Course Two: Nature 93
of the crops I’ve mentioned above can be planted suc-
cessfully from seeds (particularly corn and squashes),
and I would like to encourage you to give this a try, as
it’s particularly magickal to go through the entire pro-
cess from seed to harvest.
The problem with planting seeds right in the
ground is that birds love to eat them. One way to guar-
antee success from seeds is to sprout them yourself,
and then transplant the seedlings into your garden.
Some seeds need to be slightly sliced (scarification)
before planting; some need to be in the freezer for a
month (stratification) before germinating—read the
package. Soak your seeds overnight in a bowl of wa-
ter, and then lay them out on several layers of wet
paper towel. Fold the layers over, and lay them on a
tray. Keep the towels wet (but not soaking in a puddle)
and check them every day. When you see little roots
coming out of them, it’s time for the next step.
All gardening supply stores have little peat pel-
lets for sprouting, so pick up as many as you need
(one for each seedling). Get a baking pan or
Tupperware tray, and line it up with pellets. Then soak
them with water until they soften and expand, keep-
ing about ¼” of water in the bottom of the pan. Use a
pointy object to doodle out a hole in the middle of
each pellet, and carefully insert the sprouting seeds,
with the roots sticking down. Gently cover them with
loose peat, and place the tray in a window where it
will get Sun. Keep the water replenished so the pel-
lets don’t dry out, and watch for the
green shoots to come up. Re-use
any pellets that don’t
sprout. When the sprouts
get about 6” tall, you can
transplant them into your
garden. Very small seed-
lings are still vulnerable
to snails, slugs, and bugs,
so you might want to re-
serve some back-up re-
placements, and let them
grow larger.Mulching and Weeding
Once you have the starts well established in the
ground, and they are about a foot tall, you should
mulch around them to keep down the weeds and pro-
vide cover against moisture loss. This will make it a
pleasant place for the plants as well as beneficial
nematodes and earthworms. We’ve used straw and
leaf mulch for this purpose, but the most effective
mulch we’ve found is old newspaper. Save up a pile,
and then lay them flat, several sheets thick, all around
your little plants, covering up as much of the bare
earth as you can. Then lay enough straw or leaf mulch
over the papers to keep them from blowing away.
Throughout the growing season, keep checking yourgarden for any weeds that have somehow managed to
escape baking and mulching, and pull them out so
they won’t compete with your crops.Irrigating
It is essential that you do keep your garden well
watered—especially if you live in an area, like I do,
where there’s not much rain in the Summer. You want
to get water to the soil and roots—not the leaves and
flowers—especially with tomatoes, as the flowers will
not produce fruit if they get wet. For a small garden,
you can simply go from plant to plant with a hose
every few days and soak the ground at the base of
each one. This works especially well if you make a
kind of crater around every plant, so it will hold a
little pool of water. I’ve done this for many years, and
it works just fine. It’s a good way to make sure you
get out into the garden regularly, for both watering
and weeding. Or you can set up a drip irrigation sys-
tem, with special drip and soaker hoses. But this is a
lot of work, and fairly complicated (and costly for the
hoses, timers, etc.), so if you want to go that route,
you should probably get help.Important: Never water your garden in the heat
of the day; the beads of water act like tiny magni-
fying glasses to focus sunlight and burn the leaves!Composting
An important part of magickal living is recycling,
and composting your organic garbage is where it
starts. Keep a compost bucket with a lid in the kitchen,
and throw all scraps into it except bones. Some of the
best stuff to compost is coffee grounds and crushed
eggshells. Store eggshells until dry and them pound
them to a powder. Apply the powder to the earth
around houseplants, garden plants, and roses. Or bury
them whole in the soil around your plants. Eggshells
have minerals to keep your garden healthy and strong.
Set aside a place right near your garden and mulch
pile for a compost heap. Every few days, dig a hole in
the center of the heap and empty the compost bucket
into it, covering it all over with mulch and dirt. Turn
the heap with your shovel as you do this, and you will
create a rich source of nutrients for your garden next
year. The more you turn it, the better it works (and
the less it smells). You can also cover it with clear
plastic to keep heat in. Spread the compost at the time
you are preparing the soil for planting, and start build-
ing up the next heap for the following year. (Never
put fresh compost on your garden; the escess nitro-
gen will burn the plants and kills them!)Pests and Diseases
Unfortunately, we aren’t the only ones who find
fresh garden veggies tasty. Whole populations of- Nature.p65 93 1/14/2004, 3:33 PM