Ruth Stout figured it out and has been teaching her gardening method since 1955. She grew ALL of her own vegetables well into her 90’s without digging, weeding, watering, or any hard work at all.

the Secret… Hay!
Spoiled hay in fact. And lots of it.

Ya see Ruth’s answer was very very simple. She mulched. But her method met a bit of resistance. She’s talked exhaustively on this subject – teaching workshops, writing numerous books and articles, showing a plethora of visitors through her garden over the years. It seems that some people were not inclined to listen.

Imagine agriculture in the 1950s. Before no-till, before ‘organic’, before conservation and restoration. You wouldn’t consider growing without nitrogen fertilizer. Airplanes swept the fields with poison insect killers (crop dusting is still in practice to this day). The plow was the farmer’s best friend. This was when things were done a certain way, and that was that.

But Ruth had always been on the radical side. She questioned things, thought for herself, and did what she wanted. Some stubborn farmers with beliefs of steel wouldn’t even come close to stopping her. Her method worked and the world needed to know about it. Ruth passed in 1980 at the ripe old age of 96. Considering that we’re still talking about her to this day, she must have done something right.

What is the Ruth Stout Method?

In short, the Ruth Stout Method uses spoiled hay as a mulch. A generous application of hay smothers weeds, retains moisture, fertilizes the soil, and grows healthy plants, leaving no work in the garden aside from sowing seeds and harvesting vegetables.

Does it work?

So many people have succeeded with this method throughout the years. I’ve also seen some YouTubers that have failed, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t work.

In my personal experience, this method works very well. In our heavy clay soil and heavy weed pressure, only two methods grow great plants. Raised beds OR a heavy load of compost.

It cuts down on weeding and watering and grows beautiful, healthy plants that need no fertilizer or insect sprays. The only drawback is that you need quite a lot of material to get started.

Did Ruth Stout use Hay or Straw?

Ruth Stout used Hay. She was particular to ‘spoiled’ hay that had been exposed to the elements and began to rot. There’s a very specific reason that hay was Ruth’s mulch of choice. It makes for excellent fertilizer. Moreso, not only does it smother weeds, it retains water while also feeding plants effectively. Experiments show that spoiled hay grows more sizeable plants than fresh hay.

There’s an important distinction between hay and straw that might be making the difference between success and failure. Knowing the basics of the material itself.

Hay is grown for animal feed. It’s cut while young, still green, and before it has gone to seed. Hay is ‘green’ material. If you’ve composted you know that green materials are a source of nitrogen. Nitrogen helps grow strong, healthy plants.

Straw is grown for seed grain. It’s harvested when the plant is no longer green. After the grain has been harvested, straw is what’s leftover. Straw is ‘brown’ material. Brown materials are a good source of carbon. Carbon is needed for a healthy soil structure.

ANY organic material helps plants grow strong and healthy but the extra boost of nitrogen obtained from Hay might prove to be more beneficial.

What other mulch or compost can I use?

Can’t get your hands on hay? There are so many materials you can use. The gardener’s motto is ‘use whatever you can get’. Mulching with ANY organic material works, it doesn’t even have to be broken down.

I’ve used every single material I can get my hands on. Woodchips, grass clippings, leaves, and leaf mulch, used coffee grounds, kitchen scraps, newspaper, straw, pine needles… and every ounce of plant debris went into my homemade compost. (BUT remember, you don’t need to make compost if you mulch heavily.)

I’ve had the local landscaper deliver massive truckloads of debris they pulled out of other people’s yards. I’ve had the tree service deliver dump trucks full of woodchips. I’ve had my neighbors dump their grass clippings in my compost pile.

Grass clippings added to the soil grew excellent plants. My belief is that the high nitrogen content in grass clippings (just like hay) helped the plants grow faster, bigger, and stronger.

[safety tip]
When collecting large amounts of green materials such as grass clippings and hay, don’t let it sit in a pile for months. A large mounded pile becomes anaerobic (without oxygen) and emits ammonia, which smells strikingly close to cat pee.

Also, as the material dries out, yellow jackets find it an optimal habitat to build a home. These determined buggers are very eager to defend their home when someone tries to use it in their garden. They will chase you 100 feet and sting you even when you’re far away.

Here are some options to keep things smell and sting-free. (You only need to pick one)
Spread the pile flat.
Turn it often.
Mix in woodchips, leaves or other brown material.
Keep it watered.

In order to get mulch on the ground fast, I’ve utilized the ‘chop and drop’ method. While you’re trimming, pruning, or cleaning up your plants, place the cut vegetation right on the ground, next to the plant as a green mulch.

I’ve used grass clippings collected after mowing the lawn to mulch around my tomatoes. This worked fantastically. Maybe 5 weeds grew the whole summer and the tomatoes flourished. The same exact bed untreated, one year later, is jam-packed with weeds.

