The straw/wood chip situation will not beat the tilled side the first season but give it one or two good rain years, poultry grazing, etc and it will beat the tilled side in the long haul. Awesome video. Dealing with similar challenges on a much smaller scale.
It took about 3 years for the woodchip side to finally catch up to the side without, but the new owners decided to put a spa in that area instead of maintaining the pasture. What part of the country are you in?
A few things. You should have left the wood chips down. Get rid of your tiller and get a skyline plow. It doesn't destroy the mycorrhyzal fungi and the microbiome. That and don't moy that field. Let it go to seed. You will be amazed if you put your pigs and chickens on 1/4 acre at a time and what comes from that. Pigs then chickens 3 days later. Get some legumes in there as well. With that you are on the right path to sustainable regenerative farming, nice job using what will grow naturally in that climate. Love what you are doing.
Those are good suggestions. The challenge we have with the pasture is a lack of time to wait for the woodchips to break down enough to use the pasture (even with irrigation it takes a few years for woodchips to break down completely in our environment). We need to run chickens this fall for production, so I need to speed up the establishment process. We do plan on more legumes and also going to try and get some daikon in the ground if we can get the small chicken pasture fenced before we get into spring.
I was doing permaculture before I'd ever even heard of it back in MN. I'm currently in Tx and looking into VA loans and Grants available to start my dream. One thing I noticed in my garden in MN was the shoots will grow up through the wood chips without any issues and it will feed your plantings for years to come. Make sure to use dirty mulch with leaves and limbs shredded into it as well it will help a lot. Find a company around you that you can utilize. Arborists are a great resource as well as your local utilities.
I just watched a special from China you might find interesting "How China pushed back the desert and turned it into green space" April 7 2019 and "How China transformed it's desert into a fruit growing oasis" Sept 26 2018 from CGTN both using their straw or wheat checker board pattern technics. This could help you as well. The Chinese are way ahead of us in this and so is Africa. Sad to say. This is why I wanted to create a non profit seeing stuff like this.
@@drqin402 oh yes I saw that one it's amazing. I live in fuerteventura and we have problems with climate change, salinity, extremely low rainfall, high winds, lack of organic material etc etc etc the thing with extremely dry climates is things just take so much longer to break down
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm I had heard on other programmes of a different better kind of ploughing... I know this chap mentions the skyline plow, or I heard of some better way of tilling where it doesn't go so deep. I'll leave it there, think I mentioned this before, and not sure if you replied Duane. Well hey ho... just thought it was worth of saying again.
I planted the same pasture mix last week. Tilled the soil with a small tiller, broadcast spreader with the mix, raked in with stiff tooth rake. Put wood chips on a test patch, the rest I left bare. Watered 1-2x/day. About a week in, and it’s sprouting where the wood chips are, nothing yet on bare ground. Tonight, I put wood chips on the entire area.
That's great to hear you're having success with woodchips as a cover on these. We're still deciding on how we're going to start the pastures on the new property, so we'll need to give this a shot!
I think this is a testament to no til... especially if you’ve seen improvement after two or three years in the no til side. My understanding is that it takes years to build the soil with no dig from the start. If you do a sunflower patch on the no til side, the roots act as TIL and when you cut sunflowers down, you leave the roots in. ... basically you are trading work for time with no til... but, even with no til, it is often important to do an initial til... then from that point forward you never til again ... if you turn the area into a bed, you would still take a pitchfork or similar to lift and loosen the top eight inches or so without turning it. That’s what I’ve learned from watching a grip ton of no til farmer videos. But haven’t tried yet... just getting started with my farm.
Those are great observations. We're noticing that an initial till is needed to jump start that first flush of growth and get things going. From there on we're sticking with no till. Funny your comments are coming over right now as we're getting ready to start this process over with our new chicken pasture on the new farm. Should be doing the initial till this weekend and flattening the ground to get ready to plant in September. Considering Daikon this winter to see how that does compared to straight seeding. If not in this area we'll definitely try that elsewhere. Thanks for the suggestions!
I agree. An initial tilling is definitely needed to break up virgin ground. I’m Looking at buying property in the next few years. My plan is to buy some land with substandard soil to try to get it at a better price. I’ll be tilling up the ground then laying a heap of composted material over the top before seeding it with a good pasture mix. I’ll protect the ground by laying a combination of straw and wood chips over the top as a mulch.
I live in Florida, near the west coast. Our "soil" here is basically sand. My yard, along with a lot of other yards that are not fertilized, watered, etc. had turned mostly back into sand after it was sodded when I had the house built about 10 years prior. The grass died in the heat. I saw some videos on how to have a green lawn, and one of the most important things was to never mow shorter than 4". So, I started to raise the mower, and I also let it go to seed at least once a summer. It looked bad, but if I did it by sections at a time, it was better. So it re-seeded again this year - not just the grass, but other plants growing in it. My yard now is lush, too lush, in fact. There are no patches of sand outside of where the drip line is off the house. The snakes love my yard, as do the squirrels and bees who come for the wild flowers that have sprouted. My point here is, why mow before it gets a chance to re-seed at least one time? That way you don't need to keep planting yourself. In terms of the wood chips, it could be some of the chips were too green, even after a year, and it threw the chemistry of the soil off. It will probably catch up. The fact that it came up on such dry land is a plus, so give it more of a chance. Wood chips are great, but they also have an impact on small plants.
Hey Lynn. I think you're spot on with your assessment (and I can't imagine having to deal with straight sand, hard clay is one things, but sand, goodness!). We raised our mower last winter and kept it about 4" tall minimum and it did really well through spring when it went dormant. We did let it go to seed and just finished our overseeding about a week ago. Already, even in 100+ degree heat, the pasture is coming back much stronger this year. Hoping to see what you're seeing with that lush green this winter for our broiler chickens. Thank you for the comment and advice!
Hey quercus. You are absolutely spot on with that suggestion. We ended up keeping the grass much taller while we had the chickens on the pasture and it did a great job taking over the weeds. Thanks for the suggestion!
@@lolaby2 very true. Once we have the chickens off the pasture we usually let it go to seed prior to dormancy and it definitely helps to have it longer.
Im not surprised in the least about the wood chip patch. For me its a no no,do not do under any circumstance. For three reasons. 1. It ties up crucial nutrients long term in the soil. 2. Adds high amounts of salts to soils. 3. Adds waxes to the soil which can make it water repellant.
Hey Kevin, great points on that. On top of those it just takes a very long time for them to break down in our dry environment (literally years!). The tilled side without woodchips just outperformed without exception.
There is another point to they are a serious negative if you are in an environment where fires are a serious issue. They are a real death trapbthat way
Can you elaborate? Im unsure what you mean by salts and wax.. maybe by wax you mean resin, which is only noticeable in pine and spruce chips. As far as salt.. wood contains less than 1% salts.. wood ash on the other hand contains 22% potassium in a salt form. Neither being detrimental to gardens. Now to address the nitrogen tie up, that is 100% true. Its pays off in the long run though. If you can organically fertilize the woodchips they will soak up the nutrients then slowly release them for years to come. So, after the first few years that effects turns beneficial.
Thanks CrankyBubushka. Just took a pic tonight before we put our last round of broilers on it this weekend and should have it up on Instagram in the next few days. Running chickens over desert ground does AMAZING things!
Wood chips will work, however, they must decompose some first. They only way this will happen, if used as a top dress, you must soak them in a VERY nitrogen rich water. The best nitrogen rich water to use is either urine, or ammonia. Also remember that if your top dress can absorb moisture, it will. It will do so by absorbing it from the ground underneath it,THEN, it will evaporate it to the air and sun. Wood chips work best if soaked in nitrogen, then put UNDER about 2-4" of topsoil or whatever you have available.
What you're suggesting definitely makes sense. The biggest challenge we have here is a complete lack of moisture for most of the year which is another key ingredient needed to break down wood chips. Fungal decomposition is one of the keys to wood chips and without water that's tough to come by!
Interesting result of the experiment. I wonder if the low water had an effect on how much the hydro loving guys were able to break down the wood chips and make a good place to live. Also curious about the aeration of clay for those anerobes. Did you fertilize both sides equally when you did? Or add fertility to the tilled side and not to the wood chip side? I’ve been bookworming on so much of this biological/regenerative/permaculture ag stuff living in the desert of Arizona incredibly curious about what works and doesn’t or needs to be shifted to work here on the edge of nowhere, so I just wanted to say THANK YOU for sharing your knowledge and experiments and experience here on TH-cam. I’m just starting on my own little garden box, but getting involved in a community vegetable garden project and looking for some land to learn on besides that, so. Thank you again for giving some context to this area.
Kellen, those are some great questions and observations. We didn't do anything with the woodchips on that side of the pasture, so lack of water to help with the ability of beneficials to do their job is no doubt a big issue there. We also know that we need to do something with the hard clay/caliche in the beginning to give them a place to dig deeper to do their job. On the new farm we're doing a couple of tests to see what will work most efficiently and right now we're using woodchips with daily water to see if we can create good soil in a couple of raised beds for berries. So far the results are encouraging. I'll link that video for you here; th-cam.com/video/JoWYdTHkFPc/w-d-xo.html
Nice video. Thanks man, Seriously. I live in Casa Grande. I'm a big fan of wood chips also. Finally found wood chips source. This year fist year for veggies. Odd spring, still had light frost first week in March. I've been covering all seed lightly with pine animal bedding chips bought at Tractor Supply. Will be trying experiment with cover crops this week. Finally figured it out that if I put chips in chicken run, feed them there, I / they will create top soil by scratching all that up. Will probably screen all that ground and start watering in December.
