Tonight, on a special edition of studio 12, we're taking yo inside the Denver Urban Gardens.

From learning how to transition your garden from summer into fall to the best ways to protect your plants.

We've got all of your gardening needs covered, plus a unique garden walk experience you will not want to miss.

And a composting lesson from Jungle Judy herself.

All that and more right now on studio 12 from the Five Points Media Center in the heart of Denver, Colorado.

This is studio 12.

Welcome to this edition of studio 12.

I'm Erica McLarty.

The past several months, we have had the pleasure of explorin the art of gardening with help from our friends and partners at Denver Urban Gardens, also known as Doug for short.

With more than 200 community gardens spread across seven counties.

Doug is helping transfor vacant lots and underused spaces into vibrant hubs for growing fresh food and cultivating community.

Here's more about how Doug's roots and how their impact branches out into education, equity and empowering neighborhoods.

Take a look.

Hi, my name is Judy Elliott.

I'm director of Compost and Garden Education with Denver Urban Garden.

So Denver Urban Gardens, we are one of the largest nonprofit, independent communit garden organizations in the US.

We started in the late 70s, unofficially, with one garden in northwest Denver.

And in that garden, our garden leader met a group of young women who had come from their country saying, isn't there a place in Denver where we can recreate our cultural traditions of food and heritage and connection to family?

So the garden leader said, I don't know.

Let me go talk to the person in the church right there.

So the garden leader talked to the person in the church who said, absolutely we'll donate this plot of land and make it a community garden.

So today we are at our Grove Community Garden, which is a community garden.

And there's also our citywide composting demonstration site.

We are right off of Colorad Boulevard and 13th Avenue, right next to, you know, and a lot, which is actually owned by National Jewish Hospital.

It is very urban.

It is very loud.

When we teach compost classes, we have microphones to drown out the noise.

Here I've got all my peppers for the season.

Fresno, Shishito some pri Chamar, which is a Thai pepper.

So gardens absolutel are important for food access.

They're also important.

Many of our gardens are on land in the inner city.

That has very little in the way of a tree canopy, canopy on heat islands where grocery stores are not available yet.

You're such a good guy.

From our start in 1970 with four gardens.

We now have almost 200 gardens, 20 food forests many, many education programs.

And we're proud that of those 200 gardens that we had, only four of the gardens we no longer have.

So that's a pretty good testament to what we're doing for sustainability and resilience.

Our gardens are always manage by volunteer garden leaders to.

Nobody is prohibited from growing.

If they don't have the funds to rent a plant.

They operate on a pay.

What you can basis.

I'm never done.

I mean, I do plants like printers and things at home, but I'm never planted vegetables.

I think what distinguishes them from backyard gardens is that you were I might have in our home.

Is that her way of joining cultures?

So I gather you're not, a fan of the habanera?

It's very interactive.

Hey, I've got a new pepper.

Do you want to try it?

I've got a new tomato type.

Want to try it?

Whether they ar in under-resourced communities or whether they are in the community, they're a little bit more resource.

They bring people together from different cultural traditions different growing styles, people who might not in everyday life know of each other and know of their strengths.

So they're a way of joining community.

We're lucky in this community garden because we have a really tight knit group, and I really like it now.

It's just a nice little plot and I've met a lot of people, so this garden got me through Covid.

Actually.

I joined in 202 when everybody was stuck inside and I was going stir crazy and I joined the garden.

And I found my people.

I don't usually join a lot of things, but this has been kind of nice for me because I like to see things grow and watch them.

I get a little anxious like, well, hurry up and grow.

But, you know, it's been fun to watch things.

So I like to think that tha we don't just provide the space, but we're there to adapt our resources and our trainings to what community meet needs to definitely to share and to have a sense of community outside.

I think over the winter, people are, you know, tired of being inside.

They want to get out in nature.

I love the way you've planted things like corners.

All the gardeners share what they know about weed and what works and what doesn't.

Teaching the skills for people to grow their own food.

So we're not providing food.

We are helping with food, access plants and then teaching people how to grow those.

I know for me, getting the chance to get outside is great, especially when you get to meet other gardeners who share the same passion and you don't have to travel very far either.

It's incredibl to see these beautiful gardens right here in the heart of the city.

Summer is winding down into the fall, but your crops don't have to.

I'm here with the wonderful jungle Judy, and she's going to show me how to take your crops into the fall season.

Right?

Right.

So, Erica, fall is my absolute favorite time of the year.

Because during fall, I follow the seasons.

The shortening daylight hours.

And I learned to actually prune extra foliage off plant that are getting out of control.

Okay, that squash, that may be four feet long.

I learned to harvest things at the right time.

I learned to cultivate my soil carefully around my plants, and then I learned to cover the earth so it stays nice and cool and permeable to water.

This is a lot to learn, but I believe in myself.

Where are we going to start?

I think we're going to star in a garden plot in our horse, an community garden where we can demonstrate all this.

Okay, shall we do that?

Let's head out.

Let's head on out.

So today we have some wonderful winter squash.

We have a butternut, but we've got a lot of extra blossoms.

And I'm going to hav Erica prune back first of all.

Right.

Here okay.

This is my very first prune.

She' not only going to use a pruner, but then she's going to use her finger to pinch this blossom.

