Hey all, I've failed at my last attempts at a garden, and it seems to be mostly because of fire ants. They get into EVERYTHING I plant. Last year, I figured, if I planted peppers that were hot enough, maybe I could ALSO plant a few herbs, and the hot peppers would keep the ants at bay so my herbs would survive. Nope, fire ants devoured my peppers too, even the ghost peppers and caribbean reds.

So, this year, I'm trying a raised container idea. I have lots of white plastic bins with holes in the side (the kind you get at WalMart), and was going to use landscaping cloth to keep the dirt in, but still let the air through the holes. My plan is to drill holes in the bottom of the buckets, and do either one tomato or two cucumbers in the bottoms, and then radishes and lettuce on the top. Has anyone tried this? Am I being too ambitious with a small space? I have a metal rack that I've "engineered" (read: rigged...) to hold 10 buckets about 4 feet off the ground. The idea is, I can treat for fire ants at the base of the rack, and I won't have to worry about chemicals on my plants.