Connect with Allison on Instagram @Long Cut Garden

Links mentioned

Patti Armbrister Composting course 

Jesse Frost No-Till Growers Podcast

Nothing Much HappensPodcast for falling asleep

Favorite Books

The No-Till Organic Vegetable Farm: How to Start and Run a Profitable Market Garden That Builds Health in Soil, Crops, and Communities

Daniel Mays 

Lean Farm: How to Minimize Waste, Increase Efficiency, and Maximize Value and Profits with Less Work

Ben Hartman

The Living Soil Handbook: The No-Till Grower’s Guide to Ecological Market Gardening

Jesse Frost

Jackie mentions Nicole Master’s

For the Love of Soil: Strategies to Regenerate Our Food Production Systems

INTRO

Hey, Green Future Growers. Welcome to Season 3 I’m your host, JackieMarie Beyer. If you’re new to the show, I hope you’ll subscribe on iTunes for free or follow on your favorite podcast app and let’s get growing. Hey everyone this is JackieMarie Beyer, your host here to help inspire you on your journey to create, grow, and enjoy a green, organic oasis. So let’s get growing!

Not really. I, I have been enjoying listening to episodes of your podcast and just kind of getting familiar with, you know, what you do and how you conduct your interviews. And it just sounds, you know, pretty much like I expected it. So I don’t know.

2m 27s

JackieMarie Beyer

So tell me, is there like a guest that, well, who’s the first guest that stands out in your head?

2m 34s

Alison McClendon

Daniel Mays. I was like, holy Kerry. You know, May’s on there

2m 38s

JackieMarie Beyer

Is it. He is amazing.

2m 40s

Alison McClendon

He is amazing. And you know, I I’m just a green horn and all of this, but I am super curious and super inspired by the people that I follow. Who do, who put all this stuff into action in a, in a way that seems to be really just smart. So when I, when I got, sorry, I’m, I’m just having a little brain fart here. I got

3m 19s

JackieMarie Beyer

Keep going. I’m going to mute my mic.

3m 22s

Alison McClendon

I got a lot of different books by people who I admired their work and Daniel Mays. I really love the way his book is laid out to just provide concrete information. You know, it breaks down the money part. It really just tells you start to finish. I mean, so many of the books do, but his, I guess just resonated with me just right.

3m 55s

JackieMarie Beyer

I can not agree with you wholeheartedly. And the thing I love, the way he breaks down the money, he gives you the schedule. I mean, I literally read that book twice, like once and then right in a row, right after that, I have red lines under any of it under all sorts of paragraphs, because it just, it does, it lays it up. You plant this at this time, you plant this at this time, you put these things together, you, you know, these props fit next to each other and he’s, and he’s got the whole note tilt system down, which is show nice. And the market gardener. And then at the back, you know, he gives you ideas. I’m like what you can charge for things. And at first I was thrown off and I was like, oh my gosh, who is going to pay $7 for eggs? Let me tell you those eggs are $7 in the grocery store.

4m 38s

JackieMarie Beyer

I’m at my mom’s in New York right now. And I could not believe the price. And these aren’t even like special eggs, special, you know, they say they’re organic or they’re cage free or whatever, but it’s like, they’re not like from the farm they’re in the grocery store. I was like, oh my goodness. I cannot believe. I mean, you know, we are in, you know, still the throws of the pandemic, whatever, you know? So it’s like, what, November 19th, 2021, if listeners are listening to this later. But yeah, but that, but all the, I mean, it’s just the mate. Yeah. I loved his book. I got show much information out of his book, so cool.

5m 20s

JackieMarie Beyer

Well, I’m so glad to hear that. And then he was like one of the beginning episodes. So you, do you remember back from, because I haven’t really like I’m having like this computer problem or I, I like can’t even, I, I almost, it’s like a magnet, you know, like when two opposing magnets with my computer, I just got so much, I’m going to it last year. So I haven’t put an episode out in a while. I kind of took some time off, but I’m right about to get back into it yesterday. I got to see my GFF, my garden friend forever. I leaned control. We went into New York city to, we went to the drew Barrymore show or on Wednesday was so fun. And we walked around the city and just we’re we’re so like-minded like, everything was perfect. She’s like, let’s go find a bookstore.

6m 1s

JackieMarie Beyer

And I was like, all right. And what is she reading? Kissed the ground. She’s reading that book. She had like a two and a half hour train ride to get into the city and back. And I was like, and then she brought the real button. I’m like, oh, you’re reading it. I’ve had no, I have the real book. And just, we had so much fun.

6m 16s

Alison McClendon

Oh, that does sound fun. I haven’t done anything like that in a long time. I’m from Illinois originally and lived in Chicago for quite a while. And while I really do resonate most with being outdoors, there’s a part of me that really misses the, the feeling of being in a city. And it’s a, it’s a, excuse me. Okay. I should learn how to mute.

6m 48s

JackieMarie Beyer

No worries at all. No, let me do the meeting cause I’ll do, actually what I do is I do it afterwards, super easy to edit. I have this program garage band it’s piece of cake and it’s fun. And you get like audio waves. You can almost see where the sneezes, I can’t even like, not only that, like a lot of times I edit while I’m driving. And like, all you have to do is like command T to, to split the file and then hit the space bar to get it going again. And then I can go back when I’m not driving or like I’ll pull over on the side of the road really quick and hit the command T space bar and then, and then go, you know, and then do it later when I’m at home that night, you know, just where are all the splits?

7m 33s

JackieMarie Beyer

Wow. Was really super easy. Having the, I spent way too much time on my computer since the pandemic started. And my podcast, the other thing is this guy started transcribing my show notes and I, I almost feel like I’ve lost like connection with my show. So I think I’m going to go back to doing my own show notes and typing them and stuff because I feel like I used to remember things better and more and whatnot. Yeah. White background noise. I’m at my mom’s. And like, I can hear like there’s landscapers across the street. I think the garbage men are like coming down the block. I don’t know.

8m 15s

JackieMarie Beyer

Anyway, Alison, what might listeners want to hear about you show? I’m going to introduce you and we’ll go from there. I might put a little bit of the pre-shot in here and there, but I’m ready to roll. I’m

8m 28s

Alison McClendon

Ready.

8m 28s

JackieMarie Beyer

And do I say your name and McLendon

8m 32s

Alison McClendon

McLendon?

