What did you do in the garden today?

[CapricornFarm]

Wink says she is doing fine but very busy hosting friends who live in at risk areas. So glad she is ok!

 

[igorsMistress]

Thanks, @Pensmaster. Definitely can do the banana peels, I just made some bread. Will dig those in this afternoon or tomorrow morning.

@lazy gardener my soil is hard clay that's so bad it won't even grow many weeds out there. I'm starting from scratch and have to add everything. I'm going to add the Epsom salts and general fertilizer tomorrow before I go to work. Will add some egg shell and maybe a little gypsum plus increase watering to twice a week.

Thanks so much for the suggestions. As always, you're awesome!

 

[NanaKat]

Heard from NorthTexasWink...She said her area is predicted for an inch or so of rain...has been prepping for hosting friends who are evacuating today.

 

[pennyJo1960]

need those friends at time

 

[ChocolateMouse]

igor, you just need material to build your soil more than any amount of minerals and fertilizers I bet. You just need to buy up old, cheap straw and hay bales and dump them somewhere with some manure from a farm if you can get it and any kitchen scraps and let it rot away. That'd be the best possible thing you can do for your dirt, every time.

 

[lazy gardener]

Destroyed an other monster burdock plant. Started cleaning a swath behind the chicken run.

 

[CapricornFarm]

Thanks, @Pensmaster. Definitely can do the banana peels, I just made some bread. Will dig those in this afternoon or tomorrow morning.

@lazy gardener my soil is hard clay that's so bad it won't even grow many weeds out there. I'm starting from scratch and have to add everything. I'm going to add the Epsom salts and general fertilizer tomorrow before I go to work. Will add some egg shell and maybe a little gypsum plus increase watering to twice a week.

Thanks so much for the suggestions. As always, you're awesome!

I feel for you, i have the same type soil. I bought a pickup truck load of composted manure and have been adding that and sand. I will also add rabbit manure as it becomes available, only 2 rabbits right now. Another great manure is goat, you can add it directly to the soil without burning anything. I also am going to build a compost heap from pallets. Good luck with your soil!

 

[igorsMistress]

Thanks @CapricornFarm it's the pits isnt it? When we first moved in we didn't have weeds much at all. Now I have them so I know real stuff can grow out there lol. Good luck to you as well!

 

[NanaKat]

I feel for you, i have the same type soil. I bought a pickup truck load of composted manure and have been adding that and sand. I will also add rabbit manure as it becomes available, only 2 rabbits right now. Another great manure is goat, you can add it directly to the soil without burning anything. I also am going to build a compost heap from pallets. Good luck with your soil!

Every home we have had over the many years has had a red clay soil that needed to be opened up and fortified with compost, lime, calcium, manure and peat....and lots and lots of humus

Hubby had a dump truck and would pick up loads of manure and straw washed out of semi trucks hauling livestock to our local stockyard for auction. He told the guys at work that he bought his new wife a load of "$h!t" for Christmas and that she loved it....and he was right!

We composted everything including leaves and grass we collected from curbs in town. Good compost was black gold...worth its weight in gold.
We made raised beds from many materials including cement blocks, landscape timber, used railroad ties and the end rings salvaged from a metal culvert manufacturing company. We have gardened in the empty cowlick mineral tubs, old plastic trash cans, truck tires, an old bathtub, old whiskey tubs and five gallon buckets....anything we could drill holes in for good drainage. (From experience, drill holes in the side of the tub or container about two inches up from the bottoms...not in the bottom.)
Besides a rotor tiller and a wheel barrow with a screen mesh sifter we found a cement mixer was handy back saver for mixing soil ingredients.

No soil challenge will ever deter a determined gardener!

 

[igorsMistress]

igor, you just need material to build your soil more than any amount of minerals and fertilizers I bet. You just need to buy up old, cheap straw and hay bales and dump them somewhere with some manure from a farm if you can get it and any kitchen scraps and let it rot away. That'd be the best possible thing you can do for your dirt, every time.

Yea I'm working on it. Problem is most people here have zero scape...nothing in the yard except maybe a tree and some rocks, as was the case here. Ok by me, but didn't give me much in the way if compostable materials in the right proportions. Part of why I decided on chickens.

I do have a compost pile and I'm watering the DL in the coop to help decomp to add to said compost pile. I've just been concentrating on areas in my yard that I'm keeping desert plants so not a lot of amendments. Once they go, they go with only a little regular fertilizing and weekly water at the hottest times of year is sufficient.

Wish I had a pickup so I could get the hay!