Gardening tales from the UAE: How to grow a kitchen garden in your balcony this summer

Gulf News

Read the full story here: https://gulfnews.com/friday/home/gardening-tales-from-the-uae-how-to-grow-a-kitchen-garden-in-your-balcony-this-summer-1.1679993345418  See more videos at https://gulfnews.com/videos Read more Gulf News stories here: https://bit.ly/2HLJ2km  Subscribe to Gulf News on YouTube and watch more of our videos: https://www.youtube.com/user/GulfNewsTV  #UAEnews #uae #gardening

Transcript

00:00Actually, it started five years ago. First of all, I was looking for organic food in the market and I

00:06realized that it's a little bit expensive and you don't know where it comes from exactly. So I started

00:12to think about why shouldn't I try it to grow in my own garden. It was my first journey started in

00:18this country. So it was hard to understand the climate here, you know, because you are in this

00:26climate. We're going from summer to winter, but the rest of the world is having spring and summer.

00:34It was just my first couple of years where I was trying to understand the climate, what can I grow

00:40here, deciding on those. I just started with just a few pots, you know, and then it's increased and

00:47increased by the time. First of all, I started with some tomatoes and peppers just like everyone

00:53else doing. I have two kids and I want them also to include, I mean, to come with me to the garden

00:59and see how the food is growing just in front of them. I want them to see and realize. So

01:07we started like that and also the first reason I started was to giving them the healthiest and

01:13the freshest food also to us. We are a family of four, so that's how my journey started actually.

01:20The most important thing is the soil, understanding the soil. It all starts with the

01:24high quality soil. So if you understand the dynamics of the soil, because it's a living

01:29organism, not just a dirt. So there is a life in it. So if you keep that life healthy, your plants

01:37are going to be healthy, your crops are going to be healthy also. So my first point, starting point,

01:43was working about my soil. How? Of course, we're doing composting, you know about it. All our

01:51kitchen scraps go through our Bokashi bins and then we do traditional hot composting outside

01:57the garden. So we use our own scraps for our soil. All the kitchen scraps, I can say, because with

02:04Bokashi bin, you can even use dairy, meat, fish scraps also, not only the veggie plant-based

02:11material. Bokashi composting is, you ferment your scraps at first, like two weeks of period,

02:18and then you either bury them in your garden or you can combine them with brown materials because

02:24it's green materials that you call them. Like brown materials, what do we call? Like cardboard,

02:30dry leaves, things like that, brown. So you combine them and after a month or so, you get a

02:38soil-like compost which is very rich and then you add it to your soil and to your plants and

02:44they get all the nutrients from that. We also do vermicomposting. Vermicomposting is that you

02:52put your kitchen scraps in a warm hotel. These are composting worms, special worms, that eat them

03:00and make a vermicompost. It's very rich, also the most important menu, let's say, in the world.

03:10So we also use them in our garden. Let's talk about the pests. As I said, if you have a healthy

03:17soil, your plant is going to be healthy. Pests are attracted to the weak plants.

03:24If you have a plant like this, I mean like healthy looking, they don't want to come to that plant

03:32because they want to destroy it as soon as possible. Other than that, we are using companion

03:37planting. Companion planting is matching some of the crops together that work together better.

03:45Like, let's say, I always add flowers and herbs next to my main crops. For example, I want to

03:53grow tomatoes in my garden, in my bed. I always add basil and marigold because each plant has

04:01different smell. Pest doesn't like to sit there. If you make a garden full of just tomatoes,

04:08it's just a place to party for the pest. Also in organic gardening, prevention is the most

04:14important thing. So we are sometimes using mesh covers when we transplant our seedlings to our

04:22garden at the beginning of the season. We try to protect them from the pests. Or we use organza

04:28bags like this to protect them from the fruit flies. They don't come and lay their eggs inside.

04:35So we basically do the companion planting, mixing the plants and try to prevent them,

04:42to prevent the pests come there and put their eggs there. Most of the time, I save my own seeds

04:48because most of these plants are heirloom varieties. You can save seeds year after year.

