My grass is sad. And dead.
Mostly dead.
I am currently in the throes of my second year of midwest gardening, since our return from the west coast. All things considered, things are looking good.
This is how my garden looked initially.
Have I mentioned that the parcel of land that our rental house is built on, used to be a gravel parking lot? Also, there is ALOT of red clay in the soil, here. Needless to say, my patience and determination to grow my own food since moving back to Indiana, has been tested extensively. I found my shovel caught between a rock and a hard place.
Quite literally.
I have done some rough "landscaping" around the house with my first harvest from the garden. 100+ pounds of pulverized limestone.
Once the sod removal was completed, the search for someone to till it (on a zero budget) resulted in me surrendering additional elbow grease and hand-turning most of the soil with my garden trowel. I would not let this beat me. For the first time in nearly 10 years I was unemployed (due to our recent relocation), and had nothing but frustration to burn off in between emailing resumes & searching wanted ads. My gravel pit garden served it's purpose.
After cutting into a low-lying cable line, waging a war against 45lb ground hog demons, and getting an overall late start on planting; all in all things turned out ok. I even received a generous donation of starter plants from my mom, and did what I could, using what I had to work with.
This year I better prepared. I was able to put alittle more planning, funding, experience, composting, & renewed vigor behind this year's endeavor.
My mom even hauled my grandpa's tiller, a few bags of top soil (and the 3 wheeled bicycle in the background, that I dream of pimping out to the max, one day) 3 hours south, to my house to help me do some proper prep work.
I had seen a post about how great bamboo teepees are & how easy it is to make them : 3-4 sticks of bamboo & a rubber band.
Easy to make? Yes.
Great? Not so much.
First of all, my neighbors, whom we generally refer to as "the hillbillies" have several groves of bamboo growing in their yard. I figured since (a) bamboo can be a pretty invasive plant (b) the hillbillies only apparent use of it is to whack each other with it, and (c) since our landlord also owns the hillbilly's house; it all seemed reasonable that I help myself to a FREE, hefty harvest of the stuff to fashion the 30 or so teepees I needed for all my veggies.
Fast forward about 3 days in the blistering sun, and the rubber bands started dry-rotting (?) & snapping, turning my garden into a bamboo stake death trap. I quickly reinforced the remaining teepees and attempted to re-secure the others with the gardening twisty-tie stuff. All was right in the world, again.
The teepees seem to work good for pepper plants, ok for cukes & peas, but definitely not tomatoes. Grandpa's tomato cages are the way to go, for sure. Cement wire mesh (like a giant sheet of metal graph paper) wrapped it into cylinders. Bamboo is such a wonderful material. What I have purchased it from garden centers before did not seem to suck as bad as the hillbilly bamboo. I guess you get what you pay for, huh?
Easy to make? Yes.
Great? Not so much.
First of all, my neighbors, whom we generally refer to as "the hillbillies" have several groves of bamboo growing in their yard. I figured since (a) bamboo can be a pretty invasive plant (b) the hillbillies only apparent use of it is to whack each other with it, and (c) since our landlord also owns the hillbilly's house; it all seemed reasonable that I help myself to a FREE, hefty harvest of the stuff to fashion the 30 or so teepees I needed for all my veggies.
Fast forward about 3 days in the blistering sun, and the rubber bands started dry-rotting (?) & snapping, turning my garden into a bamboo stake death trap. I quickly reinforced the remaining teepees and attempted to re-secure the others with the gardening twisty-tie stuff. All was right in the world, again.
The teepees seem to work good for pepper plants, ok for cukes & peas, but definitely not tomatoes. Grandpa's tomato cages are the way to go, for sure. Cement wire mesh (like a giant sheet of metal graph paper) wrapped it into cylinders. Bamboo is such a wonderful material. What I have purchased it from garden centers before did not seem to suck as bad as the hillbilly bamboo. I guess you get what you pay for, huh?
Aside from the drought, (oh, and 3 of my tomato plants getting so big and heavy that they toppled over, taking the bamboo teepee with them) I'm loving my garden. I recently canned for the first time. My monster tomatoes are fly's fart away from being ready to pick & I couldn't be more excited.
BLT's, here I come!
This first post seems incredibly longer than I'd imagined it being, so lets re-cap:
1. It's hot.
2. Bamboo stakes have their place and purpose. Tomatoes are not it.
3. Gravel is not a preferred growing medium.
4. Life lessons are learned through trial and error. I tend to have many errors, and don't mind sharing them to help others avoid similar mistakes.
1. It's hot.
2. Bamboo stakes have their place and purpose. Tomatoes are not it.
3. Gravel is not a preferred growing medium.
4. Life lessons are learned through trial and error. I tend to have many errors, and don't mind sharing them to help others avoid similar mistakes.
5. I am obsessed with commas. If you are a grammar-nazi, please don't judge me. I tend to sprinkle them everywhere.
No comments:
Post a Comment