The Greening of Gavin

Suburban Food Bowl – Growing in Small Spaces

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We all have tight spaces around our yards. You know the ones. It’s the little nook or cranny that gets some sunlight during the day that is lying dormant, overgrown with weeds. Others may just have a little space that has been allocated for an outdoor living area.

Believe it or not, these areas are perfect for growing a large range of food, mostly in containers, or in existing landscaped garden beds.

Not all vegetables need full sunlight, in fact some actually suffer or bolt to see when they get too much. Lettuce varieties are a good example. They love partial sun and a couple of hours are all they need.

But, I am getting ahead of myself.  Here are three ways to start growing in small spaces.

Growing in Containers

Just about anything that can hold soil can be used to grow food as long as you can ensure adequate drainage. You can reuse some of the most unlikely items such as old buckets, laundry tubs, Bathtubs, or make your own portable planter boxes. Of course you can buy large pots as well but sometimes cost is an issue. I tend to stay away from plastic pots because they don’t biodegrade, and exposure to UV light makes them brittle and break. I have many glazed clay pots of various sizes, the larger the better. The larger the pot, the less likely the soil will go dry in between watering.

While we are talking about soil, the nutrients in potting mix tend to become exhausted after each season, so before replanting, I refresh it with a couple of handfuls of homemade compost and a handful of blood and bone or pelletised chicken manure then dampen with water. I ensure that it is well mixed and rested for a week before planting in seeds or seedlings. By using this method we have healthy potted herbs or vegetables every year.

Herbs in a row

Herbs in a row

We also grow citrus in large pots, but I will cover that in part 5 of the series when I cover fruit trees.

Mini wicking beds

Wicking beds are becoming increasingly necessary in our hot dry climate. With little spring rains, we have to use methods that preserve and minimise water usage, all the while keeping crop yield steady. Portable wicking beds are very simple to make, and prevent your soil medium from drying out.

A wicking bed can be as simple as getting a plastic tub or large wooden planter and lining it with pond liner or builders plastic sheeting, then laying in a watering pipe and overflow pipe, half filling with scoria or gravel or even sand, adding a non-degradable textile layer, then filling with compost or good potting mix.  I’ve even seen polystyrene boxes used as mini wicking beds, though I haven’t used these myself as they’re not recyclable.

Stapling the liner to the wicking bed

Stapling the liner to the wicking bed

You can see an example of in this post titled “Building a Wicking Bed on Concrete“.  Just scale it down to container size and you get the general idea.  It works really well and is shaded for half the day, so salad greens thrive in this bed because there is a continuous supply of water.  Veggies planted in this bed tend to be slow when bolting to seed so you get longer cropping.

Wooden Pallets

Using wooden shipping pallets is a great way to upcycle and grow some food.  I’ve seen excellent examples in small gardens of these being used for planting out herbs and salad greens.

These pallets just need to be stood vertically, have a bottom placed across each section of board and have a few drainage holes drilled, and it’s ready to plant out with good potting mix or compost.

Pallet Garden for Vegetables

Pallet Garden for Vegetables.  Source; Growing a Greener World

Here are some fantastic step-by-step instructions for a Pallet Garden from a TV show, Growing a Greener World, that I follow via the web.  definitely a great idea for those who are pressed for space around their garden.

I’ve also seen wooden pallets laid down on the ground, filled with soil, and used as a raised garden bed.  Just make sure that the pallet is not made of treated pine (CCA) or otherwise you risk copper and arsenic leaching into your soil.

Give it a go

So there are three methods of growing vegetables in tight spaces that are cheap to implement and easy to maintain.  The only thing I have to add is that you need to ensure that the soil is kept moist otherwise your plants will struggle to draw up nutrients.  Oh, and keep them close by so that you will remember to pick your produce often.  Think of this type of gardening as Zone 0 in your suburban permaculture garden!

Can you think of any other ways to grow veg in tight spaces?