Hey Hal. Yeah, wood chips are a must, especially as mulch around trees, etc. We still have to get our veggies going here, so you have a leg up on us there! Definitely a good idea to put those chickens to work and get the manure benefit from it. It's amazing to see how our broilers have really allowed our pasture to green up through the winter with no fertilizer and the topsoil it's already generating in some areas is amazing. Thanks for the comment!
Great question and for us it's a challenge. That's mainly because of how we run our pastured broiler chickens across it which doesn't allow for zone watering schedules. Otherwise it would be ideal.
Wood chips??? How about leaves, worm castings, actual worms and organic mulch from tree trimmings. Although this looks good for grazing; sheep would be better than small chickens. Need big shade trees or maybe bamboo. If you’ve ever walked through an orange grove in Mesa...you’ll see free growing tall grass that keeps the soil cool and helps retain water.
Great question Jaxson. We do water the pasture about 3 times a week, but only during the winter when the grass is growing and not dormant. This lessens the need for water during the hot summers where we may water very briefly once a week to keep the dormant roots from dying.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm thank you so much! I’m helping my grandpa convert to holistic management in Grantsvile Utah. He doesn’t have anyway to irrigate the pasture he’s leasing. He has 40 head on 320 acres. I’m young and broke, how would you suggest planting out 3 acres to experiment and show Him? I plan to keep it fenced off until I can graze it. One day rotation on half a acre at a time. Any tips tricks or seed advice would be loved thank you!
@@j.swipes oh wow, that's a heck of thing to do for your grandpa. I imagine it's overwhelming right now to figure out how you can help him make a better way with that land. So I'm going to link Greg Judy's TH-cam channel for you here; th-cam.com/channels/i8jM5w49UezskDWBGyKq5g.html He is about as good as it gets when it comes to detailing grazing systems and animal movement here on TH-cam. He had a short series on a project he's working on in Southern AZ and their climate is very similar to ours. We have experience with chickens on pasture, but as you're seeing here that's on irrigated pasture. Much different from what you're wanting to accomplish. We're going to be testing that here as well this coming fall, but I imagine you'll want to get started before then. One things is for sure, you'll need electric fencing to guide the cattle with your rotations. That along with feed and supplement costs (unless g-pa can finance that for you??) will be your major expenses given you'll be using an existing herd.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm what you need to do is record a base soil sample from a couple areas to see moisture start point Every month you measure how much change in depth of soil moisture. Be interesting to see how deep in a year one can change non ferrile soil to fertile soil. A ph and and moistuter meter will be help full.
The one we used here you can find on Amazon, but I will say we've switched that up a bit and now focus on alfalfa and perennial rye as the seed mixes get very expensive on a larger scale. I'll link to the one we used for you here, so you can see what's in it; amzn.to/3TyqtFA Assuming you're going for a pastured chicken setup, but for turkeys it's a bit different. We're posting a video next week with how we're doing that on our new property.
@@coyotesden Ok, I know right where you're at. We're just North of Dixileta and 243rd, so just a few miles from there. Good luck on snagging that land!!
Hey! I'm trying to calculate how much water and time it took for you to get those results. Could you let us know how long it took t get that growth from seed to pasture? Mostly really want to know how much water it took. Would love to know some numbers I can parse out the math but your best aproximation would be super useful! Thanks!
Hey there! This is a great question and I really don't have an answer for the water usage. We used a manual oscillating sprinkler and hose, so there was no way to measure the amount of water used. We started the process of establishing the pasture in September of 2017 and this video was shot in November of the same year, so it took 2 months to see this growth. By the following year, with some overseeding of perennial rye grass, we saw even better results. I assume this was due to the 2 rounds of pastured chicken we ran across it the fall-spring before. We're going to be doing the same thing starting in September of this year as we establish a new chicken pasture on the new property. We'll be documenting all of it here, hopefully in more detail, so that should help all of us figure out what this is going to take. Right now we're running our new flock of laying hens across bare desert ground to get some manure in place ahead of planting this fall.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm thanks so much for the reply! Do you have a guess as to how long you let the sprinkler run? Was it just left on 24/7 or just at nights & mornings? I want to build Chicken pasture on an off grid setting in AZ so I'm trying to calculate rain catchment fixtures needed for square feet of pasture and water is a key element. Thanks!
@@thehuntfortruth For the first few weeks we had it running in the morning and at night for about an hour. Once the grass was growing in well we went to evenings only. You'll also need to water heavy behind chickens if you tractor them to get the manure broken down enough to not burn the pasture. It does take quite a bit of water up front and throughout the season if there's no rainfall. The last couple of years were great rainfall years in the Fall-Spring which is when we keep the pasture green for chickens. That would be a huge factor for you off grid.
It is a lot of maintenance! A lot of the weeds we use a trimmer or we actually just mow to keep them knocked down. But I do spend a lot of time scraping or pulling in certain areas.
No, we don't attempt to harvest the seeds. When they're planted as pasture the plants wind up getting consumed by the chickens, so they don't get a chance to form and significant seed heads.
Glad you enjoyed this one. Is that SD as in San Diego? We've found a mix of alfalfa and perennial ryegrass are our best options here in this part of AZ. They are both perennial for us here, dying back during certain parts of the year, but coming back strong in either Fall (Rye) or Spring (Alfalfa). The water varies drastically from season to season and depending on moisture. Summer is alfalfa season and we water most days unless it rains. Winter we water every few days if there is no moisture. We use overhead sprinklers for watering, so I wouldn't be able to give you a hard number as to how many gallons.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm Hey thanks for the reply and yup San Diego less hot then you guys but we only get 14 inch of rainfall a year. Those sound like good options for grasses I just don’t want to dry up my well watering pasture i was wondering if there’s some native stuff that just grows that’s not weeds lol but I guess everything does need some water inputs. Where’s the best place to get those drought tolerant seeds are they special order ?
@@stickolascage2936 we're working towards getting some desert weeds/pasture started now that we're raising goats, but chickens are a bit more particular when it comes to what they'll actually eat. We purchase the alfalfa seeds from a supplier here in town. The variety we grow is Fertilac 11 which is a very common variety for desert areas. Perennial rye is available at Home Depot here in the Fall, so we just over seed with that once it's available. I'm right there with you on wanting to limit the water use for pasture. We use enough already for fruit trees and garden beds, so we keep our chicken pasture limited to 6,000 square feet. With that our 24 layers and 4 turkeys have plenty of forage space and we can still run 2 rounds of 150 broilers (each round) across it in Fall and Spring.
I’m just starting a pasture on sand and would like to see your three videos in order. Can you share link?? Also do you mow if you are going to put in the pasture?
Hey Carol. I'll link them in order for you here and we also have a playlist that is called Desert to Pasture that covers the process here on the old farm and on our new one. As for mowing, we do mow the pasture if we don't have animals doing the job for us. Here are the episodes in order; Episode 1 - th-cam.com/video/_e0JP2zLm0E/w-d-xo.html Episode 2 - th-cam.com/video/U7_f0OlUDUw/w-d-xo.html Episode 3 - th-cam.com/video/AYmux8bRChg/w-d-xo.html Also an update at 1 year - th-cam.com/video/EYQgNcv42IA/w-d-xo.html
Hey Victor. We're no longer on this property, but during the growing season (Fall - Spring) it was usually watered 3x/week. More often during the early Spring and late Fall and not at all if there is any rainfall. Summer depends on whether or not your trying to grow Summer "grasses". Otherwise, the pasture is dormant during the Summer and receives water every other day to keep the roots alive through the off season.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm thats what i figured i would have to get variants bred in similar regions . my main thing is i need to be able to produce feed for goats, in high desert .
@@worldwidereviewst.v699 gotcha. We have not raised goats ourselves yet (we'll have our first on the farm this fall/winter), but we have a lot of folks around us who do. From they tell us they really prefer woody type material and also like it dry. The desert has you covered on dry, but you may want to look for some small shrubs and/or trees to include for your forage. We're growing a few different types of mulberries for that very reason. Worth considering as you design your space for the goats. Good luck!
I assume you planted the seed on top of the wood chips? Paul Gautschi plants seed in the dirt and when it comes up recovers the wood chips. This planting seed on top of wood chips probably accounts for the patchyness as some seed did not hit dirt to germinate? Paul puts wood chips lightly over established grass in the fall and it's green, lush and needs less water.
Hey Lore! We actually pulled back all the woodchips and planted in the humus layer that was starting to develop. Yeah, directly into woodchips would probably be a bad idea here in AZ where it takes years for woochips to fully breakdown. On a positive note, we did an update video a couple months back and that side of the pasture is catching up to the tilled side pretty nicely. Still not as strong, but in much better shape.
Alright, I’m up in North East AZ, up at the base of the white mountains. We get more rain than you do, and I’m wondering what your opinion is on being able to start a pasture that takes little to no extra watering using the savory methods? I want to build a small water retaining system at the low point of my property and slowly trying to build up a good soil base with drought resistant grass that already kind grows around here in small patches. Is that a totally unreasonable to think I could get a thick pasture like you have with using only rain water or mostly only rain water?
Hey Derek! That is a very good question and I can't really say for sure. Typically you would try to store water higher up on a property so it has a chance to seep into the soil. Similar to how a berm/swale system would work. From there you can also move the water more easily to the lower parts of the property. You guys get a LOT more rain than we do typically, but there are times like this year where it's few and far between. In years like the one we just had I'm not sure it could make it through without some help. For us down here the only option is to irrigate, but we noticed the need for irrigation was less as we added more fertility. Are you going to run cattle on this land?
