renting and gardening?

[Big D]

So less than a week after my Baker Creek seeds show up, I find out that we'll be moving! Aaaack! Luckily I hadn't planted anything yet, but since we'll be renting for at least a year I don't know if I'll be able to garden this year!
I'm not ready yet to give up on gardening this year, I'd really like to make it work. Any suggestions? I'm toying with the idea of container gardening, but I don't have a patio to put the containers on and I worry about killing the grass under the containers (if I'm going to do that, I may as well have a full garden!)

Any ideas, suggestions, experiences? What can I grow in containers besides herbs and tomatoes? (I'm not interested in flowers, just edibles.) If I do containers, what do I use- potting soil?

[CariOfOz]

I rent and I've done the potted veggie garden for 2yrs (mediocre success) but this year I asked our agent and they were fine with me putting in a raised bed or two So I'm going that route. I use good quality potting soil with compost in my pots... I have tomatos, silverbeet/chard, lettuces and spring onions in there now You can grow an amazing variety of stuff in pots!

My suggestion for saving the grass.. maybe go pot feet underneath your pots to lift them a bit? should keep it from being utterly killed off and then it should spring back up fairly well.

[ms.shell]

we rent and we garden.
vegetables are annuals, so you can grow them in the new place as you know you will be there a year.
i like to plant in the ground, as ime container plants don't produce nearly what they will in the ground.
the only thing we are limited about is not being able to plant fruit or trees or anything like that.

[nolansmummy]

Talk to your landlord, they may not mind if you dig up a garden. Ours didn't. We dug up a nice section along the fence in our backyard and planted lots of stuff- tomatoes, onions, carrots, strawberries, pumpkins, swiss chard, green peppers, jalepenos, eggplant.
We do have pots also but we have a little cement back porch area those are on.
Do you have any where in the front of your place to put the pots so you wouldn't kill the grass?

[rainbowmoon]

I have lived in many rentals and they have all allowed gardening. It is usually one of my top 5 prerequisites when renting a place.

You can also grow alot in pots. Herbs, tomatoes, strawberries, peppers, cucumbers, lettuces, blueberries,etc.

Another option is check and see if there is a community garden in your area.

[Erinz]

When I used to rent I always gardened! Just ask

[sunnysandiegan]

We own a townhome and have a tiny backyard. We do a mix of container gardening and garden beds (very small). Right now, we have:

two lettuces + spinach in a lettuce bowl (large shallow round pot up on an upturned bucket to deter the bunnies)

compact variety of cherry tomatoes

bay leaf plant

parsley

blueberry bush

broccoli

sweet peppers

baby watermelons that will grow up a trellis, if "slung"

beets

All of the above are in pots. We have the pots up on various flat-ish, slatted items on our colored, stamped concrete in order to both encourage proper drainage AND to protect our concrete. I move them around a bit, also. The same principles would apply to grass, especially moving them around a bit to allow sunshine/photosynthesis.

In a small bed, we have worked on the horrendous soil for years and finally started "garbage gardening" last year. We already have worms in there and we compost directly in the soil. And we've added many free and a few paid amendments over time. Last year, we stopped burying certain "compost" items to see if they would grow. In the past NOTHING would grow. Two years ago, flowers finally would grow. Last year, random veggies started growing. Just recently, we planted veggies purposely....

pole beans along the fence

beets (thinned out the pot, which had started as seeds from a cropswap)

garlic (2-3 varieties)

The random veggies we've just tossed out there that are coming up or were harvested:

potatoes (1-2 varieties)

onions/onion family items (2-3 varieties)

radishes

avocado (suitable for replanting as a houseplant, not for the fruit tree version)

and others I have forgotten.

All of the above fit in small spaces and did well.