Seaweed: A "Brown" or a "Green"?

Last night at least 21 Haines gardeners gathered at the library - called together by Master Gardeners George Figdor, Alexandra Feit, and others. It was fun. There were prizes - (where there is George, prizes are nearly always nearby!) - generously donated by Haines Home Building.

This question came up: Should seaweed be considered a nitrogen source (a "green" in lasagna gardening lingo) or a carbon source ("brown")? Opinions differed.

Feeling feisty, I was quite willing to offer my first born to defend my position that seaweed does not belong in the "green" group. But I did and do feel guilty about being so opinionated backed up only by memory of previous research. So here is a little new news about seaweed and it's role in the development of the nitrogen content of your soil.

W. A. Stephenson, in his classic book, Seaweed in Agriculture & Horticulture states:

Basically, the addition of seaweed leads to a temporary diminution of nitrogen available for crops, then a considerable augmentation of the nitrogen total.

When seaweed, or indeed any undecomposed organic matter, is put into the soil, it is attacked by bacteria which break the material down into simpler units -- in a word, decompose it. To do this effectively the bacteria need nitrogen, and this they take from the first available source, the soil. This means that after seaweed has been added to the soil, there is a period during which the amount of soil nitrogen available to plants is reduced. During this period seed germination, and the feeding and growth of plants, can be inhibited to greater or lesser degree. This temporary nitrogen deficiency is brought about when any undecomposed vegetable matter is added to the soil. In the case of straw, for example, which is ploughed in after harvest, bacteria use up soil nitrogen in breaking down its cellulose, so that a 'latent' period follows. Farmers burn stubble after harvest to avoid this latent period, and the short-term loss of available nitrogen which causes it. But such stubble-burning is done at the cost of soil structure, soil fertility, and long-term supplies of nitrogen which ultimately would have been released from the decomposed straw.

So, seaweed, through the bacteria it adds to your soil, facilitates nitrogen, but it, in and of itself, doesn't "contain" nitrogen in any appreciable amount. The quote also adds the cautionary note about that period of time when the carbon you add to the soil takes up nitrogen and your soil, if tested during that period, will test "nitrogen deficient." It's really not. It's just busy. But it also explains why fresh seaweed put on your garden during the growing season is not a soil amendment. It's good for mulch; but as an amendment, let it compost first.


Stephenson's book, and other neat books about seaweed, is available at Acres subtitled, "The original Eco-Ag bookstore."
Check it out. There are at least 4 reasonably priced items on seaweed.

Don't Miss The Haines Energy Fair! Saturday, February 28, 10:00 AM - 3:00 PM

Come to the first ever Haines Energy Fair! This is a celebration of energy conservation, energy efficiency, and renewable energy. To help, the Haines Borough Assembly declared a sales tax holiday for all products related to energy conservation, efficiency, and renewable energy sold at the Fair. That's a 5.5% discount!

A couple of highlights....

There will be a compact fluorescent bulb (CFL) exchange. Bring an incandescent energy slurping bulb and trade it in for an energy sipping CFL.

Get a look at the spacey LED streetlights the Haines Borough is considering. Step into a dark room and compare them to the conventional high pressure sodium (HPS) lights now installed. The LEDs consume 65-78% less energy than the HPS, but...do you like them? Check it out!

Holiday Lights

I love holiday lights. When I was mistress of my own power system, I turned on strings of little incandescent lights as soon as it got dark. Why not? I was running a 5KW Northern Lights diesel generator and I was told that it could use the “load.” Then I went on the grid. I couldn’t be happier, but I had to get smarter. It turns out that those incandescent lights are little suckers – perfect when I wanted to put a load on the generator, not so great when I am paying per KWH for the pleasure of the twinkling ambiance.

So I set out to figure out how much I was paying for my incandescent holiday lights. According to Save Energy, the traditional incandescent bulb used for holiday lights is called a C7. Each bulb on a string uses 6 watts. So a typical strand of 50 lights uses 300 watts or .3 KWH. We pay for our electricity per KWH. At the AP&T current residential rate of $.1444/KWH, one strand of incandescent lights costs $.04 an hour. Not bad. But hey, who has just ONE strand and who leaves the lights on for just ONE hour? Today, for example, I turned my lights on at noon! I don’t expect to turn them off until I go to bed – 11 maybe. So that’s $.44. And guess what? I don’t have one strand! No. I have 6! So, that’s $.04 x 6 x 11 or $2.64. And that’s just today. But realistically, let’s say on average I turn these lovely lights on for 6 hours each day during the holiday months of November and December. Thirty days has November, but December has 31. So that’s 61 x 6 hours x 6 strings x $.04/KWH per string = $87.84!! That’s quite a bump in my electric bill.