8m 32s

JackieMarie Beyer

Yes. Okay. Here we go. Welcome to the green organic garden. It is Friday, November 19th, 2021. And I have an awesome guest on the line who joined your organic corner podcast, Facebook group. And I said, will you please come on because listeners, I’m looking for backyard gardeners, just like you. If you’re out there, reach out to me. I would love to hear your experiences. And I’m sorry if you emailed me and I missed it because on the plane, I’m in New York visiting my mom and I on the plane. I went through my emails and I didn’t find an email from a listener that I still haven’t replied to, that she wrote me in like September.

9m 11s

JackieMarie Beyer

But anyway, today, Alison is here to tell us about her gardening journey. She is also from Montana or originally I think, well, we’ll find out I’m going to let her talk show welcome to the show. Alison McLendon.

9m 25s

Alison McClendon

Thank you for having me. I’m really glad to be here.

9m 29s

JackieMarie Beyer

Well, we’re excited because you have an awesome Instagram channel and you’re the kind of people that we really learned from like in the preset. We were talking about Daniel Mays and, and I do appreciate the, but to me, it’s the backyard gardeners, just like you, that bring my show to life and, and share their experiences that we can then take and turn and put it into place in our gardens. So, I mean, unless you’re striving to be a market farmer, but a lot of my listeners are just like you and me. So we’re going to show told us a little bit about yourself.

10m 1s

Alison McClendon

Well, so I am actually originally from Illinois, but my family and I live in Birmingham, Alabama, and we, my husband and I have a house with a third of an acre, which is really, it feels pretty big. And it looks big when I, when I see my pictures, but it’s actually not. It’s, it’s a manageable size. We moved here about five years ago. We, we started our gardening at our old house, which had a little tiny raised bed that we built. And we were, we were inspired by permaculture and we were trying to utilize our space well by, by planting densely.

10m 47s

Alison McClendon

And we were kind of using a modified square foot gardening model in that small space. And it was a really interesting way to start. And, you know, really all we wanted to do was dip our toes in the water. So we, what we discovered is that once you put a garden in all of the insects immediately find out, so it was a good way to start kind of trying to understand what grows well here, what doesn’t, what our insight pressure is. So anyway, we, we did seek out a place that had more land our backyard.

11m 31s

Alison McClendon

We are on a pie shaped piece of property where it’s wide in the back. And so our lived was originally, it had a lot of volunteer pine and sweet gum trees. And so we had, and this sounds awful to say, but we had 38 trees taken out. What we have done though is add, we have a high density, apple orchard, it’s on a trellis. We have heirloom cider apples that grow well in our region. And then we also have a large no-till market garden style garden, but it is really just, it’s just a no-till garden with the 30 inch raised beds, wood chipped paths.

12m 17s

Alison McClendon

We also put in a, well, we originally kept these. My husband has since become allergic to them. So we had to rehome the bees, but we also put in a really big, it’s a, well, it’s a wildflower bed, but we’re kind of letting the native stuff just come up as, as the seeds emerge from the seed bank. So now we have, you know, golden rod and bone set and a lot of stuff like that, that, that grows there. It’s, it’s sort of an insect. I forget how you say it, but insectary some people refer to it as a, a hedge row it’s against our back fence. So there’s the blueberries and blackberries.

12m 58s

Alison McClendon

And then this long bed, it’s 17 inches wide by about 200 feet, no 17 feet wide by about 200 feet long. It’s just all pollinator garden. And so we’re, we’re trying to encourage as much balance in our garden as possible. So, you know, while it felt heartless to remove a lot of those pine trees, what we’ve done is add diversity and life. So that’s kind of what we’re doing here.

13m 34s

JackieMarie Beyer

That is awesome. I know it’s hard to cut down the trees, but sometimes you have to, I mean, you gotta have that sun and the apple orchard trees to produce apple cider is going to be beneficial to you and your community. And the bees are going to get more out of that anyway. So, you know, it’s all, what can you do? So I do always start the show out. Alison asking about your very first gardening experience. Like, did you grow up in Chicago proper? Did your parents like ever have a garden? Like how old were you when you were a kid? Were you an adult? Who were you with and what, what’s the first thing you remember growing?

14m 12s

Alison McClendon

Well, I did not grow up in Chicago proper. I grew up downstate in the middle of the state in a place called Bloomington. It is absolutely surrounded by what was not so much industrial ag at that point, but now is just all corn and beans and it’s, it’s kind of dismal actually. I mean, it’s a beautiful environment, but the, the, the agriculture that takes place there is, is to me just sad. My mother took up gardening as I was growing up, but I think really what got me started that we, we would go camping.

14m 54s

Alison McClendon

We would go hiking. There were some wild places that we would go to in our area and I have always just loved nature. So it was really, it was really just my love of nature that kind of brought me to gardening. I lived in Atlanta for a while and had a house that had a huge yard and some people that who lived there prior to when I got the place, they were landscape designers. And so they had put a lot of really neat things in, and then they had become unable to care for the property.

15m 36s

Alison McClendon

And so it was really, my mom came and helped me with that yard. And it was, I don’t know, just trying to find out what what’s actually here and how do I take care of it that got me fired up. And she got me a lot of nice tools to work with a wheelbarrow, you know, good shovels, that kind of thing. So anyway, that was, that was kind of my beginning.

16m 3s

JackieMarie Beyer

Wow. So you probably, I think I’m sorry. I don’t know why I thought you were in Montana. And I think I have seen you posted Joe Gardner. She probably follow Jolyon bull cause he was, he was out of it like he’s out of Atlanta, I think. Right. Know,

16m 18s

Alison McClendon

I actually don’t know that, that side. No, I don’t believe I’m on there.

16m 23s

JackieMarie Beyer

He, oh, huh. Well that tells you where I’m at. I could’ve sworn, I had seen you posted in his Facebook group, but he, he does the growing a greener world show on, on the TV anyway. So then how did you learn how to garden organically was from your love of nature from your mom or where, where did document?

16m 45s

Alison McClendon

Well, both my mother was, you know, she was a, an early adopter of a lot of this stuff. And I think really my love of nature was from her directly. She had a wonder about her that I have definitely got. And so I think really the time in nature has given me an appreciation for all the living, things that are out there. I, I really can’t bring myself to use the heavy chemicals that will throw off the balance. I don’t want to kill anything. I want to create balance so that the, the system will work on its own as much as possible.

17m 32s

Alison McClendon

So I also, I growing up in Illinois and seeing all of the crop dusting, the, the, the model of growing there, the soil is some of the richest soil in the United States and it’s just being ruined and frankly, and, and it just kills me. It makes me so sad and upset to see that happening. I also, my family has celiac disease. And so when I am thinking about raising food, I am thinking about the food is nourishment and how it will affect my body is something I’m really aware of.

