Strawbale Gardening - no weeding, no hoeing, no tilling

How is your gardening growing?

I am curious. Ken has blessed us with pictures of how his garden is producing. I lost mine early this year due to sick plants. I was wondering how everyone else's garden is doing?

 

My cucumbers have finally started to die off...I have about 40 finally cukes from the vines and a lot of pickles. My zucchinis and yellow squash were doing well until the squash bugs attacked. Tomatoes: 2 canning sessions to date, and another one taking place tomorrow. Peppers have all decided to produce this week...we'd been picking one or two a week and now we have a counter full, especially of banana peppers! The beans did fine, except I didn't realize I'd need 10 times the number of plants to have a big harvest. The peas were a bust. Lettuce and spinach and radishes did fine for my early crop.

We've now taken care of the squash bugs and have watermelons, cantaloupes, spaghetti squash, and acorn squash planted there. Potatoes are planted where the lettuce was. When it's time, we'll plant collards in place of the cucumber vines.

 

I think I've finally got my sick garden back on its feet. We picked our first ripe tomatoes yesterday and have several blooms on our Anaheim chile plants. The yellow squash is doing well, and there are some teeny tiny zukes coming in. The only thing (of what's still living) that's not doing well are our tomatillos. They're pretty sickly.

I'm curious about if there is anything I can plant now that I have a few empty spots in my bales. I live in north Missisippi where it is pretty hot. Our temps have been in the high 80's/low 90's for a while now. Is it too late to plant anything else and use that space?

There are recent pics of my little garden on my blog.

 

Excellent updates, gang!

I was just thinking today we needed a bump and ya'll beat me to it.

My garden is now down to tomatoes, peppers, and the 4 eggplants. Squash and cukes have done their thing. I could probably have gotten a few more out of them, but the heat was really taking a toll on them.

Losing my German Johnsons again to a wilt. Cutting way back next year on GJ.

I've been very pleased with production of my tomatoes so far, especially the old standard Better Boys and a new variety that I've grown for the first time, Goliath.

Here's a few pics:

A variety of tomatoes. My bride and are new fans of the Romas and the Sweet Olive grape tomatoes are excellent. This was Sunday evening's crop.






Here's tonight's crop. Got my 1st ever yellow tomatoes off the vine!! Golden Jubilee's - can't wait to try them with bacon in a sandwich tomorrow night.





Tonight's hot pepper crop: Hungarian Yellow Wax, mildly warm and the SUPER HOT Habaneros, along with a few hot Cayenne peppers thrown in.

 

My zuccinnis,cukes,& squash are done to heat. Tomatoes are starting to come on. Heat & lots of humidity caused a little fungus problem in my tomatoes. Called Garden Centers Wichita,Ks & both told Me the same thing. Went & got some Fungicide Spray for Veggies & it seemed to knock it out. My bottom tomatoe leaves were turning Yellow with Black Spots. I know this wasnt Normal. I've learned a lot this First Year growing things in Straw Bales. Already looking to next year. I had 2 Ladys drive down Alley Yesterday & Stopped and asked about Straw bale gardening. In a Town of 700, it dont take long for things to get around when You are doing something differnt. Next year I think I'll lay bales Flat & on Vining plants I think I'll go 2 flat bales wide & try to keep everything on top of bales. I've got some Green house Shade cloth, I might cover Tomatoes with. It only lets 60% of sunlight through. Neighbor down the road got Me a Piece off the internet somewhere. Happy Gardening Everyone, Wishbone-Ks

 

strange visitor

While checking my cantelope vines and my gourds, I found a strange looking visitor. This little brown bug is slightly bigger than a lady bug. It also had a coloring on its back half that resembled a tiny lady bug. When I first saw it, I thought it was a lady bug until a closer look revealed it was just a larger bug pretending to be a lady bug. Any suggestions?

Charlotte, nc

 

Garden Check Up

How's everyone's garden?

Peppers are stlll producing well.

Tomatoes are fighting the heat, but doing well. Bottom half of the vines have died back but new growth is way over the top of my trellis and flopping back down.

For the first time ever I rooted about a dozen tomatoes from suckers and transplanted them into the old bales where I had my cukes.

They are doing well. We'll see if anything produces before frost.

I'm not staking them at all; just letting them run on top of the bales.

I have been very happy with my Golden Jubilees, my first yellow tomatoes. Delicious.

A new variety, Goliath, has been a great producer with beautiful fruit.

Better Boys have done well as they always do.

Romas have done fantastic.

Sweet Olive grape tomatoes have done great. I love eating them right from the vine while I water.

