We've been trying to eat better, and eating better costs money. It's also hard to find affordable produce even at the local farmer's market (which has a pretty short season around here). I was thinking we should try our hand at growing our own. Enter...the garden project marathon.
Anybody who said raising your own veggies is cheaper...didn't make raised beds. Kneeling to garden is getting a little harder each year on my aging knees. So I figured, if we're gonna do this thing, let's think with an eye towards our aging future and make raised beds.
We have deer in our yard every night...they eat EVERYTHING (except what I've learned that they don't like...I plant more of that). We have lots of squirrels, the occasional raccoon, and by the smell of it...the odd skunk. Birds galore and more tiny slugs than a yard should have (why don't all the frogs I have eat slugs?). So we have to make this thing as close to Fort Knox as we can.
We almost never use our back yard for much of anything. I have plant/flower beds around the perimeter of the house and property and in the small back yard, it is a hot spot. We struggle all summer to keep grass alive back there. Hmmm, a sunny hot spot. Hmmmm, grass that doesn't want to live anyway. Hmmmm, a garden project. Ding, ding, ding! We have a winner. Then we had to determine how much is in shade part of the day and how much room we need to still move around and mow. That narrowed it down to about a 16x16 foot square. Round figures, and a square will make building easier later...trust me. And I don't know how to build ANYTHING. My husband doesn't build much but is willing to try. Gotta love him for that!
We walked around and thought and planned. Raised beds...and we have to enclose it somehow. Fencing is gonna be too expensive, especially since deer can easily hop 6 foot fences and higher and we have deer in our yard nightly. So we thought and planned and paced it off and talked and dreamed and wondered. And I purchased some blueberry, and raspberry plants and put them in pots. That was LAST spring/summer. Sweet Baboo spent time with measurements, and drawings of my ideas, and priced lumber. HOLY CRAP lumber is expensive!! We were going to go with cedar since we wanted non-treated wood (we want to go as organic as we can muster and afford). That was going to cost nearly $1,000 for the lumber alone! So we put it off.
This is how far we got last year:
It begins with an idea. To build an enclosed garden space, approx 16x16 with raised beds and a 3 tiered center square. July 24th 2011, we measure and mark the space. We just used outdoor spray paint to mark the design on the grass.
A different view. July 30, 2011
And there is my Sweet Baboo in the waning light.
July 30, 2011.
This is the center. The dashed line represents where the three-tiered, stacked center feature will be.
July 30, 2011
July 30, 2011 Hubby hacks a perimeter trench with a polaski and mows the center super snub-short. He's transferred the design and measurements to a paper drawing....our blueprint of sorts. We've never done this before and don't know the "right" way.
He rents a sod cutter to cut out the sod...only the sod buster....busted. Chain broke...so one pass is as far as he got. We'll have to wait until it is fixed and rent it again. July 30, 2011.
August 11, 2011 the broken sod cutter is finally fixed. So we rent it again. And this time I ran the hose off and on so the ground is only sort of like a rock. We have super nasty clay soil. The earth worms have huge biceps. He gets all the sod cut out, rolled up and moved. We rented the sod buster from Bronson Lumber in La Grande, OR. They had the better local price.
August 11, 2011 Oooooh, Ahhhhh...can't you just see the raised beds developing? And can you tell how clay-y that soil is? It's SLICK.
August 13, 2011. Hubby dug and hacked all day to try to even out the plot's high-low spots to try to level it before we build boxes. He also researched the lumber he wants and it isn't available locally. You can see the arbor we bought at a yard sale for $20 bucks today up against the fence.
You may not be able to tell, but the ground slants on a hill toward the garage and he was trying his best to make it as level as possible. No power tools baby, just his two hands. We're trying to do this project as economically as possible...given that it's gonna be expensive no matter what.
September 1, 2011 He thinks he's got it level now...notice how deep he had to cut into the one end since it's sort of on a hill.
September 3, 2011. Laid down thick cardboard and newspaper. (Poor man's weed barrier)...will still let the worms work but not the weeds. Getting it wet so it won't blow away.
