... more photos

paintedlady · « **on:** January 28, 2008, 15:58 »

More photos, this time of the second plot. I'm a bit behind schedule, but I'm hoping to plant summer fruiting crops on here this year!

May 2007- the challenge!

June 2007 I owe my friend a big thank you for strimming it all!

August 2007 with the plastic sheeting down

New Year 2008 first chance to do some serious work on the plot

Facing the other way, with proposed chicken run in the foreground

crowndale · « **Reply #1 on:** January 28, 2008, 17:17 »

wow, impressive. you have been working really ahrd!

Motivator · « **Reply #2 on:** January 28, 2008, 19:02 »

Well done with that , Lot of hard work but well worth the effort

nwalch · « **Reply #3 on:** January 28, 2008, 19:05 »

Great piece of hard work. Did you dig over before you built the raised beds or have you just built them over the existing ground.

I'm digging over before I build my raised beds but after taking 6 hours to dig and clear (grass or bramble roots, not sure which) 3 sq metres I'm wondering about putting some cardboard down, bags of top soil and then the raised wooden edge.

What did you use for the wodden edges.

cawdor2001 · « **Reply #4 on:** January 28, 2008, 22:25 »

Hells Teeth Painted Lady you are a grafter! Thought i had done well with mine but you have done a job with that

. Well done

Cawdor

paintedlady · « **Reply #5 on:** January 29, 2008, 09:35 »

Thanks everyone.

To be honest, I'm doing a lazy version on this plot unlike the first half plot which was all cleared by hand, and still clearing ...... After it was strimmed, I left it a couple of weeks to start growing again (much to the horror of my friend who had done all the work!) and blasted it with weedkiller. However, as I'm sure everyone remembers, it rained and rained and the weedkiller got washed off faster than I could get it down, hence drastic measures with plastic sheeting!

Most of the wood is from some serious skip watching

but I also had to resort to buying some as I rapidly ran out on a crucial bit!

The plot is riddled with couch grass, bramble, bindweed and marestail. Short of poisoning the soil beyond recovery, I have opted to keep the plastic sheeting down (which has actually made it easier to dig), use the wood to outline the beds, then cut the plastic to shape (so even some footpaths still have the originally plastic down). The soil is like potters clay in some sections so is impossible to remove the roots of weeds (except bramble which I have dug out), so all I'm doing is rough digging (basically chopping up the roots into smaller pieces - the theory is that there is a finite food store in each piece!), going to put in lots of compost and manure, cover with cardboard and put the cut piece of plastic back to totally exclude light to the soil. The idea of summer fruiting crops this year is that I can then plant through the plastic/cardboard. There won't be many plants per bed so hopefully watering won't become too much of an issue.

That is the theory

eco-friendly · « **Reply #6 on:** January 29, 2008, 09:47 »

wow im really impressed by those wooden raised bed and they all look like they have been dug over aswell. i only managed to dig one bed this week and am going to do another this weekend.those pictures are inspirational though thank you

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