Back to Eden Gardening Thread~Note: pic heavy thread.

[Beekissed]

So, due to the lack of a chip source and the resulting high weed counts this past season, I'm switching over to something more readily obtained around here~hay. Not straw...that stuff is uber expensive in these parts. Hay it not, especially old round bales of mulch hay. Heading towards the Ruth Stout method, I suppose.

Now that the garden is cleaned up and out, I need to put out feelers for some hay to put down for the winter. Could be I could find a source of hay wherein I could also afford to cover the orchard too.

Gotta get on that...spring comes quicker than we realize.

 

[Beekissed]

Been in the 60s here today and is still 55* and raining. Been raining off and on all day. Makes all my joints hurt but it's still a pleasant change to be sitting in here in my summer nightie, not having to wear woolly socks to stay comfy.

I checked under the hay today in the garden, just a few spots where I knew things should be growing...rhubarb was up a half inch out of the soil and a few garlic seeds were showing roots and shoots coming out. Both of these things are under a good 6in. of hay, so I don't worry they will be frosted when next the cold hits. Still...it was good to see them, tender green showing.

 

[Beekissed]

We've been getting rain for many days now, so the nutrient flush from the gardens are really washing out into the lawn. Took a couple of pics of this...been noticing this happening ever since I started using wood chips on the garden beds. The only other place this happens at this time of year is over the septic leach bed!

You'll notice that the rest of the lawn and meadow is still winter brown...except right around the garden, the compost rings, the wood chip pile and directly around the house where I used wood chips on the flower beds. To me that speaks volumes about how much those composting materials of wood chips and now hay are constantly leaching nutrients when the vegetables are planted there each time it rains.

You really can't see it much, but this garden plot and the whole lawn/meadow is on a very slight grade, so the nutrients flow downward towards the house.

 

[baymule]

This will be our 4th garden here. The wood chips have made a huge difference! Rich and black instead of beach sand.

 

[Britesea]

I don't believe it's possible to have any garden, of whatever style, without weeds. If it's soil that your desired plants can grow in, then it's soil that weeds can grow in as well. Mulches, compost, etc... but as @Beekissed says, the weeds can be very easy to pull. And don't forget that many weeds have medicinal uses. I always keep a shopping bag with me when I weed, to sort out the weeds I want to keep.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

I have zero experience with this, but am watching and hoping to learn! Thanks for starting this thread Bee!

 

[sumi]

Baymule, wow on the chips and mulch and the garden! It all looks great!

 

[baymule]

I agree!!! Oh, for that pile of wood chips!!!! What a huge blessing to have wood chips and horse, sheep, pig and chicken manuey!!! You could plant dimes and grow dollars on soil like that.

Our soil is pure sand. On the pipeline, it is terrible soil. I have concentrated my efforts on the garden, because we eat so much of our food from our garden. But I have to get to conditioning the soil in the pastures. The pigs are in a half acre pasture and have roto-tilled it. When they go to freezer camp, I'm going to sprig it with Bermuda grass, seed it with a variety of grasses and clovers, spread Azomite mineral dust on it, lime, and let it lie fallow until next spring. A lot of the wood chips will go on the pipeline. I have planted grass seed on it, but the sun scorches the roots and it dies. I planted winter rye grass, which should be 2 feet tall by now and it is 6 inches tall. So, I have my work cut out for me, not only in the garden, but in building pastures for my sheep too!

 

[baymule]

So you think bte is a good choice for sand? I have sand and im giving it a shot with my garden. Does the organic material make its way into the sand without mixing it?

We are going to lightly spread mulch from our wood chip pile on the pasture areas. The sand heats up and burns the newly planted grass seedlings, hoping the mulch will shade the grass roots.

In our garden, we spread pine shavings from a horse event center in fall of 2015. We fenced in the garden and raised 3 pigs in it until March 2016. They roto tilled the shavings in, pooped, rooted up roots. I disced it smooth with the tractor and waited several weeks before planting. That was our 2nd year garden. (the first year everything died) The 2nd year was decent, not good, just decent. This is the 3rd year here and we have done deep mulch with wood chips. So far, so good. The peppers don't look so great, but everything else does. If I dig a hole, under the mulch is black, rich earth--then the sand! LOL So in answer to your question, yes, the organic material makes it's way into the soil without mixing it. It won't be overnight, but as the wood chips decompose and break down, they add enormous fertility and humus to the soil.

 

[Mini Horses]

The chickens will move it all around, make some holes & hills, adding fertilizer as they go... Plan on raking it back smooth in Spring. That's what they do.

If you deep litter their coop, you can clean that out onto the garden side in early Spring, before raking it around. Few good showers on it and you should be ok. Add more mulch when you plant.

You can lightly till in a couple inches if you have a LOT of mulch but, primarily the decomposed material keeps building itself on the top each year. Eventually, you have several inches of this which breaks itself down. Think lasagna compost area or raising the bed a little each year.

What you have done already is a great start. Keep adding.