welcome, chaya and wilson from pantryparatus!

I have been container gardening since the early 70's. It all started because I wanted organic vegetables and they were extremely difficult to find and then were extremely expensive. My current containers developed out of a need to have more sq.ft. of garden space. I was using 9 planters so I just made them more space efficient.

John Polk wrote:When I lived with a small patio, I had some old terra cotta strawberry pots. In the main (top) hole, I planted
a cherry tomato plant. In the side holes (where the daughter plants usually go) I planted some mini peppers
and green onions. Everything I needed for a fresh salsa growing in one pot (right next to the BBQ).

Oh very cool, I'm actually planning on trying to grow my own salsa plants this year as well. I have a bunch of those Topsy-Turvy hanging planters for tomatoes and peppers. Going to be hanging them from my balcony as I live on the third floor of my apartment building. I hadn't thought of actually trying to grow the green onions myself though. I don't know enough about onions so just figured I would buy those from the store when the peppers and tomatoes were ready. I used one of the Topsy-Turvy planters last year for cherry tomatoes and it did very well even though I started them too late in the season. I had to bring it inside as the weather started getting cold so the tomatoes could ripen. This year I'm starting much earlier so I hope the weather in my area starts warming up soon, I'm already starting my tomatoes inside. I'm going with the cherry variety that I used last year as well as trying a couple of heirloom variety's this year including Cherokee Purple.

Dave Bennett wrote:

Katrin Kerns wrote:

Wilson Foedus wrote:Katrin,
Truth be told, Chaya and I have more room than a balcony garden, but it does not mean that we cannot further optimize our space with some vertical gardening by using shipping pallets or even "earth boxes." Of course the Sepp Holzer (the mighty, the glorious) sausage roll idea is a good approach as well. https://permies.com/t/1522/permaculture/Urban-Farming.

Oh... I will have to look into that, thanks for the link.

I do something similar on a much smaller scale. I made cylinders out of some "sheep" fencing which I mounted to wooden circles. I had a bunch of old giant industrial size casters that were lying around so I mounted them to the wooden circles and then lined the cylinders with burlap with a wooden circle in the bottom to support the weight. I filled them with soil that was considerably lightened with perlite. Then I use the entire cylinder for growing "stuff." I start plants and then poke a small hole in the sides to transplant my starts. The whole "planter" takes up a 3 ft. circle of area and provides about 40 sq. ft. of growing area. I have 9 of these planters. They work like a charm and have allowed me to turn an ugly 12 x 14 ft rectangle of concrete into gardening space.

Dave, it would be great to see photos of your cylinders at the urban farming thread linked in Wilson's reply to Katrin!

Jocelyn Campbell wrote:Mary LaDue,
Your post was moved to a new topic.

I'd love to see what topic this was, and perhaps even to where it was moved, so I don't have to even think about clicking a link to a topic in which I have no interest. Perhaps similar "you've been moved" posts in the future could read something like:
"RedFrogTidalWave Hatfield,
your post about using lobster claws for sheep-shearing was moved to the 'Undersea Farming' forum. Thanks for your contribution!"

Just a thought ........

Mahalo!

Neil Evansan wrote:

Jocelyn Campbell wrote:Mary LaDue,
Your post was moved to a new topic.

I'd love to see what topic this was, and perhaps even to where it was moved, so I don't have to even think about clicking a link to a topic in which I have no interest. Perhaps similar "you've been moved" posts in the future could read something like:
"RedFrogTidalWave Hatfield,
your post about using lobster claws for sheep-shearing was moved to the 'Undersea Farming' forum. Thanks for your contribution!"

Just a thought ........

Mahalo!

That is a good thought that I've copied to the tinkering with this site forum. Mary LaDue's topic was whole house water filtration, and while I'm with you that I never like to follow links unless I know what they are, the message was a system generated generic one. Perhaps the amazing coding folks from coderanch.com who've been helping develop permies.com can help with that.

I thought my post got moved because people thought it was a stupid question. I was frustrated because it sent me to a commercial culligan water site and I could have found that on the web. But I guess either everyone has pure wonderful water or they use commerical units.