Edge of Nowhere Farm My goal is to eventually run one or two cows on it. The total average of the pasture would be about 1.75 acres. See I told someone else I wanted to store the water on the high point using berms to store it with a pipe coming out with a valve to release water to water the pasture and they looked at me like I was stupid and said to put water at the bottom. I have 2.5 acres total, but about a 3/4 acre of that is going to be the house, garden, shop, and wood pile. I want to use the rest as pasture. I would start using a chicken tractor and maybe a couple pigs to get started. But if I could get the soil base started that holds water better than the clay, get my tank built, and add manure and nutrients whenever I can get it. Anyway, I have seen the savory method in similar environments grow some serious pasture land with no irrigation but I am in the very beginning stages of learning about it and highly motivated to try and get this pasture going, however I feel I may not be living in reality.
@@DereksWorkshopAndProjects well, one thing is for sure it wouldn't hurt to try as long as you're not putting a ton of money into it. AZ weather is just very unpredictable and similar in some respects to the Middle East. Geoff Lawton has done a lot of permaculture work there also, but you'll notice he uses water high on the landscape and plenty of berms/swales to capture and retain water. With this he's still not accomplishing a lush pasture (rather perennial food systems), but that's not to say it can't be done where you are. One way or another, In my opinion your best bet will be water at the high point of the landscape so it can flow down naturally. It will do this both above and below ground if it has the ability to absorb over time. We're not able to support pasture year round down here in the valley (at least without a TON of irrigation), but if I had property up North I would try multiple options to see what works best. I'm curious how storing water low would provide a better option? Is it because it flows there naturally and can be pumped back up as needed? We do plan on having a stock pond at the low point, but most of our earthworks and catchment are above this area to retain the water on property. You'll have to keep us updated on this one, because I'd love to see what you come up with!
Edge of Nowhere Farm Thanks for your thoughts. I do think that person suggesting the low point was just misunderstanding my intentions for this water, but either way. I’m going to have a residential well but I’m thinking I might try to run a pipe to the top of the high point in my property and then flood irrigate in the dry season (spring and early summer) since the pasture won’t be that big. I might overwork my well pump. I don’t know for sure. I need to research more. Anyway, but also keep that tank at the top for catching winter snow melt and summer monsoon rains (if we ever get a decent monsoon again) for releasing in dry spells. I don’t picture a lush thick full green pasture but I guess I picture a mostly full mostly green mostly full pasture? I don’t know. It may be impossible. I’m going to take some serious notes and document exactly what I do so that if I can reach a point where I have a fairly successful pasture here in the high desert , I can share it. I don’t know anyone doing it up here without irrigation from wells or the creek but I don’t know if anyone has really tried either. If you really care I can keep you posted but this is going to be years of work probably even before any progress.
@@DereksWorkshopAndProjects I think it's definitely worth the effort to give this a shot. You're in a position where you may be able to bridge some of those gaps that are going to happen and still work with what nature gives you. Please keep us updated on it. May be easier via email, so our email address is in the About tab here on TH-cam.
Ur climate is best suited for many fruit trees. Hope you plant more mangoes (our Pakistani varieties are the bestest in the world) they can grow from seeds. The mango you buy 1 in approx 5$ we buy that in .05$ fresh. You can make a whole lot of market thru that. Arizona and South Pakistan have equal temperature zone. Also instantly buy "kandahari pomegranate" plant when u see that in ur area which is the sweatest of all in pomegranate colored bright red, plant miswak trees as well, trust me ur climate also suites "date trees" don't buy plant just buy "ajwa date packet" eat the fruit and plant the seeds in open areas, also try olive trees buy check if they are fruit baring, jujubees are king of the desert being drought taularent which all others are as well. If i had been with you i would had planted almost 10 trees of all of them. Wish you and ur wife all the best. Regards, Junaid (from Islamabad).
@@junaidfaiz Junaid, wow you have a lot of experience with some very unique varieties. We plan on trying some new varieties on our new property because we will have more space. I need to find that mango you are talking about, because Lori really wants a Mango tree, but the varieties that are sold here in the US are not well suited to our climate. Is there a specific Pakistani mango variety that you would recommend?
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm yes go for "Chaunsa" its a big mango & that really makes into a tree. I wish u have a Pakistani near by being ur colleague or neighbor cz you can ask him to bring some fruit for taste (u know what i mean). While mentioning this every single Pakistani type is the best. Anwar Rataull (Small sized fruit & considered as the sweatest of all) Sindhree (Also big). Tawta (translation of parriot). Deisi (one we make pickle off). We eat alot of mangoes. Who ever is saying that ur climate doesn't suit mangoes is wrong cz mangoes need lots of heat & humidity, less watering though. It just needs to bust out of seed. So, plant lots of seeds whenever u eat mangoes. One more thing never twist any branch of mango or louquart. These trees are like children twist them, theyll shy & die. Keep them protected from everyside uptill 2 feet from every animal especially dogs, rats & pigs. Talk to them & patt them as if they are ur children. Then see what theyll yield one day, IA.
Surely the ground has to be broken up on some level for the seed to take - otherwise the ground is too hard, "that's" why the side with just the wood chip and no tilling didn't do well?
That is exactly what we've found Sebastian. An initial till on our hard soils is necessary to allow the seeds to take. After that we're able to forgo the tilling with proper pasture management and grazing!
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm I've seen a few programmes on 'tilling' how they are "entirely" changing their thoughts on this, and recommend a special type of shallow tilling, which does not disturb the land too much? Oh, how do you find your videos from the beginning please Dwayne? Why did you get rid of the old farm, was this for a greater challenge? Or did you keep this, as well as the new... guess I'll find out, if I watch the videos some of these questions.
@@sebastianwrites one of the advantages to rock hard soil is you can only till shallow no matter what you try! You should be able to sort our videos from oldest to newest by starting on the videos tab. In the right hand corner above the first row of videos you'll see a "sort by" drop down that will allow you to sort by oldest video. Just a warning, we've come a LONG way since those first videos and I (Duane) was very nervous in a lot of those and would talk WAY too fast! We do cover the reasons why we moved onto the new farm in a few of those older videos, but the first time we talked about it was in our 100th episode that I'll link for you here; th-cam.com/video/n54_InBIzC4/w-d-xo.html
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm Oh, before I begin, sorry about your dad, I know it may be some time back, but sounded as if you were close. So it's Duane... never seen that before? I have a friend called Euan, who spells his name wrong as well instead of Ewan... so what do ya know? Thanks for coming back..
Hi Duane and Lori, . Still catching up on old videos. Had to comment on this one though. If you do this again, tilled vs removed wood chips, you need to vs wood chips as well. You know wood chips are going to hold water. Water that those new seeds planted on wood chips can use. Probably grow better that the tilled ground. Only one way to find out. So to recap wood chips vs tilled vs removed wood chips. Cheers. . Bill
Hey Bill. Thanks for the comment. We're going to have to tackle this again this fall, so we'll have to see if we can test that also. I think our biggest mistake was not watering the woodchips enough allowing them to break down and create more soil to plant in. Didn't think about trying a patch with seeded woochips..hmm...
Hey Efren. We watered it 2X daily (morning and evening) for the first few weeks and then we backed off to a few times a week (during the winter when we run chickens it doesn't dry out very fast!) And yes, we do water when the chickens are there, but we are careful not to water on them or right in front of where we're moving the tractor. It's probably not much of a concern in our warm climate, but we would rather not take the chance of getting them wet and then chilled. Cornish Cross are not very hardy so we tend to baby them if we can!
Now that is a GREAT question! We're actually planting our new poultry pasture today on the new farm. We're using perennial rye as the base along with white clover, daikon and alfalfa. I would think whatever common grass you're able to establish (Rye, Timothy, etc), plus a cereal grass and some nitrogen fixers (clover, alfalfa, etc) is a great mix to start it out. What types of animals will you be using it for?
Richard, that's so true. We'll be starting out with the 4,000 sq. ft chicken pasture right off the bat to try and get it up and running before winter hits, so hopefully we can get it rocking quick! Needless to say we WILL be tilling first!
We don't own this property any longer, but during the winter we would water it about once a week. When we over seeded in fall it was twice a day for about 30 minutes until the pasture was re-established after the summer dormancy.
What you're calling clover is what I'd call mallow (or at least some sp of Malva). I can't see it that well though so what do I know. I'm really surprised at how green that is in November, I didn't think that could happen in AZ without irrigation. We're planning on moving to AZ in the next year or so, and want to homestead. Before we decided on AZ, on my dream homestead in the first year I wanted to have a movable pig yard so they could "till" the ground for us, and then move chicken tractors over the same land, and then seed it for pasture. I'm disappointed to see how the untilled area did- I guess we'll be buying or renting a tiller. I only just found you from one of the AZ homesteading groups on facebooks so I don't really know- I saw you have pigs but are you going to get other hoofstock? We are hoping we can manage a mini zebu or jersey and some goats. Of course it's all just daydreaming right now til we finish school and actually *get* to AZ.
Not completely sure on the clover vs mallow either, we have a desert mallow that's easy to identify and the pasture seed blend had several different clovers. It's still very green and the rye is really taking off, but the un-tilled side is still struggling compared to the tilled side. Pigs in front of the chickens would be a great plan to help naturally till and get some fertility into the ground. The ground will need some water, because it's really hard for our pigs to root very deep without some water to get it a little muddy first, after that they really dig away! We're still kicking around the idea of more land strictly for additional animals as there's still very affordable land 10-15 minutes West of where we are. If so, cows, goats and maybe sheep grazed rotationally would be the plan.
The stuff he was brushing his hand across is called marshmallow. In a real good wet year ut can get up to 6-8 feet tall the livestock will eat it chickens like it as it softens the soils with its strong tap root andit attracts bugs like nothing else except legumes.
