pinned

PINNED
ive been pinned
no
my wife she is not holding me down
although sometimes she would like to
just duct tape me to the floor she would
and
leave me there for awhile
to pay me back for those things i do to her to make her
so mad sometimes
happy birthday today

i recently got on pinterest to post my blogs
thats all i ever do is post my blogs
then today someone pinned me
it didnt hurt a bit

its an interesting pinning actually
as you can see all the different raised beds made in a
keyhole fashion

if you ever thought you wanted to do one look at this sites link
and read about the different ones that are pictured

here is the link to this pinterest site
click on the picture and read the blog about the keyhole
garden i did from the old water trough

heres the picture

http://www.pinterest.com/rcdouglas/garden/

one of the big issues gardening in this area is water conservation
since i use rainwater as my only water source
i try to conserve as much as possible
the above picture is an example of a keyhole garden
that does that

this photo has not been pinned but its of interest
this bed originally was made by
laying down newspapers
plopping down about a foot deep of the lady bug
brand of hill country soil
which has everything in it you need to start gardening right away
so thats what i did
adding compost every year
so that over time the height of the bed rose some
however
i noticed that when thing got hot and a little dry the bed just
didnt seem to hold the moisure like the deeper beds did
so

enter the anthill or hugelkulter garden beds
i dug the 8ft x 4ft bed down to a depth of about 16 inches
running into soil that wasnt very good
i removed it
added cardboard my wife she got from her school
she scrounged from whole foods
i got from habitat for humanity builds
and
cardboard well seasoned that had been in our barn
for 12 years accumulating whatever unidentified stuff
that was in it

at the habitat for humanity builds i am known as a
dumpster diver

then i took my old financial records that i didnt want anymore
and didnt want to pay to shred
dumped them in the bottom of the hole

then i added the trunk from a peach tree i cut down
limbs from that tree
limbs and twigs from a small hackberry i cut down at
a habitat for humanity house i was working on

then i added compost from my chicken run that was two
years old and had a lot of twigs and debri in it

then i added a thick layer of the leaves that many of you
have given me over the last year
darlene dee kirsten and dee mark and debra and many
of their neighbors

then i added some of the dirt back that i had dug out
of the bed

then i added more of the compost from the chicken run

then i added some newspapers

i stomped this all down real good as i did the layers

then i added compost again
then i added the rest of the dirt
then i added 4 inches of the rich compost from inside
of the chicken coop real rich stuff
then i added several handfuls of lady bug brand organic
fertilizer
then i added a dusting of cottonseed meal

then around this bed
i had saved the logs from a large tree we had cut down
at a habitat house to use as a border to help hold up the
soil and give the garden bed more depth
which is now at close to 3 feet deep

i have planted 4 tomatoes in this bed
those lucky guys those 4 tomatoes
so much nutrition in there
and so much moisture holding capacity

i also added earthworm castings to the planting hole

i also made the bed concave ) so that it would be like
a bowl to catch as much water as possible
this is an idea i picked up from doing the funky chicken tour
in austin last year
when a local chickener who had a neighborhood garden
explained to me in detail how she did her garden

the old tree trunks make a good sitting down spot
to rest and work in the garden and
to just enjoy sitting and looking around the garden

the white material is row cover which i use to cover
over 5 gallon buckets to protect the tomatoes when
it gets cold
yes there will be another freeze where i live this spring

so thats a hugelkulter garden bed organicgreen doctor method
that has used recycled materials
most of which would have ended up in the landfill
that will be a water conserving monster
producing i hope big juicy tomatoes in a few weeks

now all my beds in my garden
all 400 sq ft are made this way
hopefully in our drought ridden area this will help a lot

fyi here is my first crop of asparagus
most of which never make it inside the house

the oganicgreen gardener