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Post by bluelacedredhead on May 9, 2012 21:26:04 GMT -5
Jo, don't worry. You aren't alone when it comes to failure to understand government websites. Especially ones that are specifically designed for the logical mind. We'll just muddle along together, okay? !  |
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Post by steev on May 9, 2012 22:35:30 GMT -5
If they made their help easy to access, EVERYONE would want to get it; then where would we be?
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Post by mnjrutherford on May 11, 2012 4:07:09 GMT -5
OooOOo Data for nothing and the seeds for free! (Get it? Money for nothing and the chicks for free? ::sigh:: mebbe I'm old.... )
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Post by bluelacedredhead on May 11, 2012 6:36:08 GMT -5
Now that I understand Jo.  |
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Post by mnjrutherford on May 13, 2012 10:57:24 GMT -5
LOL I was SO afraid the reference would be so obscure! ;o)
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Post by mountaindweller on Jun 29, 2012 2:55:45 GMT -5
So I've read through the thread to get some new ideas. We have an area maybe 300-400 m² that I want to use for potatoes corn and beans BUT, like all our garden it is FILL. That means the drainage is horrible and under the 5 cm layer of topsoil there is all kinds of stuff like sand concrete pavers asphalt, rubble and maybe some soil. The grass there is poor and Mrs sheep says "not great".
In Australia no dig gardening is what everyone does and what you find in every gardening book. They tell you to put a layer of newspaper underneath and then you have to buy a whole lot of stuff a bale of lucerne a bale of this a bale of that. That is neither sustainable nor cheap.
I always found that an initial digging is a good thing. But I did this several times on our land and doing 3 m² per day is enough to ruin your back. (Yesterday I dug two treeholes and the result is maybe a ton of concrete pavers). We are not in a farming area were I could get someone with a tractor to rip the "soil" up that I could collect the pavers. I never used a rototiller, but I guess, it would simply break.
In this case I'm really considering doing something no till without the initial deep digging. I did some hills last year stuff grew there but the hills did nothing to soften the soil underneath. No earthworm will ever eaat through concrete.
What would you do in this case? Any ideas? How about simply turning the topsoil and try to grow some green manure?
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Post by mnjrutherford on Jun 29, 2012 5:14:13 GMT -5
Green manure MIGHT grow without turning the topsoil. Regardless, if you can afford the seed, that is a great place to start. When we landed here, we had NO mulch resources and extremely depleted soil. Little by little we are changing that situation. Bird pooped straw from chickens, pine needles from neighbors, a new friend with TONS of oak leaves, terra preta pit where we "cook" all of our organic trash... Little by little over the years... I remember being SO frustrated by our soil quality... it's much better now.
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Post by raymondo on Jun 29, 2012 5:39:40 GMT -5
They tell you to put a layer of newspaper underneath and then you have to buy a whole lot of stuff a bale of lucerne a bale of this a bale of that. That is neither sustainable nor cheap. I agree. The recipes in the books are too expensive. I've done it with newspapers and whatever green waste I can get. It's surprising what neighbours throw out. I often take my neighbours' green waste bins and get plenty of grass clippings. Takes a while to build soil this way but it can be done. I'm currently mixing the last lot of clippings I got with coffee grounds from a cafe in town. I'm hoping it will compost down over what remains of winter so I can use it in spring. |
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Post by mountaindweller on Jun 29, 2012 6:31:32 GMT -5
That means that you do not incoorporate the soil that is underneath. I have got a lawn mowing company that delivers regualrily, but it's only a small business. Newpaper is scarce here as most people heat.
If you build everything on the top and do not use the soil underneath what consequences does this have?
I think that in my case this might be the only way to go. Or would it be beneficial hiring a rototiller (which might not do the jobor even break) and trying to dig as far as possible?
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Post by ottawagardener on Jun 29, 2012 8:52:41 GMT -5
I am working on growing and then cutting down green manures to use as in place mulch and then the following year/immediately planting. When I was urban, there was an abundance of leaves, grass clippings and other stuff for free just on the curb or for the asking.
