The family garden
I don’t know about anyone else, but we’ve had some really wonky weather around here. Temperatures up to near 80 degrees last weekend, then a sudden drop and snow on Thursday. It’s been a really crazy first-week-of-spring!
Still, the gardening but has bit and we were able to get some cool weather crops planted in our raised beds. We also planted some lettuce and radishes in hanging pots. This got me to thinking about all the families who may not be able to plant in a regular garden for one reason or another, or even have small raised beds. These hanging pots are really inexpensive, as is potting soil, which goes a long way just putting it into pots like this.
Almost anyone can find a spot for a hanging pot, or for pots that sit on tables or the edges of decks. While you won’t be able to grow corn or large rooted veggies in them, you can certain grow things like radishes, lettuce and even tomatoes, peppers, and green beans. You just need to put fewer in each pot. For example, if you want to grow a couple of tomato plants, use at least a 2 gallon pot, filled with good soil, for each plant. Same for peppers. Lettuce can be direct seeded into smaller pots. Just sow thinly so it’s not overcrowded. You could put a few radish seeds in each pot of lettuce, too.
Seeds are very inexpensive. You might want to check at one of the $1 stores in your area. I’ve seen them as low as .10 a packet, and you can get a lot of garden seeds for just that price. Imagine growing a garden with a total seed investment of a dollar! If you’re wiling to work a little hauling soil, mulch, and manure, you can mix your oil beautiful organic soil for your potted garden and not have to pay the price of premium potting soil. Still, even if you buy the bagged soil, it’s pretty low cost and ready to use when you get it home. In fact, if you have a place, you can just cut a couple of large X’s in the bags, poke drainage holes in the other side, and plant directly into the bagged soil. I’ve seen this done even for potatoes and onions.
Start dreaming now and you can have homegrown, organic produce in just a few weeks.
Labels: gardening
posted by Ann crum @ 10:34 AM
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