Organic question

thanks Brigit. You're very helpful!!

Sue

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BRAVELUTE,
what you want to look for is the yellow stuff, not the green stuff. Hay is dried grass (plus some weeds) that has the seed heads in it that is used for animal feed. Straw is the stalk part of grain after the seed head has been cut off, usually wheat, barley or oats. There are very few seedheads in it. Straw is also getting popular as a building material. After a few years the straw will rot but can than be composted and become part of the beds.

Birgit

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Brigit, I'm ignorant about such things. To me a bale is a bale. I obviously grew up in the city and I'm new to this. I HAVE had a problem mulching with a couple of those bales and all kinds of things growing like weeds. They WERE weeds in my garden. Wish you had been around!

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I like the idea of water bottles and also hay, but would suggest using straw instead because it is much cheaper, about half the cost, and will introduce less weed seed into your bed.

Birgit

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My 2 cents: use un pressure treated lumber for your grow boxes. Use the other for projects away from your garden. What about the plastic lattice that is already colored? You wouldn't need to paint.

If you find scrap lumber for your grow boxes, you won't feel like you have waste money if you have to replace them in five years.

You can build your boxes of filled plastic water bottles. The water would then become a solar collector, extending your growing season into the fall, and getting you started earlier in the spring.

There are community gardens in California who form the edges of the beds with a "sleeve" filled with hay. I think rectangular hay bales would be a great idea anywhere where it's real cold. It's something to think about here in Florida, too, especially if you have easy free access. Because I see it really enriching the soil on down the line.

I love my raised square foot gardens!! I can't wait to get up in the morning to go check on what's happening out there. Hope our first killing frost holds off until after I go to North Carolina in 10 days.

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Thank you guys. I am just trying to get a handle on all of this before I get started. I am a bit over whelmed. I think I will use my non pressure treated sscrap wood to conceal some self watering 5 gallon containers.

The question is whether or not you still want to eat the veggies grown near pressure treated wood. I personally wouldn't. "Then a solution containing chromium, copper, and arsenic is added. " Metal is cumulative in your bloodstream and eventually causes trouble.

www.finegardening.com/design/
articles/
pressure-treated-wood-in-beds
.aspx
www.organicgardening.com/livi
ng/have-h
ealthiest-home-block-patio

Second link has a section on keeping it away from what you eat and plant native flowers instead.

There is a lot of info out there.

I would stay away from pressure-treated lumber. Over several years quite a lot of toxic stuff can leach out and I would not want to be eating that, whether or not it can be labeled organic. There are so many alternatives.
Birgit

Body Fat %: 18.0

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Before I made my veggie box I looked into that. What I found out was that what the wood leaks is a very little amount of toxins, almost untraceable. My box is made out of an old privacy fence that we took down.
A lot of sites was saying to use cedar because it weather better than the pressure treated.
I don't really have an answer for you. I was never really able to find a yes or no on that question.

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If I use a planter box that uses pressure treated wood, can I still call the vegetables organic?