My garden is basically a huge PIB !!!

[JDgreen227]

Started it back in '97 with a few tomatoes, gradually kept expanding it until today it measures about 30'X60'. We live in the country, meaning wildlife abounds, I took the cats out at 7 am this morning and I could see three rabbits in the yard even without my glasses. And there are numerous deer, possums, skunks, etc. so of course anything planted has to be protected. Hmm, the last two years I have redone the fence, dug holes for 20 treated landscape posts and set them in concrete...$160 for posts and concrete alone. Then I built a 4 foot hinged gate, and a 10 foot movable gate...probably $50 for lumber and hardware there. Replaced all 5 foot high fence wire, even cheap stuff cost $160 for 200 feet. Then add another $80 for two foot high rabbit gard mesh...PLUS ALL THE LABOR TO DO THIS...

Now that the fence is done, lets get to the real S--- about country gardening here...take a look at the attachment. Those planters were bare soil five weeks ago, the field across the road has 5 foot high weeds and quackgrass growing wild, guess which way the wind usually blows here? Meaning any and all bare soil in planters, flowerbeds, GARDENS, etc quickly becomes full of quackgrass sprouts and roots, and it's next to impossible to keep them free of the stuff. The only way I can possibly have a garden free of weeds and quackgrass is to use that black landscape fabric to cover EVERYTHING EXCEPT MY VEGGIES. I so envy those who can plant seeds and sets in their soil and not have them quickly and permanently overgrown with the unwanted vegetation. I have tried using weed and grass killer, it works for two weeks,and then yet ANOTHER new crop of seeds begins sprouting.

Have you priced landscape fabric recently? Can you imagine having to use enough of it to cover an 1800 square foot garden area? Can you imagine the headache trying to put down 1800 square feet of the fabric when the wind is almost always blowing?

And my wife wonders why I come in late in the afternoon grumbling under my breath "Frickin garden is more bother than it's worth".

Thanks for letting me rant...:laughing:

 

[dave1949]

You gave me a good laugh! Those are nice pig weeds you got coming on in that container.

I think you are making the case for raised bed gardens where every inch is well used, instead of the typical row garden where most of your expensive to enclose/protect area is not growing veggies.

On the bright side, if the weeds take hold that well, you have good soil :laughing:

Dave.

 

[JDgreen227]

You gave me a good laugh! Those are nice pig weeds you got coming on in that container.

I think you are making the case for raised bed gardens where every inch is well used, instead of the typical row garden where most of your expensive to enclose/protect area is not growing veggies.

On the bright side, if the weeds take hold that well, you have good soil :laughing:

Dave.

Some of it is pig weed yes, but the majority is quack grass sprouts. What I didn't reveal in my original rant was the 16 inches of rain in May that rotted out $50 worth of onion, tomato, and potato sets....

 

[DocHeb]

Every gardener should read the book The $64 Tomato by William Alexander. It is a quick read, and will having you shake your head in agreement!

 

[JDgreen227]

Every gardener should read the book The $64 Tomato by William Alexander. It is a quick read, and will having you shake your head in agreement!

Thank you for the information...looks like an interesting read. Back when I started the garden all I wanted was a few tomatoes...it was HER IDEA to expand it and plant all the other stuff....REALLY.

 

[MossRoad]

Nice!

I also have several hundred dollars worth of rabbit fence lined with a hundred dollars worth of chicken wire surrounded with three strands of electrified wire to protect $30.00 worth of veggies. :licking:

Makes perfect sense. :laughing:

I have mentioned before that I should switch from growing veggies to growing rabbits, woodchucks and moles, since I have much better success with those. :thumbsup:

 

[YesDeere]

I figure your better off not thinking about it. I trenched my wire fence two feet in the ground. Then used all treated 4by4s. Then ran electric fence in three strands. This is on a garden about 75 by 100 feet. Never added it up and I'm not gonna. But I got some dam fine beans;-)

 

[jonyyuma]

Something must be wrong with your whitetail deer?? Ours insist that the fence be 8 feet tall to keep them out...I bet I spend more than a hundred dollars just on plant s and seed for our garden.. We never sell anything, either eat it or give it away..

 

[Chuck52]

I figure your better off not thinking about it. I trenched my wire fence two feet in the ground. Then used all treated 4by4s. Then ran electric fence in three strands. This is on a garden about 75 by 100 feet. Never added it up and I'm not gonna. But I got some dam fine beans;-)

Congratulations on your beans! Last night I found Japanese beetles on my pole beans. Turns out 2x4 welded wire doesn't stop them very well. :smiley_aafz:

Chuck

 

[YesDeere]

I usually use sevin and it works great. This year however the wife is pregnant with our first and chemicals are a no no. So I've been using niemoil. I have had pretty good success so far. Feel like a dam hippy doing it though

 

[YesDeere]

As for the deer. I usually teach them a lesson early. I smear peanut butter on the electric fence!! Works good!!!

