Soil Cover - An Important Consideration in Soil Health

Covering the soil is one of the most basic things you can do in soil conservation.  If you walk in the woods, you always see the ground covered with decomposing logs, leaves and understory.  Small trees thrive under the canopy followed by grasses.  Bugs and worms thrive beneath the rotting organic matter as rich moist topsoil is being formed.

The photo below just west of our barn was taken five years ago.  There is one tiny patch of grass seen on the bottom right.  What Happened?!  This entire area was once covered with bahia grass and bermuda grass and now this...  It's all dirt.  In the summer, the sun heats up the dirt and dries it out.  When rains come, the soil is washed away.  When winds blow, the dust (our topsoil) is blown away.

In trying to figure the genesis of this problem out, I think it all started with bonfires.  When winds would blow limbs out of the trees, I would stack up a big burn pile.  The pile would continue to grow, and when it got HUGE, especially in the winter, I would light it up and we'd sit around it and enjoy its warmth.  The fires were so big, one time the neighbors called the fire department thinking that our barn was on fire!

I love sitting around a fire, staring into the coals, but the fires killed the grass, exposing the dirt.  The chickens scratched holes in the exposed dirt to take their dust baths.  When tiny grasses started to grow, they dried up quickly in the heat and chickens plucked out the grasses to eat.  The situation went from bad to worse.  I had to change this!

A barren wasteland

We have cows, goats and chickens all grazing on 3 acres.  Soil health aside, this barren wasteland needs to have grass growing on it to feed all the hungry barnyard critters.  I stopped burning the big bonfires and then planted sprigs of bermuda grass in the dirt taken from cuttings.  Our chicken population, due to the minks, was cut in half, taking pressure off of the barren area and allowing the grass to take root and grow.  Moreover, and I can't quite explain it, but for some reason the spring after a very hard freeze, the grass started coming back - first gradually and then quickly.

I took a photo of the same area yesterday.  Although there is still work to be done in bringing this area back to its former glory, a good start has been made.  Grass almost completely covers the old desert-like area.  The animals and the humans are happy with the progress.  Imagine how it would look if we hadn't been in a drought!

A return of our grass pasture

The grassland now gives additional grazing capacity to our animals.  The roots hold the soil together, reducing erosion.  The grass keeps the soil cooler, and gives bugs and worms a place to hide and do their work.  As organic matter decomposes, the soil and its microorganisms thrive, doing their job.  We'll continue to do our part to rehabilitate the area that I negatively affected by unwise choices.  More work to do, but I like before/after photos that show evidence of good stewardship of the land.

Louisiana Grass Roots - The Cajun Prairie

 

Our town has an old theater in the downtown area.  We've gone to see plays that are put on there by a community theatre.  They'll also show old movies from time to time.  The last one we saw was "Roman Holiday" starring Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck.  The other day, though, we were invited to a screening of a film called "Louisiana Grass Roots" that a friend of a friend produced.

The movie was about Louisiana's Cajun Prairie.  Growing up in Louisiana, when you travel to other places, they always have this idea that you wrestle alligators in the backyard.  That's only partially true.  Those Cajuns definitely exist.  We are prairie Cajuns.  We do have bayous and alligators and bullfrogs all around, but mostly the land is flat.  Very flat.  

The film describes a time in our area before commercial agriculture and intensive cattle grazing when the Cajun Prairie was wild.  It had prairie grasses and wildflowers, some sending down roots 16 feet.    This held the soil together.  The land teemed with insects and pollinators.  Over time, with land being plowed fencerow to fencerow and cattle grazing the land, the native prairie grasses disappeared.  The topsoil also disappeared, eroding into bayous and rivers, silting them up.

A professor from LSU and a biologist from Louisiana Department of Wildlife and fisheries spoke about a time back in the 80's when some people were walking along a railroad right of way and found some prairie grasses and wildflowers - the plants that formerly populated vast acreage across Louisiana.  The railroad right of ways were the only areas left that retained some of the old prairie grass landscape.  They began gathering seeds and growing a seed bank.  Over time, they've converted parcels of land back to the Cajun Prairie of time past.  It's been slow going, but they are recruiting people to take portions of their non-productive land and re-populate it with prairie grass seeds to bring the prairie back.

