Using a “Bag Garden” for Temporary and Transitional Production
Sometimes you have a situation were you don’t have time to dig a bed. Sometimes the spring passes before you can’t get planting. In our situation we have all that and more.
We didn’t get our moved accomplished until June, then I had to leave for two weeks to enjoy a promised vacaiton with the most supportive and understanding wife in the world. So I found myself in late June with nothing planted, the solution a bag garden.
Basically I took the absolute worst spot on my land soil wise and laid out some bags of top soil, built a trellis with some existing pines and planted some fast growing summer crops.
The goal is simply to provide us with some production while we spend the rest of the summer doing soil improvements for fall gardening. The video below is the results after about 4-5 weeks of growth.
Wow you can grow stuff fast. Must be the heat. I’m up in western, WA. We have great soil and moisture, but we must be the only place in the country without any heat this summer. My squash and beans have grown decent, but hardly any blossoms after 2 months.
Jack, nice looking temporary beds, also adding some organic matter to the soil after you are done using them. Hopefully next year you will be taking your own plant starts out of your new greenhouse. Let me know when you are ready for it. Happy planting. Steve
More gardening inspiration! I live in Ocala Fl., and I started my box garden 2 years ago; now on my third attempt. I’ve had fair success with tomatoes (they tend to split, but I get lots) yellow squash, cantaloupe, corn (dismal results), red & white potatoes, sweet potatoes (easy to grow!!), eggplants ( good success), some strawberries, horseradish (I can’t stop this from growing!), a few carrots ( first crop was scary, good for Halloweeen) and bush green beans (love these beans, taste great and produce a lot!!). For anyone who expects to grow stuff for survival food, get started now. It is NOT easy!! I’ve earned a huge amount of respect for the commercial farmers who put the veggies in our grocery stores. For me, here in Ocala, I like the fall crops better… less heat, less bugs to battle. The spring crops grow into the summer heat and the summer bugs… a constant battle. I’m such a novice…
Thanks Jack, I may simply throw some of these bags on top of my garden boxes. FYI: I need to do my gardening in boxes because my yard is loaded with clay and my drainage is terrible. The boxes help my problem. I’m open to ANY suggestions! I’ve got an acre of land so I’m gonna expand my gardening. I can tell you,,, picking food you grow and feeding it to your family is extremely rewarding! Sure, I’m sweating my ass off, but I think it’s worth it. Especially when things get worse… not that I’m expecting things to get worse. 😉
Good luck to all gardeners out there. Your neighbors will love you! LOL!!
Val
Wow we have had our veggies in all summer and they are not even half that size. To much rain and not enough sun up here in buffalo. I’m very jealous.
If the weather continues as it is they are going to have to redefine full sun planting….things are baking in the central Texas heat/drought…so far 3 months in the 100s. 🙁 no one is getting much from their gardens this year which concerns me for prepping/planning.
Excellent idea for late planting or in hard soil areas like you have there! Thanks!
Good point Woolval- gotta get experience growing food before you need to. I think it takes 3 years just to sort things out.
Hey Jack, Nice gardening video. Appreciate your stuff.
And it looks like my criticism of your weight has really paid off. Man, Before you know it you are going to be fitter than the best of us.
BTW, what message are you trying to send with that T-shirt?
@Dax,
1. Your criticism of my weight hasn’t ever and won’t ever mean shit to me.
2. The message of the shirt? If you have to ask you won’t understand, other than to say ITS Tactical is a kick ass website run by a good friend.
wow that’s one evasive answer. T-shirts with the Infidel message in large Arabic and English writing are usually worn by douchebags and racists who are trying to taunt and assert their aggressive attitude towards the people of middle east/Muslims in general. Now I know you don’t believe in any religions and if you are wearing that t-shirt to display your agnostic/atheistic view towards all religions, i can understand that. I consider myself an agnostic. but if you are wearing it just to insult one culture/religion and to show how tough of a sob you are then shame on you!
@Dax to be blunt, go f yourself! Your comment is that of a douche bag. My answer wasn’t evasive, it was true. If you have to ask you don’t or choose not to understand.
I will try to explain it for you. The term Infidel is used by Radicals that have bastardized to the Muslim faith to describe innocent people they want dead. These shirts are a version of “come and take them”. (molan labe) to a very small segment of scum that do not represent anything a real Muslim believes in.
Also jackass, please DO NOT speak for me on my behalf. I am not an agnostic and I do NOT take the stance of not believing in any religions. Rather I take the stance of believing in the truths all legitimate faiths represent.
I am pretty well fing done dealing with your shit! To infer that I am taking a racist stance due to your own ignorance and intolerance is bullshit. If I didn’t love and respect people of all faiths who are decent people, specifically if I didn’t feel that way about legitimate Muslims I would have never done a show like the one I did today.
You know the one where I honored a wonderful Muslim man who is feeding his country?
So kiss my ass and if you continue your trolling baiting bullshit you will find yourself blocked completely from the TSP servers. I have no time or energy to screw with bitter little asshats who comment only for the purpose of being a dick.
Apparently a thread about beans and squash can digress into political f***tardary.
Thanks for hanging in there Jack.
Cheers
-Sean
@Sean when you deal with f-tards anything can become f***tardary. Thanks for the humor injection.
Jack. You’ve referenced a 5 gallon bucket gardening method in some of your recent podcasts, but I’m not seeing any links. I ask because I’m close to rolling out a 5 gallon bucket roof garden and wanted to see if the method you were talking about had any ideas I haven’t seen yet.
@Dax: some of us have real significant others to “armpit serenade”. Also, as dogs go, I’d be more of a homestead mutt. Attack dogs wait for commands. Finally, I’m part and partial to (though my upbringing would discourage me from using it) the term f***ery. As in your off topic tangential insults are a bunch of f***ery.
@all,
Dax is now on probation as best I can put it. Any of his comments will go into moderation and most likely not be allowed. I have had enough of wasting time and energy dealing with someone who just wants to be a dick. I actually think he isn’t that bad so I didn’t block or ban him, I was hoping the threat would work, it didn’t so probation for now. Don’t feed him any more he can’t answer you anyway. Insulting other commenter’s, making a big deal about a shirt and talking shit about someone’s weight or sewer connection is not constructive nor does it help the community at TSP.
If anyone thinks this is trampling on his free speech, go here, http://www.thesurvivalpodcast.com/about-tspc/disclaimers-policies-2 read section 4, the end.
@Inbox, I was talking about the stuff Larry Hall is doing, here is his Youtube channel. http://www.youtube.com/user/larrylhall
Thanks. I thought I knew what you were talking about the first time I heard you mention it, but you said something about only using one bucket and a basket, I thought I might have mis heard or something. That just cut my bucket expenses in about half. Also, I’m thinking the double rain gutter that he showed for strawberries/etc. would make a very nice raised bed border… (just a thought)
BTW the main video link for the method is here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Vxj7YiXnfw
Thanks again!