Rise and Thrive: Crafting Your Elevated Garden Haven

Whether you live in the city or out in the country, the best way to have complete control over your garden is by building a raised bed.  I say this because everyone’s soil is going to be different. It could be very sandy, loamy, high or low in nitrogen, or even solid red clay like mine is.  The best way overcome challenges presented by your soil is by building a garden bed on top of your existing soil.  

The first step is determining the size bed you would like to build.  I built my raised beds in a 6’ x 12’ design. The only reason for this was the untreated 4”x 4” lumber was in 12’ sections, and I happened to have just the right amount of room for that size raised bed.  Gronomics makes great modular raised beds in many different sizes if you don’t want to build one from scratch.  Once you have decided on the dimensions, try to find an area that gets the most sun.  Leafy greens and herbs can handle some shade throughout the day, but if you want to grow tomatoes, peppers, or other flowering plants, you will need full sun for those fruit productions.

After your raised bed is complete, you will need to fill it with soil.  To determine how much you will need we need to calculate the cubic foot of the bed.  Take the length x width x height to determine your cubic footage.  Let’s take my 6’ x 12’ for an example.  The height of mine is 1 foot, which makes my bed 72 cuft. Unfortunately that is going to take a lot of soil to fill, but I will only have to fill it once.  I used a mixture of Pro Mix (peat moss, perlite, and a wetting agent) Happy Frog Soil Conditioner (Forest humus, worm castings, bat guano, beneficial microbes, and humic acid) Bio Char (charcoal-like substance used to reduce nutrient leaching, reduce soil acidity, and reduce fertilizer requiremnts) Mushroom Compost (contains beneficial fungus) and Azomite (contains all of your micro nutrients).

It took 7 bags of Promix, 6 bags of Happy Frog Soil Conditioner, 4 bags of Bio Char, 8 bags of Mushroom compost, and 1 x 44lb bag of Azomite to completely fill my raised bed.  After filling my bed, I only have to add 4-5 bags of compost and a 5lb bag of Azomite to my garden each year.  I also like to use the Fox Farm Tomato & Vegetable nutrients to feed my plants through out the year.  It contains several great amendments, which will feed your plants for 2-3 weeks at a time. They include: Alfalfa Meal, Feather Meal, Fish Bone Meal, Rock Phosphate, Bone Meal, Fish Meal, Sulfate of Potash, Kelp Meal, and Mycorrhizae. I like to top dress with this fertilizer every 10-14 days. That’s typically how long it takes for these amendments to break down and be available for your plants.

Raised beds can seem intimidating, but they can actually be pretty simple projects. We are happy to work with you to help you get the raised beds of your dreams.  They are truly a great way to garden, allowing you to grow a lot of produce in a relatively small space and have a large amount of control over your planting space.

Back to Your Roots

One of my all time favorite liquid organic nutrients is from Roots Organics. This company uses top quality inputs that help create some of the best tasting fruits and flowers in my opinion. Their products are all CDFA certified which is an organic certification from California. Their testing is very stringent and more difficult to get than your traditional OMRI certification. I feel this is one reason why Roots Organics is a bit better than some of the other organic nutrients I’ve used in the past.

Their base nutrients are the Buddha Grow and Buddha Bloom. The Buddha Grow consists of bat guano, kelp extract, soy extract, molasses, worm castings, and yucca extract. The Buddha Bloom has the same composition except it also includes rock phosphate to help increase the size of your fruits and flowers. The bat guano is a source of nitrogen, the kelp extract has B vitamins that help to reduce stress, the soy extract is another source of nitrogen, while the worm castings add beneficial bacteria and trace minerals to your plants. Last but not least, the yucca extract is a natural wetting agent.

Roots Organics also has several additives to help maximize your yields. One of my favorite additives is their Trinity. It contains all of your carbohydrates which are the building blocks of your soil. Every time I water with Trinity my leaves stand straight up toward the light which means the plants are extremely healthy.

