Starting an (Imperfect) Garden from Scratch | Feed Your Family No Matter What!🥕🍅🌽
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- čas přidán 28. 08. 2024
- Food insecurity, the rising cost of food (and everything else 🙄), natural disasters, drought, animal diseases, supply chain issues … are all a concern when it comes to making sure our family’s are fed. Learning to grow your own food is an essential skill for long-term food security.
Start TODAY. No excuses. No matter your living situation. Learning to understand how plants grow and what they need to be nurtured and thrive can happen anywhere - even if all you have is a kitchen window or balcony.
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You are right! It doesn't have to be beautiful, weedless, and perfect. It just has to produce. Gardening is all about willpower, perseverance, and experience. You get better at it every year. Learning to preserve your bounty is next.
I hate inviting people to our homestead. We have a garden, but it is a mess. Weeds, no raised beds. We don’t have money like that and we are not That handy. We do have a lot of land and just plant. Thank you for this.
I use old milk crates, old tires and boxes they're all free. I look at the blessing of being ahead of the game. You have land to grow your groceries when big box is gone. Get seeds, keep going, hold on and God Bless...p.s. less visitors the better.
I mulch mine with anything I can get or have. I used to be picky about what I used to mulch, because of seeds and such. Now it doesn't matter as long as the lawn mower didn't go through the mint patch it goes on the garden. I use grass clippings, hay, animal bedding and all that comes with it. I've used cardboard also. Whatever it takes.
I don't till anymore I just mulch and either pull it back to scrape for a row of seeds or dig a hole and plant the plants. I'm 60 now and did huge gardens for years and now just plant where the sun is good for that plant. I don't really fight the land anymore just go with it.
Yay on the first zucchini! That one was a beaut! ❤😊
Next time plant on top of the mounds. That’s what my daughter does. Then when you mow, put grass clippings in the dips. Also gather leaves in fall for mulch. Put that in the dips. Cardboard in dip etc. Eventually you’ll have less weeds. The dips also keep in moisture and it encourages deep root growth. Are you able to just scrape that top layer of grass off next time? My daughter also did that and transferred that to areas of her yard that she needed more grass. Her garden does great growing that way. I don’t have the land like her and do bed and container gardening and struggle way more than her. In the end, any food is better than no food grown. Keep up the good work.
You're doing awesome! We're not new to gardening and are learning a lot to adjust as needed. Last year, we broke ground to more than double our garden space. Wild mint took over, out competed and literally made me sick to smell it all the time. I couldn't manage it. Bob got help to rip it up. He planted 2 and 3 times in places, as deer and rabbits kept getting in and eating it. A lot of work for very little. This year, that sod and mint came back with a vengeance. We decided our only option was deep mulch. We couldn't buy mulch, so we took grass and weeds from the pasture. We used hay that got wet while we were unexpectedly away in December. In places, there was some animal waste added. Some plantings were done down in dirt in very narrow strips through the mulch. Some seeds were planted in the mulch. Both ways are actually working. Weeds that come through are easier to pull. The mint, we keep piling on top of. It's actually easier than the way we grew up gardening. I am really impressed by your tenacity! Keep going. I can't wait to see your progress as the years go by. I am sure you will find the best ways for your garden. -Mrs. Little
Count your successes! Congratulations!
I have a garden and orchard in suburbia, a TRAILER, LOL. Trees r finally producing and i have my kitchen garden. This years accomplishment: I was finally able to grow root veggies. Heavy clay. I am pleased. Better every year. You have a great attitude! I love what you r doing.
Looking forward to seeing your veggies grow!
You are doing great! Gardening is so different every year! Literally every single year. What works great one year can be a complete flop the next 😂 We are always learning!
Looks great to me! Since the zone you’re in you can replant , plant on top of the humps that should help you.
I really enjoy your channel! You are an inspiration to my husband and me.
