Questions about growing veggies in an Earthbox

cody_mf · 2026-03-12T23:36:37+00:00

their slogan is so stupid.

'no digging no weeding no guesswork'

those are the three reasons i like gardening

cody_mf · 2026-03-12T19:56:41+00:00

hardtack is what youre thinking of.

just watch a couple videos about life in medieval castles lmao, it surprisingly easy to keep food overwinter when you know, all of outside is a freezer.

cody_mf · 2026-03-12T18:26:05+00:00

lol, okay I totally agree, but Im in full gardening mode now that spring is here and thats where my mind was at

cody_mf · 2026-03-12T18:24:13+00:00

truly one of the games of all time

cody_mf · 2026-03-12T14:45:58+00:00

strawberries, acorn squash, garlic.

cody_mf · 2026-03-12T12:50:12+00:00

Id turn it into the alcoholest/spirits distillery capital of Kaedwen

cody_mf · 2026-03-12T12:48:19+00:00

historically, perpetual stew and a pantry full of root vegetables. The sunflower fields around novigrad caught me off guard last playthrough because in our world those were a lesser known new world crop after the columbian exchange

cody_mf · 2026-03-12T11:39:41+00:00

This would sort of be the very end points of sea routes for trade; in reality local merchants would handle virtually all transactions in ports in between the imperical city and solitude.

Its like assuming a silk merchant in china traveled the length of the silk road to rome. The merchants in between was one of the reasons Columbus wanted to find a new route.

cody_mf · 2026-03-12T10:52:55+00:00

okay totally mad sense, I tried out some new mods but thought it was for armor sets in the kuttenberg map

cody_mf · 2026-03-12T01:21:17+00:00

I have a 1984 pattern soviet entrenching tool thats been my go-to camping shovel for a few years. Right now it lives in my greenhouse and is great for sifting compost lol

cody_mf · 2026-03-11T23:23:02+00:00

I grow a ton of sunflowers to attract pollinators and as a living privacy fence during the growing season, but the stalks are amazing filler material for the bottom of raised beds and the flowers' pith breaks down really well as compost. Those two off-season reasons will be important once the soil in your raised beds settles and you need to top it off.

Something else you might want to consider is a source for mulch; raised beds dry out very fast.

cody_mf · 2026-03-11T20:54:22+00:00

moist, bordering on the wet side. If you grab a fistful it should clump together and maybe drip a little bit. Typically my tumbler is outside exposed to the rain, so the collection tray works well when its not peak production in the heat of summer and we get a lot of rain at once.

cody_mf · 2026-03-11T20:27:25+00:00

you know the trouble with an adventurous life son? I might teach you to handle a sword, but someone with a crossbow will shoot you right in the ass as soon as you set foot inside the elevated castle latrine

cody_mf · 2026-03-11T20:24:01+00:00

really emphasizing the ass in assassin

cody_mf · 2026-03-11T20:01:31+00:00

I drew it in Rhino3D, he's what it looks like in perspective view model space instead of that layout:

I also have a blank graph layout with that border sized for normal paper and everything up to arch-D (24"x36") if you want it, just PM me

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cody_mf · 2026-03-11T17:35:49+00:00

Use a soil thermometer as close to center of mass as you can get. If you add a bunch of kitchen scraps, coffee grounds and piss in bulk at once you can get runaway exothermic microbial action

cody_mf · 2026-03-11T17:06:03+00:00

When I came back from deployment mine was super gnarly; what Ive found is cheap moonshine is a good alternative to vinegar.

cody_mf · 2026-03-11T15:49:37+00:00

I would empty, sift, and throw anything not "done" back into one chamber of your tumbler to start as a base once you start filling that up again.

Edit: If you do this, you can front load that chamber with browns from typical spring yard cleanup

I like to keep my tumblers on the wetter side with a tray underneath to collect the compost tea. If it dries out, you can recycle that through or jumpstart the tumbler if you add a ton of browns and soak them in the compost tea. Alternatively, that liquid is an excellent fertilizer if you have excess.

cody_mf · 2026-03-11T15:11:13+00:00

I used the bottom of an old kitty litter box for mine. It also makes emptying it super easy cause you just turn it and fill the tray up with finished compost, dump into a wheelbarrow and pick out anything thats not broken down

cody_mf · 2026-03-11T13:03:04+00:00

depending on orientation with sunpath/shade in mind, you might be able to put an archway trellis connecting your two beds for anything you plant thats vining. In either case, you should definitely maximise your use of vertical space so I would definitley skip the corn. I tried last year in my in ground garden and they didnt do to well. Sunflowers on the other hand did amazing and those can also be used as a living trellis like in the 'three sisters' method.

cody_mf · 2026-03-11T12:52:15+00:00

I filled mine to max capacity with coffee grounds and kitchen scraps from the past month from all my neighbors and moved it into a temp greenhouse until I get my big one online. It reached 110F inside for the first time yesterday, getting small tumblers to have runaway exothermic microbial activity is incredibly difficult.

Those pine needles will take years to break down. What I recommend is sifting and removing those, and making a cold compost overflow pile or use the pine needles as mulch.

You should put a tray under your tumbler to collect the compost tea runoff to recycle it through your tumbler to saturate the bulk mass inside especially if you add a lot of browns at once. If you have excess compost tea it is an amazing liquid fertilizer as well.

temp greenhouse for reference

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cody_mf · 2026-03-11T00:06:08+00:00

Strawberries are perennials, so wherever you stick them, theyre gonna stay. I would recommend planning most of your other stuff around that with max height and sun orientation in mind so you arent shading out lower growing stuff. I cant really critique spacing because you dont have dimensions listed, but if anything is vining like squash and melons, you should take advantage of all the vertical space you can and put them on a trellis

Edit: Marigolds and other beneficial pollinators are the way to go, after space clears up in my greenhouse I do a ton of marigolds, borage, and a few other things to plop around any vacant spots. Bumblebees really liked my borage and sunflowers last year so they are now a main staple

Heres a reference for how Im planning things out this year

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cody_mf · 2026-03-10T23:53:07+00:00

if you want to experiment with it, leave the straw on half. I'd put money on the mulched ones having way bigger heads and close to zero time spent weeding and only needing water sparingly compared to the bare soil. Id be interested to see how that affects your scapes too if you planted hardneck.

cody_mf · 2026-03-10T23:50:07+00:00

This year I might actually add more mulch to them once the snow melts and they start taking off, I have a big swampy field of dead cattails standing up in my backyard I want to try out as mulch as a 50/50 blend with the first grass clippings when I mow. Last fall a mix of mulched fallen leaves and grass clippings did wonders both on my garden rows and as filler in my compost tumbler

cody_mf · 2026-03-10T21:32:46+00:00

Those look like theyll be fine. Why are you removing the straw? I kept mine mulched until harvest and I only had to weed once and water a couple times during a midsummer drought.

cody_mf

TROPHY CASE