Planting a garden in soil bags?

[npmommie]

There was an article in this month's Mother Earth News about planting a garden in soil bags. Says its an easy way to try growing a garden.
anyone ever do this? what were your results?

I found this online if you are interested and don't know what it is
http://www.vegetablegardener.com/item/4396/try-soil-bag-planting-for-no-dig-beds

 

[J3nn78]

Seems kind of lazy and ugly to me, but to each their own. I would not do it. It would drive me nuts to look at the ugly bags.

 

[The Mystery Machine]

That has to be the stupidest thing I have ever seen.For goodness sakes, just build a berm. You will get better results.

 

[lovesmurfs]

There was an article in this month's Mother Earth News about planting a garden in soil bags. Says its an easy way to try growing a garden.
anyone ever do this? what were your results?

I found this online if you are interested and don't know what it is
http://www.vegetablegardener.com/item/4396/try-soil-bag-planting-for-no-dig-beds

Um. Well. No. Thanks, though.

 

[Nette]

My step dad used to do this with tomatoes years and years ago... He said it worked great, but to remember to poke some holes in the underside so the water can drain a bit.

We have our tomatoes planted in garbage cans this year... An idea we stole from the EPCOT flower and garden show.

 

[npmommie]

Seems kind of lazy and ugly to me, but to each their own. I would not do it. It would drive me nuts to look at the ugly bags.

oh no you don't leave the bags exposed!!!!
you mulch around it all with something, you don't see the bags
here is a better picture of what it may look like
http://www.motherearthnews.com/Orga...ag-can-make-gardening-simpler-AP-1282009.aspx

The soil in the spot that would be best for a garden on my property is not great, ( everything I have tried so far the past couple of years did horrible!) so I think I will try this, then at the end, take the bags away and work the soil into the ground, to help prepare it for a ground garden.

 

[Silent1CB]

Stupid? Well perhaps not so much. I can see benefits from the heat of the plastic in colder parts of the country. We live in an area with tons of rocks in every shovelful. Its impossible to dig a good hole. That's one solution I guess.

Ugly? Absolutely without the mulch.

 

[hopemax]

When poking around gardening sites for Colorado, I did see this method for growing blueberry bushes. The soil is too alkaline for them to grow well in the ground, so they recommended getting a bale of peat moss and planting the blueberry bush in it.

 

[wdwfan16]

I can see a use for this. - You rent are have only a patio and you love tomatoes off the vine. A wildlife problem.

We plant a few plants in pots rather than the gound. We have lots of ground but also lots of wildlife. It is easier to put the stuff in pots and then elevate them rather than try to wildlife proof the area.

 

[ChristaDeVil]

I think it's a great idea. I might try this myself, so thanks for the link!

 

[MushyMushy]

I love it! We don't actually have much land, and the back space of our property is all patio. The dirt we do have in our landscaping area is bad, so DH was thinking of taking it all out and replacing it with better soil -- this would be SO much easier!

 

[BernardandMissBianca]

That is really cool.
DH's mom used to plant tomatoes in hay bales.

In a magazine I recently got had an herb garden planted in a canvas over the door shoe organizer.
I'm considering trying that this year.

 

[HERSEY]

I was thinking about trying them out. I saw them here http://www.gardeners.com/Grow-Bags/GrowBags_Cat,default,sc.html

I think they are a great idea.

 

[denisem]

Never tried it, but understand the attraction after years of gardening in decent (or at least easily amendable) MI soil and then moving to FL sand.

So we played with container gardening last year - same concept, but slightly more attractive containers than a bag laying on the ground. We took it a step further & made homemade "self-watering" earth boxes from our endless! supply of kitty litter containers and were pretty amazed with the results for little money (many use 5 gal. buckets free from restaurants or for a few bucks from Lowe's or Home Depot).

Most of my info was from davesgarden.com. Here's a link for making your own and a picture of our tomatoes.

http://www.seattleoil.com/Flyers/Earthbox.pdf

 

[HERSEY]

I never thought there was a good way to reuse the kitty litter pails.

Thanks for the suggestion.

 

[npmommie]

I can see a use for this. - You rent are have only a patio and you love tomatoes off the vine. A wildlife problem.

We plant a few plants in pots rather than the gound. We have lots of ground but also lots of wildlife. It is easier to put the stuff in pots and then elevate them rather than try to wildlife proof the area.

we have tons of wildlife, we have several acres, and tons of blueberry and blackberry bushes, I have to get to them before the critters for our summer supply of wild blueberries! LOL
our soil near the house is terrible, when I dig for anything, I hit rocks rocks rock, and lots of clay.
we did have loam trucked in when we built the house.

Never tried it, but understand the attraction after years of gardening in decent (or at least easily amendable) MI soil and then moving to FL sand.

So we played with container gardening last year - same concept, but slightly more attractive containers than a bag laying on the ground. We took it a step further & made homemade "self-watering" earth boxes from our endless! supply of kitty litter containers and were pretty amazed with the results for little money (many use 5 gal. buckets free from restaurants or for a few bucks from Lowe's or Home Depot).

Most of my info was from davesgarden.com. Here's a link for making your own and a picture of our tomatoes.

http://www.seattleoil.com/Flyers/Earthbox.pdf

oh great use for the kitty litter containers! Ours hold the endless supply of Thomas the tank trains that come into our house! LOL

But I may try to use containers too.

I went to the farmers market today and I got some plants.........I got lettuce, tomato, pepper, and swiss chard.
I think I will put the tomato plant in a container and the other in the bags and see what happens

 

[npmommie]

here is the link to the actual article I read, I found it online
http://www.motherearthnews.com/organic-gardening/start-a-quick-and-easy-food-garden.aspx

their plan is too ambitious for me, I need to start small