Back to the erosion, according to the professor, 130 years ago our topsoil was many feet thick, but when the prairie grasses went, the topsoil was carried away too, leaving just the clay hardpan.  I have no way of knowing if this is correct, but they told of a time when our bayous whose water look like chocolate milk once flowed clear with sand bottoms like the Ouiska Chitto River.  I have no way of proving or disproving this.

This water, now laden with chemicals and fertilizer runoff from farming practices, flows into bayous and rivers and into the Gulf of America, creating an algae bloom and a Dead Zone, negatively impacting our fisheries and estuaries.  Adding insult to injury.  The thick topsoil that once thickly covered the clay hardpan acted as a sponge, retaining rainwater and fertility.  With the topsoil sponge gone, the rainwater quickly runs off.  Farmers who need water to grow rice and crawfish depend on deepwater wells that pull water from underground aquifers.  These aquifers are being depleted and must be drilled deeper and deeper.  Now some of those wells are producing salt water, resulting in acreage that can no longer be used for agriculture.  They describe a crisis at hand.

I've never liked alarmist claims, striking fear into people.  Remember back in the 70's we were told that we were going to be going into an ice age?  Or how about the population explosion?  Or Y2K?  This professor told the group after the film that in 50 years, there would be little agriculture as we now know it because of no water.  Like I mentioned, I don't like the alarmism, but this water issue seems to have some validity to it.  

The purpose of the film was to educate people on the Cajun Prairie, how things used to be, and encourage people to take a portion of their land and revert back to the Cajun Prairie.  It showed various groups of people planting seeds and taking steps now to help save the land and help future generations.  Materials, seeds, contact information and links to websites were handed out.  A breakout session was held at 221 Bistro down the street where many were going to discuss it further, but it was getting late and we headed home.

It was an interesting film and introduced us to some things that we'll talk about and study.  We're already working on building the soil and have our own regimen of doing so.  It's exciting to see others getting involved in a different method of building soil and stewarding the land that the Good Lord gave us.

Improving the Soil

One of our projects on Our Maker's Acres Family Farm has been a work to improve the soil in our garden and side garden.  We've used cover crops.  We've made biochar and inoculated it with cow manure and worked it in the soil.  We've done hugelkutur.  We've composted for years and amended literally tons of organic matter into the soil.  We've used only composted (cow and chicken) manure and fish emulsion for fertilizer and planted plenty of crops that set nitrogen.  Finally, we've incorporated the "Back to Eden" gardening technique which is no-till and uses layers of wood chips to always keep the soil covered.

The soil was in poor shape when we started, however.  I have a soil test from about a decade ago and figured it was time to do another soil test just to see where we are and how we might improve.  We went to the LSU AgCenter Extension office here in Jennings and got a soil sample kit.  We followed the directions found within and took soil samples.

We took three separate samples.  One was from the garden.  Another from the garden in the side yard.  Finally one from the pasture.  Each sample was put in separate bags and labeled.

Each test costs $11.  I labeled the samples by putting the crop grown on the outside.

All the samples were taken on the five acre piece of land where we live.  I want to show you something that was obvious at first glance.  Look at the color of the soil in the three samples.  Starting from the left is the garden soil.  We've been working on improving that soil for the longest time - maybe 20 years.  Then the sample in the middle is from the side yard garden.  We've been improving that soil for about 5 or 6 years.  The last sample, on the right, is the soil sample from the pasture.  Other than cows and chickens pooping on it, we've done nothing to it, although I had intended on putting lime down, but never followed through.

Quite a difference in color!  It appears that the amendments have improved the soil in color, at least.  We'll wait and see what the soil test analysis shows.  Once we get the tests back, we will have a good idea of what we need to do.

A Brief Getaway

We've been radio-silent for a few days.  I had a conference for work that I had to attend to get some CE credits to keep my license active.  Spouses were invited.  They put us up in a hotel in Baton Rouge near the river.  It was my wife's 57th birthday, so it was a good opportunity to celebrate and relax.  Russ took care of the animals while we were gone.  We left Thursday at noon and came back Saturday at 3 pm.

On Friday evening they loaded us up on buses and took us to Top Golf.  It's essentially a multi-level driving range with food and drinks.  You are awarded points for hitting the ball into certain targets.  The computer tracks the distance of your hit, the speed, the curve and the hang time.  It was fun, but I am no golfer.  In fact, I'm dangerous.  I teed off and sliced it.  The ball ricocheted off the ball box, hit me in the face and then bounced through the table where everyone was eating.  Embarrassing!

Tricia was much better!

We had a nice time!

