Our Vegetable Garden

Creating a new garden from scratch has been a lot of work.  The spot we chose probably required more work than any other spot on our property.

The Location

There are large trees all over our property.  So, we have a fair amount of shade in the summer.  However, there are a few gaps in the trees that could be suited for a veggie garden.  In our effort to align our property with the principles of permaculture, I wanted to put our garden in a place that things already like to grow.

The southern-facing hill on the side of our house was covered in river rocks.  I assume a previous owner was tired of maintaining and weeding the hill and covered it in rocks to reduce the work.  Our neighbor told us that they would periodically spray roundup to kill anything that grew there.  The large poplar trees would drop leaves and flowers which would cover the rocks and make them always look unkept.   Over time, the leaves broke down and filled the gaps in the rocks with compost.  This caused even more things to grow which required more work.  It was an unnatural system that can be repaired with proper design.  I wanted to put the southern exposure and free natural mulching to work for us instead of battling it.

The Work

To prepare the area for a garden, we had to remove all of the river rock.  And, if you've ever had to move tons of river rocks without equipment, you know that you can't use shovels or pitchforks or anything.  We had to move every single rock by hand.  We loaded them into our cart and hauled them out.

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While clearing the rocks, we found several snakes. Muddy tried to play with them but they didn't seem to happy.

It took weeks worth of evenings and Saturdays to get them all cleared out.  Then we had to build things back up since we just removed about 1 foot and a half of material.  This took around 15 yards of mushroom soil and a few yards of mulch.  Then we covered the hill with straw to reduce runoff and help things stick together a little better.

The Design

I wanted to make the system easy to keep an eye on so I created paths along the hill.  The upper path is made of cinder blocks I collected from our back lot (which is a project of its own that I hope to shape into a food forest).  One of the principles of permaculture involves making use of the resources at hand and producing no waste.  So, I felt lucky to be able to use the free materials on hand while also working to clean the back lot up more.

While removing the rocks, I also found that our sump pump pipe was broken and pumping the water right outside of the foundation wall into the clay dirt.  So, the water was just going back into the drainage around the house and back into the sump pit.  Instead of just fixing the pipe and running it out into the yard, I decided to use the water being pumped out to help water the garden.  I drilled holes in the new pipe and ran it along the edge of the garden so every time it pumps, it waters the plants.

We created another path lower on the hill so we can reach every part of the garden from a path.  This will include field stones that I collected from another garden that I am repairing.  The field stones will become stepping stones that can help to accommodate the traffic.  I want to wait and let the new soil settle a little before I set them in place.

The hill runs most of the length of our main property and I hope to gradually work my way down and make the entire hill productive for us or the wildlife.  It will also mean I won't have to mow the hill anymore.

The Crops

We started with the plants we started from seed This Spring.  Then we picked up some plants from the Horn Farm Center's annual heirloom plant sale.  So, we have tomatoes, peppers, onions, carrots, lettuce, spinach, peanuts, potatoes, strawberries, squash, zucchini, cucumbers, and green beans planted.   I've already noticed that something loves our strawberries.  It may be the birds or rabbits, but they keep stealing our strawberries before I can get to them.  The birds do the same thing to our raspberries every year.  Hopefully the critters won't be too greedy and leave some for us.  I don't mind sharing some.

The Future

I'm sure we will have some more challenges working this garden throughout the year.  But, I look forward to learning as we go.  At least I don't have to hand pick all the weeds and vines that were growing out of those rocks and blow the leaves out constantly.  Now the leaves can stay and I can handle the weeds as they pop up while I check on the fruits and veggies.  Since the crops are doing well, we have had enough to experiment with some canning and pickling this season.  I'll share our progress and lessons we learn as we turn our suburban property into a productive farm.