I live in Namibia. It's super dry here because I litterly live in a Desert and because of that I never tried gardening. But because of your videos I managed to amend my soil. I just started growing some kale and cabbages and carrots and they all seem to be doing really well.
I think you should start with native plants that just need good cover. This reduces water evaporation and increases the top layer of biomass followed by shade trees. You see, the secret to a healthy tree is the microbiome, so any shade-bearing plant is a good choice.
Thanks so much for sharing your method there - that's really comprehensive and appreciated. I didn't know that about apple leaves, so you've taught me something new today, thank you.
I just have to say THANK YOU Ben for providing me with much-needed therapy! You are cheerful and sweet and just what we need now in this crazy, often mean-spirited, self-absorbed world. If I've had a day full of mean and nasties, I just come home from work and soak in your kindness and warmth. My garden thanks you too for your inspiring ideas.
That is so kind of you to say Beth, thank you. We're a team here and together work hard to come up with useful but friendly content, and receiving feedback like this really makes all that hard work worth it. :-)
Other that adding compost in the spring and summer in the fall after most everything is done. I layer a mixture of leaves, straw, and grass clippings. By the spring there rotted down enough to turn them into the soil and ready for me to plant
Ben -- I am SO HAPPY to hear you spreading the word about composting directly in your planting beds. I have been doing this for years around the entire yard, and everything is thriving beyond my wildest expectations. Cheers from Albuquerque, New Mexico!
This was my 3rd year on my sandy garden (re-claimed lake bed). Each year I've increased my production of homemade compost and leaf mold, and this year I was able to cover almost all my garden beds with one or the other! It's exciting! The soil had almost no nutrients in 2019, but it's gotten better each year.
How satisfying to see it gradually increase like that. It will be unrecognisable in a few more years I'm sure - those gradual additions of organic matter make such a dramatic difference after a few years.
Me too! Started out in 2018 with weeds sandy gravel / rocks & boulders. First half-decent harvest this year. Covering my plot with manure/compost/leaf mould is an ongoing problem of my energy & supply. Im still waiting for my local farmer (just round the corner) to deliver a few tractor bucket loads of manure but they're dealing with a burst mains right in their farmyard!! I just cant make enough compost and the neighbours not making their own wouldnt oblige. Havent the area to mow/chop up leaves to speed up leaf litter & only room for one cage. Green manure is a help.
@@lsb9073 Sounds like cover crops would be a good idea if your season is long enough to put them in before or after the food crops. If you need to chop leaves, stick a weed-whacker in your cage. It works pretty well. Good luck transforming your gravel!
That's a positive step. I have sandy soil and bought a farm truck that dumps and went to places that had manure (Craig's list) and got it either free or for small amount. Did this for several years and now do as you do; mulch leaves in the fall on the soil and add worm compost on the surface or in trenches before planting on top of it.
Great ideas! I used to amend my garden beds mostly with bagged chicken and steer manure because it was the cheapest way to do so when I first got into gardening. Now I have multiple compost bins and a large trash can filled with leaf mold so I don’t have to buy compost very often anymore. I try to feed my soil from a variety of sources in the hopes of providing many different nutrients for diverse soil life. Home made compost, leaf mold and glass clippings are my most commonly used amendments, and I don’t do any tilling - I just set it on top and let the soil life work it in over time.
I chopped my banana waste and mulch over my vegetables beds and fruit trees. Earthworms love it and you can easily see them everywhere. Many uses even the root balls can be made into liquid fertilizers.
I 10/10 recommend this channel to those who are interested in gardening AND even those who are not. You will learn something about SOMETHING, and get a great healthy laugh from a great loving life guy.
The little pot trench idea is inspired! Feel very privileged that my mums pony and donkey cost her a fortune to feed and I get to enjoy the free manure.... try and reimburse her in home grown veg!
the "lasagna garden" concept really does work .... just layer in grass clippings, leaves, kitchen scraps, cardboard, wood chips, etc. all winter and by planting time, you'll have lovely, plant-ready soil. I have been throwing a bag or three of commercial soil (bought at Lowe's) on top as extra insurance, but I really don't think I need do that anymore. I'm going to try going without next May. Thank you for another informative and fun video!
I'm trying this to fill some deep raised beds. I've been struggling with gardening post covid (I had to give up my allotment) so I'm trying to find ways to get fulfilling results using less energy and with less bending down due to vertigo (dizziness.) Buying enough compost would cost far too much, so I'll build up 'lasagne' layers throughout winter then top the beds off in spring to get the plants going.
Raised rows with mulch in the valleys and compost tea will give you more harvest per square foot than you can handle. I was hired to build a garden for a botanist that was responsible for tripling the yield of the community garden and that was how she designed it. Simply and effective. I used the method to grow some outrageous outdoor oregon reefer 😎
I live in dry hot Southern California. It’s awful. Very urban. I have 1 deciduous tree. A solitary silver maple. I blow the fallen leaves down my driveway and into the veg patch weekly. The chickens stir it up and I water as normal all winter to support life in it. I don’t let it sit naked that’s fo’ sho’. LOVE your channel. Sooo helpful and achievable.
