What I have learned about having a successful garden in the desert. Who knew the desert had such great top soil, and how I protect my plants. Video created using my phone & InShot:inshotapp.page.link/YTShare
We moved to NW Arizona outside of Kingman in 2021 and I'm learning so much. I've learned that shade cloth, straw mulch, and row cover cloth solves so many issues with birds, chipmunks, and hot sun. Great garden!
I'm close to you outside of Kingman water haul after building out here and 16 yrs later gardening is a challenge in the high desert I find mulch and leaves from my trees work great to amend soil I condensed my beds down to small growing areas so I could control the water. The quail are such a gentle animal but very destructive in my raised garden areas. Always looking for water. Red and April have some good info using ladybugs to control the unwanted bugs.
Grasshoppers last 2 years here and really hundreds maybe more! Eating everything so I have tried garlic, pepper spray, soap, onion/garlic/hot pepper/dish soap spray, a flour as a dust and nothing has worked. This year's grasshoppers hatched in August which was much later than last year. I may spray. I tore out almost all that could be torn out to deprive the bugs of food. I may try Neem. We shall see.
Fortunately some insect eating birdies have come around plus the colder nights and yes, the hoppers have eaten almost all of the edible to them vegetation including the peppers, onions, and Bearded Iris flower plant's leaves! Desperate. No, I did not spray as I am very reluctant to use even NEEM here. I will see what happens next year but am not planting much for Fall.
It makes a lot of sense that you've had success growing in soil taken from underneath mesquite trees. Mesquite is a nitrogen fixing tree, which means it harvests its nitrogen directly from the air and accumulates it in the leaves and seed pods. Imagine all the nitrogen that has accumulated in the soil under these trees over the course of decades from the litter - that's why your crops are so happy. Instead of mining soil from underneath the mesquites, you can prune them and break down the branches and leaves into mulch. Add a thick layer (4") to your garden and it will not only act as a slow release fertilizer, but it will add organic matter as it decomposes. If you want to start a new garden bed, you can lay the mulch down directly on the ground a foot deep and let it rot down during the monsoon season - you'll end up with some rich topsoil underneath. You'll end up with even better soil over time this way, plus pruning the mesquites instead of taking their soil is much better for these marvelous trees and the delicate ecosystem they support. Work for your ecosystem and it will work for you. 🌎
Yes, I didn't expect to be able to plant directly in the top soil without letting it break down some, but it doesn't seem to matter even though it has a lot of leaves and small sticks in it. I have been adding more top soil and mulch to the garden every year. The city mulch is mostly mesquite, because that's what we have around here, and it's free. I have about 6 inches in the garden so far. I have a little electric mulcher but it's very slow, and takes a lot of time to get enough to even mulch a small tree. We have a lot of mesquite trees on our property, and most of them desperately need pruning. In the last few weeks I have been gathering top soil from under the trees, (being careful not to take too much) and pruning lower branches, and then leaving the branches on the ground to break down. A lot of the lower branches are dead, and hang down creating a fire hazard. It's a big and thorny job, but I'm making progress. You have a lot of great tips on your channel. 🙂 Thanks for stopping in! 🌞🏜️
Wow! I had no idea that you could grow a garden like that in the desert using only native soil. I like how you work with the birds and lizards, they take care of your weeding and insect pests! Very cool!
@@RedandAprilOff-Griddo you just go around and gather native soil by where you live?. I reside in Tucson but don't trust the soil in my yard as it had broke down vehicles in parts of the yard leaking fluids who knows how long before I removed them.
