Some years back living on base and not allowed veggie plants in yard, my neighbor planted a couple cucumbers in a small 1 gallon flower pot by the chain fence that seperated us right by the faucet that they left slowly dripping into the pot during the day . Crazy people I thought. Well those darn plants grew and vined the whole fence...and produced enough cucs for the whole neighborhod. Good lesson I learned. I've 200 five gallon buckets that I use, depending on what veggie has my fancy.. Last year I was asked if I could do some extra tomatoes for a CSA...sure I said and planted 50 some cherry, some reg, and 50 containers in sweet peppers. I did a 7 foot fence by our polebarn to support the tomatoes, and had the buckets on either side. I don't do 511 anymore, way too much work and Fafard (medium mix) does the same for me, I do add a slow release fertilizer(organic) plus have to water twice a day in our scorching NC summers. I harvested more tomatoes and peppers then I could use, both for the CSA, Farmers Market, our use -and we use ALOT, plus literally giving our chickens a bucket of tomatoes to eat whenever I was overwhelmed. This year I won't be doing tomatoes or peppers in containers. I need a year break....I am still so sick of tomatoes that I can't even buy a fresh one for my salad! Am still using salsas, marinera sauces, spagetti sauses, etc....from last year and have enough sweet peppers chopped and frozen to last another season! I plan on cucumbers, squashes, and eggplants this year.....

Jigg, Ah! Not often I get to answer a question with any kind of authority, but, since I moved into Philly with concrete as a backyard, and too cheap to spend big bucks on containers, I KNOW 5-gallon (and 6-gallons, if you ever get into wine making kits, and 3-gallons, if you have a cat and get your litter in a plastic container) containers! Yes, tomatoes are a first thought, and grow well in them, but, if you haen't done it yet, drill several holes in the bottom and the low sides of them, because tomatoes are water hogs, and the pots will mildew on the inside. Doesn't affect the tomatoes, except maybe that is the cause for our tomatoes to have all been an inch or two smaller then expected. (Then again, we're also both disabled, so we also can't get to sucker plucking as often as we should, which also might be the cause.) Also, another secret to remember in the future, if you've filled the bottom of the buckets with filler -- plastic bottles, cans, or styrafoam peanuts (I hope not, their a drag to deal with, when you change soil) -- before planting the tomatoes, don't. Tomatoes have deep tap roots, so they can enjoy the entire depth of the buckets. Not a problem though, since this is my first year not using those buckets for my tomatoes, and we always had plenty of tomatoes for the two of us well into the winter. One piece of advice about tomatoes though -- don't use the same soil or even the same pot for next year's tomatoes, unless you wash the pot well. (No using the same soil though, ever.) Chances are good, you'll end up with Blossom End Rot the second year. Any annual produce, herb, flower, or intersting textured plant can grow in them, assuming they can grow in our area. By now, you have to plant, instead of sow seeds, unless you go for easy to germinate seeds, like hyacinth beans or moonflowers (you'll need something big for them to grow on, like a chainlink fence, trellis or anything big for it to wind its way up.) My clematis has been growing in the same bucket with the same soil for 4 years. I'm hoping a couple of summer squash will grow in one (also needs something to grow on, since it's a vine, too), and cukes grew out of two last year. If you have way too many and plenty of room to put a whole bunch together, you can even grow corn (any variety, including popcorn), although that's a heck of a lot of cost in potting soil, and corn tends to absorb every single nutrition out of the soil, so you can't use that same soil for next year. Basically, you can grow anything in them that won't out grow them, or won't grow past three times the height of them, IF you're planting perennials. The only thing you need to remember is, since they are containers, they have to be able to survive zone 5 winters. Oh, and if you're still needing more ideas, after the gardening with them, if you have a slew of them, take a truck load to a Philly flea market, and you can sell them for $.50-$1.00 each. Enough of us need them that we're actually willing to buy them off of Dunkin Donuts and delis! LOL

I could be dead wrong on this, but here goes anyway.... Based upon what people have said the general consensus is this. The book on square foot gardening recommends that you plant 9 bush green plants per every 1' x 1' square. People from past experience have said that you plant that many plants in one 1' x 1' square it's going to overcrowd the plants; for various reasons overcrowding any kind of plant isn't good for it and it's going to be more liable to die as a result. People have recommended that you plant 4 bush green beans per 1' x 1' square. Also I do have other questions regarding Mel's recommendations with how many of each type of vegetable you can plant per square. For small plants (which is what I plan to grow mostly) you can grow this many of each type of vegetable per square according to the recommendations outlined in his book: This is the quote regarding how many of each type of plant you can plant per 1' x 1' square: "Here are some charts to help you plan a garden for one, two, or four people. You can mix and match crops as you choose. Each 1' x 1' square will hold any of the following crops: Small plants: 16 radishes 16 carrots 16 onions 9 spinach 9 beets 4 swiss chard 4 lettuce 4 parsley 4 marigolds Large Plants: 1 cabbage 1 broccoli 1 cauliflower 1 pepper 1 eggplant Vertical plants: 1 tomato 2 cucumbers 8 pole beans Now based upon his recommendations are these reasonable recommendations, or do you think these recommendations are overkill and/or not feasible. If it's not feasible to plant that much stuff with any of the vegetables recommended for a 1' x 1' square, then can somebody please give more realistic recommendations for how much of each type of the above veggies to plant in a 1' x 1' square. My biggest concern is I'll follow the guidelines, the plants will become overcrowded, and then they'll die. I'm on a limited budget and although it's feasible for me to do one square foot box, I really can't afford to have failed experiments. It would be a waste of my money, which I have a very limited amount of, and on top of this, as stated previously I'm on a very tight budget.

I agree that its possible and that it takes more work in feeding and watering and that choosing smaller utlimate size of plants will help a great deal. A couple other suggestions. Rather than drilling holes in the bottom, try making just one horizontal saw cut, maybe 2" long, a couple inches up from the bottom. Much better water retention and it will still drain if you used a potting mix. If you can get 20 gal containers for anything like that price, I'd get several. Pots that big, in my climate serve lrg indeterminates very well. I dont even cut drain holes in them but if you have a very rainy spell you might need to build a mini well point to syphon excess water. If you don't have that rainy spell though, they'll be just dandy and your watering chores are much reduced. Again, only with potting mix, which confused me quite a bit when I started hanging around here. It must be regional thing. We have many products, and always have, labeled "potting soil" but has a light texture due to compost, humas, vermiculite etc. Many refer to this as soiless mix and can get kinda touchy about it :-) We do also have a few products that are labeled potting soil but you can tell from the heft, that un-ammended, are much too dense for containers and will not drain properly.