A Year of Organic Growing with Klaus Laitenberger

Taking place from February to November this course comprises a series of one day courses and is designed to teach participants how to start and manage a productive organic growing space - at any scale. Delivered by soil expert and renowned educator Klaus Laitenberger, organic Inspector for the Organic Trust Ltd as well as project lead on a number of exciting new garden projects and author of four gardening books: ‘The Self-Sufficient Garden’, ‘Vegetables for the Irish Garden’, ‘Fruit and Vegetables for the Polytunnel and Greenhouse’ and ‘A Vegetable Grower’s Handbook’, this course is structured across the 4 seasons for anyone who plans to start and maintain an organic food garden.

Home, Community and Commercial growers will benefit from Klaus’ decades of organic food growing experience as we learn by doing across the 100 acre organic farm, gardens, polytunnels and glasshouse (from August on once the new glasshouse build is completed!).

Series Dates:

Feb 13 (Thurs), March 6 (Thurs), April 10 (Thurs), May 8 (Thurs), June 3 (Tues), July 10 (Thurs), August 14 (Thurs), Sept 4 (Thurs), October 9 (Thurs), November 6 (Thurs)

What You’ll Learn:

Kicking off the series in February we’ll start with the most important element of all - healthy soil and build from there with sowing seeds, planting, caring for plants and harvesting. Across the series the following topics will be covered:

• Introduction to soils
• Practical ground preparation – no –dig, digging, lazy beds, Huegelbed etc
• Soil improvement – composting/green manuring/other inputs
• Practical seed sowing and other propagation methods (cuttings, division, layering etc)
• Theory – what is an open pollinated variety and a F1 hybrid
• Pruning of top and soft fruit throughout the season
• Crop planning and rotation – how much to grow and making a sowing plan Individual crop requirements
• Growing in Polytunnels and Greenhouses
• Organic weed control – weed identification, hoeing, mulching, flame weeding, hand weeding, stale seedbed technique
• Organic pest and disease prevention – throughout the seasons we will identify common pests and diseases and show methods and techniques on how to prevent them
• Plant care – training, pruning, side-shooting etc for a range of crops
• Harvesting and storing vegetables

Course Elements: 

• Indoor and Outdoor Classroom Learning
• Practical project work across the organic farm, gardens and glasshouse
• Q&A sessions throughout the days as we review each session and put theory into practice

Good to Know:

• As we’ll spend time walking and learning around the farm please bring suitable clothing and footwear - and allow for changeable weather!
• Refreshments and Lunch included; eat alongside our students, cookery school teachers, farm staff, gardeners and visiting experts
• Tea and Coffee with whatever’s fresh out of the oven will be served from 8.45am each course day so please arrive early to sign in, meet other students and get ready for a busy day of hands on learning
• The course is held at Ballymaloe Cookery School’s Organic Farm and Gardens in Shanagarry, Co. Cork P25 R274