Timeline

Add dates for getting spring garden stuff in (greens, radishes, bunching onions, etc.)

• {x} Februrary 1st: Safe to plant garlic and bunching onions
• {x} February 10th: need to be germinating anything like peppers growing from seed
• {x} March 1st: cut off window for starting seeds

• April 1st-10th: Last frost date, in theory

• March/April: Overseed pitiful patch of grass near deck

Current Tasks

Delete as completed.

• Dump container media into trash can
  • Keep tomato media separate? Might be an old wives tale but... blight sucks.
• Clean up back yard perimeter
• Prepare garden squares for garlic and onions
  • Test soil if possible (at least pH?), but add 2x suggested compost since they are heavy feeders. Needs to be done about a week before planting. Add media if the squares are looking low.
• Buy seeds
• Plant garlic
• Mix up batch of container media
• Mix up 3 gal batch of starter media (or: just use pro mix with maybe a bit of vermiculite + liquid fertilizer)

Log

Log of things that should be remembered, to avoid doing them again too soon or not soon enough.

• 2014-01-13: Cleared dead plants from trellis and garden beds

Seed Propgation

See /SeedPropagation

Plants to Germinate

• Fancy pepper varieties
• Onions

Things to Buy or Build

• Row covers (at least for trellis beds -- vine borers are evil)

Transplants

Given the effort required to germinate a lot of things, we'll probably have more success just acquiring transplants for most things.

Needed

• Peppers (4 cell pack of each, not growing all of them)
  • Habaneros
  • Thai ("Bird's Eye" or similar)
  • Poblano (Mulato Isleno)
    • Did really well in 2013
  • Serrano
  • Red Bell Pepper (Karma)
• Herbs
  • Basil (6xsweet italian)
  • Rosemary
  • Parsley (24+, seriously)
  • Mint
• Juliette grape tomatoes
  • Extremely good producer, really disease resistant, and it tastes pretty good too.
• Slicing tomato
• Marigolds (center of garden bed, inside tomato bed)

The All-Knowing Internet says chives and tarragon are good companion plants too.

Acquired

Garden

Pests

• Figure out how to deal with stinkbugs

  • http://www.epa.gov/pesticides/controlling/stinkbugs/

  • http://njaes.rutgers.edu/stinkbug/pesticides.asp (looks like applying "Spectracide" around the deck might work)

• Deer and birds were not a problem in 2013

Construction

Several small raised beds due to limited areas that receive enough sunlight, root infested soil (well, living in a forest does have its disadvantages), crappy soil, large drip lines, etc.

Garden CUBE Trellis

Netting: Dalen Gardeneer, 60lbs breaking strength (looks pretty typical). Installed 2013, survived season and looks fine for next year (leaving it on the trellis because saving a few bucks every N years isn't worth the pain of removing and reinstalling it).

See Clinton's weblog posts about the trellis for details on the construction process. After using the trellis for a season, update wiki or website with general design (don't want to add too much to the "I built a trellis that ended up collapsing but never wrote about that part" noise).

Materials

• 1/2" EMT Conduit for legs and low-weight supports
• 1/2" Rigid Conduit for supports for things like squash and melons
• 1" PVC (plumbing, schedule 40) Side outlet elbow junction
• Various bushings to adapt pvc junction to 3/4" and 1/2" thread
• 1/2" and 3/4" EMT Set Screw to threaded connectors

Building It

• Measure a square on the ground
• Hammer in a piece of rebar in each corner
• Put EMT over rebar, decide on a height, and cut all of them to be level.
• Build the needed elbows
  • 1/2" threaded bushing for direct connection of rigid conduit
  • 1/2" threaded bushing to attach 1/2" EMT set screw connector
  • 3/4" threaded bushing to attach 3/4" EMT set screw connector, which is used to attach the cut end of the rigid pipe (unless you have a pipe threader, in which case why are you taking advice from amateurs). It's not a super-snug fit, but it seems close enough.
  • Measure, cut, install horizontal supports
    • 1/2" EMT seems fine for things like tomatoes; 20lbs of weight results in a bend that you can see if you're looking for it. Attach with two set screw connectors to elbows.
    • 1/2" rigid conduit doesn't bend before the pvc on the ends starts deforming so if the trellis can handle heavy things, it looks like this is the best bet for squash/melons. Attach one end to a 1/2" threaded pvc connector in one elbow, and use a 3/4" set screw adapter on the cut end.
• Stake and tie down elbows
  • Keep the frame under slight tension so that it does not sway back and forth easily.

Soil

Raleigh will sells compost and mulch at reasonable prices. Then we just need an equal amount of soil-less media. One truck load of compost was enough for two seasons.

Strata:

• 3" (overflowing top of bed) mulch
• 10" 1:1:1 peat moss:vermiculite:perlite base media, mixed 1:1 with compost
• 1" of mulch
• tilled earth

Main garden bed had a small amount of blood meal added with the bottom mulch dug in (blood meal to compensate for nitrogen loss as it composts). Also added recommended amount of bone meal to mixture about halfway down (since the plants will likely need it when their roots get about that deep).

Layout

Using Square Foot Gardening as guide for layout.

• 5'x3' raised bed

• 2 5'x16" beds, around a 6' tall garden trellis cube made of electrical conduit (Five 10' boards)

Main Plot

First step: allocate each square roughly so that we can visualize the garden. Unspecific order (easier to perform plant location optimization after we know how many squares of each will be grown).

Cell 3x5 is the one in the corner closest to the house / next door.

planned, not yet planted, normal text is planted.

Garden CUBE

Probably just live with only two beds, perhaps three.

Bed are ~60" long internally, plots are spaced 15". Cucumbers can probably be spaced tighter because of low weight, SFG book says one every 6", so 5" should be fine.

Cell 1 is furthest from house

The third side has a rubbermaid bin with three or four grape tomatoes. Grow some grape tomatoes and at least one vine of a slicing tomato.

Containers

In Use

• Catnip (medium pot)
• Rosemary (large pot)
• Oregano (rubbermaid bin)

Available

• 3 Deep rubbermaid bins (suitable for 4 plants)
  • One is attached to the trellis
• 9 12" pots (possibly ten, or eight, need to double check)
• 1 Huge pot
• 1 Large pot
• 1 Five gallon bucket
• 3 Shallow rubbermaid bins
• 1 Recycling bin

Container Media

• 5 gal Pro-Mix BX
• 1 gal screened compost
• 2 cups Plant Tone (recommended amount for 1 cu ft, close enough)
• 1/2 cup blood meal for initial fertilization
• 1/4 cup bone meal for a bit of extra phosphorous

Ideas

• Do we want to grow onions in containers?
• Can onions, garlic, or bunching onions be grown in containers with e.g. peppers?
  • Green onions everywhere would be nice. Concerns include resource competition.

In the yard somewhere

Possibly just mix a bunch of herb seeds together with a bit of sand, toss in a spot near the edge of the yard, and cover with a thin layer of topsoil.

• Chamomile
• Chicory
• Anise
• Cumin
• Lavender
• Rosemary (good hedge for the front!)

History

• /GardenLog2012

• /GardenLog2013

CategoryEvergreen