We cut up old boxes. Weed cloth or plastic is too expensive and not as organic as we want to go.
September 4, 2011. A truck load of wood chips from the recycle center for $10. Now it might have to sit like this until next year, or until we can afford the lumber to build the boxes and fencing.
We'll do some shopping around, thinking, negotiating and see what we come up with. Oh yeah, and save up over the winter.
March 17, 2012...it begins anew...
He settled on pine instead of cedar. It won't last as long, but will save us nearly 50% on lumber expenses. Sure, yes, it will rot, and no we will not be treating it with any preserving chemical. But perhaps we can replace one rotten board at a time with cedar when the time comes. Even still, the lumber is over $500. But hey, that arbor was $20 at a yard sale remember? WOOT!
March 17, 2012 Different angle. Trying to figure out what to do in this corner, where to place the arbor and gate.
March 18, 2012. The outside perimeter boxes are just about done. (upper portion will be wire mesh to hopefully keep the deer out.). There will be an inner pyramid. It's taking shape! Don't you wish wood would stay this pretty forever? It smells lovely too!
March 26, 2012 Part of the inner pyramid is built.
We bought straw from D & B Supply in La Grande. It's pretty cheap (and hopefully not full of weeds). I think it was around $3.50 to $3.75 per bail.
Starting to fill. There's some dirt we saved from evening out the ground...it went in the bottom...then some more or less not quite done/woodier compost (we had about two years of saved up yard and kitchen compost), then straw for filler and nutrients... 3-31-12
Sure, it will settle and we will have to add more to it next year, but it gets us started at a reduced price over filling it all the way with dirt. In fact...as "dirt" goes, the only "dirt" in it was a bit left over, and some stuff I cleared out of pots. Some people fill the space with rocks or other junk...we want this to be as nutrient dense as possible. No, sadly there was no way to determine if the straw had been treated with pesticides. As you try to go organic, you realize how many ways you can go wrong along the way. But, we will do the best we can within our budget and within three years or so, if we don't add anything to it with pesticide, it should be pretty darn clean soil for growing.
A truck load of compost from the recycle center (we still need more) 3-31-12
All told, I believe we got three truck loads of compost. I believe each truck load cost around $20-$25.
Once again, since this compost comes from the lawn debris dropped off at the center, it most likely has pesticide in it. But the nurseries couldn't tell us what was in theirs either. In fact one nursery selling compost told us that theirs is dairy compost. Um...isn't that manure? And no way to tell if there is pesticide in their feed or hormones that will end up in the soil. One just does the best they can. The recycle center prices were better too.
A word about manure. Much of the commercial manures come from feed lots and those animals are not fed organically, and so we decided against buying manure. We had a connection from someone at the La Grande Mavericks Riding Club to get some horse and or steer manure, but after a recent article in the La Grande Observer about horse manure having been found so high in pesticide that it killed a local persons entire garden crop...we decided not to bother with manure at all. Here's the link to that article. Someone else suggested bat guano because it would not be from feed lots and might be more organic. But it's not cheap in the quantity we were looking for.
Emptying out our yard debris/kitchen scrap/grass clipping compost...then it started to rain. 3-31-12
Would you look at that man work! Which is pretty much what I did since I'm not strong enough for most of this.
We have two compost bins, the one you see there Sweet Baboo built from a design I found in a magazine. It was expensive, difficult, and the lid is a problem...it weighs a ton and I can't lift it. Go figure. But it LOOKED so pretty. The other compost bin is a plastic adjustable cylinder that works OK, unless it's empty and the wind is blowing.
3-31-12 After the rain/wind storm. Another load of compost plus the perlite and peat moss should do it. Hubby got the columnar apple trees planted too...but the one in the foreground is crooked...we're "discussing" that.
Update. It's not crooked anymore.
We might get this hummer done before it's time to plant in Northeast Oregon (which is like...um...mid May).