On Saturday afternoon, we walked down the Mississippi River levee.  The water level was low.  In the background, the red letters spell out B A T O N  R O U G E.  Sometimes the water level is above the letters.

Here's a nice shot of the Mississippi with the I-10 bridge in the background.  I was checking out the soil at the base of the steps.  No telling where this rich, alluvial soil washed down from.  I was thinking it would be good to take some of that home with me and incorporate into my garden.

There was lots of barge traffic on the river.  The one behind Tricia appeared to be loaded with scrap iron.

Then it was back to a half day of classes.  The last one was interesting.  They were talking about investigating electric vehicle fires.  The presenter, a fire chief, asked if any of us owned an EV.  It was a room of about 125 people.  No one raised their hand.  He told us that it was the wave of the future and than Canada plans to make it illegal to sell an ICE vehicle in Canada after 2035, I think.

He told us something very interesting.  He said that his fire department and many others have a policy of allowing an EV to burn down without trying to put them out.  The reason?  Water reacts violently with the Lithium batteries.  It takes approximately 3,000 gallons of water to put out the fire, but then the water is contaminated and toxic and runs off into the soil and drinking water.  So, to combat this, they just let them burn out.  

I'm trying to figure out how EV's are good for the environment???

A Happy Medium

I did a whole lot of planting in the garden on Saturday.  It got me thinking about soil.  To start my seeds, both in seed pots to transplant later, as well as soil I direct plant into, I use a growing medium.  In the past, I would use a "Seed starting mix" that had peat moss, vermiculite, coco coir, as well as other ingredients.  What I quickly learned is that you really don't need to spend the money on this.  With a little patience, you can create your own.

I've experimented with various "recipes" I found online.  All seemed to work okay.  I've settled on one that's the best and all that's needed is wood chips and patience.  A growing medium is defined as a substance through which roots grow and extract water and nutrients. In native plant nurseries, a growing medium can consist of native soil but is more commonly an "artificial soil" composed of materials such as peat moss or compost.

With each year our soil has gotten better with more amendments and as time passes.  It is teeming with earthworms!

The health of the vegetables has improved markedly with each passing year as soil quality gets better.  Here's some happy Rainbow Chard:

Here's how we make our "happy" medium.  We have local tree trimmers on right-of-way clearing crews drop off truck loads of wood chips on our property.  Loads of wood chips in your yard doesn't create "curb appeal" and probably won't win you a "Garden Spot of the Month Award."  But the benefits are priceless.  The chips are free and they will work for you.

In three years, the size of the piles is cut in half.  They decompose.  I can cut that decomposition time in half by adding cow poop to the pile to keep it heating up and composting as well as moving and restacking it.  Pretty soon that compost pile is a dark brown pile of topsoil.  When it is time to plant in pots or directly into a row in the garden, I shovel a wagon-load of the rich stuff and get a bit of hardware cloth.  Then I take handfuls of the rich, dark wood chip compost and rub it across the hardware cloth.  The 'grated' compost falls through the screen.

The screen catches sticks, chips, and leaves that have not been transformed into soil yet.  I throw this back on the pile as it needs more time.

What falls beneath the screen is our growing medium - our Happy Medium.  It is full of organic matter.  You can see eggshells in there as well.  It is full of nutrients, composted cow manure, trace elements and minerals that were once part of the tree.  It holds moisture well and is light and fluffy and resists compaction.  I do add some composted chicken manure to this medium and mix well.

We either fill our seed pots with it and plant seeds in it, or we hoe a small trench in the garden soil after raking away a small amount of wood chips, fill the trench with our plant growing medium and plant directly into that.

In no time at all, we have happy plants germinating out of our happy medium.

Applying Biochar to the Garden

Back in February, we made THIS POST to show how we were making biochar for the garden.  You can click on the link to learn how we do it and why we do it.  It is very beneficial for your soil.  Today I want to tell you how we inoculate the biochar and apply this to the soil.

A quick recap.  We start a big fire going with all the sticks and branches in the yard.  I did this back in February on a very cold day so it was NICE to stand by the fire and warm up.  Except, just when the fire is burning good and there is gray ash on all the sticks, you do the unthinkable on a freezing cold day.  You drag a water hose and completely put the fire out!

This stops the burning process and keeps it from turning to just ash.  When the coals are cool, I shovel them into a big tub.  I'll use a shovel to chop up the coals into 'nickel-sized' cubes.

