Just How Organic is Your Organic Vegetable Plot?

It's hardly surprising that organically produced fruit and vegetables are gaining in popularity, especially if you are privileged enough to be able to grow your own at home or on an allotment.

We are surrounded by issues such as climate change and global warming and our hospital Oncology departments are full to overflowing with patients suffering from various types of Cancer which are clearly man-made issues.

After decades of self-abuse, the world is slowly waking up to the fact that through this exploitation of the planet and ourselves, there is a distinct possibility that we are all on a one-way collision course with eventual disaster.

But, it is not too late to make changes and reverse course. If each one of us made small amendments to our daily lives, we could in time make a difference.

As growers, the obvious change is to ensure we are all as organic as possible but attention to detail is essential for maximum impact. Taking care of your soil is essential, using zero synthetic fertilisers, pesticides or fungicides is a given and making your own homemade compost would seem indisputable.

However, there are some conspicuously hidden hazards that may not be quite so self-evident. Let's take a closer look at some easily overlooked booby traps that may ambush your organic endeavours:

| Organic Seed - This is a good starting point. Check to see if the seed you are purchasing is from an organically produced source or conventional seed production methods.

It should be noted, that many conventional seed varieties are not only produced by conventional methods but may have been treated with chemical seed treatments or coatings before sale. 

Most seed companies offer a range of organic seed varieties, albeit limited. These seeds are produced in an ethical, chemical-free way and should be the basis of any organic cropping program.

Moles Seeds offers an excellent range of organic seeds throughout its catalogue. Some seed companies such as Real Seeds and de Bolster, are organic only. Bizarrely, the Organic Gardening Catalogue is only partially organic in its seed offerings. If you wish to be 100% organic, stick with organic seed only.

| Organic Plants - If you don't have time to raise your own plants from organic seed, a good alternative is to buy plants. 

As with seeds, not all plants are raised by following organic methods. Check before you buy. Delfland Nurseries and Growers Organics carry a good selection of organically raised plants and take their production methods very seriously.

If you choose to raise your own vegetable plants, using peat-free compost should be a crucial consideration.

Also, any fruit bushes or bare-root plants you purchase should be obtained from an organically produced source.

| Water Sources - Unless you have a mains water supply, when it comes to watering and irrigation, many growers will be reliant on rainwater harvesting.

Water storage can be via water butts but a great alternative would be an IBC. Unless the IBC is brand new (an expensive outlay) they can be easily obtained as a used product. Be certain you know what they may have contained before you inherited it as many may have contained unpleasant and potentially harmful chemicals or oils.

If you choose to source water from a nearby brook or stream, ensure that there are no pollution issues.

| Leaf Mould - Everyone appreciates the benefit of collecting fallen leaves in the autumn and using them as a basis for your own compost manufacture.

Leaves falling into your garden or allotment should be totally fine for immediate use but other leaf sources may be more undesirable.

Leaves collected from the roadside may contain residues from motor vehicles including rubber, oils and traces of potentially harmful heavy metals. Also, leaves from Walnut trees can break down leaving traces of Cyanide in composts which is highly toxic to worms.

Collect leaves by all means but ensure you know the source of where they are gathered.

| Grass Mowings - Another excellent feedstock for your own composting processes is lawn mowings. They are a good source of nitrogen for your heap helping to keep the carbon/nitrogen ratio in harmony.

However, if your lawn has been treated for moss or weeds, as many are, be on your guard for herbicide residues.

Many herbicides contain chemicals with long lives and residual contamination can be a very real threat, lasting in some cases for several years.

Use lawn mowings only if you know what has been applied to the lawn you are collecting from.

You can gain a better understanding of contaminated lawn mowings here.  

| Organic Compost - In theory, this sounds like the organic grower's dream but the same issues can arise with regard to herbicide residues contained within lawn mowings.

Many manufacturers of organic composts, take materials from household recycling centres only to find that their so-called organic products are far from organic.

You can test any compost for herbicide residue by using the bean test. Simply plant some broad bean seed into the compost sample to test and wait for it to germinate. Contamination will instantly be recognisable. You can discover more about the 'Bean Test' here.

| Horse Muck - Horse manure has, and will always be, an integral weapon in the organic grower's armoury. It's usually a low-cost, readily available constituent of all good compost heaps and works wonders on soil structure and fertility.

