I think I saw a prepper garden-ette today

[LittleFish]

Driving on my usual country route to work this morning, I saw along the side of a house six or eight of those hanging tomato planters and beneath them, about a dozen good-size planters with tall stakes sticking out (for pole beans, I'm thinking). This is a house in the country with enough yard for a garden in back, easily.

So I am thinking that these people are doing what I am doing -- plant some in the ground, and put some in containers so you can grow them as if outdoors, but bring them in if either society goes crazy and people are stealing food, or if the weather goes nuts and either fries or drowns our gardens. Part of mine is lack of space, too, using my patio with pots/buckets to grow more on my small in-town lot, but this person has plenty of room for an in-ground garden yet chooses to grow some this way? I think he's covering all the bases. May even be a member here.

Just cool to see it and thought I'd share.

[momof23goats]

could very well be. I am on a homestead, tons of room .I have raised beds, a garden out back, containers on the deck, and hanging. don't know what to tell ya. :mrgreen:

[Belle]

I've been hearing about more and more people who are integrating food plants into their landscaping. That makes them less obvious to anyone looking to steal food. I planned all of my landscaping to be food plants. I have very few that are just for show (and most of those were planted because hubby liked them. Gotta keep a happy hubby!)

[Indigo]

Belle, they call it Urban Homesteading and there are tons of sites on the net. Some of the blogs on urban homesteading have neat pictures to show how people cope with less space to grow things. Some folks sure can be creative!

I live in the city but do at least have a double lot. My elderly mom has never gardened with raised beds and she's so excited about the ones I built this year that she wants to dismantle one of her flower beds, parcel the roses and lillies to other spots, because then I would have room for two more raised beds. These are behind the house and don't show from the road. But we tuck veggies in amongst the flowers. We have a big pansy gardens at the front of the house...but there are radishes and onions tucked here and there. The flower beds also have herbs tucked among the delphinium and columbine. You can hide a lot of yummy goodness in established gardens.

We are also removing some old (and very ragged) low growing evergreen bushes (dunno - they could be yews) and putting in HoneyBerry bushes in their place. There is a little decorative fence between our yard and the neighbors and oh, that echinacea looks sooo pretty blooming there! ;)

Indigo

[Belle]

Belle, they call it Urban Homesteading and there are tons of sites on the net. Some of the blogs on urban homesteading have neat pictures to show how people cope with less space to grow things. Some folks sure can be creative!

Cool. I'll be doing some reading about that tonight. I like the idea of having a garden, but not having a garden.

[LittleFish]

I'm growing on a really small in-town lot. Maybe I will keep better notes than I was planning and post that to a blog. So far, I have 15 KY Wonders up about 2", a couple dozen green onions standing tall 3-6", and five of the eight potato plantings have started sprouting up 2-3". Next weekend I will add cukes, zukes, pumpkins, tomatoes and peppers. Also have herbs growing. Incorporating companion planting for space and benefits plus succession planting to harvest into the late fall. I do need a rabbit fence, however. Two of my beans were clearly nibbled. Will get that up this weekend, too.

And after reading a post elsewhere on TOL today, I'm wondering if a couple egg laying chickens in a 'coop' on the enclosed back porch might be feasible. Will have to research the whole chicken thing.

[Alder]

I have 40 acres, but I think that the deck boxes I grow kitchen herbs, spinach, lettuce, radishes and green onions in are some of my most productive ground. They are there right by the kitchen for salads and sandwich greens, omelet ingredients and soup flavoring. Full sun all day and good dirt. In fact, today I'm going to plant a section with turnips and carrots.

Our big garden is great for tomatoes, peppers, potatoes, squash, root crops, etc, but I'm constantly fighting the clay...even with all of the manure that we have on the place thanks to the livestock.

Those little gardens are amazing!

[Ms. American]

Adler, you might consider tilling in some course builder's sand into that clay soil along with the added organic matter, and build it UP a foot or so. Better drainage for the roots.

I'm in heavy clay soil with no organic matter, and this is the first year it's been gardened. It's only a tiny patch...i do mean tiny..like 6x12. I had to do it by hand. Each year I'll add to the top till I build it up.

I've always had such sandy, organic free soil that this clay is a treasure for me! I spent over 10 years cultivating my sandy soil, and it didn't do much till I built bed walls for raised beds, then took the existing sand(it was so fine it packed tight) and mixed it one wheel barrow full at a time with kitty litter (for some clay), peat(for water holding capacity) manure (slightly fresh for the organic matter, and microbes) and vermipost. Then I dumped the load into the box. One wheel barrow full at a time...equal amounts of everything. I ended up with an amazing, rich, healthy productive garden that year. I'll have to do something similar with my little patch next year.

It's hard work, but oh is it ever worth it!

[LittleFish]

Saw this thread pop back to the top so will add on to it to tell of how many people are growing food in our little neighborhood this year. We are packed fairly tight, too. It's not a modern housing development neighborhood but one estabilished in the 1950s. I have my containers on the patio and beans, tomatoes, cukes, zukes growing alongside the house. The guy behind me has a raised bed and a row of some kind of berries. The people next to us have berries on a trellis and tomatoes in pots. And those are just of the four yards I have clear view of from my house.

The guy behind us appears to be really serious -- he has some sort of electrified wiring around his berries to keep out the varmints. I saw the warning placards but didn't stop to study it, of course.

Also have heard many interviews on the local npr station about community gardens and comments that folks are growing more edibles than decorative annuals this year.

[packyderms_wife]

Found this link for urban homestead http://urbanhomestead.org/journal/
This is what we are doing, if we didn't have the driveway I'd be doing even more.

Kimberly