The soil varies a lot out here. We have some caliche, but it's not too rocky which is nice. Thanks! I plan to do an update for this year's garden in the next few weeks. 🌞🏜️
@@RedandAprilOff-Grid We're close to a lot of bedrock, so we had a backhoe dig large holes for the fruit trees and replaced the soil with good dirt. We actually had a bumper crop of peaches this year. 🍑🌳
Aww, thanks! Appreciate it especially coming from you! Your yard and garden are beautiful! 🏵️🌺🌻 I have a few trees and bushes planted, and most of them are doing pretty good. I thought about adding some footage of the trees in this video, but ran out of time. I have fig, plum, and a bigger pomegranate. The leaf cutter ants and bees are a real challenge with the trees. We hope to plant more trees in the fall. 😊🌱🏜️
In case you don't already know, most county's in every state in the USA have Agricultural Extension Agents at the Agricultural Extension Office (a branch of our land grant agricultural colleges in every state, your college is the University of Arizona located in Tucson.) They provide advise and free or low cost testing for soil, plants with potential disease and animal care instruction for the benefit of farmers and the general population. They are a tremendous resource and your tax dollar already pays for it.
Nice - look up how far the taproot of the mesquite goes! That’s the answer for the good soil beneath. It pulls minerals from deep below and when the leaves fall, you get your good soil. :)
What a great video. I’m new to growing in the Arizona desert too. We lived in Northern Az for 20 years so Im having to learn everything over. I do love the fact that we have a longer growing season and can actually have a winter garden. Thanks for your video. Your garden is great.
Thanks! If you have some good sized mesquite trees around, the soil under them is good stuff! The growing season is a bit longer than in most places we have lived, but our particular area still gets down below freezing all winter, and even down into the single digits some nights. Glad the video was helpful, best wishes! 😊🌱
I am so happy I found your channel. I live just west of Tucson, Az on 5 acres and have been attempting to garden for many years. The many critters have found a way to eat almost every attempt I've made. Add that to the extra warm spring and summers...it's been a challenge. I have over 50 mesquite trees and you've given me renewed hope and new ideas. Thank you so much!!
Thanks, glad it was helpful. The mesquite top soil should help a lot! The fence is important to keep big critters out, and the chicken wire cages keep the little critters from eating the small plants. Best wishes! Hope it goes better for you next year! 🌱
Very nice! I love the concrete wall kinda giving that old Southwest adobe vibe like in the cowboy shows I grew up watching. One thing I might suggest is to look into growing native Prairie Grasses around the homestead. Big Bluestem, for example, can get up to 8' tall while sending roots down just as far. As a "clump grass" not only does it provide you with a ton of fodder and mulch every year, but it's a fantastic living screen that you can use to create a shady spot block an unsightly view. Being native to the region, the prairie grasses are already designed to handle the conditions, their deep-rooting nature allowing them to not only survive the droughts, but also break up tough soils and pull minerals up from deep down where your veggies can't reach. When you put that mulch on the veggie beds, they get to eat good! Big bluestem, Prairie Dropseed, Sideoats Grama, Compass Plant.... there's a ton of variety that can really help build up your soil while adding beautiful flowers and habitat for the wildlife.
We have a lot of large clump grass in certain areas of the property. There are several different kinds, but I'm not sure what varieties they are. I hadn't thought of trimming them and using it for mulch, great idea! Thanks! 😊🌱
@@RedandAprilOff-Grid I just found out you can buy Switch Grass at Lowes. Folks are using it for landscaping because it's pretty. Could be a good way of trying it to see how it handles for you. If nothing else, it'll add a bit of flair. 😁
Thanks! Yes, I love them! He used some of the leftover twisted wood from our barn roof build. The bean trellis probably should have been a little shorter, I can't quite reach the top, and lots of beans are starting to grow up there. 😄🌱
Hi April, congratulations on the wonderful garden started basically from rocks and dust looks really good and the harvest is also good by the looks of it, hang in there doing really well and that the desert in Arizona
Thanks! Yes, we already have way more than we can eat ourselves, and some of the extended family isn't real fond of squash, but it freezes pretty well. 😊🏜️
I'm glad the video is helpful. 😊 Yes, the fence is very important, we have a lot of rabbits and ground squirrels. I think the solar lights help too. I have some that are motion activated, and some around the fence that flash and come on automatically at night. Best wishes! 🌱🏜️
Thanks! It has been really hot and dry this year. My okra, zucchini and beans have done really well. I plan to do an update in the next few weeks. Best wishes! 🌱🏜️
I love the birds and lizards that help with the garden. I have planted some onions in my little garden. I hope I can do it right this time. You have done such a great job. 🥰
Love this. Please keep on sharing what you are learning about growing in the desert. I went over your channel list of who y'all are following. We share a few. And i am taking inspiration to watch a few more from y'all's list. Thank you!