Growing Salad Greens in a Wicking Bed

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Today we are looking at growing salad greens in a wicking bed.  This type of growing medium is ideal for thirsty vegetables.

So, here’s one I made earlier.  During the Easter break, I reported to you all that I finished off the wicking bed in the pool area.

You can read about how I built it at this post titled Building a Wicking Bed on Concrete.

Leveling out the gravel in the reservoir

Leveling out the gravel in the reservoir

We are currently using it to grow salad greens, like pick-and-come-again lettuce, mizuna, spring onions, miners lettuce, etc.  I found the perfect spot in the back yard between the deck and the car port wall.

This is what it las looked like when I first planted it out.

Growing Salad Greens in a wicking bed

April 2014

And here it is again in early May.  A bit of growth, and I put in some spring onions in the vacant space.

Growing salad greens in a wicking bed

May 2014

So what does it look like now?  I think you will be surprised at the growth.

Growing salad greens in a wicking bed

June 2014

This is just over 30 days growth compared to the May picture.  We have received steady rain over the last few weeks, so that has helped, but I top the reservoir up once a week anyway.

I have not fertilised the bed in any way, shape, or form.  The compost growing medium supplied by the chooks is all that I added above the geotextile layer.

We find that these types of leafy greens grow best in cooler weather; they appreciate part shade.  I reckon that this will be a great place to grow lettuce during the summer as well.  It is shaded by the wall from about 1pm onwards.

It is amazing growth for this time of year.  We have been harvesting salad greens every couple of days for sandwiches and a side salad for dinner.  Delicious.

Wicking beds certainly deliver the goods.  Who has had success growing veggies in a wicking bed?  Would you make one now that you have seen my results?

 

Building a Wicking Bed on Concrete

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Do you desperately want to grow vegetables, but all you have is concrete all around you?  Do you have blazing hot summers that turn your soil into dust?

Well if you answered yes to either of these questions, I have a DIY gardening project for you.  Building a wicking bed on concrete!

I had an unused space on some concrete in the backyard, so I decided it was just the place to grow food.  I built the frame out of spare wood I had lying around and wrote about it in this post titled Yet Another Garden Bed!, way back in January.  Yes, I know that it has been four months, but I had to find a spare day in which to complete the project.

So this is where we left the project.

Building a wicking bed on concrete

Garden bed made from scrap wood

You can see all the concrete beneath it.  Impossible for a garden bed to drain properly, and obviously not a good place to dig into!

So we must build up and provide the proper conditions for vegetables to grow.  Enter the wicking bed.  It has a water reservoir and proper drainage if we have a lot of rain, so the veggies never get waterlogged.

The entire project cost me $11 in hardware, and I reused a lot of things that I had lying around or scrounged.

Firstly, we put in the liner.  I opted for some builders plastic that I had leftover from some other job.  I made sure that the concrete was well swept and had nothing that could piece the liner.

Stapling the liner to the wicking bed

Stapling the liner to the wicking bed

The liner gets stapled to the top of the bed, spacing the staples about 15 cm apart.  Here is a close up.  Nothing too fancy.

Stapled liner on wicking bed

Stapled liner on wicking bed

I found that by starting at one edge of the liner made the job a lot easier.  I trimmed off the excess using a Stanley knife leaving about an inch above the wood just in case I needed to make any adjustments with the liner.

Wicking Bed lined with builders plastic

Wicking Bed lined with builders plastic

Next I fitted an overflow pipe.  I used a 22 mm spade bit on my drill and drilled a hole just below the centre line of the bed.  Be careful to drill from the outside in.  When you see the tip of the spade bit against the plastic liner, stop.  Drill from the inside out so that you don’t rip a tear in the liner.

Then I fitted a piece of 19mm poly irrigation pipe and sealed it in place with more silicon.  It won’t move from the liner.

Overflow pipe about half way down bed

Overflow pipe about half way down bed

Just so you get an idea of how much pipe sticks out, here it is from the other side.