Hey tTrippa. We're in Wittmann which is just outside of Phoenix, AZ. I know growing conditions are similar in southern Nevada, but I haven't lived there before.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm is there anything you think I should know about the lifestyle of the area? Snakes, other things you wish you had known before you started. Anything helps, thank you for the quick response!
@@ttrippa1295 well, the biggest issue is the extreme weather we have. Everyone knows it's hot in the summer, but most don't realize we get down into the 20's in the winter. That's a challenge for plants like tropicals where they may really like the heat, but get killed in our winters. Conversely, there are stone fruit with low chill hour requirements that do fantastic. There are snakes, but scorpions are a bigger issue that you'll wind up encountering inside the house. As for livestock, weather can be a challenge again. We have to raise our broiler chickens in the fall/winter (too hot in the summer), but winter is tough on meat chicken breeds. What are you looking to grow/raise?
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm from what I've learned from you booster chickens, create a portable chicken coop so they can move across the land to fertilize as I choose. As for everything else I'm still researching what plants would do best to help make the land more habitable. Your input is greatly appreciated. Are the scorpions aggressive and dangerous?
@@ttrippa1295 if the scorpions feel threatened they're going to sting you, but they don't chase after you. It's just hard to see them as they move around at night, so it's easy to step on one when neither of you is expecting it!
We're overhead watering with oscillating sprinklers. They're adjustable, so we can control the watering around wherever the chicken tractor happens to be. We've gone through one round of pastured chickens on it and it's working really well so far.
Hey Joseph! I'm going to link part 2 here, hopefully it works! th-cam.com/video/U7_f0OlUDUw/w-d-xo.html Good call on the aerator, we're going to need to invest in one as it will definitely come in handy. And thank you sir for your service.
Hey Clarissa. Thanks for the information and that makes sense. We just shot another update video and the tilled side is just doing amazing. Definitely going to start with that on the new acreage.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm with good texture in your soil there is good aeration. If you have good aeration you have plenty of oxygen. Tilling disturbs microbiological colonies and ecosystem and changes the moisture balance, dissipation etc. That is why no-till method is superior, less work, more production... no brainer. Grow clover and other cover crops and mulch a plenty
@@naviababyg Hey Rosa. What you're saying definitely makes sense. I think the challenge we have here with our desert soil is it's so very hard and hence very poor texture. Once the chickens have made a couple of passes and the grass has a chance to establish we're seeing some amazing results because we now have a living mulch layer on top of the native soil and the soil life is just amazing.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm, do you have the opportunity to add cows and sheep to the rotation before chickens come in? Then there's no need to mow. Your philosophy and practice with the chickens applies to cows and sheep too. Good seeing this discussion about aeration too. Interested in your experiments with desert soils. Does it make sense to imitate nature by laying down layers of compost, straw, and wood chips to hold the soil for grasses to grab on?
@@Reciprocity_Soils Hey Sean. We do plan on adding sheep on the new property and rotating as best we can. Not too sure on cows as we will only have about 3 acres designated for "Pasture". Given the sustained difference we're seeing now with the tilled vs. non-tilled side we're going to start out tilling the hard packed soil and then coming behind it with chickens to start and then sheep and other livestock to lay consistent layers of fertility down that we will then leave un-tilled.
Hey Mike! Yes, you're absolutely right. We really needed to be adding water to this regularly and give it another year or so to really test this out. Need to create another test area for something just like that!
That doesn't surprise me at all about the difference in pastures. If your soil is compacted it won't matter much what you put on top of it. It usually takes an initial till no matter what on compacted soil, unless you're going hugelkultur or working with an insane amount of biomass and building up. What you might think about trying is tilling them both and then putting wood chips on one side.
You hit the nail on the head with this one Jeff. We've since done an initial, light tilling before trying to plant. Right now we have a test patch of sorghum that is doing really well and you can clearly see the areas where the tiller was able to reach further down. Those wood chips as an initial cover is a solid suggestion as well as it does a great job of holding in moisture.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm That sounds much more promising. I just moved to AZ from the Blue Ridge mountains of NC. I've been off grid for about a decade, practicing permaculture and other regen systems. I'm still learning about the desert. But, soil building is something I've explored in many different areas of the country, I'm many different soils. And, the basics never really change. Though the challenges for addressing the basics are entirely site specific. So I always first ask myself, how can I optimize for and create the greatest range of aerobic environment, circulate gases and water efficiently, expand the rhyzome, and optimize the balance between moisture retention and drainage. Soil structure is the first step. Then biomass, water, and microbiology. Have you experimented much with hugelkultur yet? I know finding biomass in the desert is challenging, especially the kind of dense, hardwood biomass typically used in hugelkultur. But permaculture has some answers to that question. And, after seeing the Tucson swales, I'm quite confident is possible to create oasiseses(plural?) in the desert. Besides swales, it seems critical to establish an alliance with certain fast growing shrubs and trees that can be pruned back hard in the early, or cooler seasons, (ideally multiple times) to build up a surplus of biomass thru the year. Acacia seems like a good option. What do you think? That's in addition to the cover cropping mind you, and any natural fertilizers available and repurposed gray waters. Btw, I really appreciate the time and effort your putting into your channel. It's very helpful to see how others are making this all work in the desert.
@@pottsjk it sounds like you have some great insights that will definitely make soil creation here easier for you. We haven't grown Acacia before, but it should make for a solid biomass accumulator. Mulberry is our primary focus for that right now as we have multiple harvests from a fruiting mulberry tree. Multiple in that we have the fruit and also the fodder, besides the shade it also creates for livestock. Moringa is another alternative we will eventually incorporate, but they will take extra care in the winter. We learned this the hard way losing one when we hit the 20 degree mark a few winters back. We haven't tried our hand at Huglekultur, but we may give that a shot down the road. Something like that would be ideal as long as you have a water source available to irrigate from time to time.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm Ahh, Moringa, yes, thats a good one. And I can see how mulberry trees would produce lots of biomass here, not to mention extended harvests, of one of the most amazing berries in the world. Mulberry trees are also great border trees, to feed birds, enough to keep them from devouring other berry plants. I'm not sure how much you know about Hugelkultur. Forgive me if I'm saying too much you already know. It's one of my favorite things in the whole world. But it's an ancient ag tech. It was rebirthed in Bavaria, out of their early forest management projects. It creates extremely robust, long lasting and resilient soil profiles. It takes a bit of work in the frontend. But it's worth it. Basically, the dense wood at the bottom creates a huge water battery that keeps roots watered, naturally, from the bottom up, thru evaporation. The roots learn to grow down and more evenly over time, towards the moisture stored at the bottom, which is also thermally stable, which has many benefits. They can be dug in or not, depending. In your case, I would absolutely dig in, but not any deeper than a couple feet. In most cases, 18 inches is sufficient. It may be that deeper is better here. You don't want to go too deep though or you risk creating an anaerobic layer. It's essentially a raised bed filled and packed with wood, piled with incrementally smaller pieces, starting with rounds and ending with chips and compost. The organic climate control and the rich, deep biomatter support a wide range of microbiology, and a full range of fungi including endo and ecto mycorrhyzae, at optimum depths for a wide range of root zones. It's basically mimicking a midsuccession forest floor. I've done microscopy on many beds and it's incredible the life it produces and sustains and how fast or establishes. Anyway, I better stop there. I would love to collaborate with you, if you're interested. I'm located in the far eastern side of Phoenix major. Mediblegardens@gmail.com
One tip for "mowing" and watering. DO NOT DO IT IN MORNING OR NOON. Why would you send all that time money and energy to make clouds? When you mow or water in the morning or afternoon all that water and moisture mixed with scorching sun and temperatures not only all evaporates off but also hurts and kills the plants because how you you feel is someone cut you up and left you out in the scorching sun or poured nice cool water on you and left you in the sun for it to boil and leave you more thirsty? You'd just want to give up and die right? If you want the grass or pasture to FLOURISH especially in hot hot sun. Wait till everything goes to seed, mow with a bush hog and leave the clippings where the fall as mulch. Do this just before sundown in the late evening, it should be dark by the time you're done. THEN water IMMEDIATELY. By doing so you're providing it mulch and protection AND SEEDS, natural propogation, washing the nurtients from the clippings down into the soil where it's needed rather than putting it in the air via evaporation to blow away; the water you just put down has 6-8 hours at minimum to soak down into the soil where it's needed. That and you know how there is dew on the plants in the morning? It's condensation from the cooler evening temperatures. Now imagine if one a week or so the dust and dirt was washed off the plants and the surface tension already broken to aid that water to sink down in the ground faster? Also no till? Not only leave plenty of mulch (straw, grass clippings, leaves, invest in a small wood chipper and run prunings and raked brush etc through it... but all get you some sunflowers, dandelions, look for taproot plants that LOVE lots of sun and will till or irrigate the soil for you. If using woodchips and mulch, do a layer of decent soil and spread seeds including legumes and mushroom spores on it before covering it with sparse or shredded leaf mulch, then woodchip mulch. You just increased the the amount of water the soil can absorb and hold but also how much nutrition and microbiology you can grow. It should work. Give it a try.
Woods chips are not equally as beneficial for a grass for 5 years. If you watch the Back to Eden videos of the guys who popularized it, for new ground it takes a long time to build up to the full benefit but also does better with plants and not grasses. He started with already tilled and amended ground, then started new untilled areas and began to build them up. The chips have to break down deeper into the ground. But ya with grass its not quite the same because they have to fight chuncks of chips that they cant grow through on the top.
Not sure where Whitman is, but i just purchased 2 acres in Williams, you think climates are similar enough for my land to do similar? I currently own pigs and cows and rabbits and chickens. Im ok with paying for feed for them for years, but want to plant an acre or so of feed to help offset costs. Ideas? Possible?
