Episode #1: How to Get Started Growing Vegetables and Herbs in Containers With Kathi Rodgers
Are you interested in learning how to start growing your own herbs and vegetables even if you don't have a ton of space? In this episode on the HobbyScool podcast, I chat with Kathi Rodgers with Oak Hill Homestead.
Specifically, we cover:
Do you need a lot of space to grow vegetables?
What vegetables and herbs can you grow in containers
How to decide what to grow
What you can use as a container
Listen in to learn tips on how to grow your own garden in a small contained space.
Mentioned In This Episode
How to find Kathi: Oak Hill Homstead website, Facebook, Instagram
Kathi's free gift: Guide to Growing Vegetables & Herbs in Containers
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Transcript:
00:00:02 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
And my special guest today is Kathy Rogers with Oak Hill homestead. Kathy is a lifelong homesteader at heart. She truly believes that home is where your garden is. Decades of experience with gardening goats and chickens has given her the passion to help others enjoy gardening as organically as possible. On her website, you'll find gardening advice, tips on living a simple, healthy life and encouragement to keep you going when times.
00:00:33 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
Get hard, Kathy. I am super excited to chat with you today. We're going to be talking about how to get started growing vegetables and herbs in containers, and I'm interested in this conversation myself. Personally and I know the listeners are so I'm super excited to chat with you. And why don't you get started by telling the audience a little bit more about you and how you help people?
00:00:58 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
All right. I'm very excited to be here. Thank you so much for having me.
00:01:03 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
I I have a passion for helping people get started with gardening with growing their own food, even if it's just tomatoes. Which is, you know, was my main reason for gardening for many many years. I just love tomatoes, and they're not nearly as good from the grocery store, so I have have a blog. It has, as you said, lots of advice on for beginning gardeners and.
00:01:26 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
I just want to help people get started. That's my main thing.
00:01:32 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
Well, tell me a little bit about me. We're going to be talking about growing vegetables in her herbs and containers. Do you prefer like growing vegetables and and and flowers and stuff in containers or? And I don't even know what to call it. This shows you how much I know about this topic or just like out in a garden that's in your yard.
00:01:53 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
What's the difference there? Tell us a little bit about what's the difference.
00:01:56 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
The difference is, for instance, my husband was career military, so we moved at least every two years. We I I stopped counting at 30 major moves. We have been everywhere. Most of those places I did not have the opportunity to garden in the ground. It just, you know, was not possible whether we either we were in an apartment or in military housing or even if we rented a house, it was not ours and we couldn't dig up the grass.
00:02:23 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
The landlord probably wouldn't have liked that, so containers were it for a long time, and actually even.
00:02:31 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
House plants indoors was the best I could do for quite some time, but after that.
00:02:38 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
I just, you know, I gardened as much as I could and containers wherever we were gave my plants away when we moved. Got more when we got settled again it. It gave me that opportunity to be.
00:02:49 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Out with with plants outside, balcony, porch, whatever. It just gave me that connection with nature that I really, really craved, and.
00:03:00 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
After he left the military retired, he became a pastor for several years, so we kept on moving.
00:03:08 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Fortunately, we had parsonages by that time, so that it was a little easier, and sometimes I would inherit an asparagus patch that somebody had planted years before.
00:03:21 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Little Chive plant by the front steps, perhaps that somebody had planted before I fell in love with hollyhocks flower one at one house because there was the most beautiful garden I'd never seen them before. They were just beautiful and one time I actually inherited an actual in the ground garden, which was just such a blessing. I enjoyed that one so much.
00:03:46 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Now that we have our own place, our own home, I'm I am gardening outside because I do have the room to do that, but I have a raised bed garden rather than gardening in the ground. Oklahoma soil is not the greatest in the world. Not like up in Michigan where we used to live, where you had this lovely black dirt and it rained all the time and I hardly ever had even water here. It's a bit of a struggle with the bugs and the drought and the heat and bad soil and all of that, but I'm trying. I'm still out there.
00:04:15 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Doing it and what I don't have room to grow in my raised beds I have in pots on our patio so I'm still growing in containers even though I have that outside.
00:04:26 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
And and what I'm hearing from that is really anybody could do this, whether you live in the city, an apartment or you know you're renting a home anybody can, you know, grow vegetables and herbs in containers.
00:04:40 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
That's right, anybody can just about anywhere. You might have a sunny window sill that you could put pots up, herbs. You might have a patio or a balcony and an apartment you can garden there. Like you said, a rental house that gardening and containers in a rental house is really the best way to do it.
00:04:57 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
You you have some space, but you can't put them in the ground, so just put your containers out there.
00:05:04 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
People do a lot of gardening in flowers in containers, but I don't think many people really think that you can grow vegetables in containers, but you can.
00:05:14 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
So do you need and I'm kind of thinking through this because a lot of the listeners they might not have, even if they have a yard, it might be a very small yard, or you know a very small patio. How much space do you need to grow vegetables? You know to put together a vegetable garden in containers?
