Container Gardening Together - Week 7

Here's what I ended up planting so far:

4 blue lake bean plants

4 pinto beans

4 kidney beans

4 lima bins

8 linclon green peas

20 snow peas

3 rutgers tomato

2 roma tomato

2 tomato (other)

10 cucumbers (marketmore, straight 8, ashley)

2 jalapeno

2 cayenne

4 beets

4 black eyed peas

2 bell pepper

4 cabbages

1 strawberry patch

1 grapevine

1 zucchini

2 yellow squash

6 rows spinach

6 rows collards

6 rows lettuce

14 celery

8 yellow onion

8 radish

Oregano

rosemary

parsley

thyme

basil

sage

spearmint

cilantro

dill

garlic chives

avocado

goji

raspberry

lilies

I haven't started my sunflowers or my potatoes.  This list is a bit different from the one I started with, I know, but I had to edit it some. 

I went ahead an bought some basil.  My basil Sucked. In fact I bought five herbs from he local farmer.  Oregano, sage, basil, thyme, and rosemary.

In the back are my bean plants.  Pinto, Lima, Blue Lake, and Kidney.  In the front We have the Peas. In the red Buckets are Lincoln Green And the Blue buckets are Snow Peas.

Just a continuation of the image above, except you can see a little bit of my radishes next to the red buckets.  

Peeking In front of my greens containers which we'll get to later - they're marvelous so far! you can see the grapevine, and my bell peppers followed by my strawberry patch!  On the very end is my peppers, but you can hardly see them. 

My black eyed peas are still coming along.  The one is still doing better than the others.  Still no explanation for that one!  

 My cabbages are a little bit bigger than last week, but still very tiny. 

My tremendous amount of cucumbers.  10 I think total, if I counted correctly!  Good think I love cucumber!

My eggplant, and then right beside it, a couple of tomato plants. 

Some more shots of my beans. Also my goji and raspberry plants.  The raspberry has little green berry thingies on it.  But no fruits yet. 

More of the goji and raspberry

These are my greens.  I am going to have to thin them very very soon.  Lettuce on the far left, then Collard Greens, then spinach.  Also that's my sweet dog Wasabi on the left there photobombing.  She's a full blooded pug and a hot mess.  And I love the bloddy ass of her. 

Here are some more shots of my herbs oregago (top), thyme (middle), sage (bottom)

 rosemary and oregano

This is a closer shot of the radishes.  

 Still nothing has come of the onion or celery.  I think it might be time to give up and replant. 

 Tomatoes and Eggplant

The tomatoes in the buckets are sooo much better now. 

 and that's about it.  I'll keep you updated!  :)

Container Gardening Together - Week 6

Here's what I ended up planting so far:

4 blue lake bean plants

4 pinto beans

4 kidney beans

4 lima bins

8 linclon green peas

20 snow peas

3 rutgers tomato

2 roma tomato

2 tomato (other)

10 cucumbers (marketmore, straight 8, ashley)

2 jalapeno

2 cayenne

4 beets

4 black eyed peas

2 bell pepper

4 cabbages

1 strawberry patch

1 grapevine

1 zucchini

2 yellow squash

6 rows spinach

6 rows collards

6 rows lettuce

14 celery

8 yellow onion

8 radish

Oregano

rosemary

parsley

thyme

basil

sage

spearmint

cilantro

dill

garlic chives

avocado

goji

raspberry

lilies

I haven't started my sunflowers or my potatoes.  This list is a bit different from the one I started with, I know, but I had to edit it some. 

I planted my lilies directly in the ground.  I bought them from lowes.  The were beautiful.  I say were because they are dead as a doornail now.  Frost got them.  

This is an assortment of various bean and pea plants in the "self- watering" buckets.  If you haven't gotten a chance to check out my tutorial yet it's super fast and super cheap.  It' something you can do with the kids and it's worked great for me so far this season! 

I believe I ended up planting 

 This has been a big experiment!  I planted 12 Beets.  It looks like 4 made it.  I might try some more later in the season.  I've had my hands pretty full lately, though and honestly I HATE beets.  So if I can grow 4 I feel good about it.  So I'll probably not re-plant. 

My Black Eyed Peas are Doing well.  One, for whatever reason is doing better than the other three.  But they are coming along well.  

