This goes best by variety, I think:
2 tomato varieties from seed. 4 starts - these are my backup in case I need to impress someone and everything else sucks. One is a cherry, which we don't really care for, and one is a determinate, which we really don't care for. The third is an Early Girl, which everyone apparently cares for. Then we get a Big Beef for $.32. Immediately the Early Girl, followed by the cherry and determinate, yellow and die from the bottom up. I realize that healthy sod is not an indicator of healthy soil, it might even indicate the opposite, but either way my soil is delicously nitrogen-free. I should have tilled the grass, worked in compost, blah blah expensive. I buy a 50-lb bag of 16-16-16 (recommended is 5-10-10). I spread the overkill in granular form around my plants, too little and they die, too much and they burn, and I have no idea how long it takes to work. So I throw a little food out when I go check on them everyday, even though the stuff from before is still there. It's exactly like caring for a dead hamster.
Monday, May 31, 2010
Friday, May 28, 2010
Field work
She and I make the garden - a 13'x14' plot with 115 sq ft of growing area, fashioned out of a sunny, out-of-the-way plot of grass with a couple of shovels and a hoe. I should mark everything off, the pathway, spots for the big plants, the outside edges. I don't. In the meantime I set up a border of some untreated 8' poles around the downhill half of the garden and move soil downhill to try and level it out some. As it turns out, whatever supplies I need, I will only buy at most half. I don't add more topsoil, so the slope ends up halfway between what it was, and level. And clumpy, because I didn't have a good way of breaking up sod clumps. As grass dies the clumps do seem to disintegrate. I also don't add compost or do any soil testing - this is a point with me. I didn't move to one of the most fertile valleys on the planet to grow plants out of bagged manure.
I mulch with straw, a bale from a feed and seed store. As it turns out, what supplies I do buy, I buy from the first place I find them available. I needed mulch, and I read about someone using straw somewhere once. Actually, this has worked out well so far, doesn't blow around, keeps things weed free on the path. For weeds I use landscape fabric, but I don't buy pins or anything to hold it down (see above). It lets plenty of sun through for the weeds, either way. Seems to slow down the rain, though. For water I use dripper line, 50' of 1/2" (!) for a couple bucks from Habitat for Humanity. The stuff doesn't shape well, and again no pins, so there's serpentine ridges running underneath the fabric. I hook it up with hose from Home Depot (another couple bucks) and hose from a nursery (not just a couple bucks). This means a lot of adapters and cursing to make up for all the slight size discrepancies. Bed, weeds, water. Time for plants.
I mulch with straw, a bale from a feed and seed store. As it turns out, what supplies I do buy, I buy from the first place I find them available. I needed mulch, and I read about someone using straw somewhere once. Actually, this has worked out well so far, doesn't blow around, keeps things weed free on the path. For weeds I use landscape fabric, but I don't buy pins or anything to hold it down (see above). It lets plenty of sun through for the weeds, either way. Seems to slow down the rain, though. For water I use dripper line, 50' of 1/2" (!) for a couple bucks from Habitat for Humanity. The stuff doesn't shape well, and again no pins, so there's serpentine ridges running underneath the fabric. I hook it up with hose from Home Depot (another couple bucks) and hose from a nursery (not just a couple bucks). This means a lot of adapters and cursing to make up for all the slight size discrepancies. Bed, weeds, water. Time for plants.
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Something something green
It's Cinco de Mayo, and I have no time for battle plans or comparision shopping. Two $75 trips to pick up my investments and I'm off and running with seeds in a 36 and 72-tray starter. I'm unable to spot the sprouts with pure enthusiasm, and an actual check a week later reveals a crop of struggling lettuce. Green, nonetheless, and drinks are on the house. I wedge them confidentally under my setup: two 4' "plant" bulbs and fixture from Wal-mart. Now I've grown plants from high-intensity special order bulbs before, and I've read about enough people having fine luck with regular bulbs, so I figure this is at least passable till they can go outside. It's on an adjustable height chain from the ceiling, just in case. Which drops a link the next day, and a link, and two links... My first lettuce sprouts snap and fall over just as I bury the bulbs in the soil. From then on the flats go outside every day, and the worthless excuse for lighting hangs idly, never to be used again. My small, early-sprouting seeds: onion, brocolli, lettuce, are the first victims, albeit replaceable ones, of my shortcutting ways. The rest are marked with a number system, the key to which is saved on a computer that died days later. The flats become confusing, crowded masses of unidentifiable and increasingly inseparable green. Oh well, they'll do fine once they get to the garden.
