Need Gardening Help

[Sapphire Silk]

I spent most of the day today doing yard work.

I have two flower boxes in my backyard that came with the house. One grows tomatoes (I've got to clean it out and prep it for a new crop).

The other had some flowers I couldn't identify, and some mint plants. The flowers died. The mint is doing great.

I've cleaned out all the weeds, but I'm trying to figure out how to prepare the box for some new plants. I freely admit, I suck as a gardener.

Should I put some weed killer in the box to clear out the old weeds that are starting to grow back? Should I replenish the soil?

What kind of plant food should I use, if any?

I'm thinking I'd like to keep the mint, and add in some flowers, a mix maybe of perennials and annuals. I honestly don't know what yet . . . I figure whatever looks pretty at the Orange Apron.

[ArcticChicken]

If I recall correctly, mint is an aggressive little bastard, you're going to have to work pretty hard to keep anything else in the same box.

You don't need to put weed killer in the other box, you can just go in and get out the root systems. If you really can't get all of them out, you can change the soil.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

No on the weed killer. It will kill more than the weeds.

Just empty out the old soil and put new in. You can buy a bag of potting mix for container gardening and just put that in there.

If you want to keep the mint, you won't hurt it by digging it up, replacing the soil in the planters, and then simply replanting the mint in the new mix. Mint is tough. Sometimes, it's too tough.

You always want to freshen up the soil in containers every season, as it will be full of unwanted seeds (as you are seeing), possible harmful pests or diseases, and be depleted of nutrients. Even if you plant perennials in there, you will want to add at least some new topsoil every year.

How big are these boxes? I'm picturing smaller ones. If you mean larger ones, use a hoe or shovel to yank out and dig out the old root layer. If a bag of pre mixed soil is not practical, buy yourself a bag of peat moss and a bag of composted manure and mix that into the existing soil to enrich it. The moldy rotten leaves under a leaf pile are also awesome to use.

[Frantic Freddie]

What RK said.

Here's something I do every year: my neighbors have horses,so I'll take a couple of 5 gallon buckets over & get some horseshit,maybe 1/4-1/3 of the bucket full.Fill the bucket up with water & let it set a few days 'til the water's nice & green,then use that to water my trees & garden.The leftover horseshit goes in the compost pile.
It doesn't hurt to use the shit directly but you end up with hay growing wherever you put it (don't ask me how I know this),this way you get the nutrients in the water & the heat of the compost pile kills the seeds.

[Sapphire Silk]

Thanks for the suggestions, guys. They're a big help.

The boxes are about six feet long, but only8-10 inches wide. I can get the soil broken up with a pickaxe, and out with a spade without too much trouble. I broke up the soil last year for planting, but didn't change it out. That's what I'll do this year.

It's going to be a lot of soil though. Should I just use it to make a compost pile? I don't want to put it with the yard waste . . . it's going to be a fair amount of dirt.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

You can, the heat from the pile should kill off anything you don't want.

[Der Cute]

And last year in my containers, I had a habit of poking/aerating the soil..took a shishkabob stick and would poke holes occasionally, to help the dirt breathe.

One time I took an earthworm to a large pot and threw him in there. He liked it.

[protege]

If I recall correctly, mint is an aggressive little bastard, you're going to have to work pretty hard to keep anything else in the same box.

Yep, mint and catnip, will spread all over the place. Plus, it grows like a bitch too--it doesn't take long for half-inch-high plants to turn into 12-inch-plus-tall bushes. Great to use as ground cover, since it'll grow nearly anywhere. But, I wouldn't want to put it in a flower garden--eventually, it'll block out the other plants. Right now, I'm in a similar state with the yard. So far, I've found that coreopsis flowers, along with blue geraniums, seem to be the best for my gardens.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Aaaah....coreopsis. One of my favorites. The color! And with blue. That sounds georgeous.

[Mishi]

It doesn't hurt to use the shit directly but you end up with hay growing wherever you put it (don't ask me how I know this),this way you get the nutrients in the water & the heat of the compost pile kills the seeds.

