My garden efforts

MickaC said:
Plan to. I'll empty halfway down the 3 that have the dirt, into the ones not filled yet, and fill the rest up to the top with the same stuff i used in other ones. I'm really happy with the ones that i used CIL enriched topsoil mixture, not as much watering and holds moisture well.
Will get the dirt moved after the garden is done, then just half to fill up with the other next spring.
Thanks Aneeda for the tip.
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You might want to look into landscape fabric next season. You lay it down with holes for what you intend to plant. It retains moisture in the soil and prevents weeds.
 

IMG_1095.jpeg The three water troughs were delivered on Friday. I thought i'd try the things for some garden.......one reason......they're tall enough, 2ft high......my guys can't get up to them......play or dig dirt.......so i don't need to fence these off.......the other reason, tall. Where did i get the idea.....internet of course.
The job now is to drill drainage holes, level them, add some stones in the bottom, then hopefully find chunks of wood, to help fill up to the soil line.
I'll put a layer of landscape fabric in before the soil.
 
IMG_1087.jpeg This is 1 tomato plant.......it's called Cobra......supposed to be a high producer........in a 4ft x 4ft bed......as you can see.....it needs the room......see how they taste......may definitely have this one again.IMG_1089.jpeg Two tomatoes on the plant i just posted......have never had ripe tomatoes this early.......i'm sure the heat helped......this plant is loaded.
This may be the only large tomato plant i get next year, plus cherry tomatoes.
 
IMG_1086.jpeg Pole beans and green bush beans......i got yellow poles beans by mistake.....didn't have my glasses with me......pole beans have a 5ft trellis to climb.....as you can see.....they're up and over.
Saturday on my routine inspections......had a talk with the pole beans, quit growing all over the country and make beans.....tons of flowers......same with the green bush beans.....quit wasting time and grow beans.
Saturday after supper inspections..........there are little beans coming !!!!!!!!!! Must be female plants......male plants wouldn't listen like that....LOL...LOL...LOL.
Anyone want beans.
 
Great garden, some really nice veggies.

I take a similar approach, with the containers anyway. One thing I have found is that with the gravel layer in the bottom there is no need to drill holes, just leaving the drain plug out seems to work as well. I am no expert, slowly learning by trial and error. Still getting used to Utah gardening, very different from Florida where I gardened for many years.
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Some pictures of mine, not so neat as yours but I like it.
 
MickaC said:
#1 reason is , i didn't want to bother with a tiller.
Have buried cables, hydro, telephone, water, sewer lines.
Raised ones are much easier on the back, the white frames are 15" high......the galvanized water troughs are 2ft high, getting three of them.
Can control the soil according to what certain veggies need.
And i just wanted to be different......and wanted to try something different......next to no weeds.
The ground i set these beds into are not good parts of the yard, so not losing anything good.
The open area of the yard will stay as grass.....my guys need that.....and have to think about resale. If a young family were to consider to buy, They would certainly want grass area.
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All good reasons, I would add that here in Utah it saves water, more focused irrigation. I started using the raised beds and pots in Florida where our soil was 100% lovely white beach sand, no organic material, no nutrients. The beds let us more easily import good soil. My wife still does some gardening in the ground, but I would never go back. The containers are just too much easier for me.
 
Alligatorob said:
Great garden, some really nice veggies.

I take a similar approach, with the containers anyway. One thing I have found is that with the gravel layer in the bottom there is no need to drill holes, just leaving the drain plug out seems to work as well. I am no expert, slowly learning by trial and error. Still getting used to Utah gardening, very different from Florida where I gardened for many years.
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Some pictures of mine, not so neat as yours but I like it.
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LOVE your garden.....looks totally amazing.....and very neat.....love your landscaping and planning.
Doing a lot of learning on the raised beds.
On the farm, 90% was ground gardening.....but did use a lot of my half barrels for some veggies, the rest were flowers.......think if i remember right.....had about 60 half barrels in and around the house yard.

Do i have pictures....next to none.....why not....my now X, always commented when i got the camera out, why are you taking pictures, who wants to see pictures of that stuff.....so i left the camera alone.

Funny.....someone must have liked the yard.....was chosen for a garden tour one year.....2 days of show......made me so Happy.

Ang tips you have, would love to see and hear.
 
Aneeda72 said:
You have a HUGE yard. It looks great. But too much work for me and I though my yard was huge, but it was not as large as yours.
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Don't sell yourself short Aneeda.
You transformed your front and back yard in a very short time, with a bad hip.......to something totally AWESOME.
Love the things you chose to do, excellent landscaping IMO.
Thanks for your thumbs up.
Now, take it easier and let that hip heal.
 
IMG_1100.jpeg Going to be the first 2 toasted tomato sandwiches of the season........snack on cherry tomatoes everyday......wasn't able to eat them up to now because of acid reflux......but......these ones are called ...Sugar Rush...and are so sweet...don't bother me at all.
 
