Life Reboot

It’s coming into Summer soon, and that means it’s time to get planting again. Since the two small gardens by the house have done well I’ve decided to spend a bit of cash and get a little fenced off area started as a garden. The chicken wire will keep out the chickens, and hopefully the turkey. I’m not sure if it will stop the possums, and there’s no way it will stop a determined kangaroo.

To keep costs down, but still allow me to start straight away, I’m going to trial putting in a hay bale garden - and probably a “Ruth Stout” bed as well. Hugel mounds would simply be too much back breaking labour, as I can’t afford a backhoe for the digging right now.

A hay bale garden just needs a pile hay bales to get started, and will compost down over time into fine soil. You just place the plants on top of the bales (after they have been “cured” for a bit) in a pile of soil, and let nature do her thing.

Here’s some shots of the garden prior to getting started. The garden beds are mostly being used to compost manure and ground litter. One of them sprouted a bunch of pumpkin, so I’m going to let that finish fruiting before using the compost. I’ve planted sweet potato in with the pumpkin to see if it will do well in that situation.

The sunflower sprouted up out of a bag of manure I hadn’t placed on the compost pile. Horse feed can contain sunflowers, so there’s always a chance one will spring into life for you.

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