Hello, everyone! Come on into the garden. Today, we're going to talk about container,
it's hard with great danes. Today we're going to talk about container gardening
and filling our containers with the best soil. First, go ahead and hit that subscribe button
and that notification bell so you don't miss any great videos this season and,
if you like the video, if you tap that like button we'd really appreciate it. All right! So,
this container here, I filled, I don't know how many weeks ago, with some soil,
and we're going to do a quick rewind so you can see me filling it and how I did it
and usually, and this is a 30 gallon fabric pot that I filled with quite a bit of soil when I
first started this and right now. I've got some, I had a very, very hungry grasshopper come through
here and hit some of these plants. Some were started in the bed and some were transplanted and
these guys were actually transplanted from another location, so they were protected. When I
am filling my containers, whether they're this big, the 30 gallon or they're 5 gallon containers.
When I'm deciding on which soil to use, it really has to do with what I'm going to be growing
in the bed itself. So, in the video, you're going to see that I ended up mixing a couple
of different soils. I used a raised bed soil in here, on the bottom, and then,
I used a potting mix on the top. A little bit fluffier and part of the reason I did that is
because I wanted to do some seeds starting in the bed and the potting mix is a little more
conducive for starting seeds, but, you'll get to see that. I also mixed in some other,
I mixed in some composted chicken manure to give me a nice nitrogen kick in the beds. I put in some
worm castings, which I love and I'll talk about in the video. Now, when you're putting your beds
together, you could use just the raised bed soil or you could use just the potting soil,
and you would grow just fine using your organic fertilizers and your compost,
but I'm going to show you why and what I did in these beds because I was starting
seeds in them. Alright, so we're going to do a quick rewind and you're going to see the process,
and I hope you enjoy the video! Hello, everyone, Bridget here! Welcome to what's normally sunny
Southern California. Today it's about 45 degrees though, I'm layered like it's maybe
10 degrees out, 45 is a little chilly for us. Today I'm going to be filling up this
felt container. I like growing in felt bags so we'll go over me layering and why I like
felt. First, of course, go ahead and hit that subscribe button and that little bell notification
so you don't miss any great Kellogg Garden content. So, all right, let's get started! So,
growing in felt pots, I really, really like it. If you're buying them online, they come in gallons
and I'll put in the video what this is. I don't know if it's 20 gallons or a 40 gallons. It's about
two feet in diameter and about 16 inches deep and really most of your feeder roots are in
about six inches, right. So, it's a nice, deep container to grow in. Part of why I like growing
in felt is, lots of air flow so you don't have to worry as much about the roots getting root bound.
Now, on the other side of that, the negative or con to growing in felt is that
the soil dries out a little bit faster. So you really have to watch your watering but for me,
I really like growing in them, and because price wise, and what you can do with them
it's a good one for me. Now, ignore this little, so, they have some handles, makes it easy to move,
which again, I really like that but I have a chewer somewhere. So either I have a squirrel
that's doing this or, I have a nice, big great dane that's chewing this. So, I'm not really sure.
At first I thought they were breaking, but it's one on each one and I really think it's
a critter. All right so, today I'm going to put in here, so, I've got some raised bed
potting mix. I also have some blue ribbon blend potting mix. I really like,
I really like that. So, in the bottom I normally put in my raised bed.
The particle size on the raised bed is a bit thicker, it's got more of the
aged wood fines in it and I like for the top to be a little bit fluffier. I also put in some of
my granular organic fertilizer. So the tomato and veg, I sprinkle that in when I'm doing this. I've
also got some composted chicken manure. I compost on my own but, I don't, you could probably see it
behind me, but I don't actually have a big compost yet. So I can't compost as much as I would like
and then I also have worm castings. So I've set up some little vermicomposting, in my
beds but I don't worm compost enough. So, I've got some worm castings in there. So, I'm just going to
go ahead and layer this up. I'm excited because I have some seedlings that I need to get in here,
some sprouts that need to be get going. So I'm going to go ahead and get this started.