The compost pits have been the best method for me since I live in town and have close proximity to my neighbors. Its worked wonderfully for me and it doesn't smell or attract vermin. In the warmer months especially if I dig it back up a month later theres almost no evidence that I ever put anything there.
At last! My heart is warmed 🔥 by someone talking about the importance of the health of soil. It’s our very body, what feeds and grows us. Sequesters carbon dioxide and stores water. If we could all get our governments to truly understand the critical need for healthy soil, our climate and our health would improve 🙏🏼 Yay 🎉for Ben 🫶🏼
A dilute solution applied some time before eating shouldn't leave much of a trace. But you are right to be cautious, and this is perhaps safest used on the parts of the plant you won't be eating.
I am trying field beans and peas as green manure this year for the first time. I didn’t realise about not letting them flower or set seed, so thanks for the tip.
Do these "Field Beans" have another name? I'm not sure I have ever heard of them nor seen them in any nursery, garden centre, etc. Would plain, Green Bush Beans do the same thing?
Another great video, thank you Ben. It’s always important to know about your soil and what we can do to enrich it ready for the new growing season. I really love the way you present your videos, you are always so enthusiastic and encouraging. Kind regards. Gary
All being said, we just have to do it! There are many beneficial methods of composting and the outcome is practically the same. When I was a little boy I remember my neighbour used to trench compost every Fall. He had gardens that were the envy of the neighbourhood.
Thank you for the warning about aminopyralid damage in manure. So many gardeners have lost produce and damaged their soil by using contaminated manure. Even Charles Dowding was affected by it.
Again, another great video! I like the idea about planting the beans to provide nitrogen. I have always planted buckwheat late summer for the bees and soil.
I was collecting pea straw and the nursery suggested an old duvet cover to line your car boot it's a great idea. I got a black one. From an op. Shop. Enjoy your humor and wild animal!
Thanks, I can smell the gold in your video! There's this giant lime tree outside our house that the council has ignored pleas to trim. For 2-3 years I've just collected all the leaves and lay them over the raised flower beds now and mixing in kitchen scraps. Love seeing those WORMS.
Hi I'm an absolute novice, could you tell me if you gathered your leaves up and rotted them or did you just spread them on the garden as soon as they fell? Thank you.
@@mariannedarrow7227 I put them on the flower beds and just cover them with a little bit of soil. I also have a tumbling composter where I put leaves in mixed with kitchen. scraps. I also store some in large bags and I line larger containers with them before putting soil in - then they won't leak out. Have fun :)
I have lately practiced growing chickens and I noticed they do great job to the fertility of the soil. they bring eggs and also fertilize the soil for better larger crops.
Another lovely vid. Had a great laugh at the part about adding kitchen scraps where you say: '...It's important to cover it over, to stop it from being dug up by wild animals' and the face shot of the innocent looking dog right after 🤣
My kitchen waste I put in a compost bin and add red worms. Then in the spring I have mostly worm castings. When I add it to the raised bed garden there will young red worms and red worm eggs. It’s getting a double treatment.
I just planted my first green manure cover crop i( I soaked the seeds first since my soil is compact), covered by straw and leaves. I am on the learning curve.
Bed I use we rotted horse manure and chopped leaf mulch which I leave for a year. Also home made compost I make at the alloment. One I like to say bed about woodchip you carnt put pine chippings in beds as it will stop growth of things you plant pi e has within its self to stop anything growing. Any other chippings are fine. Great vid always look forward to the next one all the best.
I'm a big user of cover crops ... I like winter rye and hairy vetch best. The winter rye just looks like grass, but does a great job crowding out weeds, and is easy to mow down and turn back into the soil in spring. The vetch is pretty, and also easy to till in once I am ready to use that space.
I'm fortunate to live near the sea, so I harvest seaweed that's washed up on the beach. Leave it out in the rain for a couple of weeks to wash off any excess salt, then chop it up with a lawnmower, together with dried leaves, grass clippings, shredded cardboard or anything similar. Makes a great mulch.
Great episode again. Enjoy it very much. We're in Aus and I am using a worm farm to recycle about half of our composting material - the other half goes in to traditional compost bins.
First, I enjoy these videos very much. This particular one on soil management was very informative. If you don’t mind, I’d like to emphasize the importance which adding composted organic matter to garden soil has on improving soil texture and soil structure. This enhancement improves water retention and increases the ability of the soil matrix to adsorb and retain essential nutrients in the proximity of the plants root zone. Anyway, I wanted to share this tidbit of information while giving thanks to the makers of their videos.
