Simone Schlich

Wonderful suggestions coming up, do keep in mind that you may want to take extra caution with certain plants such as Comfrey, St John's Wort, Mint families as they love to expand and are hard to get rid of... containment planting would be great for these plants within your garden :)

Hello Skandi!  Aha I see what you are referring to, sorry I misunderstood and I will look more into this. I can make a manure compost pile if necessary, this would also assure enough time for potential pathogens etc to leave the manure and speed up what I can plant in the following years. Thanks.  

Good evening Skandi,
Doing drainage testing referring to horsetail is a great idea, could be why they are fond of one area of the garden. I bet there could be some specific soil remediation there to help with that.
As for the pigs, here is the suggested or legal square feet/ pig "The University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine recommends a minimum of 10 square feet per pig for those over 250 pounds. In a well-drained lot with sandy soil pigs this size need a pen with a minimum size of 10-feet-by-10-feet each."  
I would never even dream of keeping pigs in such a tight space! Instead giving them 500 sq/ft each (or 1000sq/ft together) for running full speed, so they will be just fine in a space bigger than my current house :) I think this is just a misunderstanding in measurements! Anyways, I do assure you my animals are always under good care, but I appreciate your concern for them and the ground beneath.

Thank you KC, I am liking what I am hearing! I'll post a couple pics in summer :)

Thanks Phil, I could see this being useful for some areas of the garden for sure, and potentially even let me get something planted there this season! If it still needs further help under the cardboard/chips next year... well, this is a multi year project so :)

Going to be taking on the grand task of a reviving a large garden (1000 sq/ft) which has been left to grow over for 6 years. Containing well rooted grasses, horsetail, clover etc.  I know there are no easy answers here but what are people's experiences with this? My plan is to keep 2 pigs this summer, rotating them in small areas with water to loosen the soil and hope they root some of it up... cover crop with peas or rye and till under, and replant or cover. At this point a tractor tilling would have difficulty so I have been advised to loosen first or hand dig areas. I am not adverse to hard work, I know there will still be much hand digging in there but any tips are welcome! I would prefer not to "cover for 2 years with plastic" instead to get this project rolling this summer so that it will be somewhat usable in 2021. I am in the Kootenays, BC, so ground will be frozen till mid April. Thanks!