Composting for Gladiolus

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axmerc New York City, NY Feb 21, 2016

Hello! I live in NYC and I have ~80 feet of railing on my 12th floor terrace. My plan is to line it with Glads. I bought about 450 bulbs and they'll be arriving soon. My issue is how to get enough soil for them - and especially to encourage them to bloom heartily.

I have a strange plan that I think could use some tweaking from somebody seasoned. And I'm willing to change it based on someone's wisdom.
There is a metal railing inset a foot from the stone wall exterior of the terrace. I plan to drape tarps over the metal rail in a W shape (the railing sitting in the middle of the W and twine holding up the sides) to make rows/ troughs on either side in which to plant my glads. But - I've just realized that the expensive part of this plan could be the soil - 80 linear feet of railing, times 2 troughs in which to plant and each trough should be about 6 inches deep soil and probably 4 inches wide. 27 cubic feet of soil. And I have to get that into my elevator and up to my terrace. I was considering putting down some foam in the troughs to assist with drainage - that might take away some needed soil.

I and my roommates use a ton of veggies in our cooking and I've been wanting to compost for a while. I'm worried about our lack of browns. I'd get us a tumbler to use on the space. But there's no way I make more than 7 cuft before the glads have to get into the soil.

I've been considering coffee grounds, though. There are a ton of coffee places (it's nyc) from which I could probably get a couple buckets from a week. It'd probably take 50 buckets to fill up that space...but it'd be straight coffee grounds - and again I lack the browns to compost it effectively. Could I buy a couple bags of mulch to put in my compost tumbler with the grounds? How long would that take? I'm willing to set up the tarp planters early (like now) and fill it with whatever, or lay the tarps out as a place for the grounds to sit/ compost - but I am worried about runoff staining my terrace pavers. Is there an amendment that's not too pricey? I have about $200 in my original budget left for this (not including foam). I could get two large compost tumblers (7 cuft each) or I could do something else? Is there a way to get the compost going faster? If I start now (late feb) there's under 3 months until planting starts (NYBG says to plant glads in nyc in may). I do plan to plant the glads in 2 week rotations so that I'll get longer bloom season - so I could have more time to add soil if I figure a way to bunch the soil around the early glads and add in between as they go from almost 2 feet apart to 3 inches apart. - maybe paper bags that will disintegrate with watering?

Anyway - any knowledge or proposals to make this system work so I get two rows of blooming gladiolus on my railing within budget would be spectacular and much appreciated. Thanks so much! :)

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