Hey Steven. Well, Williams is up in the mountains of Arizona and in zone 6 (we're zone 9b near Phoenix), so it would definitely be a different process for you up there. You'll get a full 4 seasons including snow in the winter and mild summer temps. That being said, the soil prep and planting would be the same with different seed and your "season" would be the more traditional spring - fall time frame where ours is fall-spring. It's beautiful up there!
Edge of Nowhere Farm it looks like Flagstaff is a source of woodchips, and with the input of my animal manure, hoping the soil will build up after a year or so. Only issue i can see is water.. Wells are like 1000 feet deep. Too deep for it to be cost effective for me. So i am planning on going with a large rainwater collection ala "DIY Homestead" using a large roof and making a concrete holding tank.
Good plan. Also, Williams and Flagstaff do receive a lot more rain than we do down in the valley, especially during the summer months/monsoon season. So your rain collection would really pay off particularly during the spring-summer growing season. Good luck!
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm do you reckon the heat island effect from all the asphalt/concrete has changed things from when Phoenix was just farms in the 19th century?
@@rhodesianwojak2095 Oh definitely. We can see the difference going into town where we are at least 4-5 degrees cooler separated from the effect of the city. I've clocked 10 degree temperature swings first thing in the morning before daylight heading into downtown.
Hey Farmer Brown. You're right on with needing to add acidity. We're to the point now with multiple passes with the broiler chickens that we're really seeing a difference in the pasture quality.
Not sure where you farm but out here in the west you don’t add lime to your soil. Peat moss is good and some humus helps too. But it’s hard to bring our PH down and lime would just complicate issues.
That is a fantastic question/suggestion and yes we have/are considering that. The biggest challenge we face out here in Wittmann is the limit to how much water we can use, so we have to limit the amount of pasture we irrigate. We're going to try some permaculture techniques on the "back 40" on the new farm where we have a couple of open acres. Hopefully we can get that to take and try something like that out. Again, great suggestion!
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm wish i was there just to help, does your soil crust over even with the pasture on it? mine used to when i was in N.M., i didt have any animals so i am not sure if they would have helped .
@@yoopermann7942 yeah, it still crusts over during the summer months. However, we raise our meat animals over the winter months, so if we can get some rain in the fall it may give us a shot at this.
Ken, thanks for the comment! We've since run our broiler chickens over that side of the pasture and it did see some life before going dormant for the summer. No doubt it should have a noticeable impact on the fertility once the fall comes and we get the pasture up and running again.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm but the problem with Mississippi is not the rain it’s that it’s hotter than the damn dessert In that we have 80% humidity all year and it’s 80 in December but hell during the winter one day will be 30 next will 78 so idk I weathers messed up
Hey Nick. Thanks for the comment. This year that side of the pasture has come a long way, but we do need to figure out how we can really take advantage of what the water holding capability of woodchips really is. Moving onto the 6 acre property will really give us a chance to try different techniques out and what you're suggesting is something we are considering. We did test out having the chickens on woodchips this fall, but our focus for our broilers is to have them feed on greens to enchance the meat. We also have some layers that we can use to help fertlize the woodchips, so that may really help with what you're suggesting. Thanks again!
The straw/wood chip situation will not beat the tilled side the first season but give it one or two good rain years, poultry grazing, etc and it will beat the tilled side in the long haul. Awesome video. Dealing with similar challenges on a much smaller scale.
It took about 3 years for the woodchip side to finally catch up to the side without, but the new owners decided to put a spa in that area instead of maintaining the pasture. What part of the country are you in?
A few things. You should have left the wood chips down. Get rid of your tiller and get a skyline plow. It doesn't destroy the mycorrhyzal fungi and the microbiome. That and don't moy that field. Let it go to seed. You will be amazed if you put your pigs and chickens on 1/4 acre at a time and what comes from that. Pigs then chickens 3 days later. Get some legumes in there as well. With that you are on the right path to sustainable regenerative farming, nice job using what will grow naturally in that climate. Love what you are doing.
Those are good suggestions. The challenge we have with the pasture is a lack of time to wait for the woodchips to break down enough to use the pasture (even with irrigation it takes a few years for woodchips to break down completely in our environment). We need to run chickens this fall for production, so I need to speed up the establishment process. We do plan on more legumes and also going to try and get some daikon in the ground if we can get the small chicken pasture fenced before we get into spring.
I was doing permaculture before I'd ever even heard of it back in MN. I'm currently in Tx and looking into VA loans and Grants available to start my dream. One thing I noticed in my garden in MN was the shoots will grow up through the wood chips without any issues and it will feed your plantings for years to come. Make sure to use dirty mulch with leaves and limbs shredded into it as well it will help a lot. Find a company around you that you can utilize. Arborists are a great resource as well as your local utilities.
I just watched a special from China you might find interesting "How China pushed back the desert and turned it into green space" April 7 2019 and "How China transformed it's desert into a fruit growing oasis" Sept 26 2018 from CGTN both using their straw or wheat checker board pattern technics. This could help you as well. The Chinese are way ahead of us in this and so is Africa. Sad to say. This is why I wanted to create a non profit seeing stuff like this.
@@drqin402 oh yes I saw that one it's amazing. I live in fuerteventura and we have problems with climate change, salinity, extremely low rainfall, high winds, lack of organic material etc etc etc the thing with extremely dry climates is things just take so much longer to break down
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm I had heard on other programmes of a different better kind of ploughing... I know this chap mentions the skyline plow, or I heard of some better way of tilling where it doesn't go so deep.
I'll leave it there, think I mentioned this before, and not sure if you replied Duane. Well hey ho... just thought it was worth of saying again.
I planted the same pasture mix last week. Tilled the soil with a small tiller, broadcast spreader with the mix, raked in with stiff tooth rake. Put wood chips on a test patch, the rest I left bare. Watered 1-2x/day. About a week in, and it’s sprouting where the wood chips are, nothing yet on bare ground. Tonight, I put wood chips on the entire area.
That's great to hear you're having success with woodchips as a cover on these. We're still deciding on how we're going to start the pastures on the new property, so we'll need to give this a shot!
I think this is a testament to no til... especially if you’ve seen improvement after two or three years in the no til side. My understanding is that it takes years to build the soil with no dig from the start. If you do a sunflower patch on the no til side, the roots act as TIL and when you cut sunflowers down, you leave the roots in. ... basically you are trading work for time with no til... but, even with no til, it is often important to do an initial til... then from that point forward you never til again ... if you turn the area into a bed, you would still take a pitchfork or similar to lift and loosen the top eight inches or so without turning it. That’s what I’ve learned from watching a grip ton of no til farmer videos. But haven’t tried yet... just getting started with my farm.
Those are great observations. We're noticing that an initial till is needed to jump start that first flush of growth and get things going. From there on we're sticking with no till. Funny your comments are coming over right now as we're getting ready to start this process over with our new chicken pasture on the new farm. Should be doing the initial till this weekend and flattening the ground to get ready to plant in September. Considering Daikon this winter to see how that does compared to straight seeding. If not in this area we'll definitely try that elsewhere. Thanks for the suggestions!
I agree. An initial tilling is definitely needed to break up virgin ground. I’m
Looking at buying property in the next few years. My plan is to buy some land with substandard soil to try to get it at a better price. I’ll be tilling up the ground then laying a heap of composted material over the top before seeding it with a good pasture mix. I’ll protect the ground by laying a combination of straw and wood chips over the top as a mulch.
I live in Florida, near the west coast. Our "soil" here is basically sand. My yard, along with a lot of other yards that are not fertilized, watered, etc. had turned mostly back into sand after it was sodded when I had the house built about 10 years prior. The grass died in the heat. I saw some videos on how to have a green lawn, and one of the most important things was to never mow shorter than 4". So, I started to raise the mower, and I also let it go to seed at least once a summer. It looked bad, but if I did it by sections at a time, it was better. So it re-seeded again this year - not just the grass, but other plants growing in it. My yard now is lush, too lush, in fact. There are no patches of sand outside of where the drip line is off the house. The snakes love my yard, as do the squirrels and bees who come for the wild flowers that have sprouted. My point here is, why mow before it gets a chance to re-seed at least one time? That way you don't need to keep planting yourself. In terms of the wood chips, it could be some of the chips were too green, even after a year, and it threw the chemistry of the soil off. It will probably catch up. The fact that it came up on such dry land is a plus, so give it more of a chance. Wood chips are great, but they also have an impact on small plants.
Hey Lynn. I think you're spot on with your assessment (and I can't imagine having to deal with straight sand, hard clay is one things, but sand, goodness!). We raised our mower last winter and kept it about 4" tall minimum and it did really well through spring when it went dormant. We did let it go to seed and just finished our overseeding about a week ago. Already, even in 100+ degree heat, the pasture is coming back much stronger this year. Hoping to see what you're seeing with that lush green this winter for our broiler chickens. Thank you for the comment and advice!
Leave your grass 3 inches tall or more and it will overtake a lot of the weeds in a few months.
Hey quercus. You are absolutely spot on with that suggestion. We ended up keeping the grass much taller while we had the chickens on the pasture and it did a great job taking over the weeds. Thanks for the suggestion!
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm letting it grow up a little helps with water retention and also helps shade new plants coming in.
@@lolaby2 very true. Once we have the chickens off the pasture we usually let it go to seed prior to dormancy and it definitely helps to have it longer.
Im not surprised in the least about the wood chip patch. For me its a no no,do not do under any circumstance. For three reasons.
1. It ties up crucial nutrients long term in the soil.
2. Adds high amounts of salts to soils.
3. Adds waxes to the soil which can make it water repellant.
Hey Kevin, great points on that. On top of those it just takes a very long time for them to break down in our dry environment (literally years!). The tilled side without woodchips just outperformed without exception.
