Bonding over bindweed

Yesterday was the first Minton Stable Garden work day for the 2009 season. After I signed in, Terry, the Steering Committee member in charge, gave me two options. I could help with the weeding of the grassy near the fence along Dungarven Road, where lots of burdock and even a few rhubarb plants (which we have decided to keep) had sprouted up. Or, I could grab a shovel or hoe and help dig bindweed out of one the the heavily infested plots. The first option was pretty well covered, so I decided to join a few others for what one gardener had referred to as "bonding over bindweed," and put in my first work hour battling our horticultural equivalent of the swine flu.
Native to Europe and western Asia, bindweed is thought to have made its way to the US as early as the 1700s as a seed contaminant. Highly adaptable and proficient in finding light, bindweed will aggressively rob other plants of soil nutrients and space to grow. According a link I found about how to control it, bindweed is often referred to as wild morning glory or creeping jenny, and it is so widespread that there are words for bindweed in 29 different languages. Although I was short on time yesterday, I managed to take a few photos, including the one above of a few plants in the plot that was next to the one that four of us (including the plot-holder) dug up.What we tried our best to do was dig around the bindweed and pull it up, roots and all. Yet sometimes, despite our best efforts, we'd feel the snap of the plant breaking apart, and we'd have to dig further. We were doing that anyway, since the goal was to extract every possible piece of root, from the thick white arteries that you can see in the bag, to the smaller thread-like offshoots. We also pulled some of the bindweed from neighboring plots, though the infestation had not yet risen to the same point of severity. In any case, the gardener in the above plot, who will have to start over, and his neighbors will have to remain extra vigilant, checking for new growth weekly for the rest of the season.
What was the origin of the MSG infestation of bindweed? Could it have arrived with a load of free compost, or with some strawberries that were transplanted from an outside garden? Regarding the latter, if you look around the MSG you will find many strawberry patches, often the result of plants spreading in from neighboring plots. Some gardeners like myself had kept them as an experiment, and after a successful harvest considered them a mainstay.

This plot holder also had a strawberry patch, yet despite the possible risks of more bindweed, he has decided that in addition to tomatoes, he will keep growing strawberries. They seem to do well here, as opposed to in my backyard, where they had been eaten so often by some critters that I had to give up on growing them there, so I really can't blame him.

So, in the end, enough about the plants we don't want. With tulips in bloom everywhere, let me end this post on a brighter note.

One area of growth

There is nothing like a sunny Sunday in the 60s to treat the seasonal depression brought on by a near week of raw air, spitting rain, and stories of economic gloom and doom. After sleeping in, tackling my shrinking Sunday paper, and running a few errands, I made it over to the Minton Stable Garden to put in a little maintenance and appreciate something that is still growing.

I encountered nearly a dozen people gardening, walking dogs, or just relaxing on the stone benches. Asa, my plot neighbor, was there with her two sons, including her not-so-newborn, whom I met for the first time. When I arrived she was finishing up a task that was on top of my agenda: weeding and thinning the strawberries, and making sure that the patch was free of bindweed. In the presentation at last week's meeting, the Steering Committee warned that this highly invasive weed has a tendency to spread among strawberries; both plants have persistent root systems. Bindweed continues to threaten the MSG. An investigation by the Steering Committee revealed that about four plots are so seriously infested that the soil in them may need to be replaced. Although I saw one plot covered with plastic yesterday, it was not announced which areas were affected.

On a brighter note, my spinach and lettuce are starting to appear. As you can see in this photo, our soil is littered with small rocks, presumably washed or blown in from the footpaths, so the spinach sprouts may be hard to notice. I ran into another gardener who shared my complaint that the peas (which I planted nearly two weeks ago at home) have yet to be seen.

Then we turned the faucets--still no water. When I asked Allan from the Steering Committee about this, he joked that he should just make a pin that says "April 23" and wear it everywhere because of all the times he's been asked. The water won't be turned on for another few weeks. The copper pipes don't benefit from the same warmth as those in our homes so it's best to wait until they are no longer frozen and at risk of bursting. With more showers in the forecast today, we probably won't have to haul too much water to encourage more growth. It is April in Boston, after all.

The season begins

I'm not a big fan of meetings.  I can usually gauge the inefficiency of one by the intensity of my resulting headache.  Luckily, the Minton Stable Garden Steering Committee understands this, as there is usually only one meeting of all of the gardeners each year.  Aided by a shortage of intense controversies, about an hour was all that was needed to review rules and share other information on the upcoming season.