Celebrity tomatoes did well.

German Johnsons petered out early. Developed another virus/wilt.

 

Everything has succumbed to the heat except my bell peppers. They are still doing well. Does anyone ever replant their bales with late summer/fall crops? I'd like to do that now since most of my bales are empty, but not sure what to plant. Any ideas?

 

surprised!

I have been pleasantly surprised at the number of cantelopes and musk melons that I have harvested from the bales. Back when I lost my tomatoes in june, I quit watering and what little rain we have gotten over the last two months is all the bales have gotten. The quantity and size of cantelopes and melons are about the same as my traditional garden. The watermelons succombed to the heat.

So if anyone is interested, yes, you can raised cantelopes successfully on straw bales!

 

My tomatoes are still growing, but they are being attacked by stinkbugs! Really doing some damage.

 

Garden update

Peppers still going very strong. Best crop I've had in 5 years.

Transplanted tomatoes that I rooted from suckers and cuttings are doing great.

I don't know why I've never considered doing this. No one in my circle of garden family/friends does it that I'm aware of.

Some of the trellised tomatoes (Better Boys, mostly) are still blooming.

Got my new tomato book I've been wanting for some time:

http://www.amazon.com/Smith-Hawken-...ef=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1253662140&sr=8-1-spell

Can't wait until next year to try some of these varieties.

 

I'm enclosing my bales this year with some recycled lumber from an old fishing pier. I've got most of the panels made, using 3" exterior screws, and plan on completing this project and getting my new bales in w/in the next 2 weeks.

This will enable me to recycle the straw and not to have to buy as many bales from year to year.

Enclosing the bales should also help retain moisture in the bales.

 

Update

Just about done with my frames.

I have another 4 x 16 section (for double bales - 1 for cukes; the other for squash) to do and another 22 inch x 16 section.

The old straw from last year is perfect for recycling back in the frames.

Each year from here on out I'll have to get fewer bales.

 

Your garden sure has progressed through the years!!

Sherry

 

These look great! I've got to show it to my husband and maybe I can talk him into trying it this way this year,every year so far we've planted a regular vegetable garden which does ok at first but eventually it just dies off miserably bit by bit.

 

Sherry: my garden has definitely taken a few different turns these past 5 years! LOL

Annette: I've finally evolved into what would probably be a traditional raised bed garden with my growing material being mostly wheat straw. Bale gardening has worked well for me since I don't have a tractor, I don't like breaking up that big of a garden with a tiller, the soils in my garden area is just not that great, and I've had good success with this method.

 

Kent,

One of my grandfathers used to grow strawberries by building a pyramid with cement blocks that have holes in them. He would put a strawberry plant in every other hole and it sure would take off. Don't know if I have posted this before in this thread or if you know about this.

Sherry

 

Spring fever's hitting hard!

 

Lookin good

I've been straw bale gardening for 2 yrs, this year will be my 3rd. My garden was pretty small, but boy did I have plenty of tomatoes and peppers. I also tried growing pole beans last year which did so so--they were actually planted in a bed of old decomposed strawbales with a thin layer of soil on top. I just think they probably didn't get enough sun. But year before I did cukes, squash and eggplant of which all did great.

My bales are also enclosed in raised beds which really helps to shade them from the hot summer sun. Last year I tried something different when watering. I collected water from my ac line condensate as well as rain water. Once the plants were about a 1 1/2 - 2ft tall and shaded the bales, I only watered once a day with 1 gallon of water- starting at the base of the plant and watering out. My tomatoes and peppers never wilted. It proved to me you do not have to soak the whole bale there for saving water.

I don't know if you've had much trouble with southern wilt, but it has been terrible here. That was the main reason I switched to the bales. I did lose a couple of plants to the virus during my 2nd year but I believe it was the soil the seed was sown in was contaminated to begin with. Last year had no problems at all. But because of this I do not plan to use my decomposed bales at all for the tomatoes, opting instead to buy new ones for them. I recycled the old ones to my raised flower beds in my bird garden as flowers are not suseptible to the virus. I am totally hooked on the system and most people who see them in the bales can't believe they actually can be grown in this manner. Look forward to following everyones garden. BTW I'm on the NC coast, you can see mine here.. http://lantanalane.blogspot.com/search/label/straw bale garden

 

Good post, Lantanalane. Welcome to the thread.

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Here's my set up for the year.

All I have left to do, construction wise, is put up 2 more posts for another 16 ft cattle panel that I'm going to use for a tomato trellis.

I busted up several bales and used the straw to chink the gaps between the bales and the frames so I could get a nice snug fit.