I regret to inform you that I don't have photos of the next steps in the process.  I think I can describe it, though, but you'll have to use your imagination.  Now that I have a big tub of what is essentially homemade charcoal, it is time to inoculate it.  The microscopic holes in the charcoal needs to be charged with good bacteria to enrich your soil.

In order to do that, I'll grab a five gallon bucket of cow manure and scoop it on top of the biochar.  Then, I'll fill the tub with water and stir.  The biochar and cow manure mixture makes a slurry.  Now, we just let time pass.  I let the mixture sit in the sun and ferment for two weeks.  At the end of two weeks, I'll get my shovel and dig a trench about five inches deep between each garden row.  I scoop up the bacteria charged biochar and shovel it into the trench and then cover it back up.

Then, we plant rows on either side of the inoculated biochar trenches.  The plants will grow and their roots will extend and will feed on the the biochar.  I call it beneficial bacteria 'condominiums.'  We'll do this on alternating rows each year until the entire garden is seeded with it.

It is a long process and, to be honest, I'm not sure how you'd do this on a large scale.  But it works in our garden.  Biochar, amending the soil with tons of organic matter, incorporating compost, and earthworm population growth has definitely made our soil more healthy and rich with each passing year.  It was once compacted and had no earthworms, but has really changed.

Making Biochar for the Garden

It was chilly and building a fire sounded nice.  I also had on my to do list to make some biochar for the garden.  Two birds.  One stone.  We have a BUNCH of tree limbs from all the storms that are piled up in numerous piles.  I gathered some up into a pile away from the hay bales and trees and lit it up.  I kept piling the branches on the fire.  The coals were glowing.  The fire was kicking up some real nice heat.  While the north wind blew, I huddled by the fire,  The hens scratched the ground where the big pile of branches used to be.

I let the branches burn until everything was grey ash with coals underneath.  Then, I got out a water    hose and stopped the burning process quickly.

The coals smoldered and I kicked through them and sprayed them down, saturating them with water until they were cool.

This leaves you with charcoal - just like the hardwood chunk charcoal you can buy at the grocery store for barbecuing.  

Let's look just a little bit closer.  If you could see this under a microscope, you would be able to see that the charcoal is very porous.  There are millions of microscopic holes in the charcoal.

These little holes can be beneficial bacteria condominiums.  Let me explain what must happen to get to that point.  You must inoculate the biochar with bacteria.  Here's how I did it.  I took the charcoal I had just made, poured it into a big blue tub and chopped up the charcoal with a shovel.  Then I went to the barn and got a 5 gallon bucket of cow poop.  I poured the cow poop in with the charcoal and filled the tub with water.  Now I had a biochar - cow poop - water sludge.  I stirred up this concoction like a 5 star chef in a restaurant might do.  What I'll do is allow this 'brew' to ferment for a couple of weeks.  Then I'll dig a trench and bury it in the garden.  The 'charged' biochar will provide tremendous benefits to the soil.

This was first discovered in the Amazon.  The pre-Columbian Amazonians made this.  Its effects are good for the soil and good for vegetative growth.  It can reduce soil acidity and increase soil fertility.  I've got more piles to burn and thus, more biochar to make, inoculate and incorporate into the garden soil.

Uzziah Loved the Soil

"He also built towers in the wilderness and carved out many cisterns, for he had much livestock, both in the lowland and in the plain. He also had plowmen and vinedressers in the hill country and the fertile fields, for he loved the soil."  - 2 Chronicles 26:10

Uzziah is mentioned in Isaiah 6:1-8 at the commencement of Isaiah's ministry.  To learn more about Uzziah, you must flip backward in your Bible to 2 Chronicles 26.  In that chapter we learn that Uzziah was a king who was 16 years old when he became king.  We learn that he was a GOOD king.  We learn that he is mighty in battle and has built a formidable war machine, including inventing catapults to aid him in overtaking walled cities.  We learn that he was famous.  We also learn, importantly, that he is a husbandman - a keeper of livestock, a farmer!

He "loved the soil."  He farmed not from necessity.  He was king and had all he needed.  No, he farmed because he loved it.  I admire Uzziah for his love for things agricultural.  I think God put that desire in many people and that it hearkens back to him placing Adam in the Garden to keep it.

I have many fond memories of loving the soil and farming from early childhood.  I have told the story before, but a can recall pushing my chair back from the table as a toddler and running outside with my fruit cocktail and planting it.  Sadly, I can report that the germination was 0%.  I remember planting green beans in Dixie Cups in elementary school, watching the progress of growth day by day.  It was magical, mesmerizing!

