Zeldahoffenheimer’s Weblog

April 3, 2008

55 Gallon Drum Planter

If you look closely, you will see that this is one 55 gallon barrel on the bottom.  Part of it has been spray painted silver with a “plastic” spray paint.  If I am going to fill my yard with white barrels and pieces of white barrels, I don’t want it to look like my yard is full of white barrels! 

On top of that barrel is the bottom third of another barrel.  I haven’t decided if I want to make a SWC out of this or just drill drainage on the bottom and sides.  I was thinking this would be a neat eye level container for low maintenance things like carrots, onions, or herbs, that would add interest and height to the rain barrel area.

I plan on having 3 barrels right here, connected by hoses, raised on cinder blocks, with the overflow of the main barrel aimed at the raspberry bed.  What do you think?

I am also dreaming of a strawberry bed made of – what else – barrels, as well as a compost tumbler and, in deference to Tom’s new “special interest”, chicken nesting boxes.  That last one is also waiting for me to design a chicken tractor to go along with it which will be portable and maneuverable to put over the “conventional” raised beds that we have.

February 6, 2008

Path to Freedom (and Worms)

Filed under: chickens, fruit trees, growing things, worms — zeldahoffenheimer @ 2:01 pm

We want to be like these guys www.pathtofreedom.com .  They have taken a 1/5 of an acre in Southern CA and turned it into a very “green” paradise.  The are closing in on 10k pounds of food produced on their property per year.

Even though we moved into our current home with the idea that we would outgrow it and move eventually, it has now dawned on us that we could do so much more with the land and house.  To that end, we are planting fruit trees, a more diverse crop of things that we will actually eat, and want to learn stuff like cheesemaking.

Are we going “Little House on the Prairie?”  Maybe.  Tom wants chickens too.  We’ll see on that.  It just makes sense to grow as much as we can, store as much as we can, etc.  We will reduce the mileage to our door (and tummies).  I am looking into worms.  Yes, worms.  It seems that they eat garbage and provide great fertilizer.

We have so many great ideas, I hope we can pull some of this off and the weather cooperates.

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