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wordwiz_gw

Bad news, maybe good news

wordwiz
12 years ago

My plan was to have a garden that was, at first measurement, about 15,000 square feet but upon closer inspection was closer to 22,000. Plenty of room to grow a plethora of plants, many of which I have started or ordered. But those best laid plans... they fell astray. I had planned on tilling the ground myself, not an easy feat but something I thought I could do, based on past experience. But once I got started, I found the ground was far too hard. Plan B was to have it disced and then I would till it - a couple thousand square feet at at time, until it was done. That fell apart when no one in the city had a disc that would cut the ground deep enough to make a difference. Plan C, which the people who tried to disc it recommended, was to have the ground plowed, then tilled. I found the guy who is suppose to be the best at this, but after giving it a go, he declined. Too many big (and I mean BIG!) rocks. So it is back to Plan A. But the guy from Plan C suggested a long-term solution - he knows excavators who can deliver decent dirt to the garden over the next year or so and add a foot of depth to the entire area. His suggestion was to only use a part of the area this year.

I went over and tilled about 1000 sq. ft. today. Feel like a whipped puppy, but I need to grow up. So I'm looking at his suggestion as being my best option.

The bottom line is instead of a minimum of 15,000 feet of space, I will have about half that. I can handle manually tilling this space, though I suspect I'll regrow some muscles I haven't seen in a couple of decades. I'll still have room for:

Six rows of tomatoes (600 plants) a row of peppers, broccoli and sweet potatoes (100 each), two rows of Sugar Snap Peas, since they will take up the same space as one row of the above (1200 - and they will be replaced with beans/cucumbers in the summer) and a row of chard and onions (~600 each). Plus, I can interplant at least 100 heads of Romaine lettuce between the maters. Then this spring/early summer, before I have a lot of stuff to harvest, till some more ground and plant another row of short-season maters with lettuce between them as well as some acorn squash.

This may be a blessing in disguise, though I will have way more plants to sell than I thought I would. It will allow me to really get my feet wet as far as big-time growing. Sort of like walking with medium-size dogs in grass instead of running with big dogs in tall weeds. Plus, it will allow me to practice my soil conservation methods - I plan on only tilling the ground where plants will go, not the space between the rows.

Updates will follow - for better or worse!

Mike

Comments (17)

  • myfamilysfarm
    12 years ago

    Mike, how about making some raised beds over the rocky areas? Just stake it first, around the rocks, then add the boards.

    Marla

  • brookw_gw
    12 years ago

    Mike, we were in the exact same situation when we took over our farm. At the time, all I had was an ancient front tine tiller. The previous owner, God only knows why, dumped tons and tons of big septic rock all over the place. We spent a whole summer digging out rock and burning giant bulldoze piles he also had in the field. It was a nightmare tilling that soil that had forever been a neglected hayfield. I'd suggest killing the grass first. You can lay something over the top and till once it's gone, or you can spray it with the evil one. It didn't take me long to realize I needed a tractor for something that size. Now I can literally do in 5 minutes what took me half a day before.

    Brook

  • wordwiz
    Original Author
    12 years ago

    Mike, how about making some raised beds over the rocky areas? Just stake it first, around the rocks, then add the boards.

    Marla, the sheer size of it! To grow what I am now planning would mean 7,000 sq. ft. in beds. Besides the massive amount of lumber and good fill dirt, it will not have gone through the freeze/thaw cycle, and I am a very firm believer this is important. Especially when we hit our summer drought time.

    It didn't take me long to realize I needed a tractor for something that size.

    Brook, the problem is no one wants to touch it with their tractor. One big rock, if it was hit is the wrong way could break a plow or the tines on a power tiller.

    I only (!) have 2000 more linear feet to go and I did 600 yesterday, though I got a late start - not that having more time would have translated into a lot more tilling - I was spent when I quit.

    If the garden makes enough money, I will have some kind of a tractor with an attachment or two next year. Won't have to be anything special, just something to make life a bit easier.

    Mike

  • myfamilysfarm
    12 years ago

    I was suggesting to do SOME beds, alittle at a time, just like planting. You wouldn't need to have the beds for tomatoes YET, but you would need them for the peas. Even 1-2 would be extra ground.

    I made raised beds one year without side boards, just dumped a bunch of dirt and horse manure and tilled them together. Yes, they took more water, but if I had chosen a lower spot, it would have worked better. Good thing was when I gave up the raised beds idea, those spots were excellent to work into the ground that I had.

    I was lucky that my dad, grandfather, great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather had already 'picked' rocks from this farm, of course I 'helped' when I was little. We still have some of those huge rocks around the edges.

    Marla

  • wordwiz
    Original Author
    12 years ago

    Marla,

    I appreciate the ideas, really. But there is no water available. It looks like I'll have to do this dance with the horse that brung me. No doubt, I'll cheat a bit - scatter horse manure and compost in just the area where the plants will go.

    One neat thing, a person from the OH Dept. of Ag contacted me about my project. He is promoting jobs creation in urban areas based upon Ag. Don't know where it may lead but it cannot hurt to explore and Interstate, Road or Alley!

