I am not in the habit of giving up, but I think I've sunk enough sweat, tears and money into my allotment garden with little to show in return. This was the first year with the plot. I thought I did everything right, amended the soil well, weeded like a madwomen. But either I am doing things wrong or am unlucky
The good news: my lettuce, mustard greens and onions are thriving. Peas & soybeans seem to be on track. Squash and cabbage are much fewer than I seeded but oh well.
The bad news: About 1/3 of my seeds did not germinate. The weeds are in the 10000s..seriously. I weed for hours each day but it's not enough. I mulched with straw but it seems to have done nothing. I just can't keep up with the weeds, and my back can't take any more, so today I put down landscape fabric in a feeble attempt to smother the weeds. I should have put it down at the beginning, had I realized that straw mulch would be useless. I honestly don't know how my plot neighbors do it.
Between the seeds, plot fee, tools, compost, some fertilizer (most was DIY), mulch and other items, I've invested at least $500 into this garden and likely it would cost about that each summer. I expect to get about $100 in produce. Although I am sure it will taste yummy, it's really not a good return, effort-wise or $. I cannot see spending this much time every summer, and yet continuing to work full-time, volunteer and do the regular household stuff. I feel like I am watering more weeds than veggies. It's not just the time, but also that I am physically exhausted afterwards for hours..
I have decided to still water and weed, and harvest whatever I can from what is growing well, but I am not spending any more time improving the soil or doing much weeding. I will surrender the plot in the fall. The reason I got a plot is that my backyard gets little sunlight. However maybe next year I will try vertical gardening in pots, set on the edge of my yard where there is a bit more sun.
HopeImReady
"The thing about smart mother f*ckers, is that they sometimes sound like crazy mother f*ckers to dumb mother f*ckers." -Abraham .”
its been a hard year in regards to getting seeds to start in ground, combo of dry, heat and pest pressure has produced a great issue with seed germination.. so you are on par this year.. in some cases I am on my third or fourth seeding of things, and or I had to start more things in seed pots and transfer them at a started stage..
as for straw mulch, it does work but it need to be thick and a chip-chunk.. and a min of three to four inches thick, six inches is better, broken, and fluffed straw helps hold water but will not hold down weeds.
sounds like you did a good job on the soil fertility, the weeds growth proves that.. my big question would be a) how many of those weeds can you be eating? as a food crop.. and b) if sore back, you can choose to stand up and get a hoe at correct height and cut and drop mulch them in place.
and yup.. for sure the gardens are tiring, they work muscles we did not even know we had etc.. every winter I swear I will try to stay in better shape and each garden season, I have to build back up again.
sounds like to been a very hard learning curve for you.. best ofluck on the rest of the season.. this drought year has put me behind in some ways, I expect it will drop ,e yield between a thousand to two thousands pounds this year in my garden returns, but only time will give me my answers
http://livingmydreamlifeonthefarm.wordpress.com/
Thanks, farmgal 🙂
I did the straw mulch about 4-5 inches thick. I am using a long-handled cultivator for much of the weeding right around the crops, and that is working well. However, it is the weeds between the rows that I cannot really dig out - at this point I would need to shovel to rototill them out.
For edible weeds, I have been bringing home lambs quarters to eat - but I can only stomach so much of it. The rest is crabgrass, thistle and other non-edible weeds. There are dandelions and plantain, which I know are edible, but I do not like the taste, so unless/until the SHFT, I will forego them 😉
HopeImReady
"The thing about smart mother f*ckers, is that they sometimes sound like crazy mother f*ckers to dumb mother f*ckers." -Abraham .”
Smart, absolutely quit...that's a Labour, a demand of your time you don't need, and your experience is very typical. When you decide to try again, look at what this member did http://internationalpreppersnetwork.net/viewtopic.php?f=46&t=5935
And start with store bought soil to get your self started weed free, I Just bought some for the raised gardens I am building, cause they were blowing it out at 1.50 per bag at the lumber yard. No clay at all in it so you never need a rotor tiller, you can work it with hand tools, weeds when one gets in just pulls out easy...And the poor weeds don't really stand a chance in a raised garden, look at the barrel of carrots, there is no room for weeds at all,
and automate it a bit so you can go away, take a vacation, or forget it for a few days.
This is my favorate waterer control, runs on a 9 volt battery, its a older one with a couple knobs you set, newer ones are push button.
maybe cost me all of 5 dollars from the restore.
Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.
Last year I tried an experiment in part of my gardens: which worked best for keeping the weeds down.
1. Newspaper/cardboard around the plants covered with mulch (ie grass clippings/leaves)
2. Seaweed spread around the plants and every spot where there weren't any plants (luckily I live along a river)
3. shredded comfrey (I have tons!)
4. hand weeding
And the winner is: Seaweed! It's still keeping weeds at bay a year later. Newspaper-mulch covered worked almost as well but I found that the mulch blew away during the winter leaving the newspaper to follow.... I put sticks/branches on top to keep this from happening again.
I wish I had a seaweed source 🙂
According to this, I have rich soil (groundsel & lamb's quarters): http://www.almanac.com/blog/gardening/gardening/weeds-indicator-plants
I may give it another year but only cultivate part of the lot, and heavily mulch the rest of the lot...
HopeImReady
"The thing about smart mother f*ckers, is that they sometimes sound like crazy mother f*ckers to dumb mother f*ckers." -Abraham .”