Share Your Gardening Tips, Methods Etc

When I first started gardening my plot was 8 ft x 10 ft, later when I had the larger plot to Garden I enjoyed experimenting with ideas to reduce weeds, make it easy to weed, get earlier Harvest, and get more bounty.
WEEDING
My favorite tool to weed with was the shuffle Hoe, it would cut the weeds at or just below the surface of the soil. I would go up and down the rows once a week and cut any weed seedling that has sprouted. At first I was using a claw cultivator which is great for aerating the soil around plants, but many weed seedlings that got buried would return.
I space my plants so the shuffle hoe would fit between them. Weeds that were under or close to the plant had to be hand-picked, to reduce or eliminate those weeds, I tried a different method of
PLANTING & SOWING
When planting my veggie seedlings ( tomatoes, peppers, etc.), first I would prepare a soil mix of peat moss, sterilized soil, & fertilizer in a wheel barrel. This mix would be used to fill the hole where I planted my seedling. This sterilize soil mix did eliminate most of the weeds that would be directly around the seedling.
To sow seeds like melon, squash, cukes directly in the ground, I would use a bulb planter to make a hole, fill the hole with sterilize peat moss then plant my seed. This eliminated any weeds growing directly around the seeds, and provided a fungus free base for the seeds to germinate.
My garden was approximately 50ft x 55ft and I was continually trying to find better ways to care for it.
Later I would turn to mulches to keep the weeds down.
Any gardening suggestions or message you may have let's hear about them.

 

The most time comsuming ,hard work was the Hugelculture for sure. I built that pile myself with a shovel and hand truck.My daughter came down and put in about 20 wheelbarrrows of dirt out of the about 50 I needed.But I also had to get the brush from woods to put in over the logs I had to use a hand truck to transfer to plie.We had to use the dirt from back of feild so that made it more work pushing wheelbarrow across field ro mound. We did move the garden area closer to the housse though,amart move!. Then wait for about 4 years for it to break down,but you can use it sooner if you apply nutruents to top soil.which of course is what the mound will do later once it starts breaking ddown.

 

I didn't take pictures while building this but here it is after I dug a 3' trench put large logs in then filled with some dirt bruch from tree limbs and a few doxens wheelbarrows. This was about 7 years ago when I first started this project and I was still in good shape.



I had to use hay to cover it later I put leaves over it.



I smoothed it out applied a little more dirt and added hay ,,its done.A peojuect I never would have started ifr I knew how much work it would be,most peopel use heavy equipment to build these mounds this large.I just kept telling myself [ Bible quote] 'there plenty of time to rest in the grave where thy is going' to keep going,that'l put a buest of energy in the ol body.

 

Wow!!! MAYBE a lot of work but it looks great, I hope you had a lot of Success With It.

 

Thank you Tony and we had really good succes with this as you can see in some pictures.We had lots of pictures byt Photobucket made me take them off or pay so I deleted them till the price came down.Now they are gone forever I guess.

 

The hydroponics wasn't much work at all it was the hugelkulture mound that was really lots of work.I don't always make myself clear,sorry.

 

Yes I almost bit off more than I could chew on that mound. We cut down some trees so I gigured I'd make use of them. So I loaded them on a hand truck and took them to the trench I dug to put them in.Hubby ws busy repairing the van and checken pens at the time,.He told me not to do it,lol.

 

The one I used is buried in my barn right now, with the threat of hurricane my family packed a lot of yard stuff into the barn for protection, but my back right now I can't dig it out.
Here is a photo of a similar one I hope it helps.
I don't know if you're supposed to but every few weeks I would sharpen the edge.

 

I've always wanted to try hydroponics, I first saw it in Disney World and became very intrigued by it.

 

Looks like a sling blade ,kinda,hubby said looks like a rool for young people,lol.He too has bad baak,lots of metal rods,3 cages and nuts,bolts and screws. So he has good and bad days.Got off opiates almost 2 yers ago. Withsdrawals were more often than pain releif. It wasn't easy. He was taking the polls more for withdrawals than pain near the end of 17 years.

 

My garden originally was 3 ft. X 10 ft. I made it 3 ft. wide so I could reach everything without walking in the garden itself. I bordered it with pressure treated landscaping ties and used landscaping paper with prepositioned holes where each plant would go before planting which eliminated weeding. I located it in the farthest corner of the yard since the previous owner had a garden there where he added much garden soil.

That was then. Eventually I got tired of walking through dewy wet grass in the morning and just the distance to travel to set it all up and take down and the amount of work in general.

I quit that area and removed the ties only to find that I had created a condo for termites. I stood them all on end to dry before I brought them near the house for removal.

Now I have only two 18 in. X 18 in. areas prepared near each other for two tomato plants with brick borders located 4 ft. from where I hang out on the patio. It’s much less work and enough for me at this time.

 

We use to grow enough to can but that was years ago. We too moved our garden and greenhouse and chicken pens closer to the house.Only have 4 hens now so they have lots of pen room plus they free range all day.
I wish I had of put in solaream
'spl' to plant inside house for climate control.

 

John we used pea gravel they last forever and clean up nicely for reuse.But I do understand you were just useing it for project.