Hugelkulture

[mrsbusy]

Hi. Is anyone on the forum a fan of this system? I have been reading various articles about it and I am tempted to try making a bed.
On my allotment I have a dry area where there is a channel of chalk under the top soil which might benefit from hugelkulture.
yesterday I collected a sack of rotting wood. As I live near beech woods there is a vast amount of wood available.
Is there a risk of bringing diseases into the veg plot through the rotten wood?

[Nicos]

We have two beds which OH made recently. One last summer and the other this Spring.
He’s also made raised beds by digging down a foot the building up in the same way to about 2 ft high.

Not had any disease so far…..

[mrsbusy]

We have two beds which OH made recently. One last summer and the other this Spring.
He’s also made raised beds by digging down a foot the building up in the same way to about 2 ft high.

Not had any disease so far…..

I have 2 fairly large dustbins which I used for growing things in so holes drilled in the base. I have rescued 2 tom plants which need potting on so might put some layers in the bottom of the bin kind of like the Hugel system - a mini trial to see if the plants do any better than the ones I have in the ground or in pots.

[Nicos]

I understand they do better as they rot down as there’s too much dry ‘stuff’ at the bottom to start with. We gave ours a darned good watering before putting on the top layer of soil.
Loads of smaller branches, leaf mold and grass clippings and cardboard higher up.

I’m new to this so deffo not the best to advise but my initial thoughts are that maybe the plastic would create a barrier to worms, etc which are part of the process?

Incidentally - within one week of making our first one a rat moved in underground …lots more water ( hosepipe) sorted that out, so the lesson from that would be to try and fill in inviting ‘gaps’ between branches etc so they look less burrow like.

[mrsbusy]

I have well rotted stable manure which has worms in it....still dithering about the bins tho

[rary]

I do something similar to hugelkulture, my veg bed is built on top of a concrete base 22ftX6ft and 28ins. High, I had to cut down an Ash tree so I cleared part of the bed and put a load of the wood onto the base, the first lot of wood I added was made up of old wood that was in a field behind the garden and smaller thinner branches, by the way, all wood used was of cuts from the trees in my hedge, no treated wood was used, I then infilled with stuff from my my compost bin, next cleared another section of the bed piling all the soil on top of the wood, I repeated the same but evedently the wood was getting thicker and was mostly from the Ash tree, finishing with 2ft. thick sections of the trunk, the spaces were all infilled with compostable material and as I added the soil I tried shaking the wood to get the soil to settle, this is my second year with the bed, last year I didn't need to water the veg, I had onions growing in the area which had been filled with older and mixed wood, cabbage etc. in the rest, this year I reversed the planting with the cabbage doing great without any watering, but the onions needed to be watered, which I left too late and a number have bolted, so my recommendation is to keep the wood thin by splitting thick logs and if possible mix the tree verietys or go for soft wood like birch, look up the types of soft and hard wood, evedently if you are going for the type of hugelkulture bed where you build it up I think the principle would be the same, even with the problems this year I would still recommend this type of garden bed

[Nicos]

Had a quick scoot around on gooooogle and it looks like people are trying out the same concept in plastic containers….have a look before you decide mrsbusy.
And if so, do please let us know your results.

[smallblueplanet]

Hugelkulture

Guzuntight!

[Nicos]

Ha ha ha…you made me LOL there SBP

[mrsbusy]

Hugelkulture

Guzuntight!

I had to Google that one !!

[mrsbusy]

Had a quick scoot around on gooooogle and it looks like people are trying out the same concept in plastic containers….have a look before you decide mrsbusy.
And if so, do please let us know your results.

Hi Nicos - thanks - yes I did the same as you. I watched a lady in the US with a rather small.(IMHO) plastic box.
I have potted up the dustbins with a sort of hugelkulture base so will see how the tom plants get on - they are surplus plants so if they fail it's not an issue. I don't think I'll get any rats in them ! The hens however are very intrigued - I'm just heading out with some mesh.

[rary]

Just a reminder mrsb it can take two or three years before the hugelkulture system is working properly, personally I think its as I said type of wood, hard or soft, and thickness, by the way, have you noticed while searching if there are any tree types to avoid, the reason for asking is because I have an elder tree to cut down, and it is not recommended for burning

[ameno]

Just a reminder mrsb it can take two or three years before the hugelkulture system is working properly, personally I think its as I said type of wood, hard or soft, and thickness, by the way, have you noticed while searching if there are any tree types to avoid, the reason for asking is because I have an elder tree to cut down, and it is not recommended for burning

Elder isn't fit for burning because it gives off cyanide in the smoke.
This shouldn't be an issue for hugelkulture, though, as plants are not harmed by cyanide, nor will they draw it up in their roots to poison you (and it will break down into harmless stuff as the wood breaks down, anyway, as it's an organic compound).
Certain trees do give off plant-killing compounds, though (walnut is the most well known one), so those might be bad for it. I'm not sure how long those compounds persist after the tree is dead.

[mrsbusy]

Just a reminder mrsb it can take two or three years before the hugelkulture system is working properly, personally I think its as I said type of wood, hard or soft, and thickness, by the way, have you noticed while searching if there are any tree types to avoid, the reason for asking is because I have an elder tree to cut down, and it is not recommended for burning

Yes I did find some advice about what wood to avoid and certainly black walnut was mentioned but it was not a UK site and the other woods mentioned I'd not heard of. I'll try and find the link. Here it is -
https://wildyards.com/hugelkultur-wood-to-avoid/

[ameno]

Having read that article, one other point comes to mind: don't use logs which are too fresh or they might grow.
Willow is the obvious one, as the article mentions, but there are others which can root and start growing, too. My allotment neighbour made a hugelkulture bed one spring from wood from an apple tree and a prunus of some sort had he cut down, as well as a load of redcurrant stems, and all started sprouting that summer. He also used some ash branches the council had felled as posts, and some of those are growing, too.