My city lot...

[honey-lilac]

We moved to a new place the summer before last. It's our first house with a yard, but it's tiny. I made all sorts of excuses why I shouldn't plant it up - it's too small, the kids will get into it, we might move soon - so why bother? But I've more recently become enamored with the "bloom where you are planted" approach to life and I'm planning the garden for this coming spring.

The issue is this. I want to actually dig IN the ground. There are several raised flower beds the last owners put in that would be perfect for vegetables. Trouble is, there is absolutely zero crunchy factor in this neighborhood. Everyone is super "green lawn" crazy (and we live in the desert!!) and we live on a hillside so I'm imagining all the water runs down into our yard. Also, I know the last owners were not organic gardeners so I don't know what sort of chemicals they put into the soil.

We did some container gardening last year which was fine; we plan on doing it again. But honestly we can't afford to get that much more soil/containers. I'd LOVE to use some of our own land (I mean, why do we have land if we can't garden it??) but I don't want to poison my family either. Is there some way to detoxify the soil? Or even test it to see how bad it is? How long does it take for soil to rid itself of various chemicals? And what about that whole "we live on a hillside" factor?

Any help would be appreciated.

[ProtoLawyer]

Your local agricultural authority or state university extension should have a soil testing program, as well as ideas for remediation or work-arounds if the soil is bad. (Try googling "(your state) cooperative extension".)

We installed raised beds with fresh soil on our city lot and had a so-so summer last year (but so did everyone--weird weather).

Good luck!

[honey-lilac]

Wouldn't ya know it - the very link to soil testing out reach was broken! Grr! Thanks, though, I think I found someone I can email anyway.

[honey-lilac]

OK, new question.

We are planning on selling the house eventually. I'm not sure HOW far down the line - could be one year, could be ten. It depends on DH and his job prospects, really. Our neighborhood is very... um. Monotone. Green lawns, maybe a couple of trimmed bushes in the back, maybe a toy or two in the garden. We, on the other hand, have stuff planted and we don't do green lawns and stuff like that. Is this going to really affect our selling price down the line? That we planted up the yard with fruits and trees and vegetables and stuff? Are we going to have to landscape back to the monotone look when we do leave? I'd say just get containers for container gardening but what if we're going to be here a long time?

[lmonter]

Our neighborhood is very into grass lawns as well. I'll let you know how the selling goes here (once we have it ready to put on the market, hopefully within the next month or three, but I'm not holding my breath). We have 12 fruit trees, 1200sf of garden space, etc. We'll see what happens.

I think doing raised beds that can be veggie or flower is good, and a bit more multipurpose. Or just do the mounds like what's-his-name does in the wide-row-gardening thing, no sides to build or buy for your beds. Then you could just flatten out the rows and throw down grass seed if need be. Not sure about the hillside runoff thing - our lot and neighborhood are pretty flat so it's not really a concern.

As for more containers, check with your local nurseries and tree folks. A tree nursery 2 miles away from me sells their gigantic pots for super cheap. I got something like ten 5-10 gallon pots for $8 total. They aren't super, super pretty, but they'll do the job (and I can give the kids some paint and turn them loose or wrap the pots with something pretty if I absolutely need to).