Dig It!

At Kirk Ranch Organics we really love plants...I mean really love them. 

So much so that we will spend 8 hours digging up a 100 square foot raised bed to the depth of 24", just for them. This is a ton of hard work, which over the next ten days will be repeated five times.

Normal people build raised beds from the ground up with construction materials and then fill them with dirt. We used to be normal. Then we met John Jeavons and read his book. Now, we dig down and attempt to create a bed of "spongecake" for our baby plants. 

Prior to this activity, our midsections resembled spongecake, but after two straight days of double digging, we think John Jeavons might just have a hot new weight loss program on his hands.

The theory is this: Most plants have deep root systems. There is a lovely band of topsoil for about 12" in our garden. We even add year-old kitchen scrap

compost to this topsoil (can you believe that's what's in the wheelbarrow)? Unfortunately, under that topsoil is hardpack red clay. It makes sense that if plants aren't working to penetrate the clay layer, because we have already done it for them, they will have more energy to grow strong and healthy with abundant vegetables.

So we dig.

This is driving ranch boss seriously crazy. Anything that cannot be done with a diesel-powered machine may not be worth doing. Our custom farmer friends, who certainly know a thing or two about growing stuff, confirmed upon surveying our progress yesterday that "Yep, there's no machine that can do that." 

So we dig.

The funny thing is, this really is not driving me crazy. In fact, we are rather enjoying ourselves. During a little rest break yesterday, we heard the cranes, who are coming back to Texas. We need to ask around a bit about them because all we know is 1.They are definitely cranes 2. They make a noise that, from 1,000 feet overhead, sounds like doves cooing. We sat and watched them fly over and noted with glee this definite sign of spring. The last time we saw them was  November with their V pointed south.

So yes, double digging 600 square-feet to make spongecake beds for baby plants is hard, but so are things done in office buildings. And in office buildings there are no cranes.

So we dig. March 15, 2010