture one.
When we were constructing our raised beds, we installed hardware cloth in the bottom of the beds before putting the soil in. The hardware cloth is stout enough that it deters the gophers from trying to dig through and has held up for 6 years now. The challenge is that they will still come up in the walkways under the wood chips where there is no barrier! We resort to gopher traps for this – the Gophinator is by far the best and most effective trap of several designs and approaches we’ve tried.
We don’t trap any gophers that don’t get into the garden. If they are on the other side of the fence we leave them alone.
Squirrels – We generally don’t have squirrel problems, but one summer had a rogue agent that was climbing the fence and dining on our garden. The solution was to borrow a live trap from a friend, capture the little bandit and release it into another area that was far from any houses. In this case, we were able to relocate it without harming it.
Do you feed wild birds? You may be bringing in unwanted visitors like squirrels, mice and possibly raccoons as they scavenge the seed dropped from the feeders. There are a couple of solutions to this challenge: stop feeding the birds – this removes the food source and will decrease the visitation of wildlife, or move the bird feeder to a spot that is the furthest possible distance from your garden and use a feeder design that minimizes the amount of seed dropped by hungry birds.
Javalina – These wild relatives of pigs have poor eyesight, but a very keen sense of smell. If you put fresh kitchen scraps onto your compost pile, you might be attracting these large and destructive critters. If you live in javalina country, don’t locate the compost bin or pile next to the garden, use leaves and manure with kitchen scraps aged for a couple of weeks in a bucket instead. This way it isn’t as appealing to them and won’t encourage repeat visits.
Controlling Fungus Gnats in Seedlings
Fungus gnats are more of a nuisance than a real problem to most young plants and seedlings, but they can cause some issues if their population gets high enough. As you start your seedlings for this year’s garden, you will probably notice these tiny white flying insects that seem to infest some of the seedling trays. Sometimes they are everywhere, other times only on certain plants or sections of the seedling flats.
Fungus gnats are tiny mosquito-like insects (actually flies) that are small enough to be able to enter your home or greenhouse through the tiniest openings, but more often they ride in as eggs in soil that has been outside or in damp potting soil that has been exposed to the air for some time. If their population gets high enough, their larvae will cause damage to seedlings as they feed on the young, tender roots.
Fungus gnat life-cycle
There are a couple of approaches that we’ve found to be effective. Closely monitor the amount of water or moisture that is in the flats or cups where the seedlings are. Fungus gnats are highly attracted to moist and over-moist growing media, so they are almost always concentrated where there is a bit more moisture. Over-watering is one of the most common mistakes of all gardeners, new and experienced. This is understandable, as the seeds need a moist and warm environment to soften the seed coat and start the germination process, but afterwards they don’t need nearly as much water. This is where the over-watering condition sets in. It doesn’t take very much excess moisture at all to attract the gnats.
Treatment options
To detect and trap fungus gnat larvae, simply insert a small slice of potato just under the surface of the soil. The larvae will migrate to the potato and start feeding on it within a few days. After 3 – 5 days, remove the potato slice and look on the bottom side for clear to very pale white larvae feeding on the potato. This will tell you whether you’ve got the fungus gnats as larvae and how concentrated the population is. If you’ve got a large population of larvae, put a number of potato slices into the soil to attract more larvae, then remove, inspect and throw the slices away after about a week.
Yellow sticky traps are very effective means of monitoring and capturing the adult gnats. They will show up as black specks on the bright yellow background. This may be all you need to do, but if they persist there are a couple of biological friendly sprays that we’ve had success with. The first is from Safer products, is called “3-in-1″³ and is effective on insects, mites and fungi. We have found that one or two applications are effective. The other is Safer brand “Yard and Garden” spray with plant-derived pyrethrins that are highly effective on insects. Both products are OMRI listed as accepted for organic growers.
Overall, realize that fungus gnats are more of a nuisance than real problem, but serve as an effective notice that your seedling soil is a bit too moist. Decrease the soil moisture slightly, monitor and trap the larvae and adults and you’ll most likely not have any noticeable damage to your seedlings.
