Orchard People

[00:00:00] Introduction to the Urban Forestry Radio Show
Welcome to the Urban Forestry Radio Show here on Reality Radio 101. In this radio show and podcast, we learn about fruit trees, permaculture, aboriculture, and so much more. So if you love trees, and especially fruit trees, or if you're interested in living a more sustainable life, then this is the place for you.
I'm your host, Susan Poizner, of the fruit tree care training website, OrchardPeople. com. Thanks for tuning in! And enjoy the show.
Welcome to the Urban Forestry Radio Show with your host Susan Poizner. To contact Susan live right now, send her an email. instudio101 at gmail dot com.
And now your host of the Urban Forestry Radio Show, Susan Poizner.
[00:01:05] Weather and Its Impact on Orchards
Hi everyone. Wow, it's been a big year this year for crazy weather. Have you seen those images of flooding in Texas? They're so scary. And if you're a listener there, I really hope you keep safe and stay dry. It seems that more and more, the weather around the world is getting really strange.
Here in Canada, we've also had our share of strange weather recently. We have warm winters when it should be cold and wet summers when it should be dry. And when the weather is just right, it is so important for us to thank the universe and for us to go out and enjoy it. So right now in Toronto, the weather is getting cooler, it's sunny, it's breezy, and it's a perfect time to enjoy and celebrate the harvest by visiting a local orchard.
I love wandering around and admiring the beautiful fruit trees. And I love tasting and buying delicious and different cultivars of apples and other fruit. But the thing is, when I visit orchards, I also learn a lot.
[00:02:12] Interview with Gaye Trombley of Avalon Organic Orchards
And a while back, I visited Avalon. It's called Avalon Organic Orchards in Ontario. And I met the owner, Gaye Trombley.
So Gaye grows thousands of disease resistant apple trees in her orchard. She features unusual cultivars like Galarina, Redfree, Pristine, and NovaMac. And I asked her, of course, what her secret of success is. This was her answer. If you have good soil, you'll have healthy trees. And if you have healthy trees, you'll have great fruit.
And that has stuck with me ever since. But what happens if you're stuck with the crummy soil in your yard, which is hard as a rock and filled with construction rubbish? Or what if you live in a sandbox? Does that mean you can't plant fruit trees or grow anything at all? let's find out.
[00:03:05] Secrets to Great Soil with Liz Stell
In today's show, I'm going to chat with Liz Stell, author of a book called Secrets to Great Soil.
And she's on the line from the Berkshires in Massachusetts. Now, I recently discovered Liz's book and I gotta tell you, I really enjoyed it. It's illustrated. It takes the fear out of working to improve your soil. And during the show, if you have any questions for Liz about soil, you can email in those questions too. Or tell your story.
Like, how did you improve your soil? What's the soil like where you're growing your fruit trees, vegetables, and other crops? Again, send your email to instudio101 at gmail. com and I can't wait to hear what you have to say. Now, in the meantime, Liz Stell, author of Secrets to Great Soil, is on the line. Liz, can you hear me?
Yes, I can. Hi, Susan. Hey, thanks so much for coming on the show today. My pleasure. So first of all, I want to ask you, your book is beautiful. It's simple in a way, it's beautifully illustrated. What was your inspiration or what were your goals when you decided to write this particular type of book? I wanted to get other people interested in soil.
I've always been interested. I guess I've been a bit of a soil nerd. And there are books for soil nerds, people who are really into it. The people who aren't sure if they're into it or not, some of the books that were available 20 years ago were a little too technical or just assumed you were already converted to organic gardening.
the internet wasn't around 20 years ago, so I wanted, just to inspire people or intrigue people or make it seem like Soil was something that was easy to find out about and play around with. it's interesting because you say right off the bat, and like you say, you wrote this book a while back, it's I think a classic, it's beautiful, but why, what is it about soil that inspired you so much?
I gotta tell you when, if you're talking to people at a party and you say, I'm passionate about soil, I think they might look at you funny. It's possible it's a case of arrested development. I might be stuck back in mud pie land. I'm not sure. I liked mud pies as a kid, and I've always been interested in it.
Driving by highway construction, if you see a cutaway bank, the soils are different colors and different layers, and I just thought that was cool, and I wondered why. I just have always liked gardening, and I've been an environmentalist forever, so pretty early on I thought, even not so much strictly organic gardening, I just wanted to find out how to grow healthier plants without chemicals.
