Hugelkultur.
So what is it anyway?
Well for starters, hugelkultur is a German
word meaning hill culture or mound culture.
It has a history going hundreds of years back
being used in both German and Eastern European
societies as a way to utilize the available
plant biomass materials that surround us.
Effectively composting it down into the soil,
sequestering the carbon and allowing for the
growing of plants, creating a more drought
tolerant raised bed that will continue to
build the soil.
Now there's many different ways to build a
hugelkultur and it really does depend on your
location, what you have available to you on-site,
the slope of your landscape and the goals
for your property.
I turned to hugelkultur initially because
I had an abundance of organic biomass material
coming off some of these larger ornamental
trees in the yard that were here before I
arrived.
After looking at all the options I came to
the conclusion that the best way to harvest
those organic materials with the least amount
of work and the least expense was hugelkultur.
Initially I tried to run all these branches
coming from these trees through a wood chipper.
That ended up being a lot of work, made a
lot of noise and to me I just couldn't justify
doing this year after year.
Now of course I could hire a landscape company
to come back and trim back the trees and take
out the branches, but that can become very
expensive and not very sustainable in my opinion.
And because I'm capable of getting the work
done myself, I'm more interested in just streamlining
the operation.
I also looked at the possibility of chipping
up some of the excess branches in the yard
and converting that into bio-char.
But nothing compared to the possibility of
actually burying this wood along with other
organic biomass in the yard and turning it
into a raised garden bed.
So as I had mentioned before there's many
different ways that you can create a hugelkultur,
Whether your using large logs from cut down
trees or just branches from backyard trees,
wood is one of the key ingredients to making
a hugelkultur work.
Now, it's best to add older wood into your
hugelkultur that's had a chance to decompose
and break down.
Usually between a year and 3 years is best.
You can also throw fresh wood into a mound.
But fresh wood mixed in with the soil will
initially tie-up nitrogen.
It's important to note however that the nitrogen
will then be released into the mound after
a period of time when it begins to decompose.
So if your looking to plant edible crops and
such in your mounds immediately your going
to want to try and use older wood up front.
Now, depending on the diameter of wood that
you put into your hugelkultur is going to
determine how long that hugelkultur is going
to actually remain a hugelkultur.
What I mean by this is by including smaller
branches in the main structure of your hugelkultur
after just a few years that's going to break
down and become mostly a mound of premium
soil.
Whereas if you fill the core of your hugelkultur
with larger logs it's going to last a much
longer time before breaking down into pure
soil.
So again, depending on your goals with your
mound you can play around with this.
So my hugelkultur mounds, and I have three
of them back here consist of smaller logs,
some larger branches and also smaller branches,
leaves, woodchips, native soil, potting mix,
coffee grinds, many different materials have
been used in the construction of these hugels.
I also trenched down beneath these hugels
about three feet on two of the mounds, and
filled that with hugelkultur material as well.
So in my experience, each year the hugelkulturs
reduce in size by about two and a half feet.
So basically if I wasn't constantly adding
to these hugelkulturs rebuilding them they
would quickly reduce to a smaller mound predominately
made of soil.
This actually works out very well for me as
I'm able to add to these mounds each year
as I do my pruning on some of the trees around
here.
As I'm adding on to the hugelkultur each year
I'm using mostly smaller branches and I'm
mostly lining the perimeter of each bed leaving
the center of the mound mostly composed of
soil.
Then I top those smaller branches with soil
throughout the winter allowing the rains to
soak into the mound helping to spread that
soil into the crevasses between the sticks.
Then I'll give them a nice good covering of
woodchips creating a nice skin on the surface.
When it comes time for planting I just push
back the woodchips, push back some of that
top layer of soil.
I may even add in some more soil in that spot.
Equivalent to maybe like a five gallon pots
worth.
then I'll plant right into there.
This has shown me great results!
And like I had mentioned, as the mound breaks
down over time it just get's better and better.
In the first two to three years depending
on where your at you may have to add a little
bit of water to the mound throughout the summer
if you have plants growing on it, which is
just fine.
What ends up happening is as the mound breaks
down all the different biomass that made up
the hugel is now composting down and marrying
together and becoming like a sponge.
Which helps add to even more water retention
capabilities in the mound.
So is it drought proof?
No.
Is it drought tolerant?
Perhaps.
There's a lot of factors to consider and a
lot of it has to do with how you construct
the mound.
Is it in full sun or part shade?
Is it primarily made up of wood?
Or is there plenty of soil mixed in?
Did you build it on contour of the landscape
with a swale on the side of it?
All these different factors are something
to consider that will contribute to your results.
For backyard gardeners with an abundance of
biomass available on-site I find hugelkulturs
to be a great way to create a natural looking
raised bed.
Now I just want to thank you all for tuning
in today and as always I hope this video finds
you and finds you well.
Out in the world and out in your garden planting
more abundance in your life.
Take care everybody I'll be talking to you
again soon!
