Re-using junk!

[Alan]

We have had a bunch of old guttering laying next to the barn for years now and I've been using it a bit here and there on different buildings for water catchment systems but there was still lots and lots left. This past year when I built my cedar trellis system it never ocoured to me how perfect this stuff would be to run accross the top of the posts and how ideal it would be for raising alpine strawberries. Saturday I tacked up about 150 feet of it and drilled holes in it, this will provide me room for several hundred of my alpine strawberries.

In the winter they will freeze out, but since they self seed so easily and since I save a lot of seed from them that won't be a problem. Not only will this give me more room to grow them but the system was built out of "junk" which makes me feel good and I can reach them easily!

[rockguy]

How old are the seedlings when they fruit? Great idea, by the way!

[lavandulagirl]

That is a cool idea! Will you have any bird problems, or will you net the whole thing?

[PatrickW]

I haven't actually tried it myself, but old guttering is popular here for starting things indoors. Peas in particular. It's easier than pots or cells, because it's all one space but the roots tend not to spread far because it's long and thin. When it comes time to pot out, you just scoop the plants off the end.

Lav, if Alan is talking about his white strawberries, you don't need netting. Birds can't see the strawberries if they aren't red!

[plantsnobin]

Rockguy, alpine strawberries can bear fruit in 6-7 months.

[Jim]

Good idea. Saving money by recycling is not just eco friendly but just makes financial sense.

[mjc]

There was a time, before 'recycling' became a buzz word that reusing what some would consider 'junk' was called being thrifty. Unfortunately, it was a behavior that was often looked down upon...hillbillies, rubes and 'uncultured' folks did THAT. I think it is time that most of America realizes that recycling isn't something that you do to 'feel good' because you are doing 'something' but rather that it is an idea that make sense and should be applied across the board...and go back to being called being thrifty.

[PatrickW]

Indeed. There's little comparison between:

Using someone else's unwanted stuff that happens to be lying around

vs.

Getting into your car, going to the store and buying something, then when you're done with whatever you bought hauling it to the recycling center, who probably then ships it to China for recycling.

One of these things you do for the environment, and the other you do to feel good about yourself and get rid of any guilt you may have.

[denninmi]

I saw a post once on another garden forum. A lady from England used sections of old eavestrough to start peas in her greenhouse. She dug a corresponding sized trench in her garden where she wanted them to grow, then, when the peas had filled the soil in the eavetrough with a solid enough rootmass sufficiently for handling, she just slid them out of the eavestrough and into the garden.

I thought that was most clever, since it avoids poor germination in cold soil. My problem would be expense -- I plant usually two 100 foot rows of peas, so it would cost me like $70 for the eavestrough, since I don't happen to have 200 feet of old eavestrough lying around.

I guess I'll have to get creative and come up with something.

[bunkie]

great idea alan! when you get a chance, post some pics please!

we got our hands on a bunch of plastic long Vs that we used on banana crates at one time. we used them to help chink our basement between the logs. also, i used them in the gardens when we had water troughs going down the rows. i put them in the walkways so the paths didn't get wet, but the water's direction didn't get disturbed.

[Alan]

As Karen said, six to eight months on fruiting with alpines.....but......if I push them hard with bat guano during growth and then hit them hard with bone meal in the third month I can get them to fruit in the fourth month and fruit heavily. I start them at this time of the year, they will go in the gutter system in about april.


As Patrick said the whites aren't much bothered by birds, but my beagle dog Jimmy sure does love them, and he will flat out strip a bed of them if he finds them for whatever odd reason. I do grow some red ones and I am working on imporoving those as well, the turkeys do tend to go after those and I will have to be very vigilant this season about keeping them from roosting there and eating and smashing the berries, they only roost there just ocassionally but it could still be an issue that I will most likely have to address.


Bunkie, there is one picture over on the blog from a posting from Monday of one or two sections of the guttering, I'll get some more pictures when they are planted and in fruit which will be much more efficient a photo.


I had never even thought about using the gutters to start a "row" of plants, that is a smart idea.

One thing I did look at though was finding a way to hang them in the worm house, cover them over and use them as a "continuious flow" system for the worms and for completing small batches of castings in a short amount of time, you could feed in sections of a couple of feet every couple of weeks and the worms would finish the compost off quickly and move into the next couple of feet of organic matter quickly, I thought this would be an efficient system and if someone ever has some guttering laying around I would suggest and endorse giving this a try.

[lavandulagirl]

Now I've got Andre looking through the junk at his plant, trying to find gutter shaped material for me! Poor guy... last time he ended up bringing me empty 55 gal barrels!

[canadamike]

55 gallons barrels ghee whiz, the strawberries are big in California

[dirtsunrain]

Like most old farms around here, there is a huge pile of discarded stuff at the back of one of the hayfields. I affectionately refer to it as 'the mall". I found an ancient cream separator in the pile and enough twisted metal to pretend that I have garden art. There is a claw foot tub in the treeline with a cedar growing thru it that makes me smile.
My best score was coils of thick tubing from the old dairy operation which I RedGreened into a drip irrigation system. I love Junk.

[moonlilyhead]

I've also heard that guttering is great for chicken coops...the chickens nest in them after the guttering is attached to the wall. Could have been on here I heard that?