IMG_1103.jpeg Acorn squash, pic taken on monday, has grown a lot since, now is almost 6" across, have 5 of them this size.
It's a learning process for me with acorn and butternut squash......the only other squash i've ever grown was pumpkin and zucchini.
A couple weeks after all the garden was up, middle june, had our first storm of the season, a lot of stuff got hammered.
Lost all cucumbers, all sugar snap peas, spaghetti squash, broke them off at the stems at the ground, and all but 4 acorn squash.
Lesson to remember.....have extra seed on hand.....was still early enough to resow.
Stores here were sold out then.....didn't want to go out of town hunting for more.
I debated about the 4 acorns plants whether to keep or not, they struggled, but i kept them.
On the farm, had a big ground garden near the main yard.....so if there were losses, there was always lots more left.
 
My garden is quite overgrown this year and it's mainly my fault because I started to many plants in the spring and can't throw out the leftover plants.
I planted grape tomatoes and the packet did say they get tall but they took over a big portion of the garden. I don't think they taste as good as the big ones and its worse than picking berries. lol I won't plant them next year.

Of course next year I'll see something new to try and I'll be in the same boat as this year.
Things are a bit late this year but today I did get quite a few tomatoes.
Tomorrow I'll pick some more and Friday I'll give the small ones away and make some stewed tomatoes for the freezer with the big ones.garden tomatoes.JPG
 
Just seen this thread , and all I can say is wow wow what a great healthy looking veggie crop you have coming on ,looks like you will have enough veggies to supply your neighbourhood.
I mainly grow our own fruit in a very small typical Aussie back yard our trees supply us with enough fruit to dry / preserve , which lasts us over a year as well as eating fresh .

I haven’t had allot of luck with veggies due to our terrible lime stone soil.
Hubby made me a a solid raised garden bed during winter and it’s filled ready to plant spring/ summer veggies as soon as it’s warm enough ( still in winter here )

I love my own homemade tomato relish so I’m hoping to grow enough tomatoes to use my own to make more relish , however we have good friends who grow quite allot of Roma tomatoes
sometimes refereed to as Italian tomatoes so I’ve never had to actually buy and tomatoes in Summer for years .
 
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Kadee46 said:
Now you have me dribbling the thought of a fresh peach right off the tree @Alligatorob
here is a photo I just took of my peach and Plum trees ( winter here in Australia)
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Your trees look healthy, I am sure you will have good stuff in about 6 months!

We live in a part of Utah that used to be called the "Fruit Zone" (https://www.visitutah.com/articles/utahs-fruit-way-highway-89). Unfortunately the Salt Lake valley urban sprawl has gotten here and many of the orchards have become subdivisions. We have about an acre and a half of what used to be a much larger orchard. We have 105 peach trees, 7 different varieties to lengthen the season. A farmer who takes care of a lot of these little remnant orchards, like ours, takes care of them. He sells most, however our "rent" is mostly just all the peaches we can eat. So we will be eating them every day for the next 6 weeks or so. My favorite time of the year. There are also cherry, apricot, apple, plum and pear orchards very near by so we get those fresh in season. Peaches however are king around here, "Peach Days" is the biggest event in the area (https://www.boxelderchamber.com/about/peach-days/). We planted a few of our own a couple of years ago, but not much harvest yet. We do have one very old large apple tree, looking forward to those in about a month.

Freeze, dry, or can some of your peaches it will lengthen your season. We do all of that and in good years make peach juice and sometimes even peach wine!
 
Alligatorob said:
Your trees look healthy, I am sure you will have good stuff in about 6 months!

We live in a part of Utah that used to be called the "Fruit Zone" (https://www.visitutah.com/articles/utahs-fruit-way-highway-89). Unfortunately the Salt Lake valley urban sprawl has gotten here and many of the orchards have become subdivisions. We have about an acre and a half of what used to be a much larger orchard. We have 105 peach trees, 7 different varieties to lengthen the season. A farmer who takes care of a lot of these little remnant orchards, like ours, takes care of them. He sells most, however our "rent" is mostly just all the peaches we can eat. So we will be eating them every day for the next 6 weeks or so. My favorite time of the year. There are also cherry, apricot, apple, plum and pear orchards very near by so we get those fresh in season. Peaches however are king around here, "Peach Days" is the biggest event in the area (https://www.boxelderchamber.com/about/peach-days/). We planted a few of our own a couple of years ago, but not much harvest yet. We do have one very old large apple tree, looking forward to those in about a month.

Freeze, dry, or can some of your peaches it will lengthen your season. We do all of that and in good years make peach juice and sometimes even peach wine!
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We have a typical Aussie little suburban type back yard , 2 years ago we picked 75 kg of peaches of that tree . We don’t live in a city
I make use of every inch of my back yard for growing our own fruit which we ( hubby and I )
put in the effort of preserving / drying our own chemical free fruit
Our apricot which we keep trimmed to suit the area gave us 60 kg of delicious fruit last summer
even after the black birds had a party in our tree ,I have a saying the scouts ( birds ) turn up then go away and bring all their mates back with them.
The apricot tree that’s got lotsa buds waiting to burst out
We planted all our trees ( after having our home built ) which were not much more than a twig 12 years ago hubby spent 2 days on the jackhammer digging a hole in the limestone for the apricot tree
@Alligatorob
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Kadee46 said:
2 years ago we picked 75 kg of peaches of that tree
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Wow, that is a lot more than we get from any one tree. Ours are pretty small, short enough to pick without a ladder. Peaches don't get that big here, or people don't plant the bigger varieties anyway. Some of the apricot trees here do get that big, but I just planted ours last year. We got 3 apricots this year!
 


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