We have so many plants that we propagated, showing roots and ready to be transplanted into bigger pots! This is a huge step in our journey to start our nursery. I am so excited!
At this point it’s time to start buying our supplies in bulk. Derrick has the starter soil figured out but we needed a large amount of potting soil to transplant these guys into 1 gallon pots. We checked out a local landscaping company {named The Sodfather! haha, no I am not joking} and scored what they called “Mushroom compost”. The overall jest is that it was potting soil that was used to grow mushrooms and then composted to break down the mushroom leftovers, turning it into a soil mushroom compost something or other. It sounded good to us and was being offered cheaper than their potting soil.
We had never bought soil outside of a bag and assumed a truck load would do. So we bought 1 cubic yard for about $40. Definitely underestimated how much 1 cubic yard was!
We originally were going to fill 1 or 2 trash cans and keep it on our porch, scooping it out when we needed it. After realizing how much soil we now have, we had to change up our strategy. Derrick decided having an open bay to keep the bulk amount of soil would allow us to be able to refill it as we need it, and continue to save by purchasing larger amounts.
Using some random scrap wood (2x4s and 2x6s) that we had, he built an easy little wooden bay. Simply just screwing the sides into the back boards, and a couple of screws downwards to keep the stacked boards stable. Honestly- picking the placement of the “bay” took longer than building it!
After we started shoveling it in, we again underestimated the true amount of a cubic yard and had to continue to add more boards to make the bay walls higher and higher. Shoveling the soil out of the back of the truck took longer than I expected, and we ended up using all the hands in our household.
We still had too much soil to fit in the bay even after continuing to add more boards to make it higher. We ended up filling a trash can as well. So now we move on to the dirty work- repotting hundreds of cloned plants.
I imagine in the near future we will have a gardening table or something next to this bay where we can store pots and tools in order to make our potting process easy and convenient!
CJ
This is a great idea to use fencing for grown beans. Last year I strung wire from the ground along the side of my
Garage to the top and the beans scaled the wire but it took up a lot of space in my garden. This way I could use one above ground planter for my beans. I’ll let you know how it works.
Brooke from The Vintage Gardener NJ
Hi!!! I’m following you from The Garden Answer Groupie page! I will definitely be following what you do with interest. I really want to start selling specialty flowers.
Thagood31
That’s awesome, Brooke! Thank you! There is a huge demand out there for plants, I say you should go for it!