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We got 1/3 inches of rain, followed by a .5 inches of snow, but the snow only stuck on roofs, lawns and beds so it all melted off soon after it warmed up a bit.
I did get lawn fertilized before all the precip fell so that was good. We collected all the leaves we could as well. Then we worked on some more corners for the raised beds, but we ran out time and energy to get the beds put in before our trip. So after we get back, we plan to get them in place so we can then fill them so they'll be ready to use come early spring.
Our high today was 40, GH got up to 93 for a high, so even if its not overly warm once we get back, working inside the GH should be comfortable.
Here are 3 pics of the GH that are labeled as to what view they are. We've done a lot to really strengthen and secure the GH, so hopefully it should last several years (fingers crossed).
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The pics from the GH looks good, should make a great addition to your gardening plans. Hope you have a good trip today.
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I used fence rails for the sides I bought some used and some from home depot. Yes they are 16 ft long and the posts are custom cut not too hard. There is a steel tpost inside and the PVC pipe has a rear inside and tie wire going across the box to prevent spreading. Un fortunately you can not use utelite and cheap in the same sentence. The mine is on the same road as the dump but if you go for some have a good tarp to cover it it's very light and blows away. You are welcome to come look at what I did.
Also on a previous note here are some tomatoes i picked green before the frost.
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So do you remember what the price was for a cubic yard of utelite? We're going to need a lot for the first couple times at least so buying it bags wouldn't be the way to go if getting truck load would be cheaper. We have a really neat thing from harbor freight that connects to the tailgate then you can unwind it before the bed is loaded, load it, tarp it and when its time to unload you crank it back in sliding the load toward tailgate so you can get it into your wheelbarrow and haul it where you want it. It'll leave some residue along the sides but it gets 85-90% of it.
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So it's not cheaper to buy it at the mine vs at Valley nursery? As jjannie said, buying a truck load vs a few bags, should be cheaper. Does utelite break down over time and if that is the case, how many years will it last, until you need to buy more for your garden? I always thought utelite was a man made substance or at least part of it but if it comes from a mine I guess that isn't the case.
That is a nice haul of tomatoes and a good variety too. I think I'll take you up on your offer for a look see at your garden boxes. It would not hurt to have another idea for some taller boxes.
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I called and got current price a pickup is 47.38 and a large ld like I haul is 31.30 per yd
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Thanks much! Now we'll just need to get our truck back from our son - LOL!
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What size truck do you have?
When we called today they said if we could take 2 cu yds at once it'd cost 38.30 x 2 of course. Guess we'll need to figure out our GH layout for certain but we feel we may need 2 loads but they said we probably can only take 1 cu yd in our size truck - (F150 but our bed length is only a 6.5 ft).
They recommended for our needs to get the 'Root Zone mix' - is that what you use for your raised beds?
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I have a 1 ton but it doesn't have much more volume but I have an 8x20 dump trailer that will hold as much as you want. Yes the root zone is what I use it has some topsoil and mulch mixed in.
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yeah, that size trailer would hold a lot. Looks like after planning the layout we'll need 4, possibly 5 cu yds of the stuff. Looks like next week we'll be ready to start filling the beds. We have a lot of compost, used straw and leaves we can supplement the filling them. So we'll be calling to see if they have the Root Zone mix available.
Have you needed to add a small load amount each year to your raised beds as the plants use it up?
Does it keep its nice consistency from year to year?
We have a small Mantis tiller we use in our raised beds (its small enough to lift over the bed wall, so hopefully it'll be good in the GH beds as well).
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Wow that was really cold Tues night, we had a low of -5! Guess even you guys felt that cold temp drop as well.
Did you ever make over yet to look at mme's raised beds?
Called J&J's as well as Valley, they are out of the bulk utelite. Looks like we'll making drive to get some before winter really sets in. Next week we should be ready to start filling our GH beds. Think we're going to need 4 cu yds of it - they said to call them to be sure they have it available before we drive there - hope they will. We really want to get these beds ready for use come early spring.
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Got down to 9 here, a little chilly on our walk this morning but no worse than yesterday, when the wind was blowing.
Yes, I did make it over to mme's to look at his raised beds. He said the bottom half of his grow boxes had dirt in them, not utelite. It would be too expensive to fill 6' by 32' by 2 ft deep boxes with utelite but I loved how high they were, not much bending over with boxes that tall. If you guys make your boxes that tall, I'd recommend filling the bottom half with sand, so your SP have more growing room.
Here is a close up pic of one of his corner post.
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sorry I missed needing to respond to you...
Well we got two of larger beds filled. Seems we're good for filling one of them a day before we get too whooshed. Tomorrow we need to finishing the building process for the 2 smaller beds, still about 2ft deep each but they are only 3x4 in size. We've got our Utelite dumped out on our parking area so we fill 5gl buckets, load them into wheelbarrow and cart them around to the other side of the house to the GH where the buckets make it easier to bring inside the GH.
His beds are nice looking for sure. Those t posts will really hold them in place nicely.
I guess a sand bottom would have been option. but we past that for now.
Guess we'll be back at again tomorrow. But we are really happy with how everything is turning out so far. Hopefully plants will grow like mad in it next year. We'll be experimenting once again for sure. Already looking forward to it.
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I got a new set up for starting my seeds. Jeff made this for me. The LED grow lights have the proper light spectrum that is supposed help grow stronger starts. (see pics) He made it so as the plants get taller I can adjust how close the lights are to the plants. Almost can't wait to try it out.
Guess winter is a good time to start thinking about any/all the changes needed for next year's growing season. We have a lot things to try out next year.
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Wow, that is cool. Back in the days when I tried that approach to starting plants indoors before the season started, to get a early start, I saw those kits where you would move the lights up like that, as the plants grew but never saw grow lights like that, very impressive.
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we those available for purchase, then Jeff made this one for me from his wood scraps in the shop. The only costs were for the thumb screws to make disassembling it for storing it during the off season easier, and the paint - he used a bargain can from the returned mixed ones at HD. Its a really good paint that will handle getting a few drips of water on it no problem. So the whole thing cost less $10 and a little time in shop, when he was 'cleaning and organizing' his shop [  ] It was a nice surprise for sure.
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So that was the Christmas present he was working on in his shop? Very nice, I bet it will work out great.
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I believe so although I haven't been out in the shop to be positive. [  ]
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Thats quite the rig. Good luck with it.
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Fingers crossed, it'll help out with getting stronger plants as mine tend to get bit leggy and weak before I can get them into the ground.
Since we've added a greenhouse to our set up, we are hoping to extend our growing season on both ends of our growing season - between frosts our shortest on record has been 20 days, luckily, that has not happened since we moved to this location but its always on our minds. Most long time locals won't even try to garden anymore. But there is nothing better than home grown ripe tomato is there?
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