April 7 2012. A little more building, and two more truck loads of compost. The pyramid is now complete.
A wheelbarrow full of Perlite
04-08-12
We were able to find it in bulk at Eastern Oregon Nursery and Landscaping in La Grande. I think this wheelbarrow full cost around $25. It would have been way more expensive if we had bought the tiny little bags you can find on the shelves in the store.
I keep trying to find some vermiculite but it seems to not be available locally, or at least not yet. In looking online, there had been a problem with a vermiculite mine having asbestos in it, so many stores quit carrying it. I hope to find some for the seed planting phase of things.
Perlite and vermiculite are very similar, just different minerals. The mineral is super heated until it sort of pops, like popcorn, or volcanic lava rock. It helps keep the soil loose, helps with drainage and moisture retention. Some people swear by or prefer one or the other, and some garden instructions recommend both. We'll see.
Sort of like snow, only not.
04-08-12
Finally something I can help with, because it doesn't weigh anything! I'll work that into the soil once I distribute it.
Spreading around the Perlite
04-08-12
I bought that little gazing ball at Wal-Mart many moons ago. It will go at the pinnacle for now. Those little copper garden fence pieces were found by my mom at a yard sale in her neighborhood. I didn't have enough to go all the way around, so I just put some here and there for effect.
More of the frame is done and the potato box and arbor go in.
04-08-12
You may not be able to see it, but we decided to try a vertical potato box to the right of the arbor. We will put dirt only in the first 12 inches, there is room to add more slats, and as they grow, we will add straw mulch and keep growing them vertically one layer at a time. We'll let you know how that works out.
There are many designs for vertical potato boxes online. Just Google it. Some are more complex than others. I've heard some people stack old tires up for the same effect. We decided against this, since A. we no longer have old tires laying about, and B. because the tires may leach unhealthy chemicals into the soil where the potatoes are growing.
Hens and Chicks hanging in a bag. Sorta looks like a green udder. If you look close, you can see some baby strawberries went in...about 30 of them. (Also, I transplanted three blueberry bushes, a raspberry bush and a struggling Goji Berry. The neighbor lady keeps bringing guests to come see. They all have advice of what you MUST do and what you must NEVER do. We're winging it.
04-08-12
The neighbor also mentioned that his project might be something that the Ruralite would be interested in covering in their publication. We'll see. I'll ask them.
4-10-12 I eventually got 4 bales of peat moss broken down and spread around. Hubby lifted them into the wheelbarrow for me.
I think the best price was Wal-Mart. About $9 something per bale. Yes, I shop at my local Wal-Mart.
4-10-12 This is the vertical potato box. Only the first 12 inches or so will have growing medium, then we will fit slats into the front as the plants grow covering them with straw mulch up to a height of 4-5 feet. We'll let you know how that goes.
Now it's supposed to rain all week.
I think what's left is a cross beam over the top, a gate, and to string all of the chicken wire. Someone told me to get the one inch hole chicken wire to keep the small birds out, but it is nearly twice as expensive as the 2 inch. If the little birds get in and get at the berries, we'll use some cheaper deer netting over the chicken wire. Gotta mind the budget where we can. We have to try to foil birds, and deer and squirrels...then there's the slugs and other things.
We got a 150 foot roll of 6 foot chicken wire at D & B Supply for around $70.
I have planted the strawberries (about 30 plants including a few wild ones), and have transplanted the three blueberry varieties I bought last year, a failing Goji berry, and a raspberry bush. The two blackberry bushes didn't make it. We planted the two mini columnar apple trees and I have seeds awaiting warmer weather, and will order a few transplants (tomatoes/peppers etc) in a few weeks. I ordered from Territorial Seed and BBB Seed companies which do their level best (they say) not to sell any GMO seed. I chose organic varieties where available. I will plant the potatoes maybe this weekend (weather permitting...weekend of April 14th). I had some organic seed potato left over from last year's crop of Cranberry Red, All Blue, Kennibeck White and I even just picked up some over the hill organic baker potatoes from Safeway. They were cheaper than the organic potato suppliers and already had eyes on them. I purchased the red/white/blue potato varieties from Wood Prairie Farm online.
