Best Survival Starter Food for My Raised Bed

Hi y'all! I need some guidance. I started trying to garden during the pandemic in grow bags and in ground. I'm partially disabled, so in ground was difficult. Plus, freaking fire ants are everywhere. I live on 3/4 acre and have a nice, big fenced in backyard so I want to be able to grow my own food for survival.

I bought a 71" x 35.5"x22.4", 6x3x1.9 FT large metal outdoor galvanized metal raised bed box. I also have several grow bags, but they've been outside so not sure what shape they're in.

I have tried growing: tomatoes, cucumbers, watermelon, okra, potatoes. The plants themselves get big and grow normally. Then I see little vegetables. Maybe ended up with 2 tomatoes off of 6 grow bags of them. Got a few tiny cucumbers that were disgustingly bitter. My watermelons vined out of the grow bags onto the ground and little golf ball sized melons were there before they just weren't anymore. NOTHING grew from my potato eyes in ground. I had a few okras pop up but they were hard as a brick - inedible. I don't even know what went wrong with everything.

Not sure what I'm doing wrong! My question is: What is ONE good survival food I can start with in that sized raised bed this spring (like within a month) and try to master on my own? It sucks having to go spend a small fortune on bags of soil etc. to get no return from my efforts. Any advice for me on this? I have room, time, and some starter money for it. Just no clue.

 

Even I can raise potatoes and okra... and greens! You're in Texas, so it gets HOT, like here in Alabama, so you might need more water, shade for the plants and mulch for the soil. Also, some of the bagged soils are nutrient poor, so you might need to add fertilizer...just don't go crazy with the fertilizer. Last June was VERY hot and dry here, and NOTHING did well!

 

My dad used to have a full on oasis - a thriving garden like I've never seen and I can't grow a single thing. I get so confused by the pH and soil and this and that. I've watched so many videos and bought hundreds of dollars worth of stuff and I fail. Annoys me. LOL

 

Some major problems with using fertilizer and grow bag is that you need a different formula for growing the plant, high in N and a different one with less N for fruiting. With high N, the plant just keeps on growing and doesn't produce tomatoes. A second problem is pruning the suckers that grow off the main stem. They keep growing and give you a very pretty and large plant with few tomatoes. A third problem is watering a grow bag plant. On a cool damp day your plant may only need water once, but on a dry windy day, it may need water 3 or 4 times. Another problem is heat, if it is too hot the plant won't produce fruit and you may need to shade the plant and try to let it cool itself.

You are doing everything right, learn that gardening is an art that your dad learned from masters who either were experts or went hungry. It is a hard thing to do and the idea that if you have a hoe and a can of long term storage seeds, you will just put in a garden and feed yourself will not work.

The best advice I can give you is to find someone in your area that is a good gardener and try to learn from his mistakes. Most will help you if they know that you are really trying.

 

Calling @ditch witch ...

 

I asked my local expert, the wife, a 3rd-worlder that had to grow a garden to survive. She agrees with all Duane said.

1. Soil - In her simple words, "sometimes soil too rich, too much poop!"

2. Prune the tomatoes - You MUST prune the tomatoes (95% chance this is your problem for tomatoes)

3. Watering - Normally, tomatoes need a good watering twice a week, don't over water, HOWEVER that is if your tomatoes are in the ground, if you have them in that metal container...might need more.

Other points:
a. Do not grow tomatoes and cucumbers in the same bed, "They're not friends."
b. Both, tomatoes and cucumbers like it hot...however when it gets overly hot, you will see start to droop, literally, not good.
c. Some people do prune cucumbers, not absolutely necessary but some do it. Best to see a video how to do it correctly.
d. She doesn't recommend the galvanized bed, especially where you live but many reasons, says too easy for plants to get too hot, too quick so you will need to watch them carefully.
e. Water cucumbers every day, water their leaves also.

She said, needs more info about your cucumbers. What type of seeds you used? Where are they planted, in bag or ground, in sun or shade, is the soil loose (roots like oxygen)...but given what you said, she thinks too much Nitrogen.

She also said, she tried bags for potatoes, made from Landscape paper, but potatoes were small and she didn't like it but think you might have better luck given your region is warmer, here in North Idaho, didn't work well.

 

Being in Texas (and speaking from experience, as I lived there up till a few years ago), it's never a bad idea to set up a drip irrigation system, and put it on a timer. Mine would water everything around 4 AM (shortly before I'd get up, to be at work at 6), when it's cool outside, and you're not going to see much, if any, evaporation from the soil. Definitely a plus, in hot summer states!

Speaking of evaporation, as @duane said, grow bags can dry out really easily. Two things you can do, to help prevent that, are add compost (it acts like a sponge, in the soil), and don't worry about over-watering! If you put too much water in it, it will just run out, right?

