Machine Builders Network+ Forums Machine Builders Network General Discussion Coffee Cup Lounge 2023 gardens

A good time to start thinking about our gardens for the coming season! post ideas and pix. of your setup and equipment, etc. for a full season grow thread.
We have most of our seed now, and onion plants have been ordered, s'posed to be sent the week of the 23'rd of March for our area.
Ground was plowed in the fall and ready for spring planting.

garden setup? the only garden I have here has Sonny's horseradish growing in it..planted that YEARS ago..by now I might need a stumpgrinder to dig some up..thats for the fall farm party

Gotta wait for a little dryer weather to finish digging out the Damn Bamboo that snuck into the garden last year. They say the roots only go 3-5" down.. Well I'm here to call bullshit on that one. down about a foot and still haven't got it all out.
Maybe we put that garden in over an existing root and it finally worked it's way to the surface. It is a raised garden but only about 6".

Yup they sure do go down and spread out..even miss one little section and it all comes back..its the most pervasive tuber ive ever seen..I had basic green stripe bamboo,nothin special..at first was maybe 10ft square plot,then it spead up near the shop and the downspouts from the roof turbocharged it...It was spreadin and makin a beeline for the neighbors, the owner came over one day and gave me hell about it..so took the 977 and tipped the bucket down just the teeth in the ground and raked a good 10-12"down and got most of it..that was the easy part..then sat right there with a spade and rake for the next two days picking and raking to get the rest of the small sections..then sprayed with roundup next, havent seen it come back yet..that stuff loves water and will crawl distances to find it..there's a house down in town nearby that has been completely surrounded by it

I like it for the privacy from the main road out back (that wasn't there when we bought the house). I dug a 1' X1' trench to keep it out of the garden but I think it snuck in from the neighbor's yard. we spray the trench with total vegetation killer, so I don't think it came across the trench. He just mows over it. Majority of it is on city property so you know I'm NEVER going to totally get rid of it. We just kick it off wherever it pops up in the yard. Pretty much just along the fence line. Can't do that in the garden. Once I get the new loader valve installed on the backhoe, I'll get it out. Gotta gently move the good soil off to the side before I get into the clay first.

cant get bamboo to grow here! Too cold out here on the tundra I guess! --- I need to harvest another horseradish root myself!--gittin kinda low! last jar, so as soon as the ground thaws enough that I can dig,-- gotts make more. I usually do it 2 times a year, fall and spring,---keeps my supply fresh that way.
I think we are going to have to cut down a bit on some of our tomato planting area. --fewer sweet potatoes, and maybe fewer regular potatoes. ---could go more sweetcorn since its roundup ready and it grows like weeds here so plant and harvest!
The food bank will take all we can grow and take to them. We dont need much for ourselves, but have to over plant everything in order to have something!

got a couple more old tb tillers to get running for spring. both were auction finds, so who knows what it will take to get them running.!

Cover was off TroyBilt rear tine. guess I'll have to make sure there's No water in the tank before I even try to start it. the little front tine tiller is in the shed so It should be good.

never did get time to look at my econohorse and see if it runs or not

gonna put a tarp over the garden to kill off the weeds & grass. makes it easier to till when the time comes.

clean ground or at least dead dry stuff tills good. --- green stuff kinda makes a mess in the seed bed unless you til and wait for it to rot.
This year I hope to be able to plant the onion plants right when they come.---the week of the 23rd of March. Planted then gives 2 pound onions and a LOT of them here!! LOL!

Got the tarps on the garden today.. Actually was a great day to do it because the ground was frozen. Gonna fix up the green house and use it this year, at least to get some plants started. I have it on the upper deck due to the lack of yard space. wind keeps blowing the roof panels out. wife has decided to skip squash this year. need to let the damn vine borers starve this year.

Elderberry plants are looking good. leafing out.


AND SPREADING

Wow! --- nuttin coming up here yet! Ground is froze one day then thawed the next so gonna be a while yet here!