And if it's hard to pinch off, you can use the hoop.

Right.

What she has done then is remove extra growth which is going to allow more of this ripening for fruit that's already on the plate.

It feels so weird pinching off something.

So don't you know, it feels like you're killing the plant.

And actually I'm goin to have her really quickly take the pruner.

That's that blossom.

That's not going to have time.

It would need about 45 days.

And Miss Erica, can I have you?

We're going to do some pretty rampant pruning.

Go ahead and prune back to here.

Right over there.

So we've actually removed this extra growth, some of which looks healthy.

But any of these blossom which would open would not have time to produce fruit.

So we're allowing that squash plant to maximize its energy in producing the fruit.

I'm ready to step in here.

And we like to use boards to step o so we're not compact with soil.

I know it's hard.

I'm going to have you wor when we're harvesting tomatoes.

We prefer to not let them get completely ripe at this time.

They ripen indoors, outside the fridge.

Okay, I'm going to hold this.

You are going to cut it.

Don't pull it.

All right.

Cut it right there.

Eric is going to cut.

Oh, look at that.

Beautiful.

This is about two days away from eating.

So pretty.

That's going to promote more blossoming.

But we're going to do one other thing.

As long as we have the tomatoes to remember the way we prune back blossoms on the squash.

Yes, I can do a similar thing on these tomatoes.

I'm going to hav you just prune it back to here.

All right.

The whole thing, the stem.

Let me hold it.

You going to prune right there.

Oh pardon me.

Right there.

Right above it.

Right here.

You got it.

And chop all of the blossoms and all foliage.

Oh, I know you might think you're killing the plant, but again you're promoting ripened grain for fruit which is lower down on the plant.

Okay.

So another thing that's really important is our soils have worked really hard.

Okay.

So we need to make sure that the water will permeate, will infiltrate into the.

So I like to keep the soils nice and loose.

So you bring back the tomato.

She's lightly going to cultivate.

So she's not digging deeply like she would when we plant soil sprouts.

These are weeds, but that's what you can do with the more you can cultivate them.

Right into the soil, the weeds into the soil.

Yeah.

They're not going to sprout again.

Okay.

It's organic material.

You don't just yank.

No.

This is so easy job.

I'm using the hoary here.

You can see how nice and loose and soft it is.

And I want to feel it because you can.

You feel how much different that feels in this.

That feels hard.

The roots can go down deeply on this.

I would almost want to sit on that if I were a worm.

Yeah Would you want to crawl through?

Absolutely.

I think we would love to cover the soil when you get a big handful of that strong.

Absolutely.

That way the birds won't say, oh, and Erica, I'm going to have you spread it around the base of the plant.

This is mulch.

This is organic straw.

I get so excited.

I know she does.

I can see that.

Good job.

You could go crow.

By the way, do scarecrows actually work?

Yeah, they work for our soul.

Oh, okay.

No, it's garden art.

God keeps you in your garden.

Works okay?

All right If it's scarecrows, it's great.

But this is tomato.

Would be for you to work with this.

What I'm saying, she's not going to.

Yes.

Give it another day on the counter to ripen.

Never ripen in the fridge.

I'm going to pretend I grew this.

Well, can Judy tell me what is your favorite thing to make with tomatoes?

Seasoned.

Dried tomato slices.

Yeah.

Ooh, that sounds very wonderful.

I have an American Harvester dehydrator.

Okay.

It's to hydrate tomatoes.

Oh, they work so well.

So spread the slices out, and then I sprinkle them with some organic, no salt seasoning.

Do you dare me to try this?

Because I have a dehydrator but I. I think you should try.

I'm going to try this.

This is fabulous.

Thank yo for all the amazing tips today.

I'm so excited for the fal and give us like a little recap.

So during this segment we talked about ways that you can maintain your garden, keep warm season crops growing a little bit, but also realize that there's more than one season during the year.

So therefore.

Right.

Yeah, there really are.

I think sometimes we only celebrate summer, the season of proliferating crops.

But during this season of the year when we have a little bit cooling temperatures, we can replant certain crop for fall that we did in spring.

And most importantly at all, I think we can celebrate the fact that we've learned to 1 or 2 new things.

It seems to me that you've fallen in love with a horror story.

You like the horror.

I've fallen in love with the wing reader here, but I'm also celebrating the fact that fall is a time when we can really celebrate the changing of leaves, learn to use them as a resource, and realize.

And most important to me is that gardening is not a race.

It's not about the biggest tomato, but it's about learning one more thing each year, not making the same mistake each year.

And perhaps most to me, findin a place of reflection and peace that allows me and the soil to deepen our roots.

I will cheers to that.

Cheers.

Cheers to the season of deepening roots.

We're just continuing.

Oh my gosh, at your phone.

The tomato plant.

Come on over here.

Oh real quickly watch out.

By the way, if you would like to support Doug, you can head on over to their website where they also have so many great fall workshops so that you can sign up for and we will see you there.

Happy gardening!

If you've ever strolled past a sign like this one and wondere what is it and what's behind it, Denver Urban Gardens is inviting you to step inside.

They offer free walking tours through some of Denver's garden spaces and tell the story behind each one.

I got to go on one and meet on of the original Doug founders.