Thank you so much for sharing that point Eric - and very true it is. You're really helping to feed the soil life that will support the plants you grow.
This year I have tilled everything into the garden. Then we added a layer of mown leaves and I tilled them in. Now we are adding another layer of the mown leaves as a cover. This way they are not too thick to till in when spring cones. Our Niece raises show rabbits and once a month I get her rabbit poop All winter long I add another layer of rabbit poop over the leaves, often between layers of snow, eventually covering the whole garden. Which when the snow melts and Spring comes i till it in with the compost from our bins. All summer long I use grass clippings as a mulch so that is some of what I tilled in this fall
We just spent this past weekend prepping our garden for next spring! You are so right - if you do it now, in the fall, you'll have a better growing season next year!
I dump stall cleanings (from the horse, goats, and chickens) directly onto the garden all winter long, stopping in early March. The heavy rains in our Maritime climate (helped by chickens foraging through the garden in winter) break everything down so it's ready for planting in Spring. I make sure to include stall bedding (urine-soaked wood pulp) as well as manure. The native soil here is gravel-over-clay, so amending it is vital to even move a shovel around in it.
My chickens get all my food scraps. I live in north eastern Florida on two acres and my yard is pretty much sand. I am hoping to start a Food Forest. Thank you for the info. This video was great!
I use grass clippings as mulch to conserve water and later work it in in the fall along with any compost or other amendments available. Normally throw down a lime treatment due to acidic clay soil. Use a rotary mower to chop up any remaining vegetation. Worm castings and bags of composted manure go into the seedbed row along with fish fertilizer type products during spring planting.
In addition to adding homemade compost in the spring and fall, I have been burying leafy veg and a bit of straw in the beds to help feed the worms living in our beds. I just push a small handful down into the loose soil to a depth of about 6 inches periodically here and there randomly throughout the beds. Now we find worms whenever we dig up potatoes, sweet potatoes, etc. We don't buy worm castings, because our beds are basically vermicompost bins themselves.
I lay down compost I make in November and cover with landscape material. No tilling I just use a pitch fork to aerate the soil. In the early spring I lay down shredded leaves that have been composting all winter. I grow microorganisms in a bucket and drench the soil. And cover again and let it sit for a couple of weeks until planting. This my second year doing this. Last years crop was the best ever. And it will only get better. Starting Bokashi this year and will be incorporating that also……
I use a multi- variety of green crops to tide my garden spots over winter. I cover seed with annual ryegrass, ladino clover, vetch, and buckwheat. The ryegrass overcovers the ground and holds the other seeds in place over the winter. Then the blossoms of the buckwheat, clover, and vetch go crazy in early spring, and the wild bees, butterflies, and mothbutterflies go crazy around it for a few weeks before I till it all under before the vetch makes mature seeds. It really improves the soil.Thanks!
@@GrowVeg Actually it has help the soil come a long way in a relatively short time period when it was only a woodlot. I still have "stump wars" and the grubs that follow those. Battling stumps and long roots. But, it is part of my yard now. Am really really lucky the soil is well structured already and just needed sustaining/sustainable nutrients in it. I try to use all the organic choices along the way. I even hand till it because I have seen the damage excessive power tilling will do to the structure. Right now the main two gardens are about a 1000 sqft. Am adding a little more tilled area this winter to prep for spring. Thanks!
Covering my earth bed with cardboard first, then shredded leaves. First time trying this method. 😬🤞🏼My bed has thrived the past several years with me doing absolutely nothing. 😆 Bare soil overwinter, never fertilizing, never amending. I’m having so much fun being out in the garden, and sourcing materials. I’m so nervous. It feels like I’m trying to fix something that isn’t broken, possibly messing up a good thing. 🥺 The only issue I’ve ever had with this bed is all the weeds and grasses, which is why I’m covering the bed this year…in hopes of drastically reducing weeds next season. The space under my peach and cherry tree, I’m going to cover with a thick layer of wood chips. My wood chips are definitely only single shredded, but I’m not complaining! They were free from a wood chip drop my friends and I shared.
Here on the North Atlantic seacoast, a lot of people gather seaweed that has washed up on the shore and add it to their gardens for the winter. Word is that it is golden! (Word also is that it may not be legal in some areas to take it away, so beware.)
20 years ago, we rented an old Victorian monstrosity in Portland OR. You could see places where outbuildings had been 150 years ago, but one such outline was the only really tomato-worthy place for sun. I got the soil tested, and it came back as contaminated with heavy metals. Apparently, 150 years ago, what they used for horses for colic or worming or something was mercury compounds (they sold such as "patent medicines" for humans at the time, too). The sunny patch had been the corral for the stables. I was very sad at the state of the soil. To sow in it, or even above it in a raised bed, it would require excavating and removing a meter down. I didn't have a garden there, except containers. Sometimes you can't build on a bad foundation of soil at all.
