Not a $4,000 kit, though. More like a $400 homebrew.
I'm still in the R&D phase.
Posted on 05/15/2009 4:19:04 AM PDT by Red_Devil 232
Nothing tastes better than vegetables and herbs picked fresh from your own garden.
It is now the middle of May and many Freepers are starting gardens for the first time this year. And there are those lucky Freepers whose gardens are well established at this time.
Our Freeper community is full of gardeners, each with varying skill levels from Master Gardener to novice and I hope all of you will stop by this thread each week and share your experiences.
Ohio Master Gardener here ... please put me on your list. Thx.
What healthy plants!
Heh. :)
Thanks. I’ve got four beds total ... three of them new this year. I’d love even more, but the kids should probably have some space to play :) One of these days, we’d like to get some land and move out to the country. Now’s not the best time to sell a house though.
Thank you :) The wood in the bed pictured is cedar, I believe. The new ones are pine, as cedar can get kind of pricey.
I think we have a family of rabbits under our deck. I even found a rabbit nest in the pictured garden bed when I was prepping it in early spring. They’ve not bothered too much, aside from some soybean seedlings I am growing to make edamame. I’ve planted more and am using a row cover over the top to hopefully protect them. I’ve decided not to spray the dandelions in the backyard, as I’ve happened upon the rabbits eating those, and I’d prefer they continue eating those as opposed to my plants.
Good luck with your tomatoes and peppers! What kind are you growing?
This year, they sent more free replacements, not once, not twice, but four times. Each order had nine plants, so that was an additional 36 plants. They also sent three zucchini and three bell pepper plants. We have some plants in containers, since the garden is not large enough for that many plants.
Have you tried a Earth Box? Looks like just about anything can be grown in them. Earth Box Web Site
You can make your own homemade box. PDF Instructions For A Homemade Earth Box Loaded with pictures.
From January through April we had a little over 10 inches of rain. Since the start of May, we’ve had over 11 inches, if not more. Garden is so saturated I can’t plant my peppers, eggplant, or replant my okra and pole beans that didn’t come up from the first planting. I wish we could spread all this rain out over the next three months, but looks like we may get our total allotment for the summer in May.
We have had our share of rain down here also. It sure does slow down work when putting in a new garden.
Green beans, okra, corn, snow peas, sweet peas, carrots, radishes, okra and assorted squash, cucumbers and melons were all planted by seed and are growing well.
Still waiting for the tomatoes and peppers, though!
Not a $4,000 kit, though. More like a $400 homebrew.
I'm still in the R&D phase.
Hmmmmm. What is it? The pic did not work.
Sorry about the pic.
It’s a geodesic dome greenhouse. I’ll try to add another pic.
I have tomatoes, bell peppers, various hot peppers, basil eggplants, zukes and cukes in the main garden. Strawberries in earth boxes. I just hope they all do well!
Excellent! How big is the dome and are those 2x4s?
yep, you nailed it.
Wellll, the doors and face have been off my partially completed passive solar raised tomato bed for a week or so now here in the Southwest’s 4 Corners area.
Picked a tomato yesterday—wasn’t quite ripe but good enough.
The jungle is kind of bursting the seams but mostly leaves with some blossoms and some green fruit.
Might need to take a dead plant or two out. I’m not sure that the Hawaiian Pineapple tomato plant made it through the winter for some reason. The rest of the heirloom tomato plants seem to be quite robust.
Now the trick will be how to finish glazing the thing with poly carbonate sheeting on top and the front and still let the plants grow profusely. May end up putting another door on the front instead of another sealed panel. Probably will have more hinged sections on the roof, too.
Then, I’ll need to put ferro cement/plaster over the foam insulation on the back and lower sides and lower front.
May want to have a different crop in the winter. Tomato’s aren’t too functional . . . daytime temps could get up to 120 degrees and night around 45 degrees. Blossoms don’t germinate above 90 degrees and don’t set below 55.
It’s been an interesting project so far and not over yet! At least I have a head start on getting tomatoes to eat early.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.