 

[GGB]

Regarding "The $64 Tomato", I'd bet that if I'd written it, the title would have been "The $100 Tomato"!

GGB

 

[dmccarty]

Congratulations on your beans! Last night I found Japanese beetles on my pole beans. Turns out 2x4 welded wire doesn't stop them very well. :smiley_aafz:

Chuck

Our garden is fallow this year. I had great plans, weeded, planted dozens and dozens of seeds for transplants, did it early, etc.

The some family issues popped up and no garden.

You guys with gardens are killing me. I do have one tomato volunteer.

For Japanese Beetles, there are traps at the farm store that attract the devil's spawn. The traps have a chemical attractor, and a yellow divider holding open a bag. The bugs follow the smell, hit the yellow divider and fall into the bag from which they cannot escape.

The traps really do work. Much less work than spraying too.

Later,
Dan

 

[keegs]

And I used to think I was the only one keep a running tab on what it's costing to maintain a veg garden. :laughing:

 

[JDgreen227]

And I used to think I was the only one keep a running tab on what it's costing to maintain a veg garden. :laughing:

Thanks all for the input, and some of you made me laugh. I had the very best, most fertile soil of my garden plot tilled, raked, leveled, all ready to plant my beans. Then my cop neighbor texted me to ask if his kids (4 and 5 years old) could do some planting in my garden plot, it only took me an instant to decide and text back, "sure, they can use the area to the west that has been raked and leveled, it's the best soil"

How can anyone look at these cute kids in the attachment and NOT give up the best area of the garden for them?

 

[jonyyuma]

Kids seem to get the lesson from where food comes ? I would not count on too high a yield from the planting, unless you give close supervison and before it gets hot. Our Contender GB's are over afoot tall and blooming.The purple-hull peas are not quite that high yet. This is the first time in years that they both came-up on the first planting? I did have several tomatoes die ,from I guess Drowning..?

 

[Western]

Good to let those kids in the "prime" spot. they may take to gardening and grow up spending $100's of dollars, just because.

That is some of the nicest "quick grass" I have ever seen, nice job.

Careless weeds are the ones that I don't like, at least that's what they call them here.

I have almost always had a garden, but skipped this year. It only really makes economical sense if counted as therapy, mental and physical.

 

[JDgreen227]

Good to let those kids in the "prime" spot. they may take to gardening and grow up spending $100's of dollars, just because.

That is some of the nicest "quick grass" I have ever seen, nice job.

Careless weeds are the ones that I don't like, at least that's what they call them here.

I have almost always had a garden, but skipped this year. It only really makes economical sense if counted as therapy, mental and physical.

$100's of dollars, LOL, so far this year I have had $150 or tomatoes, potatoes, onions, etc rot away becuz of the rain in May (16 inches). A retired guy in the country HAS to have a garden, it's an unwritten rule. And as we all know, the stuff we "produce" tastes so much better than store veggies. Yeah, we tell us ourselves that to justify all the work and expense...:laughing:

 

[Chuck52]

So far I've tilled under two sets of bush beans, maybe due to the weather. They came up, but did poorly and then the weeds swamped them. I thought I was gonna lose all my tomatoes, too, after they got whacked by hail twice, but after I put in all my extra starts the original tomatoes decided to live. Now I have 50 tomato plants of 10 different varieties. Who knows, maybe they'll eventually bless me with some fruit.

Grandkids turn out to be useful for weeding. My 11 yo granddaughter weeded my peppers so nicely I should have taken some pictures. It sure was fun watching her. She crawled over under around and through the patch and took out everything that wasn't a pepper. About half way through she stood up and stretched her back just like grandpa....but unlike grandpa she then went back to work. That was last week and the weeds are back stronger than ever now, so I need to go fetch her for another round. I knew my kids would pay me back sometime, just didn't think it would take a whole new generation to get the job done!

Chuck

 

[MoKelly]

And my wife wonders why I come in late in the afternoon grumbling under my breath "Frickin garden is more bother than it's worth".[/QUOTE]

I feel your pain. But, for whatever reason, we come back every year.

I can live with th eweeds and four legged creatures ... I can manage to keep them out mostly. However, the BIRDS are killing me. They eat my watermellon.

MoKelly