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Was:Brown Thumb /Bulbs/:Now:My garden

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Ok- -that has got to be one of the best ideas I have ever heard for  beds of
bulbs! I have been planting hundreds of the suckers everywhere and
varmints(some of the varmints live here in this house) have been digging
them up just as fast as I have planted them. I was really hoping  to have a
lot of them near the veggie beds as pollinators as to make it pretty and
though there will be some - many will have bit the dust. I think there might
just be room for a  couple "mini" beds- maybe some 2 x 2-'s    the wire
framework sounds like just the ticket. I have some four oclocks coming up
along the fence and morning glories and my is lavender going great guns.Also
my pineapple sage is huge and the nasturtiums reseeded al lover the place.
Planted  All kinds of flowers around the perimeter of the veggie garden so
hopefully will get some BEES- Decided to dedicate one whole bed to
strawberries!!!!!- Brandie and I just love them and hate to pay supermarket
prices- last year we grew some in containers - mostly for show- so this year
they are going crazy. It was a hard call because I really wanted the space
for  more veggies and those strawberries are gonna be there for a long
while- but now that we made the decision- I 'm glad-I can always find room
for more veggies somewhere else- Am mixing up flowers and food so much this
year is isn't funny. Got some great untreated redwood at Neighborhood
cleanup and thinking about trying Mels patio box and doing another one
there- but boy- it gets scalding hot there- I think I would have to Water
twice a day. I feel  I like I am going to be sleeping with a hose in one
hand and a watering can in the other. Got all of my watering soakers in and
arranged but you still wind up with a fair amount of hand watering -at least
I do for propagation and seedlings and whatever-else you have going on. (By
the way- about 80% of the flower seeds that I overwintered using Trudi
Davidsons's(Is that her last name?) method- germinated and I have
transplanted most into pots or into the garden-doing great and no hardening
off- pretty amazing and easy. Got about 100 plants with no grow lights-Just
the patio table and clear food containers-check to archives for her post).
Been very chilly here in zone 9 after a very warn March  and I am still
holding off to plant most of my warm stuff until after Easter . My neighbors
who jumped the gun lost their tomatoes. It is hard to know what April will
do here- I am frankly glad for  a little more spring coolness. It gets to
darn hot too darn fast for too darn long here. As it is- I spend every free
moment that I can out there watching the babies come up and digging and
weeding and moving things around like and maniac. It is never finished. I
rearrange things in my garden like people rearrange their furniture. I
survived moving my veggie beds and building(and rebuilding) new trellises.
Moving the compost heap and bin and repairing and revamping the watering
sytem - putting in some paths and  widening every bed I had and adding
several new beds. I never thought I had these much fortitude.-especially
after having had health problems in the fall and being such a slug. Spring
must have cast a spell on me.Sometimes I wonder who's in charge of these
gardens-me or them.I am so sore I can hardly move.-Teri
----- Original Message -----
From: JC Dill <garden@vo.cnchost.com>
To: Square Foot Gardening List <sqft@listbot.com>
Sent: Wednesday, April 11, 2001 11:06 PM
Subject: Re: Brown Thumb in Utah with Questions


> Square Foot Gardening List - http://myweb.flinet.com/~gallus/sqft.html
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> On 01:52 PM 4/11/01, Sandy M. Hammond wrote:
>
> >
> >         My name is Sandy and I live in Utah.  I have tried growing
> > different plants (flowers, bulbs, vegetables) at various periods in my
> > life.  All without success.  I definitely have a brown thumb, not a
green
> > one.
>
> Hi Sandy,
>
> Hopefully this will all change with Square Foot Gardening!  :-)
>
> >  I've always wanted to grow something successfully.
> >
> >         I have read most of Mel Bartholomew's book Square Foot
> > Gardening.  It seems like it might be the answer.  It appears to take
> > little space and a lot less work.  I think I'll be brave and give
> > gardening another try!  There are some questions I have and I would like
> > to hear from both newer square foot gardeners and experienced ones.