Jocelyn Campbell wrote:
That is a good thought that I've copied to the tinkering with this site forum. Mary LaDue's topic was whole house water filtration, and while I'm with you that I never like to follow links unless I know what they are, the message was a system generated generic one. Perhaps the amazing coding folks from coderanch.com who've been helping develop permies.com can help with that.

Thanks Jocelyn!

I always thought those short "you've been moved" messaged seemed to be quite cold and lacking in personal touch. That explains it!
I'll bet those codeRanch peeps can make that (auto-responder?) message say just about anything. What would be cool is if they could offer a couple 3 or four the Forum Moderator can select from.

Mary LaDue wrote:I thought my post got moved because people thought it was a stupid question. I was frustrated because it sent me to a commercial culligan water site and I could have found that on the web. But I guess either everyone has pure wonderful water or they use commerical units.

Oh gosh, Mary, it was a good question! It's just that questions weren't supposed to be in this thread. Other questions didn't get moved because I think moderators kinda got tired of moving them, or the Pantry Paratus folks answered before they were moved. (I'm only occasionally able to moderate.)

Katrin Kerns wrote:

John Polk wrote:When I lived with a small patio, I had some old terra cotta strawberry pots. In the main (top) hole, I planted
a cherry tomato plant. In the side holes (where the daughter plants usually go) I planted some mini peppers
and green onions. Everything I needed for a fresh salsa growing in one pot (right next to the BBQ).

Oh very cool, I'm actually planning on trying to grow my own salsa plants this year as well. I used one of the Topsy-Turvy planters last year for cherry tomatoes and it did very well even though I started them too late in the season. I had to bring it inside as the weather started getting cold so the tomatoes could ripen. This year I'm starting much earlier so I hope the weather in my area starts warming up soon, I'm already starting my tomatoes inside. I'm going with the cherry variety that I used last year as well as trying a couple of heirloom variety's this year including Cherokee Purple.

Katrin, you might want to consider Window Gardening. That is catching on in many places, most notably cities and dense urban areas where people have limited or no access to a garden plot. All it takes is a window with southern exposure. You could even plant your topsy-turvy planters extra-early and take them outside as weather permits.

One of the things that I miss about being in Germany are the window boxes. It seemed like anyone with a window and a structurally sound wall to hold a window box had one with the most beautiful flowers planted in them. Of course with window boxes growing herbs and flowers it is a short jump to small scale bee hives on the balconies or roof tops.

The possibilities are endless!

Neil Evansan wrote:
Katrin, you might want to consider Window Gardening. That is catching on in many places, most notably cities and dense urban areas where people have limited or no access to a garden plot. All it takes is a window with southern exposure. You could even plant your topsy-turvy planters extra-early and take them outside as weather permits.

Sadly what window space we have in our apartment is not easily enough accessible, but we do have a nice southward facing balcony which is where I hang my Topsy-Turvy planters. I have been researching on YouTube for different and alternative methods of container gardening for small spaces though; and have gotten many ideas.

commenting on my reading thru the book:

https://permies.com/t/13299/permaculture/book-report-Encyclopedia-Country-Living

Katrin Kerns wrote:

Neil Evansan wrote:
Katrin, you might want to consider Window Gardening. That is catching on in many places, most notably cities and dense urban areas where people have limited or no access to a garden plot. All it takes is a window with southern exposure. You could even plant your topsy-turvy planters extra-early and take them outside as weather permits.

Sadly what window space we have in our apartment is not easily enough accessible, but we do have a nice southward facing balcony which is where I hang my Topsy-Turvy planters. I have been researching on YouTube for different and alternative methods of container gardening for small spaces though; and have gotten many ideas.

Katrin,

I just reached the 1/3 mark through the book Worms Eat My Garbage by Mary Appelhof--and it occurred to me . . . *light bulb* Balcony! Very doable. Although worms are not quite palatable (except if you are a Klingon), it may be "productive" food wise by a) creating soil or b) trading them to a chicken farmer for eggs. Of course option b presupposes that you have one locally who would like to have worms for feed.

I wanted to throw it out as a possibility because it is a positive input for your household by reclaiming bio-waste back into the food stream. Even though the ratio is very low (very slow return on investment) it puts the emphasis on redeeming the waste and production with your balcony while using very little space.

Wilson

been reading thru your blog..love it..