Gardening The Back 40

I have been trying to get something to grow in the back yard (about a quarter of an acre) since we bought this house six years ago (Yorktown Virginia, zone 7b). Tried grass for two years and it just wouldn't take in the heavy clay. Sod was too expensive. Then I decided I didn't want to mow it and started turning it into garden, hoping to plant something to feed us in our retirement years. Yea, I know, gardening is a lot more work than mowing the lawn. I must have hauled fifty plus yards of compost, bark fines and sand from the nearby county composting facility over the past couple of years. Spread it out and tilled it in and made some raised beds. The first year was a mess....got a few tomatoes...bugs got everything else (I don't want to use chemicals). The next year was better but all the tomatoes got wiped out by some fungal disease. We got some nice beans and cucumbers, but the racoons ate all the corn. Last year was better...lots of cukes, swiss chard, pole and bush beans and a few zucchini early in the season, but then the cucumber and bean beetles came and brought their virus with them and the squash vine borers got the zucchini.
This year is off to a good start. Tried something different to keep the bugs away. So far it's working like a champ. These are row covers/small hoop tunnels made from EMT and an agricultural fabric called agribon. It lets in air, rain and light and keeps bugs and bunnies out and works for everything not requiring bees for fertilization. The photos show the results.

Few more pics--Romaine lettuce

Kale

Pole Beans on Cattle Panels from Tractor Supply

Horse Radish, tomatoes and jalapenos

SugarSnap Peas yum!!

Blackberries and sweet peppers

Swiss Chard

Last one--Broccoli Rabe. Thanks for looking

Fabulous looking garden! All your hard work has really paid off.

Okay, I'll be the first to ask this: What's EMT?

I started peas under hoop loops this spring to keep the birds from eating them.

Fasteddy, your yard is MUCH more interesting as a veggie garden than it ever would have been as a lawn. Me, I have zero patience for water/mowing/fertilizing grass. Big waste, IMO. So like you, my yard is gradually turning to veggie garden. I have a ways to go, but it sure is fun.

Great going, your garden looks fabulous.
Lise

Thanks HoneyBee. Electrical metallic tubing (EMT) it's galvanized electrical conduit available at Lowe's and Home Depot. Works great for garden structures. I really like it for trellis frames and use welded wire mesh for the trellis (an idea I found somewhere on this forum)

Thanks Lise....It's sure more fun than mowing.....and much tastier than grass :)

Honeybee...here's a close up of the EMT frame
Ted

Fasteddy, you're garden veggies.
are awesome! You've clearly found a recipe for success.

Are your low tunnels made out of the EMT, also? If so, why do you choose it over PVC for hoop Construction?

I was wondering the same thing as Gymgirl.

Do the EMT's rust? It looks like it would take some strength to bend them into hoops as seen in your photos.

WOW your garden is gorgeous!

WOW!!! I wish my garden looked half as nice. Everything thing is so neat and weedless. I just manage to get the plants in, water and fight with the weeds.

Peg

Gymgirl, Thanks. Yes the hoops are EMT also. I chose them over PVC because I wanted to use hoop tunnels to try and overwinter some plants and, believe it or not we occasionally get heavy snow here which can collapse the PVC hoops (I'm told). Also, I suspected the hot summers might weaken the PVC and UV (sun) would affect it over time.

HoneyBee, The EMT is galvanized and very slow to rust. I've used short pieces of EMT stuck in the ground as hose keepers for years and although the part that gets stuck in the ground has rusted, they are still very solid. Bending the hoops takes a jig. I'm lazy and purchased mine, but if you are resourceful with a band/sabre saw and router you could make your own. i bought all the stuff for my hoops from Johnny's Selected Seeds in Maine. Here is a video of how the hoops are made:

http://www.johnnyseeds.com/t-video_quickhoops.aspx?source=HomePage1209

PrissyJo and Chesapeake...Thank you. Glad you enjoyed the pictures.
Ted

Wow, your hard work has paid off bigtime! Great looking veggies and I'll have to show my hubby your setup. He's an engineer and can make almost anything. If this keeps buggies out, I'm all for it!
Here's my cucs and some of my eggplant plants.

Bariolio,
Nice looking raised bed. I need advice on constructing three RBs for my fall plantout. I finally got my landscape design, and now I need to implement the DIY labor to get them built for planting out mid-September.

The bed in your pic looks like it has just an edging to hold the soil in? And, it slopes toward the front, too, right? Also, looks like you're into pine bark as an amendment. Tell me what your planting soil is made up of, please?

Thanks,

Linda

Just as lovely as it is practical. Greta job, FastEddy!

I see a few zone 7ber's are using fabric row cloth. I going to implement covers this fall, but I'm still confused about the choices. I know the fabric protects from frost, but does it heat up and act like a greenhouse, like a plastic cover would?

