A Quick Garden Update and Cheap Garden Amendment Ideas

I popped a few more things in the garden. I’m not sure if the kids will eat them, but I put Kohlrabi seeds in the new raised bed anyway. They are fun for kids to watch as they grow. I also put in amaranth seeds and a few hills of snow peas. (I had a spot that gets some dappled shade that might not get too hot for the peas)

I’m considering making a hoop house for Four-Season Gardening, but if I don’t get to it, my awesome baby brother has promised to make me some cold frames. I checked with the county and they said I don’t need a permit to build a small hoop house, but I should be sure to anchor it securely so it doesn’t become an airborne missile if there are high winds.

By the way, there are some pretty good sales on the mail order catalog sites this weekend. I got some Japanese popcorn seeds and some patio blueberry plants for 75% off on the Gurney’s site. I’m excited about the blueberries because they stay small and are supposed to be winter hardy to zone 3 in their containers, but will produce a pound of berries when they mature. When they arrive, I’ll mix some tea leaves in with the compost and top soil to make the mixture a bit more acidic and will avoid putting mushroom soil in the pots. (Mushroom soil is said to make acidic plants unhappy because of high salt content.)

Which reminds me – if you’ve been spending a lot of cash on things to improve your garden soil, here are a few of the ways I’ve been improving mine for free 0r very cheaply:

• Check with a farmer to see if you can get some aged cow manure. A lot of times, if you haul it, you can have it.
• See if a mushroom farm will give you a scoop or two of their “worn out” soil. I guess mushrooms don’t suck the same nutrients my plants do out of the soil. Bedding plants love it. My local mushroom farm wasn’t managing their soil right or something and was giving it away as fast as they could so they could get their piles under control. I think most mushroom farms charge, but it will probably be less than if  you go to the store to buy bags.
• Ask farmers for ruined bales of hay or straw for your compost heap. If they had some bales that didn’t dry right, they can’t use them for animals, but you can toss them in your compost bin. Or, if you get straw bales, use them as mulch.
• Rake and chop your leaves. It takes just a few minutes to do this with a riding mower with a bagger. Just keep a sharp eye out for deer ticks.
• Make your own compost. This is the best soil improver, because you can make it organic by controlling what you put in it and it is filled with stuff that just thrills plants to no end.

How do you improve your soil cheaply?