Frogs are singing the trees are starting to leaf out some of the flowering trees are in blossom already.

You will be planting gardens way before us! Hope this year will be a great one!

The onion plants came Monday, --- now we got rain/snow/wind for the next 4 days making it impossible to plant!

are you a wine maker Sonny?

Dont do wine but have several grape vines.

my elderberry bushes are looking nice enough I might try elderberry wine next year. They're coming up pretty healthy. I'll get pictures later today.

My tire changer fell over on the plants up front a few weeks ago and snapped a couple branches off. Kathy stuck them in the stream & they're starting to sprout roots.


The plants got new growth where the branches broke off so All is good.


This one is growing out behind the shop. It's rubbing on the metal roof so I'm going to try & train it. Got it pulled down & tied off for now.

Around here they usually get 10 feet tall in a good location and very wide, usually loaded with big heads!

yeah that's what they're like back up home in western NY. the ones growing wild Might get that tall here if the city didn't mow them down all the time. This one I pulled over to get off the edge of the roof was topping out around12'.

sounds like you got them growing in the right place for sure! Thats the way they should get if they like the spot you plant them in!

got 3 rows of onions planted,---got a BUNCH to go!

got all of the onion plants planted, ---- 11 rows 130 feet long.

part of the tiller inventory! lol!

no wonder why I cant find a good tiller..Sonny's got 'em all

that's quite a collection.. I only have two.

just got 2 more at the auction and got 2 more running from the last auction, so we should have the cultivating covered. I try to start out with a dozen running cause no time to do much fixing during garden season here and with 4.5 acres each one runs a lot of hours.
Had to work ground with 2 of them to plant onions cause it was too wet underneath to run the tractor tiller so that added more run time on them.

hole maker for the onion plants and 3 of the 11 rows planted. Now have all 11 rows in and starting to green up a bit.

Sonny what ever happened to your 'garden creeper' idea? you were bent on making a lay-down self-propelled garden creeper for working the dirt

I have the bikes and the 3 wheel jobber,---wanted to make one on crawler tracks. have a lot of the parts, 1 track made, need bearings for the sprocket shafts, and etc.!

the other half of the tiller shed!

looks like you have a tiller infestation problem Sonny..I know a guy with a truck and trailer that can help you

well I know who can corner the market on used Troy-Bilt parts.

I think the Elderberries are really shooting up. almost a foot taller than last weekend. lot of new growth. Gonna have to get some bird netting.

got 8 rows of sweetcorn planted today. a bit early but maybe it will make it!

got 1 row of potatoes planted and dug up the remaining strawberry plants from the old bed then tilled it up good. will plant something else in there for a couple years then maybe back to berries.
The new strawberries are slow coming up this year,---got kinda cold last winter with no snow and it did hurt them.

Blake Shelton planted corn all ready... saw it on TikTok HA HA HA
...

Well the wife got the tarps off the garden while I was at work and I after taking the carb apart on the Troy-Bilt pony tiller and cleaning it, got it turned over. Looks good. We put a lot of love into that nasty ass clay to make good soil. sure did look nice after I got it turned over hopefully we're going to get some cukes and tomatoes and peppers don't think we're going to plant anything else this year cuz we're going to be gone for the entire month of July and August.

Had to put a small fence around it this year.

Our new dog is a digger... Half mini Ausie Half Maltese. She's VERY SMART and acts just like a child.

Gardens in And cardboard between the rows. Keeps the weeds down Helps hold moisture and lets us get through there without all the dirt sticking to our feet.


ELDERBERRIES are coming along nicely too.

Lookin good Jim! Not much going here,--- radishes and turnips just came up and a few peas up. Sweetcorn is growing but slow due to the 39* temps we have here now.

Elderberries are starting to blossom already. Going to have to get the bird netting up soon.

