Next comes the layering of carbon, nitrogen and mineral materials.  I actually bought some stuff and I was able to reuse stuff we had.  I saved some grass and weed clippings from the lawn mower and raked up some old mango leaves we had in the yard.  I bought a 1/2 bale of straw and hay from Kaneohe Feed Supply because I was interested in experimenting with these materials.  This step can be done according to your preferences with which materials to use, I basically took the best how to videos I could find, found correlations in their processes and made up my own.  Basically my layering is as follows:

No-dig gardens are simply a layered compost pile used to grow plants.  It is pretty simple to build and there are a few really good videos online to help you.  Mahalo to my brother, Maka, for helping me with this project.  The layering process consist of nitrogen, carbon, and mineral components.  I will explain more about the layering in part 2.  In this part I will be talking about collecting resources, framing the garden and covering the ground.  It is important before starting to get all of your supplies together.  From this experience I learned that not having a layer available can get really annoying.  So basically have enough nitrogen (grass clippings, hay, urine treated leaves or compost), carbon (dried leaves, straw), minerals (compost, top soil, crushed river rock, chicken manure) and organic matter (vegetable food scraps, earthworms).  You will also need all of your cardboard (soaked in water) and yard tools ready.  First lay out the frame for the garden by using rocks or wood or anything to show you a line to follow.  Next break up the ground up the ground within the framed area using a pick, shovel or digging pitchfork.  After the ground is broken, use the wet cardboard to cover the area of the garden.  Be sure to cover the entire area and if possible add two layers.  This will help prevent weeds from growing through the cardboard and into the garden. After this you are ready for part two.

Okay folks, sorry its been so long since I last posted.  A lot has been going on and will will do my best to make sure all the juicy goodness gets up on the blog asap!  So today is about earthworms!  Mahalo nui loa  to Cami Kanoa Wong for bringing over a worm house, endemic worms, and teaching us what to do! (Also congratulations on your new kamali'i!!!)  So this is the scoops.  The worms live in a platic storage box that has a lid and drainage holes that have been drilled out on the bottom.  The box sits on two concrete blocks about 3x5x8 and the blocks sit in a plastic tub.  The tub collects any water that drains out of the box and which you can also use for plants.

So the process for the earthworm/compost/black gold box is pretty simple.  Any vegetable or fruit scraps you have is placed evenly on top of any existing layer.  Then newspaper that has been striped approximately 1 inch wide is soaked in water and then laid evenly to cover the food scraps.  Repeat as many times as you have scraps.  Most foods scraps can be used except meat, dairy, citrus and papaya seeds.  You have to add the earthworms at the beginning, but they will quickly multiply and aid the process.  Thats about it, mahalo again to Cami and enjoy making black gold!

Well, I have been doing a lot of reading and thus research on permaculture and no-dig gardening.  Though I will not be discussing those two items in this blog, you can look forward to upcoming blogs that will discuss those topics.  Today I will be talking about sprouting.  I am planning to compile my first no-dig garden in a couple of weeks, so I began to sprout some seeds to have saplings to put into the garden.  I got the seeds online from www.seedsnow.com, which is a website that sells a wide variety of organic, non-gmo, heirloom, hybrid and non-hybrid seeds.  They carry various vegetable and herb seeds and so far the first shipment came in fine and I have been pleased with their service. So I have chosen to start with kale, tomato, beans, cucumber, squash, onions, watermelon and some herbs. 

There seem to be many ways to sprout seeds, from wet paper towels to soaking bigger seeds in warm water to using growing pellets.  But for this particular sprouting I am simply going to use a mixture of compost, potting soil, a little chicken manure and a little bone meal.  I had done a previous sprouting using this mixture and it worked fine.  When sprouting this way I have found out that using regular soil isn’t always best and that the key is keeping the mixture moist, not constantly soaking it or letting it dry out.  In an earlier batch I just kind of sprinkled the seeds in a smart pot that I had put the mixture in.  I tried to cover the smart pot with a clear plastic bag to create warmth and a sort of greenhouse effect but that didn’t really work because the bag broke and leaked in.  So I just left that batch out and it sprouted just fine.  For this particular batch of sprouts I decided to use a few empty plastic organic egg containers, an empty plastic apple container and some other plastic boxes I pulled from the trash.  I made the mixture with some organic compost and potting soil I got from Home Depot.  The amount of chicken manure I added to this batch is about 1 part manure to 20 parts soil/compost, while I added about 1 part bone meal to about 50 to 75 parts soil/compost.  The second measurement is a great approximation because I measured by adding a handful of bone meal to about 7-8 gallons of soil/compost/manure.  I think especially for sprouting it is better to use less soil/compost supplementation and be more precise when adding fertilization to crop beds or planting areas.  I am pretty sure the sprouting could happen without any of the extra stuff, but I just add it to help it along, I may try a batch later with only compost and potting soil.  Got the kids to help me with the mixture and soaking the trays, which they really enjoyed.  Kids plus dirt equals fun.  I put the seed in myself after the mixture soaked in all the water by poking a hole with my finger about ½ to 1 inch deep and lightly covering it with mixture.  That was pretty much it, just gotta make sure that the mixture in the trays stays moist and doesn’t dry out.  Enjoy the pictures and please comment with any questions or helpful insights.  Mahalo nui loa a hui hou

Aloha mai kākou! 
Let me start out by saying that I am not an expert in farming or horticulture or even in customary cultivation practices.  I am simply one kanaka ʻōiwi who wants to grow as much safe and healthy food as I can for my family, friends, and lāhui.  Basically, I am choosing to grow food.  This blog project will try to document my growing efforts and open up a forum for questions and helpful insights, I know I definitely will have a lot.  My plan is to focus on researching contemporary small-space horticulture techniques that require minimal resources. Mainly I will be researching permaculture, no-dig gardening, aquaponics and a few other techniques. For techniques that may not be availiable to me right now (because of funding or time) I will try and blog to share and comment on videos that may prove helpful to most.  I am receiving money from Hulili as a professional development grant ($500,yay) which I am so grateful for and which can help me to defray some of the costs I plan to incur   I also opened up a good amount of time for this project (because I know I will need it) by getting it approved as a HWST 699 directed reading class.   I also plan to plant in accordance to customary practices, as best as I can find out about.  My hope is that this project can open more opportunities for food production, food sovereignty and increased mālama ʻāina.  Look for the upcoming posts and feel free to add comments or questions, a hui hou!