Can anybody reccommend a good bagged garden soil? I was considering miracle gro but seen bad reviews that it has alot of debris and dries out to fast. When i mix garden soil with topsoil is the ratio 50/50? Also, will i be able to reuse the soil every year?

What part of the state are you in?

Good question. You can get a full yard of it for around $25 three miles from my house.

However you can also get straight compost. I'd go with that if I were mixing it with top, like Payne did with his mushroom compost.

Im in ellis county

Are you mixing it in with a started garden or making raised bed?

I would be making a raised bed.

You need soil instead of straight compost.

Do you have or have access to a truck and/or trailer?

If so it will be cheaper and a better way to go with a top soil from your area. Do you have any nursery's that sell by bulk?

wait a second, are you in the country?

Yes we have couple of nurserys that sell soil. So i can use all topsoil in my raised bed? Do i need to mix it with anything else such as compost or peat moss?

Pretty much. Live on 80 acres

First time I would go with 70/30 split soil/compost.

Not to be nosy BUT why not a garden?

I dont have a tiller and dont want to spend a few hundred bucks on one. I plan on it in the future. I just dont know what my soil is like.

You can get a soil test from A&M for 17$. Much better than the store bought tests.

Anyways back to this year,

How big is your raised bed going to be?

What are you going to plant?

There's a link in this thread that would probably answer all of your questions.

http://www.texashuntingforum.com/forum/u...ion#Post4110118

I plan on a 10x4 to start out. Maybe some collards, peppers, tomatoes and green beans. How many plants of each to feed two people and maybe can some also?

Here's K.P.'s link, some good info

Garden Planner

Here is what I did when I first put my raised beds in....

Supposed to get down to 38 in Dallas, wind is going to start blowing about midnight, wind chills in the upper 20's. I covered everything up.

I guess the good thing about everything in containers is that I got it all moved into the garage for the cold

Thanks for the heads up, Kevin.

So since it was raining today I figured I'd spend some time in the garage and realized my grow light was getting crowded so I went and picked up another shop light and rigged up this frame to move my larger plants to. Then since its going to get colder the next few nights I thought I might make a sudo green house type thing by wrapping a garbage bag around the frame. I actually works! It's about 10-12 degrees warmer with the trash bag set up. Once I was finished with the grow light set up I noticed some boards lying around and instead of putting them away I thought I might make another set of raised beds. That's about it for tonight.

FREEZE warning for Dallas tonight.

Genius


Wind has been gusting all day suppose to get in the mid-thirties tonight, hoping for the best.

There was always something great about the first bale of cotton, when I was growing up in Arkansas. It was always like a carnival. Lots of free stuff.

It's the same in my subdivision about the first ripe tomatoes. I went out and dug up four of mine, covered the rest, as well as some of my peppers. There was a lull in the wind as I placed the plastic pots over my tomatoes. The pots have now blown all over my yard. I am soon headed back out to put them back over the plants. Hope for another lull.

Mine did the same thing, Bill. I had to put bricks on top of the pots to hold them in place.