The ones at sis's are just starting to bud. We are several weeks behind you in this area!
A guy over on the next mile south of us has 5 acres of them in rows and I guess they process and sell the juice from them. They spend days on end picking!

got my real ID ; so I can get past homelands check point at the air port.

Need to get mine still but have a valid passport for now. Happy belated Birthday Tom.

onions today. starting to bulb, need rain but none in sight for next 7 days so gonna have to start hauling from the river!
The small garden behind the shed has parsnips, carrots, beets, turnips, dill, and 1 row of potatoes in it. We did get them sorta weeded for now.

onions starting to bulb pretty good now.

looking good... just pulled the last of the radishes.

the east coast of the USA needs rain bad

Trying to haul wat er to the gardens.
Big Boy and the dump trailer tankers to start with. Big Boy is 1,200 gallons and the dump trailer tank is only 500 gallons but better than nuttin. The small garden was just cultivated and watered in this pic. tatoes,beets, carrots, parsnips, turnips, and dill in this one.

some of the stuff looks decent. cabbage wilts in the daytime but comes back at night. No rain here since forever! AND none in sight! Cracks in the ground are way bigger than normally in August!

I have onion envy. What do you use for fertilizer? Do you need to add lime where you are?

no lime here. I was told to keep lime out of the gardens,--have no idea why anybody thinks that but I never use it anyway. Fertilizer is horse poo spread on thick and plowed under deep. I stockpile it during the summer and spread it after garden harvest.
I subsoil 36" deep and fall plow 18" deep, or close to it, and till in the spring.
Triple 10 or 12 is good but got too high to use so I quit on it.
Normally a high percentage of the onions will weigh 1 to 2 pounds each. This year not going to get close to that. I cant carry enough water to keep everything going.

Started the onion harvest. These are some of the short day varieties.

got short, medium, and long day varieties. 21 in all. some will not be ready til last day of July.

Have some onions this year that weigh 3 pounds. Guess all the water hauling paid off this year.

God bless thats a monster onion Sonny

a ton of 2.5 pound ones this year out there to harvest yet. I dumped several thousand gallons of water on them during May and June growing season. Planted them the 25'th of March.

some of the cabbage rows

so I have a zuchinni in a pot that turned yellow leaves,it flowered..but no zukes at all yet..usually always have at least one..too much water Sonny?

This year I had all my summer squash plants along with other plants turn yellow and die! Not sure but I would say heat and humid conditions are to blame.

we actually did ok with squash & cukes this year. tomato's are about done. elderberries were a bust. plants grew great but I didn't get any berries other than a few scattered ones. I don't think they pollinated or some thing. Had netting over them so I don't think it was birds. The ones that grow wild in the ditch got mowed down. Bummer they were loaded. that's what I get for procrastinating.

Yeah I have to say I water every morning so no lack of water for the plants,the heat has been strong,I think you are spot on with that about the yellowing

The heat and humidity causes wilt in plants. Melon plants here died and melons burned white on top. Tomatoes in the open did too. Been a nasty year to grow stuff but we still getting a small amount. Took load # 5 to the food bank, 2,460 pounds of sweetcorn on this load.

OUR garden is done.... Kathy is searching for some broccoli and cauliflower to plant.

In the major harvest of things here now, cabbage, tomatoes, eggplant, beets, carrots, and still have a 40' row of potatoes to dig. Weeds have taken over most of the garden this year due to late rains. Sweet potatoes still too early to tell if they are going to make anything or not. Sweetcorn long gone as is the onions. Still have onions in the basement in temp storage til we can freeze dry them.

we need rain bad here..great for working outside right now,no mud.. but everything is turning to dust

fairly dry here now too,--great for tomatoes!

sweet potato came out at 12.5 pound.





neighbor got this buck on our farm. gave us part of the meat from it. 230 pound field dressed weight so over 300 pounds live weight.



The jungle cactus is blooming again. total of 8 big flowers on it this time.

now THATS a friggen sweet tater if I've ever seen one Sonny