Well welcome everybody.

Thank you so much for joining Denver Urban Gardens on our OG tour.

This is going to this is one of the best ones.

This is our original gardens.

This is a very sacred space.

It's been here since 1994.

People know that they are safe and welcom and included here in this space.

I can't even imagine, Denver without Doug and Denver without these gardens.

It's jus just in the fabric of this city that these spaces, are here for everyone to enjoy.

Beginning of the year, we were like, how can we get more people involve in, like, the gardens and just, you know creating this bigger community?

Let's see.

Gardens, struggles.

So this is our second one.

So thanks for joining us.

We're at the George Chavez Memorial Peace Garden here at 38th and Cicerone in North Denver.

We're visiting the OGS, our original garden.

So we'll be visiting this Troy Chavez Memorial Peace Garden, and we'll end at Pecos, where it all started.

This garden was built in 1994, designed, in memory of Troy Chavez who was killed in gang violence and during the summer of violence here in Denver.

And so we worked with Ana Chavez, Troy's mother, to really design this space as a sacred space, a safe place for anybody to be in here.

This is a place where, weapons are put down, and we're we're taking care of the earth here.

So it was designed, with Aztec art.

You can see behind me.

Mother Earth is holding its children.

Makes me cry.

So up front, we have a lot of different medicinal herbs, for the neighborhood and for anybody to to come in and pick and smell and touch and feel.

And in the back, we'll see a lot of different plots for neighborhoods, and residents around this, the space to grow food for themselves and their families as well.

All right.

Let's head to the next one.

Here we are at the Oasis Garden.

And so this was rebuilt, just a couple of years ago.

The community was part of the design, the rebuild.

A lot of the residents that garden here are feelin much closer to their neighbors, which is you know, a wonderful, benefit for creating a smaller space for the gardeners, but also just to start a new, with this space.

Oh, you can see it's it's beautiful.

There are things growing.

It's really turned into a true oasis here in north Denver.

All right, are we ready to head to the next location?

Well, I'm Jeremy Garcia.

This is the Shoshone community garden.

We're part of the Doug, Denver Urban Gardens program.

We're in lower Highlands, which is at the intersection of 33rd and Shoshone.

And, we've got about 30 gardeners here.

I get to be a part of this community and also share my expertise in managing the space.

Everybody lives in the neighborhood, and it's a great way to build the community.

And, get outdoor and kind of meet your neighbors.

My name is Taylor.

And welcome to my block.

I have growing here.

Corn, beans, squash, carrots.

Lots of different flowers, such as dahlias.

I have so much.

These are my plots.

I grow a lot of peppers and tomatoes.

I love to cook.

So, my mid-August or late Jul or early August for harvesting and good to take everything hom and, throw it in the pans and, you know, make dinner, so it's awesome.

Come on over.

So we're sitting her in the Pecos Community Garden, which is on the north side of Denver.

Some people know it as Highland, but growing up here, we call it the North Side.

My mom is, Marty.

Robert.

Every time we water, we sell up to seven houses.

Marty is the one.

His guy was one of the first original people to start dow via the Pecos Community Garden.

And this is one of the original.

They call it the OG Doug Garden.

It started out as a garden behind the nearby church, Saint Patrick's Church.

And then they found out, hey, there's actually space a block down that the archdiocese was willing to sell them that was sitting open.

And let's fly it and make a community garden out of it.

A bunch of people who had come from LA was called the Hmong people was their culture.

They had come over and were looking for space to grow their traditional foods.

They get, it says to Seattle.

And from Seattle they came together and then they found me.

And so they came and tracked down Marty and said, hey, we're yo have a pot of land, can we join?

And she said, yes.

Witness Garden and Paco' Community Garden started there about 7 to 8 Hmong families and within the family multiple generations.

But the sad thing over time is as generation generations integrated into our society a less they lost their desire to garden.

We still have 2 or 3 families left, but it's the older generation, but it's definitely not as popular with the younger generation, unfortunately.

So now it's trying to figure out how do we get younger people involved and get more younger people gardening.

Let's make gardening cool again.

Marty starting this plot was really trying to develop a place for people in the neighborhood to grow their own food and have food access and have fresh food.

Do the right thing, spike Lee.

Do the right thing and we take this as forever diet.

And then with me continuing he legacy, continuing to maintain green space in, ever urbanizing, crowding neighborhood and trying to maintain a space where people can be in touch with the Earth and grow their own food and be curious about nature and learn about the environment and develop, friendship with, with their neighbors and develop community and develop relationships.

Take care of Mother Earth, okay?

You go back.

One of the coolest things I loved about the garden walk was seeing how different each gardener's plot was so unique to who they are and what their interests are.

Urban composting is becoming more popular in Denver than ever, and if you have no idea where to start, don't worry.

Jungle Judy is an expert composter, and she was gracious enough t give us our own private lesson.

Check it out.

So, Denver Urban Gardens we are one of the largest nonprofit, independent communit garden organizations in the US.

Hi, my name is Judy Elliott.

I'm director of Compost and Garden Education with Denver Urban Gardens.

I actually I go by Jungle Judy.

So Jungle Judy came for the time many, many years ago when I spent four years in the Peace Corps teaching integrated agriculture in Brazil.