April it looks great 👍! On my 5 acre 🫐 farm I have limited area for our garden's. I might suggest investing in some cattle panels they are 4 foot x 16 foot and are very handy for climbing plants and those that need support. I tie twine from the bottom to let them climb up to the panels. You are doing fantastic though. Another thing to consider is the use of plants in addition to marigolds like dill for sacrificial plants and with the combinations you have it will draw them to give you or your little helpers time to get to them prior to causing damage to the crops. I cut 2 black beauty eggplant this week 6 inches in diameter and 10 inches long.- eggplant french fries yummy. I also make squash and zucchini fried chips. Every year we all learn a little more. Most folks have forgotten the old ways of gardening. But y'all are doing very well 🤠. Been raining like crazy here 5 inches week before last, 6 inches last week 20 inches in the last month causing me to have to pick tomatoes early or they burst on the vine. I should give you big atta girl for your work installing the insulation in the house way to assist Red, find a project you could take charge of and make it your own. Anyway, I hope everything is going well with you and Red on the house, the garden and the family. God bless!🙏
Thanks! I am pretty amazed at the soil here, it seems to be exactly what the plants need, and we can add more each spring. That is a whole lot of rain! I hope we get more soon! We need it to cool things down, it's been hot. We have some more of this heavy 4 foot fencing that we can salvage on the property. It's been great, I also put it around my new trees. I looked for dill plants or seeds but I haven't found any yet. The ants stripped the leaves off of 3 of the marigolds, but they have grown back and are blooming again. Glad they don't seem to bother the vegetable plants. Glad you are getting some good produce, fried squash is amazing, but I haven't had much egg plant. 😊🌱
Ahh the challenges of living in the desert 🥴 at least you can get decent soil to work with. I’m in high dry hot 🥵 sandy windy desert in nw Nevada. Seldom get rain ☹️ but have a well. Even have an evap cooler for greenhouse 😆 And shade cloth is a must Your garden is really cute & glad you found some good soil. Have a great day 👵🏻👩🌾❣️
Yes, amazingly we have some really great soil here. I added a little shade over a few plants this year, and they seem to appreciate it. It's another really hot summer, but the garden is doing really well. Hope it's going well for you also. Thanks for stopping by. 😊 ❤️🌱😎
Excellent video Mam, Look like yard long bean in your garden with other vegetables. lot to learn from your your experience specially in desert, you will have a great harvest.
Thanks! These beans are definitely our favorite! They are easy to pick, cook, and they produce a whole lot of beans! We are already getting way more than we can eat. 😊🏜️
Thanks! Everything did much better than I expected! I just planted some seeds yesterday. I added a couple of new beds, and more mulch and mesquite top soil. 🌞🌱
i recommend planting some trees from the out side of the garden it'll keep the garden inside a bit cooler and a bit shaded from the hellish sun of the summer like maybe papaya or madras thorn they have delicious fruit maybe even a palo verde you could even plant a prickly pear or a peruvian apple cactus all really good and can survive there
Birds, ha! Here I thought it was the little 4 legged critters that were getting after stripping the garden plants! I will plan on following your advice for doing a greenhouse-type enclosure (above and below) for the plants that I want to keep. Thank you for sharing this !
