2023 gardening thread

[Saltwater60]

Yep it’s a bit yearly but I’m planning and making moves physically and mentally so I figured I’d lost it up.
What I’ve been doing is the following
I bought a second raised bed on wheels and I’m rather excited.
I’m planning on doing a few bucket tomatoes in 5 gallon buckets.
Last fall I tripled my veggie garden and I’m still adding fruit and veggie scraps to my composter.
I’m adding coffee grounds and rabbit litter boxes to my fruit and veggie growing areas. I’ll fill my composter and then be done with it. I’ll then move onto my ornamentals.
I’m not growing anything from seed and I still haven’t done my hydroponic set up just because of costs. I’ve never been big on doing stuff from seed but last year potted veggie plants were $5/plant so maybe I will.
I’m planning to grow the following
potatoes
Tomatoes
Garlic
Shallots
Peppers
Basil
Snow peas
Green beans
Carrots
My perennials are
Peaches
Apples
Raspberries
Black berries
Blue berries
Strawberries
Plums(maybe)
My plans to add are two pears, plum of my current one dies, more blueberries, and possibly another variety of raspberry like yellow or black.
What is everyone else doing.

 

[99cummins]

The Mrs ordered seeds a couple weeks ago. More cucumbers for pickling. Tomatoes, corn, peppers, beans and a few other things I know I’m forgetting. Planning to add a few more raised beds this spring. We started our little orchard last summer and I think she ordered some more for that as well. My wife is mostly in charge. I’m just the farm hand/mechanic/equipment operator.

 

[Saltwater60]

The Mrs ordered seeds a couple weeks ago. More cucumbers for pickling. Tomatoes, corn, peppers, beans and a few other things I know I’m forgetting. Planning to add a few more raised beds this spring. We started our little orchard last summer and I think she ordered some more for that as well. My wife is mostly in charge. I’m just the farm hand/mechanic/equipment operator.

What fruit treees did you plant?

 

[99cummins]

What fruit treees did you plant?

Apple, pear and something else. A variety of berry bushes and 2 different kinds of grapes. Not sure what else she has planned for this year.

 

[Acer-m14]

no catnip .. its a good tea for bed time .. and if you have cats they get wild lol



and yes going hydro can cost .. them 3 gallon jugs of food cost like 30 or 40 buck each back then

when i was learning hydro .. had to move the pepper plants outside . flower drop .. from temp ..







the only thing i can say with learning hydroponics .. if you get it right .. you can see plant growth every day ..

and its crazy

10 /24 2004

That's November and im growing strawberry's in the house

and Tomatoes too ..


The number 1 thing you need to know with going hydroponic .. who is the pollinator .... you ... or you let some bumble bees loose in the house

 

[Acer-m14]

I still haven’t done my hydroponic set up just because of costs

just remember the hydro food can help feed all crops too

i built all my hydro systems DIY ..

 

[Saltwater60]

just remember the hydro food can help feed all crops too

i built all my hydro systems DIY ..

Even DIY it’s expensive. A 4” pvc 10’ length is $60 and that’s my hold up. Between that and the wood prices I just have other priorities right now. The pvc sucks because I’ll be cutting 2’ off each one and just tossing that and I’ll need about 8-9 of them so your talking $600 in pipe alone.

 

[Depick]

So far for 2023 I’ll plant the usual 6 to 9 tomato plants. I am also considering adding some plants in the front of the house. Possibly peppers or cucumbers. The front of my house receives a ton of sun and there is a good spot to take advantage of it. So maybe a new raised bed or just five gallon buckets. I haven’t decided yet.

 

[Saltwater60]

So far for 2023 I’ll plant the usual 6 to 9 tomato plants. I am also considering adding some plants in the front of the house. Possibly peppers or cucumbers. The front of my house receives a ton of sun and there is a good spot to take advantage of it. So maybe a new raised bed or just five gallon buckets. I haven’t decided yet.

5-gallon buckets seem to work well. Im
Not sure I would grow cucumbers in a 5 gallon bucket. A guy by me made a set of steps for 5 gallon buckets and they grow 3-4 per row 3-4 rows high and it seems to work well.

 

[masterswimmer]

Even DIY it’s expensive. A 4” pvc 10’ length is $60 and that’s my hold up. Between that and the wood prices I just have other priorities right now. The pvc sucks because I’ll be cutting 2’ off each one and just tossing that and I’ll need about 8-9 of them so your talking $600 in pipe alone.

Will the pvc be used in a pressure application? Or is it being used in a gravity fed application?

 

[GOPerfect]

I will be planting a few things this year. I am going to bucket plant only. Maybe ten buckets of veggies in total. Nothing major. All will be done by seeds.

 

[Saltwater60]

Will the pvc be used in a pressure application? Or is it being used in a gravity fed application?

It will not be pressure but you have to drill a bunch of holes in it so I’m not sure I would trust the thin walled drainage stuff. I have enough to keep me busy now anyway but it’s been something I’ve wanted to do for a long time.

 

[Saltwater60]

I will be planting a few things this year. I am going to bucket plant only. Maybe ten buckets of veggies in total. Nothing major. All will be done by seeds.

