Back to Eden Gardening and Hugelkulture and other non-conventional garden methods

[igorsMistress]

I used wood mulch in some bad areas of my yard. People would sink, slip and slide in our clay. ONE year is all it took to be able to walk there after rain. Speaking from my own experience this helps.

 

[DesertBrahma]

Water water water before you think about planting. Before I put down my BTE stuff my soil was hard rocky sand clay with lots of caliche. It's still rocky sand clay with calivhe, but now I can actually dig a bit to plant transplants. You can see the difference between the dirt right outside the garden, and the beginning of soil inside. The dirt outside is so dry and hard compared to the moist stuff inside.

 

[Kellycbf]

I am new to this site as we just got chickie babies last month. Last spring we started our own BTE garden. We had a good harvest. We doubled the size last fall, but we did not add any soil, just mulch. Our strawberries are already coming up. I am hoping to move them this weekend as we want to do corn this summer and the strawberries are in the spot where the corn needs to go. This method is so easy after the initial large amount of work.

I got a large truck of tree mulch delivered last spring from a tree company. I plan to look on Craigslist again this year and hopefully get another large load. I am excited to see how our chickens can help the garden this year. We are going to do the deep litter method and we plan to do a clean out in the fall so we can be ready for next spring.

 

[politicalcenter]

Water water water before you think about planting. Before I put down my BTE stuff my soil was hard rocky sand clay with lots of caliche. It's still rocky sand clay with calivhe, but now I can actually dig a bit to plant transplants. You can see the difference between the dirt right outside the garden, and the beginning of soil inside. The dirt outside is so dry and hard compared to the moist stuff inside.

We had a severe drought last year and went without any rain at all for about six months. Having little else to do I started hauling horse manure mixed with a lot of sawdust. I also had another place that had more horse than wood. Anyway I composted it for a while and then started putting it on the garden. The yard was so dry it was like walking on peanut hulls. It took a lot of water to get the garden moist but after that it did well. It held enough moisture to get Chinese cabbage, carrots, squash, and other things going without much water at all. Once you get a BTE garden moist it holds water very well. We have a lot of water this spring so water shouldn't be a problem for a while. When I pull back the mulch on my garden I see earthworms. I love it.

 

[igorsMistress]

I bought some composted mulch several years ago and it had stuff that's definitely wood chips.

The next season I noticed the soil no longer sucked boots off my feet and I didn't almost break my neck slipping and sliding all over when it rained.I have been using this composted mulch in problem areas.

What I can't believe is that it never occurred to me that I should do this on a grander scale. Kinda feel like an idiot.

 

[lazy gardener]

I absolutely can't wait till the snow gives up it's hold in my yard. I'm hoping that I can convince a tree company to start dumping here. I could easily use 10 loads. Wish I had a little tractor with a plow or scoop blade to spread the stuff with.

 

[Arielle]

Instead of recycling my cardboard, its laid out on the walk ways in the garden. Sure to decompose in time.

Snow is gone here--lots of cold rain this week: two storms. Did put in peas and covered with plastic in hopes of preventing rot. Also planted a few potatoes as they are already sprouting. Dang, how do they know it is spring??? lol They have been in storage, cold storage and still they have sprouted.

Last years tiny crop of potatoes was grown in a horse trough, with a rusted hole in the bottom. I kept adding leaves and weeds --still amazes me how fast the debris composted and grew potatoes at the same time.

The "brook" is full, running at full speed with all the rain. Wish I had a back hoe to dig a farm pond. Barring that, am looking for large barrels to store rain water. Will try a couple car washes.

My plan is to drop weeds right back on the bed--no need to dump in a compost pile, right?? (smile) Or put in the potato barrel. I did empty that down to the last 8 inches, moving the nicely composted material to a 4 x 4 raised bed and planted MORE potatoes!!!

 

[drewskimac]

I followed the advice of many and contacted a tree cutting-company. I drove my truck to his house and in 6 minutes my truckbed was loaded. It was 70 degrees and the truckbed was steaming. I'm excited. The man told me to come back 15 times if i want to, because he needs to get rid of it. Special thanks to lazy gardener for introducing me to this whole concept.

 

[Kiki]

I followed the advice of many and contacted a tree cutting-company. I drove my truck to his house and in 6 minutes my truckbed was loaded. It was 70 degrees and the truckbed was steaming. I'm excited. The man told me to come back 15 times if i want to, because he needs to get rid of it. Special thanks to lazy gardener for introducing me to this whole concept.

JEALOUS!!!!

 

[chickengr]

great thread. I have just read all the posts and feel a bit tired to comment. but I will say that I use pine shavings in my chicken pens and when there is about 50% poop I put it directly in my garden and water it. it has never burnt any plant. if I don't have shavings I collect the pine needles and use it instead. both shavings and needles are free.