You are growing blueberries!? Where did you buy the plant? I assumed they require colder climates.

Well, it can get chilly on the Big Island, but there are a number of varieties that don't require a great deal of chilling. I got these at the Hilo Walmart. I've seen other members post that they've grown them on Oahu, so they will grow - soil acidity seems to be a key issue - I'm still working on it for my bushes.

Aloha Randyg!

Yep they sell Blueberries over here on Kauai too, down at Walmart and KMart. They get paid WELL for them of course (I'd personally rather grow them from seed to save the cash!) at about $25.00-$30.00 each for a 1-2' tall rooted plant (consisting of a single vertical stem, lol)
I can't recall the exact species/cultivar though! I assume it's a variation/cultivar that doesn't require the extremely cold conditions, or at least requires these conditions for less time, than 'traditional' Blueberries.

As for your planting box questions Dashinhi, not to get too far off-topic, lol. There are plenty of veggies and herbs available for sale just about anywhere that can do well in close quarters growing conditions (Baby back Choi is a great example, 'Toy-Choi' reaches about 5" tall when it's ready, but they're stubby little plants that supply plenty of foliage to eat) You can get alot of food out of just a small plot of land (even down to a square foot!) ...it's almost all in how ya manage the space that you've got!

It's the warmer season now, so it's not the absolute best time to grow or plant any lettuce, but you CAN do it nonetheless. Again it depends on where you're garden is and how much sun it gets, but a shade is easy enough to stick up over any sensitive areas (or plant something tall on the north side before you plant the sensitive plants to give them some shade throughout the time which the sun would be beating down on them)
You'll have to pick it (lettuce/ broccoli, and I believe cabbage as well) sooner than normal, as it will go to flower/seed quicker in this warmer weather than it would at milder times of the year. If you're planning on planting a selection of Lettuce varieties, I suggest doing the following;

Buy a 'bulk' load of each variety you'd like to plant, Home Depot. Walmart. Etc. usually sell a small bag (in ounces) of different lettuce varieties. Mix these seeds 1/1/1 (or however many varieties you have) with an equal part sand, and spread this mix evenly on the topsoil. You can either pull the whole plant(s) when they're ready to harvest, or cut the tops from the stems, leaving enough that new leaves will grow back (supplying a continual supply, for some time, of fresh lettuce)This way you can grow an assortment of different lettuce in one area, and it conserves space quite a bit as well, salad intercropping =D

If you'd like to do some carrots and radishes, these can be planted in the same manner which the lettuce was, just mix the seeds and disperse evenly over an area (however large) The Radishes should germinate first, and be ready to harvest first, and about the time that you harvest your radishes, the carrots should be needing more room (freed up by the removal of the radishes).

There are hundreds of methods like this regarding intercropping, I've read up on it and taken a class or two, and found that you can grow enough food to eat fresh, freeze, can, and/or store, for one person for one year, in an area about 2x2 in one growing season!

Depending on how big the slug problem is, how big the garden is, etc. You can take some ground up Chili peppers and spread them or the powder in around the base of the plants. Another way if you have a wall they'd have to climb up to get into the garden (careful if you have dogs or cats though) would be to take some Vaseline and mix a good amount of Chili pepper powder in with that, enough that it's tinted red. Just take this mixture and make a perimeter on the outside of the wall to the garden area, and it'll hold up for a while before the rain washes it down. Just be careful to put it in a place on the wall which won't be getting touched very often, can obviously be a nasty surprise if ya get it in your eyes or something. This is what I use on my potted herbs and veggies, seems to work pretty well. This combined with killing every slug or snail I see, and having plenty of the toads and centipedes around, has my yard almost completely clear of those pests =]

I think I may still have some of the pages from my course around here somewhere, if you want to email me I can scan them in and shoot them over to you, they give some good examples of layouts and whatnot that helped me out a bit =]

Take it light and talk with ya all later on, all the best!