Loving the soil is something that doesn't come without hard work.  I recall clearing land to be planted for the first time.  It was bottomland off of Carrier Road in Oberlin.  Our goal was to plant this land.  My Dad said it was "rested land" and would yield like crazy.  As the hot, summer sun beat down, we pulled a flatbed wagon across the cleared land with an old John Deere 4020 tractor.  We tossed pine knots onto the trailer as we criss-crossed  the land.  When the pile of pine knots was tall and threatened to fall off the trailer, we unloaded them in a pile against the fence row.  We pulled a disk across the newly cleared land and picked up more pine knots.  After a rain, you could walk across the land and find antique bottles and old-fashioned marbles and wonder about the lives that those folks lived a generation or two before - those tied to the soil like you.

It is a strong pull - the love for the land.  Once the land was cleared, as the sun set, we leaned against the old wagon with sweat-drenched clothes.  The muscles ached, the back protested, and we didn't smell too good, but we had pride in what we had accomplished.  The first harvest from this 'new' land was special.  In our own small way, we had tamed the land and converted formerly useless land into useful and productive land.  

In some sense, the taming of the land is metaphorical of what the Lord does to the untamed human heart.  If we yield to Him, believing in the finished work of His Son, He transforms the hardened soil of our hearts to fertile soil, productive and wholesome, yielding a bountiful harvest.  Praise Be to God!

 

“The care of the Earth is our most ancient and most worthy, and after all our most pleasing responsibility. To cherish what remains of it and to foster its renewal is our only hope.” – Wendell Berry

Gardening is something I really love to do.  Although it is a hobby requiring labor, it is a lot less work now that we're several years into the "Back to Eden" Gardening method.  I look forward to planting things in the ground and watching the miracle of life bursting forth in germination from a 'dead' seed.

One of the things that is rewarding is the redemptive nature of it.  The garden, at one time, was in what formerly was a rice field and pasture land.  The soil was hard and compacted with no earthworms and not much organic matter.  Over years of amending the soil, it has changed.  It is teeming with earthworms, beneficial bacteria, and is healthy.  I often joke that I could never sell our 5 acres and move unless I could take the soil with us since we've worked so hard in building it!

Another rewarding aspect of gardening is the satisfaction of growing most of your own food.    We enjoy looking down at our plates at supper most nights and knowing that everything on our plates and cup was raised right here on the land.  It is fresh, good and delicious.  It is tempting, at times, to say, "We are eating like kings.  Look what we did."  But here's the other thing:

Gardening can be extremely humbling!  One year you might have a bumper crop and run out of room to store everything you grew.  You are tempted to think you've got it all figured out.  And then the next year, you do the exact same thing and experience crop failure.  This year the garden looked fantastic!  And then we got almost a foot of rain in a few days and it sickened half of our peppers, tomatoes and green beans.  A hurricane, an early freeze, a torrential downpour, a plague of stink bugs or worm, or a thunderstorm can ruin a perfectly good crop.

Gardening teaches persistence, a love for the land, and a healthy respect for the Creator.  What's in your garden?  What are you learning from your gardening experiences?

Before And After

I had a big double row of zinnias growing on the last row of the garden before the sugar cane.  For months it gave us beautiful technicolor blooms.  Tricia has been picking bouquets and putting them in a vase in the kitchen.  It was my first trial in planting flowers in the vegetable garden.  Last year I planted zinnias right outside the garden in the holes of some cinder blocks that line the ditch that borders the garden.  They did nicely and at the end of the season, I saved the flower heads for seed.  I really didn't know how well they would germinate, but Good Golly, Miss Molly, I think every last seed grew.  I think I'll plant them again next year. 

Well, last week, in one of the earliest freezes I can remember, temperatures dipped into the mid 20's and zapped the zinnias.  In a stunning before and after shot, you can compare the photo above with the same flowers a day after the deep freeze hit.  From delightful to dull in a very short time.

But the flowers weren't the only thing that the freeze claimed.  It also obliterated our okra.  We have harvested loads and loads of okra this year.  We ate it very often and have some frozen for gumbos, too.  It produced for months and was still producing until the north wind freeze dried it.  Here is a photo of the last two plants left standing before I chopped them down.

