Some commentary and practical examples from our vegetable garden as we enter a third drought year in southern Hampshire. Key lessons are go for overwintering varieties if possible, try to find drought resistant plants, cover the soil to conserve moisture, and mulch with grass cuttings or other suitable material including polythene, hairdresser waste and cardboard.
Let’s have YOUR tips!
31 Comments
Drought, I know just how you feel. We had a horrible summer last year here in Texas and this year looks like another dry one. I'm keeping my orchard watered and a much small garden this year. A lot of people I know are doing the "Back to Eden "garden concept.
Dry as a bone here in Norfolk, plus a hosepipe ban now in effect.
I have been using chopped conifer cuttings as an experimental mulch.
Best use for the damn weeds I think. 🙂
a friend of mine used trenches along the rows to water which lets the water go down into the soil under the plant making the roots grow deeper,i water lots but less often to get the same effect but may not do as well looking at the results. i do get stronger plants than just watering normaly just not as much produce, i also use grass trimmings to protect the soil even though some books say not to, this year i may also use cumfrey leaves if they do not attract slugs
Croatia is suffering the same lack of rain. Your comments about how you deal with human waste is revealing and very useful, thanks.
i wish i can do gardening, i really miss it.
As for tips in drought i recommend saving the water from your kitchen sink for gardening.
You can also use a bin-bag to cover the soil to keep from water evaporation.
But the most economical means is to water the plant where the root is.
Experience from Australia
-long grass for insulation, humidity and cool.
-stone mulch the trees, unlike normal mulch it doesnt steal water for itself.
-fortnightly application of a liquid fertiliser. A trowel-full manure soaked in bucket of water for 2 days, looks like a strong tea. Dilute 1 to 20 parts water and apply half a bucket to each tree. It is not high nitrogen, main function is to apply a solution with high biological load to maintain soil life and fertility.
All the best Stephen.
Great video. Thank you.
As Garrisonpea mentioned, Back to Eden has been an inspiration for me. I also like the hugelkulture idea of gardening. I'm doing a combination of sheet mulching, hugelkulture and Back to Eden with the heavy mulch on top. Soil does not see the sun in nature. I gave up on my garden in the heat of our Texas summer last year. I've read more on desert gardening than for my own region, it just seems more practical in this drought. Really keeping my fingers crossed for this years experiments!
I've been experimenting with a drip-system using polythene bottles (2L and 5L) on my trees. I have seen a video here on YouTube of a variant in which an inverted and split polythene bottle received the drippings and distribuited them randomly. Its better shown than described.
I will be building a 6X4m losely covered reservoir on my father's property, to try to maximize any rainfall, using inverted unbrella receptacles over barrels. It has rained a bit already, but its just not enough.
Great Video Colonel!!
.
.
★★★★★
have you ever heard of permaculture?
Should get some rain tomorrow. Yay rain!!
you need to research hugelkulture. basically, bury wood, cover with soil. the wood retains water like a sponge over the course of the summer and as it breaks down you get nutrients added to the soil, and no, it does not tie up all of your nitrogen like a tilled in woodchip would.
We have about 1,500 litres of stored rainwater in linked polythene butts that collect the run off from our apple store and cider house, and we'd be in trouble without it, but it won't last too long. I suspect that adapting to drought may be something we will have to do and there will not be one solution but a tool box of strategies. Reservoirs small and large will certainly be one aspect.
Stephen, I would recommend the Ruth Stout method of heavily mulching with straw. Here in Southern California, a near constant drought area, I successfully grow tomatoes, leafy greens, corn, courgettes, egg plant (aubergine), and so on with very little to no watering at all with this method.
It may be worth your time watching a film called "Back To Eden Film." I can't recommend the method as I've not tried it yet, but the film is impressive. It has a great deal to do with the topic you are covering here.
I second @docsimonson in suggesting "Back to Eden" as a great watch…
We also garden with wicking beds… They hold moisture in a reservoir in the base.. More suitable to smaller beds but we have found them to work great here during the last 2 years of a 10 year drought…
google -colin austin wicking garden beds- & some good sites come up.. waterright is the one that put us onto them… We have a few clips on them as well as a post or 2 on our blog..
HTH some..
