My Compost Bin

I thought I'd jump on the compost bin bandwagon that Erin from Garden Now - Think Later started. What a fun posting topic!

My compost bin is more like a "heap," and this is what it currently looks like. It's made from recycled pallets that I obtained through craigslist, and I added chicken wire to the inside to keep the pile's contents inside (not that they are right now LOL--go wind).

Oh! I just added the picture and realized I'm doing double duty with showing you my fork. Better late than never! I always keep it there even though I rarely ever turn the pile. I only use it for turning the pile, and never think about putting it away.

Here's another view of the heap. It's located in the back right corner of the yard behind the orange tree, and out of view from the house (behind me is more dirt and the cherry tree). That was the only way I could convince DH to let me have a pile.

All the green on top of the pile are clippings from the bushes between the lawn and dirt (on the right side of the above pic). They were thrown on a few days ago. I guess I should mix them in... sigh...

If I had more space, I would love to add more bins like DaBeardedOne has, but I'd have to convince DH to let me expand, and I don't see that happening. It's not too bad since there's only dirt around the heap, and things aren't added to it frequently.

Aren't my weeds lovely? That dirt plot is what attracted us to this home, only to find out after we moved in that it's shaded majority of the day (except first thing when I took the pic) by huge redwoods in our neighbor's yard.  I've considered tilling the dirt, and making it a shade garden, but there's no way to easily water that area. Besides, I'm still holding on to the thought of it becoming a play area for chickens this fall or next spring.

Now it's your turn. Get out there and take some pics of your rotting piles!

Dirty Pictures Enclosed

Madeja look! HAHA! I couldn't resist. I just couldn't... Yea, so, anyway, I turned my compost pile on Monday. It's the first real turn it's had since I started it last May (the bottom pallet shown in that post was removed some time ago). This was one of those projects I knew needed to be done, but procrastinated on because it seemed like a pain in the butt to do. Sheesh, silly me... Cool weather and working in the shade made for easy work, and I finished in a little over an hour.

I have the bin hidden behind the orange tree so it can't be seen from the house...

I didn't have space to make multiple bins without it becoming obvious that it's there, but it was no biggie to move since nothing is growing back there anyway...

When I started the compost pile, I started with grass clippings and shredded paper. I had my landscapers add grass clippings throughout the summer, then leaves at the beginning of fall--but then had them stop because they were also adding sticks and seeds. I tried to get out what I could, but I wasn't too picky...

Since I hadn't ever turned the pile, there were lots of grass clumps and slimy chunks of leaves that I had to break up and spread throughout the pile (thank goodness for gloves). Then I put everything back, and watered as I went...

Oh! I was able to pull a lot of worms and add them to my beds. The LO was my transporter. That's what the dump truck in the first pic was for--he loved it!

Hopefully I'll have something useful to use for, oh, my fall crops, maybe?

