Roofgardener
Active member
Does anyone here grow their own food for fun ?
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Gardening
- Thread starter Roofgardener
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Roofgardener
Active member
I've just moved into a new flat with a TINY garden. But big enough to grow SOME stuff. Chilli Peppers, tomatoes, onions, runner beans.
I'm going to try a few brassica's and cauliflowers and carrots, just as an experiment.
I'm going to try a few brassica's and cauliflowers and carrots, just as an experiment.
Yes. And also for pleasure and purity.
There is no fructose or MSG in my garden.
Or my cooking.
Nothing tastes better than what you do the work for and enjoy in a garden setting.
My backyard is flowers and trees and a brick patio. But, next to my manufacturing plant, is a vegetable garden. I share the produce with the employees.
The soil in the industrial park was so bad I had to truck in topsoil. Well worth it.
In winter I do some produce in the small greenhouse attached to my home..
There is no fructose or MSG in my garden.
Or my cooking.
Nothing tastes better than what you do the work for and enjoy in a garden setting.
My backyard is flowers and trees and a brick patio. But, next to my manufacturing plant, is a vegetable garden. I share the produce with the employees.
The soil in the industrial park was so bad I had to truck in topsoil. Well worth it.
In winter I do some produce in the small greenhouse attached to my home..
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Roofgardener
Active member
Oh that is SO true ! It is also a lovely smug feeling: "Hmm.. this sauce needs some garlic. I'll just go outside and pick some..."
I grow food for a lot of people on my commercial farm. Unfortunately not directly. And not the sort of items you would use in your kitchen.
Yellow dent corn and soybeans are what we grow. Mostly feed for livestock.
Planting time here now in fact.
Roofgardener
Active member
Wow.. you own an actual FARM ?
I'm going to do some container tomatoes this year, thinking cherry tomatoes. I just need to make myself get down to the garden center and buy some starter plants.
I do think it's fun and can be very rewarding. One year I had to pick those gross green worms off my tomato plants, and of course that wasn't much fun. The tomatoes are so much better.
I do think it's fun and can be very rewarding. One year I had to pick those gross green worms off my tomato plants, and of course that wasn't much fun. The tomatoes are so much better.
Roofgardener
Active member
I like cherry tomatoes, chopped up in salad
I shall definately be growing at least one bush
Roofgardener
Active member
My 'garden' is probably a similar size, or maybe a few feet bigger ?
Most of it is lawn, but I'm digging some of that up to make a deep border (about 3-4' deep) running for 20' or so ?
I've never grown sugar snap peas before: what are they ?
Roofgardener
Active member
TWO DUMP TRUCKS ? Egads.. just how big is your garden ?
I've been a vegetable gardener for most of my life. When we moved to the country I tilled up a huge garden every year and started my quest for the "no work garden". I never quite made it but I came very close with the "little work garden". It was still time consuming and there were only the two of us to use all the produce so a lot of stuff was given away or wasted. As I got older I scaled it back until I quit altogether. I did miss it so when COVID started my wife asked me to turn her kitchen herb garden into a small veggie garden I was all over it. We planted a few tomatoes and peppers which kept the two of us going through the shortages. Right now I'm in the process of replacing two of the old raised beds and we'll be planting toms and peppers again this week-end. I've also got a small raised bed to make for her herbs. The asparagus bed is still going strong after 25 years. I have replaced some of the plants over the last 5 years or so but it still produces enough to keep us going during the spring.
The size of garden we have now is manageable for 2 old folks. I really would like to get a small greenhouse to grow greens during the winter.
The size of garden we have now is manageable for 2 old folks. I really would like to get a small greenhouse to grow greens during the winter.
What are Sugar snap peas ?
Delicious peas you can eat right off the vine, pod and all. Easy to grow on a trellis and you can just grab a few and throw them right into a salad.
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Sugar Snap Peas Nutrition Facts and Health Benefits
One serving (83g) of whole sugar snap peas provides 40 calories, 2g of protein, 7g of carbohydrates, and 0g of fat. Sugar snap peas are an excellent source of vitamin C, iron, and potassium.
Not a fan of cherry tomatoes. They are the tasteless fruits restaurants keep too long in their refrigerators and throw in salads
I grow Roma's. They make the best sauces and frankly great for salads. They will grow well on a trellis in a large pot of loamy soil. The plants, started in spring, will grow and produce well beyond a year. Hence my greenhouse addition on the south side of my house.