As far as fire ants go, your best bet is to get a broadcast spreader, like you'd use on your lawn to fertilize it, and do that whole area where you're trying to grow stuff (or your whole dang yard!) with fire ant bait. That'll help hold 'em in check, and you can spot treat any new ant hills that pop up. My favorite way to do that was to stir up the nest with a stick, then sprinkle the ant bait right on top of them, as they come out to fight whoever's messing with their nest!

For best crops? Tomatoes and peppers during the summer. The tomatoes might stop producing blooms during the high heat of summer, but once it starts cooling off again, they'll start back to producing again. Keep in mind that both tomatoes and peppers are heavy feeders, and require a lot of water. BEANS! Man, I never seen beans grow, like they did in Texas! Squash and pumpkins do pretty well, too! If you want to grow cukes, find a semi-shady area for them to grow, and keep them VERY well watered! If you want to grow smaller varieties for pickling, grow them with sunflowers.....they'll act like a trellis, for your cuke plants to climb!
Sweet potatoes do pretty darn good, too!

I'd suggest going to the Farmer's Almanac site, and looking up the planting schedule for your area, by zip code. It's actually pretty good, and will give you an idea of when to start seedlings indoors for transplant, and/or start seeds outside.
2023 Planting Calendar: When to Start Vegetable Seeds | The Old Farmer's Almanac

 

That line tells the Elders if it is worth the time!!

I am at my end of trying to help folks around here .
I have put out my time , experience and coin ,,

They all say I'm here to help anytime , just call .
Never a helping hand to just repay my time !! NEVER . always an excuse ..

Sloth

 

Thank you so much for all this advice! Well I had put my tomatoes and cucumbers in grow bags down my sidewalk in full sun hot as hades. I watered daily, pruned nothing and I have no idea how to figure out about calcium and nitrogen and so on.

I just bought bags of soil from Lowes to use. I wish like hell I'd listened to my dad and paid attention - his mom had a garden into her 90s, and he followed suit and I know nothing. I want to pick one thing and get good at it to start with. I have areas with full sun (north tex, hot in summer), shaded areas and plenty of room.

I will look something up tonight to get started with this month. I'll let y'all know how it goes and share pics etc. I even had three of those indoor growers and I'd get a sprout and nothing more. Those freaking things are supposed to be infallible. LOL

 

Fire ants the devil of the south -its hard to keep them away, if you don't want to use poison to kill them pour boiling water on the ant mount you may have to do it a few times as survivors will start a nest a few feet away. Don't know what soil you are using in the grow bags but I would invest in a soil test kit. Check the ph and N,P,K levels to much or to little of either will affect how plants grow and set fruit.

 

Raised beds here in Myrtle Beach get the dirt hot enough to kill the plants. I would imagine down there you probably cooked the plants in grow bags.

 

Hey neighbor down the road from you. Have both raise beds and in the ground . Never had a problem growing in raised beds though they do dry out quick and need to water more often. Right now I've got lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, beets all doing real well --have been picking lettuce. What time of year do you plant?.

 

find varieties of produce that like it hot, start with them.
Also think about spring/fall gardens instead of summer. Based on your location you may do better by not growing over the summer or by shading your summer crops (shade cloth or trellis with a vining produce that likes it hot).
Growing up my parents had a large garden that we canned produce from and ate all winter (I grew up in central MN). I live in the midsouth and it's taken me 7 years to get the clay soil mostly workable. Every year just a little better than the last.
There is a learning curve to everything.
Do you have any master gardeners in your area? I was able to meet up with a few in my area and got some great advice that was specific to my area. This allowed me to prove a neighbor wrong about growing sweet pepper plants as he could never get them to produce. I get softball size peppers every year!

 

Here in Costal SC we have sandy soil it has taken me many many years to build up the organic matter so it would hold water. Every yr plant a cover crop and till it under in the early spring, fall rake all the leaves and have a leaf shredder add directly into the garden. Wife cans

 

I did some research and it looks like for my area and soil, black eyed peas (which help the soil) and corn will be my best best to start with so I'm going to sow them into the ground. I already have tomato cages for the peas, and plenty of space for corn, too. I'll keep y'all posted on how it goes!

 

Crowder and other field peas all taste so much better...just saying.

I'm in the Metroplex too. They grow fine

 

Better stick with the corn as black-eye peas are fairly gaseous in nature

 

A friend grows the biggest tomato plants I have seen and get at least a 10 pound yield. She clears the stalk up a foot off the ground and uses bailing twine to support the plant from overhead. Once the base branches are established she picks the "arm pit hairs" shoots that try to grow between the stalk and the branch. Her plants end up over 3 feet high. Toward the end of season she picks off the new buds to get the energy to go to the existing fruit.