This summer we had an unexpected visitor in many of the garden raised beds. I was first excited thinking it was just renegade corn. Maybe, a bird dropped some seed. Maybe a four legged creature dropped it off. But it did look different. So, I decided to let it grow and see what it turned out to be.

The green plant grew longer and longer but it did not act like corn stalks even though it grew like corn.  Gardner’s started to complain at least hinted they would like to vacate this green monster. 

My wife Pat and the garden worker Brysedi grabbed a shovel and started to dig and dig. The more they dug more roots were found. This was defiantly no corn.  This was Johnson grass.  What is Johnson grass?

It is a warm season grass originated in the Mediterranean region. It was introduced to North America by Colonel William Johnson in the 1840’s. According, to an article from Oklahoma Cooperative Extension Service written December 2019, “Johnson seedling can resemble a corn or sorghum seedling: its stems and leaves are narrower and completely hairless. Johnson leaves have a very distinct and promenade vain. It can grow as high as 7 feet tall. The roots and rhizomes travel underground. If pulled and a root remains the plant will return.”  

There are several ways to control this invasive grass. Some say use Round up but you know me that is not the way I recommend. However, it can be last resort. The best way, is get it out of the ground as soon as you see its head rise up. Make sure you get the roots, all of the roots. Do not let it take over. If it is really bad spray with 40 percent vinegar solution and cover the plot for at least 9 months. Don’t let this visitor fool you it is not welcome to the garden. It needs to go as soon as it arrives.

This is not corn.

John Krabacher

I will admit I am no expert in gardening or even farming but I am learning advantages of techniques every year. After receiving the vision of growing food and feeding people by producing vegetables on land that was not gardened before, many that know me, thought I was crazy. Maybe, I was, 5 years later I have realized not crazy just passionate.

Recently, my wife and I came across some facts by watching two videos on You Tube “Kiss the Ground” and “Living Soil”.  I will tell you some of the recent facts.  Sit back and read on.

I do believe in climate change, but I was not sure until recently what was causing it. I was not sure it was industrial, but I am sure it is agriculture, the worldwide farming practices, especially in the USA. Farmers trying to get more and more yield on the land by adding chemicals produced by the larger companies. Artificial fertilizers and pesticides.

Let us look at why we till and recently no till is popular. According to an article “Renewing the Soil” Farms around the world, people are working as hard as they can to produce crops only to see production decrease with each passing year of soil fertility.   When we till according to “Kiss the Ground” carbon is released into the air. Wait, is that science says of the causes of climate change? Farmers and gardeners are moving toward no till options. I know you will say the samething I say, “No till is more work.” I will say, yes, it is. However, you can get larger yield production and after the soil is restored it will become your friend and help to grow more flowers or vegetables.

The soil is not a living organism, it does provide a place where organisms live. These organisms interact with the air, water, inert elements in the soil. When these organisms are killed and not able to reproduce, the topsoil suffers can even be killed.

Soil organisms can come alive again by adding organic matter and microbes. Adding organic matter promotes beneficial bacteria growth, improves oxygen levels, and enhances soil quality and texture. You can make your own home brew of soil conditional by making your own compost or adding fermented food wastes to soil. Adding soil conditioner can also loosen compacted soil for easier planting.

Helping the soil can help the gardener or farmer to produce more than ever expected. Dodge the big companies and go natural.

We made a decision when we started the garden a few years back, to do raised beds. Raised beds have some awesome advantages over gardening in the ground. To start with, to start a garden in the ground requires breaking up soil that has been in place who knows how long! This can be back breaking work even with a rototiller, which most of us don't just have in the garage! Working existing soil means that it has had something growing in it before - grass and likely weeds. If it didn't have weeds, it likely has some kinds of chemical in it that was used to control the weeds. I for one, don't want what ever those chemicals might be, to be in my food.

Weeds are a normal companion to growing anything outdoors. The seed blow in the wind. By starting with raised beds, we started with almost a foot of soil and compost that had never been walked on. The beds we put in at Madison St. were primarily 4' x 12' or 4' x 24' the first year. We did have some beds that were done in tractor tired that made it somewhat easier for people who wanted to garden but had some trouble working down low. We also got a lot of mulch to hinder the weeds. Even when you got weeds, if you were diligent and didn't let them become monsters, they are easy to pull in the virgin soil.
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This past year we tried some more traditional gardening when we plowed up some of the land at Westlake to plant corn. This was not the year to start trying that out with the early rains, and then no rain later. We will be dining it again this coming year.
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The first article I want to refer you to is a short piece on Square Foot Gardening. This is interesting and if you want more information on it there are books on it at the New Carlisle Public Library.
Next time I will talk some about the concept of permaculture

In the Fall of 2018, John and I went to the Tecumseh School Board and asked if we could lease the site of the old Westlake Elementary School. They agreed to lease it to us for $1 a year.

This site is 9.4 acres! 409464 square feet!!!! Now part of that is paved parking lot - a guess would be 2000 square feet of parking lot. The population of New Carlisle was estimated at  5,586 (2017). That means a bit more than 72 square feet per person in New Carlisle. Since John has an estimate that 16 square feet can provide enough vegetables for 1 person,  that means we have enough space there alone to feed more than 89,000 people! Free! (well, realistically we can probably not provide THAT much seed and plants!. I do get a thrill out of thinking about the entire city working together to feed themselves though!),
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With all of that land to maintain we really couldn't mow it with hand mowers. John was able to secure a grant from the National Church of the Brethren's Going to the Garden program (  http://www.brethren.org/peacebuilding/going-to-the-garden.html ) to purchase a tractor so that we could be good neighbors with a nice "yard."

In the spring the City of New Carlisle provided us space and OSU Ag Extension sent out people to teach how to plant seeds (some common garden veggies need to be planted in the early spring). And later they sent out someone to help us learn to transplant successfully. 

In the summer we had 12 families gardening 28 personal beds of 42 raised beds at the Madison Street Garden. We had families and individuals, men, women, boys and girls, pre-teens and a nonagenarian and 25% of our participants were Hispanic! Of the remaining beds, 2 were set up as perennial herb beds and the rest were common beds containing potatoes, pumpkins, salad greens, tomatoes, and onions. There was also 2 large in-ground beds one of which was community corn and the other was Three Sisters plantings (corn, squash and beans). 

Some of the common beds were used to provide produce to sell at the Farmers' Market, and produce for for the Bethel Churches United Food Pantry that serves our community.

2016 Was the first year that OSU Ag Extension commented on the diversity in our gardens compared to other community gardens in Clark County.

The two grants we got that first year paid for a lot of lumber and nails, good top soil and mulch (provided with a very generous discount by Professional Property Maintenance), and a shed.

The New Carlisle Church of the Brethren loaned us there kitchen on Thursday evening for a few weeks and OSU Ag Extension sent out an instructor to teach food preservation. We made some awesome salsa! 
OSU Ag Extension also came out to the library in the fall and taught us how to save seeds and thereby reduce our investment in the coming years!
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The weather was great and everything grew like gang busters (including the weeds!).  I personally got enough from my beds to can and freeze.... a lot! I still have salsa and V-8/9 on the shelves in my kitchen!