Dangerously organic!

North Florida Fall Garden Primer Course

On August 14 from 9:00 to 12:00 the Loga
Springs Academy on 931 NE 1th Avenue, Gainesville Florida will host a gardening boot camp, complete with coffee and donuts, lunch, resources and info to go, and the hands-on assistance of several local experts.

We are a loosely-connected group of community-oriented folks working on various green ideas and projects. Having a hands-on gardening seminar at the beginning of planting season seemed like a good idea, and the Loga Springs Academy came along with the perfect site for it, in the nearby Northeast with plenty of space to dig. The adjoining Highlands Presbyterian Church is also very supportive.

People who will be teaching include:

· Denise Weber – landscape designer/builder and intensive gardener. Denise has supervised the installation of hundreds of raised bed gardens in this area.

· Jim Notestein – Gainesville nurseryman and horticulturist, manages the Plants4Life Nursery in Gainesville and the ‘Agave Land’ Nursery in LaCrosse.

· Paul Miller - organic farmer, horticulturalist, marketer, and web designer. Fairly new to Gainesville, Paul also has a business producing starts.

· Floyd Gainey - Local expert in composting, and owner of Soil Enrichment Products, Inc. His products have been deployed to farms and gardens in this area for two decades, including hundreds of Gainesville’s raised beds.

As a Yankee transplant myself, the things I have the most trouble with are choosing the right plants, the right planting schedule, and knowing how to get them established. The timing here in Florida seems really weird -- planting things as the days get shorter and cooler. There is also the nematodes issue, and I want to know which specific varieties can handle the pests without lots of chemicals. I’m not sure that anybody has a great handle on these factors, which we kind of take for granted up in the temperate loamy northland. Some other topics that we’ll try to briefly cover are:

· Starting from seeds, producing your own starts, and planting seedlings

· Square foot gardening and raised beds

· ‘Natural’and organic gardening techniques

· Rain barrels, drip lines and irrigation methods to save water

· Harvesting, processing, and storing foods from the garden

· Soil amendments, fertilizers, composting, cover
crops

· ‘Edible Landscaping’ -- trees and shrubs

Registration – $25 per person, $10 for children under 12. Participants are asked to pre-register by August 10 online by clicking here , or by referring to Fall Garden Primer, at
352-336-0904 or email at dwr3745@gmail.com

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