[personal story]
2 years ago, I dismantled my raised beds to make them larger. When I put them back together, they were empty. With all I learned about building, restoring, and preparing the soil, it was the perfect opportunity to do something a little crazy… and I was pretty sure it would work. I stuffed the empty raised beds full of yard debris from spring cleanup. All the dead growth from last year was collected and squished down into the bed. Sticks, dead ornamental grass, tall perennial flowers from last year. All of it went in. Then, I covered it with a layer of compost – whatever I had left in the pile I’d made from years past. It only stacked up to 3″ of compost… but it worked! I planted flowers and some vining veggies in those beds and they all grew fabulously. (see below)

How Much Mulch?

When asked how much mulch, Ruth Stout always responded “more”. Add 6 to 8 inches of mulch at the very minimum for the first application. Then, it must be replenished every single year. Preferably all summer, every summer. Whenever you see areas that are thinning or if weeds start to emerge their ugly heads, throw a pile of hay on top of them.

The hardest part about mulch and compost is collecting enough of the stuff. But it’s really worth it. The biology in the soil is hungry. It eats all of the organic material you can feed it faster than you can imagine.

SO, the Ruth Stout method is not 100% no work gardening. Spreading mulch is very hard work. But once you spread it, the only work left is to replenish. But remember to replenish often, multiple times, every year.

Where do you get this much Mulch?

Collecting mulch is a matter of resourcefulness. Visit your landscaping material yards. They might have a cheaper source of mulch or compost. Call your local tree specialists. They might deliver woodchips for free. Chip Drop connects you with local tree people who will deliver woodchips.

In my area, one of our tree services sells leaf mulch for $9 a yard. This gives me a little thrill inside whenever I think about how much leaf mulch I can buy whenever I want.

I don’t feel comfortable unless I have a massive pile of mulch as a resource. Considering the sheer amount of mulch your gardens are hungry for, you will quickly learn that a little is not enough. The more the better and you’ll be happy with no less than piles of the stuff.

If you live in the city, try looking for a compost program. California has a massive compost program.

If you live in the suburbs, try asking neighbors to donate their grass clippings. They might even save money on disposing of yard debris.

If you’re lucky enough to live near farmland, hay should be an easy material to resource.

Why is the Ruth Stout method superior?

Not only does Ruth’s method save time, energy, and your back! it’s very good for the soil and the environment. If you’ve heard of no-till farming, or even tried it once, I promise, you’ll never dig in your soil again. Conventional plowing destroys soil biology, causes degraded fertility, causes runoff, erosion, and the inability to hold rainwater.

Healthy soil is teeming with life, earthworms abound, it holds moisture, and grows healthy plants that are resistant to disease and pests. See Soil Conservation.

I am 100% convinced that if every gardener and farmer refrained from disturbing the soil, we’d no longer be threatened by climate change. Plants sequester carbon from the air. That means it’s no longer in the atmosphere, the carbon goes in the ground, where it belongs.

Have you seen a farm plot of brown soil with not a plant as far as the eye can see? Though it seems natural, mainly because were accustomed to seeing it, the land is supposed to be green. This practice of leaving land fallow is an example of how humans mess things up.

The more acreage there is with a live plant growing, the more carbon the plants suck out of the atmosphere and put back into the ground. I’m not the only one that believes this can reverse the damages of climate change.

Kristin Ohlson wrote an entire book about it, called The Soil Will Save Us. I love listening to Audible while gardening. Woody Harrelson hosted a documentary all about it on Netflix, called Kiss the Ground. And, most importantly, the US Department of Agriculture is promoting no-till farming as the new better way to farm.

How do I start a Ruth Stout Garden?

Shouldn’t I till the land start things off? Actually, you don’t have to. Not even kill the grass? No, really, it’s absolutely not necessary. It’s as easy as spreading the mulch. Hay will suffocate grass and weeds. That’s why she uses it. Plan out an area and dump 6-8 inches of mulch on it. Wait for it to break down a little… That’s it. Ruth promised it would be easy, and it really is.

Over the years, I’ve mulched and composted with just about every material you can think of.

When do I start a Ruth Stout Garden?

Start your Ruth Stout garden as early as possible. As soon as you can get your hands on materials – hay, or your chosen mulch – put it down on the ground. The longer your materials have to break down into the soil, the more your soil will be prepared with organic material and nutrients.

What can you grow with the Ruth Stout Method?

Everything you grow in a normal garden can be grown with the Ruth Stout method. Follow the directions on the seed packets. Timing and spacing are exactly the same.

How do I plant seeds in Hay or Mulch?

You don’t really plant your seeds directly IN the hay. Sowing seeds is just as easy as you’ve always done it. When it’s time to plant, rake the hay back from your seed rows and plant the seeds according to the package. Seeds need to make contact with the soil in order to germinate. So don’t plant them in the hay, plant them in the ground. When the seeds sprout, spread the mulch back around the plants.