So, here’s what I’m going to do. I’m not giving up lights. I’m just giving up incandescent lights. I’m switching to LEDs. Let’s see how this work out. Each LED bulb uses .08 watts, so a 50-bulb string uses 4 watts, which is .004 KWH. (Convert watts into kilowatt-hours by dividing watts by 1000). At our residential AP&T rate of $.1444, .004 KWH is $.00058. Let’s see. Using the same formula as I did with the incandescents, $.00058 x 6 x 6 = $.02088 for 6 strands of LED lights on 6 hours. If I ran them for 61 days at that rate, I will add $1.27 to my electric bill – a savings of $86.57 – almost enough to pay for the 6 new strands of lights which cost me $14.99 per strand at a Howser’s here in Haines. Presto. The “savings” nearly pays for itself. And oddly, the longer I leave them on the more I “save.”

I have to point out that the most savings would come from not having any holiday lights on at all! It’s been said, and I can’t deny it, that the cheapest unit of electricity is the one you don’t use. That means don’t plug in those incandescents AND don’t buy the new LEDs. If you decide to plug in your old lights because after all, they still work, don’t they? – you are burning a lot of money with absolutely no return to yourself in savings – because in addition to using very little electricity to glow, LEDs have an exceptionally long life.

But it’s the holidays and holidays are for a little splurging – however, in these tough economic times, I’m for a splurge that ends up in a save. How about you?

The "Rack"

My blogging has been pre-empted by my new job as coordinator for the Haines Borough Energy & Sustainability Commission. I have been buried in numbers. I know exactly how many gallons of heating fuel municipally owned facilities consumed over the past 2.5 years; and exactly how many kilowatts were used. And exactly how much it costs. Next stage: how to reduce that use by 5-7% percent. Stay tuned.

But right now, let's consider the "rack," because Thursday, October 16, at 9:05 AM I have to introduce the rack to the Haines Borough Library Board of Trustees. Not that they aren't already well aware of the rack. They have, in fact, rejected the rack. At the September Board meeting, the Board declined to allow Cooperative Extension materials to be available, in the rack, at the Haines Borough Public Library. The reason: if one organization is allowed to disseminate materials at the library, then all organizations should be allowed a similar privilege. Then it follows that the library may be overwhelmed, and, perhaps, even forced to become host to some unacceptable broadsides.

There's a little history here. Interest in Cooperative Extension services and information was re-awakened in Haines as a result of the Master Gardener's class that was held in May, minting 17 new Master Gardeners, adding to the group graduated about 5 years ago. We re-discovered the volumes of Alaska-centered growing, gathering, and preserving information published by the University of Alaska, Cooperative Extension Service. It used to be that you could browse these publications in Enid Verbon's Community Education Office, or in the Garden Shed at Haines Home Builders. No longer, no more.

After leaving Haines, the Cooperative Extension service notified me that they had received a grant to buy pocket shelves to put materials in outlying sites. Would Haines like to put a shelf in its library? I checked with the former director, who checked his policies, and said, "Sure. That works." Time passed. The rack and materials arrive. The director moves on. The status of the rack is brought before the Board in September and the Board says, "No, that won't work," for the reason stated above.

What am I to do with the rack? I would like the Library Board to reconsider. I think making University of Alaska Cooperative Extension materials available in the Haines Borough Public Library signals a linkage between the University and the Library - a sensible linkage, perhaps even the beginning of a meaningful partnership. I think that the offer of the rack by the Cooperative Extension Service is an opportunity and it would be a shame to miss it. What do you think? Take the survey. Thanks.

Stems, Weeds, Purple Cows, and Flowers Gone to Seed

Thanks to a grant from the State of Alaska, Department of Natural Resources, Division of Agriculture, I attended the Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers 2008 National Conference, Growers’ School, and Trade Show in Portland, OR, Sept. 8-11. Within minutes of starting Growers’ School at 8 AM, I began to build a new frame of reference for my incipient flower growing business. I am a flower “farmer” and my dahlias, lilies, cosmos, snap dragons are my “crop” from which I produce "stems." I also learned about two routes to success: you might be able to grow a “purple cow” or perhaps just as good - produce a crop that “grows like a weed.”