We grow our food, doubled our garden this year and will triple it next year. I have been growing our food for 15 years now. Hands down, the permaculture approach is the most productive, efficient, inexpensive, and even beautiful way to grow food. No dig! I have found tilling our soil kills the microbes. We use the no dig method. In the early spring, we put down cardboard on the wet ground (right on top of the weeds, if the grasses are tall, we mow it down first, leaving the clippings for nitrogen), wet down the cardboard, put down leaves, wet it again, put down aged horse manure, wet it, then compost and soil. We are trying to make enough of our own compost but so far our garden is too big and we haven't produced enough yet. Then we wet it all down and cover it with anything we have: black plastic (expensive though), hay that the animals can't eat, or leaves.
Just let it sit. When the soil is warm enough and the frost danger has passed, plant seeds directly into the prepared no dig beds. So easy. Once the seeds sprout, I mulch with saw dust from our goats or old hay or leaves. This makes the soil healthier and also saves on water. Weeds hardly come up and when they do, so easy to pull.
If you are row planting, you can still use this no dig method. You can put cardboard down in your rows, then put woodchips on the cardboard. Usually, the power companies deliver woodchips for free.
Thank you for all you share with us!
I love that you started your garden without it being “perfect”! Every year is a learning experience 🙂 If you have more cucumber seeds put them in the ground. Cucumbers grow really fast so you may still have time.
I cannot grow cucumbers to save my soul. My seedlings are still that and they have been same darn size from a direct sew in hills for 6 to 8 weeks. Giving up soon on them.
@@Saoirse.n.Murphy This is my first successful year to grow my cucumbers from seed. I’ve tried the last two years but ended up buying starts from a nursery. This year I started them indoors instead of direct sowing. Apparently that’s the trick for my conditions.
I’m only 3 minutes in and I just love your honesty. Your perspective is a breath of fresh air in the perfectionism culture! Thanks for sharing and inspiring!!
I’m glad you showed the imperfections of your garden. It gives me hope that it doesn’t have to be perfect.
Falcon is the cutest baby! It's going to be fun to watch him grow on your channel. Your garden looks great!
Isn't the baby a girl?
My goal. No trucks driving across country bringing me food.
Hi Katy, great video. To keep your plants hydrated between watering. You can use cardboard if you don't have compost. I use large milk bottles with a tiny hole at the side near the bottom. This will slowly drip feed the plants. Your soil looks amazing. The 3 sisters usually planted in a square. There are great how to videos on google. I tried it using 3 by 4 corn plants plus pinto beans and cucumbers. Companion planting is the go. Cheers. Don't worry about any fails, just thin of them as learnings. Your brilliant at that.
This is great! If at the end of the season, you fill the holes with manure/ whatever organic matter you have, you can plant into that next year and it will hold water better. Waffle gardening I think they call it? You can also mulch super deep with whatever you have like leaves or grass clippings and that will help with water and weeds too. No tilling necessary, could save yourself that purchase/rental
I think it is excellent that you are showing and encouraging people to just get on the land and get started. Too many wait around for all of the creature comforts or ideal setups before they get to work.
Thank you for making videos that show not just what you're doing, but HOW you're doing it.
I beat the water dilemma by growing in small pots inside my greenhouse.
All the pots sit in a tray, so if some water splashes out, it's not lost and will be sucked up by other pots.
I also grow only medicinal plants, because I'm a carnivore and I don't eat plants. I eat animals that eat plants . . . and they eat mostly grass at that.
Pick your battles. You can't grow everything.
If you live in a farming community, like I do, grow just one thing, maybe two and trade with neighbors for variety.
I grow mostly cayenne pepper & mint.
I also have fruit trees, but unfortunately, the best time to plant fruit trees is 15 years ago.
I think keeping buckets in the garden to catch rain is a very clever idea. Would certainly reduce impact on your utility bills to have any time of rain catchment system.
Good on you! I too live off-grid, but in the mountains in New Zealand. It's taken me YEARS to build up the soil to where I can eat something out of my garden all year
Compost, manure and wood chips are your friends. I love the ruth stout books, lots of good advice for easy gardening. I do "no till" gardening. Each year is a learning curve based on the weather, pests, what varieties you plant... It's always worth it although some years, like last year was a super low yield year. This year is much better.
