Millions of Carrots

This is serious. I met with Carla of Austin Urban Gardens to witness her current installation. Six 4’x16’x18” garden beds. Each bed holds 3 cubic yards of soil, tiered down a sloping back yard off of Bull Creek. The cool thing about the frames is that they are modular (I’m working on a bed in the shape of Abe Lincoln).  The planks are made out of smushed together recycled plastics. It comes out looking like wood. Get ready for a whole lot of confused termites.

Every garden bed needs a little drink from time to time. I don’t know if you can get proper scale of this cistern. It’s quite large. Imagine six of our Earth’s Suns stacked end to end. Then, subtract five and .9999999995 of those Earth’s Suns. That is approximately the size of this thing. Five thousand gallons. It will store rain caught from the home’s roof that will then be piped down to soaker hoses in the beds. Pretty impressive, huh? Almost as cool as the metric system.

Action Shot! Sweet, sweet earth. Carla brings in soil from the Natural Gardener. I live on a slab of rude black clay. The only thing that will grow in that is more cracks in my house. The bed pictured here is being filled with Hill Country Garden blend. It’s a mix of reclaimed composted topsoil, composted rice hull, decomposed granite and a special blend of composts. This is a versatile mix, as it provides a variety of microbes and nutrients that benefit a wide range of plants. This means that you can grow almost any type of plant with it. Or, hopefully like this homeowner, 14 million carrots. I love carrots.

Austin Urban Gardens : Patrick @ 512-632-3599 or Carla @ 512-619-7966