Getting Dirt and other free stuff for Gardening

[Russ&Caro 1,549]

Brown thumb here, but I'm trying to assist my wife as she brings plants/flowers into our lives.

The condo unit we are renting has a nice unused metal planter box on the balcony. We have dirt and some flowers we could root up and place into the box, but here's the dilemma... the box has no holes in the bottom. And, even if it did we would have the problem of excess water dripping down onto the first floor neighbor's deck because the balcony floor is made up of closely spaced wooden planks.

Should we drill holes in the bottom of the planter before using? Should we place a pan beneath the planter to catch excess water drippings?

[Darnell 8,478]

I say put in a smaller planter box inside the current planter box. Drill holes in the smaller planter box. The excess water will stay in the larger planter box and get into the smaller planter box ....and you have happy plants...

[Darnell 8,478]

Setting up vertical planters all month, made from wood pallets. Need 2 or 3 ppl when going vertical, though.

[Darnell 8,478]

Ooooo. Heavy trash day! Picked up almost 50 windows, use for hotboxes. Alrready have 2 x 12s and dirt and nails.

Composting operation successful. 300 bags of leaves, ground up, mixed with 400 pounds of dead coffee.

[davidwilbertusa 0]

Essentially the most common reasons people supply for not starting a garden is that they can’t afford it. They think of buying seeds or plants, soil amendments, tomato cages and hundreds of tools they might need to have. Gardening certainly can be a costly endeavour, but it doesn't should be. If you want to grow your own food with out spending an arm and also leg on supplies there are various gardening supplies you could possibly get very cheaply or even for free. It takes some time to locate some of these alternative and it could take more advance planning, but if you want your garden to conserve even more money give most of my suggestions a make an attempt to see how free gardening may be!

[NigeriaorBust 4,087]

Hundreds of tools ??? I have earth based and aquaponics and don't have hundreds of tools. In fact I have about 20 tools. This week I plan on making the compost happy by deep cleaning the chicken coops.

[Darnell 8,478]

DavidWilbertUSA.. welcome to my topic! I think if you reread all of my posts in this topic, you'll find we're on the same page...

Which is a plus.

For anyone else reading this...

Hey! Did you get to a garden co-op meeting this season?

[Dakine10 5,452]

I always used to offer to use my leaf blower/mulcher to take care of my neighbor's yards this time of year. One of the best "free" things that people forget about is leaf mulch. Soil can end up like baked clay around here but people were always asking why our's was so good.

[Darnell 8,478]

Ah geez. Leaves. I talked 3 crews into dropping off their leaf bags . Now i get almost 120 each weekend, these last 4 weeks.

[Dakine10 5,452]

Ah geez. Leaves. I talked 3 crews into dropping off their leaf bags . Now i get almost 120 each weekend, these last 4 weeks.

Yeah - people here bag up their grass, bag up their leaves, throw them in the trash. Then they run out to the store to buy fertilizers, lawn food, plant food. It's kind of strange.

[JamnSol 35]

Darnell- I also prefer 2x12's for raised beds. I won't use treated wood for that, so with good healthy, microbially active soils, they only last a couple years, but I felt it a price I was willing to pay for good veggies.

[Darnell 8,478]

Sure!

[Sousuke 1,214]

Just caught this thread.

If you are making a raised bed try and use cedar or redwood. Avoid PT wood.

[Neonred 3,562]

Cool, just found this thread. After two years away from growing vegetables we are back at it. Got started just a few weeks late but have a nice crop of beans and stong tomatoes and green, red and yellow peppers. The cucumbers are so so but I always have trouble with them and squash. Now that it has finally cooled off a bit will try some variety of lettuce. Lemons are ripe, and our oranges are almost ready. Unfortunately the ruby red grapefruit tree seems to be diseased and will likely have to go.

The wife is only concerned with roses and it is a struggle at times finding roses that do well in zone 10. Our soil is sandy and needs organics added but I do have a chipper/grinder that eats all the leaves and branches and small trees and provides supplements.

Loking for something else to grow in the vegetable garden but have not decided what.