What did you do in the garden today?

[Sueby]

I have clip on cups like you use for rabbits, and a tower one that is smaller like you have for parakeets.
The parakeet one is great as it's a small quantity for clean water/med change daily.

I have these & they are FANTASTIC for a crate! They can't knock them over or poop in them if you put them high enough & are perfect to clean & refill from the outside so they can't escape when refilling. Works great in my broody breaker crate. (not that anyone was asking, I just like them so much I thought I'd share, lol)

As a kid, Canadian geese would regularly chase us, honking and hissing...even if we didn't get close to their babies. They also poop EVERYWHERE. Every summer we have several lakes that inevitably get shut down to the public due to e.coli problems related to goose feces.

I've lived on a couple lakes - they are a nightmare!

Looks nice out there, but it's too cold & the snow is to deep for me to actually find out.

I ordered 2 more greenstalks yesterday for the sale - I should be good to grow all that I want this summer. I have 2 collapsed cedar raised beds to get rid of (they only lasted 4 or 5 years) & some of the greenstalks will go in their spot. This is my list of things going in the greenstalks this year, each one gets their own:
Peppers
Lettuce/spinach/arugala
Onions
Strawberries
Bush beans/edamame
Turnips/Celery/Mini eggplant?

Speaking of drip irrigation - it's getting put off another year. My disability & all the changes to the garden because of it has sent that want to the pending pile, lol. We'll see how the new set up goes this summer & maybe next year I can do an automatic system.

 

[Wee Farmer Sarah]

I figured out how I can grow strawberries and keep them safe from chipmunks and squirrels. I’ve ordered hanging grow bags and will use the old unused bird feeder pole to hang them on. It has a squirrel baffle on it already. This makes me happy.

 

[fuzzi]

I like watching those bucket stand videos. If I made such a stand, I would want to make the buckets self-wicking, or sub-irrigation buckets and not just have drain holes in the bottom where you would have to water them all the time.

I have tried to figure out how to make the watering of the buckets easier. That is, maybe one large water reservoir container with some kind of water lines to each bucket, filling each bucket to a predetermined level and stopping.

I have not yet figured out a system that I want in that respect.

I like the idea of being able to swap out buckets if you want. Maybe planting some early cool weather plants (like peas) outside while warm weather plants (like peppers) are still growing inside the house or greenhouse. Then, about the time the peas are done, just pull out that bucket and plop in a bucket of peppers.

Having said that, I am still very happy with my 4X4 foot 16-inch high pallet wood raised bed v2.0 which I can build for less than $2.00 each.

View attachment 3748321

I fill the bottom half of the raised bed with hügelkultur wood and the top half is topsoil/compost mixed 1:1. I have lots of chicken run compost on hand, but my native soil is sandy lakeside crap, so I do buy a trailer full of Red River topsoil from a local nursery about every other year - depending on how many new raised beds I'm building.

Just thinking out loud, maybe one could fill a 5-gallon bucket with about 4-6 inches of wood chips on the bottom, and top it off with that topsoil/compost mix and have a Hugle pot type of setup? I would think the wood chips on the bottom would act like a water battery and retain lots of moisture even if you had drain holes on the bottom, or the side.

I just don't like the idea of paying all that money for buckets ($5 each) and then drilling drain holes in the bottom - which guarantees that you will be watering those buckets all the time.

And the plastic quickly cracks from sun and heat.

 

[TJAnonymous]

Looks like a nice place to build a nest if I was a Candian goose. Are they going to set up home on your property?

Nope... They didn't stick around. They were gone by mid-morning so I let the ducks out for a swim.

 

[gtaus]

And the plastic quickly cracks from sun and heat.

I have the opposite problem. If I leave a plastic bucket outside in the winter, right side up, it will fill up with snow, which in the spring will melt, and then at night will freeze and crack the bucket. If I store any bucket outside in the winter, I have to turn them upside down.

I live in northern Minnesota, and I don't think I've ever had a bucket crack from the sun and heat. But I have lived in warmer locations where that certainly would be a concern.

 

[Jenbirdee]

started a shmita - the seventh year rest the land system, I’m using 1/7 of my garden as a place to dump all my compost materials this year, and will probably let it sit a second year before just planting right into it . Then I’ll do the next 1/7 and the next one seventh and so forth, and so on ..I am tired of having a compost heap far away that I have to shovel buckets and bring it to the garden. Why not have it right in the garden and just plant on top of it when it’s ready.
Actually, with this system 2/7 of my garden won’t be growing anything each year but that’s OK because I have more garden boxes and plots then I can keep up with anyway.

 

[Acre4Me]

started a shmita - the seventh year rest the land system, I’m using 1/7 of my garden as a place to dump all my compost materials this year, and will probably let it sit a second year before just planting right into it . Then I’ll do the next 1/7 and the next one seventh and so forth, and so on ..I am tired of having a compost heap far away that I have to shovel buckets and bring it to the garden. Why not have it right in the garden and just plant on top of it when it’s ready.
Actually, with this system 2/7 of my garden won’t be growing anything each year but that’s OK because I have more garden boxes and plots then I can keep up with anyway.

We may move to doing this eventually. We have a big garden and garden beds. I just assume it will get to the point where we use less…perfect for this kind of thing. Grow green manure, dump compost or animal bedding (or let a friend dump some), let it age and use that space for growing after a year if two.

 

[Sueby]

started a shmita - the seventh year rest the land system, I’m using 1/7 of my garden as a place to dump all my compost materials this year, and will probably let it sit a second year before just planting right into it . Then I’ll do the next 1/7 and the next one seventh and so forth, and so on ..I am tired of having a compost heap far away that I have to shovel buckets and bring it to the garden. Why not have it right in the garden and just plant on top of it when it’s ready.
Actually, with this system 2/7 of my garden won’t be growing anything each year but that’s OK because I have more garden boxes and plots then I can keep up with anyway.

My old neighbors did this (the Shmita). I miss them, they had a beautiful, huge garden & we're my only neighbors that also had chickens! I miss hearing their rooster crow.

 

[Sally PB]

I have a big garden (60?x30) and a huge garden (145x25). Before I had the big garden, I would work half of the huge garden and planted the other half in some kind of cover crop. The asparagus bed was in the middle, so it was the dividing line.

Tip: Alfalfa is very difficult to get rid of, if you don't till it to death. If you don't plan to till your garden a couple times (at least!) or use some kind of herbicide, alfalfa will come back from the roots. Again. And again. There are STILL alfalfa plants coming up along the edge of one part of the huge garden. Plant buckwheat instead. Or cover rye.

I realized that if I planted something like butternut squash which takes over a LARGE area, I was out of space, so I decided to use the entire huge garden. Then I saw how much more light the area where I put the big garden got, and decided the stuff like tomatoes and peppers would go there.

I love the idea of part of the garden "resting" and being a place for compost. Good luck to those of you who do that. I bet it works well!

 

[Nym]

Looks like a self-contained drip irrigation solution. What nozzles did you buy? How long does a full bottle of water last?

I use these on standard drink bottles. The water runs through at a good pace, depending on the size of the hole I've cut. I wouldn't get days out of it.