In my garden, I tried to plan much better this year based off of what my plants nutritional, sun, water, & root depth needs were. With this in mind, I have been experimenting with intercropping and companion planting to maximize our food production for a small backyard garden. I spent a lot of time this past winter and spring researching companion plants and various plants needs to successfully grow in my garden and put all of that knowledge into my layout design of my garden. I also prefer not to use chemicals in our garden and instead take sustainable agriculture practices when combating pests such as spraying soapy water on plants to get rid of insect pests, spreading cayenne & cinnamon powder around the garden edge and certain leafy plants, and planting particular plants that deter pests such as marigolds, lavender, & mint. 

After I researched and planned my garden, I ordered seeds and started a lot of plants in my garden from seed in early spring indoors. I set up a small grow area in an extra room in our apartment. I would check on the plants daily to ensure they were getting enough light and water. I would also check their root system and plant strength to determine when I needed to up-pot them to bigger sized containers. This was a really great experience, because some of my plants thrived as seedlings and others didn't. This allowed me to reflect back on ways I could improve my seed starting setup for next year and focus on getting better and better each year. 

I think it is also important to consider a systems thinking approach when a problem occurs in your garden space. For instance, we have had woodchuck problems for the past two years. To combat this issue, we redid our fence around the garden this year to a more sturdy fence and we also dug a trench around the garden to bury our fence ~8 inches below the ground. We added a gate to our garden and thought we would finally be able to keep the woodchucks out this year. Unfortunately, we didn't realize there was a gap just big enough for a woodchuck to sneak through in the bottom of our gate. So the woodchuck did some damage to our plants early in the season. Wiping out our dill, parsley, borage, bush beans, radish tops and some more. We quickly adapted to the problem, found the hole the woodchuck was going in and out of and blocked the hole with extra logs and netting. I also ripped out the plant stalks from the plants that were eaten, knowing they wouldn't come back healthy and instead planted a different vegetable crop there. Being able to adapt and problem solve is an important part of systems thinking!

In our garden, we will continue to use a systems thinking approach when practicing sustainable agriculture. We will always think about the larger picture ensuring our garden works as an ecosystem that all benefits one another. We will make mistakes along the way, but we will learn from them and continue to practice trial and error and make sure to closely monitor our plants throughout the season to stay in tune with their evolving needs. We will continue to plan and prepare ahead of time as best we can to reduce the amount of waste we produce and make sure everything we do in our garden is intentional and well thought out.