pkrantz's Iowa Square Foot garden

I enjoy growing perennials, annuals, and, especially, vegetables. I hate doing the same thing twice, so my square foot vegetable garden has evolved over the years. Originally composed of 4 4×4s (4×4-feet), my garden has morphed through 2×4s and 2×8s to the current configuration of 2 2×8s, 2 2×4s, and 4 new homemade self-watering planters, each the equivalent of a 1×2.

The big experiment this year are the self-watering planters, modeled vaguely after the Earth Box. So far, so good. We’ll see how they perform in the hot weather to come.

I’m not an organic gardener, per se, but I try to avoid chemical pest controls. Heck, I’m too lazy to use any pest controls other than a critter fence. I use the cheapest 10-10-10 or 12-12-12 fertilizer I can, and started adding dolomite lime this year to control the acidity in the beds. (My soil mix is roughly 1/3 peat moss, 1/3 vermiculite, and 1/3 homemade compost.