I put down straw over all of my beds. Then plus some organic fertilizer. Just brought home two bales of straw last night after work... and got straw all over the inside of the car 🙂.
You can either compost in situ - by piling kitchen scraps into pits or trenches and then covering them over with soil - great for where hungry plants like squash and beans will go. Or, of course, add them to the compost heap to break down first. I would make sure scraps are always covered to avoid attracting animals that might dig about.
I sometimes would do blender composting. You just take kitchen scraps and put them in a blender and liquify that then go outside dig a small hole and pour in the liquid. Y can dig it in or just let it be under some soil...
I live in Namibia. It's super dry here because I litterly live in a Desert and because of that I never tried gardening. But because of your videos I managed to amend my soil. I just started growing some kale and cabbages and carrots and they all seem to be doing really well.
That's wonderful - well done on getting such great progress already!
That's wonderful
Amazing! Well done man. Hope your growing is still going well ❤
I think you should start with native plants that just need good cover. This reduces water evaporation and increases the top layer of biomass followed by shade trees. You see, the secret to a healthy tree is the microbiome, so any shade-bearing plant is a good choice.
@@hautran9959 yep a good way to have good soil is to take notes from nature like forests and jungles etc
This man should have is own BBC garden shown on a Sunday morning. Down to earth and bad ass knowledge and experience that is shared.
It’s true! His energy is so upbeat and pleasant. Good info too. Plus he gets his hands dirty! ☺️
Agree! He's wonderful!!
Guys - stop, stop! You'll have my blushing! But thank you anyway, it's appreciated. :-)
@@GrowVeg 😊
I’m pretty sure he was the face of the Farmers Almanac RUclips site.
I laughed so hard at “this really is the 💩.” I was not expecting that from you 🤣😂🤣
Straight outta Compton, crazy mother f... etc... ;-)
Thanks so much for sharing your method there - that's really comprehensive and appreciated. I didn't know that about apple leaves, so you've taught me something new today, thank you.
@@GrowVeg oh, pls don't spoil it!
OMG!! Thanks to your comment I was prepared for it, but ... I still wasn't prepared for it 😂
He’s merely calling a spade a spade.
I take all my table scraps and pulverize them in a blender then pour them into my garden beds.
That's a great idea, i never thought of this. I will do this for sure. This will make it all break down quicker.
I just have to say THANK YOU Ben for providing me with much-needed therapy! You are cheerful and sweet and just what we need now in this crazy, often mean-spirited, self-absorbed world. If I've had a day full of mean and nasties, I just come home from work and soak in your kindness and warmth. My garden thanks you too for your inspiring ideas.
That is so kind of you to say Beth, thank you. We're a team here and together work hard to come up with useful but friendly content, and receiving feedback like this really makes all that hard work worth it. :-)
That's a lovely comment friend. Greetings from PEI.
You couldn't have said it better. Give back to soil for ALL that the soil has given us. Amen !
The soil needs some love back Jackie, it really does. :-)
Other that adding compost in the spring and summer in the fall after most everything is done. I layer a mixture of leaves, straw, and grass clippings. By the spring there rotted down enough to turn them into the soil and ready for me to plant
Ben -- I am SO HAPPY to hear you spreading the word about composting directly in your planting beds. I have been doing this for years around the entire yard, and everything is thriving beyond my wildest expectations. Cheers from Albuquerque, New Mexico!
Nice work. Yes, it's great isn't it!
This was my 3rd year on my sandy garden (re-claimed lake bed). Each year I've increased my production of homemade compost and leaf mold, and this year I was able to cover almost all my garden beds with one or the other! It's exciting! The soil had almost no nutrients in 2019, but it's gotten better each year.
How satisfying to see it gradually increase like that. It will be unrecognisable in a few more years I'm sure - those gradual additions of organic matter make such a dramatic difference after a few years.
Me too! Started out in 2018 with weeds sandy gravel / rocks & boulders. First half-decent harvest this year.
Covering my plot with manure/compost/leaf mould is an ongoing problem of my energy & supply. Im still waiting for my local farmer (just round the corner) to deliver a few tractor bucket loads of manure but they're dealing with a burst mains right in their farmyard!! I just cant make enough compost and the neighbours not making their own wouldnt oblige. Havent the area to mow/chop up leaves to speed up leaf litter & only room for one cage.
Green manure is a help.
@@lsb9073 Sounds like cover crops would be a good idea if your season is long enough to put them in before or after the food crops. If you need to chop leaves, stick a weed-whacker in your cage. It works pretty well. Good luck transforming your gravel!
That's a positive step. I have sandy soil and bought a farm truck that dumps and went to places that had manure (Craig's list) and got it either free or for small amount. Did this for several years and now do as you do; mulch leaves in the fall on the soil and add worm compost on the surface or in trenches before planting on top of it.
