This document summarizes part two of a three part series on "Good Farming and the Public Good" from the book Meeting the Expectations of the Land by Donald Worster. It argues that good farming promotes a just society by providing opportunity and livelihood through access to land. However, agriculture is currently failing in its obligation to provide for the poor, landless, and minority groups. Concentration of land ownership has increased inequality. For agriculture to be strong, it needs to rediscover democratic principles of distributing land and opportunity more evenly.

1. COVER CROPS Garden
Locations
Fall is the prime planting time for &
cover crops, or crops that improve the Scheduled Volunteer Workdays:
soil quality of your garden.
Legumes such as fava beans fix Arroyo Viejo Garden
Arthur Street and 79th Avenue
nitrogen, help suppress weeds, and
reduce insect pests and diseases. Bella Vista Community Garden
Hairy vetch can be grown Second Sundays 9 AM
alongside fava beans in a symbiotic 1025 E 28th Street
relationship as the bean poles act as Behind Bella Vista School
trellises for the vetch to grow on and
Bushrod Community Garden
vetch helps keep favas from blowing First Saturdays 10 AM
over in the wind. 584 59th Street
Harvest your favas in March when beans are 4-7” long,
then prepare as you would prepare peas. Fava beans are great Golden Gate Community Garden
Third Saturdays 11 AM
in soups, stews, sauces, salads, and spreads!
1068 62nd Street
Other examples of cover crops include alfalfa, lupines,
clover, buckweat, canola, and cereal grains such as oats, rye, Marston Campbell Garden
and wheat. These friendly plants provide organic matter to the 16th Street and Market
soil system to reduce erosion, soil loss, and soil compaction.
They enhance the nutrition of the soil for future plantings and Lakeside Park Kitchen Garden
Fourth Saturdays 9 AM
provide carbon for composting. 666 Bellevue Avenue
It is important to monitor
your cover crops, though, so they Temescal Community Garden
do not become out-of-control Second Saturdays 10 AM
weeds. 876 47th Street
Happy Planting! Verdese Carter Community Garden
Bancroft and 96th Avenue.
Come to the community garden workdays!
We have 100 lbs of fava beans to plant out!
Oakland--- Office of Parks & Recreation --- Community Gardening Program Fall 2006

2. COMPANION PLANTING
By Aija Kanbergs
Some plants just seem to grow better when certain other plants
are nearby. Then again, some plants seem to "hate" each other. This
fact has been noted by gardeners in different parts of the world for
thousands of years. You too can take advantage of these special
plant "relationships" to help your garden thrive.
Sometimes, it's just a matter of planting something that repels
harmful organisms - garlic to repel aphids, for example, or mari-
golds to help control nematodes, tiny worms in the soil which eat
plant roots. Sometimes, the plants are there to attract helpful insects:
catnip or sunflowers to attract pollinating bees, or Bishop's Flower to
attract ladybugs. Some plants can even act as a sacrificial decoy.
Eggplants around the outside of a potato patch keep Colorado potato
beetles from eating potato foliage, because the beetles love eggplant
even more than potato.
Often, the interrelationship between plants is more complex. A
traditional example of several different types of "companionship" is
the Native American "Three Sisters" garden: corn, squash and beans.
The corn provides support for the bean vines, and also provides some shade for the beans and squash.
The beans make nitrogen available for the corn through the nitrogen-fixing bacteria which live in nod-
ules on their roots. The squash shades the ground and suppresses weeds. Adding a few sunflowers to
this trio attracts bees, and looks pretty nice, too.
Some plants, such as beans, make certain nutrients available in the soil. Others may have a more sub-
tle effect with various enzymes. Strawberries and bush beans do well together, for example. Last fall, I
planted fava beans in a large container in my backyard. In the planter were some forgotten farmer's
market potatoes I'd stuck in when they sprouted. By mid-spring, I not only had great favas, but the best,
most disease-free potato plants I'd ever had. I looked it up, and, indeed, potatoes are helped by broad
beans. Sometimes, the relationship between plants is negative - sunflowers can stunt potatoes, and cu-
cumber grown near potatoes makes them more susceptible to
fungal diseases.
You can get very fancy with companion planting and craft-
ing of home-made "teas" to fertilize your garden or to repel
insects. This so-called "Bio-dynamic Method" is now fashion-
able in some California vineyards. You don't need to become
an expert - some simple companion plantings will be just
fine.
Want to learn more? The classic text is Helen Philbrick's Com-
panion plants and how to use them (Old Greenwich, CT : Devin-
Adair, 1966). It's out of print, but some libraries have it. Louise
Riotte's Carrots love tomatoes : secrets of companion planting for
successful gardening (Pownal, VT : Storey Pub., 1998) is in print. It
takes a lot from Philbrick's book, and is padded with stuff you don't
really need, but it's available.
Oakland--- Office of Parks & Recreation --- Community Gardening Program Fall 2006

3. Community Gardening Program
250 Frank H. Ogawa Plaza, Ste. 3330
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helping in the garden!
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Oakland--- Office of Parks & Recreation --- Community Gardening Program Fall 2006

4. This is Part II of a three part series on “Good Farming and the Public Good” from
Meeting the Expectations of the Land by Donald Worster.
Good Farming PART II
Good farming is farming that promotes a more just society. For a long time in America, the land was where
most people expected to go for their start in life, where they hoped to find opportunity and secure a living. The
land, always the land: if not in this place, then farther west. Our society’s thinking about fairness and democ-
racy reflects even now a reliance on the land as an available, inexhaustible resource. Today however, we are
telling the majority of rural people that there is not enough farm land for them, that they will have to go some-
place else for their livelihood, although it is never precisely indicated where that “someplace else” is. If agricul-
ture passes the buck, where will it stop? Does agriculture not have an obligation to the poor and landless in its
midst? An obligation to pay decent wages to its laborers and to make room for new farmers rather than expect-
ing the besieged, depressed cities to take the unwanted? Agriculture through both private and public agencies,
can and should give assistance to struggling racial minorities across the country: to black farmers who are liv-
ing as tenants on worn out land, to Indians farmers who need irrigation water, to small Hispanic growers who
seek a fair share of attention from county extension agents, to Hawaiians who want land for taro and cultural
survival. The agricultural community should work to lop the top off of the rural pyramid of wealth, which is
reaching stratospheric heights; today a mere 5 percent of the nations landowners control almost half the farm
acreage, while in the mountain west a miniscule 1 percent owns 38 percent of all agricultural land and in the
pacific states the same percent owns 43 percent of the land. Agriculture, however, is not doing any of these
things. On the contrary, it is everywhere retreating rapidly from a commitment to justice and democracy. Mean-
while several other nations are managing despite the pressure of the world marketplace and industrialization, to
hold onto the democratic principle; the Danes, for example, have long pursued the ideal of a rural world where
few have too little and fewer have too much. When our own farm experts and leaders rediscover that moral
value, American agriculture will be stronger and more successful than it is today.
Oakland--- Office of Parks & Recreation --- Community Gardening Program Fall 2006