"AMMO BOX GARDENS"

                or

"Swords into Plough-Shares"    

Written by:

Dr. Reilly Maginn

of Montrose, Alabama

   “And they laid down their arms and turned their swords into ploughshares.” A familiar biblical quote known to most of us. Now, today, very few us have swords for warfare and ploughshares are made by John Deere for those huge mechanical behemoth tractors, for corporate farmers. But after a fashion, I’m recommending a similar exchange of equipment. Well, almost. It’s not exactly biblical. What I’m advocating is converting obsolete M-16 ammunition crates, (“swords”), into (“plough shares”), planter boxes for table top gardens. It’s a stretch, but it is changing weapons into useful gardening implements.

     Why planter boxes for container gardening? Because the ordinary garden-variety backyard garden (pun intended) can become a nuisance rather than a pleasure if one’s not careful. Small is fun. Big becomes work. Let me explain. The conventional backyard vegetable/flower garden is planned and begun in the spring. Usually too big to easily manage and with too little thought as to how much work will be entailed later on. It’s usually muddy or dirty. Hands, shoes clothes all get filthy and take a beating. Your arthritic knees, hips and shoulders all ache from the bending, lifting, digging, stooping and weeding. It’s an expensive investment for all those hoes, rakes, hoses, shovels, fertilizers and possibly even a mechanical tiller that may need purchasing. One might even poison one’s self with pesticides or herbicides. Varmints like the rabbits, squirrels, armadillos, raccoons and possums will gladly share your produce as it matures. Moreover, the effort of maintaining a garden through the long growing season becomes a burden by the time the August dog days of summer arrive. As Louie Armstrong says, “Hoein’ in the sun just ain’t no fun.” Weeding, cultivating and hoeing and harvesting your bounty become chores at the end of the season, instead of a pleasure. And finally, what to do with the plethora of fruits and vegetables you’ve obtained?

“Can’t waste good food, can we?” “Our neighbors are fed up with all the excess tomatoes, cucumbers and zucchini we’ve been foisting off on them. I don’t relish (pun again intended) canning and pickling all this stuff in that steamy kitchen on a torrid summer afternoon.”

    I think I’ve made my point about the ordinary backyard garden. Many of us say, “The supermarket, the farmer’s market and the florist can furnish all my culinary and decorative needs. No gardening for me, thank you very much.” But I’m not referring to the ordinary backyard garden plot. I’m recommending the waist level, tabletop, container garden in an ammunition planter boxes.

The weapons into tools garden variety mentioned at the beginning of this article. Swords into ploughshares. Interested? Does it sound attractive or appealing? Let me count the ways.  No stooping, kneeling, lifting, digging or bending over. Clean hands, shoes and clothes. No shovels, rakes, hoes, forks, hoses, or garden tillers to buy. No pesticides or herbicides. Gardening is at waist height so there’ll be no varmints to bother your garden. No weeding, cultivating or “hoein’ in the sun, cause it ain’t no fun.” No need to alienate the neighbors with bushels of zucchini and no long afternoons in the kitchen over a hot stove canning and pickling. Still interested? Let’s get on with it.

Start by placing a sturdy table near your back door in a sunny, high traffic area, where you can see your tabletop container garden every day. None of this out of sight and out of mind stuff. Get one or two used M-16 ammunition crates from the army surplus store. They have rope handles at each end and are constructed of yellow pine right here in Alabama, and are roughly made so they drain well when watered, and your plants won’t have wet feet. They are three feet long, one foot wide and six inches deep. An ideal size for a small table top container garden. Put the ammo boxes on the table, fill them with potting mix, get a couple of ten cent seed packets from Wal Mart and follow the directions on the back. A few pieces of broken clay pots in the bottom will help in the drainage department. Today’s seeds are usually guaranteed to have 90% germination so you don’t have to follow the old adage, plant “one for the rabbit, one for the crow, one to rot and one to grow.” Tools? The most you’ll need is a trowel and a watering can. Plant a seed or two in each little depression in the soil, cover them and water them and then just stand back and let Mother Nature do her thing.

I think you’re going to be amazed at what you can grow with a single planting in such a small three square foot container garden. Fifty radishes. Twelve heads of Bibb lettuce. Nine broccoli plants, three tomato vines but only one zucchini plant. (darn it). And that’s only one planting. If you plant two boxes you’ll double your return and that’s only the first planting. Here in LA (lower Alabama) you can get two or even three plantings in a summer because of our long growing season. A little drink of liquid fertilizer every two to three weeks will help your seedling become prolific plants. I use Miracle Gro. A big thanks to Mel Bartholomew for his advice and instructions on his square foot gardening techniques.

With just the investment of a few dollars and minimal effort one can enjoy the pleasure of green and growing things right at your finger tips. Can you think of a better way to enjoy a culinary herb garden than on your patio or back porch? Container gardening can be enjoyed without the guilt of discarding good food, alienating your neighbors with your plethora of vegetables, and, as I said before, there’ll be “no hoein’ in the sun, ‘cause it ain’t no fun.”

      Easy, affordable and enjoyable. Watching seeds sprout, plants mature and bear flowers or fruit can be yours with minimal investment of time and effort. Try it, you’ll like it and you might even save a buck or two at the market. Swords into Ploughshares? Well, almost.