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Cy Yockey, 3, helps clean up during the monthly garden meeting at Midtown's Wilson Garden, which is one of five community gardens around Tucson.
Jill Torrance / Arizona Daily Star
More Photos (3):
» For more information:
• www.civanonursery.net.
• www.communitygardensoftucson.org.
• www.gardenguides.com/how-to/tipstechniques/containerindoor/ container.asp.
• about.com and search for "container gardening."
» Join a community garden
If you don't have the time and energy to invest in a container garden, try gardening in someone else's yard.
By paying a $12 fee for water usage, you can join a community garden that will provide space, a drip-irrigation system and access to some gardening experts with quite the track record in desert gardening.
The Community Gardens of Tucson, www.communitygardensoftucson.org, offers such a setup.
"It's a group of people who want to do gardening and with our help," said George Brookbank, education director for the group. "We find places and invite neighborhood people to come in and do their gardening."
Brookbank started the organization in 1989.
He tries to visit once a month each of five community gardens around Tucson. During his tours, gardeners can ask him questions and get a little constructive criticism on their plots.
Here are the five community gardens maintained around the Tucson area:
• Chaverim Garden on the East Side, near East Speedway and North Craycroft Road.
• Corbett Garden on the East Side, near East 29th Street and North Wilmot Road.
• Presidio Garden on the North Side, near East Fort Lowell and North Palo Verde roads.
• Sabino Vista Garden on the Northeast Side, near East Cloud and North Sabino Canyon roads.
• Wilson Garden on the North Side, near East Fort Lowell Road and North Campbell Avenue.
To join a community garden, call 795-8823 or e-mail admin@communitygardensoftucson.org.
» For a container garden
• When should I start?
Vegetables can be planted year-round. Ask a professional for the planting seasons.
• What should I plant?
"We've already phased out tomatoes for the heat," said Stephanie Kosik, also a nursery professional at Civano Nursery. "Melons, peppers, squash . . . you can still do basil, thyme and oregano."
Dwarf fruit trees work great, as does any citrus, she said.
Brookbank said gardening is certainly a seasonal event, with winter plants (leafy vegetables like kale, root plants like carrots) and summer plants (including peppers and eggplants).
Seeds at Civano cost from $1 to $3 depending on the type of vegetable.
• What kind of containers should I use?
Kosik recommends exceedingly large, terra cotta containers, and consider trellises for climbing vegetable plants. Big, steel horse troughs or tanks are ideal.
"I would recommend staying away from plastic because they don't hold any water or moisture, so you'll have to water more frequently," she said.
Stock tanks at Civano Nursery range in size from 4 to 6 feet in length and cost about $100-$260 depending on size.
Brookbank said 5 gallons is the minimum size for a container, but 7 is ideal.
Also, "a clay container allows the soil to breathe and the roots to get the oxygen they need," he said.
• What kind of soil should I use?
"The one thing to remember is to use good soil," Kosik said. "We mix planting mix and compost."
Brookbank said container gardeners need well-drained soil.
"Probably a third of the material should be organic matter, and that would be manure or compost or organic soil," he said. "You can buy it in mixes."
• How often should I water?
"You need to leech out the salt that builds up in the soil, and that means putting a lot of water on at one time," Brookbank said. "You need to drain out and let the top inch of soil dry out before you water again."
Kosik recommends watering every day during the hottest 90 days of summer through August.

at Home

Cultivate your garden know-how

Anyone can grow fruits and veggies
By Jennifer Sterba
Arizona daily Star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 07.20.2008
A teeny yard and rising grocery bills don't have to cramp your culinary style.
Why not try a patio vegetable garden? A 7-gallon tub or stock tank can serve as a container garden on your patio, providing plants plenty of room to spread and to grow vertically. Just make sure you set the container on a rolling platform before you fill it with soil and seeds so you can move it out of the sun, or out of your way, if necessary.
Civano resident and Civano Nursery Professional Ken Speakes maintains four garden beds at the Civano community garden. He recently expanded to his patio after the Civano Nursery, 5301 S. Houghton Road, south of East Irvington Road, got in some stock tanks.
"The advantage in having a raised container off the ground (is that it) helps to maintain watering and keeps pets out without having to use any other type of control," he said.
Speakes recommends asking the pros lots of questions about planting seasons and growing habits — and "just have fun and be creative."
He said people often come into the nursery for seeds for vegetables they don't enjoy eating.
"Plant the things you like, and you'll have more fun," Speakes said. "And the one thing people always forget is to plant enough herbs."
● Contact Jennifer Sterba at 573-4179 or e-mail jsterba@azstarnet.com.
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