Cocoa.
It depends on the cover. The agrobond I use is the lightest weight. It lets air circulate so there's not much added heat. Heavier weight fabrics let less air circulate and heat up more. Think about using those for overwintering or extending your season
Ted

Scanning your posts, I thought I would add my 2¢ worth. I grow a market garden, so do what you are doing on a larger scale. Our supplier sells #9 wire hoops for the tunnels. They are only 60¢ each. They are spring steel so go back to straight when you take them up. We place them 5 feet apart in the row. We have a machine to lay the row tunnel, but they could be used for hand setting also.
Supplier is; www.jordanseeds.com
Page is: http://www.jordanseeds.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=browse&id=170168&pageid=95

Item is wires. They are 64" long & make a 14" high hoop.
They can ship anywhere.

This message was edited May 25, 2011 9:20 PM

Fasteddy, thank you. Have you used plastic in the past?

Bernnie, glad you joined the conversation. I was going to post in the market forum to ask about cover preferences. Since your already here, why did you choose plastic over fabric for that row? Do you use fabric as well? Thanks for the link.

Country....Thanks for the info. It's nice to have a pro weigh in. I like the spring steel idea, but it's too late for me. I have enough EMT hoops to last :) How long do you leave your covers on? Seems like the smaller hoops would be for just at the beginning or end of the season, since they wouldn't leave much upward growing room?

We are only looking to speed up growth of melons & cucumbers. Covers will come off when blossoms first set. Plastic is perforated so they don't overheat.
Supplier recommended it. They have been market gardeners for over 50 years.

Drthor used that perforated plastic to protect tomato seedlings she set out at the beginning of February, when folks were balking, 'cause it would freeze and she would lose her crop...

Well, we're ALL drooling over the harvest she has bringing in, even as we speak!

She's almost a full month ahead of those of us who didn't plant seedlings out until mid-March...and, she had a couple night of dips into the low-30s, but protected the plants by throwing blankets over her pvc hoop.

They didn't fry, freeze, or get attacked by buglies...

I think I am going to have to think of them for specific crops. My biggest issue is finishing fall crops. I don't have the indoor space to grow out seedlings. I need to skip the 'potting up' and transplant at no less then 6 weeks, preferably sooner. The problem is all my veggies 'stall out', broccoli, cabbage, etc just sit there, and don't grow until spring warm up. I would think that row covers should extend my season and I could get a fall/winter harvest, but I don't know? Fabric offers frost protection, but would it reduces an already lowering light? And plastic would offer frost protection too?

I'm just dense, I'm not getting it. There must be pro and cons comparing plastic to fabric. I just can't find any comparisons. It would be nice to only purchase once, if you know what I mean :0)

Cocoa, Just my amateur opinion. Plastic provides frost protection and acts as a greenhouse...you will have to watch inside temps closely and ventilate when necessary.
Ted

Coco_lulu,
I'm confused about your growing schedule. When would you normally set your cole crop seedlings (broccoli, cabbages, etc.) out for your fall/wtr garden? At what average daily temps do you put the seedlings out?

Ted, your garden hardly speaks "amateur".lol That makes sense about the plastic. I like being out in the winter and don't mind checking, so I'll consider that a plus. We just raised 400sft of beds this last winter, I noticed the soil warmed so much faster in the spring. Do your raised beds contain the heat during the winter?

Gym, my veggies beds and field are in a strange spot that has more of a micro climate of zone 6. I have the same heat issues and the rest of Texas, but I get much colder and colder faster then ya'll do south. I've been transplanting around mid September (daytime mid 80's), but can expect a hard freeze starting November. That should give me enough DTM for things like broccoli, but it hasn't....

I guess that would be you?

^^_^^ (Drthor jumping up and down, laughing all the way to the dinner table)

OK, I will state what all of us are thinking, drthor for the 2011 Nobel Gardening Prize. That 1 million dollar prize money would keep her in tomato seeds and bat guano for a long time. And I also believe that she deserves her own thread, maybe it could be called "drthor, what are you doing in your garden today?" I wish I had joined DG and read her posts back in December 2010 and then I would be laughing along with her now.

you are really funny.
Here is what I did harvest after the stom of a few days ago.
I run out the night and pick all of those which were on the floor. (not the eggplants and peppers)
Lots of green tomatoes and I hope they will ripe in the house.

This harvest was the next morning ... still a lot of tomatoes on the ground !!

I just read "The $64 Tomato"... a GREAT look at how much money we spend creating these back yard works of art...

I just keep telling my husband that this hobby is a lot cheaper than being a compulsive gambler, or hobby car builder, or sky diver... PLUS, the bounty is SO fun.

I am really looking forward to the days next month when I can invite friends over for a harvest dinner -- we'll pick it and eat it!

My only problem now is that it is RAINING in California! (We ususally have no rain between mid-April and mid-October). All my hot crops are sloooooow. (However, all my cold crops are doing fine, and usually they are done by now!)

happygirl345 - I've grown vegetables in Florida, Tennessee and here in North Carolina and each garden has cost a small fortune to get the soil just right.

This is my 5th season here in NC and so far I've spent exactly $450.53! By adding fall leaves and compost each year, the cost eventually goes down.