Go Food Gardening
Two Day Course
with Di-Di Hoffman

Learn how to create an abundant organic food garden in your own backyard.

For some people, starting a food garden from scratch or improving the results from an existing garden, can be intimidating. There seems to be so much you need to know.

Whether you are a gardening novice who wants to start your first food garden or an experienced gardener who just want to enhance it, this two day course offer the know-how and guidance you need to experience the thrill and satisfaction of successfully growing your own edible crops.

Developed by the SA Herb Academy, this course is a proven fast-track to creating a productive and sustainable food garden. Your food garden can be as small as a few pots on a windowsill, as large as a soccer field, or any size in between.

"The cheapest experience you can get comes second hand - if you'll buy it." - Steve Solomon, Food Gardening Author

Course Aims

• Creating a low cost productive and sustainable food garden in your own back yard.
   
• Good, un-poisoned herbs and veggies that tastes like it should.
   
• Throwing impressive dinner parties with home-grown green cuisine to delight your family and friends.
   
• A bit of stretch to the household budget.
   
• Work that feels like play, and not too much of it.
   
• Greenery, flower smells and abundant wildlife around the house.
   
• Paying it forward by sharing food with the needy and helping others setting up their own little Eden's.
   
• A world that is fit for your grandchildren.

Day 1: Food Garden Setup and Organic Gardening Basics

By the end of day one you will be able to plan and install your own low cost / low input food garden based on your needs and tailored to the characteristics of your site. You will also be able to prepare the beds and amend the beds with organic soil conditioners. You will also be able to start composting and you will be able to set up a working worm farm.

Program Outline:

• Determining Your Needs: Using your expectations, needs and available resources to determine the best size for your food garden.
   
• Site Analysis: How to choose the best site(s) for your food garden based on your local climate and micro-climate; taking your whole garden into account.
   
• Bed Types: The pros and cons of informal gardens, row gardens, formal raised beds, keyhole beds, herb wheels and mandala gardens.
   
• Pathways: Access to your garden and beds (where, what shape, how wide, materials.)
   
• Garden Layout: Designing the overall bed layout and transferring it to the garden.
   
• Bed Preparation: How to prepare beds for first time planting and subsequent plantings.
   
• Soils and Soil Analysis: How to determine your soil type with simple but very effective soil tests.
   
• Building Soil Fertility: The best organic soil conditioners for your garden and how and when to use them.
   
• Selecting and Using Cover Crops: The role and selection of cover crops in building soil fertility.
   
• Composting: Meeting your own particular composting needs and making your own compost using a simple proven method.
   
• Worm Farming: How to set up and operate your own low cost worm farm.

Cost: R315 - R750 (see Cost and Payment below)

Minimum 8, Maximum 16 Participants

Day 2: Growing for Health and Vitality. Boosting Harvests.

With the beds ready for planting it is time to get the crops into the ground and care for them until they are ready for the table.

By the end of day two you will be able to plan a crop growing schedule based on your needs, experience level and local climate. You will also be able to sow and plant crops, water, weed, and fertilize them using best practices. And you will be able to harvest crops at their optimum; and deal with pests and diseases when needed without using poisons.

Program Outline:

• Crop Selection: Selecting which veggies, herbs and fruits to grow based on your needs analysis and level of experience.
   
• Planting by the Moon: Basic concepts and how to use moon planting calendars as an organizational tool.
   
• Seasonal Sowing Guide: Determining your best sowing dates and adapting the regional sowing guide to your own garden.
   
• Crop Growing Schedule: Planning which crops go where and when and how to avoid the common "feast or famine syndrome".
   
• Raising Seedlings: Direct sowing, raising seedlings, thinning, transplanting and spacing.
   
• Container Food Gardening: How to do it successfully, re-potting,etc.
   
• Watering: Frequency, hand watering and simple watering systems.
   
• Weeding: Four simple strategies for weeding.
   
• Compost Teas: What they are and do. When and how to apply them. Setting up a system to make them using herbs, seaweed and manure.
   
• Pest Control: How to identify and deal with them without poisons. Recipes for making your own pesticides.
   
• Harvesting: How to determine crop readiness.

Cost: R315 - R750 (see Cost and Payment below)

Minimum 8, Maximum 16 Participants

Booking is Essential

Bookings will be considered on a first come, first served basis.

Cancellations must be made 10 days before the course date and a 50% cancellation fee applies.

No refunds for no-shows.

Cancellations: In the case of inclement weather, or insufficient participants, confirmed bookings will be notified as soon as possible and will be refunded or booked for another course of their choice.

Contact saha.admin@gmail.com. Essential information to include in your email:

1. Your name and contact details - email, phone numbers, address (or just the area where you live).

2. The workshop and dates you want to attend.

3. Any relevant food gardening experience or background.

4. A brief statement of your motivation for participating in the course.

5. The amount you intend to pay.

Cost and Payment

Costs are based on a sliding scale, where participants decide on the amount to pay across the scale, appropriate to their income. The lowest amount is for lower income people and students, the highest amount being for higher income people.

This range simplistically represents wealth discrepancy in society, with the aim of making the program accessible to the 'lower strata' whilst still enabling it to be viable for the facilitators and organisers.

Please follow your heart and give as generously as you are able to.

Bookings will be confirmed once payment has been received. (Payment details will be sent to successful applicants.)

Venues

Pretoria: The outdoor classroom in Di-Di Hoffman's garden. Situated on a small holding just north (about 10 minutes) of the N1 Zambesi off ramp. Directions on registration.

Cape Town: To be confirmed. Please note that Cape Town courses run on a weekend and not on two Saturdays.

Course Dates

Pretoria
Day 1: Saturday 2 October 2010; 09h00 -16h00
Day 2: Saturday 16 October 2010; 09h00 - 16h00

Cape Town
Day 1: Saturday 6 November 2010; 09h00 - 16h00
Day 2: Sunday 7 November 2010; 09h00 - 16h00

Need More Information?

Please call me on 082 416 7145, or send an email to saha.admin@gmail.com

To your success.

Director: SA Herb Academy