What I Learned from My Container Garden

My container garden taught me several valuable lessons this summer:

1. Indeterminate cherry tomatoes grow like monsters and cannot be contained by tomato cages.

2. Collard greens grow beautifully in containers and so do basil, tomatoes, lemongrass, spearmint, mesclun mix, dill, mustard greens, jalapenos, cayenne, tarragon, radish and string beans.

3. I think cabbage grows well in containers, but it’s hard to tell with the collard greens grabbing all the sun and hiding the cabbage.

4. I think broccoli grows well in containers, provided you don’t put too many seeds in such a small container (guilty as charged).

5. Be careful with arugula. If not properly trimmed and pinched it goes crazy.

6. Strawberries don’t seem to like containers so much, but they are producing another round of strawberries.

7. Caterpillars are a real pain in the butt.

8. Self-watering containers rule (especially when growing indeterminate tomatoes).

9. Do not use compressed particle board when affixing wheels to the bottom of a container. It doesn’t stand up to the rain so well (2 of the wheels rotted off).

10. Squirrels (the little brats) love squash seeds but won’t touch radish.

11. Bokashi and the tea is a great addition to any garden.

Will I do it again?

Absolutely! I’ve learned a lot this growing season and will modify things for next year. I like growing tomatoes, greens and herbs on the deck because it’s easily accessible for making salads. Next year, however, I’ll plant the cabbage and broccoli in the yard along with a few other items.

My only regret is that I didn’t plant more veggies such as cucumbers, onion, garlic, red and green peppers.

I’ve still got a lot of learning and planning to do for next year, but in the meanwhile, I’ll enjoy my current harvest. Oh, on a side note, I finally created my first window farm contraption. (I mentioned window farms in an earlier post ) By creating a window farm, I should be able to grow fresh veggies year round.

As with pretty much everything else I do, I’m experimenting with the window farm. My first contraption is very ugly, but I’m working on improving it both aesthetically and functionally. As usual, I’ll let you know how it goes.

Ugly but Functional

8/9/12 Update:  I just couldn’t stand looking at that ugly thing so I modified it to look a little less ugly.  It’s still ugly, but at least I can tolerate it until I can figure out a better way to implement this.