A few Days of Work

Few! It's already Wednesday! With the LO being sick, Boy Wonder's last week of school, and working in the yard, I've forgotten to blog... This weekend DH built my 2 2'x4' raised bed (RB) frames (yea, I "let" him lol just kidding honey). He also went the extra mile for me and leveled out the ground for the beds to go on. It's good that he did that instead of me... He's very detail oriented, and had a level out n' everything. I would've just eyed it, thrown some dirt down here and there, and gone about my business. The RB on the right will have my sweet potato slips growing in another week or two... As I was filling the bed, I decided to try the "dig and drop" method of trench composting. My pallet compost bin isn't doing very well (yet! I won't give up!), and I was tired of storing food scraps in my freezer so I buried them at the bottom of the empty RB. LOL I felt like an animal burying my food... Oh wait. I am an animal, and I was burying food. Doh! The box on the left has my cantaloupe and unhappy marigolds (suffered heat stroke from sitting in containers on the concrete). The cantaloupe already look a lot happier not being crammed together! This weekend I broke off a few SP slips and placed in water. They're not very big, as you can see, they're sitting in standard size shot glasses. I noticed the slips still growing from the SP have taken off, and almost doubled in size since removing the below slips. DH and Boy Wonder had a little fun picking cherries from the tree. Someone at GardenWeb let me know we're growing a sour cherry tree. And sour those cherries are! Whoa! We won't get enough to make a pie or anything, but the boys still had fun... I wanted post this pic because I think it's so darned cool! Again, my GardenWeb gurus let me know this is a parasitoid wasp resting (or parasitoid-ing) on a bean leaf. Before borrowing Garden Insects of North America from the library, I'd never heard of parasitoid wasps, so it woulda' been a goner! I love that book... I took daring action with my Yolo Wonder bell peppers on Monday, and separated them. They were doing perfectly fine sharing the container--my best growing plants so far in fact, but I had an empty container after moving the cantaloupe, and decided to separate the plants to give them more growing room. The existing fruits appear to be doing well, but a few buds have fallen off. The roots were pretty compact, and filling most of the container, so I think they'll be happier now... I pulled up a radish to see how they were growing, and it was all leaf, no root. I proceeded to tear them all out, tear the leaves into shreds, and put the shreds back into my empty squares (the ones previously holding broccoli). I read somewhere to do that with the leaves... don't know why though... In those squares, I also planted my okra seedlings. Lastly, my cherry tomato plant is growing like crazy, and has it's first buds. "Oh, neat" I flatly thought when seeing them... I don't like tomatoes, so am rather indifferent about their growth.. But I'm growing a tomato plant, so don't be a tomato hater hater, ok?!?! ;-)

First "Harvest," and This n' That

It's been slow-paced in the garden this week... The LO has been sick so he's needed some extra lovin' from Momma the past few days. I picked an onion to see how they were growing, and ended up pulling them all up. I was hoping for the bulbs to grow, but some of them were mushy. I only ended up with the greens that I chopped, and added to the taco meat I made on Wednesday. I guess that was my first harvest! YIPPEEEE! LOL One spearmint plant replaced the empty onion square. I'm hoping the mint will detract some of the bugs making homes on my bush beans. I'll keep a good eye on the mint to make sure it doesn't spread too much. Boy Wonder and I have been enjoying plucking the leaves, and munching on them after dinner. I also got rid of two of my three broccoli plants. I discovered more leafminers in the leaves, and decided to pull the plants instead of attracting more bugs from growing unhappy plants. The third broccoli plant is doing well. I haven't been shading it as much--partly forgetting, partly because it's been cool out, and it's really grown. Maybe I'll end up with a head of broccoli soon! I fertilized my bush beans and okra with a slightly diluted 24-8-16 fertilizer. They're now forming little buds, and the leaves on the beans are green again. Along with the new buds, I counted eight peppers growing on ONE Yolo Bell plant! My two Yolo's are in one container with some marigolds shoved in two corners, so I'm happy they're being so productive, and coping well with the tight quarters. The fruit may end up a little smaller, but I'm so excited!!! Things are finally starting to happen! Thanks to a fellow Freecycler, I was able to obtain enough grass clippings to start my compost bin yesterday. I added shredded paper to the grass (that's the only "brown" I have right now), watered it down, and will check on the pile tomorrow. I've done reading on composting, but still have no idea what I'm doing! Just gonna play it by sight and smell... If I have some heat generating in the pile, I'll add some food scraps I previously froze. Yesterday I managed to get the LO and I out of the house long enough to get my wood cut for my 2'x4' beds that are going next to the deck. I'll (ok, maybe DH if I let him) will construct and fill those this weekend.

...As Visions of Gardening Dance in My Head...