I fixed that problem by putting a 3-4 inch layer of sugarcane mulch over the manure. The manure broke down in 3 weeks, and for those that find the smell of horse shit offensive, the sugarcane mulch stops the smell completely. The good thing about the plants that grow from it is that you can use them to boost the soil by treating them as a green maure crop and digging them in just before they go to seed.

[Sarlon]

anyone wanna throw their 2 cents in in reguards to a small problem I have in my yard?

I've deceieded this year will be entirely the front yard (full shade till almost 1pm in summer facing west).

I pulled up a very BADLY done cinderblock path way that was horrible in the front area between the street and the city sidewalk, and have doing my dangdest to fill in the holes left behind. Everything from clippings from where I edged the path leading to the house, and dirt knocked loose from the cinderblocks.

The other problem there is there used to be a HUGE old tree that we got ripped out by the city (deader then dead, and tearing up the sidewalk). So there is that hole too.

Now I realize that thats TECHNICALLY city property, but if I sat around waiting for them to fix it the world will of ended. (still waiting for them to fix a pothole in the alley behind the house connected to the parking area).

The yard is badly in need of work, it having been a rental property for many many years before we bought it and gave one side to live in and the other to rent out.

I'll post some pictures later tomorrow to give a better idea what I'm talking about.

The biggest suggestions I need are for filling in that hole and any advice on helping level that area.

[Sapphire Silk]

I pulled up a very BADLY done cinderblock path way that was horrible in the front area between the street and the city sidewalk, and have doing my dangdest to fill in the holes left behind. Everything from clippings from where I edged the path leading to the house, and dirt knocked loose from the cinderblocks.

The other problem there is there used to be a HUGE old tree that we got ripped out by the city (deader then dead, and tearing up the sidewalk). So there is that hole too.

I had a similar problem when I bought my house. The water pipe started to leak right near where it connected to the city line . . . so it was my problem to fix, not the city's. I had to pay a plumber to dig it up and fix it. All my neighbors had had problems with their lines (bad choice of pipe product when the neighborhood was built) so I listened to their advice and replaced the entire line from the street to the house.

Problem was, it cut length wise across the front lawn from the driveway to the opposite side of the house. When the plumbers filled everything in, I still had a trench, and a hole around the manhole access to the water turnoff.

EE had bought dirt from the city to do some landscaping in her yard, and had a lot left over. She gave it to me, and I used it to fill in the trench, then tapped it down with a rake to compact it. There was just enough to do the job.

Check with the city or the county; you may be able to buy dirt in large quantities for a lot less than at the Orange Apron, and you don't really need topsoil. Then throw some hay on top of it, and some grass seed, and water it. It should fill in nicely. You can still see part of the trench behind the big hickory tree in my yard (not visible from the street, thankfully), but the rest filled in nicely and you can hardly see it now.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

If you are planning on planting over it do NOT, I repeat DO NOT fill with cinderblock, brick pieces, or any other urban debris. The rubble will leach alkaline and other crap, and will make planting anything over it a frustrating affair.

This is why you should take special care to make sure builders don't bury stuff like that in your yard when they're building. It will negate any chance of a beautiful lawn.

My lawn is shit. Guess what I'm constantly digging out of my yard?

I don't know what to tell you other than get a landscaping company to bring you a truckload of dirt (if you need that much). Maybe yard debris like branches or leaves, but that will probably not be the best thing to use as that stuff rots down.

I live near the Orangeburg Scarp, in an area that used to be a beach during the Pleistocene. I have sand for the asking around here. Seriously, there is so much sand you can drive to an active sandmine, fill up a truck, and then drive away and nobody cares. I don't know where you are located, but if you have something like that (sand, topsoil, clay) you might borrow a friend with a truck and get some filler.

[AdminAssistant]

After you fill the holes and trenches, you may want to keep some dirt "on reserve" because once wind/water hits the new soil you'll have unevenness, holes, etc. At least until you can get some grass over it.

Heh. The house I mostly grew up in sits on the corner of a cotton field that Dad sectioned off for our "yard." It's really sandy ground, so after he got the land cleared off, he threw bermuda grass on the front section, and planted wheat and pretty much anything else he could find for the back, just to keep it all from blowing away! There are still small patches of wheat in the backyard. (The house is in the middle of the country so nobody really gives a flying flip what the yard looks like.)