House & Home The Vege Garden Thread

Wouldn't mind having some of these again, had them as kids but rarely see them around nowadays


Do you recognise them?

They contain the following vitamins:

• Vitamin B1 (thiamin)
• Vitamin B2 (riboflavin)
• Vitamin B3 (niacin)
• Vitamin B6
• Vitamin C,
• Folate
• Vitamin E (alpha-tocopherol), and
• Vitamin K (phylloquinone)

Clicky Link

 

Had many of these during my childhood days, and those white sap rash and itchy.

 

Spot on Geoff Cashews

Some of them were very sweet and full of Juice, have never tried canned versions

 

I'm thinking about building a garden bed out of sleepers - would ~400mm high be enough to make the herbs and veges happy?

 

Heaps high enough. Are you using “vege” sleepers rather than standard treated pine sleepers? There’s some nasty chemicals in the standard pine sleepers which can leach out into the soil. 400 mm is a good height too ergonomically wise.

 

Thanks Geoff. I'm not the tallest person going around but should be ok with around 400mm. I would like it a bit higher but that also increases the costs of materials. I'm determined to do it for under $100 for the bed itself and not the soil as I want to get the good stuff which is about $80 a cubic metre and will probably need about 0.7m3

I didn't realise there were specific vege sleepers! But, was aware of the potential poisoning though. I was going to line the bed with builders plastic so hopefully that suffice?

 

Yep, that's why my budget is under $100! Had a squiz on gumtree this morning and couldn't find anything. Plus, I like building and making stuff so that's half the fun!

 

@Kinnon Bell 400mm is the size of ours now , we took the top 200mm sleepers off this year to make for easier access. The spare sleepers found use as edges for other raised beds around the garden.

A raised vege bed has a few "cons" too.
It drains quicker... thats both pro and con since you need to ensure good watering
Raised beds also raise the soil temperature so ensure the things you plant can handle the hotter soil conditions and this too contributes to increased watering requirements.

As others have noted, don't use treated sleepers, they are treated with Copper Arsenate which means that arsenic leaches into the soil and everything growing around them

 

Good points, thank you.

I should be able to set up an irrigation system fairly easily.

But, to give a bit more context I plan to do a 'raised' garden bed of sorts. The plan is to essentially build a box with a floor and line it then put the soil in as it will be sitting on concrete. Size will either be 1800x900x400 or 2400x1200x400 - haven't decided yet. Will probably go the larger option.

I hadn't thought about the soil getting hot either which may be an issue. The house faces east and I was going to put it on a bit of concrete at the back of the house. It will be in full shade until about 1pm then full sun until the sun sets behind the mountain so it will cop the hottest part of the day with heat also radiating up from the concrete.

I only know of treated pine sleepers - do the non-treated have a name? I can only find this --> 140 x 35mm MGP10 Untreated Pine Timber Framing - Linear Metre which may be a suitable replacement but will have to pain / seal it to stop it from degrading. It also ups the costs....

 

True to a point.... We only have 1 circular saw which my husband takes to work with him so it's a handsaw for me which is why I'm going to try and keep it to full lengths and then just cut the full lengths in half for the width.

I'll have to go back and have a look at Propagate's posts again.

The 24/7 growing season! You can grow stuff (that I like) that I can't up here too!

Edit: I just rembered the drop saw in the garage - that will give me options!

 

Make sure no fingers end up in the garden bed! Haha.
Sounds like a good project.

 

Not bad Geoff! Still chuckling.

 

White ants love untreated pine, and can penetrate the tiniest gap in any barrier you apply.