A “purple cow” is a crop that you can produce that no one else is producing. But you know what happens to purple cows – they can become quickly common and lose their advantage. The orange calla lily is apparently a purple cow gone awry. Pat Zweifel of Oregon Coastal Flowers had so many orders for orange callas last year he couldn’t fill them. Reasonably, this year he doubled his crop, and as these things seem to go, suddenly interest in orange callas dropped off. But still, callas must be the right crop for Zweifel because they seemed, at least to me, to “grow like weeds” on his place in Tillamook. From start up in 1994, Oregon Coastal has become the largest supplier of fresh cut callas in the United States.

The owner of Bear Creek Floral, also in Tillamook, introduced us to a reigning purple cow that also grows like a weed: the purple artichoke. Despite the fact that Bear Creek’s fields were inundated with two feet of water last December, this year’s artichoke crop is a good as ever. Apparently, Bear Creek is enviably cloud-covered, more so than lands a half-mile to the east or west, and the misty days are exactly what are required for tasty artichokes. The situation at Bear Creek illustrates the edge a farmer can have when a crop is chosen that is suited to the microclimate and soil type. Actually, that is the secret to weed-like crops. Know your soils; know your microclimate. Although I might absolutely love to grow carnations, I better huddle up to my sedum if I want a profitable field grown crop. More on sedum later.

Back to the artichoke. It has more relevance to the flower grower than you might at first think. It represents a multiple use crop. If you “miss” the correct harvest time for the edible artichoke, let it go to seed and harvest the gorgeous artichoke flowers. Or let’s say the petals on a flower get tattered, making it otherwise unattractive. Pull them off. Use the center. Use the foliage. Sometimes florists even prefer this. Apparently there is a market for Echinacea centers. Same thing with cosmos. The petals shatter quickly. Pick ‘em off. Use the foliage. The whole idea of using seedpods, centers, and foliage without its flower in arrangements was new to me and has opened up a whole new set of possibilities for my flower bouquet business aspirations.

Well, artichokes will definitely not “grow like weeds” in my fields in Haines, Alaska, but I do have other plants that grow amazingly well in my location: cosmos, dahlias, lilies, monkshood, iris, astilbe, mint, hosta. And when I saw an acre of sedum growing at Oregon Flowers, Aurora, Oregon , I nearly flipped. I have a new appreciation for this plant, which not only “grows like a weed” for me, but has felt like one too. Look for it in my future flower arrangements!

Upper Chilkat Valley Garden Tour

Haines Master Gardeners and friends toured four gardens Monday, July 28: Klukwan Community Garden, Lani Hotch's garden, the Gunn/Kistler Garden at 36 Mile, and the Ramsey garden at 9 Mile Haines Highway. There are a few pictures posted at the end of the blog.

I took away a sense that we eaters are in good hands.

Spinach bolts for me and my beets are bitty. Not so in the Klukwan Community Garden. Lani showed us the Savoy and New Zealand spinach with leaves bigger than my hand; and beets ready to eat. Mardell showed us kohlrabi, purple broccoli, and red ripe tomatoes.

Mandy introduced us to her pea experiment: she soaked some peas in ascorbic acid (Vitamin C) and some she just soaked. The peas are planted as side by side as possible to control for environmental differences. Neither was treated with innoculant. The vitamin C soaked peas are patently larger plants. Stay tuned to see if they produce more succulent peas! See the photo below.

We were lucky to have Charlotte Jewell come along with us. She was over for the Fair from Jewell Gardens in Skagway. I loved hearing Charlotte humbly offer the scientific names of plants. Centaura montana, what I call "wild bachelor button." I confessed to her that I have made, repeatedly, 3x5 cards identifying the scientific name of my crops and favorite flowers endeavoring to commit those elegant terms to memory - to no avail. Maybe it's because I don't understand the system. Why are cabbage and kale and rape coles and brassicas, but broccoli is only brassica? So much to learn. Charlotte has graciously invited us to tour Jewell Gardens. We organized quickly to take up her offer. Seventeen of us are Skagway bound Friday.

We were also accompanied by Darren Snyder from the Cooperative Extension Service, Juneau office, also in Haines for the Fair. We peppered Darren with questions about plants that seem to be diseased. Powdery mildew seemed to be a common affliction - perhaps because this season has been exceptionally moist and cool. This unattractive fungus literally sucks the life out of its host. Anchorage gardener and photographer, Fran Durner (Talk Dirt to Me, A Cure for Powdery Mildew?) writes that, "Once infected, it is unlikely you will ever rid your plant of the fungus though you can try to control it with good horticultural practices and fungicides, either commercial or organic." Based on the description of the disease cycle from Cornell University, it seems like it might be a good idea to just pitch out the infected plant.

