What The Hell Am I Doing?
- In ground
- Raised Bed
- Container Gardening
- No Dig
- Square Foot
- Hugelkuture
I will cover WHAT these are, in a later post. Pro's, Cons, and delve into more detail.
Hopefully, the first list makes sense. In Ground is what many of us grew up with, seeing our grandparents using this, and then, our parents. Some, grew up seeing container gardeners. The recent rise in Popularity of Raised Beds, has brought about more variety. Each method has pluses and minuses.
Personally, I grow in containers. There were many reasons I started this and the main one is, I initially thought I was moving mid season and wanted to be able to move my vegetable gardens. The Gods, perched atop Olympus, noticed that a mere man planned and reached back and laughed. Thus, we had the Pandemic, and I've been a container gardener for the last 4 plus years!
Early Years:
moving right along:
This Year:
Fabric Grow Bags are:
| Imperial Size | Metric | Vegetable |
|---|---|---|
| 25 Gallon | 95L | Potato, Onion, Garlic |
| 10 Gallon | 36L | Squash, Zucchini, Eggplant, small potato, Brussels Sprouts |
| 7 Gallon | 24L | Tomatos |
| 5 Gallon | 19L | Peppers |
This is my basic planning. I am not positive how many of each or final planting, but this is how I typically grow. For now, my Garlic is in two 25 gallon Bags, potato in three 25 gallon and two 10 gallon and nothing else is actually planted.
... OK, so How Does Your Vegetable/Fruit Garden Grow, Bluefy Woofy?
My Raspberries are in ground. That's it. Everything else, is in Fabric Grow Bag Containers. At the end of each gardening year, I take ALL the soil and dump it out of the containers, intro a very large compost pile. I also put all my grass cuttings, dead leaves, smaller sticks and twigs, into this pile. All for it to be worked over 4 to 6 months, by the wonderful creatures in ground that eat the big stuff, and break it down into nutrient rich, fantastic growing soil.
Each spring, I fill each Grow Bag with this rich soil, ADD some extra fertilizer: Espoma Organic® Tomato-Tone 3-4-6, Bone Meal 4-12-0, Blood Meal 12-0-0, and some Worm Castings 1-1-1, to add in some extra N-P-K: nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium. These fertilizers also contain some trace elements: magnesium, calcium, and many more.
All these fertilizers are Water Insoluable, meaning they are not readily available for plants to uptake. The soil biology needs weeks to break these down for the plants to use. That means the rich soil is great for the beginning, to get things started and these organic long term fertilizers will break down over time and give the growing veggies there needed food over the weeks and months of the growing season. IF needed, I will add some water soluable fertilizer (Dr. Earth's Plant Food) for a quick hit if it seems the plants are not doing well. That's VERY rare.
As I said, I typically fill the Grow Bags, each spring, with rich soil, add some organic supplements, wait a few weeks, and transplant my seedlings into the containers. This season will be no different.
In the coming days, my posts will explain what the different types of gardening are (container, raised beds, in-ground), and the methods gardeners use (no till, square foot, hydroponics,HugelKulture, etc) to get their gardens to grow. we'll talk pros and cons, and maybe even touch on costs, labor, etc.
And that makes me smile... better for the planet, better for my own family.
Leave me a comment, below...
and a link to your #GroVid22 garden!
your own health and your own lives.
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BluefinStudios
Interesting. I grow mostly in raised beds. With raspberries and blueberries in the ground. I honestly think I just like the look of raised beds lol. I always wanted a neat, fenced in garden with some nice orderly, symetric raised beds. Obviously grow bags are much better use of space. As we struggle with space moving seedlings into the beds, maybe I will try some grow bags.
when, not if, when we finally move,, it's going to be raised beds. Either made from Cedar planks, or those metal Raised Beds (Vego, Birdies, etc)
but when we move, i'll be planting blueberries, raspberries, beach plum, and some apples and pear trees.
I've planted all those except the plum 🙂
I wouldn't expect so...
the Beach plum needs the sandy soil found near shores. I think it grows Maine to Jersey. but usually only on the coast.
i should also ask, when you originally filled them, did you use the HugelKulture method?
That is, drop cardboard, (to keep grass and weeds from growing up), put the bed down,
1st layer: add lots of limbs, large sticks, some fill, leaves,
next layer: smaller sticks, twigs, leaves, fill w/ soil, some mostly broken down compost, etc
top layer: good quality compost/rich growing soil.
We did. Cardboard as an inexpensive barrier to weeds. Then fill because good soil is expensive. Then top soil. I bought 9 yards! do the math on filling up raised beds it adds up quick. Then richer growing soil on top.
Will do.
I have heard downed logs, bit limbs, sticks, etc. for the very bottom.
Nice to see photos of the progress in the garden over the year. I might have to use grow bags as an experiment to see the difference. Works in the garden is always ongoing!
work is Always ongoing! but worth it
Very great effort done in your farm. I could see a lot of work had been done. Thanks so much.
thank you
$PIZZA slices delivered:
@pixresteemer(5/5) tipped @bluefinstudios