Feed them with 13/13/13 common fertilizer, or Milorganite, with an addition of BLOOMBUSTER every couple of months.
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Don't forget your contribution to the production of BEER!
I normally buy Roma's at the grocery store. I might try those instead of cherry tomatoes. I'm limited by what is available at the garden center.
That's a pipe dream for me. The only space I have for a greenhouse is shady.
Yes I do. Born here and will likely die here.Wow.. you own an actual FARM ?
I am one of the last of my kind in either my wife's family, or mine...
Now you know why I hate Socialism, and those who promote it. They would take my families farm in a heart beat.
Socialists need absolute control of the food supply. They will use it to their advantage, to deepen the grip they must have to keep in power.
Farmers are on the hit list. Most of us know that.
Oh my yes, how could I forget that!
I just sold them 10K bushels yesterday for my marketing year high of $6.06..
Asparagus. Needs lots of manure to keep it strong and sweet. I haven't had luck with it for a while. It takes 4-6 years to get a good bed of it going.
Cheap and easy Greenhouse.
A simple lean to greenhouse can be fabricated with a few 2X4's or 4X4's, some heavy clear poly and a staple gun.
You don't have basements in Texas so putting it over one of the windows for heat is unlikely. However, a $50 oil filled radiant will do the job nicely.
Use a cheap storm door and build it 4 feet deep and 6 to 8 feet wide. Place some simple shelves against the house walls land wallah!
I used cheap storm windows with side slides over a wooden frame of painted 4X4's. Stapled bubble wrap on the inside and clear poly on the outside to fill in the walls.. Last for several years. The bubble wrap, (3/16" bubbles) insulates and diffuses the light.
Be sure to have a vent or opening window, set high to let out heat in the summer, or during warm spring and fall days.
I placed mine at a bedroom window. Then used a box fan to blow heat in from the house during winter and into the house when the sun warmed it up.
A brick or patio stone floor helps as well.
Mine has deciduous trees over it so that winter sun can come in but come summer is full shade. At 18 feet wide X 6 feet deep X 16 feet high, it contains 1,700 cubic feet of air and plant space. It heats the whole house with humidified air on most winter, sunny, days.
I use a 4'x16' wire stock panel and 3 T posts for the peas to climb on. We blanch and freeze them for winter eating.
Roofgardener
Active member
I'll look into this !
ErinKeegan
Member
It's hard for me to even grow a plant. Could you recommend to me any plants which it's easy to take care of?
Welcome..
Garden plants? Or some thing elese?
Reading is your best friend. Planting depth is so very important to know for each species.
Soils are important to in some area's. In my State of Iowa we have great soils, making that easy.
What State are you in?
One of the easiest house plants is called a "Spider Plant."
The tolerate abuse, poor soils and yet are easy to propagate. Little plants hang out on stems, you can just cut them off and plant them is soil, kept wet.
NOTE: they grow well in Australia
See all images
Chlorophytum Comosum
PlantChlorophytum comosum, usually called spider plant but also known as spider ivy, ribbon plant, and hen and chickens is a species of evergreen perennial flowering plant. It is native to tropical and southern Africa, but has become naturalized in other parts of the world, including western Australia. Chlorophytum comosum is e…
kc3tec
Member
If you like to experiment try hybrid hydroponics,
( a large trough with a perforated pipe in the bottom wrapped in screen or cheesecloth)
(( allvent pipe has small split cut into the sides and allows water to seep out))
Trough Filled with sand for base and fluid nutrients circulating through the pipe at very low pressure.
Plants grow quickly, and root veggies are very easy to pull and clean.
All plants benifit but water bearing veggies like okra, and tomatoes do best.
You must monitor the plants carefully though, too much water can cause leaf blight.
Its a good way to learn about gardening styles.
Also another skill to learn, grafting!
Grafting is the art of altering a base root to produce different results.
Its widely used in roses and many fruit trees.
For instance you can scour out buds from a donor tree and graft them onto the rootstock of a different tree in the same family.
( have one apple tree bearing 5 or 6 different apples)
Its a fascinating process and a definate shocker to someone who has never seen or heard of it.😄
I'm giving hydroponics some serious consideration.