Another 100 Pounds of Potential

In order to squeeze every last ounce of space out of the front yard, Roland constructed a short dry stone wall next to the driveway. This wall levels out a sloped area and allows another bed to go in. The dirt fill came with the stones when they were dumped off. The stones were left overs from a job site and delivered by our personal excavator, Dr. Dirt. Being the scrounge that Roland is, he naturally found a use for them.

Roland raided his wood stash and built another 4x8 foot bed 3 feet from the existing bed to the north. The wide clearance allows things like wheel barrels and big butts to pass through that isle to access the hypothetical garden tool shed and composting area. Actually the tool shed is in progress and awaits the roof to get finished and is being used for tools: saws, nail guns, routers.....but that's another story.

Since we had more than enough soil in the parking strip, I raided around 9 wheel barrels full from there and filled the bed. This new bed adds approximately 32 sq. feet to our planting area. If I follow an intensive planting plan, theoretically this bed should yield around 100 pounds of carrots. Not that I want to grow 100 pounds of carrots. I rely on tanning bronzers to turn my skin orange.

After constructing the bed, Roland topped it with the typical cat proofing grid/row guide to keep the little monsters from thinking that we built it for them. I'm sure Mamah will have something to say about it, anyway. Anyone who owns cats knows that everything in the house and in the yard belongs to them, whether they really want it or not. And if they can't have something, it really belongs to them.

The bed will need some compost and fertilizer to finish it off for spring planting, but being the patient person that I am, I christened it with a rogue kale start plucked out of the carrot patch.

As you can see, it's thriving.