And that just increased my interest in soil because that's the way to do that. And when you think about it, I mean it's such, it's a thing like we walk on it all the time, we don't pay attention to it, but what a difference that good soil makes to how we eat or how we live and how we breathe. Good soil smells good.
It's fluffy when it's not wet. I, like sticking my hands in it, so maybe I am a little bit different, but I, think it's interesting. And the more, if you start playing around with it a little bit, I just think most people are bound to get a little bit interested anyway. I, certainly have found for myself growing fruit trees, and like I said in my introduction, it's so depends on the soil you'll have.
I will be working with a group and planting fruit trees in one location, and they jump out of the ground. And that, maybe we didn't do anything to amend the soil before. In another location, you think it's a perfect site, and the trees have such a hard time. your soil really makes a huge difference.
to how your trees and your plants will grow. So in your book, you have a chapter on evaluating your soil. Like, why do you think it's important to know what you've got? it helps you grow better plants. If you're interested in growing trees, you can, spend a lot of money on tree stock that dies.
If you have certain known problems, the, most important is, flooding or puddling. If you try to plant trees someplace where water collects after a rain, they're probably going to rot. Very few fruit trees will tolerate that. So the most obvious one is drainage. You need to see how the soil drains to make sure you don't have an area that turns into a swamp after a big rain.
And if you have heavy clay, it's, you have a little more work ahead of you to make the soil nice for trees. clay is, great stuff if you respect it. I have clay soils. I grew up on even more clay soils. And, if you don't compact them, if you, work with them, they grow. All kinds of food crops wonderfully.
Sand is the same. It can be wonderful. You just need to exert a little effort to make sure you're not watering every five minutes. And if you have, if you're going to try to grow blueberries on a limestone outcrop, you're going to have A really hard time and maybe you need to think about a different plant.
it really helps to know what you're starting with. Because you can improve many soils. See, I love what you said because I think what happens is so many of us, we come to a spot and we're like, okay, and I want to grow some blueberries here and some raspberries and then I'm going to put some fruit trees in and I'm good.
And it's all about you. It's all about me. It's all about what I want. And I think that the more that I do this, it's like, people come to me and say, Oh, we want to, I want to plant a food forest. And, again, it's a swampy site and I'm like, I think it's really admirable to plant a food forest, but I'm not sure that's the site for it.
so it's, it seems like when it comes to soil, there is no one size fit all, all soil is good in a way. maybe not some soils, urban soil, but it's all good in a way, but you have to find the right plant for the soil. Do you think? It's, a relationship. You work with each other.
You figure out what works. You come to an understanding of what's mutually beneficial. Absolutely. Yeah, just by testing. Yes. By trying to see what you've got. How often, when plant a new garden, will you do a soil test? Do you think that's important? I do. I have been fortunate to stay in one spot for 30 years, so I haven't done that for a while.
before you do a soil test, I would look at your site, partly to figure out the best spot to plant and the best spot to do a soil test. But what's, if you look carefully at what's already there, you'll get some idea. If it's a whole field of dandelions, It probably means, the area stays moist.
That might be because it's, it's poorly drained. It might be because there's clay. if you have fabulous chickweed, if you try a little vegetable garden and grow gorgeous spinach, those are two great test plants. If chickweed grows really well and if spinach grows really well, then most plants, trees, fruit bushes will grow really well.
Wow, that is amazing. That is very interesting. That's magic. If you don't happen, if you, before you plant spinach, if you want to know what you've got, in the U. S., you, most states will do soil testing through the cooperative. Extension Agency. Sometimes local master gardeners will do soil testing, but that might just be the pH, the acidity of the soil.
if you want to do organic gardening, it might be worth spending some money and getting a test from a, a company that specializes in organic farming. They'll tell you more about your soil. Then the Cooperative Extension agent will. But you'll have to pay a little money for that. They'll tell you about the organic content.
and just give you slightly different recommendations. A soil test is a great place to start out. you need to go, each site will have a, each testing lab will have a slightly different approach to how you dig your sample. You need to take a sample for more than one spot. So you need to follow the recommendations of your particular lab in order to get consistent results.
So that can be a head start if you don't know what plants and weeds to look, at. I guess I like what you said about, it's a relationship. It's like you getting to know the soil getting to know you, to see what you want, and what you want. it's interesting.
[00:13:04] Listener Questions and Soil Tips
We got, an email from listener Norman.
