San Diego GreenLife

by Erick Pettersen

Photo credit Theresa Vernetti

In the current economic climate, with financial disasters brewing like thunderstorms, organic gardening can give you one less reason to concern yourself with rising prices and falling stocks.

One San Diegan—Jazz singer Tokeli—will harvest her organic vegetable garden for the third year this summer. From it she will prepare a dinner for family and close friends.

In the backyard of her Coronado home, a small, rectangular plot of dirt reveals a garden of green beans, spinach, black-seed butter lettuce, mint, carrots and other vegetables. Tokeli makes sure to plant vegetables best suited for each season.

After my tour of her vegetable garden, we walked to the back wall of her house where she set about planting basil, thyme, parsley, and dill in pots set on a bench below her kitchen window. After this summer’s harvest her backyard will produce enough spices and vegetables to keep her and her family well-fed for weeks.

Because of San Diego’s desert-like conditions, when Tokeli planted her garden she had to dig more than a foot to reach ideal soil. Most organic gardeners, even many in San Diego, can get away with planting seeds no deeper than four to six inches below the surface, but to follow Tokeli’s good example you must dig until you reach the right depth for your location.

You will know when you reach good soil because it will crumble in your hands. If the soil turns into mush, you have gone too far and need to wait two or three days for it to dry.

After you reach ideal soil, plant organic seeds, which you can find at many local grocery stores and nurseries. If you want to keep traveling costs down, purchase them from sites like seedsofchange or organicseed.

After planting an organic garden, Tokeli recommends maintaining its organic integrity by fertilizing it with compost tea. Her recipe involves placing a large roll of chicken wire inside a trash can and throwing biodegradable items, (such as orange rinds, banana peels, and other leftovers), inside the chicken wire. Heat from the sun causes the waste to liquefy. When the compost has liquefied, pour it into a separate bucket, then add water to dilute the concentration.

In order to deter insects, gardeners can take many preventative measures. Since insects often attack weak plants, ensuring your plants’ health will help keep the pest population in your garden to a minimum. You can help assure that health by planting fruits and vegetables in conditions, and during seasons, ideal for each plant.

Because of their predatory nature, frogs, birds, and lizards provide another natural defense against pests. In order to keep these helpful critters in your garden, put a low bowl of water out for them, and offer some safe havens, such as rocks or upside-down pots to hide under. You can also plant vegetables that produce flowers. Some predators drink nectar and will seek the flowering plants.

When planting seeds, Tokeli recommends spacing them so the roots from one do not choke those from another. She also recommends planting carrot seeds, and others that produce plants with smaller leaves, away from beets and plants that produce large leaves. This will ensure that smaller-leaved plants are not shaded out and their growth hindered.

At harvest time, which varies from plant to plant, gather your bounty the same way you plant and maintain it — under the most ideal conditions. Because of San Diego’s Mediterranean climate, we can bend the rules of what and when to plant and harvest. But in spite of our mild climate, Tokeli recommends only planting, harvesting, and eating fruits and vegetables ideal for each season.

When Tokeli is not caring for her garden, you might find her taking care of her six-year-old daughter, preparing for her next music gig, or riding her Electra beach cruiser around Coronado Island.

Musically Tokeli has received much praise. In 2006 iTunes gave her a five star rating; INK19 compared her to Norah Jones. Tokeli’s debut CD “Where Do you Start?” was nominated as San Diego Music Awards’ best Jazz Album of 2007.

If you would like to support San Diego’s local music scene, (and help Tokeli fund her organic garden), attend her upcoming show at Anthology, Thursday, June 11th at 7:30 p.m.

For more information about Tokeli, visit her site Tokeli.com. To learn more about growing an organic garden consult your local greenhouse, bookstore, library, web site, or friendly neighborhood organic gardener.