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Jan 10, 2011

Setting up a plastic wall for creating new planting beds

 As you know I had mentioned changing layout of planting beds in my garden, which is the biggest plan in my garden this year, today I will show you my plan. Look at the picture shown below. That is not painted by my kids but I drew the new layout with "Blackboard" application on my iPad. Actually I feel it so embarrassing to show my "work" since it looks so childish!!
 Anyway, yellow areas show planting beds and blue line shows plastic waved panel which works as a wall to bear and bolster soil. Could you see the plastic panel create extra planting beds?
 Today's mission is to set up the panel.

 Today I bought a roll of a 20meter-plastic waved panel and 15pegs with some hooks at a local home center. The panel costs $10 and pegs $8.00



 The peg is so functional for the price that you can see the hook can hold the panel and it can avoid waving and winding on the panel.



 I cut grooves 20cm deep and 10m long with my scoop to insert the panel. That was a tough job in a cold winter...



 After inserting the panel into the groove I pegged down the panel to bolster the panel with the pegs and that can secure the new planting bed.






Complition of setting up the panel




the panel from above


 I tried to create new beds along with the panel adding fertilizer, cow manure, rice bran.
But the amount of soil for new beds is less than I thought so I will have to add much soil.




 The new bed is narrow due to the shortage of soil.
But I'll remove soil from other beds for the new one and I believe I can deal with that.
Creating new soil bed with digging and removing soil in a cold temperature is so hard that I have backache!



-- from iPad

13 comments:

p3chandan said...

Thats a great idea Takaeko, now you have extra beds to plant and a good border to protect your soil on your old beds!

Mark Willis said...

Wow, that's a big task you have undertaken. I have the opposite problem to you - I have little space, but lots of compost! I make so much home-made compost (as well as buying some bags from the Garden Centre every now and then) that it hardly fits in the raised beds. I have actually been thinking of making the raised beds taller because of this - they are currently constructed of 15cm-tall wooden boards, and I may soon need to increase this to two boards (i.e. 30cm).

takaeko said...

>p3chandan
Well, my plan has not been completed yet but in the middle. I believe the extra beds will be where new vegetables will be planted in the near future!

>Mark
I envy you,Mark. Because a big amount of your compost means you can create much nutritious soil! If I were your neighbors, I would ask you for your compost!
My wife's aunt, our teacher in gardening, said soil is the most important factor in gardening. The problems I had in my garden shows less nutrition in soil so I will try to create much nutritious planting beds.

fer said...

Your new layout looks great. I wish i could do something like that, but for now i will have to settle with having a plastic bag over my pots.

takaeko said...

>fer
The new layout is the biggest plan in my garden this year and I will post it on your next blog carnival!

~TastyTravels~ said...

Wow! Looks like a great place to garden!

fer said...

I am sure you will make it great! best luck on your project!

Noel Morata said...

aloha

what a wonderful project, it looks fantastic


thanks for sharing that and showing us your garden today

Anonymous said...

Great how to post showing all the steps from beginning to end. Why don't you start composting at one end of the bed to create soil?

takaeko said...

>noel
Aloha, noel! I love Hawaii and I've been to Oahu, Kauai, and the Big island. Especially I love the scene from the top of Mauna Kea! I'll be happy to share ideas about gardening, foods and Hawaii.

>carolynsshadegardens.com
Yeah, composting is one of my options for making the soil more nutritious. I and my wife are seeking good ways of it.

ann said...

Really good idea for giving your garden structure. ann

Eliza @ Appalachian Feet said...

Wow, not only do you have goals but you're already so far along with them! I know the backache you're talking about -- you can only get one like that after a major garden project.

I wanted to invite you to participate in the blog carnival How to Find Great Plants. It has a slightly different system for submitting posts which is explained at this link:

http://www.appalachianfeet.com/how-to-find-great-plants/

If you don't have time to write a new post you can use one you've already written (such as your komatuna harvest one).

J.C. said...

It's great to see your plan for your garden bed being rolled out. Looking forward to see further development.