Yes, fortunately the small plants are pretty easy to cover. 🐦 I hear rats and rodents can be a problem too, we have plenty around, but they haven't bothered the garden yet. Best wishes! 😊🌱
I'm glad I found this video! We attempted our first garden in the high desert of AZ and it was torn to pieces over and over. I love that you used the soil you had under mesquite trees. We have all juniper where we are and I noticed the soil under them looks rich. I wonder if it can be used...I may have to experiment! This video gives me a lot of hope 😄
Glad it was helpful! It seems like people should be talking about this, it's pretty amazing. Yes, I would definitely try any type of native topsoil you can find. Best wishes! 😊🏜️
@@gettogetheriwith7did you try the juniper soil last season? I’ve wondered the same about the junipers here in Apache co but have also heard junipers are alleopathic so I was hesitant. I did, however, use the dead branches in hugel culture beds and that seemed to do just fine!
You did just fine with this video. It was so good to see your successes in growing food in the desert. We're gardening in the desert too. We started small with shaded enclosures and are expanding this year. I like your plant cages, too. Thanks for the video!
@@RedandAprilOff-Grid Thank you. We got hit by grasshoppers this year so we're still playing catch up. But our tomatoes survived as well as the chard and cucumbers. Thanks again for the video. It gives us hope.
Excellent video! I learned a great deal from your coverage of the first attempts to now. Really amazing how you’ve been able to get such bounty from the native soil. I look forward to seeing next year’s results! Thank you for sharing your experience.
Thanks for watching! I really am surprised we have such great soil available here in the desert. Excited for next spring! 🌱 We are still working on eating all of these spaghetti and butternut squash, before they go bad. 😄
Thanks to your advice I found a study saying mesquite increases the organic matter within the top soil up to 20cm deep beneath their canopy. Going to find some mesquite top soil now. Thanks!
April I am so impressed!! This is I think the nicest desert garden I've seen where folks are planting in the ground using our Northern AZ clay dirt!! Did you all do one of the tests on the soil or add anything to it? I have used the cinder blocks in our garden but I purchased soil...I did plant some lilac bushes in the native soil and those have actually been growing and lived through the winter and everything! I do have to water then when we don't get rain but they're handling it wonderfully! Grow Joy is great for telling you what plants will survive low water, clay soil and certain temps. That helped me pick. If I ever move I'll plant perrenials first for sure! Thanks for sharing and hope you're having a blessed week, neighbor! 😊💗
Thanks! We are in southern Arizona, and have big mesquite trees on our property. We gathered the dark top soil from under the mesquite trees to fill the beds, as well as some sand and silt from our water catchment pond. It is amazing stuff, high in nitrogen and the plants seem to love it. We haven't did any soil testing. Just planted a few things in the top soil last year to see how they did. I water the garden every morning unless it rains. The monsoon rains really cool things off here in July and August, so that really helps too. Best wishes! 😊🌱🏜️
Interesting that you plant later in the season.. I too live in the desert of AZ and i start planting in early November. It is almost May and I am still harvesting veggies.
That sounds great! Yes, we expected our growing season to be longer here, but we get down into the single digits in the winter and our last freeze is usually in mid April. In the winter our lows are typically 15° colder than in town! We can watch the thermometer drop all the way home. The trees here are just barely starting to come out.
I grew the yard long beans a long time ago. I like the slightly different taste and texture from a regular bean. But my favorite are yellow pole beans. It was an heirloom variety, but don’t remember the name. I grew sweet potato es for the first time. Dug up 3 pounders. The growing tips are edible, very mild. I like how you are observing and learning from experience. Great garden! I got my first rain last week in Phoenix! .08 inches!
