I have been carefully prepping our garden bed in anticipation of the growing season for months now. Back in the fall, I sheeting mulched an area of lawn at the rental house we are in. Over the last couple weeks I started finishing the prep for spring planting.
The sheet mulch layers consisted of dried leaves, used bedding/chicken manure from our hens and some compost. That has helped killed the grass in the garden area and add in lots of new organic matter. Although it has broken down pretty well, it’s not fine enough soil to plant seeds directly in yet.
Luckily we had the foresight to start our compost bin within the first week of moving into this rental house. I shoveled out the finished compost from the bottom of the pile and spread it evenly over the sheet mulched layers. Our seeds now have a great new, healthy place to call home.
It’s hard to stretch your arms over beds that are more than four feet wide, so I improved our bed layout by adding paths. The bedding from the ducklings and chickens were used for the simple paths. I moved our cool, rusty wire-dome-thing into the middle for a focal point and a pea trellis.We should now have an easier time accessing the planting areas.
It looks pretty snazzy for a pieced-together garden, if I do say so myself. I can’t wait to plug some seeds in. I anticipate it will look even more amazing when it’s actually fill with food!
I really like the way it turned out. Maybe it’s that black gold making it even more beautiful to this garden addict. 😉 Can’t wait to see how it fills in with life of summer.