- Joined
- Apr 25, 2022
- Messages
- 40
- Climate
- Arid, Desert, or Dry
So I'm wondering what I should be doing now to greatly reduce or eliminate the need for store-bought products in my food garden. A couple key points:
1. I cheaply filled my first raised bed with some yard clippings and then filled the rest of the space with peat moss and Black Kow manure. I'm going to save up over this season so i can rent a truck and buy bulk soil (probably 3 CU yards) when I expend and then work on amending that soil.
2. Composting - right now I'm tumbler composting, but this is going wayy too slow for me so after some research I'm going to switch to vermicomposting in a multi-tray system. To my knowledge, This should cut the time to usable product in half (2-3 months) and while it's not EVERYTHING the soil will need apparently it's a really good amendment
3. I'm noticing I'm getting a lot of stuff at the store: The Soil, beds, tumbler, Fish fertilizer, soil and amendments, seeds etc etc and I'm looking to get away from that. I know up front I'm going to have to "buy in" to gardening, but is it reasonable to expect to be self sufficient inside 3 years with conscious purchasing of equipment and garden practices?
In short: What should I be doing from the start of my gardening practice to make my garden as self sustaining / self-sufficient as possible? I want to eliminate as much non-equipment purchases from the store as possible.
1. I cheaply filled my first raised bed with some yard clippings and then filled the rest of the space with peat moss and Black Kow manure. I'm going to save up over this season so i can rent a truck and buy bulk soil (probably 3 CU yards) when I expend and then work on amending that soil.
2. Composting - right now I'm tumbler composting, but this is going wayy too slow for me so after some research I'm going to switch to vermicomposting in a multi-tray system. To my knowledge, This should cut the time to usable product in half (2-3 months) and while it's not EVERYTHING the soil will need apparently it's a really good amendment
3. I'm noticing I'm getting a lot of stuff at the store: The Soil, beds, tumbler, Fish fertilizer, soil and amendments, seeds etc etc and I'm looking to get away from that. I know up front I'm going to have to "buy in" to gardening, but is it reasonable to expect to be self sufficient inside 3 years with conscious purchasing of equipment and garden practices?
In short: What should I be doing from the start of my gardening practice to make my garden as self sustaining / self-sufficient as possible? I want to eliminate as much non-equipment purchases from the store as possible.