The lawn guys came yesterday, and I was able to get a few (literally) clippings in my bin. I knew I wouldn't have a lot, but when I went to take a look at what they dumped, I guffawed at my "reward." Oh boy... I better get creative, or move on to vermicomposting the kitchen scraps I've been saving. During my walk yesterday I noticed the city lawn service collecting the park's lawn clippings in a truck. I may stop by next week with an empty container or two and ask if I can take a load. I'm sure they put them back into keeping up the city's parks, but maybe they'll see giving me some clippings as less work they have to do for the day, hehe. I don't know my neighbors well/yet, but maybe a good introduction could be interrupting them while they're all sweaty from mowing their lawn to ask for their clippings... I have visions of a steamy bin and want to stick with this project. Cross your fingers for me! I think this section of the yard will be my next project. It's a 24'x2' section running along the deck, and as you can see, the CA poppies are about done and looking pretty gnarly. Also in the bed are random weeds, a stump, and ugly black wood chips. It'd be nice to remove what is there now, and make a raised bed. I'm thinking of 4-5 sections, and the two below the bars for the canopy on the deck containing a few vine vegetables. Perhaps sweet potatoes in the summer, peas in the fall. The vines would look nice growing up the canopy bars. The other sections would either be filled with bulbs/wildflowers, strawberries, or more vegetables... I'm hesitant to have food growing there because of the boys playing in the yard. I'd be ok if flowers were accidentally broken, but probably more upset if food crops were hurt by flying balls, falling bodies, or a curious toddler. This is another project area on the right side of the lawn that I have planned for the spring of 2010. This is the spot where I want to put a 4'x'4 bed of strawberries. I think it'll end up being a little bigger than 4'x4' because I want to have the strawberries bordered by herbs and flowers. After my first experience I previously mentioned with strawberries not being pollinated, I want to encourage as many beneficial bugs as possible to visit this bed. The two issues I foresee with this spot are the shade to sun ratio (haven't payed a ton of attention to yet), and the tree that shades the spot. I don't know what kind of tree it is, but it's in the neighbor's yard, and in the spring, it drops a *TON* of pollen and fuzzy seed pods in that spot. We're already planning on cutting it back this fall (don't want to kill the neighbor's tree by pruning at the wrong time, ya' know?) so hopefully that will help the pollen count. I thought I'd share a few pictures of our orange tree today. The orange oranges are actually from last November's blooms. I pulled a few off over the past few weeks, and although they're very sweet (or so DH and Boy Wonder tell me--I don't like them), the insides of them are about halfway hard or containing just pulp now. The green oranges are also from November's blooming, but they didn't start growing until around February I think. The small babies in the third pic are from blooms we had two weeks ago. I need to do some reading and asking about how to care for the orange bush/tree, but it's not one of my top priorites right now. Probably because I don't much like the fruit. I spotted this grasshopper chillin' on my containerized Yolo Bell peppers. He's the biggest I've seen so far so I scared him off. The little babies I've spotted have been squished (sorry guys), but he would've been a little too gooey between my fingers. blegh. I also spotted this caterpillar (you'll need to click the pic to see) on the underside of a bush bean leaf. I think he along with the growing number of white flies, are the ones making holes in my leaves. He's gone now too, but I didn't squish him with my fingers like I do the other little pests I see... Plucked him off with tweezers. I am finally seeing some little bees on my snapdragons. I haven't seen any buzzing close to the house before, so it's nice having them visit. The window box overlaps one of the kitchen windows, so I can get nice and close without scaring them (or myself) off. Laslty, a quote I like to remind myself: "There are no gardening mistakes, only experiments." -Janet Kilburn Phillips

The Compost Bin is Ready!