00:05:33 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Right, right. It depends on what you want to grow. Partly some things are a little harder to grow in a small space. For instance, corn. If you want to grow corn.
00:05:44 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
But you you see pictures of of corn growing in rows, but actually the best way to plant corn is in a block, so like 6 rows of six plants because it's wind pollinated. So the wind has to get in there and move pollen from one plant to another. So that might be a little bit harder to do if you're if you have a small patio or something and it does get very tall, but you could do it if you were really serious about doing it. Another thing that might be hard to grow in containers on a small space would be.
00:06:14 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Pumpkins or squash or melons, uh, winter squash. Those vines can grow up to 25 feet long, so that would take up that would take up a lot of space, but you can grow smaller things. You know, smaller melon. Or, for instance, Bush cucumbers. Instead of finding cucumbers so that they don't take up as much room.
00:06:36 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
You probably won't be able to grow every vegetable that your family eats, but you can grow your favorites. You can grow.
00:06:44 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Something that tastes so much better when it's fresh grown than than it is from the grocery store. Like tomatoes. As I said, you can grow.
00:06:53 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
You can grow.
00:06:55 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
What is on The Dirty dozen list? That's a list that's put out by the environmental working group that has the 10 most dangerous plants to eat from the store because of the residue of.
00:07:08 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Herbicide and pesticide.
00:07:10 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Strawberries are #1 and have been for several years, so I have strawberries growing in containers.
00:07:17 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
And.
00:07:18 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
To me, that's important because I don't want to be eating that. If it was, let's say, it was an orange, OK, you peel the orange, you peel the peel off the orange. So you're not necessarily eating the pesticides that are on it, but something like a strawberry or tomato or something like that. You are eating that skin and you really can't wash that off.
00:07:38 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Enough for my Peace of Mind. Anyway, you could wash it, but I don't know if you've really got it all off. So to me those are important things to grow, so it just depends on what you want to grow, what you.
00:07:54 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
How much space you have, you don't need a lot of space for most plants.
00:07:59 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Just those big ones that I was talking about.
00:08:01 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
Yeah. So that kind of brings me, you know, to my next question and that is, you know, you mentioned some of The Dirty dozen, but how, how do I really decide, you know, what to grow if I'm just getting started? I've never done this before and I'll put myself in this category because I'm one of these people. I've never done anything like this before. What, where would I start? What would I start?
00:08:24 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
With OK, I would start by writing down what you like to eat, because if you don't like okra.
00:08:29 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
You don't wanna grow okra.
00:08:31 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Why would you? You don't. You're not going to eat it. Strawberries. If you love strawberries, that's something you probably would like to grow. I suggest you make a list of all the foods that you and your family would love to have right outside the back door. And by the way, I was just looking over at my kitchen. There's.
00:08:49 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Too many bowls of tomatoes and cucumbers over there for me to even count, so it's nice to have it right out there.
00:08:58 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Write down this list of all of the things that you would like to grow, and once you have got them all down and like I said things that you would eat. Once you do that, go through kind of decide.
00:09:11 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
How much room those things need you may not have room for corn. You may not have room for watermelon, which is another long vine, but you could fit in some lettuce and onions and radishes. Make a little salad garden that wouldn't take up much space. Strawberries and I have a trick for strawberries that I can tell you about how to fit as many in as you possibly can.
00:09:34 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Those would be good to grow.
00:09:37 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
See tomatoes, those are something that I have always enjoyed growing.
00:09:42 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
And whatever it is, that's on that list that you are the most interested in that you have the room for. That will grow well in your climate. Those are the ones that you should start out with.
00:09:53 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
Well, what should you mention it? But what's the tip for strawberries? So now I want to know.
00:09:57 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
How you want to know?
00:10:00 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Strawberries have a very small root system and they are so easy to grow in rain gutters. You know the gutter you have along the roof of your house.
00:10:09 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
Wow.
00:10:10 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Yeah you can.
00:10:11 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
Definitely have those.
00:10:13 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
You can buy those from the home improvement store. You put a cap on each end. You can hang them on your balcony railing in several rows.
00:10:22 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Arrival a row another row of strawberries and you have fit that many strawberry plants into that space. They're just very easy to grow in a small, small area.
00:10:34 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
Wow I love. I love that tip well and that kind of brings me to my next question is you know what if I don't have a sunny space or you know the containers? You know what kind of containers? And I like your tip about the the rain gutters for the strawberries. What would you use?
00:10:52 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
Some of the other plants.
00:10:55 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
When I first sat down and made that list myself and thought of all the things that I wanted to plant and I nearly had a heart attack at how much I was afraid it was going to cost to buy all those containers if I went to the store to buy them. Pots are expensive, but you can think outside the box, you can use what you have.
00:11:13 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
I'm sure that you have driven around in your lifetime and noticed a bathtub on somebody's front yard that was full of flowers.