I don't know where Norman is from. Now, he, or Norman's opening a can of worm because he asks, what are Liz's thoughts on annually rototilling. Now, rototilling, oh my goodness, I think once it was like a standard, wasn't it? That's what you did every year, you rototilled your soil and you maybe put in some nice compost or something.
What are your feelings on rototilling? we used to have a rototiller, an ancient model and when I started out, yes, we rototilled our beds to get them started. I had some cover crops that I wanted to turn under. the rototiller being the same age as me, was a little bit cranky, so we gave that to a farmer friend and got a mini tiller, but pretty soon that just sat in the shed because, I started learning more about soil organisms, I also, In an earlier location, I double dug my beds, which, there was clay soil there, so there is, there are a few reasons for double digging.
That used to be a standard recommendation. It's a great way to burn calories. But, unless you have, real problem soils, that's not considered necessary. And, deeply disturbing the soil is, for most Gardeners, if you're not a farmer, there's really, there's not much reason to rototill. People have done it successfully.
I knew a fellow, when I was in college, one of the professors had beautiful raised beds because he had been tilling in leaves every fall for 30 years, and the beds just kept growing. growing higher and higher with more organic matter. his worms survived the rototilling. He must have warned them, all the worms and all the organisms, Hey guys, I'm going to till today, so you guys go down, right?
And I think, just for the listeners that don't know, there are so many organisms in the soil that we're learning more and more about. And we realize the more you disturb the soil, you're disturbing their habitat. And they're really important for healthy soil and for great vegetables and, great trees.
So I love what you said, some people got away with it forever. but so now you're saying the rototiller is in the shed. we've actually passed that along too. Oh wow, so it's not even on the property anymore. Okay, good to know. Nope. All right. Not needed, even if you want to. I now have switched over to mulching in my vegetable beds rather than, cultivating for weed control.
Occasionally, the scuffle hoe comes out when I get a little bit behind, and I don't mulch everything. But, mulching is a great way to suppress weeds. And, we used to think that, a generation ago, it was thought that rototilling is how you opened up the soil for better drainage. But, in fact, it's not.
Leaving it in place, so long as you're not at the bottom of a swamp, leaving the soil in place, the, organisms will create little channels for you. And that's what you're destroying when you rototill. So you're substituting, it's, the sledgehammer approach. I will make the soil more open.
Whereas the organ, organisms will do a more subtle version of bigger channels and little channels. Wow. In healthy soil. Oh, this assumes that the organisms have enough organic matter to feed on. If there's no organic matter, you won't have many, organisms to help you out. So maybe, and I think this is going to be a relevant point for the next question.
If there's not enough organic matter, is there even any organisms in your soil? So I've got this email from Kelly. Kelly is from Indiana. Kelly sounds like an interesting person. She says, I'm planting on. brownfield lots in an urban environment for a few different community garden projects. Each one has its own needs and micro environments, but the one thing that they all have in common is the fact that they only have dirt.
She says, I have dug down two feet in places and have not found one bug or a worm. Oh, she says it's a challenge and I could use your advice. We are planting everything from veggies to fruit and nut trees What can you suggest for us here in West Central, Indiana? Oh good question. Thank you very much Kelly.
So Wow What would you say to Kelly Liz? If money were no object, I would say Find the highest quality compost around and get a couple of truckloads. I suspect that she doesn't have money to cover all growing areas with two or three inches of lovely, compost. that's the ideal. Most of us can't quite afford that.
the second idea is Wait a little bit to plant trees, because trees are more expensive. Start with annual vegetables, and while you build the soil, I would, recommend buying a truckload of wood chips from an arborist. Not, the pretty cedar mulch that's all even, but, and maybe a local tree company will actually donate.
the chipped material that they've pruned off of people's trees, but if she can get a load of, from an arborist that has big trunks, little trunks, maybe leaves chopped in there too, just a nice messy mix of shredded trees, and if she can dump that on the site, and leave it for a year, she'll be okay.
thank you very much. create a haven for all kinds of wonderful fungal organisms. That's especially important for tree crops. So that would be a multi year plan. That would be a multi year plan, and in the short term, chopped leaves, compost, it's And in fact, if you're starting vegetable beds, this is a great time to mention trench composting, where you just dig a trench and fill it with whatever you can get.
Chopped leaves Get coffee grounds from a local coffee shop. Often they'll give them away. That's a nice source of nitrogen. fill trenches in areas that you want to be vegetable beds. And this Those should be ready next year for planting. And they'll definitely have more organisms.