Have you done bucket planting before this year? Just curious what your fertilizer routine is and I’m going to do 5-6 this year.

 

[GOPerfect]

Nope. First time will be this year. Bought a couple of books, and found some good channels on YouTube.

If I fail, no worries at all.

 

[Saltwater60]

Nope. First time will be this year. Bought a couple of books, and found some good channels on YouTube.

If I fail, no worries at all.

Just curious if you had a system that works. I’m going to buy some promix soil and mix in some rabbit poop and add some worms. This will allow the pool to breakdown and allow the worms to reproduce since I want some for spring fishing anyway. I’ll occasionally add some veggie scraps until I get the veggie planted in them in spring. I’ll start the soil prep next week or the week after just to get some worms going.
I bought an organic fertilizer off Amazon last year that was nice and I like epsoma products. I go to Lovacats nursery and they have the 20 lbs bags there and it’s much cheaper than buying the 4 lbs bags. It keeps for a long time and is essentially composted chicken manure so it does have a smell to it.

 

[diggs223]

It will not be pressure but you have to drill a bunch of holes in it so I’m not sure I would trust the thin walled drainage stuff. I have enough to keep me busy now anyway but it’s been something I’ve wanted to do for a long time.

I would think you could use sdr35 pipe its still pretty strong and if you're glueing fittings on, sewer & drain fittings fit. Works for direct bury downspouts.

 

[S&W Fan]

All of my raised beds are amended and ready to go in the spring. We did a version of this last year with pretty good results for several varieties of lettuce , spinach and a couple of specialty herbs.

 

[fnfalguy]

Going in a different direction this year. Nothing but flowers and herb in the raised beds. Taking the year off from annual veggies. Letting the established fruits do their thing.

 

[S&W Fan]

We grow a large variety of veggies, fruits and herbs .
Herbs- rosemary, basil, parsley, oregano, two kinds of peppermint and sage , bee balm & chamomile


Veggies - heirloom tomatoes , sauce tomatoes , grape tomatoes and cherry tomatoes
Red potatoes & sweet potatoes- garlic , sweet onion and scallions, green & red bell peppers, jalapeños, cubanell( and another hot variety of my choosing while at the farmers market.)
Romain, redleaf, butter crisp, amish curly leaf lettuce & Swiss chard.
Zucchini , butternut, Acorn and spaghetti squash. Cucumbers, Japanese eggplant, & beets.

Fruits - Blueberries, red raspberries, blackberries ( three varieties) strawberries, pears, peaches & Apples.
I’ll be putting in currants and a mulberry tree this spring as well.

 

[S&W Fan]

Not to forget a myriad variety of flowers to attract pollinators

 

[Saltwater60]

I would think you could use sdr35 pipe its still pretty strong and if you're glueing fittings on, sewer & drain fittings fit. Works for direct bury downspouts.

I will have to look at it since it’s half the price. I have not checked standard PVC in some time but it was $60/length a while back.

 

[S&W Fan]

 

[Saltwater60]

Of course you can I just think peppers are better suited.

 

[S&W Fan]

Of course you can I just think peppers are better suited.

I agree. Cuckes require a fair amount of water .

 

[Saltwater60]

I agree. Cuckes require a lot of water .

Although I wonder if growing them in buckets would keep the powdery mildew down. To me peppers and tomatoes scream good bucket growth plants.

 

[S&W Fan]

Although I wonder if growing them in buckets would keep the powdery mildew down. To me peppers and tomatoes scream good bucket growth plants.

I’m not a big fan of growing tomatoes in buckets but I will be growing some specialty hot peppers in 5 gal. Pails this year.
There are a couple that I want to experiment with but I don’t want to use the real estate in my raised beds.

 

[masterswimmer]

It will not be pressure but you have to drill a bunch of holes in it so I’m not sure I would trust the thin walled drainage stuff. I have enough to keep me busy now anyway but it’s been something I’ve wanted to do for a long time.

I think you're seriously overestimating the cost of 4" drainage pvc. And underestimating the ability to drill it.

 

[Chris1389]

If you grow two different variety cucumbers together they tend to come out very bitter tasting and youll get alot of lemon cucumbers. Happened to me last year.

 

[S&W Fan]

If you grow two different variety cucumbers together they tend to come out very bitter tasting and youll get alot of lemon cucumbers. Happened to me last year.

I haven’t experienced that at all when growing different varieties together. I do know that cucumbers need lots of nitrogen, more so than tomatoes even. Not enough and they will definitely yellow. Also watch out for aphids when conditions are warm and humid, they carry ( CMV) cucumber mosaic virus and can yellow your cuckes rather quickly. Finally over watering will damage and yellow your cucumbers too.

 

[Depick]

5-gallon buckets seem to work well. Im
Not sure I would grow cucumbers in a 5 gallon bucket. A guy by me made a set of steps for 5 gallon buckets and they grow 3-4 per row 3-4 rows high and it seems to work well.

My brain just clicked on about the cucumbers in the buckets. The few cucumber plants I had last year spread everywhere. It was actually kind of cool to see mini cucumbers hanging all over the place. So you’re absolutely right the cucumber plants wouldn’t work out well in the buckets.