We have some leftover lumber from a few projects so this weekend my husband is going to build a couple of boxes for us to use as small gardens in a corner of our yard. We have been hesitant to plant in our yard for a couple reasons: soil conditions and big dog! This seems to be a viable solution. What are some vegetables I can plant and possibly find success with (I don't have a great track record...guess you could say I don't have a green thumb)?
What a nice idea! You can virtually plant anything you like. It all depends on the quality of your soil and how far apart you are planting your crop. Personally, I would fill the boxes with fast growing vegetables, such as cherry tomatoes, chilies, cucumbers, squashes, etc. I'd also plant herbs and edible flowers as companions. The trick is to have fertile, well-drained soil. Natural fertilizers, such as animal manure or blood and bone, work wonders. Good luck!
That is a fantastic idea when you have dogs around. I just realized this too as we do have a dog now, and he will be into everything if we don't watch him. I would love to have garden boxes for my garden too, and I would just plant whatever I want. Cuccumber, green pepper, tomato, green bean are all easy plants to try.
A tip to help your garden boxes is to use straw bales inside of the boxes. It will help to keep your plants warm and feed the plants as they grow. The boxes would cover up the straw to make the yard look better.
I've moved to all above ground gardening and have had great success with it. I put all my tomatoes in containers last year and they did awesome. This year we added two boxes (larger). I'm doing squash and hoping to get it to grow vertically up a trellis. I'm also going to do onions, potatoes, carrots, and garlic. I mostly just think of things I like to eat. Hah. Broccoli, I've heard, is hard to ruin, so I might try that too.
A few more tips to help your plants grow would be to add coffee grinds to the soil, if you do not drink coffee go to a coffee shop like Starbucks and ask for their grinds they will be happy to give them to you. Also save all the natural waste items in your kitchen like egg shells and greens grind them up in the blender and pour that into your gardening area.
