AMAC'S 2012 garden

[AMAC]

I'm excited to get growing with some veggies this year. I have lived in my house not yet a year but there have been many improvements. One notable improvement is the "raised" bed garden I constructed. After fighting with the cost of cedar and the longetivity issues with other boards, I decided to build a stone wall bed. Well, "wall" is a long stretch, i'ts more of a stacked rock line. It's about 21 X 7' and held 9yd of compost/topsoil. I had to import this soil as my land has a bit lead in it.



The "wall" was fairly cheap, $75 delivered for 6 yd of stones mixed with wood bits that i discarded. I have read two gardening books where i found soil blocks to be pretty neat. Either im super cheap or inventive, I decided to make my own blocker. Here is stage one and two.






They seem to work pretty well. Stage two was made by potting epoxy in stage 1's former and then attached to a plunger in stage 2. I may make stage 3 for tomatoes & peppers.




There is the setup in the basement. We have a few things for early consumption, endive, spinach, arugula and spices.I also have started some Mary Washington asparagus, De Cicco Broccoli, two Anaheim and two Ancho chillies. I have some Purple Jersey asparagus stock coming in the mail. The dang asparagus hasn't sprouted yet it's been about 13 days at 70F, I'm watching that and patiently waiting. Well, that's the setup so far. I think my last frost date is 16 Apr. I'll start some tomatoes likely at the end of this week.

[AMAC]

broccoli sprouts are the winners thus far.

[xapabwa]

Very nice. I cheat with mine, I buy all of my veggie plants as sproutlings at the garden center except for my green beans which I can plant directly in the ground when it gets warm enough. Have seeds from my mom that came from my great aunt's pole bean plants. I have cats, so having anything green and living in the house can be challenging, never mind having flats of dirt

I tried brussel sprouts the first year I had my garden and had cabbage worms EVERYWHERE. Tried broccoli last year and ended up with cabbage worms again. I also planted yellow squash and ended up with squash bugs. The husband and one one of the kids won't eat squash and the other one only likes it fried, so I probably won't give up the space it requires again this year. More room for tomatoes, cucumbers and green beans! I planted two asparagus plants last year, so I'll have those (I hope) as well.

[AMAC]

Well, i think im into some trouble with damping off. A few of my seedlings emerged and died. I used the compost I bought in the mix for soilblocks, it must be that. I think the compost may not be quite finished/too new. The CEC was 30, and I'm told that's on the low side for finished compost, hence it may not have cooked well enough. Anyways, I'm going to have to start over with only soil-less.

[Michael Wise]

I've had 2 good seasons with coir.

[ Post made via iPhone ]

[AMAC]

I got some really great soil mix at the local "medical plat growing shop" Super light, lots of coir, has a complex trace profile, organic nutrients. After searching forever locally, it turns out there is a community of people interested in maximizing their plants, just not vegetables.
I'll use the typical soil-less starting mix without compost then the next size will use that super mix. The super mix is a little too coarse for my mini blocks.

[AMAC]

I had/have an issue with the broccoli. I think they just didn't have enough light. They all grew there second set of true leaves and they just have really weak stems and fall over. They continue to grow so i hope it's just the light. I have since transitioned them to outside but still in pots (plastic baggies w drainage holes). The light is far better outside and it's been so warm. I'm hesitant to plant them this early in case of a frost. I did plant the asparagus babies as i think they are a bit more cold tolerant and they exhibited the same behavior of falling over.

Now that those guys are outside I concentrated on the inside setup. I had poor germination in my last seeding attempt, so this time i made a heated area with a rope light in a plant tray. Works brilliantly. Also I upgraded my lighting. I previously had one twin tube T8 48", now i have that with a T5 48". There spaced about 9" apart on center. The lumen output of the T5 is far more serious, it should be double. With this setup I should have enough light to keep the plants a bit more stocky. I didn't get my pick of bulbs unfortunately as i spent enough on the T5 that came with bulbs. I would have liked some blue light.


This pic shows the new lights with some plants they are all leaning because of the old lights. They should be straight up today. The tomatoes are in the middle and in the seed trays there is some kale, spinach, more tomatoes, arugula, lettuce, peppers again and some corn. I think I'll rotate the tray every day so the plants get an equal share of the T5.

[AMAC]

No pic's lately but many things are in the ground. I don't know if i got suckered into it because of the warm temps or if i was impatient but the tomatoes went in two weeks ago. I watched the soil temp and didn't drop below 50 and more like 55. So, i put them in. What a mistake, the week after we had two freezes. There alive i think but severely hurt. I have a few in the house still so i'll have to replace the worst ones. Strange winter, warm warm, then my 80% chance of frost date comes and we have two more frosts. I'm scared to put the tomatoes out now.
On a plus note, the Broccoli is doing pretty well and the Kale is hanging in there. I'll have to post pic's.

[AMAC]

some updates,
As i mentioned the tomatoes went out too early



some kale and broccoli



and the asparagus bed. I planted the crowns about a foot down and keep piling dirt around the stalks as they grow. surrounding the bed are garlic and some lettuce.