In this video, Dan from http://www.plantabundance.com shares with you a great way to grow food and sequester carbon using hugelkultur beds. You can easily help support this channel by bookmarking and shopping amazon through Dan’s affiliate link: http://amzn.to/2fqnpGp Thank you so much!
Hey there everybody, how’s it going? It’s Dan from http://www.plantabundance.com coming to you once again from the urban backyard food forest. Today I wanted to share with you guys one of my newest and favorite ways to grow food and sequester carbon in the backyard food forest. I’ve got these hugelkultur beds here that I wanted to share with ya. You can see this 1st year bed that’s still being built up, it’s not functional yet, I’ve just been piling up different yard waste….branches, leaves, green waste from the garden, got some coffee grounds here, grass clippings, wood-chips you name it it’s been getting piled up on this mound. Now it’s about I’d say 3ft – above the surface but besides that before the mound was actually constructed I trenched in underneath about another 3ft deep so there’s actually another 3ft below the surface you can’t see. So were looking at about a total of 6ft of mound by about 3 and 1/2ft wide so I can access both sides. And over here we have a hugel bed that I started 2 years ago so this is the first year this spring that I actually planted it out and you can see that it’s doing wonderfully. I’m quite blown away by the results seeing as I felt like the hugel bed itself was still kind of bare bones the way I built it up. I didn’t add very much compost or anything to the top but you can see we have some definite winners in this system and I wanted to share with you my results here. So right at the end of the hugel bed you can see this ‘Moringa Tree’, and I’m really excited about this tree, it’s also known as the ‘Miracle Tree’ it’s like an all in one multi-vitamin that can get up to 18′-20′ in just one growing season. They are perennials and will die back in areas where you get down to frost temperatures but they will come back again the following year, at least in this zone where I’m at 9B. You can see where this ‘Opo’ has just cascaded down the side of the hugel bed and is now working it’s way over the garden fence into the main portion of the food forest. Besides the ‘Opo’ you can see I’ve got some green ‘Curly Kale’ back here and it’s getting a little suffocated out right now but still it’s doing great and the leaves are nice and lush so it seems happy. Here we have a ‘Purple Tree Collard’ and again this plant is doing pretty good, seems like it’s happy in it’s spot here… there’s a nice little squash growing beneath it. There’s a little ‘Parsley’ back there. Here’s another ‘Curly Kale’ and you can see the wildlife is digging it too. We have many types of butterflies back here, lizards, praying mantis, of which I’ve seen quite a few of now. right here we have some lambs quarters growing out and although there’s not many leaves left, there is a bunch of seeds that I’ll allow to drop on the spot. Here’s a ‘Crookneck Squash’, it’s not producing very much but the leaves and the overall look of the plant is healthy. Another ‘Lambs Quarter’ here with tons of seed that will drop and propagate. Here’s a leaf. These are edible highly nutritious leaves that will make good chicken fodder as well. Back there we have a tomato that I have harvested a few from…taste great! Another ‘Opo’ there. You can see this top layer of wood chips that I put on here and it has made the greatest difference. You can see where I did not continue due to me running out. This area of the hugel bed that I coated with the wood chips is doing great, it’s lush, the food taste good…Now the theory behind the hugelkultur bed for those who don’t know is that the larger chunks of wood that are in the middle of the mound once rotted down will absorb moister throughout the winter months and then disperse that throughout the spring and summer season through evaporation and your hugel beds eventually will need no to very little watering. So I’m still watering my 2 year hugel bed a little bit and that’s mainly because it’s still in it’s infancy and it hadn’t fully rotted down before it was planted out but I’m very happy with the results thus far, I’m going to keep you guys updated so stay tuned and I hope your having a great day, I’ll talk to you guys soon.
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