Ashley Handy

It's true! I had forgotten all about this post. So sweet of you guys to dig it up and help me out! Haha! To be honest, I haven't seen this plant since....hmm.

Wow. I'm getting lots of good info here. I am glad you are sharing so much. I do plan to have animals one day, so this is good stuff to know

Thanks so much!!

I am totally with you on every bit of that

I would like to go more in depth with that information after I get them past the basics. I'm probably going to primarily have 2-5 year olds with hopes of having children ranging into their teens. I want to start really basic with everyone, so I was just looking to make sure if I say they should let most animal manures compost for at least one year that I wouldn't be too off base- haha!

Does anyone have a quick concise answer for how long you should let an animal's manure compost before adding it to the garden?

I'm going to be teaching some kids about using poop in the garden in a few weeks, and I just can't seem to narrow it down.

I want to first teach them which animals have good poop to use. The creatures I am including are rabbit, sheep, goat, cow, horse, worm, chicken, bat, alpaca, fish. Now I know composting the manures applies differently to livestock vs say worm or fish, but I want to throw in there that the manures need to compost for a while first. Is a year a safe measure to apply across the board you think?



Any advice or opinions?

Thanks guys!!! Free pine straw it is

We are planting three 4x8 raised beds at the local library where I work. I can get pine straw for free, but my husband feels like the wheat straw is superior. He thinks it is possible that over time the pine straw could create too much acidity in the beds.

Does any one have advice?

Bottom line, my garden wouldn't make for a pretty raised bed at the local library. Similarly, I wouldn't want to forage for dinner among the raised beds that look pretty in the public spaces around town.

Ha! Same! They actually do want me to plant vegetables. And as far as pretty goes, the way they explained is that they just don't want it to ever look abandoned. So I'm sure I can work with that.

Thanks for the advice. I have all sorts of things in my garden bed, but the ideas you gave me helped me put my limited space into perspective, so thanks for that! I have a tendency to just put things all over the place and just see what happens, and I don't get the impression I'll be able to do that here- haha!

Awesome!! So glad to have you in this forum!

So I have been told I am to be in charge of some raised beds we have created here at our local library where I work. I'm a little nervous, because I imagine their idea of a raised bed isn't going to be exactly like what I have at home....

Also, I am expected to keep it "pretty" all of the time? My first thought was, "Well I guess we could give it a good cover of clover." Haha!

So I suppose I was going to see if any one had any experience in melding together both their principles with the principle of a business to make a sustainable, pretty raised bed. I'm thinking we're going to be planting it ASAP, and I'm thinking that we're going to start out with some vegetables...maybe?

Anyhoo, I'm to receive more details later today. Any ideas?