But recently, a worrying concern has arisen regarding herbicide residues. As with lawn mowings being contaminated by herbicides, a similar larger-scale problem has emerged with the use of aminopyralid-containing herbicides as a weed killer on grassland. 

Hay fed to horses on a year-round basis may have come from a source that uses 'GRAZON' or similar products manufactured by Corteva (formerly Dow Agrochemicals) as a selective broadleaf weed killer on grassland. It kills everything except for the grass, leaving a perfectly weed-free forage for livestock, but contaminated food that passes straight through the animal and into its manure.

The resulting byproducts hold on to small traces of the herbicide which is incredibly persistent and can remain in the soil for several years.

Even in minute quantities, this contamination is disastrous for a number of crop types. All Legumes, in particular, are worst affected including all bean and pea varieties. Also severely affected are potatoes, tomatoes, peppers and lettuce.

You can discover more about aminopyralid contamination here.  

| Farmyard Manure - FYM tends to originate from either pig, cattle or chicken commercial production units. That fact in itself doesn't always fit well with fundamentalist organic growers views but is still a staple ingredient in many compost heaps.

The possible problems occur when you delve into what exactly forms the composition of the manure other than poo.

Have the said animals been given any type of inoculation or growth hormones? The residues will probably be present in their manure, they are certainly present in milk from non-organic cows! 

Livestock bedding, either straw or sawdust can be equally contaminated. Straw with herbicide residue, already discussed, or plant growth regulators applied to growing wheat and barley crops to reduce the straw length is only too readily available.

These PGRs are translocated, meaning they are absorbed by the plant. Do you seriously want to add growth regulator-contaminated straw to your soil?

You can discover more about PGRs here: Plant Growth Regulators

Ensure that if your FYM contains sawdust, as many chicken manures do, the sawdust hasn't come from chemically treated timbers.

If you choose to use FYM, ensure you can be certain about its origin and pedigree.

| F1 Hybrids - This is more of a grey area. F1 Hybrids are varieties produced by manipulating plant traits from different varieties that have to be crossed with inbred lines to produce each new cycle of seeds. Open-pollinated (OP) varieties remain true to type, with no human intervention.

However, many F1 Hybrid varieties are readily available as organic seed and if grown using organic systems of husbandry, will produce organic harvests. Purists may wish to stick with OP varieties only.

The Real Seed Company offers an excellent selection of OP-only vegetable seed varieties. 

As determined as you might be to obtain the maximum from your production area, working with nature and the local environment is an essential response to your organic integrity.

In an attempt to foster biodiversity and sensitive habitats, consider keeping an area that can be allowed to become a little wild and unkempt. Sow some wildflowers to encourage pollinators and maybe place a bug hotel or two around your plot to encourage beneficial insects.

It's not always about 'how much' sometimes it's more about quality of life.

You can use MAGIC https://magic.defra.gov.uk/ developed by Defra to find out more about your local native species. 

If you have previously grown your own produce using conventional production techniques, or have taken on a plot/allotment that used them, simply changing to a more organic way of doing things doesn't mean you have reached an organic utopia.

Bear in mind that the conversion period from conventional production can take at least 24 months or more for the land to be considered organic.

Soil Association  https://www.soilassociation.org/

MAGIC  https://magic.defra.gov.uk/home.htm

Garden Organic  https://www.gardenorganic.org.uk/

Charles Dowding  https://charlesdowding.co.uk/

Stephanie Hafferty https://nodighome.com/

Moles Seeds (organic veg) https://www.wholesale.molesseeds.co.uk/organic-vegetables/

Real Seed  https://www.realseeds.co.uk/

De Bolster  https://www.bolster.nl/

Tamar Organics  https://www.tamarorganics.co.uk/

Growers Organics  https://www.growersorganics.com/seeds/

The Organic Gardening Catalogue   https://www.organiccatalogue.com/

Kings Seeds  https://www.kingsseedsdirect.com/organic-vegetable-seed/

Bingenheimer Saatgut  https://www.bingenheimersaatgut.de/en/organic-seeds/vegetables/beans.html

Biodynamic Association  https://www.biodynamic.org.uk/

Demeter  https://www.demeter.net/

Irish Organic Association  http://www.irishorganicassociation.ie/

Organic Farmers & Growers (OF&G Organic)  https://ofgorganic.org/

The Organic Trust  http://organictrust.ie/