    Mike

  • myfamilysfarm
    12 years ago

    Sorry to say, Mike, if you don't have water, don't count on having a garden. Believe me, I didn't have running water until this last year. Mother Nature is not consistent. I had to pack water, I used 55 gal barrels that I filled at a neighbor's well. Then used a generator and a small trash pump to pump the water onto my plants.

    Can you get some water from one of those houses that I seen in your pictures?

    Marla

  • cowpie51
    12 years ago

    Mike , as far as my main garden tractor it is a 21 H.P. and has a rear hitch setup to handle a 12inch plow and any other ground attachments.
    I think you are doing a great job and I hope you break that pesky soil.
    As far as water truck in with your vehicle as many 1 gallon milk jugs as you can and water your plants with a 2 gallon sprinkler

  • myfamilysfarm
    12 years ago

    Mike, if you're buying a new sprayer, buy the backpack style it's much easier on you. Holds between 3-5 gals. I can't handle the 5 gal, so I just fill it as much. Also juice jugs will hold up well, milk jugs will break down after about 6 months from the time of manufacture. Learned this the hard way, when storing water for a hurricane emergency kit. One day, I noticed that there was a puddle under the stand that I was storing the milk jugs of water.

    Marla

  • cowpie51
    12 years ago

    Mike , a backpack sprayer is designed more for pesticides, or herbicide spraying.Get a couple of 2 gallon Sprinkler Jugs for watering your plants . They will put out a flow about 10 times that of a sprayer . Note, that this will take about 2 gallons about every 15 row feet of crops.
    So figure 13 gallons for a 200 ft. row.

  • myfamilysfarm
    12 years ago

    I use 1 sprayer for water/fertilizer and a different one for other stuff. I've not seen teh Sprinkler Jugs. My barrels worked for me, I filled 4 of them at a time and used my generator (or an inventor would work) along with a 1/4 hp trash pump. One person would drive the truck and the other person would water the plants. I've also tried a 40 gal tag-a-long sprayer with a marine battery. Only problem with the tag-along was I forgot the disconnect the Y pipe and it froze. Easy fix, just a regular diverter for garden hoses.

    Mike, you will still need to be able to irrigate some how in case Mother Nature doesn't water enough.

    Marla

  • cowpie51
    12 years ago

    Sorry my math is bad. Figure about 26 gallons for a 200 feet row.
    I have 28,000 sq. feet ( 3/4 acre of tilled growing area)
    Some of it I manually water, although I have a drip system. Mark

  • wordwiz
    Original Author
    12 years ago

    Well, the good news is the site does have a 6" water line running to it, but it is plugged. The village will probably make it available without charging me an arm and a leg. The administrator is really behind this project; he likes the idea of "From a Brownfield to a Green Field - How Lockland is leading the way in Community Sustained Agriculture."

    Mark,

    I've been looking at some of the JD tractors that have a Cargo Hitch. The D120 Lawn Tractor is 21 HP and looks good. I'm also looking at the Brinly-Hardy Disk Harrow, Model# DD-55BH. I would love to find a pull-behind tiller but all the ones Google turns up means I would need a much larger tractor.

    Mike

  • myfamilysfarm
    12 years ago

    Those tillers are GREAT, but they don't like rocks either.

  • myfamilysfarm
    12 years ago

    james here,Mike I would find a Kubota dealer near you in my experience they have a much better line of small equipment than john deere

  • davepays
    12 years ago

    I would avoid the brinly-hardy disc. I was in the same position as you several years ago and purchased one. It was worthless, it just skidded across the ground without breaking in at all. Even with several cinder blocks strapped on. they're just not heavy enough to work unless you have soft sandy river bottom land.

  • wordwiz
    Original Author
    12 years ago

    Mark,

    >> Figure about 26 gallons for a 200 feet row. It takes ~65 gallons to provide an inch of water over 1,000 square feet. If I water a one-foot wide area, your original estimate of 13 gallons is spot-on!

    mff,

    If this guy follows through, I'll have about a foot of mostly clean dirt to plant in next year. Won't have to worry so much about rocks then!

    Davepays,

    >> I would avoid the brinly-hardy disc Thanks for the heads-up. It does look rather weak. In a thread or two down the page Mark (cowpie) has some pictures of his equipment. I'm hoping to find out more how it works.

    Mike

  • cowpie51
    12 years ago

    Mike, the disk. works good with 2 cement blocks after you plow. As far as just trying to disc virgin soil with grass it wont do it. You have to plow to loosen the soil.

    My best tool is my spring tooth drag harrow. I can run that through a few times and then till each path for planting seed with my 2 Earthways.
    without having to plow every year.( because my soil has been worked up every year.) But my first year was a Bugger.

    I have 6 growing areas this season for around 29,000 sq. ft. of tilled soil. I do not use beds but add a lot of organic matter and manures.
    I plant my greens tight spaced rows of 3, my beans tight rows of 2. The rest I plant convential with 18-30 inch spacing ,depending on the crop.
    The equipment that I have does a good job for 1-3 acres ,any more and I would go with a 8n ford or similar with a 3point.
    My chipper/shredder is great for making compost and also grinds soybeans and corn for chicken feed fast I can grind a 50 lb. bag of any grain or seed fast and have perfect texture, also grinds cornstalks and any other dead plant residue even chicken-manure /straw mix.

    Mark

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