Specialty Gardening: raggedy beginning of a growpole garden, 4 by Jaywhacker

Jaywhacker wrote:
The trees in my cedar fenced area are beginning to shade out some of that area so I am moving some grow poles to my original deer proof garden area..........two large dog pens located on the sunny side of the property.

Picture #1 dogpen shows my old original verti-grow type grow poles which are now planted in strawberries and bush beans as of yesterday. The containers sitting around have some pole beans, bell peppers and eggplants recently planted.

Picture #2 and #3 is a view of EZgro type grow poles mounted in the second dog pen. There are some tomato's growing in 4 gal containers sitting in about 4 inches of dirt in that pen as well as some other plants growing in one gallon containers. I need to add more dirt untill I have about 6 inches of loose dirt in the bottom of the pen. If you partially bury a container in dirt, plants in those containers can send roots out thru the containers drain holes into the loose dirt. You can grow some relatively large plants in one gallon containers using this technique as the plants are getting some (maybe most) of their nutrients and moisture from the loose dirt around the container. And the plants are mobile, can be moved. During the dog days of summer when flowers and tomato's stop producing, I lift the containers, jerk the plants from the containers, whack off about half the roots and most of the top foliage, re-pot in fresh grow mix with some slow release fert pellets and set them in a shady (or dappled shade) area to re-cuperate. About the time the hotter days of summer are waning, they are pert and sassy and ready to go again and be set out in the loose dirt beds again.

Picture #4 is a close up of some poles with broccli, lettuce, various flowers, and some onions which are flowering that overwintered in the poles. All of these grow pole containers were removed from the back fenced yard to these dog pen's one at a time and re-stacked again in whatever order I decided on. Mobility in gardening is a definite advantage and as I mentioned before.........I am running out of sunshine in the backyard.