And people just starte calling me Judy of the jungle, and then it became jungle.

Judy I'm so glad we're filming here.

It is very urban.

It is very loud.

When we teach compost classes we have microphones to drown out the noise.

I mean, it's part of it, isn't it?

I mean, it's just urban gardens, you know, we're right here on Colorado Boulevard.

What we have here are a series of compost bins.

And I like to say that no matter what you use, if you use a cement bin, this is a holding structure.

If you use our little pallet bins here, these are turning systems.

No matter what type of holding structure you use, the process is the same for creating compost.

And in organic gardening that we do, compost is the decomposed product.

After time with the help of microorganisms, microorganism to create really healthy soil.

How do you do it?

We like to say that there are it's just like five conditions for you to thrive.

We need a diverse diet and water and exercise and a roof over our head.

And voila!

Our compost bin, which is basically a cubi yard of diameter, is the home, the minimum diameter tha our compost microorganisms need.

It needs a diverse diet.

So diverse diet means that we use leaves from the fall.

No meat, fat, cheese.

Our bones belongs in a compost pile.

You need to provide air.

So we turn the pile every two weeks, 2 to 3in of green material.

A sprinkling of soil turned it on a weekly basis.

Keep it as moist as a wrung out sponge.

That's the water that we need, so the microorganisms body needs to be covered.

When we started this pile, this was April 26th and it didn't look anything like it did now.

So this is what it looks like now.

Look how pretty it is.

It's got some old flowers of larkspur in.

So a compost pile can be very beautiful.

You can see it already is some materia that's starting to break down.

This is April 26th in about two months.

I'm going to have usable compos here, which is pretty amazing.

I would say that most people in Denver, unless you're living in Aurora, you're dealing with a heavy clay soil.

Can I really grow anything here?

The roots don't go down.

It cracks when it's dry.

How do I grow in your soil?

So what you need to know is you're never going to not have a heavy clay soil.

What you need to do is an inch and a half of that wonderful plant based compost that you're creating right at home.

Spread it on top of your soil before you turn it in the spring, and dig it into the top two inches.

That's what you need to do.

This is a plot which has compost spread up on top of it.

Befor this garden is ready to plant, the compost needs to be du into the top couple of inches.

In other words, don't leave it as a top dressing needs to be incorporated in.

You.

Even get a tour of the worm box today.

Would you like to see what we have in here?

And let's dig dow and see if we can find anything.

This is richer in all major and minor nutrients than even backyard composting is.

Isn't this beautiful?

Look at this stuff.

This is to die for.

It really is.

Yes.

You can buy commercial, good quality compost, but doing your own at home is a way of knowing exactly sourcing locally decreasing your carbon footprint because material doesn't need to travel.

Plus, you know exactly what went into the product that you're producing.

I love if I get ten people to say, yes, I can do this, then I'll feel like we're doing just a fabulous job at dug.

I'm pretty sure you're goin to get way more than ten people.

Judy.

Also, if you want to learn how to compost yourself, Doug has workshop at their compost demonstration site at Grove Community Garden in Denver.

To sign up go to their website at dog.org.

Next up summer may be coming to an end, but your fall garden doesn't have to.

I go over to the horse barn garden and get a private lesson from Jungle Judy herself.

On taking your summer crops in the fall.

So if you're thinking that summer is over and you're not supposed to be planting things for the fall, it's too late.

It is not too late.

This is Jungle Judy, and she's here to tell us why there are so many thing you can be planting right now.

So we're thinking, cool is in vegetables, Erica.

So if you think about our spring veggie garden, what would we grow in our spring garden, do you think if we're thinkin salads, kale, spinach, lettuce, I don't know, all those leafy crops up?

Leafy.

I got my emerging garden expert.

Leafy.

Absolutely right.

So we've got masculine in here, our salad crops that we're repeating.

Mixed lettuces.

Not iceberg or head lettuce, but leaf lettuce.

And we have a regular, which, when grown in fall, is a little bit less loved than it is in spring time.

And then we have spinach.

So for a crop like spinach that's got a hard coat on it, I soak it for a couple of hours in water and then plant small quantities, sell it, crop spinach for regular lettuces.

They love the cool temperatures and shortening hours.

The trick on these guys is that you need to plant, or soo enough, plant them a little bit deeper than you would in spring to account for warming soils.

Make sure you dig in compost beforehand, and mulch them after you plant them so you the soil doesn' try to harvest the outer leaves.

Young salad greens will fall a great look at some other things here.

Okay, we are moving on to root vegetables am I right.

Look at these root crops that we have such difficulty growing in the heat.

Radish you can harvest in less than 30 days.

In less than 30 day you can have a brand new radish.

We have a brand new.

And you harvest any o these things when they're young.

The same thing with beets make sure that you soak beat seeds and turnip seeds for a couple hours to soften that seed coat and use the package directions for the planting depth.

But they're super hardy being a root crop.

Just mulch over them very often.

You might be able to harvest some of these in late fall beginning of winter.

If your soil doesn't get all the way to beginning of winter, that's amazing.

As long as you mulch over that with leaves, don't forget to mulch.

Don't forget to mulch any of this stuff.

And we have.

And another crop which is a super high nutrition.

Oh, I love kale.