Rob
hope ya'll get some rain soon.it was hot and dry here last summer .i had real good luck with lucullus chard it took alot of 100F plus days.this sun seems to me to be so much more intense the last 2 years. i am afraid its going to be a rough gardening year for a lot of us.
Yes, MULCHING! I'm not a farmer myself, but creating an environment much like what nature itself would make, is ideal. Check out the wonderful documentary, ONE STRAW REVOLUTION (parts I & II), on YouTube. Hope you find it useful, Stephen & Julia! 🙂
Thanks for all these great suggestions, I will certainly look into the 'Back to Eden' film. As you can see from the video this is something we've thought about and found some solutions that work for us, but the more contributions the better as people's gardening situations vary and there is unlikely to be one solution.
I'm no anti-capitalist, but its a fact that big corporations can't make any money from research into drought gardening. So its up to us enthusiastic amateurs to share ideas
This has been a concern of mine. I have already leveled my nice raised bed system. They are not very good for dry springs. Although I did well with parsnips in them. I'm moving more towards perennials, such as asparagus and good king Henry. I have had a drip feed system on the tomatoes in the green house for a few years now. And find it uses much less water(Also much with grass clippings or spent hops).
I have invested in a solar water pump, which hopefully fill a elevated 1000lt from a well.
Also an Aussie… Living in the driest state of the driest continent in the world :).
Have to agree that the top 3 are
Heavy mulching, targeted dripper irrigation, and choosing varieties that can handle the conditions!
Good soil is so important. Applying soil wetting agents may also be necessary…
I do hope rain finds you. Nothing as frustrating as repeated droughts for farmers and orchardists.
Be sure and video that wonderful rain event when it happens. And congratulations on keeping what sounds like a positive attitude. Dry trees make me unreasonably grumpy.
Thank you again Stephen and Julia for another video. I have linked waterbutts on the downpipes of my house / outbuildings. I then use a waterbutt pump (Hozelock brand and excellent) to pump excess water from my waterbutts when available to my veg plot about 70m away into further drums used for storage and can dip a watering can into. Once storage is full and more rain is predicted i then treat bushes / trees. I do not use this 'grey' water on leaf crops that are going to be eaten raw eg salads.
A further suggestion : Babbington's leeks are native perennial plants that produce a large garlic like bulb and lovely garlicky leeks that make superior leek and potato soup and are cropping now ,easy care , just weed and occasional compost mulch and they are perennial. I plant mine near fruit bushes / trees and they seem to be complimentary as crop before fruit in full leaf.. Haven't dug up the bulbs, just cut the leeks below the surface like asparagus in early spring. Propagate via bulbils
Ps … Last year I bought a pallet load of secondhand fruit juice drums from a company called D&V Fuels of North Wales to use as waterbutts …. very good value and they will fit taps to the drums for you … recycling and the drums are more substantial and much cheaper than waterbutts from a garden centre ! I have no financial interest in the company by the way and live in sunny Suffolk !
instead of mulching I use appliance boxes (Very large cardboard) and completely cover my garden to the best of my ability. then for tomatos cucumbers squash etc. I just cut a small hole just large enough to transplant the plant in. It keeps the soil moist and prevents weeds also by the end of the growing season its fairly rotted and then becomes good compost.
PS it has rained heavily over the last week. For which we are thankful.
there is an old country thyme
'No one so surely pays his debt
as wet to dry, as dry to wet.'
We've had the same problem here near Toronto, Canada in the past decade for some of the years. I am thinking of possibly putting down a tarp with holes cut out to plant my tomatoes, peppers and similar crops over a freshly watered bed. The moisture should stay in for several weeks that way. I've experimented doing the same thing in a raised bed and it worked well.
I live in Texas and we have also been experiencing a record drought but with a little relief in the last few months. Even without a drought, Central Texas has hot dry summers. In my desperate effort to garden I found clay pot (olla) irrigation. Maybe not the answer for large scale but a perfect solution for me!
Have you looked into how the chili growers in New Mexico & Arizona do it? I am in NM & we regularly go 3 or 4 months without any rain yet these guys have a huge chili crop. You can be driving through the desert with nothing green in sight & top a hill & there is a giant green field. No doubt,some of it is irrigation but they have to have some techniques to preserve water. I have no idea,I am just looking for tips for a very small hobby garden. Anyways,just a thought.