When thinking about what to plant, my first thought was non GMO or organic, and the expensive things at the store (berries, peppers, tomatoes)...any other space I will grow interesting things. I can make a list of all that later. We will also be employing some of the Square Foot Gardening and Lasagna Gardening methods with advice from Ruth Stout on the value of heavily utilizing straw mulch for weed control, moisture retention and added soil nutrient. She claims it can also foil some pests.
Sweet Baboo is fussing a bit about how crooked some of the angles and boards turned out in the construction. I say, for somebody who has never built anything like this, he did FABULOSO! If it stays together and we grow stuff...who cares? We are novices in the gardening department, and especially in the organic gardening department. We will learn as we go and learn more each season.
04-14-12 The boards go on around the interior edges so I can sit on the edges if I need to when I'm gardening. Sweet Baboo fabricates a 16 foot beam to span the center and we get that in place. The chicken wire starts to go in before day's end. Darn but that stuff scratches your arms! And it rolls back on you like a wild thing. We could have used about 8 more hands to hold it in place, but we managed, with minimal blood.
And the potatoes are in. I only planted 8 in the vertical box...we'll see how much yield we get going upwards. I have organic All Blue, organic Cranberry Red, organic Kennebek White, and Organic Russett (2 of each). I did a bunch of yard work and was on stand by to be an extra set of hands when needed.
4-15-12 The gate gets built (and what a beauty it is) and the chicken wire is completed around the perimeter. We still have to put chicken wire over the top and add more chips to the paths.
We had some old plywood laying around so Hubby made the gate out of that. It could warp in weather and not do so well, but the price was right so we thought we would see what happens. He cut "windows" in the gate to lighten the weight which we stapled a firmer, denser meshed wire over. This was a remnant of wire we had on hand from something we cut for the top of our guinea pig cage many years ago. It worked well.
We got the hardware (hinges, hooks) and such from our local Ace Hardware in La Grande.
We ran out of staples for stapling the chicken wire so I made a run to our local Bi Mart for more staples.
We also made a run to our local Dollar Tree store to see what I could come up with to decorate the gate. I was also looking for some cheap wind chimes. I found and bought three bamboo wind chimes (they aren't hung yet...that won't happen until after we figure out how we're gonna string chicken wire over the entire top of that span with just the two of us).
The sun and the moon that you see ($1 each) are painted metal wall hangings I found there. The Lady Bug, Bee, and House/Flower ($1 each) were unfinished, chintzy wall hangings on ribbons. I tore the staple/ribbons off, and with permanent colored Sharpies, I "painted" them...or more like, colored them. Then Hubby drilled a hole him them and screwed them to the door. The black lettering I'll show in the next photo.
Here you can see that smaller weave wire mesh. The lettering was another tidbit I picked up at the Dollar Tree ($1). It is an interior, wall art decal. We were trying to find one appropriate to the garden project in their collection. I think Hubby found the winner!
I have no idea if it will adhere for any length of time, or if the colors will run on those other decorations. It's all a grand experiment on a budget. It's raining like crazy today (4-16-12), so time will tell.
So...hmmm, let's see...we are down to needing to string that chicken wire over the top and staple it down, get more wood chips for the paths, and then begin to map out where we will plant things. I have a lot of seeds already, a few more on order, and live plants coming the end of May. We'll also need to put wood chips all over in our other flower beds too. We're on target!
I'll add to this post as the season progresses. I have no idea how to grow anything. But then, Hubby had no idea how to build anything either, and I think he's done a DARN FINE JOB. I love this little garden space! Hopefully, near the end he can give you a guestimate of the total cost we've put into it. I will tell you, that if you go with cedar, you can easily plan to double anything we spent. That's why we opted for pine that won't weather nearly as well. It was either that or not be able to afford to do it a at all. As it is, we've had to build this in increments as we could afford materials.