I find if I fold down the sides a little bit, gives me a little bit more structure
and I could up end this bag , oh it's heavy actually
but, I've done it in the past, but, part of, it's been in that bag for a while.
It's a pretty big, it's a three cubic foot bag, three cubic feet, almost 85 liters,
but I want to break up the soil a bit because sometimes it gets, you know,
a little compacted in there, takes the shape of the bag and if I pour too much in here at once
then I can't break it up. Now, sometimes you'll see some little, a little bit of white on here,
and really that's just from all the moisture that's been in the bag. Once you let it
kind of come out, and breathe, and dry out a little bit, you really don't have to worry about
that.
Now remember, on something like this, if you want to calculate how much soil you're
going to need it's the diameter of this and then the depth of this, right.
So your width and length are two feet
and then your depth is 16 inches.
So this is the
granulated fertilizer. I'm going to mix that in, get it down in here. It's slow release,
so, as your plants grow, you can get them in there.
Yeah, so as your plants grow, then the roots will come down and this will
release more nutrients. Okay,
so now on this, the blue ribbon blend. For
the particle size ,is a lot smaller, it's a lot fluffier. Where the raised bed particle size is
a little bit bigger. So when you're starting, say your seeds, if you're going in ground
you know you're starting it in the beds. This type of soil I like starting my seeds in.
Now, I'll put the seeds on top and maybe sift some soil over that or use a seed starting soil
because, the particle size again is really small. The sifting, I actually got from
San Diego Seed Company, from Brijette over there. She knows how to start seeds better than
anybody I know so, and she sifts over her seeds. So, I like that. So I do that as well
but I like this nice fluffy soil on the top, so, we'll pour some more blue ribbon
over that.
Sometimes, for me, soil is like being in the kitchen. I kind of just make my own little
recipes depending on what I want. Any of these soils would probably work just fine on their own
with just a little bit of extra, you know, compost and things like that but
maybe it's because I just like to experiment but I like mixing them. There's another
product that Kellogg has, harvest supreme, I like that soil a lot too,
so I use that quite a bit and mix that in. See how fluffy this is? I really love playing in the
soil. As a kid, I liked, I didn't mind being dirty, So I guess that kind of fits in with the
gardening, huh? I have five younger brothers, so getting dirty was part of it. As a, as a kid,
one of my brothers thought he wanted to be a pig farmer because he had a little friend who had
his family had pigs and he was young. He was around, like, four,
and he, when we would go by fields that smelled like manure, he would do things like,
"oh that smells so good." and it used to crack me up, but it's funny because, yeah, I think this
bag here, the compost and manure, it smells good. I know it's going to be good for this garden, so,
I used to make fun of my little brother and now I kind of do the same thing.
Isn't that funny? All right, this is the worm casting. Oh, I love these, I absolutely
love worm castings, look how silky that is! Oh, that looks good. Worm castings are
are great for your soil, they add minerals and nutrients. They also help with soil
borne diseases, they help with pests. So, I'm not ready to have a big worm composting
station, but
like I said, I did add some little or, I'm experimenting with some little
worm composting actually in my beds, but being able to go buy some worm castings, I love that
because then I can supplement with that. So, the compost,
the manure, the composted manure, and then, I'm going to add some more of my compost to the top,
and then I'll put mulch over this as well. First, I'll put in some of my young starts,
kind of get them going, and then I will pop in my little compost, and then, I will
also put in the mulch so I can keep some of the moisture in this.
So, that's basically what I'm doing for some of these pots. I've got, I've got five or six of
them. I might have another one somewhere but for me, this really works out well, and of course,
you'll still get a little bit of compaction in here. In each season I have to,
I have to amend a bit more but, as long as I just keep putting some really good nutrients in here,
as the plants are going, these beds are perfect for me. All right, well thank you so much for
joining me, again, and I will see you soon! Don't forget to hit that subscribe button and
the notification so you don't miss out on some more content and happy gardening. See you soon!