John Anderson

I have been using 55 and 30 gallon plastic drums cut in half both ways with good results using soil I make, the center ring when cutting them in thirds, vertically, makes an excellent ring for cabbage, tomatoes etc. Actually I make a 2 foot high bench using 8 to 10 foot long 2x6s and 2 foot 4x4s for the legs to put the half barrels on, gives me a no weed and no bend garden for lettuce, radishes, onions, kale etc. and it is easy to cover with shade cloth from april on using pvc as a frame. The potatoes, corn , squash is grown in the ground although squash and cukes do good in the barrels.

I live in North Florida and have a 50 x 50 garden. In the last year I have put 12 square bales of straw, one round bale of hay, 3 pickup loads of cow manure/sawdust and 6 inches of leaves on the garden and as of now it is sand with no evidence of any of the above. It takes a lot of organic material to have a garden here but I have corn 8 feet tall. Growing tomatoes and cukes in boxes works good, let them have morning sun and afternoon shade.

The sun is so hot in the afternood that sade is necessary, To grow lettuce in the summer I use shade cloth. You can grow all year here if you take in consideration the seasons and sun path keeping some plants in the afternoon shade. Potatoes do great, plant in Feb. mulch good and use a soaker hose at first, also I use a soaker hose to start the onions until they can go it without.

This year I am going to use cardboard etc under the mulch to try to cut down the water usage.