Damping off – Causes and Control
Damping-off is a soil borne disease that can attack almost all young vegetable seedlings. Home gardeners often first notice that something is wrong when the very young seedlings have a constriction around the base of the stem, some of the seedlings have fallen over or there are small flying gnats around the base of the seedlings. Damping off is caused by soil fungi and the right conditions to help them flourish.
If not taken care of, losses can be severe and results in the majority of a flat of carefully planted seedlings dying in 24 to 48 hours. Damping-off can happen before seedlings emerge from the soil. With this type of damping-off, fungi infect seeds as they germinate. As the infection progresses, seeds rot and do not germinate, leading many home gardeners to think that the seed quality is poor. Another result of seedling infected damping-off is poor or weaker seedlings that become apparent days or weeks later.
Even if some of the seedlings survive damping off and are transplanted, they are often stunted and have a twisted, constricted or off-color stem – called ‘wire-stem’ – and have health and production issues.
Not everyone experiences damping off, yet other gardeners in the same area fight with it yearly. Some gardeners buy seed starting mix every year, otherwise they suffer large seedling losses; while others (including ourselves) have mixed our own soil for years and have had very little problems. Just because your neighbor or gardening club friend has trouble with damping off, it doesn’t automatically mean you will also. We’ve created this article as a tool to help you troubleshoot and control how and why damping off happens.
Causes of Damping off
The most common cause of damping off is from soil borne fungi from three groups – Pythium, Rhizoctonia, and Fusarium.
Pythium thrives in cool, over-wet and poorly-drained soils and is often the result of over-watering and not maintaining a warm enough soil temperature for the seeds to germinate. Its symptoms are a damp, odorless rot in the root, causing it to be slimy. It may run up the lower portion of the stem and cause it to be black and slimy. Pythium can survive in soil for several years.
Rhizoctonia is present in all natural soils, coming to life when a soil is over-wet and hot. This is the most common occurrence of damping off, as the seedling will have the classic constriction on the stem right around where it touches the soil.
Fusarium thrives in acidic soils that are poorly fertilized and can remain inactive for long periods of time – years. Fusarium infects the seeds, causing many of them to fail to germinate and creating the ‘wire-stem’ appearance in those that do survive.
There are also seed-borne bacterial and fungal pathogens that can decimate seedlings. These are most often seen in seeds obtained from seed swaps or gardening clubs with poor sanitation and handling techniques in processing and packing seeds. If not recognized and corrected, seed borne pathogens will continue to infect future generations of seed that is saved and distributed.
Controlling Damping Off
Damping off may not be able to be prevented, but there are several easy and highly effective methods to control the outbreaks which will greatly lessen the severity of your seedling losses.
For seeds, the easiest method to control seed borne diseases is to source your seeds from a reputable, knowledgeable and experienced seed company or person. Don’t be afraid to ask questions and listen to the answers. An experienced company, grower or garden club member will be able to easily tell you what measures they take, for what varieties and why. If you are sourcing seeds from a local grower or garden club member, it will be very easy to ask around and determine their reputation.
For soil, the easiest and most proven method is simply starting with fresh, sterilized seed starting mix from established and trusted sources. There are a number of bagged seed starting mixes in gardening centers and big box stores, and often some reputable local sources. Simply buying a fresh bag, bringing it home and dumping it into your old faithful seeding tub is not the answer – you might have just infected the fresh soil! First you absolutely must thoroughly clean and sanitize all of your seed starting tools, otherwise you’ve only infected new material and brought the problem into a new season.
After cleaning and removing all of the soil residue, wash with warm soapy water, rinse well then soak in a weak bleach solution – 2 Tablespoons of bleach in a gallon of water and keep the surface wet for 5 minutes. Soaking hand tools such as trowels, hand hoes and such in a small bucket is the easiest, while spraying the potting bench and sink or mixing container works well. Spray as needed to keep the surfaces wet, then let air dry. After sanitizing, you are ready to open the bag of fresh seed starting mix and let the magic of another season of gardening begin!
A good seed starting mix will not only be sterile, but drain well and ideally have a little nutrition for the young seedlings so they won’t need transplanting right after they sprout. You can mix your own or buy a bagged mix from your local garden center or big box store. If you are interested in mixing your own, Seed Starting Media for the Home Gardener will show you what the different ingredients are and what they do.
