Mid Summer 2015 Container Garden Report

This is our mid-summer review on the container garden and the various techniques and choices made.

There has been almost no rain, almost no overcast, and very hot temperatures. Things were different this summer in various ways.

We tried the following techniques (a) put the lettuce and the herbs such as basil in partial shade in the hope they would not bolt so quickly. (b) preventively spray with copper solution and neem oil now and then, (c) when disease or insects attack, spray with various solutions and then ruthlessly and carefully remove the affected areas and / or remove the entire plant, (d) leave more space than ever before between plants, especially the beans and tomatoes, even though this would probably reduce overall yield because of less growing area, (e) provide support for everything, beans, tomatoes, and cucumbers, (f) in the case of tomatoes, try growing the seedlings in these peat moss starting pods that they sell.

All of these techniques worked out to one extent or another and are recommended.

What did not work out was that we had total failure on our carrots and our peas, two different types. I do not know why. I suspect that the peas were victims of the birds, see below.

One surprise was that for the first time, the birds viciously attacked small seedlings, particularly the tomatoes, cucumbers and peas.

Bird countermeasures consist of $20 of green plastic fencing cut half height and surrounding each seedling with a cylinder of fencing material. This worked splendidly and had the additional benefit of providing support to the plant (cucumbers and tomatoes).

The end result was pretty good availability of romaine, green beans and just ok cucumbers. Basil was very useful. Almost all of these but the basil are now history. The tomatoes are just starting. Peas and carrots were a total failure.

We had less disease this year. The green beans always had a lower leaf yellow rot that I removed by scissors. One cucumber plant had a billion aphids, knocked back with insecticidal soap and then the plant removed. The cucumber leaves always had some sort of horrible rot that might have just been leaf burn and which I ignored.

Strangely, plants that in the past had delivered many crops only delivered one this year. Green beans and cucumbers are most notable here.

Going forward, the use of shade for lettuce and herbs, the much greater space between plants, and the use of the green fencing are all solidly recommended.

This cost very little this year, as we are in that sweet spot that equipment bought can be reused but new equipment not needed.

Finally, one final word of caution. If one were to do this to actually live on or for economic purposes, the scale would have to be vastly increased, and no doubt new issues would emerge.

Garden Update Spring 2015

I have no idea who, if anyone, is interested in my gardening experiment. But here is my update, Spring 2015.

At first I was not going to have a garden this year since I have learned most of what I expect to learn and since I have much less time than before.

But I decided to plant another round anyway for the following reasons: the incremental work since everything has been set up is small, I own all the seeds and materials I need for most of this next season (e.g. insecticidal soap, copper solution, time release fertilizer), and because I wanted to see if I could get better results from the peas and beans disease wise by spreading them out. Also to see if I could get the lettuce to not bolt so fast by planting them in the shade.

So we planted

4 x rows pole beans

4 x rows sugar daddy peas

2 x rows oregon sugar peas

1 row and 1 container romaine lettuce, 1 in shade and 1 not

2 x containers basil

4 x containers sweet 100 cherry tomatoes

2 x rows carrots

I will plant a few containers of cucumbers and a few of semi-determinate hybrid tomatoes if I can find any.

In the past, a planting of this type has resulted in occasional useful crops of all the above vegetables, with some disease and bolting problems. As long as you are not depending on them, they are nice to have fresh from time to time. The pole beans and the peas are by far the most regularly available and actually useful (as I do not normally buy them at the store due to the prices).

The garden experiment is mostly over. It is fascinating to get a feel for the genetic and development issues in plants, and it is also fascinating to see with my own eyes the continuous struggle with disease and pests. If you have never seen this before, it is worth it. As an economic or health activity (e.g. save money or improve health with fresh vegetables) it is marginal. I would have to invest much more and scale way up before the incremental value was worth the investment.

All Will be Well in the Garden: Summer 2014 Edition

These are my notes from my ongoing container garden experiment for the summer of 2014.

The goals of the experiment has been to understand a bit more about what it takes to grow your own food and to perhaps improve the quality of my life (or food) just a little bit by having higher quality ingredients around (e.g. fresh string beans, herbs, peas, etc).

The result has been mostly positive and enlightening if uneven. To recap: there is a constant war between the garden and pests, the startup and operating costs are rather high unless you can exploit economies of scale, and finally, gardening is fun but farming is work. I would hate to have to make a living this way.

I could not feed myself at this scale of effort. I can at times have a better fresh salad, or tastier food, with the garden and that is entertaining. I can see where strategies of having citizens owning “victory gardens”, e.g. USSR in WW2, would have been value added.

This is the 5^th or so planting and there are two plantings per year. I have focused this summer on my past successes: beans, peas, cucumbers and the ongoing herbs and peppers. The basil was renewed. There has been a constant war with the aphids. No tomatoes this time. Experimenting with arrugula and green onions.

Because the container garden here is somewhat mature, the startup costs are pretty much over. Now what is involved are expendables (making my own potting mix, fungicides, insecticides, seeds) and an occasional refresh of the infrastructure.

Recent observations:

1. Aphids are astounding in their geometric increase. Similar to the breeding rate of Tribbles and for the same reason: they are all females and born pregnant. The current methodology is water spray to knock them down and professional (not homemade) “organic” insecticidal soap bought in quantify (brand Safer) and sprayed with higher quality sprayers. Consistently observed: if three days go by without an aphid inspection, they will have multiplied insanely in that time and become a major problem. The little ants that service the aphids are an excellent clue to the presence of the aphid menace.