18m 14s

Alison McClendon

My son also has celiac disease. And so when my husband and I first began gardening, it was really never a question. We had some of the Rodale’s material. We were trying to learn about, you know, disease and insect pressure and how we could mitigate that. And, you know, for us gardening for our family and gardening with a baby and small child, we didn’t want to use any of the chemical stuff that was out there. So that was really a lot of our motivation there.

18m 54s

JackieMarie Beyer

I love all of that. And that’s, that’s exactly why I started my podcast, because since you haven’t been following me for very long, you might not know, but technically my husband’s the gardener and I’ve always called myself the organic eater a little bit. This year, I did myself and I grew, I grew so much, like I was like at the point where I was like, I don’t want to go to the garden anymore, but I’m kinda over that already. Like, I just love the healthy food. And then just, even like, when you’re talking to the pre-chat, we just got back from the grocery store and some of the food that was in there, some of the vegetables, and I was just like, seriously, like, oh, this just looks so, you know, you could just tell it had been neither sitting on a store shelf for a really long time, or just didn’t have anything to make you feel like you were going to get any nutrients out of eating this piece of fruit or this, I can’t remember what it was, but there was something that I was like, really they’re selling this as like a vegetable there’s like, God can’t be any nutritional value left in this like super pale celery or something that was just like, so maybe it was the, lettuce, I don’t know.

20m 3s

JackieMarie Beyer

Anyway, where was I back to tell? So tell us about something that you’ve done, such an amazing job describing your place. Like a lot of times I feel like I have to ask guests to really like go in a little more depth to explain, like, I can’t really visualize, but you did such a good job helping us visualize what your garden looks like. So what’s something that did grow well for you this year?

20m 27s

Alison McClendon

Well, I have to say because, I mean, I’ve been around gardening for a long time and you know, my husband and I did start our garden at our old house in the, in the raised bed that we’d built. But, you know, I was in the fog of early parenting. And I still consider myself kind of a green horn at this. And so I started this garden that we have out there. I started in spring of 2020, and I’m kind of, you know, for the same reason that a lot of other people did. So really we started with kind of lifeless soil.

21m 9s

Alison McClendon

We had done a little bit of, you know, mulching the soil in advance to try to, you know, add some life back into it, but this year, well, okay. So I’ll back up, last year, 2020 the garden did okay. But it was brand new soil. It was like, you know, there was nothing living in it And so everything did okay, but this year, it to answer your question, what grew well this year, I have to say everything! I’ve done so much over the last year to support the soil, to add organic matter. I’ve been making compost teas.

21m 53s

Alison McClendon

I’ve been doing foliar feeding. I’ve started getting more into the Korean natural farming concepts. I can’t say that I am anything like an expert. I’m a complete green horn there too, but I’m just really excited by the idea of being able to make my own amendments from, you know, plants and teas that I make here on site. And so everything, you know, we started out with fairly lifeless soil, and now you reach down into the soil and it’s, it’s loose. It’s not compact.

22m 33s

Alison McClendon

It has good structure. There’s there’s life in it. I’ve been able to support the soil biology. And so everything is just stronger and healthier. And I don’t even, at this point, I kind of don’t even care how much I get out of it. I want to eat out at the garden obviously, but this is just a process for me for learning and adding life into the place where I am. And so an answer to your question, I would say everything did better. So it’s just been, that’s been fun for me.

23m 9s

JackieMarie Beyer

Well then I guess I have to ask, what are some things that you grew then? Like, did you grow tomatoes or broccoli or lettuce or,

23m 18s

Alison McClendon

Okay. So I live in Alabama and it’s blasting hot here in the summertime. We, we had a wet summer, which is great because that helps otherwise I’m out there watering a lot, but so yeah, I grew, I grew okra and green peppers. Well, no, not green peppers, poblanos. I’m kind of mentally going down the rows, green beans, butter beans, cucumbers, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, and watermelon and cantaloupe. And then we also have asparagus and in the places where the asparagus head bare places, I just kind of on a Lark, threw some ginger in those spots.

24m 7s

Alison McClendon

And so, and also some turmeric, I just, I just grabbed some organic turmeric and ginger at the health food store and threw them in just for grins. And so they all, they all did well,

24m 20s

JackieMarie Beyer

Wait, hold on a sec. So like you went to the grocery store, but like a ginger root put that in the ground and a group

24m 31s

Alison McClendon

Yeah.

24m 31s

JackieMarie Beyer

Section or like you had to find ginger, is that what grows? The ginger root? Like the,

24m 36s

Alison McClendon

Yeah. Yeah. And so, I mean, I thought it was so many different folks on Instagram. That’s really, I’m so sorry about my computer making that noise. If I knew more about all of this, that would be able to stop it.

24m 53s

JackieMarie Beyer

You’re making noise

24m 55s

Alison McClendon

Here that,

24m 55s

JackieMarie Beyer

Oh, was that just the, it’s an alert? Well, it could have been my email. So that’s one thing my listeners complained about our background sounds by, you know, I’m just a one girl show. So they get what they get. We have great information. We have guests like you sharing these awesome tips. So yeah, we do work.

25m 13s

Alison McClendon

But as far as the ginger is concerned, yeah. I follow a lot of different folks on Instagram and it’s a lot of folks like me who are just like, Hey, let me try it out. And so yeah, somebody had showed that they just bought organic turmeric and organic ginger and they put it in the ground and Shizam, it turned into plants that produced more turmeric and ginger. And I was like, well, Hey, I can do that. So I did definitely go for the organic ones though. So they weren’t sprayed with any weird stuff.

25m 46s

JackieMarie Beyer

That’s so awesome to hear because I thought you had to order that stuff from like some place in Hawaii or something. So that, that is just, that’s just the coolest thing. I love that tip golden seeds. You’re giving us golden seeds house and thank you so much for sharing all of this with us.

26m 3s

Alison McClendon

You’re welcome.

26m 4s

JackieMarie Beyer

So what’s something you’re excited to try next year or someone you want to try that something new that you want to try?

26m 11s

Alison McClendon

Well, for sure, I want to scale up my compost game. I follow some really inspiring compost makers on Instagram also. And so I’m always learning more about how to do that. And compost, I don’t know if it’s true where you live, but finding quality living compost in, in my community is hard. There’s a place here that has started a really ambitious, good game of trying to make quantity compost, but the people who want compost far exceeds their there’s stock.