Practical Tips
There are a couple of tools a home gardener has in their day to day gardening to minimize the chance of damaging fungi getting a toehold in the seed beds.
The easiest, most overlooked and most important is to avoid over-watering. If you notice, two of the three damping off fungi thrive in damp, over-wet conditions. This one mistake is responsible for most of the gardening woes today, both in the seed starting trays and the garden itself. It is best to bottom water seedlings using a standard seed starting tray and wicking seed starting pots. Paper pots have excellent wicking capacity, are easy to make and give the gardener control of how long the pot will last by how many wraps of paper are used to make the pot. Let the water sit for no longer than 20 – 30 minutes, then drain to avoid an over-wet situation. Water 2 or 3 times a day if needed to keep the soil moist during sprouting.
Over-seeding or overcrowding of seedlings creates a favorable environment for destructive fungi to flourish, so give the seedlings room to grow. If needed, thin the weakest seedlings in a starting pot or seedling tray with snips, not by pulling them out. Pulling the seedlings out disturbs and damages adjacent roots and causes more problems down the road. Planting fewer seeds in a pot or seed tray cell will lessen the amount of thinning greatly.
Air movement can significantly reduce the activity of the fungi, as a fan moving air helps to slightly dry the surface of the soil/seedling interface, making it harder for the fungi to get established. This works best in combination with carefully monitoring the soil moisture.
Daily observation is another easy to do, yet often overlooked tool. Catching the fungi in action early gives you a better chance to take corrective action and save more seedlings from an early death. Get in the habit of spending a few minutes just looking at the seedling trays, looking at all of the minute details and getting very familiar with what “normal” looks like. Then compare that each successive day to see if something looks out of place or not right.
Treatment of Damping Off
Now that you’ve got the knowledge and tools to minimize the chance of damping off happening, let’s look at some treatment options if and when it does show its ugly head.
Chamomile is one of the oldest treatments and is one of the gentlest to try first. It is high in sulfur and is a mild fungicide. Make a strong tea with 3 tea bags steeped for at least 20 minutes, then mist on the seedlings once cool.
Cinnamon is a potent natural fungicide that should only be used once. Lightly sprinkle infected soil with finely ground fresh cinnamon if the chamomile doesn’t work in the first day.
Canadian gardening guru Doug Green has found that homemade garlic spray is also very effective against damping off, as garlic is a potent anti-fungal. To make, crush or blend several garlic cloves into a quart of water, then simmer over low heat until the garlic is softened and the essential oils are released. Cool and strain, then spray on the seedlings, making sure to get the stems. If using as a soil drench, straining isn’t as needed.
Now that you’ve got the knowledge to be pro-active in controlling damping off, as well as some tips and tools to treat it when it shows up, you should have a great start to a prolific garden this year!
Overwintering Cucamelons
Cucamelons can act as a perennial if you are lucky enough to live in a climate where they can produce tubers, or radish-like roots. The first year they will produce as normal by starting to fruit around July until the first frost stops them. As they start to slow down, search around in the soil by gently exposing some of their roots to see if they have produced tubers. They will be a white to off white color and look something like radishes. If you see them, you can store them in a protected area over the winter and replant them next spring for extra early and larger harvests of cucamelons!
To store them, gently lift them out of the soil and stored in very slightly moist compost or potting soil in a cool but frost-free area. Next spring, wake them up by transplanting into pots early to mid-April in moist compost or potting soil and place them in a well-lit, sunny room. Plant in the garden into warm soil after the last frost date. These second year plants will take off sooner, producing flowers and fruit much earlier, giving you a longer season and greatly increased harvest.
If you live in an area that doesn’t get much frost, then you can overwinter the roots in place by insulating with 6 – 8 inches of straw mulch and lightly moistening it. They will be able to survive temperatures down to freezing with this approach. To ensure that the roots are less likely to rot in the cool moist soil, make sure that there is plenty of sand in the soil to allow the excess moisture to drain away.
If desired, the roots can be gently uncovered and transplanted much like above after overwintering in place to increase your yearly harvest.