If you can bring some compost from home, you might Bring a few earthworms with it. here, so let's summarize a little bit. So you've got some great ideas. so one idea was lots of wood chips, and I do think that if you say that you're a community gardener, you will get them donated. So a layer of wood chips, we're going to talk about trench composting, because I think it's an awesome idea.
Awesome idea. So Kelly will get some more interesting information about that in a few minutes. so yeah, so there's, there are a few things, and of course bringing in soil if she can afford it. We'll also talk about cover crops, and maybe that would be an option as well.
So here's Andy's email. Hi, Andy here from Belleville, Ontario. Just love your show.
Thank you so much, Andy. We love you as a listener. That was me writing. A question for your guest. My entire yard is clay. What can I do to improve it? Thank you. So is Andy's question similar to Kelly's? it sounds like Kelly, Andy's got clay, at least. Whereas Kelly's soil is like, sounds like it's just subsoil or something.
Who knows, what she's got? She just, we know what she doesn't have. Yes. Clay needs, organic matter in order to behave well, and it needs to not be compressed. bringing in organic matter, growing organic matter with cover crops. compost is great, and spread it where you need it most, and hope that, the organisms will slowly migrate into the rest of the area.
I'm not a huge fan of tilling up the whole area, but if it's really hard clay, then you could try a cover crop of Buckwheat or something to just grow your organic matter right on site. and I have turned it under by hand, but if you're doing a large lawn, that's that's a lot of calories. you may need to dust off the tiller then.
Rent one because you won't need it for long. Yes, yeah. All right, let's take a moment. Coming up in a minute, we're going to have a few words from our sponsors, but in the meantime, I'm reminding everybody, we'd love to hear your questions. We, I can't wait to talk to Liz about all your questions.
So send your email to instudio101 at gmail. com. Remember to include your first name and the city you're writing from. So again, the email is instudio101 at gmail. com. So Liz, are you okay holding the line for a minute? Sure. Great. now, but before the commercial break, I need to, share a secret about you with the listeners.
Is that okay? Can I share your secrets? Yes. That's good. I'm so glad you're not too private a person. Liz Stell is a person that has two passions. One of them is soil, and the other one is music. She's also a professional musician who specializes in music from historic times, and we're going to play some of her music.
During the show today so you can enjoy it.
Welcome back to the Urban Forestry Radio Show with your host, Susan Poizner, right here on Reality Radio 101. To contact Susan live, send her an email
instudio101atgmail. com.
And now right back to your host of the urban forestry radio show, Susan Poizner. You're listening to the Urban Forestry Radio Show on Reality Radio 101. I'm Susan Poizner from the Fruit Tree Care Training website, OrchardPeople. com. In this show, we talk about fruit trees, food forests, permaculture, and arboriculture.
Now, in today's episode, we're talking about soil with Liz Stell. Author of Secrets to Great Soil and a musician playing the songs, some of the songs we're listening today in the show. Secrets to Great Soil. Do you want to know all of those secrets? And you can also send in your questions for Liz. And I guess if you're sending in a question, we'll consider you an entry as well for the contest. And if you don't have a question, just send us an email anyways.
So Liz. You're still on the line, aren't you? I am. Hello again. Love your music. That was so fun. Sorry, we had a little mix up in the beginning. Somebody else's music snuck into the show.
[00:24:49] Trench Composting and Other Composting Methods
in the first part of the show, you mentioned trench, composting. what's it called? Trench composting is one form.
Trench composting. So let's talk about that because in your book you talk about all sorts of different ways to compost and you make it so simple it's wonderful, but the trench one is a little different. If I have an empty yard that I want to turn into a, let's say a vegetable garden, how would this trench composting work?
Yes. I'm going to talk about three, three related topics. One is trench composting, one is pit composting, and one is sheet composting. And they get easier as we go. but if you have a, if you like rectangular beds, then you can, then trench composting makes sense, especially if you start a year in advance.
You dig a trench, you pile the soil to one side, and you just put your compost, your vegetable waste, your, Carings from any garden that you do have. maybe you can add some coffee grounds from the, if you have a nice coffee shop nearby that gives them away. Any, kind of organic matter that's not diseased and not loaded with weed seeds.
Raked leaves are fine. You put them in the trench, and as you fill up the trench, you cover the soil back up. And, if you want to make it wider, you can add a, dig another trench next to it. you can, you just make your compost in the ground. some people actually, do that in vegetable gardens as they rotate their beds.