My mother buried food scraps all winter in our yard and garden, I'd forgotten about that. Thanks for the reminder, think I'll do that this winter.
Keep them in my raised beds. Feed the worms
Great ideas! I used to amend my garden beds mostly with bagged chicken and steer manure because it was the cheapest way to do so when I first got into gardening. Now I have multiple compost bins and a large trash can filled with leaf mold so I don’t have to buy compost very often anymore.
I try to feed my soil from a variety of sources in the hopes of providing many different nutrients for diverse soil life. Home made compost, leaf mold and glass clippings are my most commonly used amendments, and I don’t do any tilling - I just set it on top and let the soil life work it in over time.
It's great to let the soil life do the work for you - and they'll appreciate that too.
Glass clippings? 😂
I chopped my banana waste and mulch over my vegetables beds and fruit trees. Earthworms love it and you can easily see them everywhere. Many uses even the root balls can be made into liquid fertilizers.
I came here for the enthusiasm and positivity !
This guy has a nice style. He could easily be on TV.
What a great idea to bury scraps directly in the garden. Thanks
I 10/10 recommend this channel to those who are interested in gardening AND even those who are not. You will learn something about SOMETHING, and get a great healthy laugh from a great loving life guy.
Love the "wild animal" in his garden, wooof!
The little pot trench idea is inspired! Feel very privileged that my mums pony and donkey cost her a fortune to feed and I get to enjoy the free manure.... try and reimburse her in home grown veg!
That sounds like a fair deal to me!
‘Pockets of fertility’ … I love it! 💖
the "lasagna garden" concept really does work .... just layer in grass clippings, leaves, kitchen scraps, cardboard, wood chips, etc. all winter and by planting time, you'll have lovely, plant-ready soil. I have been throwing a bag or three of commercial soil (bought at Lowe's) on top as extra insurance, but I really don't think I need do that anymore. I'm going to try going without next May. Thank you for another informative and fun video!
The lasagna method is great Elizabeth, definitely.
I've done one. Worked great
i do the same, chop and drop, leaves, manure and let it rot down in the winter.
I'm trying this to fill some deep raised beds. I've been struggling with gardening post covid (I had to give up my allotment) so I'm trying to find ways to get fulfilling results using less energy and with less bending down due to vertigo (dizziness.) Buying enough compost would cost far too much, so I'll build up 'lasagne' layers throughout winter then top the beds off in spring to get the plants going.
Greeting from central Florida USA! I prepare my garden like this all year round. I grow veggies all year round.
Raised rows with mulch in the valleys and compost tea will give you more harvest per square foot than you can handle. I was hired to build a garden for a botanist that was responsible for tripling the yield of the community garden and that was how she designed it. Simply and effective. I used the method to grow some outrageous outdoor oregon reefer 😎
Great job - clearly improved the fertility of the soil in spectacular fashion!
Was the veg planted in the raised rows or the mulched valleys?
Planted on the highest part of the hump. Isn't that how it's done everywhere?
@@jaymzgaetz2006 That's why I'm thinking he meant plant in the mulched valley's.
I live in dry hot Southern California. It’s awful. Very urban. I have 1 deciduous tree. A solitary silver maple. I blow the fallen leaves down my driveway and into the veg patch weekly. The chickens stir it up and I water as normal all winter to support life in it. I don’t let it sit naked that’s fo’ sho’. LOVE your channel. Sooo helpful and achievable.
Sounds like you're doing all the right things there Karen - and your lovely chickens are doing there bit too.
The compost pits have been the best method for me since I live in town and have close proximity to my neighbors. Its worked wonderfully for me and it doesn't smell or attract vermin. In the warmer months especially if I dig it back up a month later theres almost no evidence that I ever put anything there.
It's a fantastic and easy way of building soil fertility and health for sure Amanda!
At last! My heart is warmed 🔥 by someone talking about the importance of the health of soil. It’s our very body, what feeds and grows us. Sequesters carbon dioxide and stores water. If we could all get our governments to truly understand the critical need for healthy soil, our climate and our health would improve 🙏🏼
Yay 🎉for Ben 🫶🏼
Completely agree. I don't think many of those in power understand just how important soil is for all those reasons!
Amazing. Also, your videos are so well made that they are ready to be shown on any TV. Thanks!
A dilute solution applied some time before eating shouldn't leave much of a trace. But you are right to be cautious, and this is perhaps safest used on the parts of the plant you won't be eating.
I am trying field beans and peas as green manure this year for the first time. I didn’t realise about not letting them flower or set seed, so thanks for the tip.
Do these "Field Beans" have another name? I'm not sure I have ever heard of them nor seen them in any nursery, garden centre, etc. Would plain, Green Bush Beans do the same thing?
@@kwicsociety9663 they are similar to fava beans
Yes, they may be sold as something else in the US. They are basically a type of fava bean, but sold specifically for cover cropping.
