Garden Prep

I've been planning a garden behind the "old garage" (which is now my office) for many years. It used to be a part of the alley, but we enclosed this area with a fence some time back. Since then, we've been tossing all our tree branches, yard waste, and even had a bona fide compost pile back there at some point. Consequently, there were about 6 inches of compost covering this back space.

I found these crates at our Habitat Restore--they are simply 8 1x4 hinged together with metal brackets. The bottom is open, so they are perfect for beds. They can also be stacked, so I plan to stack them and cover with plexi glass this fall for cold frames.

A friend found these food-grade buckets at our recycling center, and I'm going to use the old double gate (on the left) and a piece of wire fencing (on the right) for climbing plants.

More buckets and crates on the right side of the back garden.

This area (above) is the east side of our house, next to our back porch. I think I'll make this my herb garden.

This area is where I had tomatoes in the tires last year--this year I'm moving the tires up and adding three more crate beds. This is probably the sunniest spot of all the gardens, and the tomatoes loved it here last year, so I suppose we'll do that again.

This was another tomato area last year, but this year I think I'll put mostly root veggies here. It's not raised, though there's a concrete divider. I'm going to use that old gate as another lattice for something or other. The area under the wheel barrow is a good size--we just need to fill it in a bit.

So, consider these the "before" pictures. I am looking forward to showing you the "afters" soon!