26m 54s

Alison McClendon

So anyway, I want to scale up my compost scheme. I’ve been learning a little bit about a kind of composting called Johnson Su, Su it’s the last name of, of the people who came up with this style of composting. And I’d like to learn more about that because you can really make large quantities in a small space. I also want to learn more about Korean natural farming so I can make more natural amendments to use in my garden because really where it’s at for me is strengthening the plants for disease resistance and insect resistance without pushing them with nitrogen.

27m 35s

Alison McClendon

I want to make them stronger and not, you know, shove them to do more than they’re capable of doing. So I’d also like to add, we bought a, a stainless steel tank. It’s a 500 gallon tank, and we’re wanting to use that for water catchment. It’s ready to go. It needs a lid, but it’s really ready to go. So we want to hook it up to our, the gutters on our shed. And I’d like to be able to have some free water to use. Cause it’s just, you know, it’s a better water and it’s, and it’s free. So I’d also like to, I’m going to see if I can close my mail.

28m 19s

Alison McClendon

This is just terrible. Hold on. Okay. Can you hear me?

28m 25s

JackieMarie Beyer

Yes. And no worries. And what was I going to say? I love that because somebody started talking to me this summer about worrying about the rain, getting on their chicken poop, compost. And I was like, seriously, that is the most thing you’re worried about. I’m like, we’d collect our rain to put on the garden. I think it’s better for us. I mean, yeah. What I, not like to see like half of the stuff that we put in the planet, but like, I mean, all the water’s being, you know, I’m more worried, like you are about the glyphosate, they’re spraying on the crops that goes into the water Chanel. Like even if you buy organic food at the grocery store, half the time it’s been watered with, you know, it’s, it’s watered with water.

29m 8s

JackieMarie Beyer

That’s, you know, that has the glyphosate in it because we’ve totally contaminated our whole waters by and like here in New York where my mom lives and what drives me crazy is like, her lawn looks so great. It looks so lush. It doesn’t look any different than any, or the lawn on her block. But yet all of her neighbors insist on springing these chemicals on their stupid lawn and get rid of their weeds. And I just makes me want to pull my hair out. And meanwhile, they have like one of the worst, but like she’s a boil her water. She drink because it’s been so contaminated. And I’m just like what these people think. If you have a yellow flag, this is don’t walk here for 24 hours. Where do you think those chemicals go?

29m 49s

JackieMarie Beyer

Obviously they’re going into the soil, which then drips down into the ground. I mean, it’s just like, did you not take basic science 1 0 1? I don’t know anyway off my bandwagon, but I mean, what was, what did we, oh yeah. So a couple of things quickly listeners, I would be remiss if I didn’t promote petty armor, stir has an awesome composting webinar that you can still buy and you just, it’s not wive. So you don’t get to ask the personal questions, but you get into her classroom on the three types of composting. And she goes pretty in depth into the Johnson shoe method.

30m 29s

JackieMarie Beyer

So if anybody listeners are out there are interested in that. So how do you make your compost right now? I mean, I am so I don’t, and this is the other thing that drives me crazy. So that Kiska ground book I was telling you about that I need reading in the pre-check. I just saw the movie and I read the book last year because somebody had, I did an interview with this guy, what was his name? Finney and make piece last year. And it talks about in San Francisco, they literally like collect compost from restaurants, from people’s curbs, from everywhere, and they have this program and it’s like, you pay for your garbage based on the weight of your garbage can.

31m 11s

JackieMarie Beyer

And so if you throw your composting vegetables into the, you know, green composting, garbage ban and your recyclables and whatever, and then your black bin has what’s left, you know, that’s going to be a lot less for you to pay. Cause it’s going to weigh a lot less because you don’t have that food in there. And like why in our country we’re wasting all this incredible food that could go into the organ into the soil. And especially the whole kiss. The ground book is about using the soil to capture carbon. And the four ways, like if we save our soil and grow diverse, like you’re talking about, you know, having diverse crops and just, you know, this could be the biggest game changer in, yes, we need to stop polluting and using the, get off the fossil fuels.

31m 57s

JackieMarie Beyer

But at the same time, the saving the soil and the carbon capture, the soil can do is going to be the biggest thing to put us back on track. So I love your passion. I’m just so passionate about composting. And I just, it pulls my hair out that people don’t compost, especially where I live, because we paid a haul, our garbage 80 miles from where I lived. That’s where the landfill is. So we’re holing. And like, I just, it drives me nuts and people complain about our property taxes. I’m like, well, Hey, I guess maybe actually my newspapers, I have an article going out in the newspaper this week. It should have been cramped, but I didn’t see it. Cause I’m here in New York. I have to ask my husband anyway off track Jackie, be quiet.

32m 42s

JackieMarie Beyer

We talked about something different next year. Tell us when something had didn’t work. The season, there had to be something that

32m 47s

Alison McClendon

It didn’t go the way you thought it was gonna. Yeah, I would say probably. So our property Alabama is very hilly and so our property is high at one side and low at the other. And so one of the things about our, our property that we’re trying to get figured out is in the areas that we don’t have, we’ve put swales in berms in the areas where the trees are. And then, you know, the garden is on contour going down a hill. And so it’s essentially a series of swales and berms. The swales are the paths that are filled with wood chips.

33m 27s

Alison McClendon

And then the berms are the raised beds in the other parts of our yard, in that area that are not yet figured out. We’ve got a lot of erosion. And so, and for a lot of reasons, you know, life parenting, you know, all of that stuff, it’s been hard for us to get well in money because our property is on a hillside. It’s also very hard to get material up there. It takes a lot of doing so we haven’t been able to cover all of that soil that is exposed.

34m 9s

Alison McClendon

And so we’ve experienced quite a lot of erosion in some areas. And so that’s one of the things that definitely got my attention this summer is I saw how much, how much work is still needed to happen back there to address just that exposed soil. The other thing that I kinda couldn’t figure out is the sweet potatoes. I grew my own slips at the beginning of the season from the sweet potatoes that I raised last year. And, and I also grew them in the same area. Although I did have a diverse cover crop in that bed over the cold season, but then in the spring, I, you know, once the slips were ready, I put them back in that same bed.

34m 60s

Alison McClendon

I think I’ve got a lot to learn about how to grow sweet potatoes. I think maybe I need to change where they grow, not grow them in the same place year after year. And I think maybe I need to get some slips that are off of, you know, some other potatoes that I, I didn’t grow in that space because really what I experienced was they were, they were great plants that were very strong, but then when I got this, we potatoes out of the ground, I was super excited. I had all these bins ready to, to hold all these sweet potatoes I getting. And they were, some of them were cracked.