We also plan to utilize some old vinyl rain gutters for some gutter gardening. We're not sure yet how we will mount them in the new garden space but will post it as it happens. This is a great link to help you build gutter gardens and what types of shallow root plants will grow well in them.
I'm going to give you a list of what I have slated to plant in the space. I have no idea where I will fit it, or IF I will fit it all in. There may be only a single plant of some things. You'll have to follow along to find out if we manage to cram it all into the gardening space we've created. Forgive me if I misspell stuff...that's how I roll.
Giant Blueberry
KA-Bluey Blueberry
Tri Star Strawberries (about 25 plants, plus a few wild varieties and a couple left over from last year)
Goji Berries (2 plants)
Nasturtiams (2 varieties)
Marigolds (2 varieties)
Amaranth (2 varieties)
Golden Sentinel Columnar Apple
Scarlet Sentinel Columnar Apple
Oregon Blue Garlic
Royal Burgandy Bush Beans
Red Noodle Pole Beans
Luscious Organic Corn
Chioggia Beet
Touchstone Gold Beet
White Satin Carrot
Purple Haze Carrot
Atomic Red Carrot
Mexican Sour Gherkin Mini Cucumber
Superschmelz Kohlrabi
Redbor Kale
Winter Red Kale
Lil Loupe Melon (mini cantaloupe)
Malabar Spinach
Organic All Blue potatoes
Organic Cranberry Red potatoes
Organic Kennebec White potatoes
Organic Russett Potatoes
Milestone Onions (sweet)
Walla Walla Onions (sweet)
Super Sugar Snap Peas
Cobham Impv Marrow Parsnip
Patio Star Summer Squash (zucchini)
Bright Lights Swiss Chard
Magenta Sunset Swiss Chard
Golden Ball Turnip
Petite Treat Watermelon (mini)
Wild Garden Mix Lettuce
Casper Egg Plant
Nubia Egg Plant
Gourmet Sweet Peppers (orange)
Wonder Bell Sweet Peppers (Red)
Oregon Spring Tomatoes
Pineapple Tomatoes
Indigo Rose Tomatoes
Orange Paruche Tomatoes
Organic Leeks
Organic Basil
Butternut Squash
Organic Dill
To the best of our ability, plants and seeds will be either organic or non GMO. To the best of our ability, anything that vines or spreads we will attempt to train upwards vertically with supports.
4-19-12: I went out today in between rain showers and did my best to generally measure off and mark (with a sharpie), square foot plots within the garden area. If my math is even close, minus what is already planted, I should have around 100 one foot squares available for planting.
I got a little composition book and did some rough sketches of the plot and measurements (and when I say rough, I mean rough...as in, I'm not showing you my sketches). Next I think I will sketch out each section so I have more room to write and visualize what to plant and how many plants will fit per square foot. I went through the seed/plant catalog and cut out the photo and the description of the items I purchased/hope to plant. I will paste them into my book too, one or two per page leaving space so I can write about how it planted, when I planted it, how long to harvest HERE, how well it produced, what it tasted like etc. That will help me know if I want to replant it next year, or skip it.
I think I will take some Post It Flags, and write the name of each plant on them. Then I can manipulate them in my scale model on paper to plot things where I might want them. If I change my mind, I can pick up the flag and plot it elsewhere.
I ordered some of the transplants and they should arrive in late May.
4-22-12:
We are so close to done we can call it that. We got the "lid" or roof enclosed with wire and put a bunch more wood chips in the path. We got those chips from the recycle center. A truck load was around $5. What we didn't use in the garden paths we put on the flower beds. I don't recommend these chips as mulch on edibles. They are pretty rough and heaven knows what the various wood has been treated with. There is old paneling, you'll find some nails, some styrofoam and bits of plastic and paper and the chunks vary in size from small fine dust to chunks as long as a foot and a couple inches around. It makes good mulch for non edibles. No, it's not as pretty as the kind in the bag, but for $5 a truck load, I'm not going to complain too much.
