Permaculture? What is it? Well I’m still learning to answer that question for myself, but basically it’s designing our environment more like nature. When we mimic nature our gardens will thrive and be more self sustaining. We help the soil along by providing more materials like compost, clippings, mulch and in the case of Hugelkulture we bury wood.

It is my goal to use my farm in a more sustainable way. Or as a gardening buddy of mine on Google+, +Dan Grubbs,  says “regenerative”. The idea of restoring our land to a more fertile and fruitful existence.

This is all new to me too. I’m learning right along side you. Here is my first experiment with Hugelkulture. As the experiment goes along I’ll add pictures and video to this post. So, bookmark it and come back! 🙂

Watch this video 🙂

Starting the Hugelkulture Bed – Daddykirbs Garden Blog

Daddykirbs Garden: Hugel Bed #2 Logs covers with mulch – view from the South

Daddykirbs Garden: Hugel Bed #2 Logs covers with mulch – view from the North

Daddykirbs Garden: Hugel Bed #2 Covered with first layer of dirt

Daddykirbs Garden: Hugel Bed #2 Layered with horse manure compost

Daddykirbs Garden: Hugel Bed #2 Layered with horse manure compost – view from the South (Awesome shot of my beautiful little ‘bota in the background)

Daddykirbs Garden: Hugel Bed #2 Layered with horse manure compost

Daddykirbs Garden: Hugel Bed #2 Final layer of mulch/dirt blend.

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This garden area that I have is fantastic! There is a 32 foot square fenced in with a cute gate…. but it’s empty. Last year I tried a couple of different methods. I used an old raised bed that was there and that worked fine, but it wasn’t enough and wasn’t laid out how I wanted it.

Chicken feed bags was the another method that I tried out. This seemed appropriate to me since I have lots of bags and it was more of a mobile solution. I figured I could move the bags around as needed since there was not a clear plan for the garden.

There were a few challenges with the bags. One, they didn’t hold water like they needed too. It’s hot in Texas and the bags dried out too fast. Another challenge in Texas is the bright damaging sun. Those bags broke down pretty fast. By the end of the season they were brittle and flaking all over the place.

Those methods worked ok… I got some produce out of them. But, it was not that good.

This year I’m investing in making the garden more usable and productive. There are raised beds for the family and the kids that want them… they have their own. There is also a greenhouse going in. It’s small, but should be fine for seed propagation and over wintering the lemon tree.

Here is a snapshot of the raised beds:

New Raised Beds – Daddykirbs Garden Blog

Here is a video of the garden as it transitions from empty to useful.

It’s worth noting that I did plan on lining the bottom of the entire garden with carpet. My thoughts on that were that the carpet would be a weed block barrier. In my original thought process it made sense. I figured that the beds would be full of good dirt so it didn’t matter that they would be on carpet.  Well, after some exchange on the Google+ community, Hobby Farms: Growing Food & Families, that I moderate, I changed my mind. It was mentioned how dangerous it could be to have the chemicals breaking down and getting into my vegetables. This is called “leaching”… I’m not sure how much of it really happens and how BAD it really is, but I figured it’s better to err on the side of caution. I really do appreciate the warnings and comments that were made.

Here is a YouTube playlist that show my videos of my garden before this makeover:

Daddykirbs’ Gardening Playlist

Buy Greenstalk Vertical Gardens! http://lddy.no/25if 
(affiliate link - Daddykirbs Farm. Thank you.)
Coupon Code DADDYKIRBS to get up to $10 off!