Tag Archives: Mel Bartholomew

September 28, 2020 · 10:01 am

Beautiful COOL Fall Day

Giphy

A cold front came through overnight. Our temperature right now (9:45 a.m.) is 53!  The sun is shining and it’s beautiful outside. This is the first morning in a LONG time we haven’t opened our doors first thing when we come downstairs. It was actually TOO COOL to do that!  We’ll probably do it later as the day warms up, but it looks like summer is finally waving goodbye.

I got my six 4 foot x 4 foot raised bed, square foot planters weeded yesterday. I managed to harvest the remainder of the onions and finish the weeding without getting stung or bitten by the fire ants that had taken up residence in a couple of the planters. We live on about 8 acres. I have no clue why they would climb up the legs of the planters and live in my veggies, but it really has been a problem for me.

Today I’ll remove the broken wooden strips that support the irrigation hoses and sprinkler heads for the garden, plus I’ll string wire on the one box we forgot to prep this season. I’m not sure if I’ll start the process of mixing Mel’s mix for the boxes today or not.

Mel’s Mix is the wonderful soil alternative that allows me to have a garden at about my chest height so I don’t have to worry about the quality (or lack of) of my soil, and can have a garden where I can plant, weed, and harvest without having to bend over double or get up and down on my knees. Mel Bartholomew of Square Foot Gardening is the man who came up with the process. Mel’s Mix is a combination of vermiculite, peat moss, and as many different kinds of compost as you can find. It makes a really rich medium in which to grow plants.

I keep the ingredients in big trash cans along the back of our shop, just next to the garden. We got a used cement mixer that I use in preparation. I put the components in the proper ratio into the mixer, mix it for awhile, then dump it into a big plastic container and dump it into one of my planters over and over until the planters are all filled up.  Though a bit laborious, it works very well.

When this is all done, I have a tarp to put on each planter that I’ll secure with bungie cords. This should keep the growth of weeds down until I’m ready to plant in the spring.

I’m doing a bit on this each day Mother Nature is feeling cooperative. I’ll take pics of the garden prep soon.

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April 10, 2020 · 4:22 pm

Tomatoes!

Several years ago we converted two brick planters to be square foot gardening planters especially to grow the tomatoes we both love. Nothing says luxury to my husband and me than sliced tomatoes right off the vine.

We took all the soil out of the planters and replace it with Mel’s Mix (a combination of peat moss, vermiculite, and as many different kinds of compost as you can gather).  This is the bright idea of Mel Bartholomew, the author of Square Foot Gardening.

 

We have the six foot planter you see above and then the one below, the one we call a ‘nook’ planter, since it fits in the area beside our screened in back porch and the back of the house. It is about 4 feet wide by 2 feet.

 

I weeded the planters, then planted and staked the new plants, then put a bit of miracle gro pellets as fertilizer and watered.

It looks like the lowest temperature in the next ten days will be 36 degrees. I’ll keep an eye on the forecast, though, in case I need to cover the tomatoes, plus my garden veggies, for protection.

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March 31, 2017 · 1:13 pm

How Does Your Garden Grow?

Rodales Organic Life

 

“Mary, Mary, quite contrary,
How does your garden grow?
With silver bells, and cockle shells,
And pretty maids all in a row.[1]”

 

I’ve liked this rhyme since I was a child, but I no longer garden by it. Now my garden is not only the wonderful square foot gardening, started by Mel Bartholomew, allowing people like us to bypass our awful, rocky ridge line soil, having a chance to enjoy a garden, but now I have a RAISED BED square foot garden.

This lady is hopelessly spoiled now. I can plant, water, weed, and harvest – all without having to bend over double or get up and down endless times off my knees. I have SQUARES of plants now, rather than rows, and the plants seem very happy about it.

 

Our total garden is approximately 25 feet long and 15 feet wide. It’s surrounded by fencing, and then chicken wire around the bottom. We have all kinds of critters roaming around because of living on top of a ridge line, outside the city limits, in a more wooded area, so we have deer, possums, raccoons, rabbits, roadrunners, etc., who need to be kept out of the garden. We have a neon pink surveyors tape around the middle of the fencing to let deer know the garden is there before they run into it.

 

The garden has six 4 foot by 4 foot ‘boxes’ that are 8″ deep on metal support tables. They’re about chest high. We then marked off sections with stretchy string. I had some little bitty weeds trying to get a foothold in the garden yesterday. I weeded the whole thing in about 45 minutes with little effort, other than trying to make sure I got all the ones I could see out.

 

We have our irrigation system on a timer that goes for 5 minutes at 5:00 daily right now. We can change this any time it’s needed.

Last year I had some beautiful broccoli and cauliflower LEAVES, but didn’t get a lot of actual VEGGIES from the plants. I have no clue why. I’m hoping for some good eating this year. I’m also trying to grow celery and spaghetti squash for the first time this year.

So, you see why this lady is spoiled beyond repair now, happy as a clam, playing in my plants, and looking forward to eating romaine lettuce, red leaf lettuce, radishes, spaghetti squash, celery, broccoli, cauliflower, spinach and tomatoes this year!

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