SteemDreamPayFwd: Mini Georgian Homestead

(help us avoid compost gardening next year!!)

You can see the Contest and the rules HERE https://steemit.com/steemdreampayfwd/@greenacrehome/the-steem-dream-and-paying-it-forward-proposal-and-official-rules

Our next homestead project isn’t very interesting but it is vital to our dream of producing our food. This last year we put up a temporary garden area. We were short on funds we only had one fenced in area to put our garden and this area is surrounded by trees. We thought it would help protect the garden from some of the South Georgia heat but I believe this is why our garden hasn’t produced anything. It’s either not enough sun or the soil is too poor. Our hope is to solve both problems with our next project.

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We have decided to start on our permanent garden area sooner than we thought. There is an area in our front yard that we would like to fence in to use next spring. If we can get this done now we will have about 8 months to layer the area with organic matter and hopefully this will be enough to produce a decent garden next year.

After the area is fenced in using t posts and wire field fencing we are going to use it as a temporary rabbit colony. We will keep them there for a number of months allowing them to eat all of the grass and weeds down to the ground, hopefully killing everything so that we do not have to put down a barrier of some sort later. Not only does this enable us to avoid the work of killing the grass but we are using it as a trial period for meat rabbits. If we decide we like them we will spend the money on a permanent colony set up.

Once we move the rabbits to their permanent enclosure we will apply any organic matter we can get our hands on. Grass clippings, leaves, our compost, used duck water and wood chips. We will also continue to apply rabbit manure that we gather from the colony. This will be left to break down over the winter.

Our hope is that this is enough to build our soil quickly so that we will be able to get some produce out of our garden next year. It may be a little early for most people to be thinking about next year’s garden but we definitely waited too long this last year to get everything set up.

The space will be 80 feet by 50 feet equaling 4,000 sq ft. We are hoping this will meet all of our gardening needs as our family grows. In case it does not the fencing material allows the size easily changed.

What we will need:

T-Posts (14) 3.75= 52.50 (tractor supply)
Field Fencing (330ft roll) $154.99 (tractor supply)
Hardcloth cloth (100 ft roll) 49.99 x 3=150 (home depot)
-to keep the rabbits in
2 Wooden posts (2) $7.98 (home depot)
Fence Gate
2 Hinges
Lock
Buckets (4) $3.99 (tractor supply)
-rabbit shelter
Bucket Lid $1.99 (tractor supply)

Rough total cost $420

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Boy is that an expensive garden! I’m sure you guys are wondering what two people plan to do with 4000 sq ft of garden!! Here’s a list of plants we plan to grow at some point. We will not be growing all of these next year, that would be overwhelming but we do plan to try a number of them.

Spring Garden

Cucumber (2 varieties), Achocha Cucumber, Lemon Cucumber, Tomatoes, Peas, Green Beans, Lettuce, Luffa, Garlic, Zucchini, Gourd, Bell pepper, Jalapeno, Cayenne pepper, Serrano pepper, Garlic, Peanuts, Pinto Beans, Chickpea, Kidney Beans, Navy Beans, Carrot, Ginger, Turmeric, Strawberry, Pineberry, Cantaloupe, Watermelon, Pumpkin (2 varieties) , Corn (popcorn and regular), sunflower, and broccoli.

Fall Garden

Arugula, Broccoli, Carrots, Celery, Kale, Lettuce, White Onion, Red Onion, Peas, Potatoes, Radishes and Spinach

(these are the seeds we already have! We actually did a post about what a deal these were. We have not decided varieties for the watermelon, lettuce, carrots or radishes so tell us what you like! Remember we are in zone 8)

I hope you guys stick around to see how this project turns out!

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