> >
> >         Question 1:  Did you start with only one 4 foot by 4 foot
> > square?  Or do you need two squares?  My husband says I should do at
> > least two since there are two of us (since my teenage daughter isn't
> > going to help, I'm not including her), but I don't know if that's too
> > much for my first time.
>
> It depends.  It is better to do only one bed, and do it right, than to do
> two or more beds and then take shortcuts because it looks like too much
> work to do it right.  So I wouldn't do more than one bed at a time, and
> would be sure to stop before you feel burdened.  But that doesn't mean you
> can't do more than one bed this year.  For instance, you can do one bed
> this weekend.  See how much work it is (or isn't, compared to what you
> might have expected).  Plant it such that if that's all you do this year,
> you will be satisfied.  Then sit back and ask yourself if this is enough
> for your first year, or if you want to try to do more.  Don't bite off
more
> than you can chew.  It would be much better to end the season going "That
> was so easy, next year I'll do more!" than to say "I tried to do too much,
> and it wasn't any fun and I gave up because it was more than I wanted to
do."
>
> >         Question 2:  I am uncertain about what to plant.  Mel says
> > tomatoes, beans, corn, lettuce, zucchini, cucumbers, and Swiss chard are
> > the easiest.  Should I just stick with these?  Should I only try one
type
> > of plant for my first time, such as tomatoes?
>
> If you start with just one or two 4x4 beds, I'd also (outside the beds,
> elsewhere in your yard, if you have the space) plant at least one squash
> plant.  If you have the space, squash are one of the easiest plants to
> grow.  So you get a good return on your investment, and get an "I did it!"
> feeling when you have a huge squash plant and can harvest squash from it
> several times a week.  Don't plant more than one each of any one squash
> variety (either buy seedlings, or plant a hill of 3 seeds and then later
> thin to the strongest one, properly stored the seeds will keep for several
> years), and no more than 2 or 3 different squash variety plants total.
You
> can also plant a pumpkin if you want (if you have the space to let it vine
> about), since that's usually more of a decorative crop than a "got to pick
> and eat this before it gets too big" crop as is the case with squash.
With
> squash and pumpkins you only need a ~2x2 tilled space to plant the seeds
> and keep weed free, as long as you have plenty of area around that
planting
> space to let the vines wander and fend for themselves when the plants
> outgrow their initial 2x2 space.
>
> >          Question 3:  To grow tomatoes vertically, I know I need to
> > create a frame of 1.5 inch black plastic pipe or metal pipe and attach
> > string to it for the tomatoes to grow on.  Have any of you built the
> > trench Mel suggests in his book and did it work well?
>
> I haven't yet done tomatoes the formal sqft method.  In the past I've
grown
> them inside those water tube things to get an early start, then removed
> those and used tomato cage made of mesh wire.  That has worked well for
me,
> but others have had problems with the cages tipping over.  Many suggest
you
> stake the cages, and if you are driving stakes to stake the cages it isn't
> much more work to just make a trellis that will support 4 feet of plants.
>
> Since Mel suggests that tomatoes and cucumbers are both "easy to grow",
you
> would get a good return on your trellis making investment by making one
> trellis for each 4x4 bed, and putting in 2 tomato plants and 4 cucumbers
on
> that trellis, as he often shows in the sample bed diagrams in his book.
>
> >          Question 4 (don't worry - this is the last question):  I looked
> > at a colored zone map and (if I picked my zone correctly) I believe our
> > last frost won't be over until June 1st.  In the meantime should I just
> > set up my 4 by 4 and double dig adding whatever I can find in one of the
> > local nurseries to my clay soil?
>
> You can't put too much time and effort into your soil  Follow the formula
> for Mel's soil.  Add some extra sand if you have soil that is extra
"clay-y".
>
> What I would do is dig out the top shovel's full  and pile it off to the
> side.  Then turn over the next layer in place, loosing it so the roots can
> go deep (this is the double dig).  Then add amendments (sand, compost,
> etc.) to the pile of top soil.  Put in your edging around the bed, then
> fill with the amended top soil.  The resulting bed will be a lot taller
> than what you started with, both because of the amendments you added,
> and  because you loosened the soil so it isn't compacted tightly together
> as it was.