35m 43s

Alison McClendon

And actually I’d say probably at least a third of them, maybe half showed. They were just really, you know, how tomatoes will do when they get too wet right before you pick them. And they’ll split. It was like that. And I don’t know if it’s because we had such a wet summer and it really was a wet summer here, but when I cured them, then those that had split, they started getting soft and I have had to compost a lot of them. So I’d say the sweet potatoes where the disappointment,

36m 23s

JackieMarie Beyer

Without a doubt, rotating your crops is definitely, you know, something that you probably, you know, that you need to do. Or at least I know that I was going to say from Mike’s experience with potatoes, he struggled with potato, just regular potatoes for years. And then he finally mastered it. And then, and so during the pandemic, 2020, we had so many potatoes, sweet potatoes. I bought 85 pounds of seed potatoes, like an idiot. And he planted half the mini farm and numb. And that was great. He had the best year, but then this summer 2021, he just planted some of the ones he had saved and I didn’t buy anyone’s and he just did not.

37m 5s

JackieMarie Beyer

We just like the other day, he was like, can you buy me potatoes before you go to New York for sweet potatoes for Thanksgiving? And it just like, was like so different to me because we were still like eating the potatoes that he grew the year before. I was like, why I haven’t bought a potato? I mean, I’ve literally not bought a potato since 2019 until this past week. And I was like potatoes, really? Because, cause they’re even like, they’re on a report. I’m like those two, they just must not be good. He must not like them. Or maybe the red potatoes. I don’t know he was out of the white ones, but yeah, sometimes you’ve got to order. You’ve got to kind of get the seed potatoes from the, and I know in Montana, like I have this listener, he keeps writing to me and asking me, where am I going to get seed potatoes because of Montana.

37m 48s

JackieMarie Beyer

They, they have to be grown by specific growers or you have to get them through like Montana state university. Like, there’s really like some big thing about potatoes. It’s not the easiest that you can’t just go buy a potato, cut it in pieces usually and grow it. I don’t think I’m so like interested to hear like, and I don’t know if regular potatoes are different than sweet potatoes. We, we haven’t ever tried to grow sweet potatoes. There was a girl I did interview and billings Montana, which is very cold, you know, in Northern climate. And I know they usually prefer a cooler, but she was very successful. She did talk about like, when she ordered the potatoes slips, the first box that the first package that came, they just were like, they ended up having to reship them and like ship them on a Monday and Friday.

38m 37s

JackieMarie Beyer

So she got them like the first batch was like shipped on a Friday and sat at the post office for too long or something they didn’t do as good. And then the next batch they did, they were, they were really good. But I remember there was a lot of stuff, but sweet potatoes. I think there there’s quite the learning curve. I just want to tell you Alison before I forget, like you say, you’re a green horn, but let me tell you, you’ve done a lot of research and this guy, John Lee, do you miss? You used to always, who’s the person who taught me how to podcast used to always say, you know, an expert in a court of law. It’s just, the person is somebody who knows more than everybody else in the room. And I am definitely telling you, you are an expert compared to a lot of us because you have done a lot of research.

39m 20s

JackieMarie Beyer

You’ve taken your research and put it in practice already for a season or tail. And I can’t wait to read your book when it comes out. If you read a book because you are headed to be, you’re just, it’s just amazing. And we thank you for sharing all these lessons with us and being open about challenges. So anyway, this is the part of the show we call getting to the root of things. So do you have a least favorite activity in the garden that you got to kind of force yourself to get out there and do?

39m 48s

Alison McClendon

Oh, I do. It’s watering in the heat of the day. You know, Alabama is very hot and very humid and the pressure of the sun and the heat in the, in the heat of the summer. It’s intense. I’m from Illinois, which is not a it’s, it’s hot there too, but it’s not like Alabama, it’s it’s really hot here. So I was grateful that it was a rainy summer because when I am aware that my plants are needing water, I will go out and take care of them. But all man, it’s hard. So I’d say watering in mid summer during the heat of the day, that’s my least favorite activity.

40m 36s

JackieMarie Beyer

Well, my listeners know watering is my biggest challenge. Can I just, and I can edit this out or you don’t even have to answer, you don’t want to, but I’m just so curious. Like why did you guys move to Alabama?

40m 49s

Alison McClendon

Well, so I lived in Chicago as a young adult. I was involved in music there and I, I ended up moving to the south to beat with a boyfriend. And then that was, you know, that was a chapter in my life that ended. But then I was, I was in Atlanta and met my husband, my now husband. And so I just ended up coming on over here.

41m 21s

JackieMarie Beyer

So interesting and funny. I mean, I don’t know if anybody cares whatsoever, but of the lower 48, the only two states I have not been to you or Alabama and Louisiana. So I don’t know. I was so interested like when you were like, it’s hilly, I never would have pictured of Alabama being hilly.

41m 36s

Alison McClendon

It is, they say that we are the Amazon rainforest of the United States. If you a look at the map, like a topographic map of Alabama and you’re, you’re focusing on, you know, biodiversity, we have the highest biodiversity in the United States. We have just amazing watersheds. We have amazing natural areas. It’s a really beautiful state. So, you know, we’re, we enjoy that aspect of it a lot.

42m 11s

JackieMarie Beyer

Well, I did drive through the top of Arkansas and it was a beautiful, I was, I remember I’ll never forget that drive. Like it really stood out in my head. I was coming back from like New Mexico, via Texas. And I don’t know, somehow I went through like the top of Arkansas on, on, up, but cool. Well, I was just curious, like you moved there because, because of like the gardening or whatever on the flip side, what’s your favorite activity to do in the garden?

42m 40s

Alison McClendon

I would say definitely just looking around, you may have noticed this in my Instagram posts, but one of the things I love the most about being in the garden is seeing all of the life that has moved in. You know, when we moved into this property, the people who lived here before there was very little diversity, there were pine and sweet gum trees and some of the blue hydrangeas, but they really did not have much going on in the, the landscape beyond that. And so now that we’ve put in all of these areas that support, you know, spiders, all of the different insects, the birds, it’s so much fun for me to just walk around and see who’s here.

43m 34s

Alison McClendon

And I love to take videos of the bees as they’re gathering their nectar and pollen. I love to watch the spiders. I love to watch the goldfinches, you know, the wildflower area is it produces a lot of seeds. And so in the fall, in the late summer and fall, it’s just a live with goldfinches, which to me is so cool. And then, you know, we have an easement behind our property and we have put in a big gate so that we can get back there and I’d put all of the brush and stuff that I, you know, when we prune, I just put the brush back there. And so, you know, there’s just, there’s lots of places for living things to find their homes.

