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Amergin posted:Care to share (if you haven't already) the design for this? I have several raised beds that used to have drip but the previous owners' aeration process apparently tore the irrigation system in the back to hell, so now I'm looking for ways to redo it from scratch. Anyway, my raised beds are 8'x4', notionally divided into 8 4' rows 1' wide. The irrigation system is a long feeder pipe (with no emitter holes) that runs most of the length of the bed, with a T roughly every 2' (except the end, where instead of a T it's an elbow). Each T has a ball valve, and connected to the valve is a roughly 4' emitter that runs between two rows. This allows the water to be adjusted for each row, but the valves are also by far the most expensive part of the whole setup (each of these cost around US$30 for everything, and about half of that is the valves). The end of each emitter line has a threaded end cap, to make it easy to clean out the emitter line. This is also probably massive overdesign, but eh. A shot of one of the beds, showing most of one irrigation setup:  At the bottom right is the leader hose that feeds the whole thing. The hose adapter is cemented onto the stubby length of PVC before the first T. Each T (and the elbow) is cemented to its valve via a short (like 3/4") length of PVC (you can't see it at all, but the Ts and valves aren't cemented to each other, they're coupled together with a wee length of pipe). All the other connections are just friction fit. On the emitters this is so they can be removed for maintenance, and the can be rotated to change the irrigation pattern. To explain, here's a section watering:  The water is emitted by 1/16" holes drilled 6" on centre, staggered along each side. Since the emitter pipes aren't cemented to the valves it's easy to flip the pattern on any row. For example, in this bed when I set poo poo up initially the emitters for the cherry tomatoes at one end of the bed were hitting square on the tomato cages. Rotated, they were watering right between the cage posts. Here's a few detail shots, for whatever they're worth. First, one line more or less square on:  Here's a detail of the hose coupler, a T, and a valve, just to show how they're put together a little better.  And here's one of the end caps. The wide part is a threaded fitting that slips over the pipe with a threaded hex-head cap in it.  Crakkerjakk posted:Because PVC is so durable, it is difficult to recycle (and also because of the high Chlorine content). If even small amounts are mixed in with other plastics it degrades into HCl and Cl which ruins most of the other stuff being recycled, so it has to be recycled completely separate from other plastics. And because it sinks in water it's hard to remove from the way we recycle most PET. It'd considered a contaminant in normal plastic recycling waste streams. And, for the record, I'd wouldn't be surprised if a lot of LDPE drip lines are exactly the kind of things that do get contaminated with PVC, because while the line itself is LDPE I bet a lot of the fittings, emitter reinforcements, and so on are actually PVC and so would have to be separated out to avoid contamination. I don't know specifically about the product line you're recommending, but I'm fairly certain that many of the fittings that came with my cheapass big box store drip system are PVC. SubG fucked around with this message at 21:37 on Apr 23, 2019 |
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Apr 23, 2019 20:15
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I would love a whole cat colony in the yard but alas. I'm going to just build chicken wire cages. There are only four trellis plants in the 32 spaces of the raised beds, I think the best option is to move the trellises and cage everything else. Four foot cube with wire on five sides that I can lift off the box. They won't be able to dig into a raised bed and that cage should do the trick of keeping them out. Going to make some habanero and garlic spray to apply to the trellis plants and hope that works. This does mean I have four new plots open that I was going to just use pots for. I have herbs and am not sure which ones will spread like crazy and take over, having trouble finding any info. Mitsuba, Thai basil, garlic chives, oregano, regular chives, nira, sorrel, and Italian basil. Any of these I should definitely keep quarantined in a pot?