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Post by raymondo on Jun 29, 2012 15:35:13 GMT -5
That means that you do not incoorporate the soil that is underneath. I have got a lawn mowing company that delivers regualrily, but it's only a small business. Newpaper is scarce here as most people heat. If you build everything on the top and do not use the soil underneath what consequences does this have? I think that in my case this might be the only way to go. Or would it be beneficial hiring a rototiller (which might not do the jobor even break) and trying to dig as far as possible? I have, in the past, dug new areas to remove the fill (road pavement, footpath chunks and roofing tiles at my place). I decided that it's too much effort so now I just build on top. I rely on soil organisms to do the mixing once the newspaper has broken down. Like ottawagardener, I also grow green manures. Last summer I planted sorghum fairly late. When winter came the frosts killed the sorghum. Instant mulch on top and the roots rotted in the soil below! This coming summer I'll try some sort of bean with the sorghum, probably cowpea (black-eye) as they're cheap in health food stores. It's a lazy way to add fertility but I'm no spring chicken so anything that saves me work! |
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Post by MikeH on Jun 29, 2012 17:58:18 GMT -5
With our raised beds, we get a certain amount of settling each year as material that is not fully composted rots down. So we have to add material each year to raise the soil level and maintain the fertility. We have a fair bit of canary reed grass which we use but it's somewhat of a problem when it spreads (it's rhizomous). It's tough to get rid of and every bit of root you miss is another plant. So I'm loathe to introduce it anywhere other that where it already is. So I'm trying a perennial ryegrass and 3 perennial wheatgrasses from Southwest Seed. They don't spread by rhizomes but they do tiller quite a bit. Establishing them without spraying or tilling is going to be a bit of a challenge. I've got a number of 4" pots going which I'll subdivide into larger pots in a couple of weeks. I'll sink these into the ground to get them through the winter. In the spring, I'll scythe areas where I plan to plant these plugs. Once planted, I'll surround each plug with about 24" of cardboard to keep the weeds down and the moisture from evaporating. On top of the cardboard, I'll put a layer of woodchips to keep the cardboard moist so that it rots down. The woodchips should be good for a season before they rot. By that time, I'm hoping that the plugs will be large patches with well developed root systems and thus able to compete with and start to crowd out the plants that I don't want aka weeds. It's a cheap experiment but if it pays off, I'll have a great supply of compost material or mulch.
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Post by mountaindweller on Jun 29, 2012 18:35:23 GMT -5
I am thinking of doing a modified version of what Sepp Holzer does. I have to adap tbecause he uses heavy machinery. The main problem of getting a small bobcat in is that the whole area must be once or in two goes at once to make it cost efficient. That means until your beds are ready you have a major scar in your landscape.
That is what Holzer is doing: He removes the topsoil, lay it aside. He digs a trench. In this trench he fills wooden material, often whole stems, tree stumps limps and everything. He then piles soil and then the topsoil on and plants the whole hill. The sides of the hills are pretty steep.
I did this, but directly on the topsoil because it wasn't really worthwhile. I planted Feijoas, citrus herbs and flowers and it does good. You increase the amount of space and now I have a sunny and a shady side and create different microclimates. I did other beds like this too.
The drawback of this method is, that he has maybe topsoil and even soil, but that's what is missing in our garden that means that my soil layer was never thick enough and you have to add all the time you plant something.
One should never waste topsoil, but is it really worthwhile removing that bit? I could do everything on the top of the existing soil without breaking my back. I could buy (dead) soil which is $35 a tonne and veggie mix is over $55 a tonne, I'm afraid that the expensive material will be washed in the creek, I would have to sow ultra fast green manure. With this method I would spendt lot less than making a classical no dig garden. When I did this (and other beds) I incoorporated grass clippings layed on the wooden material too. I would lay cardboard this time in order to get rid of the grass and maybe sow clover in the pathways or the like.
However I can get stems without a doubt, twigs and branches I can get as many as I like only by calling some gardeners, but if you use twigs and branches you must cut that a bit up to get some mass in the pile, and I am doing that wit secateurs and the big pruner and that is a pain in the ...
He says that woodchips don't work very well. Finding a method to cut branches and twigs fast would be really great, because that was really the worst bit and very tiring on hands and arms. However, at the moment we have still so much stems laying around and I don't think we get around cutting everything up for firewood.
BTW he does his hills in a N-S direcriion and not parallel to the slope, a bit angled.
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Post by RpR on Jul 10, 2012 10:25:12 GMT -5
Mountaindweller:
Do you have access to shredded eucalyptus?
When it was cheaper, I used it as a mulch in my rose gardens and it broke down, far quicker than I though it would into some incredibly good soil.
It does not float away and retains moisture very well.
If you have access to some one with a skid-steer (bobcat) with a post hole digger, you could, depending on how large your garden is, dig holes as close together as possible as deep as you wish to x feet down and push the dirt back in the hole ammended if desired then go over it with a roto-tiller to break up the areas untouched.
I have broken hard grounds with a roto-tiller. It was so hard one went down mere inches and just kept going over it and over it and over it and over it and over it... till it became loose dirt.
It will not hurt the roto-tiller but takes hours and hours.
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Post by mountaindweller on Jul 11, 2012 4:32:55 GMT -5
Post hole digger is a good idea however, it won't work everywhere because we yet had a post hole digger in and sometimes it didn't work because of the fill.
At the moment we have access to a huge gum tree which came down. It is so big that our electrical chain saw for ladies didn't make it, and the motor chain saw of a frien either, but there are loads of firewood just from the smaller branches and thereare twigs and everything. I put some out for the kerbside chipping and the rest I go for Sepp Holzers method.
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