Putting the Garden to Bed

The first picture above is of my garden after weeding out nearly all of the clover that seems to want to take over.  I left a patch of the clover when I took this photo so you can see how it grows like a carpet. This garden is located inside the foundation of our old barn, which had a dirt floor covered with straw bedding.  So the soil is beautiful, almost like potting soil.

I didn't plant a veg garden this past spring due to my husband's health, but we kept the weeds chopped down and sprayed... except this clover didn't want to give up.  It grows almost like a mat, with little hair like roots interspersed with a sort of tap root.  I'm not sure why it's so prolific, but it also grows in the field road where I walk each afternoon.

Don't take me too seriously when I speak of veg gardening, because I just do what I do.  You'll probably do just as well inventing your own procedures.  It seems that nearly anything will grow nearly anywhere and produce at least a little something edible.

After pulling out all of the weeds, I covered the garden with rotted straw for mulch, second photo.  It took about 5 bales of straw for this and only about an hour of time.  Fresh straw spreads more easily and is fluffier and looks nicer.  But fresh straw still has viable seeds in it from the harvest and next spring I would find a fine little crop of wheat growing under my mulch.

I'll soon go buy 8-10 bales of fresh straw and use them to insulate the foundation of the house or other areas outside I want to protect from freezing.  I'll remove them in the spring and stack them near the corner of the garden, and this time next year will use them for my mulch.  Hopefully the little seeds will have all sprouted or rotted by that time and not cause me any trouble with sprouting in the garden the following spring.

I can still pull some straw from these bales throughout the summer next year for mulching my flowerbeds or tomato plants or whatever.  I love to mound straw all around to hold in moisture and make weeding easier.  I hate weeding.

I'm going to rest my body this weekend.  I've been pushing myself pretty hard, but I'm almost done with fall chores.  Just a couple smaller projects that I'd like to complete within the next couple weeks, and they won't take long.

Blessings,

Katrinka