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Learn how to create an easy raised bed with straw bales

Placer County master gardeners offer free workshop on straw-bale gardening

Sacramento Digs Gardening
BY Debbie Arrington PUBLISHED FEB 28, 2024

This collection of sweet potato plants grew in straw bales at the Far Oaks Horticulture Center a few years back. Once the bales are spent at the end of the growing season, they make great compost material, too. Kathy Morrison

Think you have no space for a vegetable garden? Or is the sunny spot where you want to put a garden on top of rock-hard clay – or paved with concrete? Does your achy back keep you from gardening? Or the weeds?

Here’s one creative solution to all those gardening drawbacks – straw-bale gardening!

Learn how at a free in-person workshop, offered by the UC Cooperative Extension Master Gardeners of Placer County.

Set for 10:30 a.m. Saturday, March 9, at Loomis Library, “Turn Your Straw into Gold” will cover the basics of straw-bale gardening, which uses a bale of straw soaked in liquid organic fertilizer (such as compost tea) as an instant raised bed.

“Growing your veggies and flowers in easily 'conditioned' straw bales means no soil, no digging, no bending, only a trowel needed,” say the master gardeners.

Once the garden season is over, the straw can be recycled, too, they add. “Your used straw bales make great compost!”

As someone who has tried straw-bale gardening, I found it was a very productive method for difficult spots where nothing else seemed to grow. The bale was elevated enough where there was less bending to tend the plants, and weeds never had a chance to take hold. It was perfect for potatoes and sweet potatoes; when harvest time came, these root vegetables were easy to find.

Straw-bale gardening also works well for eggplants, squash, strawberries, beans, carrots and many other favorites.

No advance registration for this one-hour workshop is needed. Loomis Library is located at 6050 Library Drive, Loomis.

For details and directions: https://pcmg.ucanr.edu/.

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An article about gardening.

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vegetables free class weekend event straw bale gardening Placeer County Loomis UCCE master gardeners March planting raised bed gardening Sacramento gardening

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Garden checklist for week of May 17

With an eye on warmer weather to come, continue to work on the summer vegetable garden:

* Remember to irrigate your tender transplants. The wind can quickly dry out young plants. Seedlings need consistent moisture. Deep watering will help build strong roots and healthy plants. Water early in the morning for best results.

* Plant, plant, plant! It’s prime planting season in the Sacramento area. Time to set out those tomato transplants along with peppers and eggplants. Pinch off any flowers on new transplants to make them concentrate on establishing roots instead of setting premature fruit.

* Direct-seed melons, cucumbers, summer squash, corn, radishes, pumpkins and annual herbs such as basil.

* Harvest lettuce, peas and green onions.

* In the flower garden, direct-seed sunflowers, cosmos, salvia, zinnias, marigolds, celosia and asters. (You also can transplant seedlings for many of the same flowers.)

* Plant dahlia tubers.

* Transplant petunias, marigolds and perennial flowers such as astilbe, calibrachoa, columbine, coneflowers, coreopsis, rudbeckia and verbena.

* Keep an eye out for slugs, snails, earwigs and aphids that want to dine on tender new growth.

* Feed summer bloomers with a balanced fertilizer.

* For continued bloom, cut off spent flowers on roses as well as other flowering plants.

* Put your veggie garden on a regular diet. Set up a monthly feeding program, and keep track on your calendar. Make sure to water your garden before applying any fertilizer to prevent “burning” your plants.

* As spring-flowering shrubs finish blooming, give them a little pruning to shape them, removing old and dead wood. Lightly trim azaleas, fuchsias and marguerites for bushier plants.

* Don’t forget to weed! Those invaders are growing fast.

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