You might not be able to really tell much difference between this view and the last one but trust me, we did more work today! I also got Sweet Baboo to hang the aforementioned wind chimes. It's so peaceful in there it's hard to explain. I can only imagine how it will feel with flowers, food and color!
Oh, and I also planted a whole bunch of seeds! Can you almost just see the plants? This is what hope looks like....or a tiny mouse cemetery.
I still have some bedding plants to arrive, and I need to be sure it's truly, for real in the warm season before I plant the nasturtiums, basil, corn and a few other bits and bobs. I was afraid with all of my lofty plans, I wouldn't have enough space...but I have quite a bit of space left. This is more than ample space for our needs. I LOVE IT!
May 6, 2012. These are the shorter pieces of recycled gutter he hung. I have planted two types of kale in the larger top one, basil and a lettuce mix in the lower one, Magenta Sunset Swiss Chard in the upper small one, and Bright Lights Swiss Chard in the lower small one. They have some teensy sprouts happening.
May 6, 2012. This is one of two longer gutter gardens he hung for me. I think the link to how to make them is above. We didn't follow the instructions to the letter. Basically, drill drain holes, and hang them up with gutter clips (you might have to buy end caps). If the lengths of gutter are long, like these, a center support will help keep it from sagging with the weight of dirt, plants and water. I ended up planting pansies and lobelia in the two long gardens.
May 6 2012. We are painstakingly cutting and tying tinsel stuff to the chicken wire...ALL over it in the hopes it will keep the small birds spooked away. I'll let you know how it works out. It might take me another year to tie them all on! It looks sort of pretty when the breeze blows them, they sparkle. I bet when we're done you can see the garden from Mars! I read where it is thought that birds associate the sparkly things flying in the breeze with fire or at the very least, some sort of danger. Given the berries I hope to grow in there, they will be in SERIOUS danger if they eat them.
May 6, 2012. This is what we are tying on. Since it isn't Christmas, I couldn't find Christmas tinsel. Gardening catalogs sell some stuff like this but it's expensive. I found this at the dollar store. I bought about three pkgs. I hope that's enough. The tinsel is in a big wad since it is intended to be filler in gift bags, but it works fine and is super inexpensive. So far, none of them have come untied so I hope they last once we finally make our way around the entire project.
He's sneaky. I didn't know he took this photo. There I am, planting and watering in my therapy cubicle.
It might be hard to tell what these are. Are you familiar with the older model Rubbermaid hose carts? I had two of them that were super old and falling apart and leaking. Before breaking them up to put in the garbage, I snapped off these little buckets from the handle area. It's where the sprinkler heads were stored on the hose cart.
Hubby screwed them into place on each side of one of the garden tiers and I have planted marigold and radish seeds in them both. In the photo above you can sorta see one of them for size perspective. I love repurposing!
This is the garden door with the newest edition showing through. For my birthday, my gal pal, "Thelma" bought me a cement Buddha statue. I was wanting one to line up with the door as a sentinel to the garden. I keep adding decorative effects as things show up. I think that's what gives it such a peaceful energy...that and the love we put into it. My 80-something year old neighbor said she will come and give my garden a blessing. How sweet is that??!
Ahhh, isn't that peaceful? Gently sitting watch over the pansies I need to plant in those gutter gardens.
May 11, 2012 Pansies and lobelia planted in one of the gutter gardens.
May 23, 2012. It's raining and 48 freaking degrees today. It's also my son's 28th Birthday and I miss him. That aside, can you see that some little sproutlets are starting to happen here and there??
My son, who lives in Los Angeles, found this in some left over "free stuff" from a yard sale. He has a vision of how to fix it up for my garden. We thought it would look good outside the garden gate, sort of like a mailbox near a front door. We could either prop the lid open and keep plants in it, or trail some fake ivy from it and use the box to store garden tools in. I'm excited. Hard to wait. But wait I must. This is May 2012. We'll see how long it takes.
Starting to fill in with goodness. This is a shot from above. July 1, 2012
