Has anyone ever tried growing Vegetables and plants this way?

[Marilyn beaucariche]

Growing your own vegetables in a confined space.

I have a large garden, so space is not a problem for me. However recently I gave a friend a few of my vegetables to try.

She was totally won over,after her shop bought, vegetables meant, trying to cut brown edges off cauliflowers, eat wilted spinach, fight peeling spongy potatoes. She had come to the decision that, whatever was left in terms of vitamins, once she had cooked them, possibly wasn' t worth the bother.

I came up with an idea. She really only needs vegetables for herself and her partner, so a large garden just wasn't necessary.

We proccurred large cardboard boxes from the supermarket, and a variety of other shops, that had superfluous amounts of these.

Starting with one of the longer and more shallow boxes we filled them 1/2 way with garden topsoil, purchasable in 10kg bags, from a variety of stores, and Garden centres, followed by a light fertilizer layer, and then topped up with pea straw.

It is pertinent to say at this point, we did not need a whole bale of pea straw, but could not find it in smaller lots.

Lettuces were planted into the same mix in another boxes, in the centre of each box a tomato plant was placed. We used cocktail red tomatoes, that produce an abundant crop, in one and a larger tomatoe in the other.

(You will need to stake the tomato plants)

The next box was filled the same, and broccolli was planted in much the same way,

Two smaller boxes were filled with the same dirt mixture, and carrot seed was planted in one. The other was planted out with spring onions. Another box was planted in oregano, basil, rocket, thyme, and sage.

After planting, water,but remember not to overdo it.

To protect plants from caterpillars and butterfly larvae use Derris Dust.remembering not to harvest until one day after application.

Potatoes would grow well in a cardboard box, you would need a tall type of box as potatoes need topping up with more straw and dirt as they grow. Never overwater potatoes.

[Megan]

hello Marilyn, I have done something similar in polystyrene boxes, didn't use cardboard as they're resting on gravel and need to be able to relocate them eventually (cardboard would break down). Poked lots of drainage holes along the bottom and sides & emptied the contents of a couple of bokashi buckets into the bottom,  a layer of garden soil, worms & castings from my worm farm, more garden soil and planted loads of garlic bulbils on top. I debated whether to put the worms in the bottom layer but was concerned that the bokashi bin contents might be a little too acidic for them and figured that the entire box is not much deeper than one of the bins in my worm farm so they ought to be able to find their way into the waste once the balance is right for them.  Haven't dug down to check if the worms are still there, will have to wait until the end of summer when I harvest the garlic. With any luck I'll have some great vermicast as well as the garlic :D