Arizona Cypress Are the tannins in the wood a problem for Hugel culture?

Blair Jones wrote:I am in the initial stages of planning my first backyard nursery/vegie farm, and want to include hugel culture. I am in Southern Cali high desert, so want to use as little water as possible. Last year, I put in a traditional vegie garden, watered everyday in the early morning hours, and everything did fine. But, after reading about Hugel culture, I would really like to test this idea out, take lots of pics of my baseline (traditional method) garden, and my Hugel culture garden.
I am cutting out a lot of dead and green branches from some Arizona Cypress, so have a lot of it that I could use to try in my first Hugel culture project. Will the tannins in this wood make it a bad wood for Hugel culture? I was told this subject has come up many times, but have not been able to find it, even after staying up reading till 3am this morning.

Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks

DeeAnn Downing wrote:Hi Blair,
I can't speak directly to that, but it probably depends on what you want to grow. It may make a more comfy soil culture to plants that prefer more acidic soil than our western soils offer.

dee in utah

So, it might work for say, blueberries?

Blair

Blair Jones wrote:William,
Thanks for responding. Let me be sure I understand you correctly. You did put the smaller branches of pine into your trench or hill for the hugel culture? Did you put some other wood at the bottom of your hill? What did you plant there when it was completed?

And how did that turn out?

William James wrote:

Blair Jones wrote:William,
Thanks for responding. Let me be sure I understand you correctly. You did put the smaller branches of pine into your trench or hill for the hugel culture? Did you put some other wood at the bottom of your hill? What did you plant there when it was completed?

And how did that turn out?

Here's the pic of it when I set it up:
https://permies.com/t/9373/permaculture/Raised-Bed-Hugelkultur-vs-Natural

It has a straw-bale ring.

I double dug pretty deep (20cm-ish) and set the small cypress branches at the bottom. I put a little other wood (pomegranate) in there (even smaller branches). Then a bunch of half-composted kitchen scraps, cypress leaves, and random green garden cuttings. Then (to address the problem of nitrogen-deficiency) I dumped about a half-garbage can full of manure on top.

I planted some stuff, but it died (manure too strong). Then some weeds from the manure sprung up (wrong kind of manure-cow-bad stuff) and so I chopped that down and put it in the compost pile. I then planted daikon, and it seems to be holding strong.

Few of my problems so far are due to the cypress wood that's in there. We'll see how things go this spring. Should get a PH reading on that, but I'm lazy and things grow well enough. Plan to move it slightly with a fork and plant lettuce, basil, and some few daikons to get some OM in there.

The over-winter daikons in all 4 beds are doing well. I followed more or less the same recipe with all of them. I broke my own no-till rule because I needed to get in there and see if there was cement or other crap that was inhibiting growth. Found some cement and other junk.
W

Blair Jones wrote:

DeeAnn Downing wrote:Hi Blair,
I can't speak directly to that, but it probably depends on what you want to grow. It may make a more comfy soil culture to plants that prefer more acidic soil than our western soils offer.

dee in utah

So, it might work for say, blueberries?

Blair

Blueberries are a possibility for acidity. What is it in the cypress logs that you think will inhibit growth of other plants? Does the bark have allelopathic properties? Actually, what grows around the trees in its native setting? I am unfamiliar with this tree but will look into it.

Blair Jones wrote:I understand the tree bark has tannin in it. Where they are growing, they are stand alone for a windbreak, so that won't be an indicator here.

Blair Jones wrote:I just checked, and the Arizona Cypress in NOT toxic to nearby plants.

Blair Jones wrote:Yes, the ground around them is completely barren, and the previous owner says that when there was pasture maintained up to them, there were circles under them where the pasture did not grow.