Vegetable Garden

[pepperj]

Nov.2020 I started my berry patch/ garden.
From our organic hay field I had a 200'x200' patch tilled. (Around 1 acre)

8ft fence, 3ft steel 1/4" ground cloth buried half way into the ground. Electric fence around this. Still nature loves my garden.

First go at amending soils. 13 dump trucks of wood chips, 6 dump truck of black earth manure. 2 dump trucks of sand, 1 dump truck of Wollastonite mineral. Skid loads of peat moss.
All mixed and spread out in 13 rows with a manure spredder.
Still I struggle with hard clay soils in the patch.
Before the fencing I did layers of chips, soils, chips, soils.

My current soil reserves for new hoop house this year. An asparagus plot going in today.

I seem to be always looking for organic material for composting.

Google Earth shot

 

[Tpmetal]

Nov.2020 I started my berry patch/ garden.
From our organic hay field I had a 200'x200' patch tilled. (Around 1 acre)

8ft fence, 3ft steel 1/4" ground cloth buried half way into the ground. Electric fence around this. Still nature loves my garden.

First go at amending soils. 13 dump trucks of wood chips, 6 dump truck of black earth manure. 2 dump trucks of sand, 1 dump truck of Wollastonite mineral. Skid loads of peat moss.
All mixed and spread out in 13 rows with a manure spredder.
Still I struggle with hard clay soils in the patch.
Before the fencing I did layers of chips, soils, chips, soils.
View attachment 2206878
View attachment 2206879

My current soil reserves for new hoop house this year. An asparagus plot going in today.

I seem to be always looking for organic material for composting.

View attachment 2206880View attachment 2206881
Google Earth shot
View attachment 2206882

Awesome garden space pepper, looks like you got a third or quarter or so more space than my fenced in garden/small orchard. The struggle to find enough good organic material is real. The only difference you have is looks like majority is direct in the ground, I have raised beds for everything except my large corn patch. It was just too much soil rehab for me to try and do everything in ground. My corn patch is still not quite there after 5 or 6 years here. Corn is rough on the soil, and when it was junk soil to start with I seem to be forever playing catch up.

 

[pepperj]

Awesome garden space pepper, looks like you got a third or quarter or so more space than my fenced in garden/small orchard. The struggle to find enough good organic material is real. The only difference you have is looks like majority is direct in the ground, I have raised beds for everything except my large corn patch. It was just too much soil rehab for me to try and do everything in ground. My corn patch is still not quite there after 5 or 6 years here. Corn is rough on the soil, and when it was junk soil to start with I seem to be forever playing catch up.

I rotate the seasonal crops. Somethings steal, some others give back to the soils.

Garlic & Strawberries are a companion plants.

I plant beans in the corn spot the next season.
(I have better luck with beans than my corn.)

The Mrs just queried me on the beds in the new hoop house. Ground or raised?
Maybe a mix.
Ground is easier when I can only crawl later in life.🤣
In my mind I would love to have raised with dry stacked rock.

 

[pepperj]

@robertk
Here is where we ordered from for the weedguard.
Good company, no problems.

WeedGuard Mulches

BioDegradable Organic Natural Weed Control Mulch

weedguardplus.com

 

[pepperj]

Salad greens are starting to happen in the cold frame.

Have a few potted plants to transplant.
The cherry tomatoes (yellow/orange variety)
1 plant will give us around 20-25 quarts of tomatoes.
That's not counting my daily grabs.
The only problem is they go jungle crazy going in here.
Last year near the end of the season. OCT.22.

 

[ncsuwolf]

It’s obvious I’m a bit out of my league with the folks posting here…..but just like a baby pic….got to share. 95% done, minus a few cages and some straw

 

[robertk]

Salad greens are starting to happen in the cold frame.

What do you do with so many greens ripening at once? Can you preserve them?

I like your tomato setup. Beats those little cages all day long

 

[pepperj]

My wife is a true rabbit, usually we need this and another outside garden for greens. Till December salads are a main stay of the diet.

The first section is Arugula so when it gets to big its pretty hot.
so I'll let it bolt, collect the seeds, plant more.

I will grow all the tomatoes under cover once the big frame is up.
Blight is a problem for us if the year is too wet.

 

[Tpmetal]

It’s obvious I’m a bit out of my league with the folks posting here…..but just like a baby pic….got to share. 95% done, minus a few cages and some straw

Not at all, looks like a great space. Careful with straw. You gotta vett it and make sure you know who grew it and what they sprayed on it if anything. Some have leftover herbicides that don't affect straw but affect other plants. Can leech off and poison your plants.

