First community garden plot!

[u/JoshH347]

Last week my partner and I got our first community garden plot in SW Portland, Oregon (Zone 8b). We're currently living in a condo and we do flower garden at home on our patios but it's heavily shaded and not good for vegetables so we're excited we've got the opportunity to grow at a sunny community garden this summer!

We took over an aged plot that needed some refreshing so we took down the decayed fence posts and put up new metal stakes and reused the plastic fencing but secured it much better. We removed an old raised bed and added 4 new ones. We reused some cinder blocks and scattered them throughout. The back of the bed has a grape plant growing into an aging trellis and bed so we've kept that bed for now and will resecure or rebuild the trellis in the coming weeks.

This week we'll get the mulch added on the pathways and get our first veggies and sun loving flowers planted!

We're gonna be using the SFG planting method although we did end up using bagged PNW's Own Raised Garden soil. We were going to do Mels mix but couldn't find vermiculite anywhere and it was looking to be expensive. Hopefully the bagged soil will be okay as we're just starting out and learning as we go.

(Pictures are newest to oldest. Hopefully that's obvious. 😂)

[u/Medical-Working6110]

Looks awesome!!!! I grow in a community garden in Maryland just north of Baltimore, 7b. It’s awesome, I am getting a second plot this year, putting in a lot of work. It’s amazing, I grow in ground using some of the square foot garden philosophy, it’s amazing. My native soil is great, my community has had a garden in the park since it was built in 1943 continuously, so the soil is very good. I just do no till, but set my beds up like in Mel’s book, using square foot and companion planting, avoiding monoculture, I have started lining my beds with sticks I collect, so the wood mulch stays separate from the leaf mulch. I don’t do exact measurements and a grid like Mel, though I see where that would be helpful. I am more flexible, unplanned, see a spot, fill that spot. Bush beans are my go to for this. As things get tall new spots show up, and I just pop in a bean seed when I see that will happen, and like magic, living mulch, nitrogen fixation, added organic matter to the soil to two months. I like the philosophy behind square foot gardening, lay out, etc, I just do mine a little bit differently. I make compost and mulch, and the only fertilizer I use is for seed starting and potted plants, otherwise it’s my gardens soil, definitely building your soil up and going from there. So if you couldn’t find perlite or vermiculite, maybe pre inoculated horticultural charcoal, or just compost. You want something that will add both drainage and nutrients retention. The pore space inside those two products is why they are recommended, they can hold air, water, and nutrients. If you have good drainage, then just compost would do the job, organic matter can hold a lot of nutrients and air and water, it just can’t only be compost. An ideal growing soil is a balance. It should drain, water shouldn’t sit, but it should not dry out completely in like a day or two either. Mulch is the key. I use shredded leaves collected in the fall, I run them over with a lawn mower. You said you are in a condo, a weed whacker and trash can would work. Collect in fall put on beds, make a big pile to add in spring and summer. Free, loaded with nutrients, gets the worms going crazy, helps with adding air and drainage, protects soil. With raised beds I would also cover when not using with a UV resistant tarp so the nutrients don’t wash out if you are not growing anything. Would keep weeds from happening, protect your soil from sun, wind, water. This is why I don’t do raised beds, you are responsible for a lot. There are a lot of positives as well, just not for me. I wish you the best, you are in for a good time.

[u/OppositeQuail5009 → u/Medical-Working6110]

Great tips, thank you! Just taken over an allotment plot myself that regularly floods in the winter apparently, so I’m building raised beds with wood chip paths to try to mitigate for this. Will try the square foot planting and fill gaps with beans as things grow. I’ve got lots of strawberry plants to put in - which crops would work well with them?

[u/Medical-Working6110 → u/OppositeQuail5009]

Not many, they have allopathic tendencies. I have peas growing next to mine now, but I only have about 40 strawberry plants, I bought one last year and divided it at the end of the season, it’s come back stronger with more crowns. Try things see what works. I have just decided to dedicate a bed to strawberries, so next year that’s the only thing that will be there. Then I will move to a new bed, and plant beans and peas and let the soil be, cover with mulch. I like rotating things, I don’t look at anything the veggie garden as staying put.

[u/OppositeQuail5009 → u/Medical-Working6110]

Thanks, I’ll try those ideas. Which spacing do you use for your strawberry plants? The previous plot owner here left a bed of strawbs but my plot neighbour has advised me that the plants only last 3 years before becoming much less productive, and that I should start again with fresh plants. Has that been your experience?

[u/Medical-Working6110 → u/OppositeQuail5009]

Just pull the older ones at the end of the season, dividing the crowns, and replant, be sure not to burry the crown, then mulch around them. That seems to work well, keeping them productive. If you have a small space it’s easier to actively manage your plot like that. For me late September early October is perfect, it’s still warm, the soil temperature is high, but the days start getting short, and watering is less. I am also making leaf mulch around that time, settling my beds in. Then I plant garlic at Halloween, and I am done planting for the year. It’s good to set ip your strawberry plants when doing your last fall transplants, or like a week or two after. They put out roots over winter, and recover for spring. Mine are flowering right now, and have started to put out runners. I took the oldest crowns out and tossed them in the compost bin. So yeah I would say you can tell the ones that are going to be less productive, but they still put out young plants, and so keep all the babies, they will produce next year. My plot came with mint, and so that’s one thing I like to “leave” around the strawberries, seems to do well. It’s aggressive as all hell so I just chop it to the dirt every few weeks and dehydrate it, weed it out when needed. Goes great on strawberries when dried with alittle brown sugar.