They just, they trench a bed one year. And keep it out of commission.
[00:26:42] Trench Composting Techniques
And then the next year they trench another bed and plant the first one. So what's beautiful, if you see the illustration, you've got your veggie bed, let's say it's, I don't know, 10 feet by 4 feet. And you've got a couple of trenches in the middle, but you can plant your veggies right beside your trenches.
So you've got a row of compost, essentially, which you will bury as you put in. So you put in your compost, your scraps from the kitchen, you bury it with the soil beside it, and you continue to bury it as you get more stuff, but then you plant your rows of seeds, and will the seeds in the alternative rows, will they benefit from having that rotting compost right next door?
so long as they're not, if it's next door, if it's a foot away, it's great. But if it's too close? If it's too close, some of it will be fine. if you had a, clot of, grass that, that heated up, the seeds wouldn't like that so much. if you mix things up, which is a little harder to do in a trench, it's possible that, It's really only right around where the seeds are sprouting that it would be a problem.
Okay, so we've got this nice system.
[00:27:57] Balancing Compost Materials
Now, one thing that I know from personal experience, and many personal mistakes between us, I will tell you that, is that you really need to, usually when you're composting, you need to keep a balance between your sort of brown material, your leaves and, papery things, and your, green material, so the raw kitchen scraps.
Do you have to keep that in mind when doing this trench composting? No, if you had, if you used straight compost, straight sawdust, it would take longer, but it would eventually break down. if you had something that was really high in nitrogen, if you, cover it little bit by little bit, you won't have, if you do it gradually, you won't have a problem.
[00:28:44] Variations in Composting Methods
and there's one, there's two variations I'd like to mention. if you have perennial crops or, This is what a friend of mine does in her flowerbed. She digs a little pit between the plants and buries her compost, especially her, weeding from the flower garden. She just buries it in the pit and covers it up.
And that's her little, she's gotten old enough that she doesn't want to turn compost or fork, fork it into a cart to spread around. She just does it right in her flowerbed. And she's successful. And she's successful. She does a little pit here and a little pit there and in, in the gaps in her garden.
that's another option where you just dig enough for either what's in your kitchen container or, if you have a bucket full of weeds, there again, if there's a ton of weed seeds, keep the weeds separate or chop off the seeds and, bury the rest. And so again, There's one other option, which is not to dig at all.
Sheet composting is where you just spread it on the ground. and then you can either cover it with some newspaper, or cover it with chopped leaves, or, I would cover it with something. And just let the soil organisms take care of it. It's a little slower, it's a little messier, but, if you have fruit trees, You've got a lot of space to cover, and you can just cover them with, you can just cover the area with, plant matter, kitchen scraps, and then, It's halfway between mulching and composting.
Wow. It's slow, but it's lazy and wonderful if you have too many other things to do. Lazy and wonderful sounds good to most of us, I would say.
[00:30:39] Dealing with Urban Wildlife
and also just something to keep in mind if you are in the city. A city like Toronto that has a lot of raccoons. Just keep that in mind that might, you want to think if you're going to do your pit composting, you might want to bury it a teeny bit deeper so the raccoons don't have fun.
Especially if you have fruit. I have a, a cage, an open topped cage where I, that's my compost pile. I do all forms of composting. And, when we put, I think it was watermelon, but it might have been peach scraps. one of the local black bears came wandering by and, bent all of my, the sides of my compost heap looking for that luscious fruit.
Oh, wow. skunks also like fruit. Oh, boy. if animals were a problem, then pit or trench composting with at least a couple of inches of dirt on top of. All new additions is a good idea. I think it's a beautiful idea. I love it. We have a question here from Claudette.
[00:31:39] Choosing Soil for Roses
Claudette says, Hello, I live in Los Angeles, California.
Good question here. What is the best soil to grow roses? Natural soil or bagged soil? Thank you. I love that question because that's what we all think. is it good for me to use what I have or should I just erase and start again and build a raised bed and put in other stuff? Pasadena is the city of roses, so she's, she's in a good climate for roses.
fewer fungal diseases there. I must say, I've never dug, in Los Angeles. I don't know what her soils are apt to be. Except, insufficiently watered. if her soils are healthy, there's no need to use bagged soils. If, she has, very alkaline soil or hardpan, some of the southwestern soils are basically rock.
they're, it's hard to tell that they're, closer to rock than soil. If that's the case, then the bagged soils will be really useful. but she could get a soil test, and it's possible that if her soil is close, I would usually opt for getting, for buying good compost and incorporating that with the existing soil rather than using bagged soils.
will be somebody else's good soil mixed with compost. Exactly. Yeah, you're right. And also sometimes you really don't know what you're buying, depending on where you're buying your soil from. if you get it at the side of the road somewhere, who knows what's in there? It could be worse than what you have.