There is another point to they are a serious negative if you are in an environment where fires are a serious issue. They are a real death trapbthat way
@@kevinklingner3098 very true.
Can you elaborate? Im unsure what you mean by salts and wax..
maybe by wax you mean resin, which is only noticeable in pine and spruce chips.
As far as salt.. wood contains less than 1% salts.. wood ash on the other hand contains 22% potassium in a salt form. Neither being detrimental to gardens.
Now to address the nitrogen tie up, that is 100% true. Its pays off in the long run though. If you can organically fertilize the woodchips they will soak up the nutrients then slowly release them for years to come. So, after the first few years that effects turns beneficial.
It looks amazing!!
Thanks CrankyBubushka. Just took a pic tonight before we put our last round of broilers on it this weekend and should have it up on Instagram in the next few days. Running chickens over desert ground does AMAZING things!
Wood chips will work, however, they must decompose some first. They only way this will happen, if used as a top dress, you must soak them in a VERY nitrogen rich water. The best nitrogen rich water to use is either urine, or ammonia.
Also remember that if your top dress can absorb moisture, it will. It will do so by absorbing it from the ground underneath it,THEN, it will evaporate it to the air and sun. Wood chips work best if soaked in nitrogen, then put UNDER about 2-4" of topsoil or whatever you have available.
What you're suggesting definitely makes sense. The biggest challenge we have here is a complete lack of moisture for most of the year which is another key ingredient needed to break down wood chips. Fungal decomposition is one of the keys to wood chips and without water that's tough to come by!
everyone doing regenerative agriculture wish them all the best
I think for those of us wanting to ensure we can feed future generations it's so critical!
Interesting result of the experiment. I wonder if the low water had an effect on how much the hydro loving guys were able to break down the wood chips and make a good place to live. Also curious about the aeration of clay for those anerobes. Did you fertilize both sides equally when you did? Or add fertility to the tilled side and not to the wood chip side? I’ve been bookworming on so much of this biological/regenerative/permaculture ag stuff living in the desert of Arizona incredibly curious about what works and doesn’t or needs to be shifted to work here on the edge of nowhere, so I just wanted to say THANK YOU for sharing your knowledge and experiments and experience here on TH-cam. I’m just starting on my own little garden box, but getting involved in a community vegetable garden project and looking for some land to learn on besides that, so. Thank you again for giving some context to this area.
Kellen, those are some great questions and observations. We didn't do anything with the woodchips on that side of the pasture, so lack of water to help with the ability of beneficials to do their job is no doubt a big issue there. We also know that we need to do something with the hard clay/caliche in the beginning to give them a place to dig deeper to do their job. On the new farm we're doing a couple of tests to see what will work most efficiently and right now we're using woodchips with daily water to see if we can create good soil in a couple of raised beds for berries. So far the results are encouraging. I'll link that video for you here;
th-cam.com/video/JoWYdTHkFPc/w-d-xo.html
Nice video. Thanks man, Seriously. I live in Casa Grande. I'm a big fan of wood chips also. Finally found wood chips source. This year fist year for veggies. Odd spring, still had light frost first week in March. I've been covering all seed lightly with pine animal bedding chips bought at Tractor Supply. Will be trying experiment with cover crops this week. Finally figured it out that if I put chips in chicken run, feed them there, I / they will create top soil by scratching all that up. Will probably screen all that ground and start watering in December.
Hey Hal. Yeah, wood chips are a must, especially as mulch around trees, etc. We still have to get our veggies going here, so you have a leg up on us there! Definitely a good idea to put those chickens to work and get the manure benefit from it. It's amazing to see how our broilers have really allowed our pasture to green up through the winter with no fertilizer and the topsoil it's already generating in some areas is amazing. Thanks for the comment!
Would you suggest a subsurface irrigation system for a grassy pasture or is that not the answer?
Great question and for us it's a challenge. That's mainly because of how we run our pastured broiler chickens across it which doesn't allow for zone watering schedules. Otherwise it would be ideal.
Wood chips??? How about leaves, worm castings, actual worms and organic mulch from tree trimmings. Although this looks good for grazing; sheep would be better than small chickens. Need big shade trees or maybe bamboo. If you’ve ever walked through an orange grove in Mesa...you’ll see free growing tall grass that keeps the soil cool and helps retain water.
Hey John. Those are great notes. This was a small test that we're taking onto our new 6 acre property this year. Sheep is definitely on the list.
how often does he have to water or are the plants retaining moisture naturally ?
Great question Jaxson. We do water the pasture about 3 times a week, but only during the winter when the grass is growing and not dormant. This lessens the need for water during the hot summers where we may water very briefly once a week to keep the dormant roots from dying.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm thank you so much! I’m helping my grandpa convert to holistic management in Grantsvile Utah. He doesn’t have anyway to irrigate the pasture he’s leasing. He has 40 head on 320 acres. I’m young and broke, how would you suggest planting out 3 acres to experiment and show Him? I plan to keep it fenced off until I can graze it. One day rotation on half a acre at a time. Any tips tricks or seed advice would be loved thank you!
@@j.swipes oh wow, that's a heck of thing to do for your grandpa. I imagine it's overwhelming right now to figure out how you can help him make a better way with that land. So I'm going to link Greg Judy's TH-cam channel for you here;
th-cam.com/channels/i8jM5w49UezskDWBGyKq5g.html
He is about as good as it gets when it comes to detailing grazing systems and animal movement here on TH-cam. He had a short series on a project he's working on in Southern AZ and their climate is very similar to ours. We have experience with chickens on pasture, but as you're seeing here that's on irrigated pasture. Much different from what you're wanting to accomplish. We're going to be testing that here as well this coming fall, but I imagine you'll want to get started before then. One things is for sure, you'll need electric fencing to guide the cattle with your rotations. That along with feed and supplement costs (unless g-pa can finance that for you??) will be your major expenses given you'll be using an existing herd.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm thanks for all the help I will keep you updated on how it goes!
Did you do a moisture pit time improve log,be interesting see how over time the water moisture depth of the soil has changed.
Hey Scott. This is the first time I've heard of that test. Need to do some research on it, because we're just getting these started on the new farm.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm what you need to do is record a base soil sample from a couple areas to see moisture start point Every month you measure how much change in depth of soil moisture. Be interesting to see how deep in a year one can change non ferrile soil to fertile soil. A ph and and moistuter meter will be help full.
@@scottfoster2487 a moisture meter is on the list of things to start using, so this is a good reason for it.
Where did you get the desert pasture seed mix?
The one we used here you can find on Amazon, but I will say we've switched that up a bit and now focus on alfalfa and perennial rye as the seed mixes get very expensive on a larger scale. I'll link to the one we used for you here, so you can see what's in it;
amzn.to/3TyqtFA
Assuming you're going for a pastured chicken setup, but for turkeys it's a bit different. We're posting a video next week with how we're doing that on our new property.
Thank you for being so informative
Thanks Jill. That's our goal!
Great job, we are moving out to Wittmann in a few months to start our little farm.
Hey guys, thanks and congratulations on getting started on the farming lifestyle. What part of Wittmann will you be in?
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm We have an offer pending near Crozier and Dixileta
@@coyotesden Ok, I know right where you're at. We're just North of Dixileta and 243rd, so just a few miles from there. Good luck on snagging that land!!
Hey! I'm trying to calculate how much water and time it took for you to get those results. Could you let us know how long it took t get that growth from seed to pasture? Mostly really want to know how much water it took. Would love to know some numbers I can parse out the math but your best aproximation would be super useful!
Thanks!
Hey there! This is a great question and I really don't have an answer for the water usage. We used a manual oscillating sprinkler and hose, so there was no way to measure the amount of water used. We started the process of establishing the pasture in September of 2017 and this video was shot in November of the same year, so it took 2 months to see this growth. By the following year, with some overseeding of perennial rye grass, we saw even better results. I assume this was due to the 2 rounds of pastured chicken we ran across it the fall-spring before. We're going to be doing the same thing starting in September of this year as we establish a new chicken pasture on the new property. We'll be documenting all of it here, hopefully in more detail, so that should help all of us figure out what this is going to take. Right now we're running our new flock of laying hens across bare desert ground to get some manure in place ahead of planting this fall.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm thanks so much for the reply!
Do you have a guess as to how long you let the sprinkler run? Was it just left on 24/7 or just at nights & mornings?
I want to build Chicken pasture on an off grid setting in AZ so I'm trying to calculate rain catchment fixtures needed for square feet of pasture and water is a key element. Thanks!
@@thehuntfortruth For the first few weeks we had it running in the morning and at night for about an hour. Once the grass was growing in well we went to evenings only. You'll also need to water heavy behind chickens if you tractor them to get the manure broken down enough to not burn the pasture. It does take quite a bit of water up front and throughout the season if there's no rainfall. The last couple of years were great rainfall years in the Fall-Spring which is when we keep the pasture green for chickens. That would be a huge factor for you off grid.
How do you manage to deweed all of that ground? It would take a couple days to finish that off!
It is a lot of maintenance! A lot of the weeds we use a trimmer or we actually just mow to keep them knocked down. But I do spend a lot of time scraping or pulling in certain areas.
Do you harvest flax seeds❓
No, we don't attempt to harvest the seeds. When they're planted as pasture the plants wind up getting consumed by the chickens, so they don't get a chance to form and significant seed heads.
This is amazing! Thanks.
Glad you enjoyed this one guys!
Hey good video man your giving me hope I’m in SD and need pasture. Is there a specific blend of seeds and how much water are you watering it with ?
