Tuesday, May 22, 2012

My Birthday Present

BJ, my husband, set up the sprinkler and drip system last night. I was so excited. I set the timer on the two zones. Zone 1 is down stairs from the deck in the vegetable beds. Zone 2 is on the deck for the hanging baskets and the herb pots. I was so excited!! Now we would be able to go on our weekend trips through out the summer and come home to plant that were still alive and doing well (hopefully).

In my hurry to post my project to my blog, I forgot two important pictures. The top is where we have been storing the pallets for the last16 years that I have been around. The next is a picture of the Raised Garden Kit from Ace Hardware before it was assembled.



Now the pallet pile is much smaller. BJ originally picked up to burn in the winter for the downstairs stove. He never cut them up so we could burn them.
Now the sprinkler and drip system:

 Research was easy with the internet. I decided on an Orbit because I had the options I wanted. I only needed a two zone. But I wanted to be able to control several watering times throughout the day.

  From the yard looking up to the deck.


 That is BJ working his way down from the deck to Zone 1 on the ground.













 Zone 1 has a sprinkler in each corner of the bed which waters 1/4th of the bed. So we have four sprinklers.







WE have a bed on each side of the stairs for my easy 


access for future weeding and harvesting.



                                                      
 Up on the deck is zone 2 with two areas. this area is set up for the herbs and I have my cherry tomatoes. I am keeping those separate from the Early Girly tomatoes so they hopefully well not cross pollinate.



 The water goes into the manifold that then dispenses the water to the individual pots.


There is a manifold at a corner on each of the beds for distribution of water.










The drip system on the deck (zone 2).








you can see the hose coming down from the main hose system to this hanging geranium.
Did I say I was so excited?

Monday, May 21, 2012

Raised bed garden. May 2012

April 12th I went to Lowes and looked at all the vegetable and fruit seeds. I really had spring fever BAD, bad, bad. I wanted to start a garden, however there were no plants only seeds. 

We had been having an early warmer than normal spring and was many parts of these united states. Since it was really early I decided to start the seeds myself. Half the time I do this it is a waste of money. The starters get mold or root rot. So I got the whole starter stuff and came home to plant my seeds.

 Each day I made sure there was water in each of the trays.

I put them all out each day to get some natural light.
 Each night I would bring them in and set them on the kitchen cupboard.


We were having warm days and most nights were warmer than normal and did not freeze.

I did not want to take the chance of freezing, just in case the weather man/woman was inaccurate I brought these little plants into the house.
I used photo paper to mark what was planted where. 


As I would never, never do to any of my daughters, I hovered over these little plants day and night. That is the helicopter approach to gardening. That my work on seedlings, however do not try this on children.


On the photo paper I wrote the plant date and the plant name. I cut these out in strips and folded them and placed them in the dirt.

I continued my vigil until about May 12th. My grandsons came over and helped build elevated plant beds. They actually did the whole thing. 

I wanted the bed to be near the deck and elevated so I could easily care for the plants and harvest the bounty!!

 We bought the  beds at Ace hardware. They were pretty inexpensive.


We had a bunch of pallets just sitting in the yard so we had the boys pile three and then put the yard fabric on top then the plant bed.
 The boys then filled each bed (two only) with good soil.


 My helicopter approach to the seeds worked. I hovered enough and it looks like I will have a good crop.







So now I need to put the plants into the the beds.
I am so excited I will have fresh vegetables.
They look pretty good and hearty.