An Austrian farmer has actually experienced a guiding “eureka minute” on how to grow veggies throughout the winter season– and he is now teaching his method to other European gardening communities as well.
According to a current interview with, gardener Wolfgang Palme states he mistakenly found his “winter season farming” technique after a batch of his Asian lettuce was left undamaged by an early frost in the veggie fields behind his home in Lower Austria.
The temperature level had dropped to -11 º Celsius (12º Fahrenheit), and although the crop is typically frost-resistant to temperatures of -3 approximately, the lettuce– and Palme’s other veggies– had endured the cold.
Palme, who is head of the Research study Institute of Cultivation in Austria, was puzzled by the agricultural phenomenon. Upon doing some digging on why his veggies may have made it through the cold wave, the gardener found that the existing scientific literature on the frost-hardiness of Main European veggies was just wrong … so he started to make it right.
The outcome is that Zinsenhof, the speculative farm where Palme performs his research, now grows lettuce, spinach, scallions, red radishes, purslane, lacinato kale, turnips, carrots, celery, herbs, and pea sprouts throughout the winter season.
These vegetables are all part of a crop of more than 70 species which Palme has discovered to cultivate in the winter season.
For the many part, Palme’s method includes integrating making use of unheated plastic tunnels under the produce and heating up the ground with manure. He has actually likewise been exploring with planting his crops at differing times of the year, his thinking being that if he plants seeds too late, their roots wont be strong enough to last winter season; if they are planted too early in the year, the plants will fruit too quickly.
According to Palme’s gardening guide released by Reasons to Be Cheerful, you can grow iceberg lettuce throughout winter temperature levels of between 0 and 8 degrees Celsius if you plant your seeds at the start of August, plant at the end of the month, and harvest the crop between November and January.
Given that Palme is now enthusiastic in using his research study to impact society at large, he now holds winter season gardening classes in Augarten Park, Vienna where attendees can handle their own vegetable beds. He likewise works with industrial and small-time farmers with the hopes of assisting them to exploit the year-long potential of their fields.
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Not just do his teachings help farmers to exponentially improve their crop yields, it likewise helps in reducing the greenhouse gas emissions produced by the need for imported vegetables flown in from tropical climates, which is roughly 15 times the cost of growing domestically.
“In a cold winter season night, a heated greenhouse of 1.5 acres causes as much CO2 equivalent as a removed home in a whole year,” says Palme. “Mankind can no longer manage this.”
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