I didn't ask the gardener to plant the vegetables!

I'm sure I can do things more cheaply but planting seeds and leaving
grow lights on isn't free here on Long Island either. I am sorry that
I didn't rototill the soil. That's the only real big mistke I made
but I just didn't have time then. I suspect next year will be a
better year for growing.

I planted way too many tomatoes, maybe 20 plants, maybe even a few
more. I also planted a little too close together. I had no time to
plan this and if I relied on planning I bet I would not have done it.
I had to just go in and do something quick, get an Ok yield and plan
it out for next year. A good indication of how unprepared the soil
is, can be seen by looking at how hard it was to put in the tomato
cages. It was impossible to get those prongs in the ground.

Here, there are no landfills and no place to get mulch, other than
from Home Depot or nurseries.

At the end of this season, what do you do with your wood chips? Do
you rototill again?

On 15 Jun 2005 16:22:30 -0700, "simy1" wrote:

good golly, you will have to learn to do things more cheaply. a
gardener? bags of mulch from the store? Miracle Gro?

as for the wood chips (which anybody in the world gets for free), at
the end of the season they are still wood chips. Depending on their
size, it takes them two to four years to fully become soil. Meanwhile,
you have very few weeds but can not plant from seeds (if you plant
plants, you do not care). My front beds, which got one foot eight years
ago, have established perennials that quickly suffocate the weeds. They
only need one light weeding a year, and even that would be a lot
lighter if my hickories did not drop nuts in there. Veggie beds
typically have a three year respite from weeds when woodchipped.