ECHO holds summer workshop series
Just because it’s summer doesn’t mean ECHO Global Farm on Durrance Road rolls up the moringa trees and kicks back.
ECHO does numerous things for families and garden enthusiasts. There are always the tours of the farm, but also educational workshops and seminars.
On Saturday, some hardcore gardeners used the July 4 weekend to attend a seminar on nutrient and water management in the summer garden, the third of four programs for ECHO’s summer garden workshop series.
The free workshops have been held the first Saturday of each month throughout the summer starting at 10 a.m., and they have explored some popular topics.
Jesse Sumansky, who works in the retail side of things at ECHO, is also a speaker at these workshops. He said that managing all the nutrients plants need for healthy growth can be a problem, but even watering can be troublesome with all the summer rain.
“The way I see it, see if it’s going to rain. If it doesn’t, then water it if we’ve had a dry spell. For people with sprinklers, you should set it for the evening in the event if it does rain, you can shut it off for the night,” Sumansky said.
While there are people who take the nutrients in the garden to the extreme, Sumansky said it might be better to take a basic approach to gardening and soil management.
“If you fertilize with quality stuff and add amendments, you won’t have to worry too much,” Sumansky said, adding there are some outside-the-box techniques that can add nutrients to the soil such as oyster shells, lime and eggshells. “Wood ash and coffee grounds are considered off-the-wall fertilizers. Run-off from the sink is another good one.”
The fourth and final workshop will be Aug. 3, with the topic being on identifying and treating citrus greening, which has been a major problem in orange groves for years.
Sumansky said there are some tangerine and tangelo trees in the nursery now that are resistant to greening. They are now being tested. If successful, it would mean people will be able to grow citrus at the home level again.
For more information on ECHO, go to www.echonet.org.