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Oh geez
If anything grows in my garden, I want it to be in spite of my efforts, not because of them.
I have a lot of book knowledge and very little experience and very little money to pull off something like this, but I hear the food tastes better when you grow it yourself.
I plant seeds in a 36 and 72-tray starter, put greenhouse cover on them. Lesson 1: Some sprouts will be days old before I catch them, no matter how excited or enthusiastic I am. That puts me behind, me and my leggy albino lettuce starts. I put them under a grow light, a 4' cheap-looking toy from Wal-Mart. Lesson 2: High-intensity lights are worth the expense. I have special-order bulbs from an old aquarium, but they're only 18" and I figured these 4' T12 bulbs looked at least as impressive. Wrong - crap bulbs don't put enough light even if the plants wrap themselves around them, which is what the peas were trying. This puts my plants at risk and weeks later their future is still uncertain. Lesson 2b: The little seeds need a lot more care than the big ones. I take the trays outside and in at night now. I mark trays with plant markers, but use a number system with a key stored on my computer. Lesson 3: Back up critical information. My computer died days later, so I lost my key and my garden plans. Not before the garden was built, thankfully.
She and I make the garden - a 13'x14' plot with 115 sq ft of growing area, fashioned out of a sunny, out-of-the-way plot of grass with a couple of shovels and a hoe. I want to mark everything off, the pathway, spots for the tomato plants, the border, but I don't. I figure out an easier solution for that. In the meantime I set up a border of some untreated 8' poles around the downhill half of the garden and move soil downhill to try and level it out some. Lesson 4: Whatever supplies I need, I will only buy at most half. I do not do soil tests, I do not add compost or more topsoil, so the slope ends up halfway between what it was, and level. And clumpy, because I didn't have a good way of breaking up sod clumps. As grass dies the clumps do seem to disintegrate.
I mulch with straw, a bale from a feed and seed store. Lesson 5: What supplies I do buy, I buy from the first place I find them available. I needed mulch, and I read about someone using straw somewhere once. Actually, this has worked out well so far, doesn't blow around, keeps things weed free on the path. For weeds I use landscape fabric, but I don't buy pins or anything to hold it down (see lesson 4). This means spotty weed control as the wind has its way with it. The fabric is by no means a sieve, so most rain gets redirected into any holes you have, and the rest is very slow to leak into the soil. Don't know if this is a positive yet. For water I use dripper line, 50' of 1/2" (!) for a couple bucks from Habitat for Humanity. The stuff doesn't shape well, and again no pins, so there's serpentine ridges running underneath the fabric. I hook it up with hose from Home Depot (another couple bucks) and hose from a nursery (not just a couple bucks). This means a lot of adapters and cursing to make up for all the slight size discrepancies. Bed, weeds, water. Time for plants.
Tomato starts are embarassingly cheap so three go in. These are my backup in case I need to impress someone and everything else sucks. One is a cherry, which we don't really care for, and one is a determinate, which we really don't care for. The third is an Early Girl, which everyone apparently cares for. Then we get a Big Beef for $.32. So, four starts. Immediately the Early Girl, followed by the cherry and determinate, yellow and die from the bottom up. I realize that, despite all that grass growing there, or perhaps because of it, my soil is delicously nitrogen-free. I should have tilled the grass, worked in compost, blah blah expensive. I buy a 50-lb bag of 16-16-16 (see lesson 5)(recommended is 5-10-10). I spread the overkill in granular form around my plants, too little and they die, too much and they burn, and I have no idea how long it takes to work. So I throw a little food out when I go check on them everyday, even though the stuff from before is still there. It's exactly like caring for a dead hamster.
Whew! 3 week update (has it really been only 3 weeks...).
Onions, 2 varieties, didn't get enough light so I've written them off as too leggy and bought sets. I love sets, they're coming up fine and dandy and I intend to use sets for as long as I live. They're just as cheap.
