Straw bales , garden art ?

this fits here ,and on trash to treasure . I don't have much sun to plant toms , so with this arbor , given to me and no legs on one side , I stuck the short side in pvc pipe to make it uniform . Here's where straw bales come in . I used rotted straw to line two plastic milk cartons . then filled in with compost . used more straw (hay) to top it off, and packed it in tight . Planted Beef steak in them and have jalapenos in front for border .

Who says you can't plant your veggie garden with your flowers ? Just look how healthy my homemade bales have made my toms . Thank you again Kent . digger

I'm impressed Digger. Really looks great. I had 2 single arbors out in my yard & the winds tore them up. I removed the twisted bottom 2 sections on each side & have 5' arbors instead of the reg. height. Have one in front of my storage shed & the Mexican Flame vine was so heavy it was pulling it over so had my son wire it to the shed & its holding up great. Have another single arbor that I fastened to my fence & it has held up well. So, I imagine that is what happened to your legs on one side. But, you have truly turned trash into a treasure with yours. It looks like the same construction as my arbors. Your yard looks so pretty & green. Thanks for sharing with me.

Judy

digger: great pic!

digger - do you mean you just lined the milk crates with straw then compost inside? WHen you say rotted straw, do you buy a bale and let it hand around for awhile? No dirt/soil? Nothing leaks from all those openings? I suppose the roots go down into the dirt below, what a way to foil the gophers (unless they climb over)!

I used leftover hay of the bales I had planted squash in . The squash was over and the bales were pretty rotted . pulled the squash out and used the depleted bales to get my straw . Took handfulls of it and lined the bottom and sides. Filled to about 3/4 full, packed tight , then put a coupla cups of compost in and filled up with more hay . packed all as tight as I could then used a big knife to plunge down and work open a hole to plant toms . Do I make any sense ? I water slow every day real good . Have added hay to the top as it continues to decompost . When you water slow and get the hay and compost soaking wet, it stays damp in there so it only takes a minute to water .If you let it dry out , the water will run through, so want to keep it damp. digger

Hi Sally, I love the tomatoes growing on that arch! What kind are they?

Lena

Hi , Lena , those are beefsteak . Waiting for them to ripen and gonna have a bunch . This is the first year I've planted them ,but if they have the flavor, you can bet I'll have them again . digger

Looking good! Neat idea and saw on another thread where someone picked up some arches at a Dollar store for $4.00 each (albeit, not as strong looking as yours). I am considering this whole strawbale thing and I could have a bale on each side of the arch with a climbing veggie plant(s) going over! Where do you get those milk crates? Those might dry out too fast here though where we have very high temps in summer. Add wind and low humidty and I might need to keep a drip going all day!

I've had my crates at least 20 years . If you stand on an old one , you might break the bottom out . I just remove it altogether then , and put it around a young plant . In my pic . it shows one around a Japanese maple .
I went today to buy some of those arbors but they didn't have any . None of them are real sturdy . I think they're the same . digger

quiltygirl They have storage crates on sale at Menard's.. Like the milk crates..I think they are 2 for$5..Threw my add away darn.. The hole space's are a little bigger..A little landscape fabric might help.


Tubby


This message was edited Aug 4, 2009 9:34 PM