The fungi which cause powdery mildew are spread by spores produced in the white patches. These spores are blown in the wind to other parts of the plant or to other plants during the growing season. ... During the winter the fungus survives on infected plant parts and in debris such as fallen leaves. It may produce resting structures known as cleistothecia, which resist harsh winter conditions. These will appear as small black dots within the white powdery patches. The next spring, sexual spores (ascopores) are released from the cleistothecia, shot up into the air, and carried by air currents to leaves of plants where new infections will begin. During the growing season, the fungus produces asexual spores (conidia) that help the fungus to spread and infection to build.

But if you are brave or just love that plant, cut off the diseased tissue, then try to dislodge some of those spores. Durner recommends hosing off the plant early in the morning to remove spores and then treating the plant with a fungicide. Fungicides don't have to be as nasty as they sound. Durner gives this recipe from the Integrated Pest Management Office of Alaska. (Here is the link to Alaska Integrated Pest Management, but the page labeled "Insects & Diseases" is currently "under construction." It's worth bookmarking the site, though. It should be valuable when it is finished.)

Mix 1 tablespoon baking soda, 2 1/2 tablespoons vegetable oil with one gallon of water. Shake this up thoroughly. To this, add 1/2 teaspoon of pure castille soap. Spray the upper and lower leaf surfaces and spray some on the soil. Repeat every 5-7 days as needed.

I am sure that every gardener returning from the Upper Valley tour went home and inspected their own with a critical eye. I know that George Figdor did. And right away, he recognized powdery mildew on his zucchinis! Turning to the Internet, he discovered that a spray of skim milk, applied early in the morning is the recommended "fungicide." Others spray with milk as well. According to Durner, Camille Williams of the Anchorage Garden Club uses a mixture of 1 part milk (any kind) to 3 parts water for years.

And that's why we make these field trips: to learn from each other how to recognize and treat trouble before we are sunk. And to lavish praise and appreciation on the artistry and hard work underlying every single garden. Thanks so much to our hosts Lani Strong, Doris Peck, Bonnie Sears, Mardell Gunn, and Mandy Ramsey.

Will This Lasagna Recipe "Work"?

Check it out. What will happen to the seeds and pansy plant planted in the "lasagna garden" during the Southeast Alaska State Fair, July 25th? What will happen to the beds themselves? Will the 30-inch high beds de-compose significantly? When will the layers settle into 6-8 inches of workable soil as advertised?

Leanne Converse and I, two newly minted Alaskan Master Gardeners, constructed a 12 x 60 x 30 inch high lasagna bed in the Community Garden during the Southeast Alaska State Fair last Friday. Keeping our materials wet was easy. It rained. A lot.

We started "traditionally" with a 2-3 inch layer of cardboard and newspaper, soaked over night. Then we covered that that with a 2-inch layer of forest soil and peat moss. After that, we added a twist. We made stew: two batches - a huge carbon stew and another huge nitrogen stew. The carbon stew consisted of equal parts (by volume) of seaweed, leaves, straw, and shredded paper. The nitrogen stew was equal parts coffee grounds, kitchen scraps including egg shells, and grass clippings. So, our beds are layered as follows: carbon stew, soil/peat mixture, nitrogen stew, soil/peat mixture - repeated, ending with a carbon stew covered with a soil/peat mix.

Most "lasagna garden" instructions do recommend that you use a variety of nitrogen and carbon ingredients, but generally this is understood to be separate layers of different nitrogen mediums and separate layers of different carbon mediums. For example, you might have seaweed, soil, grass clippings, soil, straw, kitchen scraps, soil, and so on.

Will our "stew" approach make any difference - positive or negative? Belatedly, the Juneau agent for the Cooperative Extension Service, Darren Snyder, gently pointed out that it is going to be hard to tell since we did not build a "control" bed in the more typical fashion. Although I have thriving lasagna beds at home, built earlier this summer using single layers of each carbon or nitrogen rich element, they are not comparable to the bed Leanne and I built at the Fair given the differences in size, location, date of inception, and materials. If I were still teaching, I think I would propose a year long science project, setting up systematically varied beds this fall on the school grounds.

There are other questions too. For example, should a lasagna garden end with a soil covered nitrogen layer, or a soil covered carbon layer? We ended with a soil covered carbon layer, thinking that a nitrogen layer might grow too "hot," thus inhibiting the growth of the seeds or burning the roots of the plant. Leanne has a compost thermometer and plans to take the bed's temperature occasionally.

Try to stop by and check it out. Make some observations. Oh, and by the way, if you see some escaped shredded paper, please forgive us. That stuff is hard to control!