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Apr 24, 2019 01:16
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Any of those herbs will only get as big as they can in any container. Basil in particular in a good plot of land is hilariously huge, like shrubbery, but all of those herbs are perfectly content in a pot or really wherever. None of them are particularly invasive that I've seen. I really need to do a better job of adding herbs to the garden here lately. The first few years I always kept a good chunk of the garden as herbs but I can't even remember the last time I grew any. Fresh basil, sun warm tomato, and a really good fresh cheese is surely part of the reason any of us goes through all this work. On a random US note, when in the world did Spinosad get so crazy expensive? Was looking to restock on concentrate and either my memory is going to poo poo or it's like 3 times more expensive than the last time I bought it. Did I miss some super secret organic gardening news? Edit: On the cat note, we've got two feral cats that came with the property. I usually keep any protein scraps I can seperate from trash and keep them next to the same tree in the woods. Sometimes you get a possum, sometimes you get a cat, sometimes it's a fox, and every now and again a coyote. Those two cats are some hard motherfuckers though. There are 4 houses on about 40 acres here, so all kinds of critters, and this one jet black cat in particular is definitely in charge. Edit edit: Found a skink that has moved into my seed starting operation in the garage. The number of flying bugs has dropped considerably and he is thoroughly enjoying the fresh water and warmth. First time for everything. mischief fucked around with this message at 01:36 on Apr 24, 2019 |
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Apr 24, 2019 01:28
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mischief posted:Any of those herbs will only get as big as they can in any container. Basil in particular in a good plot of land is hilariously huge, like shrubbery, but all of those herbs are perfectly content in a pot or really wherever. None of them are particularly invasive that I've seen. I really need to do a better job of adding herbs to the garden here lately. The first few years I always kept a good chunk of the garden as herbs but I can't even remember the last time I grew any. Fresh basil, sun warm tomato, and a really good fresh cheese is surely part of the reason any of us goes through all this work. Okay. I remember basil getting huge but not spreading, but my dad and I made a huge mistake planting mint once when I was younger and it was the loving plant Borg so I'm trying to avoid anything like that in my main planter boxes. As long as they'll stay in their square I'm good.
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Apr 24, 2019 01:38
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drat I wish basil acted like mint
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Apr 24, 2019 01:43
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A basil plague would be delicious.
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Apr 24, 2019 01:45
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I had a basil plague, then it all bolted.  
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Apr 24, 2019 02:03
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Grand Fromage posted:Okay. I remember basil getting huge but not spreading, but my dad and I made a huge mistake planting mint once when I was younger and it was the loving plant Borg so I'm trying to avoid anything like that in my main planter boxes. As long as they'll stay in their square I'm good. "Normal" to you (wherever you are) plants are weird on other places. I learned this many years ago when I first was in the bay area and found a rosemary HEDGE. I always thought rosemary was yet another one of those annual things you plant and it stays kinda contained and it's tasty. But put it where it was meant to grow.........
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Apr 24, 2019 02:09
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Garlic chives can get really invasive. I also don't particularly like to eat them. I have no idea why I planted them. Apparently the Chinese much prefer them to normal chives, but I am sadly not Chinese. I dug up a wheelbarrow full out of my much neglected herb garden: My much less neglected herb garden. I always separate out the 3 plants you usualy get if you buy parley/basil in a pot and it turned into a whoooole lot of parley and basil.  Also, can anyone identify this? Its maybe 18-24" high. Definitely an allium, hanging around an abandoned vegetable garden that hasn't been used in probably 40 years.  E: Motronic posted:"Normal" to you (wherever you are) plants are weird on other places. I learned this many years ago when I first was in the bay area and found a rosemary HEDGE. I always thought rosemary was yet another one of those annual things you plant and it stays kinda contained and it's tasty. But put it where it was meant to grow.........
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Apr 24, 2019 02:14
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Do I bury my pepper starts like I would a tomato, or is that just for the little hairy primadonas and put my peppers in at pot depth like a normal plant?
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Apr 24, 2019 02:31
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Don't go ham on it but you can definitely bury the stem where it is available. Up to the first leaves will help it go.
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Apr 24, 2019 02:36
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Bogart posted:Any hot tips on hydroponics? I’ve got a nice side room that’s used for storage and I’ve been gripped with an anarchic urge to become more self reliant. There's a thread for it here: https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3856830&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=1 You're probably going to want to start with Kratky, which means each plant sits in one reservoir which you fill once and forget (e.g. one gallon of nutrient fluid -> one head of lettuce). A good setup is a milk jug with the top cut off, a net pot containing a lettuce sprout in some inert media (e.g. perlite or clay pellets), and something to keep light out of the reservoir (e.g. cardboard). More advanced methods like Dutch buckets, flood and drain, and deep water culture allow for fruiting plants (which require different nutrients and more attention) or larger yields of leafy greens. In my experience most expensive part was the lights, followed by electricity for the lights and nutrients. Timers, pumps, buckets, and PVC pipes are all cheap. I use an HLG 100 (the 4000K model), which grows 3'x3' of leafy greens or 2'x2' of flowering vegetables like tomatoes. There are cheaper lights but it's worked for me for leafy greens, tomatoes, and its current duty starting seeds for summer. I used this for nutrients. Dry nutrients are cheaper so I want to try them out, but I haven't done so yet. I'm still learning so the people in the thread probably know a lot more.