Kale hits the hot summer temperatures.

Do choose a variety like this Premier kale that says what are the days to harvest you?

With that?

Let's see 55 to 65 days to harvest.

But probably less than that because you're harvesting the outer leaves when they're small.

Got it?

So don't look for full size.

Keep this going.

Any variety of kale actually will love the cool weather.

Soak it for an hour or so an water to soften its seed coat.

Keep harvesting those leaves.

We have an herb here to, cilantro or cilantro.

It hates the spring weather because it gets too hot and lengthening days.

And if you plant it, I adore my garden.

Without cilantro, it does not exist.

I love making salsa.

Oh, I love making salsa with my summer vegetables.

And you need cilantro.

Yes.

So you're planted in fall.

Soak it agai for a couple of hours to soften its seed coat.

You use to package directions according to the depth planted a little bit deeper.

Mulch it with straw.

You know the thing, water it well.

Cilantro is one cro that if you mulch it with enough leaves, will overwinter.

And you can get that first early spring cilantro.

Yeah that's a cilantro.

And we got one last one here.

All right.

Our very last which is kind o iffy time was what have we got.

We have some if we if I say the peas or anything because I'd like this to be in by mid-August.

Okay.

But if nothing else, peas are what we call a lagoon.

Choose a shorter variety.

That means one that does not requir a long tomato cage like support, and that matures in shorter days.

This has 80 days to harvest, even if you don't get a full harvest of peas.

It's a legume, so it's going to help to improve your soil.

Wonderful.

So much.

The selections for our seeds for fall.

Let's move on to bulbs.

Oh, we have other things that we can do.

Bulbs and other things.

And these are things that I would suggest you not plant until second week in October.

And those are everything from our beautiful spring blooming bulbs.

Those can be a crocus and daffodil and tulips.

So those are wonderful Allium, which are ornamental type of onion that produce bi purple seed heads on, flowers.

All of these things requir the cooling temperatures of soil and ai in order to develop deep roots, and then give you that wonderful burst of flower and spring.

The other thing that's mid-October, planted at the edges of your garden would be fall garlic.

Ooh, garlic, garlic seed garlic.

You don't want to plant garlic from the supermarket.

We have sources of garli right now on our website accord.

But these are, it comes as a bulb.

You need to break the bulb apart, and then you have the individual cloves plant.

You do not remove the skin from the from the cloves.

Take the largest cloves and plant them about 3 to 4in deep, about four inches apart the flat end of the bulb.

That's where the root was down.

Cover them with some nice moist compost to enrich soil.

You know what's the cover we want to use on top of the soil?

The straw, the straw, the straw.

The motor leaves water it.

It will water it well.

But don't pat it.

Don't add it.

I don't think the other thing bad garlic.

You need to take a watering can out a couple of times during the winter if unless we have adequate snow, cover water well, and that's what produces her garlic that you harvest in late June or early July.

Planted just in time.

Just in time.

And if you've never done full garlic in your own home, it's far superior to supermarket garlic.

Oh, I can't wait.

My mic has fallen down.

Who knows where I germinate?

Erica, when that.

In conclusion, there are plenty of things that you can plant right now.

It is not too late.

Correct?

That's correct.

One of the most important things is to not leave your warm season crops growing till the point where you say, I need to take every shade up from the house in order to cover them.

No, they're past their prime.

Lots of them.

Let's plan our garden to have salad crops and root crops that are more important.

I love that.

And what do you think about this whole we need to always be taking care of our garden.

Working on our garden all year round is not really a seasonal thing, right?

So when we garden, we're committing to following a season of growt and a season of sustainability.

So when I think about a garden, I don't just thin about the crops that I harvest, I think about the increased person that I'm becoming because the garden has accepted me into its very essence.

So a garden teaches us that the more we nurture it, the more we are nurtured back with it.

So what a way to learn patienc and learning from other people and learning.

That's not a race.

It's not a race to put the largest tomato in.

It's just a place of reflection and wonder.

And I am in awe of.

The garden is absolutely beautiful.

Thank you so much.

That is it for today.

I'm Eric, I'm Clarity and I'm Jeff Judy and I'll see you next time.

All right.

We're here at the Horse Barn Garden with the fabulous jungle Judy.

And today we're learning about unpredictable summer pests, all pests that include hail and heat as well.

Right?

Right.

So you're here to help us?

Hopefully.

Okay.

Yeah.

All right, let's start where do we start?

I think we need to start with the soil.

The soil.

A lot of the problems that we have that, we think are really pests and diseases are caused by improper management of our soil.

So if you don't do something like enrich it with compost.

And, Erica, I think in our magic bucket there, if I could have you walk in our magic bucket.

I love a magic bucket.

And you can take my garden pruners, and my scissor and my.

Wonderful.

Okay, then in the botto of this bucket, we uncover it.

We have the clu to healthy growing and keeping a lot of the pest away.

And can you please take your hands and run it?

I would love to.

This is Colorado Compost.

It's made from landscape material.

It's beautiful.

Isn't it beautiful.

Yeah.

So this is made from what a lot of people throw out towards wheat.

Yes.

So why would you throw this out?

Because maybe they don't know that they can take it.

Hey.

What?

You can compost class at Denver Urban Garden.

