Planting a suburb garden
Welp, I’m a gardener now. I have a garden. Don’t mean to brag, but man did I work hard on it! Remember this area? And that box I picked up for free on Craigslist?
I painted it, along with a few scrap wood boxes Haus made for me (we enlisted the neighbors to help move the big box into the backyard)…
Then I drilled 1/4″ holes in the bottom for drainage and stapled black weather guard to the bottom of the scrap wood boxes (I heart power tools)…
I put a 1/2″ of peat rock in the bottom of each box and then mixed 1/3 assorted compost, 1/3 vermiculite, 1/3 peat moss (only place I could find Vermiculite in Denver was the American Clay Works and Supply Company. $20 for that huge bag.) …
In the last step, I filled all of the boxes about 8-10 inches full of my soil and planted! Here’s my main square foot garden with cucumbers (in the milk jug “hot caps”), herbs, lettuce, beets, carrots, and marigolds in the corners:
Craigslist box
In the scrap boxes I planted winter and summer squash with a marigold border (on the left), and tomatoes with a basil border (on the right):
I used old milk jugs without caps and bottoms cut off to make hot caps for the tomato and cucumber transplants. I didn’t think they would survive the current Colorado night temperatures or wind without them. As soon as summer really hits around here, I’ll phase them out. Next time I’ll post about my transplant mistakes and tomato cage discovery (Did you notice the cages are upside down?).
Please post tips for me if you have them. I’ve spent $50 on seeds/transplants and $80 on soil and Hubby Haus is kinda hoping to see a return on the investment. Your gardening secrets would help! Happy gardening, friends!
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The mistake we made the first time around was spacing – we didn’t realize how HUGE our plants would get. So your squash and tomatoes will probably get a little crowded! Also, get some of the green wire mesh fencing material and bamboo stakes to make some frames for the cukes to climb, otherwise they’ll tangle themselves into everything. Just lean them up against the house & it should do the trick. The wire mesh comes in handy for supporting tomatoes and other stuff too. I read an interesting trick for watering – take a 2-liter pop bottle, cut a 2-3″ hole in the bottom & take the lid off. Stuff some moss or clean rags into it, then bury it neck-down into the dirt until only an inch of the top is sticking out. Then when you water, just fill the bottle and it’ll deliver the water straight to the roots, and the moss/rags will help deliver it slowly through the day. We were going to try it this year but didn’t get a chance since we’re moving.
Thanks, Jen. I almost put my squash in the box with the rest of the stuff until I read I need 6 square feet for them. Longest scrap Haus had was 4′ so we’ll see. I’m mad at myself for putting the hot caps on my tomatoes right after I transplanted them, but not my cukes. After one night outside (even after hardening off), all of my cucumber plants were wilted and half dead. Still not sure if they’ll survive and may have to replant. I think I might have some leftover mesh/small chicken wire for a frame so I’ll let you know how that goes too. Good luck on the move!