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.