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Apr 24, 2019 04:11
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Microcline posted:There's a thread for it here: Thank you!  And to prove I'm not just hopping in as a swoop-and-poop and/or trying to grow drugs, here's my garden, featuring the doggo in the background:  We got pots
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Apr 24, 2019 06:27
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I had a Nasturtium growing in my propagator, it got to 2 proper leaves plus two more forks, then started to die  I've put it into a new little pot because I think it might have gotten a bit too wet. Going to get it into a larger pot today, or is it too late for it?
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Apr 24, 2019 07:59
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Motronic posted:"Normal" to you (wherever you are) plants are weird on other places. I learned this many years ago when I first was in the bay area and found a rosemary HEDGE. I always thought rosemary was yet another one of those annual things you plant and it stays kinda contained and it's tasty. But put it where it was meant to grow......... My mom grew a rosemary hedge by accident and ripped it out because it was in too small of a space. Then we used some of the rosemary wood to smoke a pork shoulder...Heavenly
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Apr 24, 2019 15:22
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SubG posted:Sure. I'll repeat the disclaimer that this is probably overdesign for most people, so this definitely isn't something I think is the One True System or whatever. Thanks! I appreciate the effort post and pics. I'm not taking one side or the other in the whole PVC debate but just curious as it got me thinking, could you use something like bamboo as a more "natural" PVC replacement?
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Apr 24, 2019 15:25
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The problem with a more natural replacement like bamboo is you get natural things like mold
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Apr 24, 2019 15:28
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I use a lot of bamboo in my garden (putting an invasive species to work as I remove it from the woods). It's good for 2 or 3 years above ground, but sunlight and moisture definitely degrade it. It would also be challenging to run water through it as you'd have to bore holes down the center -- the nodes are solid.
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Apr 24, 2019 15:34
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Fitzy Fitz posted:I use a lot of bamboo in my garden (putting an invasive species to work as I remove it from the woods). It's good for 2 or 3 years above ground, but sunlight and moisture definitely degrade it. It would also be challenging to run water through it as you'd have to bore holes down the center -- the nodes are solid. The way I did this for my little zen fountain was to get a 4' piece of rebar from the hardware store, slam it through to break the membranes, and then ream it out so the water would flow freely. But yeah, I wouldn't use it for drainage.
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Apr 24, 2019 16:09
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Every year I forget that tomatoes have a near-100% germination rate and I overplant.  Anyway, I have a lot of cherry tomato plants (and cucumber, pepper, japanese eggplant) now and I'm still gardening on a balcony (albeit a slightly larger one here!). I haven't decided yet if I'm going to get box planters or 5+ gallon pots. How could I maximize yield over a 8' x 18" area? I was thinking I can stagger two rows of large pots, maybe plant 2 tomato plants a piece? Would crowding reduce the amount of fruit enough to offset having double the amount of plants? I also apparently managed to germinate 4-5 strawberry plants, possibly more at this rate. I was thinking those would go in railing planters.
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Apr 24, 2019 16:40
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Amergin posted:Thanks! I appreciate the effort post and pics. The one thing I'd add now that I'm thinking about it is that if you leave most of the joints friction fit (as I did) to make it easy to adjust poo poo, you might need a pressure regulator on your feeder hose. It turns out that the pressure I get from tap is fine when divided between two beds at the same time, but it's too much if it's going to a single irrigation system. Since I've got an odd number of raised beds, I ended up getting a pressure regulator for the one that's by itself so I don't have to worry about trying to twiddle the pressure at the source.
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Apr 24, 2019 20:35
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How big a no-no is it to plant carrots next to parsnips? I have one deep container left and want to use it for root veg. If need be I can fill it with parsnips because those seeds don't keep as well, but an additional 24 seems like....a lot of parsnip.
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Apr 24, 2019 22:53
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If you have an air fryer or deep fryer parsnips make good chips.
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Apr 24, 2019 22:56
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Yiggy posted:If you have an air fryer or deep fryer parsnips make good chips. I have not tried this. Once I realised roasted parsnips are a food of the gods I stopped cooking them any other way but frying them seems like it should be equally delicious. Does anyone else get performance anxiety over gardening? My garden is very overlooked and people talk to me about it - they're just making conversation - but a comment has brought home just how much time and money has been sunk into it, and how very visible failure is going to be.
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Apr 24, 2019 23:25
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Parsley leaves that are white/yellow around the edges is probably just chlorosis/too much water right? All my other herbs look great but some of the parsley is looking sad around the edges-might just be transplant shock too.
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Apr 24, 2019 23:38
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Lady Demelza posted:Does anyone else get performance anxiety over gardening? My garden is very overlooked and people talk to me about it - they're just making conversation - but a comment has brought home just how much time and money has been sunk into it, and how very visible failure is going to be.