Oh, okay.

Do you know how to make.

And we have places on our soil that we use are covered with something.

Yes.

You know what that is?

No, that's a straw.

Straw.

Okay.

And the reason that we're covering the this with straw is that it keeps that soil, that growing environment cooler up to ten degrees cooler.

Talking about gardening i the heat, it conserves moisture and it causes those roots to go down.

We're going to move over to this crop where we have some kale okay.

And I'm going to have you use one of my favorite cultivating weeding tools.

You're scaring me with that knife too.

I'm sorry.

It's a great weeding to I want you to just push back the straw around this, okay?

Get it.

Push it back.

You can use your hand.

You can use that.

Whatever works for you al the way around this kale plant.

What I'm going to have to do is feel the soil.

How would you describe that?

Cold?

Very moist.

Does it feel different than where you stepped?

Yes.

Very, very good.

How would you describe that dry and depressed.

Depressed.

Depressed I love it.

This is happy soil.

This is how we're going to make it even happier, because we're going to feed it with some compost.

Okay?

You're going to take my poor you glory great weeding tool.

And this is what you're going to do.

Just like oh, okay.

Mix it into the soil, man.

You don't know.

You don't know.

We don't want to mess with the roots.

So she's opening up air in the soil.

It's going to make the roots go down more.

This is what we can do also to eliminate or get a handle on weeds.

Oh, look what we hav right here.

This was not staged.

We have a ladybug.

Right there on the plant.

And I know that on the kale, which is a member of th broccoli cabbage family we have, how do we feel about the ladybug?

Is it friend or a good friend?

Because it's going to go say, this is a plant in whic I want to pause and lay my eggs.

And then the ladybird larva and the adults can munch thousands of aphids.

Look at this plot over here real quickly.

I'm looking at a white butterfly.

Oh, that beautiful white butterfly.

I love it, but this is the white cabbage butterfly.

And why is that important?

I'm looking because just lik the aphids are attracted to the.

This is actually a cauliflower which has been live too long in the garden.

You can see its florets are turning yellow and it's open.

So kale and cabbage and broccoli and brussel sprouts all.

Remember that cabbage family that attract they have strong sulfur smells.

And it's coming in and saying, I can smell the sulfur.

I'm going to oh another one just came in.

So they're a good sign.

This is no well they're they're attracted you kno they're attracted to that.

Yeah.

So at the first sign of aphids on your plants, you're going to take a strong, spray of water, okay.

And just wash it directly off.

This is an example of healthy cauliflower okay.

Oh, it looks great.

That one looks sad.

I look I learned I've learned this is my body.

This has been left a little long.

So what we need to do to prevent this, this one's from looking like this is to keep the sun.

And I would take the outer leaves, which probably have a tie them up.

So what do you think that's doing it first sun.

Oh gosh.

This just blocking all this long and all the sun.

Perfect.

And so you get an A-plus.

So I love this.

So what that's doing and it's not going to hurt the leaves.

No it's not going to impact the stream okay.

You can also use like a rubber band okay.

So you're just getting the big leaves at the edges.

Just so that's really cool.

Isn't that a cool technique?

Erica, I'm looking at a curl.

Breathe here.

Oh, is almost at the leaf at this.

Will you please unfurl that curl for the curl?

What?

You got a little box?

Oh, look.

Look what we got.

Yeah, we've got aphids.

So once we have washed the aphids out.

And, Erica, will you show people how to keep those curds?

Those are called curds.

Nice and white so they don't turn like that.

What do we need to do?

We're going to tie them up.

We are I mean, they've been bad and then bad.

So to keep out the sun and keep that nice and white, Erica is picking up those broad leaves, either using some kitchen string or a rubber band she's going to keep the sun at.

Oh, just like we would put sunscreen on everybody.

We want to keep the sun out of that, I love it.

I do want to look here because if we can find a caterpillar, it's dramatic.

So come on in here.

I want to find a well, I' going to let you go on a hunt.

I know that these are probably aphids.

Here I am looking at these kind of holes of this plant, so I'm not seeing it.

But the larva of the little fluttering white cabbage butterfly, it's this green caterpillar that you need to just brush off with your hand.

What's the pest right now that they're just like, help me, Judy this pest is killing my garden.

If you had asked me last year, I would have said Japanese beetles.

You could not walk in this garden and see our grapevine over there because it was skeletonized or our Grove compost site.

It was skeletonized.

There are almost no beetles this year.

I am having an incredible problem with do a lot to climate change and extreme drought and hea are grasshoppers, grasshoppers.

So grasshoppers.

We're all lookin at organic ways of managing it.

Yeah, I'd recommend that people on before things flower, take some garden knitting and put it over the plants to physically exclude the grasshoppers.

Now, right here in the garden we're always concerned about hail.

And we're concerned about extreme heat.

So right behind us we had a hail scare here where we were supposed to get a tennis ball sized hail that never came, never came.

This is dual purpose.

But you were prepared well.

Hazards are wonderful gardener okay.

Or one of the gardeners in this place was prepared.

So what this person di was just set up a simple system, went out to a garden cente and purchased some hail netting to drape over it.

This is dual purpose.

Great.

This can also be used in the heat of summer.

I recommend shade, cloth and a simple structure.