>
> If you can afford it, and if your soil is really not very good for plants,
> it can be a time saver to bring in new soil.  Depending, sometimes you can
> just loosen the top foot of soil, then build your box extra tall, then
fill
> with the new soil (and amendments, follow Mel's formula even when you
bring
> in "top soil" or "potting soil").  Or you can mound the soil up above the
> raised bed edges.  I have 2 beds that are made with 2x6 lumber, and I've
> mounded the soil another 3 inches on top, so I have 9 inches of "good
soil"
> above the loosened soil under the bed.
>
> >Should I also start the seeds indoors now and then transplant them when
> >June arrives?  Or is it better for beginners to start the seeds directly
> >in the ground where they will grow rather than transplant them?
>
> IMHO, the hardest part of being a success with plants is getting them
> going.  (The reason so many people kill house plants is that they buy the
> teeniest pots, which dry out almost overnight, and then they either over
or
> under water.  If you get the big plants, they are MUCH easier to care for,
> far more able to withstand a few extra days between watering etc.   So if
> you have a hard time keeping house plants alive, don't ever buy *small*
> house plants!  That sets you up for failure!)   Give yourself all the help
> and head-start you can in your first year - don't start all your plants
> from seed, if you can buy some of them as seedlings at your local garden
> center when practical and possible.  Once you get good at growing veggies
> from pre-started seedlings to fruiting plants, *then* you can add in the
> complexity of growing them from seed yourself the second time around.
>
> However, there are some good exceptions.  Many plants should be planted as
> seeds directly into the ground.  If you are really fond of beans, beets,
or
> carrots, (I've had good luck with both beans and beets, not so good luck
> with carrots) you should plant those from seed, directly into your soil,
at
> the appropriate time.  But for plants like tomatoes and peppers, start
with
> seedlings this year.
>
> If you want to try corn, I'd suggest you do a whole square of nothing but
> corn.  Mel wrote an article for Organic Gardening where he planted corn 4
> to the square (64 seeds in a 4 x 4 block), and he was very happy with the
> outcome, see: <http://vo.cnchost.com/garden/organic.html>.  I've got a 4x6
> block planted this way, with 4x3 of a smaller and early maturing variety
on
> the south end, and 4x3 of a taller and later maturing variety on the north
end.
>
> Finally, you mention having poor luck with bulbs and flowers.  I don't
know
> if Gladiolas are good for your area or not, but here's what I did, maybe
it
> will work for you.  I just planted gladiolas in a 4x4 bed.  I divided the
> bedin 1/2, then in 1/3s, giving me 6 planting sections, then planted 35
> bulbs in each section (my bulbs were bought at Costco, 70 bulbs in a
> package, 3 packages of different varieties).  Since I have gophers here, I
> lined the bottom of my planting bed boxes with 1/2 inch hardware cloth.  I
> turned the bottom soil, lay the box on top, then added my amended
> soil.  For the bulbs, I put in just enough amended soil to cover the wire
> mesh (about 1-2 inches) then laid out my bulbs, then 1/2 filled the box
(~6
> inches deep) with soil, enough to cover the bulbs but not all the way to
> the top.  Then I watered, this way I *know* the water got to the bulbs.  I
> waited until the next day, watered again, then filled the box the rest of
> the way with soil.  The bulbs started peeking through the top less than a
> week later!  This is very exciting for me, I've never had this many glads
> in the ground before and can't wait until I can blooms for the house!  I
> will be making a wire box to go over the bed, with 1 foot high sides (cut
> from a 6x6 piece of 4 or 6 inch wire mesh fencing, cut out a 1x1 chunck
off
> of each corner, then fold the sides and wire the corners together)  This
> will make a wire grid that stands 1 foot above the bed, for the leaves and
> stems to stick up through, and then to support the stems when they get
> heavy with flower buds and blooms, so that they don't tip over sideways
> onto the ground.
>
> I hope this gives you some helpful ideas.
>
> jc
>
>
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