Kitchen Garden

Gazing over the railing of the back deck one day, Michael was inspired by a particular patch of lawn that he felt would be ideal for a kitchen garden. It was shaded in the morning by the house, got full mid-day sun, and enjoyed filtered sunlight in the late afternoon.

The subject patch of earth with lawn removed.

Michael engaged David in his endeavor and they worked out a plan. After the first of several trips to Home Depot, they staked out their raised garden bed and started building.

Staking out and framing.

Rather than build a "floating" bed frame following the slightly sloped ground, it was decided to create a bed that would be level.

"We're going to need a lot more dirt."

This made it a tidier arrangement to attach a trellis to the deck's support beams at the back of the planter.

Adding a trellis for the climbers.

Because of the additional depth on one end of the planter, it was decided to use fill dirt taken from an unusable part of the backyard, and then top it with fertile "bought" dirt.

Time to fill it in.

This digging and moving of soil required the recruitment of brothers Thomas and William.

Ruger supervises Michael and William

Ruger taking a break from supervising.

Tigah working hard.

Even with the fill dirt from the yard, it took a LOT of bags of soil to get a good planting depth.

Ready to plant!

Our preferred gardening method, especially for veggies and herbs, is companion planting, so we've got everything mixed in together along with some nice marigolds.

Happy plants!

Our climate here in Old Hickory is consistently damp enough with enough days and nights of rain and sprinkles that we probably won't need to water very often. Which is a good thing since the hose bib on the back of the house requires some attention before it can be used.

That's not where the water is supposed to come out.