A cordless reciprocating saw is extremely useful in apartment (and otherwise) living:
Once my boards were cut to length (as defined by my planting bed edges) I simply cut a little groove in which I would set the boards. Always call before you dig.
Here's the idea:
It turned out that a previous tenant had laid some sort of peaty material down and I found it as I worked the soil in the bed (see the big organic-looking chunks):
I worked this peaty material into the underlying mineral soil (so that the peat would break down faster and release nutrients):
Why not add a bag of potting soil if you've got it lying around?:
Work that into the peat/mineral mixture:
And we've got a nice little planting bed. I watered it down, let it soak overnight, watered it again, worked it a bit more, let it drain and then was ready to plant:
What are you going to plant?
ReplyDeleteDo you think the cinder blocks have affected the soil acidity?
ReplyDelete-b
We planted greens, chiles, black-eyed peas and some sunflowers. We'll see....
ReplyDeleteI don't suspect a problem w/the cinder blocks because the peaty stuff will acidify things a bit. High pH is a fight in arid lands, in general, so we'll see. I need to get a better understanding of the soils here, that's for sure!