Jake Scelsa

i really rent a gem of nj property. i am in a small community where everythings in walking distance and i have a large yard to practice permaculture ideas.

here is my set up thus far. i moved into this 2 acre property last summer so i was behind the ball last year. during the fall i set up a 12x5 fully enclosed bed plus im using my 18x18 chain link dog run as my container garden area

its an experiment..

Doug this is a excellent idea!
Emily i have another idea that you may find useful. I saw the idea online and am experimenting w it this year. Theyre called bottle towers. theyre self watering but limited to only growing leafy shallow root plants. it does require a chain ink fence or something to wire tie the tower to in order to keep it up right. its essentially just plastic bottes i collected with the bottoms cut off and theyre stacked on top o eachother. the bottom bottle has the cap on and drainage holes and is filled w soil. all the following bottles have no caps. once you hAve all of the bottles filled w soil you want to plant, take one more empty bottle which acts as a funnel and stack it on. poke a hole into the cap of the next and final bottle and fill it up w water and it will slowly trickle down the system. in order to sow seeds i cut 3 sides of the front of the bottle. this is where the leaves will grow out of. i found that langers and ocean spray cranberry juice bottles r the best. the round seltzer bottles arent as nice as the square bottles. its benefits are that its very space effecient and very easy to maintain. its just limited to lettuce spinach maybe some herbs.

First post! just joined this morning and im really loving this site. excellent job paul i made my way here through youtube vids. Im only 26 and i really do get discusted by wasteful people. I work as a union carpenter and the construction industry on a commercial level is terribly wasteful. the construction equipment guzzles energy plus all the hazardous wasted material that ends up in landfills. I was on a job 2 summers ago where every worker on the job(and there were over 2000 it was a very large new hospital being constructed) would sit inside of their gas guzzling trucks at lunch with the AC blasting. This was very upsetting to me. i would just shake my head and go sit in the shade with my folding chair. Ok off topic but i feel shitty about my career being wasteful and environmentally damaging.

The best ways im frugal is to reuse and recycle. 2 good examples..my compost bins are made from pallets that i got FREE from a local lumber yard. and just this morning i contacted a baker who is going to save his 3.5 gal buckets for me to start worm composting..also free. contacting businesses is an excellent way to reuse things that will otherwise be tossed and for free to boot. of course working in construction i take as much lumber plywood and whatever else i can get my hands on before that ends up in a landfill. And im an avid scrapper. im always scanning curbsides for scrap metal to recycle AND make a small profit. scrapping is a smart easy way to make a few bucks and do the right thing. my next door neighbor had an old swing set that was just rusting in her yard. she knows i recycle metal and asked me to take it apart for her and haul it out. i made money, recycled an old rusty swing set that was just sitting there, and did a favor for a sweet old woman.