44m 19s

Alison McClendon

And I even, I remember one time I was in the process of pruning that apple trees and I was sitting down resting, and I became aware that I was being watched. I looked through the, and there was a little Fox on the other side of the fence and he was watching me and I was like, I was so excited. And then he didn’t like me looking at him, you know, like dogs do. He was like, excuse me, that’s a challenging thing. You’re doing staring at me. So he turned around and left. But you know, that’s what I love to do the most is just see all of the living things that have found this to be a, a healthy place to live.

45m 3s

JackieMarie Beyer

Oh, your kids are so lucky to have you for a mom. And we’re so lucky that you’re out here teaching your kids and developing that love of nature and just, I get totally, you should write a children’s book. That’s so sweet. I love that.

45m 17s

Alison McClendon

Oh, well, I would totally dig that. Yeah. And my husband and I would have

45m 23s

JackieMarie Beyer

You write the story.

45m 25s

Alison McClendon

Oh yeah. That’d be great. Okay. It’s a deal

45m 28s

JackieMarie Beyer

And your Instagram. Okay. Now I am remembering, right? Like your Instagram, like I clicked glove on like a lot of your videos and your pictures because you are an amazing photographer right after I thought you were promoting, but right. That your Instagram channel that I like was on and was like, wow, right. Yeah,

45m 46s

Alison McClendon

Yeah. It is. It is. And you know, I, I guess I use that. I come from a very creative family. My dad’s a sculptor. My mom, while she worked in insurance for a long time, she just, I think we’re observers our family. We have, we have a lot of creativity in our family and I love to just, I don’t know, focus in on the things that you might miss, but they really deserve our attention. There’s so many beautiful things in the world

46m 23s

JackieMarie Beyer

That might be the title of this show. That was so eloquent and just lovely. I think you’re totally inspiring people right now. Like you were just a GFF, a garden friend forever and the soil system. Cause I just feel like you, you feel about compost. Like I leaned in. I do. And just your love of nature and just, we have so much in common.

46m 47s

Alison McClendon

I definitely feel that way about compost. As a matter of fact, I, I think of it as like my little, my little allies, you know, they’re, they’re in there. I can’t see him, but I’m always like, Hey guys,

47m 2s

JackieMarie Beyer

What’s the best gardening advice you’ve ever received. Alison,

47m 9s

Alison McClendon

My husband and I, when we first started out, we got, do you know the permaculture fellow Toby Hemenway yeah. Yeah. So I remember reading his book and one of the things

47m 25s

JackieMarie Beyer

Is that it?

47m 28s

Alison McClendon

Yup. Yeah, yeah. But it was that one where, and I’m paraphrasing here, but he basically says take care of the soil and the soil will take care of your plants. And so, you know, while I think, you know, we, we have Americans are maybe humans in general. I don’t know, but it seems to be, it seems to be our culture, especially we have this very sort of top-down approach to gardening where we think, you know, we need to have these chemical inputs and we need to, you know, force the plant to do this or that. And I, I guess I’m not into that. I think, you know, we, we try to, we try to impose our competition style on the world.

48m 16s

Alison McClendon

And what I’ve learned is that the world is not competitive it’s cooperative. And so, you know, you think about the, the way the, the rise of fear rhizosphere functions, where, you know, the, the, the microbes are feeding the plant and the plant is feeding the microbes. The trees are lending carbon or lending nutrients or water to one another. Like here you look hungry and they’re, they’re sharing, you know, the, the mama trees are, are raising the younger trees. They’re not competing. The grass is not competing with the, with the trees, the trees and the grass are, are cohabitating together.

48m 60s

Alison McClendon

And so when I think about, you know, focusing on the soil first and letting the soil take care of the plants that just made so much sense to me, I didn’t really understand it much at the time when I read it. But I was just like, now that I can get behind that I’ll take care of the soil. And then I think all of the things that I’ve read, all the research that I’ve done has just been in support of trying to find that balance. How do we support nature to do what nature already does? Perfectly

49m 36s

JackieMarie Beyer

Golden seeds, golden seeds. And this is just exactly what I’m about my child. What’s your favorite tool when you moved? Was there only one tool you could take on you?

49m 49s

Alison McClendon

I would be in trouble. There are. Okay. Well, I would say, you know, because we do live in an area that has such a rich diversity of lives. We have a lot of seeds in the soil just waiting to emerge, which is cool. I’m, I’m cool with that. However, what it means is that we really do have to stay on top of weeding here. One of the reasons that I like no-till gardening is because you do exhaust that upper layer of soil, of, of seeds. And so, you know, if you’re keeping your paths, mulch, at least at our house, that’s how we do it.

50m 32s

Alison McClendon

And you’re keeping your soil weeded. You’re generally going to be okay with, with weed seeds in the garden. But when I’m creating new areas to work in, I love the silence tarp, and you know, I’m not big into plastic, but I have to say that this has been a really, really valuable tool. I was able to open up the area for gardening by laying the stylish tarp down and letting the weed seeds be terminated that way, or letting the weeds be terminated that way. So the silage tarp has been super valuable for me. And also I use a wire weeder nearly every day during the summer.

51m 19s

Alison McClendon

And it’s just, I want to say the, oh, darn, I’m not going to be able to remember his name. Oh, there’s somebody who makes this tool. And I wish I could give him credit, but my husband made one for me from materials that he bought at the hardware store. But it’s just, it’s just a triangle of wire kind of stiff wire attached to a handle. And you just drag it along the ground. And what it does is it removes the, the young weeds when they’re in the thread stage so that they’re not deeply attached. So you don’t disturb the soil very much.

52m 0s

Alison McClendon

You’re just dragging it along the top and dragging the weeds out with it. So those have been really super valuable to me.

52m 9s

JackieMarie Beyer

It’s a bad guy that has the never

52m 13s

Alison McClendon

Sink. Yes. That’s him. That’s

52m 15s

JackieMarie Beyer

I couldn’t think of his

52m 19s

Alison McClendon

Name. Yeah.

52m 20s

JackieMarie Beyer

Yeah. I’ve seen those, those

52m 22s

Alison McClendon

Look. Cool. Yeah.

52m 25s

JackieMarie Beyer

And your husband made one, huh?

52m 28s

Alison McClendon

Oh yeah. He has an art degree. And so it’s really, I mean, it’s just kind of our family, we’re all makers. Our son is a maker also. So it’s, it’s pretty easy. We can, we can really just kind of just see what we want, figure it out. I, I didn’t have any money when I was growing up. And so my whole thing has always been like, if I want to do that chain, if I want to have that Chang, I should probably look around and see what materials I have to make it come into being. So yeah. He made one for me. He’s going to be that way.