Dave
Kauai

Dave,

Those layouts and other info would be great!

I'm growing my lettuce off the ground, both to minimize the slug (and potential rat-lungworm) issues, and also since my dog has a taste for fresh lettuce, so I think I'm going to just plant root crops and legumes in the border. I like the idea of intercropping radishes with the carrots, although I may just do a few - not a big radish fan. I may also plant beets in the border region. Hmm... Do you think celery would work in a 4" wide planter? I realize that most plants care more about volume, and less about length and width dimension.

I've been doing the slug and snail killing, and I KNOW we've got a bunch of centipedes, as every time one comes in the house our cat kills it and leaves the carcass for us. This has become a near-weekly event. Do toads actually eat slugs? Hmm. I don't particularly care for toads - having a dog. I wonder if coqui frogs will eat slugs. Don't believe the stuff about them only being the size of a quarter - I was cleaning out my pond this past weekend and there were three coqui frogs a bit larger than a silver dollar (Eisenhower not Anthony). Don't know if I can use the capsaicin infused petroleum jelly on my vinyl box. How much rain do you get where you are?

Thanks
Doug

Hey there,

Alright I'll go through and pull out anything that might be useful to ya =] Sounds good, the slugs are a pain for sure. Lol. And, of course, the 'inner-critters' they bring along with them aren't any better! ;-]
Four inches wide by how long? (and infinite depth, on the ground, right?) I can only imagine they'd do just fine, as long as they aren't RIGHT on top of one another. I planted a row of lettuce and grew it within 1 inch of one another, just a bit closer than the directions recommended and they didn't get quite as tall as they should have, but I got three times more food than I would have planting a couple inches apart, lol. All turned out well in the end =]

Yep, the cats love em...They like scorpions on the mainland too..(Haven't seen any of the Lesser Scorpions supposed to be out here as of yet) Maybe the only thing that loves both of those pests more are the chickens...Heheheh. Yes the toads will eat the slugs and sometimes the smaller snails, they like the burrowing roaches that come out of the grass about the same though, lol. Definitely a danger if you have a dog though, the Bufo marinus are some of the worst toads around... (most toxic) Ugh, Coqui. Glad we don't have those on Kauai (give 'em time...) Had no idea what size they get, I heard they don't get big, but I guess it depends on what one would consider 'big' heheheh.

Ahh vinyl...Didn't consider that, let me think...Lol. Could always use the old beer in a dish idea =/ That's tried and true, lol. Otherwise the seek, capture, and destroy method sounds like your best bet =/ Just lay out a rug or something in the yard by the garden, if they're specifically going after the garden they'll want to rest nearby during the day, so it's easier to go the offensive...Just tossing out ideas here, heheheh, some might work and some might not =p

Plenty of rain where I'm at (about 300-350' or so) Thought it would be sunny and quit raining for a while; raining as I type...Lol.

Take it light, I'll go through over the next couple days and piece together some of those pages for ya =]

~Aloha~
Dave

(Thought I'd ask, you never know who knows; If you have any ideas how to get rid of Rust on assorted plants, please do tell....Going to battle with Canna Rust over here and would like to try anything and everything before I start shooting the fungicide all over the place...Read a few things online thus far, have yet to try them out...Heheheh)

When I worked out in Waimanalo (when I lived on Oahu) I saw a few scorpions. Freaked me out. Grew up in Kaneohe and never even knew Hawaii had scorpions.

Sorry, but I have no idea what to do about rust. Aside from fungiciding everything. I wonder if a strong camomile spray would do anything?

Doug

Doug/dashini,

Do a search on Square Foot Gardening, or French Biointensive Gardening - you can grow ANYTHING and MANY THINGS in you small space. There is a book on Square Foot Gardening by Mel Bartholomew altho I have not read it because I'm getting plenty of info online. I've also subscribed to a Yahoo Group called SquareFootGardening which has been very helpful.