Can anyone address or voice an opinion on the following:
I live along a fairly busy township road (40 mph) that is essentially level with my yard. I am playing with the idea of building a hugelkultur mound along the road (with a drainage ditch in front of it). My question is this: Since this mound will be right next to the road and just behind the drainage ditch that will collect the road runoff, should I be concerned that the road yuck will be absorbed into the wood at the bottom of the hugelultur mound and adversely affect anything planted in the mound? The mounds purpose will be to be a living fence along my property so people driving by aren't able to look across my whole yard. Are their plants that are better able to deal with this stuff?
Road salt is the only thing that I can think of that will adversely affect your hugelkultur mound. The large amount of fungi living in the mound will take care of everything else. You could plant the area where the drainage ditch transitions to the hugelkultur with plants that are known for their phytoremediation properties. Here is a reference that talks about different species used in phytoremediation.