Glad you enjoyed this one. Is that SD as in San Diego? We've found a mix of alfalfa and perennial ryegrass are our best options here in this part of AZ. They are both perennial for us here, dying back during certain parts of the year, but coming back strong in either Fall (Rye) or Spring (Alfalfa). The water varies drastically from season to season and depending on moisture. Summer is alfalfa season and we water most days unless it rains. Winter we water every few days if there is no moisture. We use overhead sprinklers for watering, so I wouldn't be able to give you a hard number as to how many gallons.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm Hey thanks for the reply and yup San Diego less hot then you guys but we only get 14 inch of rainfall a year. Those sound like good options for grasses I just don’t want to dry up my well watering pasture i was wondering if there’s some native stuff that just grows that’s not weeds lol but I guess everything does need some water inputs. Where’s the best place to get those drought tolerant seeds are they special order ?
@@stickolascage2936 we're working towards getting some desert weeds/pasture started now that we're raising goats, but chickens are a bit more particular when it comes to what they'll actually eat. We purchase the alfalfa seeds from a supplier here in town. The variety we grow is Fertilac 11 which is a very common variety for desert areas. Perennial rye is available at Home Depot here in the Fall, so we just over seed with that once it's available. I'm right there with you on wanting to limit the water use for pasture. We use enough already for fruit trees and garden beds, so we keep our chicken pasture limited to 6,000 square feet. With that our 24 layers and 4 turkeys have plenty of forage space and we can still run 2 rounds of 150 broilers (each round) across it in Fall and Spring.
I’m just starting a pasture on sand and would like to see your three videos in order. Can you share link?? Also do you mow if you are going to put in the pasture?
Hey Carol. I'll link them in order for you here and we also have a playlist that is called Desert to Pasture that covers the process here on the old farm and on our new one. As for mowing, we do mow the pasture if we don't have animals doing the job for us. Here are the episodes in order;
Episode 1 - th-cam.com/video/_e0JP2zLm0E/w-d-xo.html
Episode 2 - th-cam.com/video/U7_f0OlUDUw/w-d-xo.html
Episode 3 - th-cam.com/video/AYmux8bRChg/w-d-xo.html
Also an update at 1 year - th-cam.com/video/EYQgNcv42IA/w-d-xo.html
How often is this getting water?
Hey Victor. We're no longer on this property, but during the growing season (Fall - Spring) it was usually watered 3x/week. More often during the early Spring and late Fall and not at all if there is any rainfall. Summer depends on whether or not your trying to grow Summer "grasses". Otherwise, the pasture is dormant during the Summer and receives water every other day to keep the roots alive through the off season.
Did you have to pull a lot of rocks out? Was it highly compacted? Thanks!
There were plenty of rocks and yes it was highly compacted which is pretty typical of our soil.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm im going to attempt this is the high sierra desert lol
@@worldwidereviewst.v699 You may need to adjust the crop types, but your seasons will probably be similar to ours I imagine.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm thats what i figured i would have to get variants bred in similar regions . my main thing is i need to be able to produce feed for goats, in high desert .
@@worldwidereviewst.v699 gotcha. We have not raised goats ourselves yet (we'll have our first on the farm this fall/winter), but we have a lot of folks around us who do. From they tell us they really prefer woody type material and also like it dry. The desert has you covered on dry, but you may want to look for some small shrubs and/or trees to include for your forage. We're growing a few different types of mulberries for that very reason. Worth considering as you design your space for the goats. Good luck!
I assume you planted the seed on top of the wood chips? Paul Gautschi plants seed in the dirt and when it comes up recovers the wood chips. This planting seed on top of wood chips probably accounts for the patchyness as some seed did not hit dirt to germinate? Paul puts wood chips lightly over established grass in the fall and it's green, lush and needs less water.
Hey Lore! We actually pulled back all the woodchips and planted in the humus layer that was starting to develop. Yeah, directly into woodchips would probably be a bad idea here in AZ where it takes years for woochips to fully breakdown. On a positive note, we did an update video a couple months back and that side of the pasture is catching up to the tilled side pretty nicely. Still not as strong, but in much better shape.
Alright, I’m up in North East AZ, up at the base of the white mountains. We get more rain than you do, and I’m wondering what your opinion is on being able to start a pasture that takes little to no extra watering using the savory methods? I want to build a small water retaining system at the low point of my property and slowly trying to build up a good soil base with drought resistant grass that already kind grows around here in small patches. Is that a totally unreasonable to think I could get a thick pasture like you have with using only rain water or mostly only rain water?
Hey Derek! That is a very good question and I can't really say for sure. Typically you would try to store water higher up on a property so it has a chance to seep into the soil. Similar to how a berm/swale system would work. From there you can also move the water more easily to the lower parts of the property. You guys get a LOT more rain than we do typically, but there are times like this year where it's few and far between. In years like the one we just had I'm not sure it could make it through without some help. For us down here the only option is to irrigate, but we noticed the need for irrigation was less as we added more fertility. Are you going to run cattle on this land?
Edge of Nowhere Farm My goal is to eventually run one or two cows on it. The total average of the pasture would be about 1.75 acres. See I told someone else I wanted to store the water on the high point using berms to store it with a pipe coming out with a valve to release water to water the pasture and they looked at me like I was stupid and said to put water at the bottom. I have 2.5 acres total, but about a 3/4 acre of that is going to be the house, garden, shop, and wood pile. I want to use the rest as pasture. I would start using a chicken tractor and maybe a couple pigs to get started. But if I could get the soil base started that holds water better than the clay, get my tank built, and add manure and nutrients whenever I can get it. Anyway, I have seen the savory method in similar environments grow some serious pasture land with no irrigation but I am in the very beginning stages of learning about it and highly motivated to try and get this pasture going, however I feel I may not be living in reality.
@@DereksWorkshopAndProjects well, one thing is for sure it wouldn't hurt to try as long as you're not putting a ton of money into it. AZ weather is just very unpredictable and similar in some respects to the Middle East. Geoff Lawton has done a lot of permaculture work there also, but you'll notice he uses water high on the landscape and plenty of berms/swales to capture and retain water. With this he's still not accomplishing a lush pasture (rather perennial food systems), but that's not to say it can't be done where you are. One way or another, In my opinion your best bet will be water at the high point of the landscape so it can flow down naturally. It will do this both above and below ground if it has the ability to absorb over time. We're not able to support pasture year round down here in the valley (at least without a TON of irrigation), but if I had property up North I would try multiple options to see what works best. I'm curious how storing water low would provide a better option? Is it because it flows there naturally and can be pumped back up as needed? We do plan on having a stock pond at the low point, but most of our earthworks and catchment are above this area to retain the water on property. You'll have to keep us updated on this one, because I'd love to see what you come up with!
Edge of Nowhere Farm Thanks for your thoughts. I do think that person suggesting the low point was just misunderstanding my intentions for this water, but either way. I’m going to have a residential well but I’m thinking I might try to run a pipe to the top of the high point in my property and then flood irrigate in the dry season (spring and early summer) since the pasture won’t be that big. I might overwork my well pump. I don’t know for sure. I need to research more. Anyway, but also keep that tank at the top for catching winter snow melt and summer monsoon rains (if we ever get a decent monsoon again) for releasing in dry spells. I don’t picture a lush thick full green pasture but I guess I picture a mostly full mostly green mostly full pasture? I don’t know. It may be impossible. I’m going to take some serious notes and document exactly what I do so that if I can reach a point where I have a fairly successful pasture here in the high desert , I can share it. I don’t know anyone doing it up here without irrigation from wells or the creek but I don’t know if anyone has really tried either. If you really care I can keep you posted but this is going to be years of work probably even before any progress.
@@DereksWorkshopAndProjects I think it's definitely worth the effort to give this a shot. You're in a position where you may be able to bridge some of those gaps that are going to happen and still work with what nature gives you. Please keep us updated on it. May be easier via email, so our email address is in the About tab here on TH-cam.
Excellent Self sufficient sustainability work.
Thanks J M. It can be hard work, but it's amazing to see the results.
Ur climate is best suited for many fruit trees. Hope you plant more mangoes (our Pakistani varieties are the bestest in the world) they can grow from seeds. The mango you buy 1 in approx 5$ we buy that in .05$ fresh. You can make a whole lot of market thru that. Arizona and South Pakistan have equal temperature zone. Also instantly buy "kandahari pomegranate" plant when u see that in ur area which is the sweatest of all in pomegranate colored bright red, plant miswak trees as well, trust me ur climate also suites "date trees" don't buy plant just buy "ajwa date packet" eat the fruit and plant the seeds in open areas, also try olive trees buy check if they are fruit baring, jujubees are king of the desert being drought taularent which all others are as well. If i had been with you i would had planted almost 10 trees of all of them.
Wish you and ur wife all the best.
Regards,
Junaid (from Islamabad).
@@junaidfaiz Junaid, wow you have a lot of experience with some very unique varieties. We plan on trying some new varieties on our new property because we will have more space. I need to find that mango you are talking about, because Lori really wants a Mango tree, but the varieties that are sold here in the US are not well suited to our climate. Is there a specific Pakistani mango variety that you would recommend?
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm yes go for "Chaunsa" its a big mango & that really makes into a tree. I wish u have a Pakistani near by being ur colleague or neighbor cz you can ask him to bring some fruit for taste (u know what i mean). While mentioning this every single Pakistani type is the best.
Anwar Rataull (Small sized fruit & considered as the sweatest of all)
Sindhree (Also big).
Tawta (translation of parriot).
Deisi (one we make pickle off).
We eat alot of mangoes. Who ever is saying that ur climate doesn't suit mangoes is wrong cz mangoes need lots of heat & humidity, less watering though. It just needs to bust out of seed. So, plant lots of seeds whenever u eat mangoes. One more thing never twist any branch of mango or louquart. These trees are like children twist them, theyll shy & die. Keep them protected from everyside uptill 2 feet from every animal especially dogs, rats & pigs. Talk to them & patt them as if they are ur children. Then see what theyll yield one day, IA.