Love your channel! 💛👍🏾👌🏾... So Real
Loving my Florida garden this year! 😊
Try mulching your plants with leaves to keep the moisture in!
Get one of those battery operated camping shower systems. You drop the pump in the bucket of water and turn the sprayer nozzle on and spray water on your plants.
You are right, grow something! I have had a small container garden for 3 years and this year it is finally doing good. I would have loved to stop at the failures year 1, but so thankful that I persevered. I have zucchini and yellow squash and green bell peppers and tomatoes. Plus growing sweet peppermint and rosemary and lavender all in my small container garden. I'm very happy to see it all come up and so far everything picked has been delicious. People have to stop relying on people that may not be there in the future. Self sustaining lifestyle, thats the key.
I started a small veggie garden and I mulch the soil to save water, I think you should build a water catchment near your veggie garden .
If you still only have a plough option next season, use a large tree branch or bush as a harrow by dragging it across the plough furrows with your tractor. Good luck and happy gardening.
Your plants are looking good! Next year you will be able to use the horse and chicken manure after it composts. You could till, but I stopped tilling and laid dowm cardboard to kill the weeds, then putting the soil.on top. Vegetables will definitely still grow with weeds, though.
Nice job! follow nature's lead... don't worry too much about the weeds, they cover and keep the soil more humid and confuse the predator insects. You could add some insecticidal flowers to repel and confuse the bugs ( like marigold/nicotinia/even geraniums). My experience has been to stick to the foods I know I eat regularly. Tomatoes, potatoes, winter squash, corn. I hardly ever water and allow my garden plants to fend for themselves as much as possible, only giving them to keep a plant from dying. Also, to simplify your process don't forget that all your seed needs is some cover to germinate... most wil grow willingly even without soil as long as there is some cover...like leaves and grass clippings. I spent a lot of $ buying small cultivating equipment to finally just throw seeds down and cover with organic material and voila! it grew. Best of luck!
I love gardening. It is my happy place. Picking fresh organic food that you grow yourself is
awesome. Now we need to see how your cooking those veggies and turning them
into meals.😊
Awesome!! Thank you for sharing. You guys are so inspirational 🎉🎉🎉🎉
News friend here from Growing My Own.
Very useful advice in this economy 🌹👍🏾🥂
One thing that I have seen for people trying to turn grass into gardens is putting down cardboard and wetting it, and then putting soil on top (just make sure it has no grass in it!)
Another channel I watched mentioned a service called Chip Drop, where local tree cutters will take their wood chips and just drop them in your driveway for free, for you to use as mulch!
I have had good luck growing green beans in large pots. Bush beans in some and climbing beans in others, and I put a tomato cage in those pots for them to climb. I got all my large pots very cheaply at garage sales.
OH MY GOODNESS THE BABYYYYY 🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰
I don’t know if you were aware of it but in the scene where you were pulling out the weeds, it looked like you were pulling out wild lettuce. Wild lettuce is very good for making a natural pain killer. 😮
The more we do, the more we learn. Thanks for another great video. See you on the next one.
Put 150 sunchokes in the soil NOW in two years you’ll have enough calories for a family of 5 every year by keeping 20% in the soil each year. SHARE WITH EVERYONE.
Those thorny ones my goats used to dig up and eat the roots
I am really enjoying following your adverture.I completely agree with your mindset.Just use what you got is what we have always lived by.
rooster.
There is FALCON!! Precious and growing way too fast! Katie, y’all are doing a fabulous job. You both have worked so hard, and I have so much admiration for your willingness to try new things. Keep up the great work!❤
The only suggestion I have for the cucumber plants is they like quite a bit of water, that’s what I’ve found anyways xx
The melons may need more water too, only coz these plants are mainly water, the fruit is mainly water. So the more water the better… but what we do here, is water deeply and not daily, to help the roots go deep.
