The Ever-Shrinking Wood Chip Pile

At the southernmost part of our garden lies a big pile.  In the past it was 50% bigger.  It was wood chips and over the last two years the wood chips have decomposed.  We got these chips from a company that was chipping up trees from electrical powerline right of ways.  The wood chips were free (other than for a few dozen eggs we gave the workers).

The wood chips were once trees.  Those trees pulled nutrients and minerals from the soil.  Now those same trees are slowly deteriorating and becoming soil from which they grew, returning fertility to the land.  The wood chip pile is not dead.  It is teeming with earthworms, bugs, and mushrooms.  Those living organisms help to break down the wood chips.

While you can still tell that there are wood chips in the pile, a good portion of the wood chips are broken down.

Some parts of the pile look almost entirely like dirt, soft, rich, and moist - a perfect medium for plants in a healthy garden.  As the seedlings grow, we rake a 4" layer of this around the plants to discourage weed growth and encourage the retention of soil moisture.

We also bury our compost in the pile.  This adds bacteria to speed up decomposition.  As evidence of the fertility of the wood chip pile, I have several healthy plants growing in the pile from seeds deposited along with the compost.  How about that?  Gardening in which you don't even have to plant the seeds!

Here we have a Butternut Squash and a Charleston Grey Watermelon.

Here we have a plethora of Muscadine Grapes growing.

Here we have a luffa gourd plant.

And finally, here are three peanut plants.

We'll check in on these plants to see if they are able to reach maturity.  As our inventory of wood chips morphs into rich soil, we'll have to keep our eyes open to accumulate more wood chips to keep the process going.