Life on the Hill

Ready, Set, .....Grow!!!!

OK .... So I was raised with a great, huge garden.  I mean 10 ft tomato TREES.  You could get lost going down the aisles to pick the veggies the plants grew so big!  My dad was, and still is, an avid gardener,   as long as you can eat it --- he can grow it.  He doesn't like fooling with just pretties --- you must eat it.  Anyway, he moved an hour and a half away and moved his garden with him, so ALAS no more free freshly grown veggies.  I like the IDEA of gardening --- just not the bugs,  which torment me no matter how much deep Woods OFF I use,  and the south Alabama heat which my redheaded fair skinned self can't tolerate in any amount that make gardening doable.  But with the worsening economy and the growing teenage boys, I need to grow more food and teach the boys the time honored ways of gardening. ( As in "There's a weed over there boys ---- pull it!)

Enter Stage Left my DH.  After hearing me talk about it, he decided to do something about it and given his penchant for domes  -- the dome greenhouse came quickly about.  Really, he built it in only a few days and for very little money.  Here I can start my seedlings for the spring garden now,  and then, after the heat of the long summer has past, I can grow summer crops in the comfortable, bug free enviroment of my own little dome world.  It also gives me a way to get my Vit D dose during the winter and get a little exercise.

Back view of Greenhouse dome.  16 ft in diameter. 8 ft ceiling

Front view --- not quite finished.  The tricky part is adding the entrance without comprimising the structural intergrity of the dome,

I ordered my seeds from the seed catalog (Burpees -- with a $5 off online coupon)  last week and hope to get them started later this week.  My mouth waters just thinking of the 3 types of tomatoes, the yellow crookneck squash, red sweet peppers, okra, icebox watermelons waiting to be grown and eaten this summer. I also ordered some of the "red mulch" and plastic tomato trays to do an experiment to see if they really increase your tomato yeilds by 20 - 40 %.  I will blog this experiment to let you know how it goes. I also like pretty flowers so some of those will be sown too. I will buy shelled peas, butterbeans and corn. They are way too much work and I will gladly pay my local organic homeschool farm family to grow, pick and shell them for me to put up in the freezer this summer.

  I will do a small winter/spring garden with new potatoes, sugar snap peas, carrots and little green onions. This will be a container garden using plastic buckets gleened for free from the bakery from Sam's Club.  The soil around our house is pure sand and clay and therefore not sutable for growing much but sticker bushes and I don't have time to build a raised bed before they need to get into the ground ---hence the buckets. I will fill them with bagged soil and partially bury them in a sunny spot --- or rather the guys will bury them --- I will stand and point to where I want them.

When we start the summer garden we will have a tractor driving friend bush hog and disc up the "bottome land" into a suitable garden spot.  We live on the side of a hill of sand but at the base of the hill is pretty rich soil.  We will probably have to put up a welded wire fence to keep out the critters who live in the woods.

So --- Here we grow!  (Yes I hear you groan --- I specialize in bad puns much to my oldest son's dismay). Stay tuned for new developments!

Untitled Comment

9:09 PM, Feb. 10, 2009 .. Posted by Wayne

Wow! Great greenhouse! When Richard gets through he is welcome to come up here and build another one! Love you!