I hope I am suggesting things you didn’t know lol maybe you do, but don’t know what else
the watermelon plant's leaves looks like oak leaves where the cantaloupe leaves are more rounded. Also if you plant anymore tomato plants put a banana peel in the hole, cover with dirt then plant your plant. They will grow better. I grew up on 40 acres of farm land and even at 5 years old I was taught to use a hoe. Love your farming. You're doing an excellent job.
❤ you will have to build a big 2x4 cage wrapped in chicken wire to keep the groundhogs, deer and squirrels from eating up your garden.
GREAT JOB ON YOU GARDEN 😊
This isn’t the garden you planted in a previous video. You had raised beds and brought in some compost. I’m confused
You have a creek - get some buckets of water from your creek to water your plants. :) Folks are normally very friendly in that area you are living in so try to make friends with an older farmer nearby and he might loan you a tiller or rent it to you for a while. This summer has turned off dry and a lot of folks are having trouble with their gardens so don't feel too bad. I live in WNC.
Good job on the garden, every year is a learning experience. And some years like 2024, just horrible in Carson City Nv. for the garden.
You give such fantastic advice about gardening! Thanks for showing us your successes & failures
Thanks for sharing your garden,u like how rustic it is. When planting a garden you have to plant enough for you and the animals and pets.
Thanks for sharing real life gardening and self sufficiency 🥰
Best wishes from Karachi, Pakistan
Your plants look great! I agree with you on all the points you made.
A broad fork is a huge help for me when preparing the garden spot. I am able to pry up clumps, shake off the soil and pitch the week into a bucket. My chickens accompany me when I dig and gobble up wigglies and runners. 😂
I unexpectedly ended up in a rental home recently, and have had to embrace the patio garden! I’m really enjoying it!
I love that you show weeds and all the failures. Vegetables planted in a weed patch can still produced food. If you can't weed the whole garden just weed around the plants.
4th season of gardening here in the Berkshires, MA. I love my gardens! Keep on learning and growing! I smothered 90 potential heads of garlic this spring by having too heavy leaf cover when they sprouted in December with vigor due to a mild winter. Straw... no leaves and uncover in February. So... keep on learning and keep on growing! Good luck. Also, scraps of whatever make a beautiful garden. I agree, it can get expensive. Imagination with plants and good to go! Peace
Thank you so much for making this video!! I want to garden someday so bad, but I've got the anti green thumb. I'm still gonna (hopefully) try, though. And this video helps me think I can do it. 😊
You can do it! You should get you a little dash plant for your van 🪴 When we were in our truck, I really wanted to get a plant to travel with. A little Velcro on the bottom to hold it in place 😆 I never did but it seems like it would make a nice little companion.
@@raisingwildflowers I love that idea! 😁🪴
If you have chip drop in your area they will deliver it to your property . It’s a easy way to suppress weed and as it breaks down it will enrich the soil
You're doing a great job! Love your videos!
Deer love corn and will eat your plants, here in SC we get squash bugs they will kill squash and if they are too close to cucumbers they will eat their plants too, it’s good times fighting them 😂 nice looking garden!❤
One thing I found on Amazon for weeds-doesn’t pull the roots, but look up Japanese wedding sickle. It cuts the weeds way back under the ground. It’s worth the few dollars to grab one!
If ya'll can get your hands
on some free dead leaves, it's a good ground cover and no weeds .It will help keep the soil moist and saves on water
Gardening is so rewarding especially with edibles. My okra just started producing.😊
I planted my watermelons and pumpkins too close together like that without considering cross pollination. A friend informed me that they did the same a few years ago and had a pumpkin on the outside and watermelon on the inside. Guess we will see 😅
Oh man, that sounds exciting 😂 I will let you guys know if that happens! 🤣
Every year is different when gardening. We were in a drought last few years and today we have plenty of rain to the point of flooding. My garden is small and i planted in containers. Cucumbers are going crazy. I canned 9 quarts of pickles for the first time! We planted cantaloupe for the first time. Asparagus beans are coming up fast. They are my favorite bean.
Enjoy your bounty ! You could use straw to help keep the weeds down. :)
Yard is all shaded. No garden. We grow MOSS!