 

[ncsuwolf]

Not at all, looks like a great space. Careful with straw. You gotta vett it and make sure you know who grew it and what they sprayed on it if anything. Some have leftover herbicides that don't affect straw but affect other plants. Can leech off and poison your plants.

More so on hay or manure, but yes your correct.

Wheat, at least here is grown in the winter, so less problematic herbicide applications. Hayland is a different animal

 

[pepperj]

Both could be issues in my garden, for sure. The nitrogen should be good (composted chicken house refuse is pretty miraculous as a fertilizer), but the soil is pretty dense. I'm working on that, adding compost and organic material, but it's gonna take a while. I'm fairly convinced that our garden soil was actually subsoil from when the basement was dug and it just got spread out across the yard. Lots of improvement to be done. But everywhere I dig this year, there are earthworms. I take that as a good sign.

I've read that this year's chicken manure should be used next year.
If fresh it could burn the plant as the nitrogen is too high.
I have a couple if small dump truck loads of 3-4 year old stuff in a big pile.
This was from the barn clean outs in the spring.
Sand/wood chips/manure mixed with compost, dirt.
I nettle grows 4ft high on it! 🤣

 

[robertk]

Sand/wood chips/manure mixed with compost, dirt.

Yep. That's some magical stuff right there. Composted chicken litter (mostly manure and wood chips) is the best organic fertilizer I've ever seen, and the best part is, the chickens make it as an added free bonus when they're making the eggs.

 

[Tesorodeoro]

I saw an interesting way to make compost, they would mix chicken feed into the compost pile and let the chickens paw through it to find their food. Naturally they poop in it as they are turning up the dirt.

 

[russau]

This is some greenhouse frames I bought off my tractor mechanic last summer.
Should be a 20x50-60ft hoop house when it's done this year.
View attachment 2206662View attachment 2206665
I have now a mig welder to weld what ever I need together.
View attachment 2206666

Great choice in the welder! I've had 3 Hobart gas powered welder's in my shop back when and they were very reliable for years of welding!

 

[pepperj]

I saw an interesting way to make compost, they would mix chicken feed into the compost pile and let the chickens paw through it to find their food. Naturally they poop in it as they are turning up the dirt.

That's kind of a brilliant idea.
I was thinking of taking the end of the enclosure down and scooping off the first 6 inches of soil.

Then replace it again with a dirt mix again.

It's the main area where they get organic food scraps and stuff. So they're out in this area a lot of the time.

 

[pepperj]

It’s obvious I’m a bit out of my league with the folks posting here…..but just like a baby pic….got to share. 95% done, minus a few cages and some straw

No your certainly in the league.
Great looking set up you have going.
From the start go, to producing food is a lot of work.
Rewards is the taste and quality of what your work has produced.

A small plot of land can provide more than a large plot of land.
Easier to maintain, cost per sq., as for fencing, soils, composting, just weeding a large area is a never ending task.

 

[pepperj]

Great choice in the welder! I've had 3 Hobart gas powered welder's in my shop back when and they were very reliable for years of welding!

It came found to actually the amount of use, make, cost.
Mig + bottle $2000+13%tax.
Granted I can hire out to get my welding down, but now I can repair everything under 3/8" with this set up.
I have a Lincoln ARC welder for heavy-duty stuff.
Good to know that you've had good luck with the Hobart.
Thanks

 

[pepperj]

Today is a soil gathering up day for the asparagus bed.
Need to be 80ft long, over a foot deep, (plants need 8-12")
So off to buy some bales of Perlite.

Mix perlite, peat moss, black manure, regular old loamy soil from old garden, sand, Wollastonite
Build a raised bed out of the old garden soil. beside the strawberries along the fence line.
Dig a 1x1ft trough in the middle for plants and the soil mixture.
2 days of work it should be done.🤞

 

[Tesorodeoro]

That's kind of a brilliant idea.
I was thinking of taking the end of the enclosure down and scooping off the first 6 inches of soil.

Then replace it again with a dirt mix again.

It's the main area where they get organic food scraps and stuff. So they're out in this area a lot of the time.

You just had to have a little tractor there to turn it.

 

[pepperj]

You just had to have a little tractor there to turn it.

Scooping is not a problem. I have 2 tractors, and a skidsteer. 5 tillers, a few mowers.
Blew my hydraulic pump on the big tractor loading dirt.
Either the shaft splines or the pump splines.
But the front of the loader has to be taken off to remove the pump.

Not a productive day for soils.