2. The higher quality sprayers (at roughly $15-$20 per sprayer) seem to do a much better job than the cheap $5 versions.

3. The $25 water control hose head timer has caused a huge improvement in the garden. The system is set to water twice a day outside of the time of bright sunlight for 4 minutes a pop.

4. I destroyed one of my industrial strength hoses by walking on it to and from the kitchen. Now I have raised the replacement hose above the floor and along the cabinetry so it will not be stepped on.

5. I briefly experimented with Dacomil, a non-organic fungicide and pesticide, but did not see any particular good results so I have stopped using it.   I am continuing with the organic insecticidal soap, copper (bordeaux solution) spray, and Neem oil, all bought in quantity.

To repeat myself: gardening is fun but farming is work. I could not feed myself at this scale but would have to expand many times and I only have to feed one person. I would hate to have to make a living this way.

All Will Be Well in the Garden (Summer 2013)

In the garden, growth has it seasons. First comes spring and summer, but then we have fall and winter. And then we get spring and summer again.  

My status report on the 1.5 year experimental container garden is as follows:

-- gardening is expensive, you will not save money, except for maybe an herb garden

-- plants are weird

-- plants have enemies, lots of enemies. your only hope is to proactively spray with copper spray and neem oil unless you go non-organic.

-- all substances must be bought in quantity and mixed yourself or you will spend even more money. specifically, I mean potting mix, copper spray and neem oil.

-- potting mix is not dirt

-- throw away diseased plants and potting mix. do not reuse potting mix after one year.

-- replenish with time release fertilizer and immediate release cool aid

-- tomatoes are a pain in the ass, get all sorts of diseases, are very picky about their watering and fertilizer.

-- there is good information on the internet and there is crazy information on the internet. You will have to find out which is which.

-- buy disease resistant plants/seeds or you will be sorry

-- inspect every day

-- harvest the peas and beans relentlessly or the damn things will stop producing.

-- buy vining and indeterminate, stay away from determinate and bush.

-- concrete mixing bins from home depot / lowes make good garden containers

-- use wire to trellis

-- plant serially, use nature's simultaneity to your advantage. when harvesting basil from a productive plant, start the next plant so you will have something in three months.

-- using the simultaneity and economies of scale are the keys to successful gardening

-- if you want to improve your quality of life and save money, just do an herb garden, and leave it at that.

The quote above is from Being There.

Other notes, 6/18/2013

-- relentlessly remove diseased leaves or parts, and throw into trash
-- be aware that some of this is spreadable, so take some care not to spread disease by
contact, wash hands, etc
-- plants must be placed separate from each other to provide good ventilation, this helps stop the spread of disease
-- you must have full 360 access to plants to remove disease parts, inspect them etc
-- I use a green translucent ribbon to tie up plants to metal supports
-- I make use of hanging plants a lot to achieve separation and to keep plants off the ground where different pests like to live (e.g. slugs, etc)
-- yield will be greatly increased if you have something like a simple greenhouse or cold frame
-- if you are working from seed you are expected to cruelly thin plants, e.g. choose a winner and clip off the losers in any one area so that plants are not crowding each other.

The Container Garden in Hell and its Impact on Social Networking

You may ignore this post if you are interested in the larger topics of this blog. This post is in the "trivial issues of my pathetic so-called life" topic. It does have a social networking spin though, that I at least find interesting.

I maintain a garden here in Hell. I live in Escondido, Ca, which was originally known as Rancho Rincon del Diablo (or the Devil's Place, e.g. Hell). No one knows how it got that name but I suspect that they do know, they are just not saying. I am here for a variety of reasons, but the most important one is that it saves money. Its nice but inconvenient for anything I need to do other than sit and type, and I am very lonely down here.

I have a patio, so I started a container garden because I thought it would get me outside more, be economical, possibly improve the quality of my life (e.g. fresh herbs) and because I thought it would be fun. Well it is fun, it is also expensive, and educational.

The bottom line is this. If you have to leave your garden in August and there is no one to water it (and no money to set up an automatic watering system), then in fact putting the movable part of the garden in the shade will allow it to survive for a week. Anything in the sun doesn't have a chance.  I had to leave my garden to attend SIGGRAPH 2012 and thus this experiment was performed.   

Container gardening has an interesting social networking story to tell, I think. There are a lot of gardening forums out there and there is a lot of useful information. There is also a tremendous amount of crap. Anything you read about gardening on the Internet, you can find an authority spouting advice saying the exact opposite. Frankly, its a little pathetic. Why do people say these things, when they have not tested them, or do not know whether they work or not ? Why shouldn't they ? Its really all about their ego and the size of their virtual, umm, well, you know, "member", virtually speaking that is. I think. Maybe. But what I am describing is very real, its not at all subtle. You can read an answer to any topic, and quickly find the opposite answer somewhere, equally authoritative, without any trouble. It is probably a decent topic for a masters or PhD thesis to gather some numbers on the phenomenon. This might mean picking N topics at random. Pick M answers to the N topics. See what percentage of the answers contradict each other in either subtle or overt ways.

One more thing, if you do think about a garden, I can save you a lot of time and money. Just do a fresh herb garden, it is inexpensive, it works, it is not much trouble. Plant it serially (e.g. replant it regularly, say every 4 months) and you will have a continuous supply. We are mostly talking about fresh basil here. You might also look at some leaf lettuce, a little harder than herbs, but not much harder. Once you try to scale up from there, e.g. tomatoes, cucumbers, peas, beans, then the space, time and work required goes up significantly. And if you are like me, you will be amazed at the number, variety, camouflage and cleverness of the biological enemies of your garden, just waiting, lurking, ready to pounce.

So keep it simple and move on.

Too bad about those forums, though.