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Apr 24, 2019 23:39
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Lady Demelza posted:Does anyone else get performance anxiety over gardening? My garden is very overlooked and people talk to me about it - they're just making conversation - but a comment has brought home just how much time and money has been sunk into it, and how very visible failure is going to be. It isn't failure, it's a chance to learn. Well that and sometimes nature is just a fickle rear end in a top hat. People who don't have gardens are completely free to have opinions about mine but I don't give a poo poo about them.
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Apr 24, 2019 23:50
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mischief posted:It isn't failure, it's a chance to learn. Well that and sometimes nature is just a fickle rear end in a top hat. People who don't have gardens are completely free to have opinions about mine but I don't give a poo poo about them. Absolutely. Nothing like having four 4x10 raised beds of tomatoes get the blight and go from robust health to black mounds in 3 days. Gives you a whole new insight into the Irish Potato Famine (same bug) without the winter starvation thing and leads to a bunch of interesting reading in plant pathology and history. Haven't had the same problem since. When I started expanding our garden I got a lot of remarks from the neighbours about time, money, and the cheap price of food. Now, when they complain about the price of celery/broccoli/cauliflower I just smile. I suspect I'm irritating as hell. My most recent failure was impulse buying a package of shosaku gobo seeds (Japanese edible root burdock) at a hippy seed market. After more research it looks like they might be the same species as our wild burdock. Hopefully the seeds are some sort of improved domesticated variety, otherwise I just spent $2.50 for more of the weeds I've been fighting next to the creek for the last ten years.  And now I'm wondering what roasted parsnip and gobo roots taste like. Both my wife and I remember the boiled parsnips of our childhood as disgusting, but roasted? Worth a try.
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Apr 25, 2019 02:04
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My grandma boiled everything. I don’t think I’ve ever cooked a vegetable by boiling that wasn’t for soup, if so I didn’t enjoy it enough to remember. What were they thinking? The startup costs are not trivial but it’s sort of like camping, once you have the basic equipment it can be done as cheaply or extravagantly as one wants. My wife scours craigslist and our local buy nothing group for gardening ladies needing to get rid of stuff and we have lots of materials and plants we’ve provided for free. We had to buy a lot of soil for our planters but we’ll keep it fresh with compost and we have tons of organic material to work with from all the leaves that fall off our neighbors mature trees. I just love it. But I can understand why some people may not enjoy being outside, digging in the dirt, fighting slugs and squirrels.
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Apr 25, 2019 02:20
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Oven roasted parsnip slices are amazing.
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Apr 25, 2019 02:23
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Basilchat! We have 2 basil plants and we're worrying about them a little because of dark spots appearing on most of the leaves. However, when I look online I see some images of "amethyst" varieties that apparently are supposed to look like that. Unfortunately we can't remember if they were called anything other than "basil" at the nursery where we bought them. (Pretty sure they were just called "basil".) So I'm not sure how to tell if it's a problem or just how it's supposed to look.  We had no problem with basil last year, from the same nursery, in (sort of) the same soil. Although last year was the first year of our garden, and that definitely left an impact on the soil. A positive one, or so I thought. These essentially are planted directly in the ground, which is all we really have time for at the moment, but last year everything did pretty well aside from critter issues and planting a few things too late. Obviously it's still early and it's no big deal if we lose a few leaves. But I would also want to stop it early if it's going to be a big problem. Sir Lemming fucked around with this message at 13:11 on Apr 25, 2019 |
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Apr 25, 2019 13:09
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Hexigrammus posted:When I started expanding our garden I got a lot of remarks from the neighbours about time, money, and the cheap price of food. Now, when they complain about the price of celery/broccoli/cauliflower I just smile. I suspect I'm irritating as hell. I really don't understand the "but vegetables are cheap" mentality. It really only makes sense if you've never had a garden grown tomato. They're just lightyears better than anything in the grocery. Part of the fun for me is finding out how great vegetables can be if they aren't bruised and frozen from being driven cross country on a refrigerated truck. Tomatoes are probably the biggest difference, but I really enjoyed my perfect onions and super-tender broccoli. Cantaloupe grown at home was disappointingly small (I thought) until I tasted it, and then it became a perfect single serving melon, incredibly soft and sweet.
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Apr 25, 2019 13:52
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It'd still be worth it for me even if it just meant I didn't have to plan grocery shopping around produce. It's so hard to buy the right amount and not let any go to waste. Also, it's crazy how much basil costs.
