Read the full story here:
See more videos at https://gulfnews.com/videos
Read more Gulf News stories here: https://bit.ly/2HLJ2km
See more videos at https://gulfnews.com/videos
Read more Gulf News stories here: https://bit.ly/2HLJ2km
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00Before the season starts, we have to prepare our garden for the season.
00:28To do that, the first thing we do is cleaning the garden from the previous crops, cleaning
00:34our tools, checking if we have the right equipment on hand, if not, we need to order them, we
00:41order our seeds, and we get ready for the new season.
00:47The first thing we do, of course, is cleaning the previous crops.
00:50I always suggest people do not pull the crops from the soil, like with the roots.
00:56You can just cut them at ground level, so you leave the organic material inside the
01:01soil, which we need in the future.
01:03It's going to decompose by the time being.
01:06So we have to prepare our soil, of course, for the new season.
01:10There are two options.
01:11You might be either a beginner gardener or a gardener like me from previous years.
01:16In the first option, of course, you have to decide where you would like your vegetable
01:20garden to be.
01:22You should be choosing the sunniest spot in your garden, because we need the sun to grow
01:27those vegetables, especially the fruiting ones.
01:31So you can choose either using raised beds like me or in ground soil, you can use pots,
01:38you can use anything as you like, according to your place.
01:43So you have to set those things up first.
01:45You have to order your equipment.
01:48And then you have to prepare the soil.
01:50Since in UAE, we have the sweet sands on hand and we should either amend the soil with organic
01:56material like compost, manure and fertilizers, like organic fertilizers.
02:02You need to order these as well.
02:04You can either make your own soil mix by basically mixing cocopeat, peat moss or with compost
02:12and perlite, or you can order ready-to-use potting mix as you like.
02:19In the second option, let's say you have a garden already like me.
02:24After cleaning your previous crops, you need to amend your soil with organic materials
02:29such as compost and manure, as I said.
02:31It can be either cow manure, chicken manure, up to you, or you can use all of them.
02:37So you add your organic material to the soil and then wait for two weeks before planting
02:42or sowing your seeds.
02:44On the other hand, you should be preparing your seeds, your planting, like seedlings,
02:51to be planted to the garden.
02:53So you have to be choosing the high quality seeds to get the best results, actually.
02:58Other than that, we need to make a plan before we garden.
03:02I mean, which plant is going to go to which bed, which plant is going to be planted to which pot.
03:08It is also affecting the efficiency and the quality and the yield of the garden.
03:14The rest of the world starts the season from spring to summer, but in UAE, we start our
03:20season from the end of the summer through the winter months.
03:25So we can here grow the warm weather crops and cold weather crops at the same time of the year.
03:32So we start our warm weather crops like cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, starting from
03:40September and onwards.
03:42And we can start our cool weather crops, let's say winter crops, like broccoli, cauliflower,
03:51anything like in the cool weather in other countries.
03:54We can start them from November and onwards.
03:58The smaller shrubby vegetables should be at the front.
04:02So all of these vegetables can reach, can get the sun exposure as much as they need.
04:08The vegetable plants in general do like a well-draining, organically rich soil.
04:16So what does this mean?
04:17We can read this or see this anywhere, but we have to understand what does that mean.
04:22For well-draining soil, we either use perlite, we mix perlite into the soil, or you can mix
04:28sweet sand in your soil to make the water drain easily when you water your garden.
04:34So it doesn't get locked with the water because vegetable plants do not like that.
04:40Most of the crops like cucumbers, tomatoes, broccoli, cauliflower, any squash family,
04:49these crops need like constantly moist soils.
04:52The only thing you may think is the herbs because herbs need a little bit drier soil
04:58than the other veggies.
04:59There are again two options to prepare your plants.
05:02You can either start them indoors like I do under grow lights, of course, because since
05:09we go from summer to winter months, it is really hard to start the winter vegetables
05:13outside.
05:15You can either start them indoors, which is cooler than the outdoor weather, like I do,
05:20I prefer to do, to head start the season, or you have to wait until the weather cools
05:26down like November, I will say, I mean, beginning of November, end of October.
05:32It is really hard to make them start early because, I mean, the weather, the temperature
05:37will affect their germination timing and rate.
05:40It's going to be disappointing when you start them early.
05:45So that's a good thing to keep in mind.