Carrots, still coming up. 2 varieties. These things give you time to react. Some are too leggy. I know they don't transplant well, direct-sowed some in the ground tonight.
Broccoli, first round a total write-off from the light thing. 2nd round 2 weeks later is doing well with the outdoor-indoor procedure.
Peppers, 2 sprouts. 8 varieties, probably 20 seeds in all, and 2 tiny sprouts so far. They must be waiting for me to figure out what I'm doing. Nah, just kidding, the soil isn't warm enough. It's worth mentioning I have two starts of chili peppers in the garden, but they've been completely dormant since I put them in a week ago.
Tomatoes, 3 starts are all doing badly. 32 cent is doing well, actually, I got him with the 16 from the drop. He entertains caterpillars, alarmingly, since it's only day 2 for him. I have seeds in my trays somewhere but I don't know which ones. 4+2 = 6 varieties in all. I don't eat tomatoes.
Cukes, some started from seeds. Don't know which they are. We don't eat cucumbers anyway.
Squash, crookneck and pumpkin. Two and one really really nice start, respectively (see lesson 2b). Went into the garden tonight. Big big plans for these guys. I want a 100# pumpkin. That white trellis is for the crookneck, though I could use another to brace (see lesson 4). I have birdhouse gourds in the starting tray, but I don't know where. I don't know where they go anyway.
Peas and beans, great starts. Tons of these guys, I love home-grown peas and I have by far the most experience with them. Peas probably make up 50% of my plant material right now, including the starts I've bought. 3 peas, 2 bean varieties. We really don't eat beans. She doesn't eat peas.
Greens, chard and lettuce and spinach. They're all mixed in, lettuce was a light-off write-off so I started more a week later. They don't transplant either but I lost my plans of where I was going to sow them. We don't eat these either. Chard starts look like carrot starts, which is annoying.
Freebies are some nasturtium flowers I started today (to mark the garden path! Brilliant! I got the idea from flowering weeds we have), and strawberries. Any flowers on the plant when you buy it will not set fruit, they will die. Both of mine are setting fruit, but only on the flowers they start AFTER transplanting. Next time I will buy smaller starts. They're happy anyway, though they have spittle bugs and compete with weeds. I also have radishes to direct-sow, and maybe a watermelon somewhere.
I have a lot of book knowledge and very little experience and very little money to pull off something like this, but I hear the food tastes better when you grow it yourself.
I plant seeds in a 36 and 72-tray starter, put greenhouse cover on them. Lesson 1: Some sprouts will be days old before I catch them, no matter how excited or enthusiastic I am. That puts me behind, me and my leggy albino lettuce starts. I put them under a grow light, a 4' cheap-looking toy from Wal-Mart. Lesson 2: High-intensity lights are worth the expense. I have special-order bulbs from an old aquarium, but they're only 18" and I figured these 4' T12 bulbs looked at least as impressive. Wrong - crap bulbs don't put enough light even if the plants wrap themselves around them, which is what the peas were trying. This puts my plants at risk and weeks later their future is still uncertain. Lesson 2b: The little seeds need a lot more care than the big ones. I take the trays outside and in at night now. I mark trays with plant markers, but use a number system with a key stored on my computer. Lesson 3: Back up critical information. My computer died days later, so I lost my key and my garden plans. Not before the garden was built, thankfully.
She and I make the garden - a 13'x14' plot with 115 sq ft of growing area, fashioned out of a sunny, out-of-the-way plot of grass with a couple of shovels and a hoe. I want to mark everything off, the pathway, spots for the tomato plants, the border, but I don't. I figure out an easier solution for that. In the meantime I set up a border of some untreated 8' poles around the downhill half of the garden and move soil downhill to try and level it out some. Lesson 4: Whatever supplies I need, I will only buy at most half. I do not do soil tests, I do not add compost or more topsoil, so the slope ends up halfway between what it was, and level. And clumpy, because I didn't have a good way of breaking up sod clumps. As grass dies the clumps do seem to disintegrate.
