My husband has a passion for gardening and landscaping! I’m lucky; he does all the work and I reap all of the benefits. Thankfully we both have the same love for the old fashioned perennial types of gardens (floral, productive, and low maintenance once established – for ideas, click here), and square foot gardening for the food. He has his own personal library of books full of ideas and techniques, but my favorite is The Old Fashioned Gardner. 
This is what I leafed through, snuggled in the magic purple quilt of course, while I was enjoying the beautiful morning air, resting my healing foot, and admiring my husband hard at work. 
We have a pretty good base start for the landscape on our new house,
but of course he has all sorts of his own ideas to improve things. I can’t wait!
He starts by canvassing the neighborhoods for grass cuttings, leaves, and pine straw that other people conveniently bag up and throw away.
He definitely takes to heart the Swedish proverb, “Den enes död -- den andres bröd.” Translation: "The death of one -- the bread of the other." Or more common in the US:"One man's trash is another man's treasure." 
These all go into his ever-growing compost pile that he measured, yes I did say measured, the temperature to be a toasty 165 degrees Fahrenheit. And he says I’m a nerd with my biking gear. Hmph, nothing can compare that!
our everpresent "helper"
Then he built the area up to get the perfect raised and leveled bed so that it would drain properly.
He used 4x4 timbers, a laser level, concrete rebar rods to secure the timbers, and crushed limestone around the outer edges for the finishing touch. To get the ideal soil for the crucial growing conditions, he adds a mixture of bone meal for the phosphorus (yes, actual ground bone) and blood meal for the nitrogen (yes, actual dried and powdered blood) to help balance the nutrients needed. 
Then he tops this off with the compost that has “cooked” to a beautifully rich, dark soil turning it all under with a shovel. 
One concern is that the mulch he primarily uses is oak leaves, an abundance in the South, and they can make the soil acidic. To offset this, he will probably blend in some lime, but first he will take a soil test. He takes his gardening very seriously!Plans for the yard lay in wait for the Fall weather to come, but his ideas include blackberries, blueberries, fig bushes (LSU Golden, as they discourage the birds with their lighter color),
grapes, Natchez crape myrtles, 
and plenty of herbs and other perennials to compliment the treasures already hiding in the flowers. 
Until then, we’ll enjoy the limited productivity of our potted basil with some homemade pesto and dream of what the future holds.
1 comments:
You're going to have to hire that man out! Great job on preparing for the new garden, Travis!
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