If you grow your seeds in flats or buy your plants from the store, transplant your seedlings in the dirt and mulch around them with a lot of hay.

Ruth Stout Potatoes.

Potatoes are probably the most notable vegetable in the Ruth Stout method. Throw a seed potato on the grass. Cover it with hay. Come back a few months later and harvest. That’s IT! No hilling, no digging, no watering, and when you harvest, all you have to do is move the hay. You don’t even have to dig up the new potato crop. That’s amazing to me.

I love this video where Derrick and Paula practice the Ruth Stout method to grow potatoes and grew 10 times what they put in.

It’s a wonderful world of gardening when you follow Ruth. The list of things you DON’T have to do is much much longer than the things you do have to do. Imagine no more digging, tilling, plowing, hoeing, weeding, watering, fertilizing, applying insecticides, or even making compost! Spread your mulch. Sow your seeds. Wait. Harvest your vegetables. Oh, and add mulch where it’s getting thin.

Ruth Stout was a true pioneer and teacher. She wrote 9 books about her method. Her book “Gardening Without Work” outlines her experience with each of the vegetables she grows and is full of great stories through her many years of gardening, of teaching, and converting the die-hards that her way is the better way, or at least the easier way. If you want to have an easier time in your garden, give the Ruth Stout method a try.

The post Ruth Stout Method of No Work Gardening appeared first on Roots Nursery.

The fastest soil preparation method is to build a raised bed and fill it with a nice fluffy soil mix. It’s perfect to plant in right away. But filling beds can get expensive.

The special planting mix recommended for a raised bed is 1/3 peat, 1/3 compost, and 1/3 vermiculite.

2 cubic feet of vermiculite costs $20 alone. It takes 8 cubic feet of mix to fill a 4×4 bed to 6 inches. It might cost $40 to $50.

This is totally worth the cost if you have one or two raised beds. But what if you want large gardens and lots of them? It might exceed your budget, and fast.

Follow my journey through a year of discovery of what makes the best garden soil that won’t break the bank.

I’ll start with the tomatoes.

Did you know that tomatoes will grow like weeds under the right conditions? I didn’t. Tomatoes were always hard for me. And I’m supposed to have a ‘green thumb’. 

As my neighbors would glory over their ‘bumper crop’, I would despair, asking what they did to get results like that? I didn’t consider the most important aspect of gardening… soil preparation.

Don’t you just throw some plants in the ground and watch them grow? uh, nooooo. Our midwest dirt is all clay. Of course, it doesn’t work. It’s the same if you have sandy soil, compact soil, depleted soil, or any soil that won’t drain.

Spring: Surprise Tomatoes

I had an old compost bin that I disassembled last year. When volunteer tomato seeds sprouted in the leftover compost, I was delighted. And they kept growing… and growing!

What surprised me more is that these plants didn’t need any help at all. I didn’t even water them. All that rich compost retains water really well.

Nature has taught me that soil preparation was they key to amazing plants. And you can do this for free.

Back to the tomatoes.

Unlike the tomatoes in the veggie garden that I baby… Pick the perfect plants, harden them off, water and weed daily… the surprise plants are at least double the size.

Check it out…

Tomato starts I planted. bah! puny. The weeds in the background are bigger.

My surprise tomato plants growing in old compost. How’s that for wow factor?

How did this happen? How did these tomato plants grow like THAT? They didn’t get much of a head start. Really. it’s all about the soil.

How I Learned How Effective Soil Preparation Can Be

As I mentioned, this space was a humongous compost bin. It was smelly and ugly, right at the street where people walk by every day.

It had to go.

I wasn’t even sure what to do with the area until those volunteer seeds germinated and exploded into huge plants. By golly, put away the grass seed… this is a garden!

It quickly became clear that I’d been unwittingly preparing the perfect garden soil right there in that spot. 

With the compost bin, I knew I was building soil for other gardens. My vegetable garden, my flower gardens, my nursery gardens. ALL THAT MOVING DIRT AROUND. And I’m reaaaally tired of wheelbarrows. When all I really have to do is start a compost bin, or pile, where I want to prepare the soil for a new garden. Talk about a lightbulb.

Why is common sense not so common? Especially for gardeners.

The stuff from the bin is fully decomposed and has made amazingly good soil. Light and fluffy, well-draining AND retains moisture, and it’s full of nutrients. The PERFECT soil.

There’s a good foot of compost here.

I have discovered what I’m sure other people have done. My new soil preparation method for new gardens. No digging, tilling, weeding. No hauling 15 loads of compost across the entire yard. And no killing my back.

My Soil Preparation Method:

Start compost in the location you want your new garden.

Making compost is easy. And pretty fun in my opinion. Grab whatever organic material you can get your hands on. Throw it on the ground. Walk away.