We often talk about planting seeds in the garden.  Once a plant runs its course, what do you do.  I want to talk about that briefly.  In the past I would just uproot the dead or dying plants and toss them in the compost pile.  That's not a bad thing to do, but there is a better alternative.  Over the years I started to leave the root system intact. 

Okra grows into a large plant.  Some of the okra plants were approaching three inches across at the base of the plant!  Instead of pulling the plant up, I use a cheap but effective pruning saw I bought for next to nothing at Harbor Freight.  I saw the plant top off right above ground level.  Once I'm done, you can't even tell a plant was even there.

So what does that gain me?  A lot.  The roots will quickly rot and the decomposed organic matter will amend the garden soil.  It opens up passageways for rain water and air flow.  The tunnels that the roots opened will help earthworms as they move throughout the soil and finally the roots will feed soil microbes.  Overall, it is a win-win to leave the roots in the soil.

The okra plants themselves are another story.  Some of them were ten feet tall.  After I chopped them down, I piled them in the back of the garden.  I'll cover them with piles of wood chips mixed with some cow poop and allow them to decompose for a year or so.

Once things in the garden were vibrant with a multitude of colors from bright zinnias to the green okra.  Now, everything is dull and drab and dead.  Not for long, though.  The sugar snap peas are growing and are beginning to trellis.  Soon they'll be blooming and there will be more color in the garden.

Making Biochar for the Garden in 2019

We have live oaks, water oaks, and pecan trees in our yard and pasture.  They are forever dropping limbs.  We have to pick up sticks in the whole yard before we mow the grass.  There is rarely a time that we don't have at least two 'burn piles' stacked up.  I'm so glad that we live in the country and can burn things when we need to.  We like to sit around the fire pit in the fall and winter and just gaze into the fire.  It's so relaxing.

Time to get rid of this burn pile by the tree.

If you've followed us for any time at all, you know that we are steadfast and focused about improving soil health.  We compost everything that will decompose.  Benjamin caught a fat possum in a trap last night and finished him off with his .22.  He's digging a deep hole in the garden now to "plant" Mr. Possum - Kind of like the Indians buried a fish with their corn planting...

Well, we're in year 3 of making bio char, and that's what we'll be doing in the post today.  Bio Char is also called Terra Preta or "black earth."  Long ago in the Amazon basin, people used terra preta as a soil amendment.  They buried smoldering sticks and organic materials into the soil.  The benefits include the boosting of soil fertility, improving yields, increasing the soil's capacity of water retention, and housing beneficial soil organisms.

Well, let's make some of that!  How do you make it?  Let's get started.  First start a fire.

Come on baby, light my fire

After the fire has burned a little while - enough to burn into coals, but not long enough to turn to ash, stop the process by quickly soaking down with a water hose.  Spray until it no longer smolders.  You can take a shovel and chop into charcoal-sized pieces.

Charcoal

If you looked very closely at the pieces of burned wood, you'd see microscopic, porous holes.  When incorporated into the soil, these become little condominiums for beneficial soil microbes.  I just keep burning and spraying, making batch after batch of bio char until my burn pile is gone.  It is replaced with a mineral bucket full of bio char.

My old trench shovel works perfectly for this.

Now you might think we're done, but if you amended this into your soil now, you'd have problems.  Bio char acts as a sponge and soaks in all soil nutrients and holds them.  If you'd plant into soil with un-inoculated bio char, your plants would be stunted and sickly.  It is best to pre-charge your biochar.  Here's how we do it.  We mix in cow poop.  It is full of bacteria that will inhabit the porous spaces in the bio char.  I mix it all together real good.

Stirring the Poop

I add a layer of bio char and then a layer of poop.  A layer of bio char and then a layer of poop.  Repeat until you fill up the bucket.

When I've exhausted the cow poop supply, I fill the poop bucket with water and shake and scrub the sides down.  Then I pour the poop/water slurry on top of each of my buckets of pre-charged bio char and let the 'poop soup' filter through the layers.

I'll let the buckets sit for a few weeks and fester.  You don't want to rush things.  When the time is right, I'll work this into the garden soil.

Bio char is stable and rich in carbon and can stay in the soil for thousands of years.  I am hoping the Lord returns soon, but if He tarries, we'll continue building healthy soil and will continue being good stewards of His Creation.  Making bio char is just one more way to accomplish that.  God Bless!

