My Garden Journal

Hi! I'm an avid gardener! I grow wildflowers, flowering trees and shrubs. I specialize in native Texas plants. I've got more that 10 different native species!! I'm also 100% organic! I have a few acres of land and I spend my free time gardening and landscaping my property. I try to have something flowering all the time! Especially from march to november!

5/18/12

For my first entry, I'm going to post pics from my garden! I'll have updates to this thread whenever I get a project going and some pics taken! I'm usually very active this time of yr! So, stay tuned and thanks for looking!......

This native flower is a purple coneflower. It's also called echinacea and is used in herbal medicine

nice gardening , your space must be a nice place to medicate

^^^Thanks, I like to think so! I'm medicated a lot and my gardening is theraputic!!! When I had a Magic Flight Launch Box, I would go into my garden, sit on this bench pictured below and vape a trench! You can't see it in the pic but there's a really nice garden view from this bench!!.....I've been planting flowering trees lately - I've planted 12!! When these trees become mature, a show of summer color is for certain!! I'll be able to look all around my property and see flowers!

Update: 5/20/2012

So, I went on Craigslist yesterday and found an ad for Rabbit Manure - $10 per 25 lb bag. I went today and bought 4 bags!! I got a double size bag for free!! Easily 125+ lbs! I put it on this tarp to dry in the sun! Then I'll process it further. Since it's fresh, I'm going to compost it at least for several weeks before using!! Rabbit Manure is supposed to be some good shit!! I'm looking forward to seeing it work!!

Here's the pics!




Here's a close-up!

Looks nice..............

good idea ill have to check out craigslist someone is always trying to sell shit for money on there lol ya my garden really likes the manure tea a few of my plants prefer a fungal tea over the bacterial so im researching the different ways of creating the tea and times of brew i have a good receipt that most of them like thoe

yeah you can never have enough shit. except when you're up to your neck in it

^^^ LOL!,..... when ya got a lot of shit and it's fresh, you need to keep it further away from the House because of flies! I've got a couple dozen flies on my rabbit pile, at least! A few have gotten into my kitchen but they're dead already (fly swatter)

Update 5/23/12

I went onto Craigslist yesterday and saw an ad for an electric leaf shredder - I need one!! My other one is junk compared to this!...The model is a Flowtron Leaf Eater LE-900D. The asking price was $80. New, it costs between $160 and $199. I ended up paying $70 today cuz the lady accepted my offer!! The unit was briefly used and then put away. It's still pretty new! This thing basically has a weed-eater motor at the bottom that shreds leaves with plastic lines like the ones used in weed-eaters. I also got a bunch of pre-cut plastic weed-eater line included - enough to last a good while! You really need to wear mouth protection when this thing is shredding - leaf dust starts to fly around!!! There's a lever to adjust for course or fine shred. I'm really going to put this thing to work in the Fall....but for right now, I only had 1 stashed bag of leaves to test the unit with. Here's a few pics!!

Here's the shredder on it's own stand



And here it is sitting on top of a trash can



Here's the final product - this is the course cut!



And this breathing mask is really required! This one has a valve - these works much better with a valve!!

^^^outstanding way to put those unwantd leaves to work. leaf compost is great. you can put piles of shredded leaves directly onto flower and vegetable beds. or pile it up somewhere and let it sit for a summer. by autumn it will be beautiful and dark.

Craigslist has some awesome finds. I found somebody selling pigeon compost. (Guano AND feathermeal!) I would try it out if this wasn't my first grow with a new soil mx.

dannyboy602 said:

^^^outstanding way to put those unwantd leaves to work. leaf compost is great. you can put piles of shredded leaves directly onto flower and vegetable beds. or pile it up somewhere and let it sit for a summer. by autumn it will be beautiful and dark.

Click to expand...

I intend to put a whole bunch of leaves to work this fall! This shredder works effeciently enough to handle a few trash cans full of leaves in a short amount of time compared to the leaf blower/vacuum style shredder. Those things aren't designed to handle the heavy workload! I'm going to try to use the leaves in multiple composting projects. 1 will be just leaves, another will be leaves and rabbit manure another may be experimental with a variety of soil amendments added in small amounts! I'm thinking I may also apply the leaves right on my garden beds like you said! ......But that's a while away - this shredder is gonna sit in storage while I do my summer gardening! So, we'll meet another day, shredder....! LOL!

nice machine over there , i could really use one of those ,

Here's a video that shows the leaf shredder working + you can hear how it's a little loud! This thing operates at high RPM's!

[video=youtube;3ublASrvrnk]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ublASrvrnk[/video]

Fantastic garden journal. You need a bigger compost bin! Btw rabbit manure is considered a cool manure and can be used right away, but if it has allot of urine in it its a good idea to compost it some.

^^^ How's this for a bigger compost bin? This bin is outdoors and is specifically for leaves and grass clippings only! It's 8 feet wide, a little less than 3 feet deep and 3 1/2 feet tall. I made this myself with cedar wood & outdoor screws! Cedar is very resistant to rot and since I also put some water seal on it, this thing will last a long time! I need to get a stepping stone under each corner, cuz the weight is pushing the feet into the ground. I managed to get the worst one on the right up on a stone! - when this batch is finished I'm gonna have someone help me get the other 3 done!!

The bin is in a seldom used secton of my yard - behind the garage and under a tree



These leaves are whole and there's only a small amount of grass clipping since I started this in the Fall...next time, my shredder posted above wil make this project happen much faster! Shredded leaves compost much faster

I'd like to show you my compost bins and ask a few questions about yours if you don't mind?

^^^ Feel free to post any pics or other content in this thread! I'll try to answer any questions you have, too!

This is a 4 bin set-up but only 2 are built. Iv long been used whats in the picture (dated 1-29). It was lab tested upon finish with great numbers , best 10$ you can spend on a garden. I used wire mesh so the pile can breath and I can also stab holes in it to help with getting o2 to the bennies.
Each bin is 4x8x4 so 4.7 yard capacity in the beginning but eventually breaks down about 1/3. This mixture was oak leaves and horse manure with a little donkey manure.
My question about your bin was, whats the drainage? Do you cover it? What makes it just for leaves and grass clippings?

whodatnation said:

My question about your bin was, whats the drainage? Do you cover it? What makes it just for leaves and grass clippings?

Click to expand...

Awesome compost bin!!

The bin I built has a wooden bottom with some spaces between a few boards for drainage. I like to have my outdoor compost exposed to the elements. I don't cover mine because we get very little rain. Water will activate the pile. I'm only usnig leaves and grass clippings in this bin because of weight and ease of turning. This bin was originally going to be a big planter box but it really didn't end up being suited for that - so it's a compost bin instead