Do not dig up the grass… or till… or mow. Don’t even weed wack. I know, I know you think you have to. You really don’t.

Pile up grass clippings, yard debris, fall leaves, fresh leaves, wood chips, shredded paperwork, torn up newspaper, used coffee grounds (another good reason to go to Starbucks). The more ingredients you can find, the better.

Clean your neighbor’s yard, or ask them if you can have the bags they pile at the end of the street. They might be thrilled they don’t have to pay for trash stickers. I even asked my local landscaper to bring me his yard waste.

It doesn’t have to be smelly or ugly either.

Spread your new material on top of the pile in thin layers. When you get the right mix of greens and browns, it won’t smell. If there’s enough air and moisture, it breaks down quickly. You can spread it in a low pile and cover it with woodchips and it will even look nice. But keep building! You’ll need a lot.

How long do you have to wait for compost to break down and be garden soil? Heres a tip, every time you turn or mix compost, it takes half the time to decompose. I’ve had compost ready in as little as 3 weeks.

Is it ready yet? Dig a hole to the bottom of the pile. If you have at least 6-8″ of broken down material in the middle, you can plant in it.

If you start with great garden soil you’ll have amazing plants (I’ll show you in a few minutes)

What if you already have an established garden?

You already have a garden you say? And the plants grow ok…

If your garden is already established, keep spreading as much organic matter around the plants as you can get your hands on every year. 2 to 3 inches is recommended. Honestly, I’d add more. It doesn’t even have to be broken down. 

Add a thick cover of mulch or woodchips to snuff out the weeds and hold moisture. Make sure to clear the crown of the plants so they get air, a good 2 inches.

And you can keep piling it on in layers. Organic matter, then cover with mulch or woodchips. Keep doing that all summer. In no specific order or any measured way. Again… leaves, grass clippings, yard debris, shredded paper, coffee grounds, wood chips, store-bought mulch. Whatever you can get your hands on because massive quantities is key. It breaks down faster than you can imagine.

All this organic matter feeds the network of microbial activity going on beneath the soil. Those microbes feed your plants and they all grow unbelievably.

Imagine a garden that you don’t have to dig, till, weed, or fertilize. AND grows vegetables and flowers like crazy. You only really need to know how to prepare a garden in the spring or maintain an established garden throughout the summer.

July

The tomatoes grew so great, I was psyched to see how well other plants would do here. Let’s try some perennial flowers, shrubs, and a few annuals.

I ran around the nursery on a mission to “save my babies”. I snatched up handfuls of pipsqueaks and the poor, sick plants, crying for help.

Sitting in black 1-gallon plastic containers in the bright hot sun – some plants were nearing their demise. Quickly, with very little thought, I filled in the rest of the garden.

Fastest garden I’ve ever planted.

In under 2 months, every single plant is thriving, some have quadrupled in size!

I hope I’m expressing how truly amazing this is. (maybe the photos will convince you)… July is very late to start a garden. No spring rain to boost growth, just sun, sun, and more sun. Even still, I watered this garden exactly twice. Once when the plants went in, and once a week later.

Though we didn’t have much rain, it probably didn’t need a second watering. I think I did it out of habit. All of this organic matter was the answer to dragging that heavy hose back and forth.

Soil Preparation Results by August:

I mean, wow. I’ve never seen perennial plants grow that fast. AND… See how the hose is just sitting there, unused, in late August. 😀

My butterfly bush exploded. This shrub was just a few twigs when I put it in.

Ajuga groundcover. When I planted it, it wasn’t any bigger than my hand. Now I can’t even tell where the original plant started. It spread so far.

October… WORM INVASION!

I honestly have never seen anything like it in real life. Click the photo to enlarge.

I HAVE seen this many worms in my research on vermicomposting (worm bins).

Digging this up was every bit as gross as the photos online. But if worms mean good soil, this soil is beyond amazing.

Here’s how THAT happened…

I never did stake those surprise tomatoes.  I wanted to see how they’d grow without my ‘help’. The plant flopped and tomatoes rotted underneath all summer. Good for me for being lazy, ahem, brave enough to let things get messy.

When I cleared the last tomato and sunk the shovel to plant some grasses, I found this clump.

I learned another thing. Worms love rotten tomatoes.

I am not complaining! I’m very tempted to go get those rotten tomatoes put them right back in this garden. 😀

Have I told you yet? I like the idea of not moving a bunch of heavy compost around.

I also like that it’s better for the plants, to not disturb the activity going on in the soil.

I really like the idea of layering organic matter straight on top of an existing garden, the way nature does it. It’s hard work to keep moving stuff back and forth. And for what reason? I am sighing in relief at this very moment.

Geoff Lawton, the permaculture king, calls this “chop and drop”.