We gathered this past Monday at the nearby English High School library (thanks to Allan for the photo).  The important items of business included signing a contract pledging respectful gardening practices and paying the annual dues of $28.  For the past couple of years MSG members have followed through in completing their 4-hour work requirement and honoring deadlines for maintaining their gardens, with few people abandoning their plots or moving out of the city; as a result only four individuals/families have been granted plots, leaving 30 still on the waiting list.  Given the high demand to garden, a Steering Committee member explained that with nine work days scheduled and opportunities to mow and shovel, there will be no excuses for falling short this year.

Julianna from the Steering Committee provided a treasury report.  With a budget of around $1400 a year, money needs to be raised for any purchase beyond the basics (water, plantings, fuel for mowers, special events, etc.).  Two other issues that I would like to explore in future posts are an update on our bindweed situation as well as our inability to produce our own compost.

Nancie, also on the Steering Committee, brought up an idea to keep gardeners informed and give them a voice: a Yahoo group, now in the "beta" phase.  Also, members were urged to run for one of the three Steering Committee slots that will be open this year.

I had not seen many of the 30+ people in attendance since last season.  I look forward to running into them in the garden soon, if it ever stops raining.

Bindweed battles, continued

Let me pick up where I left off earlier this week, about my wondering whether or not I contaminated the other compost bin with bindweed.

In a panic, I shot an email to a friend of mine who is not only a fellow gardener, but somewhat of an expert on weeds.  Could he look at my plot?  What should I do if the weed I had been pulling was the dreaded bindweed?  Should I take responsibility in some way?

A few days passed--no answer.  Perhaps he had forwarded my email to the Steering Committee and a tribunal for my extradition from the garden was being scheduled.  But on the 4th, I came in contact with three committee members who made no mention of my blunder.

The next day, in one of my raised beds in my backyard, I spotted a few morning glory upstarts near my snap peas.  "That's bindweed," my husband said plainly.

Later, over at the community garden, I noticed to my relief that whatever I had invaded my plot was not the same, though it had run rampant throughout many garden beds and common areas.  I pulled one and showed it to my friend Kim, who identified it as pigweed.  I snapped the photos above of the two weeds later in their development.  The first one is bindweed growing in a compost bin, and the second is pigweed (I am struggling with adding photos; I tried to place them below, but I can't seem to put them where I want!).  You can see what bindweed can do in such a short span of time!

Three factors contributed to my ignorance:  1) a poor ability to identify plants, 2) a poor visual memory, and 3) one photo of bindweed in the early stages bearing some resemblance to the pigweed I pulled from my plot.

So, now I'm fairly sure that I composted pigweed, which is still invasive, competing for water and nutrients with whatever I've been growing on purpose.  It may not have the choking potential of bindweed, but it's made me wonder if I should dispose of all my invasive weeds with the trash.

Bindweed battles

The garden has always had its pests, animal or vegetable.  It's been years since I've heard about the Mexican bean beetle, yet I still haven't recovered enough to resume growing one of my favorite vegetables. And one need not go far to find some crown vetch choking some wildflowers in one of the common areas.  

This year, the garden's equivalent to the bird flu has been an innocent-looking perennial weed known as field bindweed, or by its scientific name, convolvulus arvensis.  We have been advised by the Steering Committee in a recent email to "keep an eye out and dispose of it properly." Bindweed has been discovered in a few plots and will proliferate rapidly if not dealt with in a timely manner.

About a week ago, before reading the email, the skies were finally cleared from our "mini-monsoon season."  I ventured over to my plot, bracing myself for what I might find around my tomatoes and peppers, which I still had not gotten around to mulching.  I encountered an explosion of one type of weed in particular, so hardy it even grew under the shade of my plot-neighbor's massive squash leaves. Though I discovered that one of the compost receptacles had been quarantined because a gardener accidentally threw some bindweed in with other plant matter, I went about my usual business, filling a wheelbarrow with extraneous plant matter from my plot and dumping it in the other compost pile.

I had always thought bindweed was the vine I had growing in my own yard, which had darker and shinier petal-shaped green leaves growing straight up on a single stem.  Then I read the email, and when I opened the link to the University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources site showing photos of our resident scourge, I felt a rise in my body temperature and a wave of nausea.  Were the weeds I had composted the same as the bindweed seedlings shown, with its spade- or bell-shaped leaves?  Had I committed germ warfare?

To be continued...