After several months of productive composting, soils heaving with the freeze and settling again, I wondered if we'd have little to do but work what would be great garden loam for spring planting. After all, I'd found putting my rabbit litter in one area over winter resulted in beautifully rich soil in just a few months, years ago...but alas, this time -Not so much!
This was not my previous rabbit manure mix and as it had sat in the weather before we 'harvested' it, it was a more soggy form when it was put into the original rows. I realized it had been distributed far too heavy in the limited areas and didn't get enough air to break down correctly. I went through with the pitch fork and tried to transfer it more equally amongst the entire garden patch but realized it was going to take more work to open up the clumps and allow them to break down. The challenge is, our soils stay wet a REALLY long time here in Washington; in particular, our property has a lot of evergreen trees (extra shade) and in some areas, quite a high water table and clay soils. For us this means we HAVE to wait until it's been dry for several days before we can even attempt to till, otherwise we'd have more chunks with a severely compacted soil base only a few inches down. Jr. Farmer and I tilled it once in April and we still had a lot of heavy manure chunks. Jr. Farmer tilled it again, going a different direction a while later - mind you, these dry day streaks aren't so common here... still a LOT of chunks! In between I was going out with the pitch fork breaking up pieces as best I could. Finally, in May, Lil' Miss was able to help us out and she went yet another direction. I was thankful for the help and grateful we had reached something I could work a bit better in...
 Making Progress! Our Compost Tea barrel in the upper right of the garden is our natural fertilizer! We use rabbit manure & Azomite in the beginning and comfrey, nettle and dock as it begins growing later in the season. | I made several pitchfork mounded rows and utilized free coffee burlap sacks to put down before I added the sawdust for the walking paths. I ended up taking advantage of our local hardware store's sale on starts because even with the aid of Jr. Farmer's hand made cattle panel greenhouse, my starts were a flop. Late into May here, I planted almost 100 different brassicas starts - cabbages, kohlrabi, broccoli, Brussels sprouts & Chinese cabbage. Blue Hubbard squash was planted in two rabbit manure based mounds. I also added some herbs and celery to round out the mix a bit. Dad decided the cement mixer would stay there as "it looks like it's pouring out a garden!" I hope things fill out well and what we're both picturing comes about! The most important thing I do when planting is ask for the Lord to bless our work with His wonderful abundance. I encourage you to do the same! |
And they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day.... Genesis 3:8a