hugel type berms or raised beds..

well as i've said we heat with wood, lots of wood..and hubby saves the bark, char and ash.

last week i built a berm in the garden, or raised bed i guess..i buried about 100 # of bark under 4 tractor bucket loads of pond dreg dirt..will be framing this bed in with some scrap posts..

this morning (it was 82 out so i'm back in ..i was getting really hot and tired)...i used a fork and dug the quackgrass and weeds out of a 8 or so by about 12 to 16 foot area and Ron hauled out to the garden 7 40 # bags of bark that he had saved for me over the winter.

so far i have buried 2 of the bags (emptied out of the bag cause the bags had plastic in them and we can reuse them again)..i raked all the loose soil off and down about 6" and then filled the area with the bark and then raked the soil back over..the soil isn't really thick on these beds..maybe 4 to 6 "..not sure if i'll be able to plant in the soil itself or will have to dig actual planting holes into the bark and fill with more soil and compost to have enough root room to plant.

after resting..maybe not todday..i'll go back out and work on burying the other 5 40 # bags of bark..getting the rest of these beds readfy before the rains come in early next week....i still need to repair the irrigation system  so i can water everything really good first too..not exactly what i should plant in these berms/ beds.. i have other beds too that are already prepared..but these new ones will be part of my permanent fruit/veg/orchards garden area..

input would be appreciate..

i have my garden seeds here and ready to go..will be planting my cold weather crops in Michigan here next week i guess..should have done them earlier but this was an exceptionally warm March we had..above normal temps and no rain or snow..

What are your cold waether crops do you plant out  now cabbages? I have never tried vegetable gardening till this year. agri rose macaskie.

Rose, I finishe up several of the beds, not all as we turned wet here.

I planted out several of my cold weather crops just before the rainy season started..so they got in and now they have had lots of water (we actually have snow today).

here is a list of the seeds that I have planted outside here already:

Bulls blood beets, Mesclun ..classic mix...sweet salad mix and green party mix, Giant nobel Spinach, Mr. Big Peas, Wong Bok Cabbage, Fordhook Giant Swiss Chard, Kale Blue Dwarf Curled Vates, Kohlrabi early white Vienna, Oregon Sugar Podded II Peas, Broccoli Calabrese (might have pushed that), Cabbage Babies Triplett (3 kinds), Carrot Sweetness III, as well as 2 blueberry plants Elliot, flowers: Mignonette Machet, Kiss-me-over-the-garden-gate, forget me nots, poppies Berris n Cream and Bridal silk and Blackk swan, Calif poppies apricot chiffon, Holllyhock Pastorale and Country Romance and columbine Harlequin

all of the seed packets said plant outside as early as soil can be worked..some said plant late winter or early spring so seeds can be chilled..

I still don't do tener plants until June here in Michigan

I also did get more of the bark buried in some beds and got my irrigation system fixed..but with 7 days of rain and snow and standing water everywhere, guess that wasn't a priority

  they say that in huggle culture beds the wood turns into full of water wood i htought this might mean there was a chance of wtering less in a hot country if the object is to have a water store in your bed i would have thought that it woild not work much the first year their would be a point in getting the bed made way befoer planting season.
  i wonder do germans bury new wood to lessen the chance o funwanted deseease or can you really put anyonld wood in the bed.

    I take it cold weather plants are the ones you can plant when its still cold then some ones for next winter like beetr abd cabbage and others like lettuce for the summer.
      What are  tener plants? agri rose macaskie. 

tener plants are the fact that the letter d on my computer as well as the letter n work about half of the time so i intended to type TENDER

cool or cold weather crops are those that can be planted "as soon as the soil can be worked" in the spring...they are also planted often as a fall crop..which i'll do again for fall..so i have the same type of plants growing then

tenDer crops are the ones that will freeze if we have a frost snap or that just won't grow in cold soil.

Rose it amazes me what will grow here when the soil is still cold..and when there is still snow on the ground..

we had snow on the ground this past week..and the vinca, daffodills, minor bulbs and violets were blooming with their faces poking thru the snow..how wonderful..also the perennials in my flower gardens are already up 6to 8 inches in many cases with these lovely green leaves, sticking through the snow..the roses have leaves, the lilacs have leaves..and it was 27 degrees overnight.


yesterday i had a salad picked from the snow..arugula with green onions and violet leaves and blooms..was a tad bitter but it was lovely to have a green salad..the rest of my lettuces aren't up yet, enought to pick, but i ate swiss chard from last years plants last week..in a lovely chjicken and noodle dish..asparagus isn't up yet and haven't found any morels