Their Ancient Amber is also a great source of natural nitrogen that is really only needed during the vegetative growth. Nettle weed is the main ingredient used in the Ancient Amber which naturally contains high amounts of nitrogen. Extreme Serene is another great growth nutrient focused on vegetative growth. It contains five different species of seaweed which helps to reduce stress and help to uptake nutrients. It also has a biomass of cyanobacteria or spirulina which is a great source of amino acids.

When it comes to plants’ flowering needs, I also like to use the Roots HPK to help increase the density of my flowers. It is made with bat guano, rock phosphate, and langbeinite. Langbeinite is a potassium magnesium sulfate mineral which helps to increase the size and density of your flowers.

Overall, I feel the Roots Organic liquid line is one of the better organic nutrients on the market. I get great root growth and development, along with denser fruits and flowers versus some of the other liquid organics that I’ve used before. Happy growing, and stop on by the shop with questions, or if you’re looking for advice, tips, or other recommendations!

Build Your Own Super Soil

What exactly is super soil? Super soil is a blend of many different amendments that will feed your plants from seed to harvest. This blend will give your plants all of the essential nutrients they need to lead happy lives and keep them from having any deficiencies.

In this blog I will give you a great recipe and explain what each amendment does for your soil.

· 8 x 1.5 cu.ft. bags of organic soil (Roots Organic or Ocean forest works the best)

· 30 lb bag of Wiggle Worm Castings

· 5 lbs of Steamed Bone Meal

· 5 lbs of High Phosphorus Bat Guano

· 5 lbs of Blood Meal

· 3 lbs of Soft Rock Phosphate

· 3/4 Cup of Epson Salts

· 1/2 Cup of Dolomitic Lime

· 1/2 Cup of Azomite

· 3/4 Cup of Nature’s Nog Granular

Lay out a large tarp for mixing. A 10’ x 10’ works great.

Start by tearing open two bags of your soil and making a pile in the middle of the tarp. Then add a layer of amendments followed by a layer of soil until you are out of soil and amendments.

Now mix all the soil and amendments together until everything is even in your mix. This may take 20 to 30 minutes but is needed for a proper breakdown of your fertilizers.

After everything is mixed, shovel your soil into trashcans, and water each trashcan with non-chlorinated water. Let the mix sit in the sun for 60 to 90 days to break down the fertilizer to make it available to your plants.

Fill your containers with 40% to 50% of the Super Soil and the rest with regular organic soil. Just add water and watch your plants thrive, whether you are growing indoors or out.

Starting with the organic soils is the main key to this recipe because they will contain some beneficial fungi and bacteria, and some organic amendments. Adding the worm casting helps to give a small amount of nitrogen and a great amount of beneficial bacteria. These bacteria help your plants break down and take up the nutrients you are feeding them.

The steamed bone meal adds calcium (which prevents blossom end rot) and some plant-available phosphorus. The High Phosphorus Bat Guano will provide an additional boost of plant-available phosphorus, which helps to promote vigorous root growth and promote healthy fruit and flower production. Blood meal is a fast-release source of nitrogen, used to promote luscious green growth.

Soft Rock Phosphate is used promote fast, healthy growth in your plants. Epsom salts are used as a magnesium source, which also helps to prevent blossom end rot. Dolomitic lime is used to help raise and balance the pH in your soil. Azomite is used for all of your trace minerals your plants need to thrive. They include everything from Copper, Cobalt, Iodine, Manganese, to Molybdenum and Zinc.

And last but not least is the Nature’s Nog. This amendment consists of Humic acids and kelp. Humic acids work by transporting nutrients from the soil to the plant. Kelp contains B vitamins and really helps your plant with any type of stress that it will incur. Whether it be transplant plant shock, heat, or even the environment.

I hope this break down of these amendments will help to better understand why they are important in your soils and what they actually do for your plants.

Happy Growing!