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Apr 25, 2019 14:11
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vonnegutt posted:I really don't understand the "but vegetables are cheap" mentality. It really only makes sense if you've never had a garden grown tomato. They're just lightyears better than anything in the grocery. Part of the fun for me is finding out how great vegetables can be if they aren't bruised and frozen from being driven cross country on a refrigerated truck. Tomatoes are probably the biggest difference, but I really enjoyed my perfect onions and super-tender broccoli. Cantaloupe grown at home was disappointingly small (I thought) until I tasted it, and then it became a perfect single serving melon, incredibly soft and sweet. Cucumbers, man. Cucumbers. Aromatic? Crisp? A slight sweetness you can barely detect? Fugeddaboudit. So much my gardening experience has bee driven by a series of "oh THIS is what they are supposed to taste like!" revelations. Plus having access to some off-the-wall varieties I wouldn't even be able to get elsewhere. Peppers have been the real revelation here -- the Shishitos last year were amazing and I am doubling my varieties this year. BTW: how many pepper plants could I pack into a circular 18" SIP planter (probably about 8 gal of soil above the water line)? Last year I just did one plant per pot, but it seems like I could be a *bit* more aggressive. The circular pot ends up being about 7sqft. Three seems like it might be pushing it, but maybe two? As an aside: does anyone have any advice for growing watermelon? I am specifically trying to grow Sugar Baby watermelons in a container. It was indicated they would be "container friendly", but als othat they grow on ~36" vines. I figure they will need as much sun as they can get, but I am wondering how vine management would work -- should i just let them dangle down the side onto the patio? try and coil them up so the fruit rests on the (18") container (on a stand/mulch obviously)? Sugar Babies are supposed to be very small but I assume they are still not at all suitable for growing on some kind of trellis (unless maybe I make some custom "melon shelves"... hmm...) As awesome as a hanging planter with dwarf melons cascading down the sides would be I assume that's not practical.
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Apr 25, 2019 14:11
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I’d try for 3 peppers in that pot and make sure to stake them up. If you do it in a triangle closer to the edges you should have room. Maybe rotate if one side doesn’t get as good sun. I think for container cucumbers and melons they’re meant to be grown on a trellis. You could let it flow, but then it’ll just take over. Make it grow up and you can still walk around it.
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Apr 25, 2019 14:19
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Sir Lemming posted:Basilchat! We have 2 basil plants and we're worrying about them a little because of dark spots appearing on most of the leaves. However, when I look online I see some images of "amethyst" varieties that apparently are supposed to look like that. Unfortunately we can't remember if they were called anything other than "basil" at the nursery where we bought them. (Pretty sure they were just called "basil".) So I'm not sure how to tell if it's a problem or just how it's supposed to look. Those leaves are well past needing to be picked, that could be it
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Apr 25, 2019 14:26
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Fitzy Fitz posted:Also, it's crazy how much basil costs. This. However you feel about tomatoes and broccoli, if you like to season with fresh herbs when cooking and don’t have the herb garden your food budget is really taking a hit in the teeth. Or you’re just not seasoning  Salad greens too. If you get a few heads of lettuce going and just pick from the bottom you get a ton of bang for your buck and it’s fresher than the bag/clam shelled stuff which I almost never get through entirely.
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Apr 25, 2019 14:59
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Harry Potter on Ice posted:Those leaves are well past needing to be picked, that could be it drat I should really try that! I haven't seen that problem with past plants that we definitely left alone longer than we should've, and I was wary of picking too many when it's only been a few weeks (in our garden, obviously not in the nursery). But I'll be more aggressive about it. (I've picked one or two figuring they were "bad" and might as well be gotten rid of, just so I could hold them up to my toddlers' nose and let them smell.)
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Apr 25, 2019 15:16
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Jhet posted:I’d try for 3 peppers in that pot and make sure to stake them up. If you do it in a triangle closer to the edges you should have room. Maybe rotate if one side doesn’t get as good sun. Sounds good. My concern with three would be that the sides close to the edges wouldn't have as much root area to stabilize the plants, but as you said: stake them. Jhet posted:think for container cucumbers and melons they’re meant to be grown on a trellis. You could let it flow, but then it’ll just take over. Make it grow up and you can still walk around it. Yeah I've always done cukes on a trellis, but my concern was that the melons would be too heavy for the vines to support. Looking at pictures though the sugar baby melons are pretty small, so this might work...
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Apr 25, 2019 16:04
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Hubis posted:Yeah I've always done cukes on a trellis, but my concern was that the melons would be too heavy for the vines to support. Looking at pictures though the sugar baby melons are pretty small, so this might work... You can make little hammocks out of old shirts or bed sheets if you're worried about them.
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Apr 25, 2019 16:31
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