Yes, the yard beans taste different but we really like them. They also last all season which is nice. Wow, that's a big sweet potato! I would definitely like to try planting some next year. Just sprinkles here lately, hopefully we'll all get more rain soon! Thanks! 🌞🏜️
We like using a steamer basket with out frest garden veggies. Just very yummy - don't over steam, keep them a little firm and crunchy. Drizzled with butter - nothing better. :)
That is a possibility. Last July was cloudy, and consistently rainy which made it cooler, so all of the plants were pretty happy. Some of the squash plants aren't loving the 100° days we have been having lately, so some shade might help. 😎🏜️
I grew up in Tucson growing with natives the trick to keep your veggies from burning is tree cover plant under mesquites palo verdes ironwoods and if you own a property with running water and have water rights you can plant right on the banks of the water and the plants will ignore the 118 degree days in my grandmothers yard there is a willow tree and a pomegranate tree she grows cape gooseberries peppers and summer squash and so on long story short I moved to nor cal to avoid the heat altogether 😒
Last year was great, the monsoons started early, so it wasn't too crazy hot. We are also south of Tucson, so not as hot here. We planted a Palo Verde just outside of the fence on the west side of the garden to eventually block some of the evening sun and heat. Property with running water is pretty rare around here, but we have a good well. You could always move back. 😁🌞🏜️
Im in tonopah. My chip drop was full of pine needles and mesquite seeds. Now i got 70+ mesquite, 50+ sunflowers, watermelons, tons of acorn squash i cant even eat all of it, cucumbers, carrots, and im using sorgum and rye to feed back to the soil. Good luck!
Wow! 😄 We mostly just get mesquite sprouts, and silverleaf nightshade. I pull the mesquite when they first come up. I definitely don't want them growing in my garden. During the monsoon season, I also get little silver mushrooms everywhere. The garden is doing great this year, thanks! 😊🌱
I personally like gardening. And the way you built up your garden in Arzona was awesome. However, Why don't you plant Green Chickpeas to your garden..???
Thanks! Lots of different things that can be planted. I'm not that much of a fan of chickpeas, and our soil already has plenty of nitrogen from the mesquite top soil. This year I am excited to try planting some red noodle beans. 🌱🌞
Congratulations on your fruitful harvest of the garden! It's been educational for us as well👍. I wonder how a solarium would do in the winter season out there in the desert🤔? Thanks for sharing 🌝🌞👏👏!
Thanks so much! It would work well, but we didn't want the moisture from watering a garden up against our house. I am sure there are ways to do it, but it wasn't in our original design. I am interested in maybe growing some lettuce and greens by the front of the house in the winter. 🌞🏜️
I would have lost a large bet on the soil content up there. Nitrogen is the rarest nutrient in soil the world over. Stunned to find high N. content where you are. Thanks for sharing... great job.. you are wise for your years. Worth noting the woody mulch from the "city" will consume much nitrogen while it decomposes. Ok for paths but not good for gardens...
Thanks! It was an unexpected discovery. The first year we were out here, I just planted a few things, I bought a few bags of top soil and manure from the store, and decided it was going to get expensive fast. Then I planted a few things directly into some of the freshly gathered native top soil, and the plants did amazing! I thought it might need to compost for a year, because it still had a lot of little leaves and sticks in it, but the plants didn't seem to mind. Yes, I'll have to make sure the mulch stays on top and doesn't get mixed in with the soil. 🌞🌱
When I plant Moringa, I have to cover them up with an upside down milk crate to keep the birds for eating them. I think they love them as micro-greens..
I am up north from you up in Mohave County in Zone 8B. Have a container and raised bed garden. Did try to put green beans in the soil but it did not work. So, pots, planter boxes, and raised beds with compost/raised bed soil mixture. Working on 2 compost piles with 1 in a 30 gallon trash can with holes drilled in the bottom and 1 old rusty burn barrel that was in the yard when we bought the home. I wish you well. Good work! By the way I try to be very thrifty about water. Bonus is how much rain we had this year so far in Jan. and previous few months. I also will use water crystals in the soil and mulch. I also had great luck with onions, garlic and surprisingly, bush sugar baby watermelons! Honeydew too.