We could use more shade. Sun-scald here in East Georgia
Here in AZ we plant on the mounds and the trenches are used to irrigate the garden like they do in the farm fields. When you prepare your garden next year pull out as many of the loose weeds and grass as you can to help eliminate as many as possible for future gardens. You can toss them in your compost pile also and the heat kills any seeds too. Save all your manure from your stock and let it age to put directly into your soil and you can do that either this fall when you put your garden to bed for the winter or next spring. You can also make manure tea to use right away also, place some horse biscuits 😂 in a large bucket and fill it up with water and let it steep for a few days then water directly at the bottom of the plant with it and you can keep adding water for a bit until all the nutrients are used up and then start over.
Congratulations on your first zucchini!! I love the excitement I am that way and I have been gardening for about 40 years now.
I'm awful at gardening, so many failures but keep on. Finally very successful! I'm growing potatoes & ginger. We are limited to Free horse manure for compost. Add kitchen scraps, grass, etc. We'll add pole beans (green beans) red beets & pumpkins. Then add more. A ton of hobby farmers partake of a weekly produce swap 1hr away. Tastier than even the commercial organic veges we buy locally at the Farmers Mkt. I've realized hobby farmers have better soil.dirt/compost producing tasty & more nutritious produce! Had nothing to swap so paid money to buy strawberries, free range eggs, Kale & red beets. Hobby farmers who grow for the purpose of just covering their own food needs is the way to go. They clearly. use better dirt/soil. We forage too. Yesterday we found 2-3 spots w/ a TON of blackberries fully ripe in 3-4 wks. Rubber boots from Goodwill + a step ladder will allow us to pick a ton of blackberries this year to can into syrup.
I took a weed eater and took the grass down to the ground. Planted okra with a knife blade and did a double tie with a 2x4 in-between them, card board for walkways. It did ok and we had earthworms under the cardboard.
Maybe a a pond with the turning plow, just keep moving the dirt higher and higher. Located maybe on a slope of a hill / valley.
We had to pull weeds out of about 30 acres of row crop land. We never got them all.
Keep going and never give up. Keep up the good work.
Good morning from Prince George VA!
Good morning! 😊☀️
Good morning Katie ❤ We have different problems with our garden lol Since we are in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan the plant date is like June 20th. We started stuff in the green house and the cucumbers did very well. We had some cheap old fencing that we cut into sections for the plants to grow up like a trellis! That is a nice zucchini! Congrats! I was excited because on the 1 bell pepper plant I have it has one growing lol! We still have another pile of branches to cut up and remove so we can plant the rest of the things in the greenhouse! I totally agree with you about the learning process! I was really worried about the critters eating but that hasn't been a problem. The big dog scares away a lot and the cat catches and eats (not sure why I feed him kibble) As for watering that is not an issue either because we get a lot of rain! We are looking forward to getting rain catchment set up. So far we have never had to water anything except the stuff in the greenhouses!
Hi there, great sharing definitely 👍🏽 like
Biggest thing for us with a ground garden was learning to rotate crops. 1st year corn on right side, 2nd year in middle, 3rd year on left side, etc. When harvest done, till back into the ground for next year's nutrients. Never used fertilizer or pesticides. Doesn't have to be fancy or perfect, just edible. Weeds will choke out the plants so we did hoe every row each week. Critters will be an issue for awhile unless it's fenced with chicken wire or there's enough activity around the garden to scare them off. All this was done in Indiana which is farm land so a little easier than the mountain area of Virginia. Congrats on a good start this year.
Save all your seeds ...amazing what you're going to produce😊
We're doing a fall garden since we didn't have time in spring
Yay! 🌱❤️
We have those thorny weeds here in NC too. Your garden looks great!
A garden is a no brainer with or without land. Start with 1 or 2 of the easiest veg , herb or fruit then build on that by adding a new variety when the first 1 is doing well.
😊😊
I watched a video years ago of a Native American gardener planting her 3 sisters garden patch. She said the most important thing is that you plant the corn first at least 3-4 weeks ahead of the beans which go in next and let them start vining before you plant the squash.