Who knows? That's an excellent. point. Yeah. It may be bringing unfriendly weeds as well. Yeah, exactly. a quick, question from, oh, here, Gail writes a question. Oh, my goodness. She says, wow, so much to learn. Where can I purchase Liz's book? Thank you. Oh, yes, I live in Orlando, Florida. Thanks. your book, is it available online?
It is available online through, Story Publishing. Okay, story s t o r e y, yep. Yeah. Super! And so she can get a copy and, but then she's also entered into the draw because she, who knows, maybe she'll be the one who wins a copy. You never know.
[00:34:08] Cover Crops Explained
I wanted to talk to you, this came up earlier and we got a question from Fender.
Fender did not write where he or she is from. Is there one cover crop you highly recommend? So let's talk a little bit because some people may not know what is a cover crop and so far our questions are from people who are saying, oh my gosh, what do I do? I've got this soil, it's not perfect. And cover crops come up again and again.
So can you tell me a little bit, what is a cover crop? A cover crop is something that you grow just to, produce organic matter in your own site. some cover crops can also produce nitrogen. The ones, legumes. do have nitrogen fixing nodules in their roots, but you have to grow them for at least a year in order to generate enough nitrogen to be any use.
So that's usually done more on a farm scale, or a very large garden. Most home gardeners, don't do that, unless there are some interesting experiments using, hairy vetch and growing that, and then Using that as a mulch to grow tomatoes. But that's a small scale. usually, nitrogen cover crops are large scale.
So the other ones, there's no one best because you have to figure out what your goal is. Buckwheat shades out weeds. That's wonderful. it shades out annual weeds and grows a lot of stuff and it breaks, it's soft so it breaks down quickly. I did that before we, we had a new septic system installed and half of our yard was, dirt and dug up.
And since it was already disturbed, we grew two crops of buckwheat and turned them under and then planted our lawn. rye will also, suppress weeds. and, If you're growing trees, you may want to grow nitrogen crops underneath the trees. Legumes underneath the trees. So that's a cover crop, but you don't have to turn it under.
You can just, Maintain that under the tree. So that's a variant. So that's the thing with cover crops. From what I understand, mostly, they can be used in farms and whatever. You'll grow them for a short time. You find out when is the time, the ultimate time to till them, back to the T I L word, to till them into the soil.
And then it increases the organic matter, it's bringing nitrogen into the soil. But does cover crop always mean till? For those people out there that don't want to till, and I just, I don't want people to get from this radio show that it's always wrong to till. There are times when you do have to, but it's a decision you make.
you were saying that your tiller, you ended up giving it away. Does that mean you no longer do cover crops? I no longer do cover crops because I have, smaller gardens. I, I mulch a lot. I have now, put wood chips on the paths in my vegetable garden. so I, keep weeds down with mulch and I, I just rake the garden with a four tined rake before I plant in the spring and smooth it.
So I do not turn my soil over anymore, but I've been pampering it for 30 years so it's pretty good. Lucky soil, that is lovely soil. You know what Liz, in a minute we're going to hear a little bit more of your music, so we'll enjoy that
there are more questions so let's hear a little bit of this wonderful music. Remind me, what instrument are you playing? I play the flute, my husband plays the piano, and our fiddler plays the violin. Okay, some more music is coming up. You're listening to the Urban Forestry Radio Show on Reality Radio 101.
I'm Susan Poizner from the Free Tree Care Training website, OrchardPeople. com, and we'll be back. In just a moment.
Welcome back to the Urban Forestry Radio Show with your host, Susan Poizner. Right here on Reality Radio 101 to send her an email. Email her right now, inStudio101, at gmail. com.
And now, right back to your host, Susan Poizner. I'm Susan Poizner, and you're listening to the Urban Forestry Radio Show. A program where we learn about fruit trees, food forests, permaculture, and arboriculture, and lots more. Thanks for tuning in. In today's program, we've been talking about soil with Liz Stell, author of Secrets to Great Soil.