@@kwicsociety9663 try "broad beans" :)
Love this guy! So sensible and easy to listen to. Makes me excited to grow my veg!
Thanks so much! :-)
Nice presentation of soil treatment. Thank you for sharing this with everyone.
Another great video, thank you Ben. It’s always important to know about your soil and what we can do to enrich it ready for the new growing season. I really love the way you present your videos, you are always so enthusiastic and encouraging. Kind regards. Gary
That's very kind of you to say Gary, thank you. And thank you for watching. :-)
All being said, we just have to do it! There are many beneficial methods of composting and the outcome is practically the same. When I was a little boy I remember my neighbour used to trench compost every Fall. He had gardens that were the envy of the neighbourhood.
Thank you for the warning about aminopyralid damage in manure. So many gardeners have lost produce and damaged their soil by using contaminated manure. Even Charles Dowding was affected by it.
I think it's affected so many gardeners - a real cautionary tale.
Again, another great video! I like the idea about planting the beans to provide nitrogen. I have always planted buckwheat late summer for the bees and soil.
I was collecting pea straw and the nursery suggested an old duvet cover to line your car boot it's a great idea. I got a black one. From an op. Shop. Enjoy your humor and wild animal!
What a great idea. :-)
All your videos are the s--- 👍🏼 Thank you!
Cheers matey!
The element of surprise 😅 “this really is the 💩.” clever addition.
Thanks, I can smell the gold in your video! There's this giant lime tree outside our house that the council has ignored pleas to trim. For 2-3 years I've just collected all the leaves and lay them over the raised flower beds now and mixing in kitchen scraps. Love seeing those WORMS.
You know you're a true gardener when your heart sings at the sight of lots of worms. :-)
Hi I'm an absolute novice, could you tell me if you gathered your leaves up and rotted them or did you just spread them on the garden as soon as they fell? Thank you.
@@mariannedarrow7227 I put them on the flower beds and just cover them with a little bit of soil. I also have a tumbling composter where I put leaves in mixed with kitchen. scraps. I also store some in large bags and I line larger containers with them before putting soil in - then they won't leak out. Have fun :)
I have lately practiced growing chickens and I noticed they do great job to the fertility of the soil. they bring eggs and also fertilize the soil for better larger crops.
They’re a great addition to the garden!
Thanks for the help, I should cover my garden with leaves
Does it help if you shred the leaves first? I am thinking of doing this next week 🍁🍁🍁🍂
@@dotnb even better, they will rot faster. Good luck!😊👍
All leaves have fallen here so will be doing this as well this week. 😊😎
@@mariap.894 Thanks! Did it today. Hope things are going well in your garden too! 🍁
@@letii6597 How did you get on? It is so satisfying when it is done!
Ben you’re a breath of fresh air. Love your site
Thanks for watching Paul, it's appreciated. :-)
Fantastic. I’ll be putting my dead leaves on my garden tomorrow
I love this guy! So down to earth, (pun intended) passionate about gardening, helpful! Love watching!
Cheers Chris!
Dig up the neighborhood cemetery and put them in my garden 🪴 they make my garden grow wonderfully
That's one way of doing it!
I started planting winter cover crops a few years ago. Very pleased with the results.
Another lovely vid. Had a great laugh at the part about adding kitchen scraps where you say: '...It's important to cover it over, to stop it from being dug up by wild animals' and the face shot of the innocent looking dog right after 🤣
Haha - indeed!
I now do trench composting. I've learnt that I have to add a little of our dogs poo to the top of the pile to deter her from digging up the scraps.
Great video Ben.
Absolutely right that now is the time to get working on improving the soil👍
Get digging out and spreading Mark, true that!
Beginners grow vegetables. Masters grow soil ;-)
Love your soil and the rest is easy Travis.
You’ve just reminded me to sow my winter green manure for digging in late Spring.
Collecting leaves 🍂🍁🍂🍁is a must, woodchips and compost are another way to build up soil. We had only sand, now it's humus.
How wonderful to have made such a dramatic change to your soil - it just shows it can be done.
Great video. Thanks. I compost and create leaf mold
My kitchen waste I put in a compost bin and add red worms. Then in the spring I have mostly worm castings. When I add it to the raised bed garden there will young red worms and red worm eggs. It’s getting a double treatment.
Oh wow - that sounds great David. We're so lucky to have worms on side like that.
Thanks, Ben. Very educational as always!
I just planted my first green manure cover crop i( I soaked the seeds first since my soil is compact), covered by straw and leaves. I am on the learning curve.
Sounds great - Happy gardening!
Bed I use we rotted horse manure and chopped leaf mulch which I leave for a year. Also home made compost I make at the alloment.
One I like to say bed about woodchip you carnt put pine chippings in beds as it will stop growth of things you plant pi e has within its self to stop anything growing. Any other chippings are fine.