Summer Garden - Almost Done

This weekend I had ambitious plans in the garden.  I wanted to work up some rows and plant a few more things.  First I moved the electric netting fence 10 feet back. You can notice the grass on that side.  I'll let the goats in there to eat it.  On July 4th I plan to pull up 4 hills in there and plant four types of pumpkins.  You can also see the Louisiana Purple Sugar Cane growing tall.  It is really healthy.  The other day I cut off a section with my pocket knife and ate the can.  Wow!  It was so sweet and delicious!

 Next, I moved the "metal mulch" off of the ground that I wanted to work and placed it on the garden walkway.  The ground under the metal mulch was soft and moist.  I could tell it was going to be easily workable.  So I got my garden spade and got busy.  I finally got it done.

I pulled up two rows and planted one row of white buckwheat on the last row you see on the left.  I'm trying a new experiment with buckwheat as a cover crop/green manure.  I intend on turning it under when it begins to bloom.  Buckwheat is a "miner" that pulls nutrients from deep within the soil so they will be available for future crops.  I like to eat buckwheat, though, and may try to grow some for grain.  We'll wait and see how it goes.

The other row, I planted multicolored zinnias from seeds I saved from last year.  I just thought it would be good to have some color in the garden.  It will be nice to pick flowers for a bouquet for my wife.  The next row is a row of black-eyed peas.  Then the row on the right is a row of okra that contains 3 varieties: Clemson Spineless, Burgundy, and Beck's Big Okra.



On the other side of the garden (the north side), I planted a row of sunflowers.  You can see them popping up below.  These were from some seeds from 2010.  The germination after nine years was about 100%!

And here are some cantaloupes:

Here is another row of sweet corn.  This variety is an heirloom, Stowell's Evergreen.

Here is some Burgundy Okra.  You can see the burgundy veins in the leaves.  They produce a burgundy-colored pod.  I notice something is eating on some of the leaves.

Here is a zoomed in photo of the blackeyed peas.

What I didn't have pictures of are the birdhouse gourds, luffa gourds, and butternut squash that I also planted.  I also planted three varieties of green beans since my early crop didn't do well.  I don't know how they'll handle the heat, but I'm giving it a shot. They are all popping out of the ground now.  As I said, I intend to plant four varieties of pumpkins on July 4th and that will complete my planting until early August when I put in the fall potato crop.

Preparing For the Spring Garden with... Metal Mulch

Several years ago I watched The Back To Eden Film to learn about a neat gardening technique.  The Back To Eden Gardening method is one that Paul Gautschi tells about in the Back to Eden Film link I provided above.  You can watch an informative free movie that explains it by clicking the link, but essentially, the gardening method seeks to re-create the habitat and environment that naturally occurs in the forest.  (Created by God, of course) 

Ever notice how you don't have to water (or weed) the wild berries that you pick each year?  That's because God takes care of it.  Paul Gautschi explains how to use wood chips and mulch in your garden to preserve moisture in the soil and crowd out weeds.  I don't have a readily accessible source of wood chips, but I've used hay to mulch to pretty much achieve the same effect in our garden. 

This fall, however, with no wood chips and no hay, I've resorted to using another mulching material, not so much to plant crops in, but to prepare the soil for spring planting.  This mulching material is not biodegradable, but it does serve a purpose.  It's "metal mulch!"  Let me explain...

After building our barn, we had a lot of leftover tin, consisting of 3 foot sections of tin that we didn't have a use for.  I'll be the first to admit it's not aesthetically pleasing,but it works.  Below you can see how I'm using it.

I've spread out the tin to be used as a ground covering.  The barrier cover of tin on the ground will crowd out any weeds, smother and kill them, and not allow any sunshine through to allow weed seeds to germinate.

Below is an example of the soil condition you'll find beneath the tin when you pick it up after a few weeks:

See how there are no weeds underneath?  Another bonus is that the soil beneath the metal mulch is moist and arable.  The soil can be easily turned over with a shovel and worked into rows for planting.

The photo above shows the area in the walkway of the garden that we picked up the tin from to place in the center of the garden where we'll be planting onions.  If we didn't have the tin laid out, rhizomes from bermuda grass would have run into the garden and created a situation that would have made preparing the seed beds exceedingly difficult.

Come springtime, we'll compare the area covered with metal mulch to the area that has grown up in winter grass.  It will be evident which method is superior.  Even if you don't have leftover tin to use, you can do this with leaves, wood chips, a tarp, cardboard, newspapers, or any other item to re-create the same situation.