And by the way, Liz is also a musician whose band has recorded the music we're playing on the show today. So Liz, I have a question here from Cliff. Cliff asked this question, it's a good one.
[00:39:48] Managing Tree Roots in Raised Beds
We have several large trees near our raised beds and we see lots of roots popping up in those raised beds.
Is there any solution for this as I suspect the trees are being very opportunistic and taking nutrition away from our vegetable plants? What do you think about that? I think Cliff is right. ideally you would move the, I had to move my asparagus because, or I re established the asparagus because this beautiful white birch was, enjoying the soil in the asparagus bed.
if you can't move the bed, then you need to do some root pruning, which I do with a, The deepest shovel you've got, shovel or spade, and just go around the tree side of the beds every year and dig down and get the top, cut through the top foot of tree roots. the deeper ones will still go through there, but you'll reduce the number of surface roots.
And If you keep the surface roots out, your vegetables should be able to coexist. That sounds fair enough. it's a ongoing battle then. Every year you've got to do your root pruning of the big old trees. Water is another competitive issue. The tree wants the water that the vegetables get. Plants get. That makes sense. I have a question for you. I've been wondering about this and thinking about this actually literally on and off for years. A few years ago, in a listserv that I'm a member of, a woman wrote, and she's a volunteer in a local community, garden initiative. And the year she wrote the email, it was a really bad drought in the city.
hardly any water at all in the trees that they had planted in the park, that this volunteer had planted or that the, I don't know who planted them, but they were suffering and I guess they had no irrigation system, no way to water the trees.
[00:41:46] Using Chlorinated Water for Trees
So she told, she, she says that there is a wading pool in the park with chlorinated water, isn't it better to water the trees while they were draining the wading pool?
She wanted to suggest that they, water the trees with this. Leftover chlorinated water. Isn't that better than no water at all for the trees? Yes, with a caveat. If you use chlorinated water for your house plants, they say let it sit out for 24 hours before you water. That gets rid of some of the chlorine.
Of course, there's more in the swimming pool. But sunlight also encourages the evaporation of chlorine. if they had just chlorinated yesterday, I would say no. If they're draining and they haven't added chlorine for a week, I should think that most of it would have evaporated and the very thirsty trees would be happy for it.
interesting. I wonder what else they put in swimming pools. I don't know what other chemicals, but I guess for me, what comes to my mind isn't chlorine salt? Doesn't, isn't that pouring salt on a tree's roots? Chlorine isn't salt, but In order to reduce chlorine levels, I believe, I don't have a swimming pool, but I believe some people are using more salt, sodium, and other salt products in order to reduce chlorine use.
It would help to find out a little bit more about what they actually put in that pool. Very interesting. A very interesting response. And if any of the listeners have any thoughts or ideas, this is something I'm going to continue to investigate, because there's my instinct just says, no, don't do it.
I would rather people take buckets from home and, water the trees. From home somehow, but that's me. I don't know. I'd like to continue investigating that so oh my goodness What a light we just got a nice email from John and John lives in BC, British Columbia John says hi. No question. Just wanted to say a very interesting show.
I live in Abbotsford BC. Thank you thank you, John. I love that you wrote That's wonderful. Isn't that nice? And you're a great guest, Liz. That's why people are writing in. let me see. Now, I have time for another question or two. And I wanted to look at some of the, let's talk about microorganisms.
oh, wait a minute. We have to get a winner for your book. Don't we? Oh my goodness. Okay, microorganisms, hold on because Gary in the studio just gave me A little CD container with no CDs in it, but it's got folded up pieces of paper. Liz, I wish you were here because then you could pick the name. Oh, that would be fun.
It would be fun, but I'm channeling you and I'm picking it on your behalf. How's that sound? Great. Okay, guess who the winner is? The winner is Gail. Gail is the winner. Congratulations, Gail. That is wonderful. I'm sorry for those of you that didn't win, but tune in again next month. We'll probably have something else great.
Gail, we're going to send you an email, get your address, and we're going to send you a beautiful book. And Gary in the studio is nodding. He's saying, yes, we will send you a book. we've got a couple of minutes. Let's talk about microorganisms.
[00:45:02] Microorganisms in Soil
When you initially wrote this book, 20 years ago, were people talking about microorganisms in soil as much as they are today?
Not as much as today. It was, something of a new concept. nobody fermented their, a few people fermented their compost. aerated their compost tea, for example. if you, compost, then you know something about micro, microorganisms, especially if it smells. Oh. People learned about them, one way or another, but, we didn't know as much.
