Garden Frames and the Peril of Floating Row Covers

It's survival of the fittest out there, and in our California garden, plant seedlings are not the fittest. Slugs, snails, birds, cutworms, wind, cold, and weeds all take their toll, with the pests probably doing the most damage. Floating row covers are supposedly the way to go. I got some of that fabric a few years ago, and, let's say, the results were mixed. I don't have the patience to deal with lightweight fabric, finding the hoops, and weighing down all the edges (which somehow get caught in my shoes and ripped out of the ground the next time I go in the garden) the way you're supposed to with those covers.

So, I had a great idea. I'd make wooden frames, attach the floating row cover fabric to it, and just lay it in the garden over my seeds. I got some 2x2 redwood, along with some 1x2 (or so) redwood, built a bunch of frames, carefully put the row-cover material over them (wrapping it around the 1*2 sections and nailing them down so there'd be good strain relief on the fabric), and then planting some seeds and putting a frame over them. It looked great, that frame did, out there. It even worked! I got a great patch of lettuce and beets from seed, without having to sprout indoors and transplant.

Sadly, I think the reason the frame and fabric worked is I put it out in winter, and the fabric only lets rainwater through. It doesn't rain here in the spring, summer, and fall, and the fabric doesn't seem to let water from the sprinklers through. I kid you not - I even took some photos to show the frames on our driveway (above) and how dry the driveway was after I sprayed the frames from the hose. If you care, I could explain why the frames don't let sprinkler water through (at least my theory), but the bottom line was I had a lot of seeds that weren't sprouting under the frames. Sometimes, the garden would be wet everywhere except where the frames covered it!

Time to turn to the neighbors. I decided to replace the row-cover material with window screening. I figured someone would have old window screens in their garage that no longer fit any windows on their house, so I asked around. Well, a neighbor had a roll of screen tucked away. He traded it to me for some lettuce (I'll drop some eggs by, too) and I've started upgrading the frames. One photo shows a frame with the screen next to one with the row-cover after both had been sprayed by a hose. Low-and-behold, the frame with the screen (on the left in the photo below) lets water through and the row-cover didn't. (If that's not science in action, I don't know what is).

I'll keep a few row-cover covered screens for winter, when they should keep the soil warmer and rain will keep things damp. Otherwise, I'm converting most of my frames. They'll keep the pests away and should really increase the number of plants that survive childhood.

- Bruce

Vermiculite and Make-It-Yourself Potting Soil

I've gotten tired of buying bags of potting soil. There's umpteen choices at the local box stores and garden centers, but I doubt the seeds care all that much what they grow in. Also, I've found some of the potting materials I've tried don't work all that well. They form a water-impermeable layer on top and when I water the pots, the water doesn't soak in.

Somewhere, I read that all you need for potting soil is a 50-50 mix of Vermiculite (an expanded form of mica) and peat moss, with maybe some slow-acting fertilizer thrown in. I gave that a try and, low-and-behold, the seeds grow! Now the problem is finding vermiculite. Most garden centers have cute little bags of it, which is fine, but I had visions of saving money and those little bags cost as much as a bag of potting soil. An online search for vermiculite didn't turn anything up. My closest garden center (Home Depot, ironically) doesn't have large bags. I asked about special-ordering it at one specialty garden center, but their supplier had stopped carrying large bags.

I put the big-bag concept on the back burner, but one day on my way into the big-box Home Depot I spied large bags of Vermiculite, just sitting there. I shelled out $27 or so and now I'm set for a while. The photo shows the bag I bought, along with the organic fertilizer I've been using. Of course, I'm out of peat moss, but that's easier to find.

My potting soil recipe.

Ingredients:

Some vermiculite
Some peat moss
Much less organic fertilizer (say 5-3-3).

Put some vermiculite into a five gallon bucket. Add about the same
amount of peat moss (you can go 60-40 on the peat moss/vermiculite mix
if you want to save vermiculite). Mix it. Add a bit of fertilizer
(optional) and mix some more.

Tight Lettuce

I ran across a column today in the Wall Street Journal, loosely titled:  How much can you save growing vegetables?

The bottom line is "a lot", if you don't spend a lot of money on capital costs (such as tools, raised bed, soil, etc). Here, we pay for water, also. Still, spending a few dollars on seeds for many pounds of vegetables, is a pretty good deal (of course, there's the work and occasional crop failure to face).

I try to save where I can, but I do spend money on some things. I've found some tools (like the shovel I leave in the compost area) at yard sales. I keep an eye out for scrap lumber for garden frames and other useful, junked items, left at curbside. Now I want a few old window screens to build more protective screens for my seeds (more about that another day).

What caught my eye in the article was "Plant the lettuce tight enough, and there won't be room for any [weeds]". The photo shows my latest attempt at fighting off the slugs, snails, birds, and other garden evils to grow lettuce from seed in the garden. My attempt succeeded! The weeds manage to poke out here and there, but you can see Romaine packed hip-to-hip, with beets and a "Red Sails" lettuce grabbing space also. I'll pull the weeds this weekend.

Front Yard Garden - White House

We visited Washington DC yesterday and walked the Mall. We made sure to walk past the White House (we'd tried to get tour tickets, but failed) and low-and-behold, there on the White House lawn (the front lawn, no less) is the new White House garden. It's partially visible from the street, and (garden-envy alert) it's bigger than ours. Of course, they have more resources, including school children and a staff. Kudos to Michelle Obama for getting out there and digging in with this tremendous promotion for backyard gardens.

I'm advocating White House chickens next.

Ten years ago, or so

After we moved into our house ten years ago, I surveyed the small, overgrown vegetable garden the previous owners had left. New to California, the land of milk and honey, I pulled some of the weeds out and dropped some lettuce seeds in. Between the forthcoming winter rains and the reasonably decent soil, I figured salad was in our future.

I watched and sure enough, things grew. Not knowing which sprouts, if any, were lettuce I let it all grow. Lo and behold, I had raised a fresh batch of weeds with no lettuce in sight. I gave it time and, one day a few months later, I surveyed a crop of healthy, ugly-looking weeds and wondered what to do with the patch. Glancing down at my feet, I saw a lettuce plant that had somehow grown and was ready to be picked.

Years later, looking back, I'm amazed that that one plant made it. It's a survival-of-the-fittest world out there, with slugs and snails itching to chow down on fresh vegetables. There are any number of weeds able to out-compete the weaklings sown by man. Birds are raring to snack, and in some cases squirrels partake to. It's man-against-nature, and in our most recent year, a man-against-chicken activity.