Prune your plants and drop the debris right under the plant. Yes, that gets messy. I have wood chips standing by to cover up the mess. And this mix of ‘green’ and ‘brown’ helps things break down even faster.

If you’ve seen the film ‘Back to Eden‘, they attribute amazing growth to wood chips as the magic ingredient. I use wood chips all the time and it’s fantastic for compost and an awesome weed-suppressing mulch.

Compost in Place

I like that you can literally throw what most people trash, into a pile on the ground, and have the best garden. Sure, you have to wait a while, but have you ever tried moving compost? Or digging an entire garden? It’s worth the wait.

For the original compost bin, I was a garbage collector for a year. My neighbors dumped their grass clippings in. We also hauled in a load of wood chips. They were in separate bins, don’t ask me why. As the grass clippings would begin to smell, I’d throw on a layer of wood chips. That’s how I experienced the most rapid composting breakdown. By mixing ingredients and turning the pile. 

Next July… 1 Year Later

After 1 year, this garden has grown like nothing I’ve experienced in my 7 years of gardening. And it’s the talk of the town!

These plants are bigger, healthier and flower more profusely than anywhere else in the yard.

There is only one explanation. Great soil!

If you want these kinds of results, the easy way, use my soil preparation method for starting a new garden. Start a compost pile first. Your plants will thank you for it.

Remember, after a few years, all of that organic matter will be gone. So it’s important to keep adding compost and mulch around the plants every year. Use the ‘chop and drop’ method if you’re tired of lugging heavy material around.

The post Soil Preparation. No-Cost Method for Great Garden Soil. appeared first on Roots Nursery.

This summer we converted an old compost bin into a new garden. It was kind of a smelly eyesore and placed right along the path where customers walk to get to the nursery. It had to go. But something kind of amazing happened before I decided what that area should be… The seeds from last years tomatoes sprouted and grew 10 times better than in the vegetable garden. So I let em GO, I didnt even stake them, just let nature do its thing.

This was my most exciting experience learning about good soil. Because everything I put in that garden grew faster than ribbon grass (Jon will get the joke). And the worms, oh the worms. you gotta see them.

Recently, we learned about Geoff Lawton. Sustainable permaculture? food forest? I dont have much experience with either, but these words give me a little jolt every time I hear them. And the information is just as exciting. In one of his permaculture videos, Geoff and his students practice what they call ‘chop and drop’. Its kinda like permission to be a lazy slob. Ive been freed! After you’ve pruned or harvested the plant, you chop up the debris, then drop it right below the plant you pruned it from. I am so DOWN for that.

But freedom is harder than you think!

We have this human NEED to CLEAN UP after ourselves. We like things neat and tidy, compartmentalized, fit in its right category. But nature doesn’t do it that way, and frankly, nature doesn’t appreciate it either. Nature litters all day long! Leaves and branches fall, animals poop, and the wind blows all that garbage around. You’d think nature would be a terrible neighbor. Yet it comes out BEAUTIFULLY! All that stuff we’re tidying up, packing neatly in yard bags and paying for removal? It all makes incredibly rich organic soil. So keep your leaves, grass clippings, yard debris… and dump them back into your garden.

And dont stop there!

Kitchen waste can go straight in your garden too! Oh, you’re shaking your head now… ‘No way am I throwing garbage in my garden’. uhhm, did you see the worms??? ok, i’ll show you!

This happened because I couldn’t get under my tomato plant to clean out all the tomatoes that rotted on the ground. What I would have never guessed in a thousand years was, what a drastic improvement rotten tomatoes could make!

So here’s the experiment Im working on.

THE ZERO GARBAGE Project.
The goal of this project is to reduce the volume sent to the landfill while creating the richest soil my garden has ever seen. Why should they get the good stuff, right? 😉

Every sliver of compostable kitchen scrap now goes straight into the garden. Ideally what’s left, should be mostly recyclable. I’ll tell ya, I feel a little naughty, standing at my doorway in the middle of December, tossing a banana peel into the garden. But its for a CAUSE! And since no ones out there looking at the gardens, winter is the perfect time to start composting. Even though it wont do much decomposing in the winter, I believe it should have enough time to break down in early spring, before the summer planting months arrive.

ok! so what goes in?
Vegetable scraps. Fruit. Herbs. Popcorn. Coffee and coffee filters. Tea bags. Napkins and Paper towels. Shredded paper, newspaper and cardboard. Stale bread and burnt toast. Dead flower arrangements. Pencil shavings and sawdust. Basically anything organic that breaks down. heres more of what goes in

now, what stays out?