Thanks for sharing! 😊 Gardening is always a challenge! The rain and cooler temperatures last summer definitely helped. I need to set up a better composting system. I usually just bury the scraps around my trees, but your comment gave me an idea. Thanks! I haven't tried onions here, and sugar baby watermelon sounds delicious! Best wishes on your garden, spring is almost here! 😊🌱
@@RedandAprilOff-Grid Try to be sure to purchase the "Bush" Sugar Baby Watermelon as the vines are pretty short - do not be confused with the regular version of same. I had one on the chain link fence (no neighbor that side). Worked well.
I also am harvesting a larger softball-sized personal watermelon from a volunteer of seed and plants from 3 years ago in same big pot's soil. So they are little but good. Can't recall the name of them but I got them from Baker Creed Seeds.
I garden in the same climate and also use the wire cages to protect the seedlings and smaller plants. I recommend the hardware cloth instead of the chicken wire. Birds and squirrrels are the worst but also mice and rabbits eat stuff too but i noticed the rabbits will eat mostly weeds if you let some grow
The fence is keeping the rabbits out, so that's nice. We had, I think it was a pack rat, move into the big tomato plant at the end of the season, it was taking the dry beans I left on the plants for seeds. Thanks, we'll see what this year brings! 🌱😊
Wow! I also live in Golden Valley, and would love to get together with you so that i may gain some of your knowledge. I would be willing to do some labor in trade. I feel so lost out here, and totally out of my element. Nice to know there are others. Haha
We are in the Sierra Vista area, which is pretty far from Golden Valley. If you have mesquite trees you should have some great soil for your garden. I have gathered many loads of topsoil, and dug and filled the holes where I want everything planted. Now I'm just waiting for it to stop freezing at night so I can get started. It's usually mid April before I can plant here, but hopefully it'll be a little earlier this year. Best wishes! 🌱🌞
Wait, free mulch? Where? We're in Willcox, is it far? And thanks for the info! We have 2 acres and a ton of mesquite trees. We also noticed that our ground isn't extremely compacted, that its almost a little soft which surprised us! We also have some older cow patties on our property which should be nice for our garden. ❤❤❤
Cool! Some trees don't have much, but others have several inches of topsoil under them. Watch out for snakes! It is the City of Sierra Vista Compost Facility, 1-1.5 hours from Wilcox. You would want to call ahead of time to make sure they have some, and then get there early, I hear they can run out. This was the only load we got, it was last summer. They also sell a more finely chopped compost. Best wishes! 🌱🏜️🌞
Red , Mrs. April , I'm John from yuma , a friend told me about using a stake and by wrapping copper around it burying the copper ,and as high as 6 feet ,this will double your crop output ,do this in several places ,good luck...john
No , I've tried it ,.also get a spool of copper wire ,and a copper rod the type they use to ground building ,attach the copper wire to the rod ,pound the rod in the dirt ,then wrap your ankles ,with the copper wire ,while you sleep ...you won't beleive how invigorating it is
It's the city of Sierra Vista. We got just the one load in our big trailer last spring. Sometimes they run out, so you would want to call before you go. It's also only available certain times of year, I'm pretty sure they don't have it in the winter. Best wishes! 😎🏜️
Birds cut the seedlings off at the base, they don't eat them nor do they get water from them. I suspect they are looking for bugs underneath the leaf, cutting the stem is the quick way to find them. Once the plants get larger they cannot cut the stems, but you will find leaves nipped and slashed. Towhees tended to do this in my Arizona garden, Pinwheels around plants you want to protect are excellent deterrents. Once season I planted out my cucumber seedlings, all but 4 or 5 of the 20 I planted were snipped. I sprouted more and all of them were snipped, not a single survivor. So I went and bought some starts from the store, those starts all survived as they were bigger. Thats when I saw the birds in and amongst the cucumbers hunting. Once I went to the garden and accidently trapped a pigeon between me and the fence, he was feeding on bugs on my plants.