Outside view of overflow pipe

Outside view of overflow pipe

It will only move if someone accidentally kicks it.  Otherwise, it is pretty sturdy.

Now it was time for the watering tube.  I found some 32 mm electrical conduit on the side of the road a while back which was ideal for this project.  You can also use slotted ag pipe, but as this bed is quite narrow, I decided to use the conduit.

Watering pipe in place

I drilled 16 mm holes along the pipe, added an 90° elbow joint to the watering tube, and capped it off at the end.  I joined all the parts together with more silicon sealers.  I use silicon because I wanted something that I could dismantle in the future.  Normally when working with PVC pipe you would join it with PVC Solvent (blue glue), but I figured that it too toxic in a wicking bed for growing food.

32 mm electrical conduit joined together with silicon sealer

32 mm electrical conduit joined together with silicon sealer

I fastened the watering tube to the bed at the staple line with a saddle clamp so that it will not move when watering.

Sand to stop watering tube from moving

Sand to stop watering tube from moving

To stop the pipe from moving further, especially when filling the bed, I put a few shovelfuls of  washed sand (had a bag lying around from my last paving project).  Then I filled the bed with smooth gravel up to the level of the overflow tube, and raked it as level as I could.

Leveling out the gravel in the reservoir

Leveling out the gravel in the reservoir

With the reservoir now complete, it was time to lay the separating textile so that the soil that I am about to add will not mix with the gravel.

Kim gave me this old blanket to use.  It was made from acrylic and kept on shedding everywhere and the dogs had contributed to its demise.  It was perfect, as it will not rot, even though Kim says that it is the most expensive wicking bed layer ever.  The last wicking bed I made, I used a thick cotton blanket, however it rotted down within six months, with the aid of some worms.  Best to stick with some sort of non-organic fabric that is porous.

Loose weave non biodegradable blanket

Loose weave non biodegradable blanket

Once I laid the blanket on top of the gravel, I then folded over the edges and started adding soil.

Filling the wicking bed with soil

Filling the wicking bed with soil

I had some really great soil over in the garden bed near Cluckingham Palace that I had been building up.  It was a mixture of chook house bedding, mushroom compost, and clay.  It had broken down over the years and the bed was just overflowing with great soil.  I need to remove some as I am planning to relocate and espalier some apple trees in that spot.  Win-win all round.

Wicking Bed filled with soil and liner trimmed

Filling the wicking bed with soil

I didn’t quite have enough soil, so I threw in a bag of compost from the hardware store, and mixed it through.  Just the right level and about 7.5 cm (3 inches) deep.  Most annual vegetables are shallow rooted so will have no problem with this depth.

I left enough room for some pea straw mulch if needs be in summer, and the soil will probably settle anyway.

Now for the big test.  To see if I managed to keep the liner intact and that the overflow pipe worked sufficiently.  I put the hose in one end, and thankfully, water came out the other end after about 3 minutes.  That means that at 20 litres per minute (flow from hose) the bed contains about 60 litres of water in the reservoir.

Overflow pipe test

Overflow pipe test

Brilliant, if I do say so myself.  The soil will stay moist during hotter weather and will only need to be topped up twice a week if it doesn’t rain.

It was now time to plant the bed out.  We didn’t have any pick-and-come-again lettuce anywhere in the garden, so this was the perfect place.  I did have to purchase the seedlings, which was included in my $11 outlay, but I wanted something quickly established as we have a private garden tour for next weekend.

Wicking bed planted with lettuce varieties

Wicking bed planted with lettuce varieties

You can see that I need another punnet of plants and as Kim wants more spring onions, her wish is my command.  I will buy some spring onion (shallots) seedlings tomorrow and plant them out.

Anyway, I am proud of my efforts.  Building a wicking bed on concrete is a great way to add growing space if you can’t remove the offending concrete slab.  It was an easy project, and is the third wicking bed that I have built.  This one is especially nice as it blends in with the aesthetic of the decking area.

What do you think?  Will you be covering up some concrete near you soon with a wicking bed?