Look at the wee little cabbages popping up!  

You really can't see anything special at all about the celery.  I almost didn't bother including it.  Except to say that I'm not sure it's even going to come up at all. 

This is my lovely Collard Greens.  Six Lovely rows.  I decided to do them in under bed storage containers.  

This was a Zucchini.  The one in the middle was killed by frost.  You can see his brother on the right there is still kicking along

My lovely goji plant is coming along just fine.

I haven't decided quite where to put my grapevine, so it's kind of in a temporary home right now. 

This is my new herb planter I picked up on amazon.  It can sit down or hang and it's just lovely.  I planted 9 things in it.  

This is my Lettuce Plants.  Coming right on along.  Now if I can only keep the rabbits out of it.  

 Cucumber, marketmore.  

This is parsley that I planted about 2 years ago and it has just lasted and lasted.  I planted it directly in the ground and it has just been the best.  One of the best herbs you can grow. 

My lovely little radishes.  These are so easy to grow. 

rutgers tomato

This is a sage patch that I planted at the same time I planted the Parley.  It has been very hearty as well. 

Spinach.  Not coming up well yet. 

My tiny strawberry patch. 

Spanish Onion.  I'm also not sure if it will come in. 

Yellow Squash.  Just blossoming. 

This is the Zucchini that survived the frost.hopefully it will bring a bounty!

DIY "self-watering" 5 Gallon Planters

I wasn't sure if this idea would even work.  I just kinda did it.  But I'm so glad I did!  First I would like to say I LOVE LOVE LOVE this for my container garden!  I would do it again and again!  

I hate this term "self-watering" because it implies that you never have to do anything.  That couldn't be farther from the truth.  I prefer to view it more of a root hydration system that a watering system.  And it's not foolproof by any means.  If the bottle were to get too full then you could drown your plants.  

It has worked marvelously for me this year so far, and I would love to share it with you!  It's so simple to do and it's inexpensive!  It's early enough in the season that you could pick up some young tomato plants for a few dollars and pot a couple.  You could get pounds and pounds of tomatoes all season long for just a few dollars investment!

You can get the bucket from Firehouse Subs for $2 with a lid, food grade.  Or just a good ol paint bucket from lowes for around $3.  The soil I used cost $1.50. It takes about 1/2 a cubic foot of soil to fill a bucket.  I used the kind for gardens with fertilizer mixed in that's $3 per cubic foot.  Then you need a knife, a 2 liter plastic bottle, and your seedlings.  If you choose to purchase seedlings then it might cost you a few bucks, if you choose to grow them it might cost you a pack of seeds. All in all, you're looking at around 5 bucks max initial investment give or take.  Next year even less because you'll already have your bucket.

You can grow 5 pea plants, 4 bean plants, or 2 tomato plants in them (I believe) spaced properly.  They seem to be coming up well for me that way anyway so far.  I will certainly keep you guys posted on it.  

Start with your plastic bottle.  Carefully punch 4-6 slits in the bottle I usually punch 2 near the neck, 2 near the middle, and 2 near the bottom.  This just allows any water that you fill into the bottle to seep out into the roots.

Once your bottle is sufficiently holey you'll place it in the 5 gallon bucket with the lid still on (so as to not fill the bottle with dirt)

Fill all around the bottle, trying to keep the bottle in the middle.    Fill all the way to the top, some dirt will settle in the coming days. 

Once the dirt is all in, remove the lid.

You can now plant your plants.  In this example, I am planting tomato.  I will plant one plant on either side of the protruding lip of the bottle equidistant from the bucket's edge.

I got these droopy tomatoes from a local farmer.  I put the little stake in indicating which type of tomato is planted there.  And in just under a week...look at the transformation!!!!

NOT SO DROOPY ANYMORE ARE WE????

As with any plants you will want to steak them and support them as they grow.  I plan to do mine with wooden dowels and twine.  

I have successfully done this with Peas, Tomatoes, and Beans so far.

You can see where I used my K cups to start this one.  I wrote a blog on that, in case you didn't see it.  

I use the K cups to cover the top of the 2 liter bottle because it's easy to remove, identifies the plant, and keeps rainwater from overfilling it!

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