i got bunch of fruit trees in my lil backyard: 4, 5 different kinda citrus, guava, star fruit, lychee, grape, blackberry and blueberry. i got an extra citrus and guava tree in container if anyone want it...
no, house is 40 years old and i did actually mix in dillo dirt w/ the topsoil i added. when i moved in i basically raked away the first 1'' or 2'' of topsoil cleaning up the yard. it was pretty rugged and it looked like someone smashed a couple aquariums back there - i was digging up knife sized shards of glass for about a year. old tools, utensils and toys from the 60's-70's - it was kind of like an archeological dig. thanks for the tips - so even if i did the scotts fertilizer 2-3 weeks ago should i go ahead and do a soybean treatment now too?
pretty simple. you will need 12 4' long 2x4's. or 4 4' long 2x12's. and 4 pieces that are 1 foot (actually 10.5''). use screws, not nails! also, make sure you use untreated wood - you dont want all those chemicals leaching into your veggies. you can tell at the store - treated wood is labeled, but its also kind of wet w/ a blue sheen. if you arent sure ask someone. you want to till the soil to kill the grass/weeds before putting the bed down. go out an extra foot around the bed too. cover the area w/ a layer of cardboard to prevent more weeds from growing. (it will disintegrate and turn to compost as you water). also, do a 1 foot wide band of mulch around the sides to prevent weeds/grass from growing. it also helps keep the water in and keep the soil cool in the summer heat. for every 2 bags of garden soil you get buy 1 bag of compost too. it will take at least 10 bags for fill it up.
Wow, that is worse than a sand lot. Do you know the sqaure footage of your yard area and how many pounds of Scotts you put down? I know you said the spreader was on 5 but that varies so much.
total yard sq. ft. is a little over 5,000 (not counting house). the bag of scotts is the standard 15 lb one and i put down about 2/3rds of it.
Sorry for double posting but we OEM this product http://www.homedepot.com/Frame-It-A...splay?catalogId=10053&langId=-1&storeId=10051 if you want another option for building that garden. We also have some cutoffs and oddlots if any of you are interested in some composite decking for the raised garden, ill give you guys the clutchfans discount.
casey - so what should i do? go ahead and put some soybean meal down now? also, i was reading up on natural fertilizer and i see cornmeal mentioned more than soy...why do you prefer soy? dang - over $200 for that! i built mine for under $15 - i realize that one is 4'x8' instead of 4'x4', but still... the soil and compost is what is expensive when starting up, but even from scratch you could get the whole thing going for about $100.
Yea I know its expensive but ppl at home depot are eating it up. But like I said I have scraps and cutoffs for tons cheaper if you would like.
You can apply an organic meal now if you want or wait a few weeks. The Scotts fert is cheap (in quality not price lol) has a very low percentage of slow release nitrogen so will be gone quickly. I prefer soybean meal because it has a much higher percentage of protein than corn meal making it less expensive and easier to spread as it needs less than half (pound for pound) to provide the same amount of nitrogen. Cornmeal is fine also, you would just need to buy and then spread 3 or 4 50lb bags instead of 2 for soybean meal for your yard size. I mix it up and use alfalfa pellets once a year. Cornmeal, alfalfa pellets, soybean meal, corn gluten meal are all great and have different advantages. The great part about organic is timing is not nearly as critical because it processes even slower than the high quality 100% slow release chemical ferts.
got everything planted over the weekend except squash and green beans, which im doing from seed and are not ready to go in ground yet. thanks to whomever mentioned natural gardener! ive been going to great outdoors since its close to my house, but natural gardener has a much better selection. got all my tomato and pepper plants there. here's what ive got... tomato - celebrity, mortgage lifter, snow white cherry tomato (best plant ive ever grown) and sun gold cherry tomato (2nd best plant ive ever grown). bell pepper - red, green & chocolate jalapeno texas sweet onion cilantro straightneck squash - squash is my achilles heel - ive tried growing it 3 years in a row and failed - last year it would have produced, but i had to pull it as it was overtaking my garden. this year i gave it much more space. bushmaster green beans - going to grow a couple of these in 10 gallon pots - did that a couple years ago and 1 plant gave me 2-3 servings/week.
casey will be proud - i just threw down 100 lbs. of soybean meal on about 5,200 sq. feet of lawn. got it at callahans and i ended up talking to two of the brothers (one was 75-ish, the other 85-ish) for about 30 minutes. really nice guys. my garden is looking good too. this is one of my 4x4 beds.
I put down my 6x6 garden I was wondering if there was any way to water it automatically. I have been trying to do an aqua globe thing with water bottles but most of the dirt underneath is sand and just drains it. I don't have a faucet near by it either. Right now I am just carrying a big bucket of water to it and watering it with cup fulls. Im wondering if I could just build some pvc pipe irrigation and then place bucket full of water in a reservoir above the piping and having it slowly drain in.
I was a little too busy with my wedding to plant a real garden. I just did my normal and planted a few pots of basil, cilantro, parsley, and mint. The basil looks like it's on roids. I had to make pesto the other day because I have way too much of it. It was delic.