Great vid always look forward to the next one all the best.
Thanks for the tip there John, that's appreciated.
I'm a big user of cover crops ... I like winter rye and hairy vetch best. The winter rye just looks like grass, but does a great job crowding out weeds, and is easy to mow down and turn back into the soil in spring. The vetch is pretty, and also easy to till in once I am ready to use that space.
Just planted a tree yesterday. Gave it a good cover with leaves from the garden
and some leftover tea leaves!
Nice one!
I'm fortunate to live near the sea, so I harvest seaweed that's washed up on the beach. Leave it out in the rain for a couple of weeks to wash off any excess salt, then chop it up with a lawnmower, together with dried leaves, grass clippings, shredded cardboard or anything similar. Makes a great mulch.
I bet you have the best soil ever with seaweed in your mix - beautiful stuff!
Thank you, Ben.
Great episode again. Enjoy it very much. We're in Aus and I am using a worm farm to recycle about half of our composting material - the other half goes in to traditional compost bins.
First, I enjoy these videos very much. This particular one on soil management was very informative.
If you don’t mind, I’d like to emphasize the importance which adding composted organic matter to garden soil has on improving soil texture and soil structure. This enhancement improves water retention and increases the ability of the soil matrix to adsorb and retain essential nutrients in the proximity of the plants root zone.
Anyway, I wanted to share this tidbit of information while giving thanks to the makers of their videos.
Thank you so much for sharing that point Eric - and very true it is. You're really helping to feed the soil life that will support the plants you grow.
Excellent info, presented in a quite enjoyable manner. Thank you and God Bless🙂
Thanks so much. 😀
I love making compost! So very satisfying : )
Definitely! :-)
Excellent video. Very important information.
Outstanding!
the no shame beater car earned you a sub, loved the video!
Cheers Michael - you're a gent sir! Appreciate the sub!
This year I have tilled everything into the garden. Then we added a layer of mown leaves and I tilled them in. Now we are adding another layer of the mown leaves as a cover. This way they are not too thick to till in when spring cones. Our Niece raises show rabbits and once a month I get her rabbit poop All winter long I add another layer of rabbit poop over the leaves, often between layers of snow, eventually covering the whole garden. Which when the snow melts and Spring comes i till it in with the compost from our bins. All summer long I use grass clippings as a mulch so that is some of what I tilled in this fall
my daughter has four rabbits and I do the same thing!
A great use of rabbit poop - don't let anything go to waste. :-)
Perfect timing! I had planned on doing this today :)
"wild animals" at 3:55! Hah! I love your sense of humour, guys!
Thank you
Totally fabulous - normal and unpretentious delivery
I love this channel so much.
We love you too!
We just spent this past weekend prepping our garden for next spring! You are so right - if you do it now, in the fall, you'll have a better growing season next year!
Your little doggie 🐶 is the cutest wild animal 😅
I reckon so. :-)
This video was very useful, and very enjoyable!
"Wild animals?" Cute pup. Good video. 🇺🇸⚔🇬🇪
Thanks so much. :-)
Cheered me up! 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼✅
Thank you so much 🌻
Thank you for watching Amer.
I really enjoy you Chanel, great intro for beginners like myself. Thank you for sharing your journey and helping others along the way. Grateful 🌍💚
Cheers for watching Catherine. :-)
You say "wild animals" and show your cute dog 😄
great vid, thanks for sharing. You speak my language, happy gardening, bro.
And you Stephen!
I dump stall cleanings (from the horse, goats, and chickens) directly onto the garden all winter long, stopping in early March. The heavy rains in our Maritime climate (helped by chickens foraging through the garden in winter) break everything down so it's ready for planting in Spring. I make sure to include stall bedding (urine-soaked wood pulp) as well as manure. The native soil here is gravel-over-clay, so amending it is vital to even move a shovel around in it.
I bet your soil is superb for all the extra organic matter your adding - great stuff!
My chickens get all my food scraps. I live in north eastern Florida on two acres and my yard is pretty much sand. I am hoping to start a Food Forest. Thank you for the info. This video was great!
I bet your chickens love all those food scraps - and great that nothing is wasted. Good luck with your new food forest - what a fantastic project!
Bury food chickens don’t eat, banana skins, citrus, potato peels, lot of both for me
I use grass clippings as mulch to conserve water and later work it in in the fall along with any compost or other amendments available. Normally throw down a lime treatment due to acidic clay soil. Use a rotary mower to chop up any remaining vegetation. Worm castings and bags of composted manure go into the seedbed row along with fish fertilizer type products during spring planting.
It sounds like you, sir, have the royalty of soils!
Thank you Mr Ben : )
Great video! I’m particularly fond of using compost and worm castings.
