Tom and I are working on our garden for next year. We had raised beds this year, but when I saw the Back to Eden film. It got me excited about gardening again. To see the results that he got using things from nature to build his garden and just needing to add a little wood chips and manure each year was great! If you haven't seen the video I totally recommend it.
So yesterday I worked on digging up all of our raised beds, putting newspaper down, adding the compost and manure. I am looking for a wood chips right now, so hopefully I will find a source so we can put that layer down next. Then see how it goes! They say it could take up to two years to see results like Paul Gautschi, but every year you will see your garden getting better because your soil is rebuilding.
Have any of you tried this method before? Has it worked for you? Do you have any recommendations on what we should tweak?
Hope you are all doing wonderfully! Happy Homesteading!
~Katie
We are trying the back to eden gardening method ourselves this year. We didn't discover the method until after the garden was planted, but managed to make a start using cardboard-newspaper just isn't strong enough for a barrier, in my experience--and lots of straw for mulch. This year after I clean the garden up for winter, I'm going to spread a layer of fresh horse manure on top of the straw, probably the leaves raked up from the yard and a layer of grass clippings, then add more cardboard and a thick layer of wood chips and let it work all winter. It's more lasanga-style gardening than what they did in the video, but we're working with what we have.
ReplyDeleteThis year we will use woodchips from a couple of storm-damaged trees in our yard, but we were able to find a source for next year...a local tree trimming company is glad to have a free place to dump a load of chips every once in a while.
Good luck!