My Organic Garden 2010 (Dial up warning)

[ixion]

I grew up on a farm, and every year we had a garden. I always helped to plant/tend/harvest, but since I've grown older (I'm in my 40's now) I have never once cultivated my own garden. Over the last couple years, I've been honing the basic skills needed to get things done on your own: woodworking, gardening, etc. Last year I had my garden on a piece of property I own about two hours away. It made tending next to impossible. This year, I put the garden in my back yard, and found that I really enjoy spending time out in the garden.

It's good for the soul. :)

So here are a couple pics I wanted to share.





I'm growing Peas, Corn, Onions (Red and Bunching), Chives, Squash, Tomatoes, Garlic, Chili and Yellow Bell Peppers and both Sweet and Spicy Basil in a 37% Peat Moss, 37% compost, 25% Vermiculite, 1% Black Soil mix.

[terip64]

1. Thanks for sharing this...

We are skipping our garden this year because my husband and I are both in school right now, but I love the boxes you made. We tried square foot gardening before and it is much more manageable. Good luck and have fun!

[ixion]

2. sure thing... and thanks!

I hope you're able to get another garden in soon. Yeah, I really like the concept behind the SFG. I've broken with protocol a bit in that I made a cage around the entire area and have used my 'cage' frameworks as platforms for irrigation and shade instead, but the box concept and soil mix make the effort much more enjoyable, in my opinion.

I went with 8" deep boxes, rather than 6".

[terip64]

3. I sent my husband this link so he can see how you did it.

We have black walnut trees and they wreak havoc on our efforts. I will miss my garden this year but we are members of our local CSA so I'll survive. ;)

[roguevalley]

19. what a beautiful garden. I love gardening like that. I wish I had a

more temperate climate. I used to have *such* gardens.

[Saturday]

4. We too had a black walnut tree nixing our....

gardening efforts. That tree was removed recently so we have container pots on our deck this year. We live in the woods so anything else is impossible. Good job ixion. It looks wonderful! I too grew up with a garden and hope to go back to my roots (so to speak lol) in a small limited way.

[patrice]

5. Hi, ixion! Nice garden! I can imagine what a Pleasure it is!

:hi:

[ixion]

12. Hi patrice! Thanks very much.

It does indeed bring me much Peace of Mind. :hi:

[tabatha]

6. Great job!

[ixion]

13. thanks!

:hi:

[shireen]

7. beautiful!

i have dreams of doing something similar, if i can ever afford a house with a yard.

[ixion]

14. You can actually do SFG on your roof or back porch...

Anywhere that you can put the box and drain the water. :)

[shireen]

22. unfortunately,i have neither

tho there have been days when i've wanted to take my 400W metal halide light out of storage and grow indoors but my apartment is too small.
Definitely a frustrated gardener here. :D

[shireen]

8. looks like square foot gardening ...

http://www.squarefootgardening.com/

was this your design, or did you adopt it from Square Foot Gardening? I love SFG!

[ixion]

11. Yep, it's a SFG hybrid

I'm using the cage frames as platforms for shade and misting, and put the cage around the whole area. I think it makes it easier to tend.

But I'm definitely a fan of Square Foot Gardening. :)

[bvar22]

9. Lovely!

What part of the country are you in?
I think I see a Banana Tree with some pretty large leaves in the background.
I'm going to guess Gulf Coast?
.
.
.
"It's good for the soul."...indeed.
:hi:

[ixion]

15. Yep, spot on.

I'm in Sarasota. Outside that garden area, we've got Papaya, Mango, Pineapple, Orange, Grapefruit and Lime trees.


mmmmmm. :hi:

[Dover]

10. Ohhhhh...wonderful! And it looks very thought out. I like the use of the structure

as a framework for shade cloth and other things. Don't know where you are located, but the shade cloth will likely come in very handy as things heat up heading into June/July. A minimal shade cloth can really help lower the temps in the garden.

I don't have my garden inside a 'cage', but did create a kind of box frame around each 4'x8' bed so that I can attach various things to it like shade cloth along the top, bird netting, plant supports, etc. I prefer the lightweight bird netting to chicken wire or other structures because it's easy to remove and at least so far keeps out all but the butterflies and insects. Some row cover cloth is also very handy for various uses and can double as shade cloth, though high winds can cause it to tear sometimes.