04:54So I try to make a sustainable garden also because, you know, gardening sometimes can be,

05:01should be budget-friendly. So to satisfy that, I'm trying to save my own seeds.

05:08And this has another advantage. You can adjust these genetics year after year to this climate

05:17because this is grown last year. Now this year I'm going to take the fruit of it and take the seed

05:22and next year I will grow again, for example. It is getting used to this hot weather and climate

05:29and making more yields year after year. Here we have herbs and flowers. That is what I'm trying

05:35to tell you. Flowers, herbs and main crops. I always try to achieve this in all of my beds.

05:42In this bed, we are having passion fruits, strawberries, peas. We have cucumbers here,

05:47lavender here. So lavender is again protecting my strawberries for the pests. Now we are in the

05:56transition period of the season. We're going through the summer as you know. So the weather

06:02is getting hot and hot. So I cleaned up some of my plants to make them pollinated. Our garden

06:10should be attractive to pollinators and beneficial insects. That's why I am trying to put flowers in

06:16between my main crops. So the beneficials come with those flowers and then visit your vegetable

06:22crops and pollinate them and make the fruit form. Here, for example, I also started beekeeping this

06:30year. So I have my bees, honey bees. That's why I'm growing some sunflowers, some alyssum here,

06:37some salvia. They come and collect the pollen and nectar from these flowers.

06:43We have different varieties of basil here. Bees love basil flowers. Basil also is a good crop to

06:50protect the vegetables. It has a strong smell. So it can protect your veggies.

07:00And other pepper plants are coming with lots of fruits. Here we have radish. What I also do is,

07:08for example, I'm growing pepper plants in this pot. I always put like radish and onion, spring

07:16in that same pot. This is for the prevention of pests. This is for making the use of the garden

07:22because this is a small garden. We don't have a huge place to grow lots of food.

07:28So making use of the space is important. That's why I'm using arches like that. I'm trying to

07:34grow vertically everything. Try to gain some space. That's why I'm using my fence during the summer.

07:41I grow all my melons on this fence that they climb up and we can grow lots of food just in

07:49that small row. That's why we have all flowers here. Borage, calendula, basil. These are also

08:00used to make tea, for example. This is another hollyhock plant that is full with pollen for my

08:06bees. On the other hand, you can collect all these flowers, dry them and make tea. So I'm trying to

08:14attract the beneficials, but on the other hand, I want to harvest flowers also and make tea from

08:20them, for example. That's another plant there, the blue flowers, blue pea flower that you can

08:26collect and make tea again. We have indoor hydroponics that we grow our greens like lettuce,

08:33arugula, things like that during the summer also. During the season, we are trying to use

08:40this space also and make use of it and grow some. We grow all our lettuce here. Now it's

08:48the weather is hot, so we have just some arugula and mizuna. This is another rare variety.

08:56Some kale, some small tomato varieties here. It's not organic, I know, but sometimes if you

09:05don't grow this here, you go to the market and buy hydroponically grown lettuce, let's say.

09:11So I'm trying to buy as least as possible from the market and try to grow my own food

09:20as much as I can. Most of the crops you can grow in winter. You can grow almost everything.

09:28Only the plants, the trees like raspberry, blueberry, they need chilling hours. We don't

09:33have frost date here in Dubai, so it's not possible to give that environment to those

09:41plants. Other than that, in winter, you can grow almost everything, but in summer, it's a little

09:47bit tricky. We can grow melons, watermelons, okra, sweet potato, basil, amaranth, purslane,

09:55malachia. I mean, I can count lots of things. You can still fill your garden with these

10:01heat-loving ones. Of course, we need to cover a shade cloth during the summer here.

10:09From May to October, we are using green shade cloths to make the intense sun rays, I mean,

10:20sun x-rays to decrease the sun exposure to our plants. But some of the plants can still be grown

10:28even if they are not covered. Some trees also handle the heat also, like pomegranate, figs,

10:34lemon trees. These are easy to grow in this climate.

Category

Transcript

Recommended