• Kitty litter, dog business. I read that feces of carnivores might contain disease organisms. ewww. i dont want that anywere near my tomatoes.
• Lime, coal, charcoal. May be toxic to plants or change the pH in a way that stops decomposition.
• Meat, fat, grease, oil, bones. This is a little controversial. Some people say yes, go for it. Other say that fat and grease dont break down. Not only do they not break down, they coat everything else so that wont break down either.
• Dairy products like milk, butter, cheese, ice cream or yogurt. This one is iffy. Its said the pungent odor attracts pests, but can be hidden in the middle of a compost pile to mask it. For our purposes, milk would just be gross, so lets skip it.
• Heres more of what stays out

COOL COMPOSTING TIP! When the Mess Becomes Unbearable.
It really does look bad when garbage piles up, so I have been covering it. We have a pile of finished compost and a pile of woodchips here at the nursery. Good materials to have on hand. I’ll sprinkle light layers on top. This not only covers the mess, but it helps it break down faster! I’ve read of people digging a hole or a trench, throwing scraps in, then covering lightly with the dirt from the hole.

I implore you, I EMPOWER you to throw your garbage straight into the garden. It doesn’t feel terribly right at first, but I imagine the rebellious attitude I’ll boast, knowing that what I’m doing is the best thing for my garden.

UPDATE: Summer 2015
Ok, well, everything decomposed well before planting time, so that was a plus. BUT I did not really see much improvement in plant growth. Because my garden area is large, I believe that I needed MUCH MORE compost to create great garden soil. More than I could consume in a winter. Now. If I were to have added a thick layer of grass clippings, and then another thick layer of woodchips to this soil, we might see an improvement. It takes quite a bit of compost to change the biology of soil enough to see vast increases in plant growth. Since grass clippings aren’t available in the spring, I can add them in the fall when the garden is spent. Add kitchen scraps all winter. Then early spring cover everything with woodchips. Mel Bartholemew, the square foot gardening genius, recommends that compost contain at least 4 different materials. The experiment was worth doing, and I enjoyed sending less waste the the garbage dump. Plus, I’ve learned what to do next year!

The post How to Compost Without a Bin appeared first on Roots Nursery.

And you can GROW good garden soil. Thousands of tiny organisms are eating away at your soil every day… and pooping it out! You know the best organic fertilizer is, you got it…POOP. Cow poop, chicken poop, worm poop. Its in all the stores. Mico organism poop is just as good and its already IN your soil… but you can grow your microbe count and improve your garden soil by ridiculous amounts.

Plants have an immune system, just like people do. Good soil grows healthy plants with a strong immunity able to absorb nutrients and fend off disease and insects. Healthy plants thrive without chemical dependency. Chemicals are in fact detrimental to the long term health of your soil because they kill off the microbes.

Lets let a pro explain the soil biology (If youre interested in growing super healthy plants watch this! then watch it again in 6 months)

So, you got it? Bacteria and fungus. thousands of different types, all helping you grow bigger better plants. Aint nature grand?

How to Make Good Garden Soil. Starting from Scratch

How do I get beneficial microbes into my soil? That’s the best part, they’re already IN there. You just have to keep them happy and feed them well so they can multiply.

Fungus loves roots. roots love fungus (fungi to be correct). They feed each other and help one another grow. It’s the greatest love affair of all time. Let’s figure out how to fan the flames.

Humus + Bacteria and Fungi + Plants

Humus
It’s the perfect environment. Soil humus is created by the decomposition of organic matter. It’s light and fluffy and contains nutrients that feed both microbe and plant. Its the perfect environment for both to thrive.  Microbes will eat nutrients that are unavailable to the plant, break it down and actually feed it to the plant.

Adding organic matter to the soil each year helps the symbiosis GO. If you have space and materials to make your own compost, its so much fun and an ultra effective way to create soil your plants will love. I’d never leave my garden without it!

Wood Chips are also an excellent source of organic matter. I’ve added them as an ingredient in my compost. You’d be surprised how fast they break down when they’re mixed in. And always, every year, we lay on a super thick, 6″ layer of woodchips as mulch to help control weeds. It’s insanely effective. Where we live, wood chips are plentiful and FREE! If your town doesn’t deliver free wood chips, try out AboutTrees.com to help you find them. If they can’t help you, you can also call local tree services. I’ve even flagged down tree trimmers while they’re working in the neighborhood so they can deliver the chips immediately when they’re done with their job. You’d get a kick out of our reaction to the sound of a nearby chipper. Seriously, its like kids running for the ice cream truck.

Some people don’t like wood chips in the garden. Can you imagine? The woman working at the hardware store actually told me that ‘when the roots hit the woodchips or an air pocket in between, they die’. I nodded my head politely and went about my business. I’d rather pay attention to what’s working for people… Check out Garden Seeks blog post about using woodchips in the garden soil. The winner in this experiment was a 50% woodchip/garden soil mix.

This is already happening in my yard. Some of my soil is really compacted and it really helps to loosen it up. I’ll let you know about the results.

Bacteria and Fungi
They already live your the soil. Keep feeding them with organic matter. You can leave plant roots in the soil after every season to provide food and organic matter.