So far the soil mix recommended for SFG is working great and I don't think I will even need to add mulch because it retains moisture very nicely. However I am adding worm castings and particularly when I transplant some new addition which they seem to really love.

What kind of tomatoes are you growing?

I'm amazed how rewarding it is to have just a little piece of earth cultivated. I love gardening, whether for veggies or flowers. And posts like yours and bvars and others are such an inspiration!

[ixion]

16. Thanks, Dover!

Yep, I'm on the Gulf Coast, in Sarasota, and that box with the shade cloth is growing mostly peas, so I pull the shade cloth from about 11am until 4pm or so, depending on the day, and have a couple misting units in there. Between those two things, the peas are doing pretty well thus far. Moving into the summer, though, it's going to be an ongoing challenge.

The cages...yeah, I built cages for all three, and then scrapped one of them. It makes it too hard to get to the plants, so I just went with deer netting around on the ground around the area, and I'm going to put up an aviary net this weekend, so I'll be covered from the air.

I agree about the SFG soil mix. I originally ordered a yard-and-a-half of black dirt that I wound up turning into a flower berm because I totally changed the soil mix. It's an outstanding blend, in my opinion.

Tomato-wise, I'm growing Juliets. I think I'll probably experiment a bit there to see what I like best.

It is a amazing. I've spent the past several weekends (and a fair amount of time every day) out there doing this or that. I find it to be grounding and provide excellent stress relief. I'm happy you found this as inspiring as I. :hi:

[ixion]

17. Here's another pic from the construction days

for anyone interested. :)

[Dover]

18. Ha! What a transformation!

So I'd be curious (and maybe others who are considering starting their own raised beds would be too), to hear a few details about your process. I'm sure everyone's process is different which makes it all the more interesting to me. And a great way to collect ideas that will be useful.

For instance, I used a lot of 'found' materials for my garden beds. My raised beds weren't all that thought out ahead of time, although I had been sort of 'dreaming' about them for some time. I got an early start on them in late February but still felt a lot of pressure to finish as things can warm up very quickly in the south. As it turned out, it was an unusually cool and rainy spring...so no rush necessary...not even for installing the drip system (I'm only now installing it!). I only needed the basics to begin at that time (the boxes, soils and plants) because there weren't any insect (or animal) threats at that time of year. So I could just gradually integrate things as needed. And I kept it simple by only planting about 6 different vegetable varieties so as not to get ahead of myself or overwhelmed. Baby steps.
I'm pretty comfortable with tools and building things, so that was one hurdle I didn't have to worry too much about, although I don't have a work space, so it was a bit of a struggle to get organized with tools and materials. A tool that really helped me was one of those cordless drills. It just provided a lot of freedom in terms of placement of the beds and working on site. And a side benefit is that I've found myself repairing things that had been out of range of even a long extension cord. So for me that was a good investment. I also had been collecting cardboard which I used instead of weed cloth on the ground around and inside the beds. I figured by the time it disintegrates any weeds beneath it will be long dead.

So what did you lay beneath the mulch surrounding your beds? What design issues did you consider and things did you run into as you went along? I hope you'll keep us up on your progress as things grow and change.

[ixion]

20. Heh heh heh, indeed. And it's still transforming...

In my case, the decision to use raised beds was pretty simple: I live in Florida, which is mostly one big sand bar. The sandy soil doesn't really support your... er, garden variety, if you will, types of vegetables, so a raised bed seemed the best route. Initially, my plan was to build one large bed, 4'x8'x16", and I had already ordered a yard-and-a-half of black soil with that in mind. Then I came across the SFG concept. I was a bit skeptical at first, but as I made my way through the book my skepticism turned to inspiration.

In short, why make more work for yourself?

Like you, I'm comfortable with building things. Before I started writing software, and after I got out of college, I traveled around quite a bit and worked various jobs building and/or fixing things. When I started writing code, I stopped building things. In fact, I sold my tools as a motivation to learn to write code. That was back in '96. Since 2007, I've started honing those skills again, just in case. But I digress. This project seemed like a good way to a) get me out of the house once in a while, b) hone those building and gardening skills. I didn't really use many 'found' materials in this case, although I did re-purpose one of the cages into a gateway. :)

Layout-wise, I was trying make the best use of the sunshine and leave myself enough room to work. The aesthetics just sort of happened organically.

These pictures are from a time lapse film I'm making of this project, so there will definitely be more, and I'll be happy to share. :toast:

[Wilms]

21. k&r n/t