Raised beds

[recurve shooter]

one of my grandpas grows tomatoes, mellons, greens, turnips, blue berrys, black berrys, oranges, satsumas, ect. along with raising worms, quails, and rabbits. so he uses worm castings, quail and rabit poo for his, and by the end of the growing season he invites people over for coffee just so he can weasle them into takeing some of it off his hands so he dont have to plow everything under lol, so it must work. 

[Justin Snyder]

I am currently setting up an aquaponics tank. It works like hydroponics, but the vegtables float on the water, and you put talapia or some other fish in the tank to provide circulation and nutrient, and you can eat the fish.

[aero86]

oh, awesome thread.  i just built a little raise bed out of some scrap would from my girlfriends work.  im gonna try not to kill these strawberries

[Badger]

Justin, do the plants rood right in the water? I have always been curious about this. Tilapia are facinating fish when viewed as a farm raised fish. Fertilizer run off from farms creates massive algae in creeks and the Tilapia thrive on the algae. They basicaly convert sunlight to protein. In 1982 I was drawing up plans for a tilapia farm in Imperial valley, which is a desert farming valley that uses water from the Colorado river.  All the canals and irrigation ditches are loaded with tilapia. In 1984 I sent a paper off to the dept of agriculure on this, in 1990 six years later I got a letter from chiquita bannana company asking me if I would be interested in interviewing for a job with them they were going to use ground up bannana peels to feed Tilapia in the imperial valley on a super modern temp controlled fish farm. I think they were successful with this but never really followed up. I always wondered if my paper was any influence on this farm. Steve

[Justin Snyder]

There are several types of system. You can use styrofoam to float plants like lettuce or use grow medium and pump the water like a hydroponic system. As Im sure you know, talatia grow from egg to full size in 10 months so it makes quick protien.

[mullet]

 How big is Full size, Justin. Ours in the wild get up to 1-5#. Ten months is pretty fast.

[DanaM]

Unreal weather here in the UP, mid march and temps are in the mid 60's. Been doing spring cleanup every evening
cleaned the garden up tonight so just for kicks I planted a few collard seeds, curious to see if they will grow this early
nights are still cold. Usually I plant the cold hardy stuff, like carrots, peas and cabbage etc in April with the stuff like cukes, peppers and tonatoes well into May

[mullet]

 They should be alright, Dana. Usually the Mustard green seeds do good early.

[Grunt]

Up here at 3500 ft in the NC mountains it's all about soil temperature. 

That sounds funny to me. We consider anything under 6000 a low elevation.

Yeah, I spent two winters skiing Aspen Mountain and two summers working on a ranch along the Frying Pan river at 7000 ft. I  also spent a cold January in Leadville at 10,000 ft.  It snowed on the 4th of July in Aspen and I had to use short growing season vegetables in my garden. Mountains around here in NC are more gentle and forgiving.

[mullet]

 Grunt, where'd you live in Colo? I lived a year in Glenwood Springs and the first time I snow skied was Aspen Mountain. And then Snowmass and Sunlight. I spent a lot of time up in Rock Springs, Wyo in the crazy days of the late 70's.

[Bullitt]

Gotta say, I've never peeked in here, till now! Raised Beds, Gardening, see, we do have something in common!

As for raised beds, my neighbor and classmate's wife, was an extension officer and Purdue grauate! Raised beds were here specialty! She Liked horse manure! Hoping to get out there this week if it stays dry. Radishes, onions, sweet peas, and beets, Oh yeah!

[Grunt]

Grunt, where'd you live in Colo? I lived a year in Glenwood Springs and the first time I snow skied was Aspen Mountain. And then Snowmass and Sunlight. I spent a lot of time up in Rock Springs, Wyo in the crazy days of the late 70's.


Mullet,I lived in Basalt, down the valley from Aspen. I was there in the late 70's also. The sure were crazy days. Pounding the moguls by day and chasing the ski bunnys at night. Plenty of mind alterating substances.

[Timo]

Still rainy here.Temp seems to like hanging around 40degreesNot the best drying out weather. Got a couple days of sun coming,then snow forecast again over the weekend.

One of the toughest,wettest winters I have ever endured. Oh well, Spring will get here sometime?

Good reading about everyone's ways of doing/growing, stuff. keep them coming.

[Eric Krewson]

Here is my raised bed, 19'x60', added at least 6000 pounds of composted horse poop to it so far. I can get a ton loaded for $15 near my home by a guy who has 300 miniature horses.

Lots of weed seeds in composted manure, the black plastic keeps the weeds out.

This is an early in the year shot when everything is still small.



Everything grows together later. Here is one cucumber plant, only one.

[Justin Snyder]

How big is Full size, Justin. Ours in the wild get up to 1-5#. Ten months is pretty fast.

1.25 to 1.5 pounds, water temp effects it. Hybrid tilapia can get to 2.2 # in 36 weeks.