It's usually 40% light, 4 to 50% light from permeability.

Yeah, just drape it over some simple stakes.

Prevents too very easy to do.

This is something I could do just.

Well, you see, we wan those things that work for you.

However, you and you don't nee to spend a lot of money on it.

I've got some area here which is not only empty, bu which I'm going to ask Erica to.

First of all, in this area, use your hands.

Move the straw.

She knows how to do that really well, but I will put it back there.

She's going to put it back.

I like it.

And then what we're going to do are two things.

So we're planting.

We're planting more onions, more onions.

We're putting more onions in here to go along with the few onions we have.

And what will the onions do?

Because the onions are going to smell stronger.

Oh, I love this, guys.

The smell by which the cabbage.

Butterflies.

Fine.

So we're going to say I'm goin to put the cabbage in the fall.

We would have garlic.

It doesn't need to be really deep.

They're just going to chop.

That's fine.

Continue doing your chop chop chop.

I'm putting in some compost.

Will you please mix that compost in?

Yes.

Like a mixing bowl.

Just will.

What I like to do what you what you can close.

You just pick it up and mix the soil in with the compost.

Right.

Yeah.

So we're not.

Yeah.

Hold it in a jungle.

I like the cooking.

So we're folding it in.

Okay.

Absolutely.

Now I have some transplant which were donated this morning.

Oh, not bad that we don't panic.

No, she knows that we don't.

Paris.

Erica, we use your daughter or son.

I have both, okay.

Tangled hair.

Carefully.

We have tangled hair at the bottom.

Okay, we're going to carefully untangle those roots because we're going to have two bulbs of onions.

So start from the top and care fully pull it apart.

I'm going to.

I don't want to hurt it.

Oh, I know what we're giving it space in between right here.

So I'm going to park almos there almost doing a damage it.

So this I need to learn to be okay.

So Erica I am going to why don't we go ahead to that one is going to go number one.

Really just wanted to put it in.

Now you're going to cover up each bowl okay.

You do hammer and flat hand pattern.

Oh okay.

Got it.

Okay.

And about three inches apart o so because we need to get that bowl time okay.

Place defense and we'll have 220 I'm going to have you use that shovel okay.

And I'm going to have you dig down all around there.

You know the plan.

I can't believe I'm getting lesson from Jungle Judy herself.

And I would dig down all wide.

I'm going to dig down deeper because we're going to actually plant a tomato plant there.

Do you want me to keep going even deeper than.

I don't know, let me sit down and see what you've done.

Okay.

Such good work.

I have the shovel.

Yes.

So I think that's what this is.

Great.

What I want you to do is just the same thing, but a little wider, because those roots there and so dig down just like that.

But just like I'm doing okay, a little bit wider.

Go for it and put it right in the same place so we know where that soil is.

Okay.

Boy, we have a master gardener in.

I'm so just trying here.

Okay.

You know, the routine, what goes in the whole the mulch.

No, no.

Sorry.

Close.

You're a clue.

The, begins with the c. Oh, my gosh.

And with the tea.

Thank you.

Let's start.

You could just use.

You could just dump cups.

Duty dump.

Dump some compost in the hole Okay.

Are we good right there?

I don't know, dump some compost in the hole.

Just go.

One more handful.

There and then another handful that you're going to mix in with this stuff.

Okay, so this is what.

But this is why I'm the perfect person.

Because I'm a beginner, you know, you're a learner, which I love.

Now that wonderful a spoon.

I'm just going to take a little bit of this.

And this is complete.

This is registered program because it's not going to give it a whole bunch of nitrogen.

This and so it form perfect.

Just mix that in with your hands okay?

I don't want you to mess with the roots.

I just want you to squeeze this so that the roots are going there, okay?

Just squeeze it.

There's going to go down.

Tomato will form roots all on the stem.

So we're going to bury this out.

So you do not break up the roots.

We're going to push all this in see how deep we're putting this in.

A lot deeper than most people will think that this is getting its last chance.

I would even go for this stuff I shouldn't.

As tomatoes grow, the flowers are produce from the side of the stem in between a branch and this stem.

I can't show you because this is so small it tries to come up with another little chute.

Call this sucker.

Okay, so if you see suckers every week finish them off or cut them all.

Got it.

Okay, so summer is the perfect time to plant your tomatoes.

Well, I would offer my late to begin here.

Okay but I think that we because it's so hot now and this is a variety that will produce fruit before the end of the season.

We're also saying this is his last chance.

These wer so we would have a chance.

Yes.

We've got onions in for Repellency these the marigolds which are going to produce pollination.

Good job.

All right.

Punching always water.

This is the best ever overhead watering.

That' probably why my tomatoes into.

So I'll show you an example before you leave with some diseases coming in because I. Because people watered them on top.

Yeah.

Always from the soil.

Those bottom leaves develop diseases first they drop on the soil surface okay.

And it just means fertile for a lot of what we're talking about is basic plant care.

Optimize the health of the plant I love it makes sense.

This was so much fun today.

Thank you for teaching me.

I learned a lot.

Are there any final thoughts that you can leave us with?

Oh, there's about three three days worth of final thoughts, but if I had to say you had to sum it up, I would say, please remember that I think people keep the negative antenna up.