And I didn't know. That, if you're growing fruit trees, you want to promote different micro, microorganisms than if you're growing, vegetables and non woody plants. That's right. So I had never heard of ramial woodchips 20 years ago, and that's something that people who grow fruit trees should find out about, and ideally get some.
If you include woodchips in your compost or in your mulch, and they come from the tips of the trees. And maybe include some leaves, too. They'll have a much better balance of nitrogen and carbon. And they will feed fungal organisms as opposed to bacteria. Hot compost is bacterial organisms, which is just grand for your vegetable garden.
Cold compost and ramial wood chips promote fungal organisms, and those are better for fruit trees. So fabulous. I've heard about people, if you've got a healthy tree, and you should know if your tree is healthy, you should hopefully know how to identify pest and disease problems. So if you're pruning your tree and it's healthy, you can clip your clippings.
Into little tiny pieces in the mulch around your tree and they will decompose. Is that correct? Yeah, so so you talk about the fungal organisms. Do you know what do those fungal organisms do? And how do they help our fruit trees? They're one of the categories of organisms that break down plant matter into organic matter you can call plant matter organic matter, but really The luscious dark humus that's partially broken down.
Maybe you can recognize it, maybe not, but it's, less recognizable than, the leaves that you rake up, or the twigs that you're snipping with your clippers. that's a great suggestion. You said also get your hands on this, rameel, compost. So, where can you? Do you know where people can source it?
The easiest way, if you have trees, is to get a small backyard chipper, which some of them will chip leaves for you, as well as small branches. And you need eye protection and you need to be very careful if you're going to be chipping your own branches. So that's one way I do tend to clip as I go along, especially if you're getting suckers later in the year.
Just snip them into little pieces because the suckers are nice and soft and they'll break down quickly and they don't tire out your hands too much if you cut them into pencil lengths or less. And so you just leave them in the, whatever you're mulching your tree with, you put them in the mulch and somehow the organisms will come and consume these little bits of branches?
Yes, they'll, especially because leaves will fall on top and they just get into the general mix. And if you see the little, if you have an old pile of wood chips, which I happen to have, and white threads running through them, those are the good, fungal, the, they're hyphae, they're not actually roots, but it's the, it's, for a mushroom, that's the root equivalent spreading through the pile.
mushrooms are like icebergs. The bit is really only a small, bit of the organism. And these hyphae will just, will work above ground as well, through the duff. through piles of wood chips and help to break them down and release the nutrients that trees need. And so with these clippings that you're talking about, obviously they'd be from when you prune your fruit tree.
Can you take them from other trees as well or would that not be good? You can take them from other trees. it's, the smaller branches that we used to wonder what to do with our pile in the edge of the yard. The smaller branches have the nicer balance and are easier to cut up.
So the younger ones. The new growth, really. Any new growth, you're removing. yeah. that sounds great. Liz, I can't believe it.
[00:49:45] Conclusion and Farewell
The show is essentially over in just a minute. I told you it was going to go quickly. It did. Yeah. thank you so much for coming on the show. And thank you so much for letting us play your music.
Oh, you are so welcome. And, what a great show. What a great source of information for people. let's hope that we continue on for many more months to come. thank you so much for inviting me. This has been a pleasure. Okay, great. goodbye for now and we shall talk again. Thanks so much.
Thank you. Bye bye. Bye bye. So that was Liz Stell, authors of Secrets to Great Soil, which is published by Storybooks. That's it for today and for this show. If you enjoyed it, go visit my website, orchardpeople. com, and you can learn so much more. I've got courses and videos and blogs. You can also listen to archived episodes of this radio show at the website at orchardpeople.
com. Slash podcast and do be sure to sign up for my email list and you can get lots more news and information. You are listening to the urban forestry radio show on reality radio 101. I'm Susan Poizner from the fruit tree care training website orchardpeople. com. Thank you for tuning in and I'll see you again next month.
You've been listening to the urban forestry radio show on reality radio 101. To learn more about the show and to download the podcast, where I cover lots more great topics, you can visit orchardpeople. com slash podcast. The show is broadcast live on the last Tuesday of every month, and each time I have great new guests talking to me about fruit trees, food forests, and arboriculture.
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Thank you for listening to the Urban Forestry Radio Show with your host Susan Poizner, right here on Reality Radio 101.