Crop Circles

My wife thinks its funny that I spent so much time planning my crop placement and wanted me to post this spreadsheet. She forgets that I'm a Project Manager and that planning is my job. If enough thought is done upfront then little intervention is needed later. It's hard work to make it look so easy during execution.

I found another great site on crop placement HERE and used it to help with my spacing. I decided to use the last one for aesthetic reasons - the taller plants are further from the house and the shorter plants are closest to the house.

Yes I do this for about anything I do and it drives my wife crazy - and she still argues with me about stuff!

Rome wasn't built in a day

After 2 tons of dirt moving and several trips to the dirt store - the garden is built! For those of you who don't know I moved over 4000 pounds of dirt, sod, and clay on my "vacation". My back hurts, my hands are scared, and I think my wife is ready for me to go back to work.

I've laid out the grid with string - all we need are plants. The onions are planted the lettuce seeds have been spread, and everything else is sitting in the seed starter kit. The spare bedroom looks like some high school kids illegal grow room. I credit the growth to the heating pad you can't see in the picture that sits under the grow kit.

Square Foot Gardening

No comedy in this posting - just a place to put some links.

Square Foot Gardening
A gardening technique where rows are substituted for square foot plots. Google Square Foot Gardening and images of some impressive Square Foot Gardens.

• Requires 80% less space than conventional gardening.
  
• Can be done in as little as 4 feet by 4 feet - or as large as you want.
  
• Uses 20% less water then conventional gardening - watering the plants and not the dirt between the rows.
  
• Produces 5 times the harvest of a conventional garden.
  

Double Digging
A gardening technique where you enhance crappy subsoil (clay) with some good growing material. The trick is to mix 50% good growing material into the subsoil and 100% good growing material on top. This should give your roots plenty of space.

Getting Started

Who knew being a farmer was hard? I've always lived by the "work smarter not harder" philosophy, but when you are a fish out of the water that is just not possible. Build a raised garden - how hard could that be? If you knew what you were doing probably not that hard. Someone who is clueless with a few beers - it takes 3 days.



I chose the Lincoln log approach with landscaping limbers, reinforced with 1/2 inch rebar and 6 inch nails. It looks real nice, but a pain in the butt lining up the holes and the timbers. One thing is for sure, this should withstand the next tornado season.

Behold - my first major project of our new house. A 16 by 4 - 1 foot raised garden planter. Next comes the garden ready dirt mix that I found at Minick Materials.

A Long Row To Hoe

We're keeping it simple the first year - since nothing will probably grow anyways. We chose generic things and used a seed starting kit that looks like a tiny greenhouse.

• Roma Tomatoes
• Sweet Peppers
• Green Peppers
• Jalapenos
• Cucumbers
  
• Zucchini
• Green Onions

I have to add that my wife wants to be a farmer too and grow flowers. I don't know what she is on, but she looked long and hard and came up with the ugliest and weirdest flower she could find. I'm not even sure if you call it a flower. It looks like a wad of brains - UGLY. I think it's called Celosia Red Velvet.

So you want to be a farmer?

This is my first attempt to blog so be gentle. First off I have no imagination so my blog must have a theme otherwise I'll never make myself consistently write something. This year I'm building a garden and going to grow thing and then eat them - my favorite thing to pass the time.

We have a huge backyard that is...empty and boring. What better way to do something about it then build a huge garden planter that will look ugly and white trash in a couple months with a half baked garden. My wife is having second thoughts about this already.

We decided to keep it simple and build a 12 foot by 4 foot planter. Just playing around we tried a 16 foot by 4 planter and just may end up going bigger. What's better then a an ugly white trash half baked garden then an even bigger ugly white trash half baked garden.

Before we could finish a thunderstorm rolled in and I first start to wonder if little plants will survive an Oklahoma spring storm. Less then 2 weeks ago a tornado touched down less then a quarter a mile away and destroyed a Target and Chuck E Cheese.