Jordforbedring, rucula og snegle - Phacelia, rocket and slugs

Jord er ikke bare jord.

”Din jord er rigtig god, den behøver du ikke at gøre noget ved”, sagde den ene havenabo.

”Du skulle tage at smide noget Champost på, inden du begynder at plante, for at forbedre din jord”, sagde den anden.

”Du skulle plante honningurt, den kan du så grave ned i jorden som grøntgødning”, sagde den tredie.

Til sidst må man følge det råd, som man føler mest for.

Idéen om at så honningurt var yderst tiltalende. Den ville nemlig - udover at forbedre jorden - også kvæle ukrudtet. Og allerbedst: den ville blomstre med et hav af lilla blomster, således at jeg faktisk ville have nogle blomster at kigge på allerede i år. Jeg tog straks på planteskolen, og købte honningurt-frø. Samtidig købte jeg et brev rucula, nu var jeg blevet overmodig.

Soil is not simply soil.

" Your soil is really good, you don´t have to improve it," said one gardenkeeper .

" You should mulch your soil before you begin planting to improve it," said another.

"You should sow purple phacelia as a green manure ," said a third gardenkeeper.

At the end of the day, one must follow one´s own heart.

The idea of sowing Phaecelia was extremely appealing . The plants would - in addition to improving soil - also smother my weeds . And best of all : it would bloom in a sea of ​​purple flowers, and I would actually have some flowers in my garden. I went straight to the garden center and bought Phaecelia seeds . At the same time I bought a packet of rocket seeds , now I had become overly confident.

Honningurten kom op, og stod som et lilla hav over jorden. Ruculaen kom også op, som min første afgrøde i haven. Jeg ved ikke, om det var stoltheden – men det var den bedste rucula, jeg nogensinde havde smagt. Det fandt sneglene også ud af, og de gnaskede lystigt huller i bladene om natten.

”Du må godt få nogle sneglekorn af mig – så spiser de kornene og dør”, sagde en venlig havenabo.

Men jeg skulle ikke være sneglemorder, og jeg nævnte min bekymring til en anden havenabo.

”Jeg havde det ligesom dig i starten. Indtil jeg en sen aften var hernede, og det vrimlede med snegle i min have. De dækkede simpelthen jorden i en slimet masse, og det var så ækelt, at jeg siden ikke har haft problemer med at lægge korn ud til dem.”

Jeg tænkte på vildtet i skovene, og på hvordan det er nødvendigt at holde bestanden nede. Det var vist også nødvendigt at holde sneglene nede på Sydbakken. Jeg blev enig med mig selv om, at der simpelthen er for mange af dem, og at jeg gjorde bestanden en tjeneste, ved at hjælpe med at begrænse dem. Til gengæld var jeg ikke sikker på, at jeg skulle have salat i min have – eller andre afgrøder i jordhøjde, som de kunne trække slimede spor henover og gnaske huller i. Jeg ville holde mig til blåbær- og hindbærbuske og et enkelt æbletræ.

Den følgende dag gik jeg på internettet og googlede: ”planter som snegle hader”. Det nærmeste jeg kom på det var: ”planter som snegle måske går uden om”. Denne liste printede jeg ud til de kommende vinteraftener, hvor jeg skulle lave haveplan.

The Phaecelia came up like a purple ocean above the ground. The rocket also appeared as my first crop in the garden. I do not know if it was pride - but it was the best rocket I had ever tasted. The slugs in the gardens agreed, and they happily munched holes in the leaves at night.

" You can have some of my slug pellets - they eat the grains and die ," said a concerned gardenkeeper.

But I wasn´t going to be a slug-murderer, and I mentioned my concern to another gardenkeeper.

"I felt like that too in the beginning. Until one late evening. I was here and it was teeming with slugs in my garden. They covered the ground in a slimy mass , and it was so disgusting, that I have had no qualms about using slug pellets ever since. "

I thought of the deer in the forests , and how it is necessary to keep the numbers down. It was also necessary to keep the slug-population down in the gardens . I concluded that there are simply too many of them , and I did them a service by helping to reduce them. But I was not sure that I was going to have lettuce in my garden - or other crops in ground level for them to pull slimy trails across and munch holes in. I would stick to blueberry and raspberry bushes and a single apple tree.

The following day I went on the internet and googled: "plants slugs avoid". The closest I came to that was : "plants slugs MIGHT avoid" . I printed the list for the coming winter evenings, when I would be creating my garden plan.