I mulch with straw, a bale from a feed and seed store. Lesson 5: What supplies I do buy, I buy from the first place I find them available. I needed mulch, and I read about someone using straw somewhere once. Actually, this has worked out well so far, doesn't blow around, keeps things weed free on the path. For weeds I use landscape fabric, but I don't buy pins or anything to hold it down (see lesson 4). This means spotty weed control as the wind has its way with it. The fabric is by no means a sieve, so most rain gets redirected into any holes you have, and the rest is very slow to leak into the soil. Don't know if this is a positive yet. For water I use dripper line, 50' of 1/2" (!) for a couple bucks from Habitat for Humanity. The stuff doesn't shape well, and again no pins, so there's serpentine ridges running underneath the fabric. I hook it up with hose from Home Depot (another couple bucks) and hose from a nursery (not just a couple bucks). This means a lot of adapters and cursing to make up for all the slight size discrepancies. Bed, weeds, water. Time for plants.
Tomato starts are embarassingly cheap so three go in. These are my backup in case I need to impress someone and everything else sucks. One is a cherry, which we don't really care for, and one is a determinate, which we really don't care for. The third is an Early Girl, which everyone apparently cares for. Then we get a Big Beef for $.32. So, four starts. Immediately the Early Girl, followed by the cherry and determinate, yellow and die from the bottom up. I realize that, despite all that grass growing there, or perhaps because of it, my soil is delicously nitrogen-free. I should have tilled the grass, worked in compost, blah blah expensive. I buy a 50-lb bag of 16-16-16 (see lesson 5)(recommended is 5-10-10). I spread the overkill in granular form around my plants, too little and they die, too much and they burn, and I have no idea how long it takes to work. So I throw a little food out when I go check on them everyday, even though the stuff from before is still there. It's exactly like caring for a dead hamster.
Whew! 3 week update (has it really been only 3 weeks...).
Onions, 2 varieties, didn't get enough light so I've written them off as too leggy and bought sets. I love sets, they're coming up fine and dandy and I intend to use sets for as long as I live. They're just as cheap.
Carrots, still coming up. 2 varieties. These things give you time to react. Some are too leggy. I know they don't transplant well, direct-sowed some in the ground tonight.
Broccoli, first round a total write-off from the light thing. 2nd round 2 weeks later is doing well with the outdoor-indoor procedure.
Peppers, 2 sprouts. 8 varieties, probably 20 seeds in all, and 2 tiny sprouts so far. They must be waiting for me to figure out what I'm doing. Nah, just kidding, the soil isn't warm enough. It's worth mentioning I have two starts of chili peppers in the garden, but they've been completely dormant since I put them in a week ago.
Tomatoes, 3 starts are all doing badly. 32 cent is doing well, actually, I got him with the 16 from the drop. He entertains caterpillars, alarmingly, since it's only day 2 for him. I have seeds in my trays somewhere but I don't know which ones. 4+2 = 6 varieties in all. I don't eat tomatoes.
Cukes, some started from seeds. Don't know which they are. We don't eat cucumbers anyway.
Squash, crookneck and pumpkin. Two and one really really nice start, respectively (see lesson 2b). Went into the garden tonight. Big big plans for these guys. I want a 100# pumpkin. That white trellis is for the crookneck, though I could use another to brace (see lesson 4). I have birdhouse gourds in the starting tray, but I don't know where. I don't know where they go anyway.
Peas and beans, great starts. Tons of these guys, I love home-grown peas and I have by far the most experience with them. Peas probably make up 50% of my plant material right now, including the starts I've bought. 3 peas, 2 bean varieties. We really don't eat beans. She doesn't eat peas.
Greens, chard and lettuce and spinach. They're all mixed in, lettuce was a light-off write-off so I started more a week later. They don't transplant either but I lost my plans of where I was going to sow them. We don't eat these either. Chard starts look like carrot starts, which is annoying.
Freebies are some nasturtium flowers I started today (to mark the garden path! Brilliant! I got the idea from flowering weeds we have), and strawberries. Any flowers on the plant when you buy it will not set fruit, they will die. Both of mine are setting fruit, but only on the flowers they start AFTER transplanting. Next time I will buy smaller starts. They're happy anyway, though they have spittle bugs and compete with weeds. I also have radishes to direct-sow, and maybe a watermelon somewhere.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)