If you don’t let the corn and then the beans start growing, the squash will smother the others out.
The corn is the foundation or support structure of the 3 sisters and it needs time to get growing before it can provide the support for the beans.
If the corn hasn’t grown sufficiently the beans will strangle the corn and kill it.
The squash is there to smother the weeds and help retain the moisture around the base of the corn and beans.
All three plants compliment each other and add or subtract different nutrients from the soil.
Good luck with your brand new garden. I would suggest making a barrel of homemade liquid fertilizer to feed your garden.
Start with some manure (put it in a fabric bag or old piece of cloth tied shut so you can remove it later) and weeds in a 5 gallon bucket, about 1/3-1/2 full.
Fill the bucket with water and put a lid loosely on it. Let it steep (preferably in a sunny location) for a few weeks, stir it a couple times a week.
Don’t place it near your living space because it will draw flies in and it will smell as it steeps.
You can add kitchen scraps or more weeds as the contents breakdown.
As your brew starts to get darker and stronger, you can start diluting some of it and using it to feed your plants.
When you remove some of the liquid from the bucket immediately replace it with more water so that you will have a constant supply.
Just remove approximately 1 cup of liquid and mix it with 1 gallon of water to fertilize your plants.
Thanks so much for the great tips! I learned about the Three Sisters in the book Braiding Sweetgrass which was SUCH a great read if you haven’t read it yet 😊
Get a large piece of black plastic (or lots of cardboard) and cover a patch the size of what you want for your fall garden. If you cover it now it will be grass and weed free when you are ready to plant brassicas, spinach, etc.
This garden looks great - what happened to the other garden that you planted with potatoes? Did the deer get it? I love your attitude - it's not a failure if you learn important lessons from it!
It’s still there! I actually just harvested the potatoes and it’s still producing tons of kale. I am going to be working on fall stuff for that area soon 😁 The deer did get a few things tho - like all my broccoli 😂
I really want to mail you a watering can 😂💗✨
I live and do the same things you do. But, I can't seem to stop my jars from popping...
You're thinking in my mind on a correct pattern. One needful item is a God centered lift ask for directions and He will provide as you need.
Sorry, commenting as I watch so I don't forget... those thorny plants are a bother. (I'm in VA too.) After years of dealing with them we find mowing (or clipping with scissor as you're doing) to be the best way to eliminate them in a certain area. When we pulled them it did not deter their growth as well as cutting/mowing them. They especially love woodchips bc it is very easy for their underground runners to spread.
What would you suggest for catching and storing water during cold weather? I live in Maine. Winters are horrible.
Mulch - you want mulch, not ground cover. Ground cover drinks your water whereas mulching retains the moisture and helps nurture/feed your soil. Mulching also keeps your weeds at bay a TON. The grass though, unless you do raised beds or literally scrape your grass surface and edge it - your garden will revert to grass eventually.
I started trying to garden 3 yrs ago and havent had too much luck except 1 year. I think the seeds are old. Where fo you get yours? Our landlord detached our water hose and we live in the city in a duplex apt. (Blah) I have a rain barrel but no gutters to attach so trying to figure a way to get it full bc regular rain/storms dont come close.
Girl, you need some good gloves! You learn as you go, been doing gardening for years and always learn something new. Squirrels 🐿️ ate all of our corn one year and the next year corn grew to about 12- ft tall but the ears of corn just didn’t develop into more than skinny little pods. All of that to say, this year I’m already buying corn from the Mennonite community. Deer and squirrels will demolish a garden in no time. Yay- your first zucchini!! That baby is adorable
Disc choppers for the tractor after plowing would have made the rows plantable. Also there are hand covers called leather gardening gloves that allow you to painlessly pull up briars
Wasn’t in the budget 😉💰
I see lots of zucchini bread in your future!
Can I ask wy you didn’t plant in the hills? There it keeps the moisture so you can mulch with the weeds so the water stays in the hill. I have a allotment and I like it and the food taste much better than when you buy it. Like your life leassons 😊
The hills were 2 layers of thick sod because of the way the plow flips over the ground.