53m 4s

JackieMarie Beyer

I love that. How about, what’s your favorite recipe you like to cook or eat from the garden or your family?

53m 13s

Alison McClendon

Yeah. I’m going to sound a little funny right now, but I, because our family has a lot of allergies, my son and I both have celiac disease and I also have a corn allergy and then just all kinds of like random stuff. Doesn’t agree. And so honestly, I am so burned out on cooking right now. I was thinking about that question and I’m like, I’m with,

53m 41s

JackieMarie Beyer

I am too. And even worse than that is the cleaning up after your cooking.

53m 46s

Alison McClendon

Oh yeah. Oh yeah. And I mean, every single day, it’s, you know, I want to provide nourishing food. I want to provide food that will enjoy eating.

53m 57s

JackieMarie Beyer

What are we having for dinner? Oh,

54m 1s

Alison McClendon

It just worst. And I mean,

54m 3s

JackieMarie Beyer

It’s all my mom, she’s like Nana used to have, like, you know, Monday was pot roast and Tuesday was this and Wednesday was that. And I was like, I wish I could get my husband on that. Cause I am so sick about what are we eating tonight for dinner? Like, I would just like to have like a calendar, like Monday we’re having Mac and cheese and Tuesday we’re having vegetable soup and Wednesday we’re having anyway, this is about you. I’m muting my mic.

54m 26s

Alison McClendon

Okay. Yeah. Well, so I, I would love to say that I’ve got some great recipes really in the summertime. The things that I enjoy are things that don’t require cooking. You know, when, when I’m working in the garden a lot, I come in and I’m burned out. I’m, I’m ready to just put my feet up. So I try to do things that are quick and easy. Some of the things that I love are my mother always kept a, a jar of quick pickles in the fridge. And she grew up as a, she was born during the depression. And so I don’t know, there’s something about my mother and grandmother always keeping this big jar of quick pickles.

55m 12s

Alison McClendon

It’s the, the two Cumbers sliced in a vinegar sugar combination with onions. I keep those in the fridge during the summertime. I also love slice tomatoes with basil. So those are things I like to pull out of the, the garden okra. I learned a friend recommended a way to cook okra that we really enjoy. It’s just roasted okra. You just slice it long ways and coat it with olive oil and salt and pepper and roast it. No, I’m sorry, not roast you broil it on a low for, you know, you’re really just watching to see when it gets cold and brown, but it’s really good.

55m 56s

Alison McClendon

It’s like okra fries. And I’d like to say that I had a whole lot of other things at my sleeve, but right now I, like I said, I’m just kind of burned out on cooking. Just never ends.

56m 14s

JackieMarie Beyer

I think those are great recipes, especially the pickle, the cook pickle. I like all of them. The quick Oak grab, my mom kind of does just like that with like either zucchinis or eggplants, but just simple prayers. She made eggplant the first day I got here because I brought tomatoes on my very last tomatoes that I had grown the summer. Anyway, I think those are great recipes. Good. How about a favorite internet resource? Where do you find you’re surfing the web? I think you’re going to say Instagram, but maybe

56m 45s

Alison McClendon

I am going to say Instagram, but also podcasts. And here’s a thing. I, I started listening to podcasts and these are connected because the podcasts led me to these Instagram feeds. I have a tendency to insomnia and when I am not able to sleep, one of the things that I like to do is we have a really comfortable couch. That’s long enough to sleep on. And so, so I don’t disturb my husband. I’ll get up and go lie down on the couch and get comfortable there. And I’ll, I’ll try to sort of disengage my brain a little bit by listening to something calm.

57m 31s

Alison McClendon

And one of the things that is discovered, and I don’t know if this was in 2018 or 2019, but somehow I ended up finding the no till market garden podcast, which I know you love too. And also the regenerative agriculture podcast, John Kemp, I don’t know if you know him, but he’s a, he’s a wonderful, smart interviewer. He’s he’s really got a great podcast. And so that led me to, you know, all of those interviews were with people who I, I learned a lot from.

58m 11s

Alison McClendon

And then I became aware that they had Instagram pages. And so just watching their processes and learning from them and then it led to their books. And so now my nightstand is just groaning under the giant stack of reference materials. So I would say podcasts and Instagram, where were my best resources.

58m 36s

JackieMarie Beyer

We’re going to podcast for you to check out it’s I want to say much about nothing. I’ll send you a, she also has an Instagram channel, but she puts you to sleep really. Like she tells you a very storage, short story, and then she repeats it even slower. She kind of talks you through a little bit of breathing at the beginning, very short, but, and she like trains your brain on how to fall asleep. I, it, it puts her. I’ve never, when I first started listening to it sometimes, and then she even tells you, like, if you don’t fall asleep, by the time I’m done reading, the second thing of it, try to tell yourself the story in your head.

59m 22s

JackieMarie Beyer

And I still remember, like sometimes if I’m laying in bed and I can’t fall asleep, just thinking about that very first story. I listened to a first where she talks about cooking tomato sauce in a lightened storm or whatever puts me to sleep. Like I don’t even make it through the whole story. It might have been. She is, is great. And she, I want to say she’s from Chicago, but just a master of, of helping you fall asleep at night. What was the other thing I was going to tell you super quick. I did interview John Kemp must have been before she had his podcast. And then of course, Jesse Frost, the Notel island.

1h 0m 3s

JackieMarie Beyer

How about a favorite reading material? Booker magazine, like w w which I was going to ask you to have an Instagram, I guess those are the Instagram people that you recommend. Is there anybody that you follow that, like you think customers really want to listen to, or just kind of get on there? Like, I don’t really remember people’s Instagram, like what they are, you know what I’m saying? Like, I don’t like, it could be like, I get on there and I click like, and I knew, I know which ones like stand out to me and I prefer, but like, if you asked me what there at so-and-so was, I wouldn’t be able to tell you.

1h 0m 39s

Alison McClendon

Yeah, I have the same issue. I couldn’t really say what the name of their feed is, but I enjoy, well, Daniel Mays, Firth farm. I like, I like his Instagram. I like Ben Hartman’s do you know Ben Hartman? The guy who

1h 0m 57s

JackieMarie Beyer

I’ve been trying to get him to come on my show and he’s just so busy. He’s the lean farm, right?

1h 1m 2s

Alison McClendon

Yeah. He, well, he eliminates all the extra stuff, so he’s going to be hard to nail down. So yeah. I like Matt powers, the permaculture guy.