00:11:21 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Or a wheelbarrow that was full of flowers. Those are just things that people had that were handy to plant, and those are containers by the way. A bathtub is a container if you think about it. If you think about it, sure, and it even has a drain hole, which is it's already there. It's wonderful. Not that your neighbors might appreciate it, but it does work. So whatever you have around it might be.
00:11:47 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Parts that the nursery pots that you bought trees in last year and planted it might be. Let's see. Rubbermaid totes. You can actually plant in the the bins that you store things in. Put some holes in the bottom of those. Those work.
00:12:05 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Cat litter buckets, 5 gallon buckets.
00:12:09 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Let's see what I've got out there.
00:12:13 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
Is the key that you just have to have the drainage system and whatever you're using.
00:12:19 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Key point if it doesn't have holes in it, put holes in it. OK, you can either drill with a a power drill or you can.
00:12:27 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Chisel a hole in it with a nail. Just hammer a nail into it to make a hole. If it's plastic like the Rubbermaid totes, you can use a soldering gun to make to make holes.
00:12:37 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
It heats up and melts plastic.
00:12:39 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
And what would you use for the? I want to, I guess dirt or potting soil. I'm not sure what you're calling it. What would you use for that?
00:12:50 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
That will also depend on how much, how, how many containers you need to fill dirt, it's expensive. I found that out this year we moved last year so I had to start my garden all over again and we made raised beds and filled all those up and golly that soil was expensive. You can go to the home improvement store. You can buy potting soil that will work. It's a little more expensive or raised bed, soil, topsoil, whatever you buy. It's good to mix in some compost.
00:13:20 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Which also comes in bags or peat Moss or cow manure, or whatever. The more organic material that you can get into that soil, the better your plants will grow.
00:13:30 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
So just be aware that you don't need that you should not buy just one kind of topsoil and put that all in there is. It will work, but you're going to have to do a lot of fertilizing and I don't like fertilizing.
00:13:42 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
I try to do this as a organically as possible. So if you happen to have acreage like we did at one time, you can go out and clean out the horse barn and use that. That worked really well.
00:13:54 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
Or maybe a neighbor who might have that.
00:13:56 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Right, I still have friends who have cattle, so you know, there's there's that source of compost right there.
00:14:04 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Let's see, uh containers. Again we were talking about those. I have some large rubber feed tubs from the farm and fleet type store tractor supply that kind of place that are probably 2 to 3 feet in diameter and we used a my husband used his drill and put holes in that for me though that's where my strawberries are growing in and that those are pretty inexpensive. So for containers I would look around and see what you have. Think outside the box.
00:14:34 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Ask your friends and family what they might have that you could have just grow in whatever you can. Actually, you'll love this one. I'm growing sweet potatoes and cardboard boxes this year. Oh wow.
00:14:47 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
I never would have guessed that.
00:14:49 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
OK, they're very heavy duty.
00:14:51 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Cardboard boxes. Supposedly they will last last the season, so we will find out. It's an experiment, we'll see.
00:14:59 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
So I have one last question before we here today and this will kind of tell you about my ignorance of the subject since we're growing in containers, do we have to? I know that you know there's a season for strawberries. There's a season to grow, you know, maybe sweet potatoes, maybe I don't know. But you know, can you grow all year round? Let's just say I wanted to grow tomatoes all year round. Can I do that because I'm doing it in a container? Or is there a certain time that I would need to?
00:15:29 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
Plant something you know certain type of vegetables.
00:15:33 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
If you were growing indoors, you could. You could grow all year round. Otherwise it depends on where you live and what your climate is. Oklahoma, of course, is super hot during the summer, but it does get cold in the winter and plants will die over the winter, so I cannot grow year round. Florida, California. Those sort of places you can probably grow year round up north. You could not so it just depends on where you are there. As you said there are seasons for different things now.
00:15:59 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Strawberries are perennial, which means that they will grow, they stay alive. I will say they'll grow year round because they're dormant during the winter, but they will come back in the spring. So it's just like I said, it depends on what you're growing and where you live.
00:16:15 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
Well, Kathy, thank you so much for all the tips that you gave us today on how to get started with growing vegetables and herbs in containers. Can you tell people where they can find you if they want to go get a little bit more information about this topic.
00:16:30 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Sure, on my website oakhillhomestead.com we have lots of information about gardening and other aspects of homesteading. If you're interested in that, about living frugally and a healthy life.
00:16:45 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
I'm also on Facebook, Oak Hill, Homestead, and Instagram, Oak Hill homestead.
00:16:50 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
OK, and do you have a gift for the listeners?
00:16:56 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
I have a short guide to container gardening and that will be free at my website.
00:17:04 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
And I I will make sure we'll make sure that those links are in the shownotes.
00:17:09 Dr. Destini Copp (host)
Links yes, so you don't have to tell them what the link is. We'll make sure that all the links to find Kathy's website and the free gift that she has for you will be on our website and a link in the show notes so you can grab it there. Thank you, Kathy, thank you so much for joining me today. I love chatting with you and now I am inspired to start gardening in containers.
00:17:32 Kathi Rodgers (guest)
Thank you so much.