In addition to adding homemade compost in the spring and fall, I have been burying leafy veg and a bit of straw in the beds to help feed the worms living in our beds. I just push a small handful down into the loose soil to a depth of about 6 inches periodically here and there randomly throughout the beds. Now we find worms whenever we dig up potatoes, sweet potatoes, etc. We don't buy worm castings, because our beds are basically vermicompost bins themselves.
That superb! :-)
I lay down compost I make in November and cover with landscape material. No tilling I just use a pitch fork to aerate the soil. In the early spring I lay down shredded leaves that have been composting all winter. I grow microorganisms in a bucket and drench the soil. And cover again and let it sit for a couple of weeks until planting. This my second year doing this. Last years crop was the best ever. And it will only get better. Starting Bokashi this year and will be incorporating that also……
Wow - you're being really thorough there, and fab to be getting onto Bokashi too - nothing left to waste. :-)
Excellent video. I’m adding ashes and sand right now.
Thank you very much for sharing useful video 👍
Cheers Yanee.
Thanks 😊
I use a multi- variety of green crops to tide my garden spots over winter. I cover seed with annual ryegrass, ladino clover, vetch, and buckwheat. The ryegrass overcovers the ground and holds the other seeds in place over the winter. Then the blossoms of the buckwheat, clover, and vetch go crazy in early spring, and the wild bees, butterflies, and mothbutterflies go crazy around it for a few weeks before I till it all under before the vetch makes mature seeds. It really improves the soil.Thanks!
That's a wonderful succession of green crops there - what fantastic soil you must have. :-)
@@GrowVeg Actually it has help the soil come a long way in a relatively short time period when it was only a woodlot. I still have "stump wars" and the grubs that follow those. Battling stumps and long roots. But, it is part of my yard now. Am really really lucky the soil is well structured already and just needed sustaining/sustainable nutrients in it. I try to use all the organic choices along the way. I even hand till it because I have seen the damage excessive power tilling will do to the structure. Right now the main two gardens are about a 1000 sqft. Am adding a little more tilled area this winter to prep for spring. Thanks!
Covering my earth bed with cardboard first, then shredded leaves. First time trying this method. 😬🤞🏼My bed has thrived the past several years with me doing absolutely nothing. 😆 Bare soil overwinter, never fertilizing, never amending. I’m having so much fun being out in the garden, and sourcing materials. I’m so nervous. It feels like I’m trying to fix something that isn’t broken, possibly messing up a good thing. 🥺 The only issue I’ve ever had with this bed is all the weeds and grasses, which is why I’m covering the bed this year…in hopes of drastically reducing weeds next season.
The space under my peach and cherry tree, I’m going to cover with a thick layer of wood chips. My wood chips are definitely only single shredded, but I’m not complaining! They were free from a wood chip drop my friends and I shared.
Whatever organic matter you can get on growing areas is going to be only a good thing Suzi, worry not. You're doing great!
Very good video. Thank you
Here on the North Atlantic seacoast, a lot of people gather seaweed that has washed up on the shore and add it to their gardens for the winter. Word is that it is golden! (Word also is that it may not be legal in some areas to take it away, so beware.)
I've heard nothing but good things about using seaweed in the garden - very good stuff apparently.
Hello 👋 new subscriber and love your content already. You're so smart. Thanks for your wonderful teaching 😘 😊 ❤ 😀 💕
Bless you for subscribing, thank you! Really great to have you on board. :-)
20 years ago, we rented an old Victorian monstrosity in Portland OR. You could see places where outbuildings had been 150 years ago, but one such outline was the only really tomato-worthy place for sun. I got the soil tested, and it came back as contaminated with heavy metals. Apparently, 150 years ago, what they used for horses for colic or worming or something was mercury compounds (they sold such as "patent medicines" for humans at the time, too).
The sunny patch had been the corral for the stables. I was very sad at the state of the soil. To sow in it, or even above it in a raised bed, it would require excavating and removing a meter down.
I didn't have a garden there, except containers. Sometimes you can't build on a bad foundation of soil at all.
Wow - that really would have been tricky (and dangerous!) soil to work with.
I put down straw over all of my beds. Then plus some organic fertilizer. Just brought home two bales of straw last night after work... and got straw all over the inside of the car 🙂.
Haha - I'm always getting in trouble for a straw-covered car!
I absolutely love your channel
Thank you so much Melinda, that's very kind of you to say. :-)
You are our hero. I put my kitchen-scraps in the smoothymaker and pour it onto our vegetable beds. Is it wiser to cover the scraps just as they are?
You can either compost in situ - by piling kitchen scraps into pits or trenches and then covering them over with soil - great for where hungry plants like squash and beans will go. Or, of course, add them to the compost heap to break down first. I would make sure scraps are always covered to avoid attracting animals that might dig about.
I sometimes would do blender composting. You just take kitchen scraps and put them in a blender and liquify that then go outside dig a small hole and pour in the liquid. Y can dig it in or just let it be under some soil...