Cam's First Hugelkultur Beds

I'm going to putting together some hugel beds this spring. I first read about hugelkultur in Gaia's Garden by Toby Hemenway. The idea sounded neat but I never got around to it until now. I'm going to do two 3' X 10' beds. This is because a 3' X 20' bed risked having one end shaded by a nearby tree. Today I broke ground, and got both trenches dug out around 1' deep. From there got a wheelbarrow full of horse manure to line the bottom.

The manure is going on the bottom because the ground I'm on is very sandy and water drains through it almost immediately. The idea is to pack a 6" layer of horse manure down to seal the bottom up a bit to retain water better. All the microbes in the manure will help speed the decomposition of the wood on top as well.

I've been taking photos as I go, and I've put together a GIF of what I've done so far. If I stick to it I'll have a nice long GIF at the end showing my hugels from beginning to the last layer being added. It should be neat!

Those 3x10 beds look like a lot of work.  Will you end up planting vegetables in these beds?

That is the plan. And yeah the digging I think was the hardest part and that is done, now they just need to be filled. I might change the order of the layers up a bit. These beds work great because the decomposing wood that goes in not only supplies nutrients, but helps to hold moisture that might otherwise evaporate or flow off. Over time all the decomposing layers generate a very healthy soil full of microbes and nutrients that plants thrive in.

I think I might be planting squash in these first, but I'm not 100% sure about that yet.

Looks good Cam. The animated gif idea is cool. We did something like that for a natural area restoration & preservation group I was once in. We permanently mounted some metal stands in various places for taking pictures from because we found it made a smoother animation & it was much easier to see subtle changes because the camera was always in the same position. I grew some squash at the base of a tall hugel during it's first season & produced some good squash. I would recommend using some compost or manure closer to the top layer for squash though. They love well composted cow manure. Fresh horse manure would probably work just as well.

Have you named it yet? I find it easier to converse with them if they have a name:)

Mike Barkley wrote:Looks good Cam. The animated gif idea is cool. We did something like that for a natural area restoration & preservation group I was once in. We permanently mounted some metal stands in various places for taking pictures from because we found it made a smoother animation & it was much easier to see subtle changes because the camera was always in the same position. I grew some squash at the base of a tall hugel during it's first season & produced some good squash. I would recommend using some compost or manure closer to the top layer for squash though. They love well composted cow manure. Fresh horse manure would probably work just as well.

Have you named it yet? I find it easier to converse with them if they have a name:)

Thanks Mike. Yes the tripod works very well for seeing the small changes. I've never done gifs like this before and it's a lot of fun. I'm really liking the stop motion feel I get from it.

And yes I talked with Kate some more and she mentioned some manure near the top will help things along. So the plans have changed from the initial drawing I just haven't put the changes into the drawing. Probably gonna make some more progress tomorrow!

Oh and as for naming...never crossed my mind lol. I might give it a try though. Maybe one can be Hugh and the other can be Gill. Hugh and Gill. Hugh Gill. I'm very clever aren't I.

Cam Haslehurst wrote:Maybe one can be Hugh and the other can be Gill. Hugh and Gill. Hugh Gill

Yes please. The more puns in the world the better.

haha That sounds perfect for the twins. My 7 foot tall PEP one is Humphrey (because it's a hump) & his friend is Bogart.

Glad you guys appreciate it. For the past 6 years or so on and off I've been working at a grocery store, and the opportunites for puns there are endless.

Song on that I like? Grab a jar of jelly and tell one of my coworkers that "this is my jam".
Why is the farfalle pasta stocked on the bottom shelf? Because if it was stocked on the top shelf it would be a farfalle to the floor. (This one is particularly cringy)
I call myself a grocery clerk and a professional boxer - I am breaking down boxes all the time after all.
If some oranges spill on the floor, I ask, "Orange you glad nothing else fell?"
When I'm in the juice section I'll occasionally ask coworkers if anyone has any juicy gossip while pointing at or holding a jug of juice.

Today I put the hugel in the hugelkultur beds.

At least I think hugel means wood in german. I could check but I'm pretty tired. Enjoy the gif! I'm on the way to a full beginning to end gif and I think it's gonna look darn cool.

At least I think hugel means wood  

Correct.

Mike Barkley wrote:

At least I think hugel means wood  

Correct.

Sorry to correct you both... but hugel shares the same etymology as hill. They both mean mound. The wood is not present in the name :-/

Lew Johnson wrote:

Mike Barkley wrote:

At least I think hugel means wood  

Correct.

Sorry to correct you both... but hugel shares the same etymology as hill. They both mean mound. The wood is not present in the name :-/

Damn. It was a good effort at least. No hills are there yet though that's for sure.

Really? WOW. Learn something new every day. Thanks.

Lew Johnson wrote:

Mike Barkley wrote:

At least I think hugel means wood  

Correct.

Sorry to correct you both... but hugel shares the same etymology as hill. They both mean mound. The wood is not present in the name :-/

Damn... as a professional linguist I had to double check myself... now I have to correct myself. They do not share an etymology. But the root words sound damn similar...

Most people probably won't care about this but I feel obliged to be accurate...

"hill" comes from the proto-indo-european root: *kl̥Hnís (“top, hill, rock”) and is cognate to the Proto-Germanic *hulliz (“stone, rock”)

"Hügel" comes from the proto indo-european root: *kewk- (“hill, elevation”) and and the Proto-Germanic *haugaz

I'm actually surprised that they don't share a common etymology because the sound changes seem obvious to me at first glance. I have been wrong before and will be wrong again.

Im glad I cam across this post! I am also looking to make a flat Hugel. I was wondering how deep you dug? I plan to add actual rotten tree trunks to mine so I suppose I would have to dig deeper. I need two beds: roughly 4x7 ft I was hoping to only dig 3-4 ft in.. but maybe deeper is required given the logs. Did you beds grow successfully? what did you grow in them?

Now that I understand the meaning behind Hugel I am embarrassed to say my subterranean project will not be a mound in theory so I suppose it is not a Hugel at all

Katherine Burelle wrote:Im glad I cam across this post! I am also looking to make a flat Hugel. I was wondering how deep you dug? I plan to add actual rotten tree trunks to mine so I suppose I would have to dig deeper. I need two beds: roughly 4x7 ft I was hoping to only dig 3-4 ft in.. but maybe deeper is required given the logs. Did you beds grow successfully? what did you grow in them?

Now that I understand the meaning behind Hugel I am embarrassed to say my subterranean project will not be a mound in theory so I suppose it is not a Hugel at all

I think I dug around 2 feet down, or maybe 1 1/2. Yes for full size logs you'd definitely need to dig deeper. Just a note: the reason I used sticks instead of logs is that the folks there had some previous experience with these beds. Another guy who lived there once made some hugel beds with full size logs. They are good now after a few years years, but the decomposition process definitely takes longer  than with sticks. That's not necessarily a downside though if you're time-rich. The issue they found with the big logs was that the gaps between the buried logs were big enough for rodents to move in. It wasn't a bad thing until veggies got planted on it and the seedlings were being munched before they could reach adulthood. By the sounds of it we did not have that issue with my Hugh and Gill as they were made with smaller sticks with very tight gaps in between them. Just so you know, as it looks like you're in a similar area to me!

I started with a blend of squash. I left early, but when I left there were a few acorn squash and some butternuts growing. They seem to do well in the first year of hugel growing. That's just me though. I think Kate told me it's year three where the hugels really explode in fertility, so that's something fun to look forward to.

And don't worry about them not being a 'real' hugel bed. I'll bet you'll have fun and enjoy digging and eventually enjoying some great food! All the best!