This past weekend I did a lot of work in the yard and garden. Springtime is one of my favorite times of the year as I love working outside.
A few things accomplished:
Raised bed – lettuce, carrots and a few beans planted from seed
Main Garden – Layer of screened top soil and compost spread evenly. Will be tilling it up shortly and then will start planting cucumbers, squash, tomatoes, and more beginning of April.
Strawberry Bed – The plants on the left side were just planted. I doubled the width of this bed and added new plants. Will be pinching off any flowers and berries that start to get the plants energy into the root growth. Everbearing strawberry plants on the left will hopefully product well this year.
Raised Bed – I have used about half of it – planted several rows of beans. Will be erecting some support twine this week.
New Plum tree planted – a little hard to see but there on the left is a newly planted plum tree. In the back behind the wood on the ground is an established 4 year old plum tree. These need cross pollination. Last year my tree failed to yield fruit – neighbors plum tree’s proved to be too far away I guess.
Blueberry and Blackberry Raised Bed – Just behind my main garden and strawberry bed is another 4′ x 8′ raised bed. This bed contains a couple of blackberry and blueberry plants. This bed was new last year and I did get a couple of blackberry’s. Hope to get more this year.
I also have started around 12 buckets of red potatoes. My wife also started readying her herb garden. Been using water from my rain barrel to get the seeds and new plants going.
Soon she will make a salad bowl using different lettuce types from the garden along with some sliced cucumbers.
Can’t wait.
Rourke
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Rourke,
If you don’t mind me asking, what did it cost to fill your garden box? I thought about making some 8’x8′ boxes, but it would cost about $100/box to fill them with potting/planting soil. What did you use?
Thanks for your time and thanks for the great site,
Lee
Lee –
Good question. If you have t do everything from scratch here is an approx cost:
3 8′ x 10″ board for the box = $24.00
need to fill the bed with approx 32 cubic feet of dirt (top soil, potting soil, compost, etc.)
I estimate a need of approx 25 bags of top soil @ 1.29 each = $32.25
plus
2 bags of GOOD composted cow manure like Black Kow @ $4.00 each = $8.00 or so
plus
4 bags of potting soil @ $1.89 each = $7.56
Total = Just under $72.00
If it can be afforded extra compost and an addition of peat moss can make a world of difference. If you have some soil on your property you can till it the price drops a lot.
Do it!!!
Check out – https://modernsurvivalonline.com/creating-a-raised-bed-garden/
Rourke
Nice to see the garden started. It sure feels like spring! It’s good to get more fruit in (trees, bushes, and plants) since once established they produce huge amounts of food (and calories) on a yearly basis with little effort by you other than picking them.
Impressive – nothing tastes better than food you raised on your own.
Rourke,
I do believe your math if off slightly. A raised bed 8′ x 8′ x10″ will require 53 cubic feet of filler(32 square feet is what you get based on a 4′ x 8′ bed(with no depth considered). Based on your pricing for current compost/topsoil/wood, would this still come in at under a $100? 25 bags of topsoil is a lot of dirt, but will it fill an area 8′ x 8′ x 10″?
Johnson –
3 boards at 8 feet long and 10″ tall will make a 8 foot x 4 foot bed. This creates 32 square feet of ground space which of course needs approx 10″ of soil on top. Getting approx 32 cubic feet will do the trick as the dirt will settle some.
I should have said the exact size of the bed. 25 bags will not fill it – will need more from compost, potting soil, etc.
Thanks – like your eye for details. Need a job?
Rourke
Looks great! I’m stuck on anything free right now, this year I’ve managed to do everything for about 32 bucks! Do you guys trade or barter there is SC? Just sayin’.. 😉
Survivalchick –
I am sure we could work something out!
Rourke