Ready to Plant Your Garden? I'm Using An Earthbox!

A couple years back, I had toured a couple places related to agriculture in Manatee County as part of a program called Leadership Manatee. One of the places we visited was a place called Earth Box.

We had a presentation by the inventor, and the whole concept of the Earth Box was pretty neat to me. I was amazed at how beautiful and big his plants were and it was all due to the method set up by the Earth Box.

The Earth Box is a garden growing system invented by Blake Whisenant. And if you are someone who has poor soil conditions and small backyards this is a way that you can still have a garden. It can work on balconies, porches, and rooftops. And even if you do have a large back yard, this is a low maintenance and self contained planter. Source, Earthbox

Maybe a year or so later, my father in law had a couple of these boxes that he wasn’t going to be using any longer, and asked if I wanted them. I had been thinking about starting a garden, and this was exactly the jump start I needed.

I didn’t have all the original pieces, but I was able to make do with what I had.

So how it works, is I put the box together. There is a screen that goes down in to the box, with a tube that stick out the side. I poured the soil on top of the screen and poured the water directly into the tube. The water goes in below the soil, and I know that I have put enough in because the water starts to come out of a little hole in the side. And the way this is set up, makes the fertilizer move through the soil.

This is one of the first things we got out of the earth box, Okra.

So I set up my box and the first year I started off with basil, tomatoes, and squash. The squash completely bombed, but the basil did spectacular and the tomatoes did alright. Since then, the basil has come back year after year, and I have just added different plants to experiment. Some times I plant seeds, and sometimes I plant seedlings.

This is something that I can do with my kids, and my son and daughter actually helped my put in the soil and plants this year. We went to Lowe’s as a family and picked out the plants we wanted in the garden this year. We decided to go with Strawberries, Peppers, Mint, Basil again, and Marigolds as a pest deterrent.

So far so good. We actually went out today and picked a few Strawberries.

My son is eating one of the Strawberries.

If you would like to learn more about the Earth Box, check out their website at earthbox.com

If you are interested in purchasing a Earth Box Kit, I found one on sale today at Amazon for $49.99. Click this link for details: EarthBox RB-EB-TRC-PBB Garden Kit, Terra Cotta

For tips on what plants to grow in your area CLICK HERE.

Good luck with this year’s gardening!

FFM