1h 1m 18s

JackieMarie Beyer

Did you have,

1h 1m 19s

Alison McClendon

Oh my gosh. I’m going to have to go way back in your backlog. Did you get his book? The regenerative regenerative soil book?

1h 1m 28s

JackieMarie Beyer

No. Matt powers wrote, I, when I interviewed him, we just had the like curriculum for the school kids. Oh, I’ll have to, I’ll have to check on. Or maybe he, I don’t know. I’ve, you’re going to be like interviewed 399. And at this point I’m kind of, after six years, they’re all kind of like jumbling together anymore.

1h 1m 46s

Alison McClendon

Yeah, I hear ya. I hear ya. Jesse Frost’s book the living soil handbook. I mean, I, I think one of the things that’s been most interesting to me as I have gone through the process of just trying to learn more about how to bring our place to life here is that I didn’t realize how interesting biology was to me. But I mean, you know, I’ll read some of these things like Jesse Frost and Matt powers both really do deep dives into what’s what’s happening in the soil and why it works.

1h 2m 30s

Alison McClendon

There’s another guy, what’s his name? Oh, Nigel Palmer, regenerative growers guide to garden amendments. All of them are talking about the real science about what’s happening in the soil. And so I would say probably the thing that I like the most with the, the books that I read is to find out like what’s actually happening there and how, how do we support? What’s trying to take place there. So that’s kind of where it’s at for me.

1h 3m 6s

JackieMarie Beyer

And then Jesse’s book. I love Hannah’s illustrations. And I mean, they have great photos too, but the two together, like I just feel like it helps to kind of like, I guess maybe I’m a visual part, but like a lot of the things that people have talked about for years of my podcast really came to life, looking at Hannah’s drawings. And Justin’s thank you so much for sharing all of this. So is there anything we haven’t talked about that you want to talk about before I get to my final question?

1h 3m 38s

Alison McClendon

No. I mean, I’m, I don’t really have any pressing thing on my mind.

1h 3m 43s

JackieMarie Beyer

Okay. Here we go. Alison, if there’s one change you would like to see the creator green of world, what would it be? For example, is there a charity organization, your passionate about or project you’d like to see put into action? Like what do you feel is the most crucial issue facing our planet in regards to the environment? Either locally, nationally, or on a global?

1h 4m 7s

Alison McClendon

For me, you know, growing up in Illinois among the, the corn and bean fields there, and just seeing how agriculture has been changed by the industrial model. I would say that if I were going to wave a wand and change something on a large scale, I would say I would love to see local food become the model. So I, I think if we could disconnect from industrial agriculture and support community-based food systems, I think that would have an enormous impact.

1h 4m 56s

JackieMarie Beyer

Ah, I love that. That was perfect answer. You know what I’m wanting to mention super quick. Did you ever read Nicole masters? Let me goodness. What’s it called for the love of soil? Nicole masters from 11. So you’ll like that. I never ever thought I would be interested in a book that talks about the biology of soil and she just takes it, breaks it up. She said she couldn’t believe when she wrote the book. How many people have told her, I’ve read this book four or five times or I’ve. And I did, I did the Jackson thing. I read the book, I bought the audio book.

1h 5m 35s

JackieMarie Beyer

I listened to the audio book. I’m like, it just seems like something. I would never think. She just makes shul fascinating. She talks about coming alive. She talks about doing triage at your place and how to figure out what your soil needs. It’s a great book. If you haven’t read that,

1h 5m 51s

Alison McClendon

I feel like I have heard her interviewed, but that book sounds fantastic. It sounds like something I would love.

1h 5m 58s

JackieMarie Beyer

Yeah. I interviewed her outside. I’ll make sure you get deli it’s episode 327 Y 26, 20 20. So bull. Do you want to tell listeners how to find your Instagram so they can follow you there? Is that the best way for them to connect with you? Because they know they’re going to love us in a real,

1h 6m 17s

Alison McClendon

It would be. Yeah. I kind of DeSanto Quintin. I named my garden the long cut garden and it’s as opposed to the shortcut, because I’m in it for the long-term I I’m trying to,

1h 6m 31s

JackieMarie Beyer

I was wondering what that meant. I get it, not the shortcut, the long that’s awesome.

1h 6m 38s

Alison McClendon

Yeah. And I think it’s actually either a Wilco or an uncle Tupelo reference to anyway. So I think they have a song called the long cut anyway, but yeah, the long cut garden is my Instagram and that’s where I just sort of showcase the processes. I’m going through to try to bring this little one-third of an acre plot of land to life.

1h 7m 5s

JackieMarie Beyer

Well, it sounds like you’ve done an amazing job and listeners, let me tell you, her photographs are just, they just warm your heart because the way you capture a spider web and the way you capture, you know, just things that are going on there is just beautiful and lovely. And thank you so much for sharing with us today and taking this time to talk to me this morning and, and, and sharing your knowledge and what you’ve learned. And maybe we’ll check back with you in a couple of years and see where you’ve come and

1h 7m 38s

Alison McClendon

Well, I thank you so much for having me. This has been such a good time. Thank you, Jackie.

1h 7m 44s

JackieMarie Beyer

Thank you. And have a great day, I guess. And I’ll send you the link when I get this out there, which I will try to do faster than I still have a couple of episodes from July that I’m waiting to post thing feels so bad and they’re ready to go. All I need to do is like upload the files and do the show notes, but that can take me an hour just to like, literally like, just to go in it. It’s just a time consuming process. I don’t know. Anyway, thank you so much, Allison. Have a great

1h 8m 14s

Alison McClendon

Day. Thank you. You too. Bye Jackie.

1h 8m 17s

1

Okay. I’m sh I am going to shut the recording off. Get your copy of the organic Oasis guide book available today from Amazon, it’s got 12 lessons designed to help you create your own organic Oasis. It starts with healthy soil. It talks about building an earth handling landscape. It helps you understand the difference between annuals and perennials and how to bring in beneficial insects. It talks about fruit trees and just all the lessons that I’ve learned on my podcast mixed with what Mike and I have done here. Okay. What Mike has done here at Mike’s green garden and just, I hope that it will help you on your garden journey to create, like I said, your own organic Oasis, where you can have healthy food and enjoy, you know, a very special place.

1h 9m 12s

1

And most of all, it’s good for mother earth. Do you know someone who would benefit from the organic gardener podcast? If you like, what you hear? We’d love it. If you chaired the organic gardener podcast with a friend, thanks again for listening. And remember.

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Twelve Lessons designed to help you create an earth friendly landscape, some deep garden beds full of nutrient rich healthy food or perhaps even develop a natural market farm.

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