Hoogle on a slope! :o)

Hi everybody!

Well, i live in the mountains, where teraces (agricultural ones http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrace_(agriculture)) are still aparent.

And something clicked into my head, while i was at the top of the chairlift, looking at the ones on the other side of the valley.

Huggelkultur and terraces could mary well on steep terrain, where it wouldn't fit well otherwise.

Don't know if someone has thought about it before. But, may be just bringing this idea back up front could help some others.

Hi there. That's exactly what I'm doing on a steep slope with crappy clay soil. First I built a hugel/swale. The strawberries, asparagus, and horseradish seem to like it. The overflow goes into the first terrace where Egyptian onions, strawberries, and rhubarb reside. The second and much larger terrace is still in production.
It was so steep I drove cedar stakes in every few feet. Then came the wood with larger pieces at the bottom with small ones as the hill ascends. So yep, it works! I'll bet yours will too.

Hey Scott, you care to put up a list of what grows best near the top/bottom, downhill vs uphill side, or maybe sunny side vs shady side. I'm starting my first hugel swale now. And to top it off, this will be my first attempt at gardening. Any help would be awesome. Thanks!

Hi guys!

Well Scott, i'm nowhere near ready. Land is extremely expensive where i live.

One question, did you do drystone walls on your beds? That's what i would be keen on

Hey guys, sorry for the late response. The only thing I took into account when deciding what to put on each terrace was how the plant spread. I didn't want to put self seeding plants near the top. I figured since they are all connected as the seeds washed down the hill they'd show up everywhere.
Satamax, I did use some stone under my hugel/swale but not much. The stone is only the foundation along the outside. On the outside of those is where I hammered in the cedar stakes. Just for fun I ran fresh muscadine vines in a web pattern between the stakes prior to adding the soil. Hoping the vines would take root but no such luck. The big advantage I had is it's really easy to make a water retention swale in Carolina clay.

Hey Spencer, sorry I didn't answer your question. What I've built looks like a traditional terrace when looking uphill at it. As you know a hugelkulture is two sided, mine are not.

When i was talking about stones, here's what most of the terraces end up looking like in france

http://a142.idata.over-blog.com/0/48/18/23/Auzat-Carolle/16-Terrasses-de-Carolle-copie-1.jpg

http://www.france-voyage.com/visuals/photos/ardeche/preview/vallee-de-l-eyrieux-09.jpg

http://nylisland.n.y.pic.centerblog.net/13479e88.jpg

It's actualy hard to find pics of what we have usualy here. Because it's not impressive and it's messy, people don't take pics of theses

I understand what you're talking about now. I like that look very much but that's not how mine are. If it ever stops raining I'll take some pics of mine and post on this thread.

This is very cool looking but... the top of the terrace isn't flat. wouldn't the water run right down? I mean it would go downslope slower than if the terraces weren't there but I wonder why they aren't flat.

Thoses are mainly meant to hold soil in place. Mind you, there's some places where they are shalower at the back so they get to retain more water. Mind you, if they retain too much, the walls won't hold the ground, and everything will slide down the hill side I think it's all a mater of equilibrium, with the area you are working in.

Hey Satamax. This is a photo of my work in progress terraces. The top one is a swale with a hugel bed as the dam. The next two are hugel terraces. So far so good. Will be making improvements as needed.

These are older pics of the swale/hugel/terrace. I've since made improvements but you'll get the idea. I hope these help. So far everything is growing very well. If you like I'll post photos of things as they progress.

Yep, intresting stuf!

Cj Verde wrote:

This is very cool looking but... the top of the terrace isn't flat. wouldn't the water run right down? I mean it would go downslope slower than if the terraces weren't there but I wonder why they aren't flat.

By the looks of the photo, these terrace's are large (notice the door to a cellar in one), which gives them opportunity to hold a lot of moist ground, and by the look of the greenery in general and on the cliff face (and the fact that the cliff face will generate run-off and condensation), I would say that retaining moisture is not the reason for creating these particular terraces. My thought is that these terraces are to create ag/pasture land on a slope that would probably have eroded without all that work to make some more level-ish surfaces, as Satamax alluded to. They may have been built with non-flat surfaces in order to purposely shed excess water, as the ground may be perpetually damp. As Satamax mentioned, this would be a hazard if saturated.

Beautiful pic.