Most of our vegetables and fruit are grown either directly in the ground, in raised beds, or in hugelkultur mounds. We do not apply any chemical pesticides or fertilizers to our soil or plants that are grown in this manner.
For fertilizer we use our own rich compost which is enhanced with manure from our goats and chickens as well as worm castings from our little worm farm. Pest and disease management is the most challenging and is done through the use of manual inspection and intervention whenever possible. If necessary we will resort to using natural sprays containing things like oils, soaps, essential oil blends, milk, and baking soda. We also irrigate our plants as much as possible with our rain catchment system to help save water.
Tomatoes and peppers are the main crop we grow in our little 12x12 greenhouse, which is completely soilless but allows us to grow quite a bit of food almost year round. This is where most of our hydroponic growing is done. We run both NFT and dutch-bucket systems in the greenhouse powered by two solar panels and two large batteries.
Currently we are not using organic fertilizers in these systems, but still refrain from using pesticides on the plants themselves. We also grow a few things (mostly peppers) using the Kratky method which requires no electricity at all!
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