You can also ‘inoculate’ your soil, adding even more bacteria and fungi. I purchased a form of inoculant, the Jobes/Proven Winners brand just yesterday. It’s filled with bacteria and fungi (oh my). But if you’re really motivated you can make your own!

How to Make Your Own Inoculant
A lot of rave about the benefits of compost tea. Drenching the soil and sprinkling the leaves of their plants had brought them massive results. I always thought making compost tea seemed hard. Of course, I can’t judge because I’ve never tried it.

The Master Gardeners in Gwinnett County Georgia came up with this method. (the procedure is at the bottom of the page. It takes a whole summer, but seems easy and like a lot of fun. In short, you’ll grow an annual plant that is known to form mycorrhizae, in sand. The roots will entirely fill the pot of sand by the end of the summer. Cut off the plant and save the root filled sand in a cool dry place until next season. Now you have a homemade organic fertilizer to sprinkle on your plants or mix in with your garden or potting soil!

Plant Roots
Mychorriza (my-kor-eye-za) is the mutual relationship between roots and fungus. The ‘Rhizosphere’ is the 1-inch area immediately surrounding the plant’s roots where bacteria and fungus congregate and cycle nutrients. They feed off of the carbon content of plant roots then poop them out, at the root making these nutrients more available to the plant.

Farmers have begun to realize that no part of their land should be ever without some kind of plant. They grow cover crops in between rows or in rotation. Crops like vetch, ryegrass and soybeans are turned back into the soil. This adds organic matter (food for fungi) back to the soil, prevents compaction, helps retain moisture and grows great plants!

SO, there you have it. Nutrient-rich garden soil, able to grow healthy, disease resistant plants without tilling or chemicals and much much less prone to weeds.

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Great gardening starts with good soil right? and things grow differently in each type of soil.  Different types of soil include sand, clay and silt.  I tried the ‘jar test’ to determine what my garden soil is made of. It was easy and fun, a project your kids will love!

The Jar Test

I found this test in a few places each with different instructions, but the premise was the same. Find a mason jar. Add soil, water and dish soap. (The best combination for a large jar was 1 cup of soil, 1-2 cups of water and 1/2 tsp of dish soap) Shake it up for a minute to break everything up, and then let it sit. The soil will settle into layers.

Set the jar where it wont be disturbed, and in 24 hours all the layers should have settled. The 1st layer on the bottom will be sand. The 2nd layer is silt and the 3rd layer is clay. Organic matter will float to the top of the water. (the more organic matter, the better).  If you have equal parts sand and silt with a thin layer of clay and some organic stuff floating on top, you have great soil! (40% sand, 40% silt, 20% clay).

Sandy soils drain too quickly, unable to retain moisture or nutrients to feed your plants. Amend sandy soils by adding 2 inches of organic matter (composted yard waste or manure) mixed in with the top 6 to 12 inches.

Clay soils dont drain well and drown your plants. Amend by adding an equal amount of sand and compost to create 2 inches mixed in with the top 6 to 12 inches. (dont forget the compost… clay plus sand equals cement!)

The Earthworm Test

Earthworms are a sign of great soil. They aerate the soil and help break down organic matter. Dig 1 square foot of your soil, down 6 inches. Sift through your soil and count the earthworms. 10 is the magic number. If you find 10 earthworms, your soil is doing fine. If you dont find many earthworms, add more organic matter.  One way to attract earthworms is by adding used coffee grounds to your compost bin. Worms love used coffee grounds, and the acid thought to be found in the grounds is removed during the brewing process… And since theyre made of paper, you can even add the filters!

The Ph Test

Want to save a trip and some cash from buying a soil test? Test the Ph level of  your soil with stuff you have at home. Grab a tablespoon, a glass of water, a paper towel, vinegar and banking soda and head out to the garden.

1. Add a few drops of vinegar to a spoonful of dry soil. Does it fizz? If it does, your soil is alkaline (over 7.5) Alkaline soils are amended by adding sulfur.
2. Clean the spoon off and grab another spoonful of soil. Add water and a pinch of baking soda. Does it fizz now? If it does, your soil is acidic (less than 5) Acidic soils are amended by adding lime.

One of the best ways to maintain great soil is to add 2-3 inches of compost on top of your garden as a mulch. It’s cheap, retains moisture, attracts earthworms and keeps plants fed. And when its time to work the soil, you’ll make it better every time.

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Used Coffee Grounds are GREAT for your plants, don’t throw it away! Add it to your compost pile filter and all, or even sprinkle the grounds directly into the garden to help plants grow like crazy. Its loaded with nitrogen, with a carbon to nitrogen ratio of 20:1, the same as manure. Not only does it smell delicious, your plants will love it.

