About Organic Vegetable Gardens

Organic vegetable gardens can provide you and your family with fresh fruits and vegetables that are free of chemical fertilizers and pesticides. You can create an organic garden through practices that have fed populations long before the advent of agricultural chemicals.

Identification

An organic vegetable garden is a self-sufficient, self-sustaining garden. Vegetable growth is dependent on soil quality. Soil quality is gained through composting of natural materials. Organic and plant based materials are used for composting. Pest control is based on companion planting, healthy soil and crop rotation.
An organic vegetable garden may not differ in appearance from that of a garden dependent on synthetic or chemical means for soil amendment and pest control. On closer inspection, however, you may note that organic vegetables are not as "perfect" in appearance as those grown using chemical enhancements.

Features

The soil of an established organic garden is nearly black in color and more granular than that of chemically amended soils. There should be an abundance of worms, as well as microscopic organisms. Organic gardening depends on organisms found naturally in soil. These organisms, many of which are eliminated when chemical fertilizers are used, are part of the process called nitrification. This process converts nitrogen into usable material for plant life.

Significance

That the soil can provide food naturally is a large part of organic gardening. The elimination of chemical fertilizers from your organic garden means the soil will not give out as quickly, that is, fail to provide nutrients for plant life.
The soil of an organic garden is kept healthy and for longer periods through composting, crop rotation and allowing ground to lie fallow. To lie fallow is to not plant on that plot for a certain period of time, allowing it to rest and regain nutrients by adding compost.

Function

Using the basic tenets of organic gardening allows your garden to function in natural cycles. Your organic vegetable garden, then, functions as a food source for you and your family. You, as the gardener, function within the organic system.
You eat organic fruits and vegetables. The table scraps from these are added to your compost. Your compost is made up of table scraps, grass clippings and discarded plant matter. The decayed matter becomes compost, which you add to your soil. You plant organic seeds, use companion planting for pest control and crop rotation for soil health. Your garden produces organic fruits and vegetables that you harvest and eat. Your garden functions as a food source and you function within the system as caretaker and beneficiary.

History

Before the widespread use of chemical fertilizers and pest controls, all gardening and farming was organic. It wasn't until after WWI that chemicals were applied agriculturally.
As early as 1940, however, J.I. Rodale, founder of the Rodale Institute, used the term "organic" in reference to gardening. He espoused the dangers of chemical fertilizers in terms of not only localized soil depletion but also to the environment as a whole.
In 1962, marine biologist Rachel Carson published a book entitled "Silent Spring." The book was the catalyst for the environmental movement. One distinctive consequence of the book is public awareness of the dangers of using chemical pesticides.

Potential

An organic garden in your backyard, chemical free and a naturally functioning ecosystem, can provide your family with organic fruits and vegetables. But can organic gardening and farming practices feed the world?
Studies at the Rodale Institute demonstrate that yields from organic test plots match, if not outperform, those in which chemical fertilizers and pesticides were used. The studies also demonstrate that soil used in organic plots was more likely to produce drought resistant crops.
As gardeners become more proficient at organic gardening, it may come to pass that families will rely more on their backyard gardens than supermarkets to provide chemical free fruits and vegetables.