A lot of times they say, thi didn't work.

This didn't work.

Keep your journal, your phone take pictures of what you loved and realize that a garden is not a competition.

It's not a race.

A garden feeds your soul.

It's for stress relief in addition to food access.

So after these many year of gardening, I vowed one thing.

Each year I'm going to make a different mistake.

I love that I'm great at making mistakes.

Every year I got this.

We're so thankful that you chose to spend time with us in this day of learning in peace and reflection.

Awesome.

Thanks, Judy.

Thank you for sharing your your heart.

Gardening in Colorado can be tough with the heat, the hail, and the pests.

But to help, Denver Urba Garden started a program called Second Chances and thanks to local farmers, you can go and pick up seeds and plants.

Anything you need to replac what you've lost in your garden.

We stopped by to see it live in action.

Are you going to help?

You want to pick out some plants?

This is the very first day of a brand new program we're calling Second Chances.

The program is a waste diversion program.

It takes surplus seedling from growers in the Front Range that otherwise wouldn't be used, or would have to get composted.

It takes those seedlings and connects them to food insecure households.

These all basil, and it connect those seedlings with community gardens that have experienced some form of loss pests, hail, theft, vandalism, that sort of thing.

We had a, an infestation of flea beetles, and they chewed up through a lot of things.

So this is great because then we can replace some of these things.

The heat is really difficult.

We live in Barnham, which is like there's not a lot of beautiful big trees.

And because of that, we have a lot of heat from all the concret and the asphalt that's around.

And so our garden gets really hot.

We play the intermediate role of identifying where those plants are available, where they're going to get tossed out because they're not used, and then bringing them to places like this where garden leader can come to a central location and pick up what they need, or the seedlings can go to a food pantry distribution and they can be passed ou with food boxes.

We kind of got, you know, somewhat of a late start this year.

And so we can use this to, you know, kind of supplement our garden.

The food access programs at Doe are really what we call sort of foo sovereignty building programs.

It's about distributing supplies to help community members build food sovereignty.

And those distributions historically have happened sort of at the very beginning of the season.

And the organization, I think, has done a good job of setting folks up for succes with what they need initially.

I think what this program is responding to is, that there are emergent needs throughout the season that historically we haven't been able to meet because some things do die, some things don't go according to plan, and you need to have a backup available to you.

Okay, let's grab some of these guys.

This is flat leaf parsley.

We were getting a lot of requests in late June and early July for seedlings.

We recognize that that need overlap really well with, a resource offering from some of the growers we work with.

We buy a lot of seedlings for our programs.

And around this time of the year, those farmers would also be reaching out to us saying, hey, I have 200 extra of this or a bunch of leftover that I have no where to put them.

Do you want them?

And so we're just really connecting and identified surplus in the Front Range with an identified need in the Front Range.

I see a tag.

What is it?

Oh it is okay, cool.

We will take a flat of this.

So today we have really just a mix of what' available from from our farmer.

These seedlings today are from the Masa See Foundation in Boulder, Colorado.

They grow really beautiful high quality organic seedlings.

It's a mix of traditional hot weather crops, stuff that thrives in the heat.

Eggplant, peppers, tomatoes, that kind of thing.

With other crops that yo could do this time of the year with a little bit of microclimate management.

So we also have some chard, we have some herbs and we have some onions.

We went in and got boolean rainbow peppers, peppers, peppers.

We got red and regular onions and we got the onion.

I don't remember what these were.

Those are peppers as well.

Okay.

These are peppers.

But we didn't get the name of them.

We got eggplant.

Eggplant.

And what's this?

Parsley.

And because we're a high desert, you know.

Yes.

We have a shorter growing season, but it also gets so friggin ho in, you know, August and July.

So educating people about that and also getting people to come to the garden when it's hot is really hard.

So I'm like, come at night, like, I don't know, after you eat dinner or something or come really early in the morning before you go to work.

The Front Range, the Denver area is very prone to hail.

We get big temperature swings in May.

Two years ago my garden was decimated by hail.

So every yea we'll have a handful of gardens across the network that experienced near total loss from hail storms and need a huge number of plants to get started again.

And this kind of program does that.

Yeah.

So I'm a community garden leader at the local street and Barnum Community Garden.

And I heard from Shay that these plants were available.

Let's grab these guys.

Look at those onions.

It's been really hot.

So we have some squashes and eggplants.

The tomatoes don't seem to die off that quickly, but, I just wanted to come and grab some extra for the community and try to give them to the new gardeners to fill some of those plots.

You know, my real aspiration for this program is that community garden leaders feel as though their needs, after the season starts, are still being heard, and that some effort is being made to still meet those later in the season, and that it's not set you up for success.

And then you're on your own for the entirety that we can be with you throughout the entire season.

Be sure to check the dug website to see what more Second Chances programs are coming up.

And that wraps up this special edition of studio 12.

We hope you feel inspired to grow something new.

Allow yourself to make some mistakes and get to know your community while doing it.

I leave you with a quote from Jungle Judy herself.

The garden is a non-judgmental teacher.

It meets us exactly where we are.

Offering lessons in patience, resilience, and healin if we're just willing to listen.

I'm Erica McLarty and thank you for spending time with us.

We'll see you next time.

You.