Gardening From the Ground Up

                                                                           by

                                                          Frank La Rosa Mazza

                                                                          and

                                                              Franky Caracia, guest gardening advisor.

                               

   During the forty years that I have gardened here in Del Mar, California, I have built up a very deep layer of top soil above the native clay or hardpan.  This created precious earth is  a rich, black loam at least a foot deep, and in some areas of the garden, it is fourteen inches deep. I truly cherish it like a cherished antique of beauty and value beyond dollar value.  As you know, our basic "earth" here in coastal California is impossible to thrust a spade into, so we have to create the "ground" of  our gardens by continual gardening effort.  And this takes a long time, even years as in my case.

   I collect every particle of leaf and plant detritus that I can get my hands on. I also chop and grind up the bigger pieces of  plants and shrubs. Egg shells and coffee grounds also help. This can be laborious especially with the plant and shrub remnants, but this is what making compost entails. This is the basis of good gardening.

   The tree leaves are the easiest to use. Simply rake them up (no leaf blowers allowed) and spread them around the plants and put them in the beds. Encircle these leaves with bricks, chunks of stone or small pieces concrete medium pieces or even with heavy pieces of wood as short piece of railroad ties or pieces of concrete,  or even short pieces of old, aged railroad ties. This keeps the detritus in place and the rest of the garden looking neat and well kept. Keep the detritus well watered to help in the decomposition process. This moisture is essential for bacteria. These containment rings of stone or brick make what Alan Palmer (lived to be 100) called "Plant Islands", and they work very well in retaining moisture, stopping weed growth, providing gentle nitrogen, and best of all making that rich black compost that is so loaded with nutrients and food for birds. I admire Palmer, a self made man, who left school at 16, who could do many things with his mind and hands.  This created earth will have the rich texture of Devil's Food cake and smell almost as good! Over the years, this compost evolves into the gold of gardening, and here in Southern California it helps make a true garden.

   I complain all the time that I have rake  up the leaves that fall from the neighbors' uncared for, unpruned trees that drop voluminous amounts of leaves on my property. But instead of complaining I should really thank them, write a handwritten letter that says how valuable their proliferated leaves are. So, I rake them and place them in the plant island-rings. Sure, this takes work but this is what creates  that relinquish acids organic compound, minerals, and best of all, create a beautiful texture, that is really pleasing to the eye in contrast to excessive to water guzzling lawn.

   To create a viable garden requires work and most of all Care, not leaf blowers, chemical fertilizers, fancy pants tools, nor abstract ideas. Of course, one could go over to the garden center or supermarkets and buy numerous bags of compost from who knows where, but that would not be Care of a personal kind. Yet, it would show a Care of a kind, I suppose. But, that thin expensive layer would only last one season at the most, and then it would need to be reapplied over and over again. Re-coated like paint. By replenishing with leaves and plant detritus,  you create a living, renewable "Ground" of being for every green plant that you wish to grow. You create an Old Garden, a similitude to  Old People. Old Gardens have an almost apparent wise beauty.

   The word "compost" literally means bringing  together, a Unity, from the Latin componere) . Isn't gardening a Unity, a bringing together of Composts, plants, birds, animals, insects such as bees, and most of all,  people who have something to say,  to talk with other?