Yes, any small plants that aren't covered get broke off. Last year everything made it except for the cucumber. They were good sized transplants so I thought they would be okay, but the birds still got both of them. I replanted by seed, and kept them covered with chicken wire cages until they 🌱 outgrew them. The lizards and small birds can still get in through the chicken wire, but they didn't hurt any of the plants. The birds are great for weed and bug control, so I don't want to keep them out of the garden, I just have to protect the young plants. Spring is coming! 😊🌱
NICE!😍Is your roof over your shipping containers done by you? besides wood, what else did you use? How much cost? where did you bought your solar panels? Thank you very much
Here is our video about the shipping container structure ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-EO5VBhCptb0.html We bought our solar panels from Santan Solar, they have great prices. Thanks! 😊
Consider leaf cutter "ant-farms" planted directly into the ground with whole dragonfruits and miner's lettuce. If you get any poisonous harvester ants though, I'm guessing to release horned toads.
We have a lot of leaf cutter ants around. They killed or almost killed several of our new trees. In the garden they took the leaves from some of the marigolds, the little pomegranate tree, and sometimes the potatoes.The horned toad didn't stick around very long, but we always have lots of lizards.
@@RedandAprilOff-Grid the horned toad seems to need the formic acid from it's environment (the poisonous harvester ants secretion was one source I understood). I figured if you give them food that is fruit with leafs coming out of it, especially with it's small seeds like dragonfruit, that they'd sprout them underground for you as they do with other small seeds. Spineless cacti stomata should also be good for ground cover as it holds dew at times like twilight hours when dew point would have dropped.
@@RedandAprilOff-Grid also I leaned later after understanding some of this that the Miwok people apparently put miners lettuce near certain ant hills for the ant's secretion but I'm unsure if a certain ant is in the story. I theorize it was leafcutters because of their sweet smelling phenylacetic acid secretion.
Grass comes up everywhere during the monsoon season, but it would require a lot of water the rest of the year. The mesquite soil is awesome for growing anything, but it also has a lot of weed and mesquite tree seeds. It worked well in the garden because the birds cleaned out everything that sprouted. I just had to protect the plants that I wanted to keep while they were small.
@@RedandAprilOff-Grid I'm trying to grow grass that is about 15ft wide 20ft long. Plan to water it through fall to spring. Summer it's to hot to be outside.
We got it from the Sierra Vista Compost Facility. It's right next to the city dump. They do not give out mulch in the winter, and I'm not sure when it starts up. You can call the day before and make sure they have some available. It's best to go in the morning, because they give everyone as much as they want, and they sometimes run out. There has always been plenty when we have gone. Best wishes and happy gardening! 🌱🌞
So have you found anything more effective for using on the ants yet? Those darn things drive me crazy. I have used DE and all. People suggest taking out at the colony but I don't want to do that.
With the leaf cutters, the only option I have found is to get rid of the colony. The little ants have been around this year, but the mulch has seemed to help some. I also spray the plants every few days with a very diluted Neem oil and dish soap spray, which might help with the ants some too. Best wishes! 🌱
😄 I bought a few bags the first year too, and figured we would need to bring in truck loads to grow much. It was a great surprise that the desert has such awesome soil. 🌱😊
yes mesquites - wonderful. i recommend reading Growing Food in a Hotter, Drier Land: Lessons from Desert Farmers on Adapting to Climate Uncertainty by Gary Paul Nabhan....my dislike for aphids in the garden of others is because they are so easy to get rid of - with right fertilization - excessive nitrogen and/or potassium is usually it - weak, watery plants. but then you say you use only soil under the mesquites which are legume trees. maybe you lack calcium and phosphorus. a soil test would give you a good picture of what you need which is not much since you have such a small garden. also, plant more - see the JENA EXPERIMENT - more diversity, better plant performance, way better....blessings
Thanks, I'll check it out. They didn't get too bad, and we haven't had aphids yet this year. Mostly just grasshoppers and cucumber beetles. They are doing some damage but have been manageable with Neem oil and dish soap. It's been a really hot summer, but thankfully it's finally starting to rain, and cool off some. 🌞🌱🏜️