Here are 5 ways to Use Coffee Grounds as Fertilizer

1. Add it to your compost bin. Coffee grounds make an excellent ‘green’ material (nitrogen). When you compost, you layer ‘green’ materials, like grass clippings, kitchen scraps and plant debris, with ‘brown’ matter (carbon) like leaves, bark, straw or newspaper. Combining the two helps the organic matter break down quicker and leaves you with a nutrient rich soil to add to your garden. “Black Gold!!!”

2. Use it straight in your garden as a mulch or soil conditioner. Coffee grounds will add nitrogen to the soil to feed the plants and adds acidity for bluer blooms on hydrangeas.  Coffee grounds will also attract worms. The more worms the better, as they are continuously composting and aerating the soil and feeding your plants with fresh nutrients.

3. Use it as worm bedding and feed. Worm castings are said to be the gardeners ultimate compost because they naturally contain so many of the minerals plants need. If you’re itching to try ‘vermicomposting’ give your worms a treat with used coffee grounds.

4. Make a compost tea. Stuff a sock full of used coffee grounds and steep it in a 5 gallon bucket of water  (or bigger)  for a few days. What comes out?… compost tea! Use the tea to water your plants for a nutritious boost.

5. Add it to your house plants. Our facebook fans report that sprinkling used coffee grounds in the soil around your house plants will make them grow like crazy!

Check out the results of compost created from only coffee grounds and shredded newspaper. The results are pretty cool

FEED YOUR SOIL!
You should always be feeding your soil to keep your plants healthy and growing. If you have a few more minutes and would like to learn exactly whats going on in your soil, heres the best video Ive seen about it! These people are growing gigantic vegetables with just great soil…

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Homemade Compost Bins

Big compost bins shown here are made of cinder blocks, hay, wooden pallets, timber, crates and fencing. If it will hold a pile, it will do the job. When planning a homemade compost bin, consider airflow, moisture retention and overall size (more on this later). If you turn the pile regularly, you can have finished compost pretty darn quick. A 2 bin system like this one holds a spot for finished compost.

I built this compost bin in 2010 out of very old boards hanging out here for years. I looked at the rotten wood and thought, “its going to hold garbage, why not use everything”. The fence was graciously donated by a neighbor. This wonderful bin turned out to be a community dump, for all my neighbors to drop off grass clippings and fall leaves.

If you dont need a ton of compost a small container can work, like this garbage can. Its easy to take care of, dump it out, mix it up then pile it back in. Unless you drill holes in the can, it wont drain or breathe well and can get downright stinky. Make sure to turn it often.


This one’s creative! A chicken wire hoop has great drainage and air flow. Being able to disassemble the hoop to turn the pile would be super helpful. Reassemble and scoop the compost back in.
Now that you have a few ideas about how to make a homemade compost bin, here’s a little science to keep in mind when building your own.

Compost Chemistry. The Science of Rotting Garbage.

Heat. The decomposition process generates heat through the microbial breakdown of materials. You might notice steam in the early morning or when you turn the pile. Heat is essential to ‘cook’ your compost pile. When your pile is cooking, you’ll know that its actively decomposing, killing pathogens and weed seeds.

Moisture. You may notice white powdery dry spots in your compost pile, and this is natural, but dry spots are not actively breaking down. The dry pile needs to be turned and watered if needed. Dont over water! A soupy mess wont break down either and may leach nutrients from the pile. ‘wrung out sponge’ is about right.

Oxygen. Microorganisms known for breaking down a compost pile need oxygen to breathe, therefore aeration is a necessity. Turning keeps the pile oxygenated and distributes moisture evenly.

Size. The size of the compost pile also helps the decomposition process. It should be large enough to retain moisture and generate heat and small enough to allow air flow. The recommended size is 3-5 feet wide and tall.

Whats that Smell?
I frequently encounter an ammonia smell which is most reminiscent of animal urine. This is caused by too much nitrogen. Mixing in more carbon rich ‘brown’ material will fix the problem fast. In the early summer when no leaves are available, shredded newspaper helps, so I use it a lot.

If the pile smells rotten, like sewage or rotten eggs, it’s caused by anaerobic activity. Turning the pile adds more oxygen and should relieve that rotten stench.

How often Should I Turn it?
Lots of different opinions on turning compost. Some research says that untouched compost still retains oxygen and heat levels adequately, doing away with the necessity to turn. While that might be true, I simply cant wait a year before my compost is ready. I’ve found that turning the pile breaks it down faster, and have read that, as a rule, every time you turn, it cuts composting time in half! But I hear you, turning large piles of compost is hard work so it’s easy to just let it sit. And that works, but a pile located in direct sun, turned daily, without the addition of new materials, can be broken down in 2-3 weeks. That’s more like it! and worth the effort. In the first few days, I turn with a pitch fork. After the grass clippings have decomposed past the bulky stage, my little Mantis Tiller works like a pro and makes the job a breeze!

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