YAY! We just came back inside from completing the compost bin. Man, it's a stinkin' hot day today, especially with it being "high noon," but that's when the LO was asleep, and we could both work on the bin together. Fortunately, we were working in the shade the whole time... I read that it's good to have a 3'x3'x3' bin because that amount of materials will generate enough heat to break everything down, and "sterilize" the contents in the bin. The finished bin size is ~4'x3.5'x2' tall. We didn't want the walls of the bin to be 3' high--that just seemed like it'd be more of an eyesore than a 2' high bin... Pictured below, Dear Husband (DH) is stapling the wire to the base. I chose a 2' wide wire aviary netting. I liked this better than chicken wire because it has a smaller gauge. My thinking is that less stuff can fall through this type of wire... Completed base with awaiting walls... It is complete! We used plastic zip ties (because we already had them) to hold the sections together. I don't know how they will hold up, but if they don't last very long, we'll switch over to wire. My biggest concern now is obtaining enough "greens" (ie grass clippings) to get a hot, steamy pile going. A part of our lease is having a lawn service, so I'll let the gentlemen know to dump the clippings in the bin for a while but since it's getting hot out, the grass will slow down it's growth. Also, I've been collecting news and white paper which I've been shredding, and these will be my "browns." Dead leaves are an ideal "brown," but there aren't any right now, and I want to get the compost pile going. I've been freezing food scraps (already have 2 gallon ziplocs + 1 of coffee grounds), but the wonderful people hanging out on the compost section of Garden Web said it's best to have a hot pile going before adding food scraps. I'm assuming it's because it helps keep smells down by decomposing the food faster, and it keeps the critters out. Oh, yes. The greatest things about the pallet bin and it's location are that it blends in with the wood fence, and the orange bush hides 90% of it. Well, for now anyway... If this bin goes well, I may add an extension bin moohahahahahaha! Garden addiction. ADDICTION I tell ya! No. Wait. NOT addiction. I'm just doing my part to help the planet. Yea... I'll keep telling myself that's the root of my gardening motivation... Yea...

A Few Projects and More Plants

With my SFG up and running, it only took me a day or two before I became bored, and needed more projects to work on hehehe... I thought I'd share a few things I've done. The first thing I did was construct a shade cover for my broccoli. I had an extra dowel left over from creating a shade cover for my salad table, so I cut it into 3rds and stuck in the soil behind the broccoli's. Next I took leftover hardware mesh, leftover bed sheet fabric (I'm so glad I saved this!), and zip ties. Used the zip ties to attach the fabric to the mesh, and made a "lean to" shade cover. Not the prettiest thing, but I was able to make it at no additional cost, and it does great for shading my broccoli babies. The only problem I've run into is on breezy days (um, most afternoons) it occasionally gets blown over, but always onto the concrete and not the plants. I had been doing some reading on composting when my brain was too full of content on growing plants, and decided to attempt composting. There is a perfect spot in the back right corner of the yard, and is partally hidden by the orange tree/bush. The biggest problem with this spot was the existing dirt pile I had to remove. I was hoping it was an old compost heap and I could use to get my pile going, but it turned out to be one big dense clay mass. On Mother's Day, one of my "presents" was being able to spend a couple hours digging in the dirt while Daddy played inside with the boys. The picture below is after I already started chopping away at it. For some reason I always forget to take pictures before I start doing things... Taking a break... Finally! Three hours of digging, and a few blisters later, here is the result. This weekend (ie tomorrow) Hubby will saw the other free pallets I got off of craigslist for the walls of the bin, and attach them for me. This was The Husband's project last Saturday. The deck was looking pretty ragged, so he took the sheers off of the side of the canopy,removed a few non-working strands of white lights, trimmed the pear and plum trees in the back, and swept the deck and pillars. It's finally a nice spot to go and relax! I was at OSH getting blood meal for my pepper plants, and although I knew I shouldn't have, I went to look at the veggies they had... I ended up bringing home 3 canetloupe babies. LOL I don't know *what* I'm going to do with these guys, but I couldn't resist! If they make it long enough, I will either find one heck of a creative way to trellis, or I'll move the container to a dirt spot on the west side of the yard. I haven't done any reading on canteloupe, so I don't know if I have them too close. Hopefully this 15" pot will suffice... We shall see! Lastly, my sweet potatoes... Ok. Again, my green thumb impulses and boredom got the better of me. I couldn't help it! I love sweet potatoes, it's the perfect time to get them a' growin', and I have a big clay pot that was here when we moved in. So. I decided to conduct a sweet potato experiment. I bought 2 Beauregard sweet potatoes from the grocery store and stuck one in the pot using Mel's mix with sand/pea pebbles added to help with drainage. I stuck the second potato with two corn cob holders and put in a container of water. HAHAHA! After looking at my soaking potato, it felt like it wanted to be looking back at me, so I gave it some eyes. Oh, and Boy Wonder #1 gave it some ears. teehee Few! Another long updating post... Almost up-to-date! My next post I'll be showing a few current pictures of my SF and container garden. Ciao!