@@junaidfaiz We have to find one of these varieties. Thanks for sharing your expertise!
Surely the ground has to be broken up on some level for the seed to take - otherwise the ground is too hard, "that's" why the side with just the wood chip and no tilling didn't do well?
That is exactly what we've found Sebastian. An initial till on our hard soils is necessary to allow the seeds to take. After that we're able to forgo the tilling with proper pasture management and grazing!
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm I've seen a few programmes on 'tilling' how they are "entirely" changing their thoughts on this, and recommend a special type of shallow tilling, which does not disturb the land too much?
Oh, how do you find your videos from the beginning please Dwayne?
Why did you get rid of the old farm, was this for a greater challenge?
Or did you keep this, as well as the new... guess I'll find out, if I watch the videos some of these questions.
@@sebastianwrites one of the advantages to rock hard soil is you can only till shallow no matter what you try! You should be able to sort our videos from oldest to newest by starting on the videos tab. In the right hand corner above the first row of videos you'll see a "sort by" drop down that will allow you to sort by oldest video. Just a warning, we've come a LONG way since those first videos and I (Duane) was very nervous in a lot of those and would talk WAY too fast! We do cover the reasons why we moved onto the new farm in a few of those older videos, but the first time we talked about it was in our 100th episode that I'll link for you here;
th-cam.com/video/n54_InBIzC4/w-d-xo.html
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm Oh, before I begin, sorry about your dad, I know it may be some time back, but sounded as if you were close. So it's Duane... never seen that before? I have a friend called Euan, who spells his name wrong as well instead of Ewan... so what do ya know? Thanks for coming back..
Hi Duane and Lori,
. Still catching up on old videos. Had to comment on this one though. If you do this again, tilled vs removed wood chips, you need to vs wood chips as well. You know wood chips are going to hold water. Water that those new seeds planted on wood chips can use. Probably grow better that the tilled ground. Only one way to find out. So to recap wood chips vs tilled vs removed wood chips. Cheers.
. Bill
Hey Bill. Thanks for the comment. We're going to have to tackle this again this fall, so we'll have to see if we can test that also. I think our biggest mistake was not watering the woodchips enough allowing them to break down and create more soil to plant in. Didn't think about trying a patch with seeded woochips..hmm...
Time to get the wood chips down before the monsoon rains begin. Am I right?
Absolutely correct. Keeping fingers crossed that may be this weekend....
So are you saying the grass is greener on the other side
Ha! Yeah, that pretty much sums it up. :)
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm ;D
How long has it taken to do all this and get to this point?
We started this pasture you're seeing here about 2 months prior.
How much did you water the grass? And do you keep watering when chickens are there?
Hey Efren. We watered it 2X daily (morning and evening) for the first few weeks and then we backed off to a few times a week (during the winter when we run chickens it doesn't dry out very fast!) And yes, we do water when the chickens are there, but we are careful not to water on them or right in front of where we're moving the tractor. It's probably not much of a concern in our warm climate, but we would rather not take the chance of getting them wet and then chilled. Cornish Cross are not very hardy so we tend to baby them if we can!
what cover crops would grow on sandy soil? or at least food for livestock?
Now that is a GREAT question! We're actually planting our new poultry pasture today on the new farm. We're using perennial rye as the base along with white clover, daikon and alfalfa. I would think whatever common grass you're able to establish (Rye, Timothy, etc), plus a cereal grass and some nitrogen fixers (clover, alfalfa, etc) is a great mix to start it out. What types of animals will you be using it for?
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm I'm planning to breed ducks, so want to grow plants that ducks eat
@@xyooj96 oh, ok. You would be fine with just about any typical pasture green. They will devour grasses and weeds alike.
Lessons learned before you start the process at your new place.
Richard, that's so true. We'll be starting out with the 4,000 sq. ft chicken pasture right off the bat to try and get it up and running before winter hits, so hopefully we can get it rocking quick! Needless to say we WILL be tilling first!
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm So important to learn how to grow in the desert. Keep up the good work.
How often do you water the crop?
We don't own this property any longer, but during the winter we would water it about once a week. When we over seeded in fall it was twice a day for about 30 minutes until the pasture was re-established after the summer dormancy.
What you're calling clover is what I'd call mallow (or at least some sp of Malva). I can't see it that well though so what do I know. I'm really surprised at how green that is in November, I didn't think that could happen in AZ without irrigation. We're planning on moving to AZ in the next year or so, and want to homestead. Before we decided on AZ, on my dream homestead in the first year I wanted to have a movable pig yard so they could "till" the ground for us, and then move chicken tractors over the same land, and then seed it for pasture. I'm disappointed to see how the untilled area did- I guess we'll be buying or renting a tiller. I only just found you from one of the AZ homesteading groups on facebooks so I don't really know- I saw you have pigs but are you going to get other hoofstock? We are hoping we can manage a mini zebu or jersey and some goats. Of course it's all just daydreaming right now til we finish school and actually *get* to AZ.
Not completely sure on the clover vs mallow either, we have a desert mallow that's easy to identify and the pasture seed blend had several different clovers. It's still very green and the rye is really taking off, but the un-tilled side is still struggling compared to the tilled side. Pigs in front of the chickens would be a great plan to help naturally till and get some fertility into the ground. The ground will need some water, because it's really hard for our pigs to root very deep without some water to get it a little muddy first, after that they really dig away! We're still kicking around the idea of more land strictly for additional animals as there's still very affordable land 10-15 minutes West of where we are. If so, cows, goats and maybe sheep grazed rotationally would be the plan.
The stuff he was brushing his hand across is called marshmallow. In a real good wet year ut can get up to 6-8 feet tall the livestock will eat it chickens like it as it softens the soils with its strong tap root andit attracts bugs like nothing else except legumes.
How is life down in Nevada? Doing some research on the area, may do something similar as your farm!
Hey tTrippa. We're in Wittmann which is just outside of Phoenix, AZ. I know growing conditions are similar in southern Nevada, but I haven't lived there before.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm is there anything you think I should know about the lifestyle of the area? Snakes, other things you wish you had known before you started. Anything helps, thank you for the quick response!
@@ttrippa1295 well, the biggest issue is the extreme weather we have. Everyone knows it's hot in the summer, but most don't realize we get down into the 20's in the winter. That's a challenge for plants like tropicals where they may really like the heat, but get killed in our winters. Conversely, there are stone fruit with low chill hour requirements that do fantastic. There are snakes, but scorpions are a bigger issue that you'll wind up encountering inside the house. As for livestock, weather can be a challenge again. We have to raise our broiler chickens in the fall/winter (too hot in the summer), but winter is tough on meat chicken breeds. What are you looking to grow/raise?
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm from what I've learned from you booster chickens, create a portable chicken coop so they can move across the land to fertilize as I choose. As for everything else I'm still researching what plants would do best to help make the land more habitable. Your input is greatly appreciated. Are the scorpions aggressive and dangerous?
@@ttrippa1295 if the scorpions feel threatened they're going to sting you, but they don't chase after you. It's just hard to see them as they move around at night, so it's easy to step on one when neither of you is expecting it!
How are you doing your watering for that area?
We're overhead watering with oscillating sprinklers. They're adjustable, so we can control the watering around wherever the chicken tractor happens to be. We've gone through one round of pastured chickens on it and it's working really well so far.
Close-ups please, I'd like to see what the plants look like. 👍🙏
Great suggestion here. Need to see the details!
👏thank you ❤
Wow, this is a blast from the past! Glad you enjoyed this one.
could have and still can use a lawn aerator!! cool job, we could not find part 2 is this the part 2?? just asking old one legged joseph t retired navy
Hey Joseph! I'm going to link part 2 here, hopefully it works!
th-cam.com/video/U7_f0OlUDUw/w-d-xo.html
Good call on the aerator, we're going to need to invest in one as it will definitely come in handy. And thank you sir for your service.
Tilling oxygenates the soil.very important.thats the reason for the difference
Hey Clarissa. Thanks for the information and that makes sense. We just shot another update video and the tilled side is just doing amazing. Definitely going to start with that on the new acreage.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm with good texture in your soil there is good aeration. If you have good aeration you have plenty of oxygen. Tilling disturbs microbiological colonies and ecosystem and changes the moisture balance, dissipation etc. That is why no-till method is superior, less work, more production... no brainer. Grow clover and other cover crops and mulch a plenty
@@naviababyg Hey Rosa. What you're saying definitely makes sense. I think the challenge we have here with our desert soil is it's so very hard and hence very poor texture. Once the chickens have made a couple of passes and the grass has a chance to establish we're seeing some amazing results because we now have a living mulch layer on top of the native soil and the soil life is just amazing.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm, do you have the opportunity to add cows and sheep to the rotation before chickens come in? Then there's no need to mow. Your philosophy and practice with the chickens applies to cows and sheep too. Good seeing this discussion about aeration too. Interested in your experiments with desert soils. Does it make sense to imitate nature by laying down layers of compost, straw, and wood chips to hold the soil for grasses to grab on?
@@Reciprocity_Soils Hey Sean. We do plan on adding sheep on the new property and rotating as best we can. Not too sure on cows as we will only have about 3 acres designated for "Pasture". Given the sustained difference we're seeing now with the tilled vs. non-tilled side we're going to start out tilling the hard packed soil and then coming behind it with chickens to start and then sheep and other livestock to lay consistent layers of fertility down that we will then leave un-tilled.
wood chips take a little linger and require water.
Hey Mike! Yes, you're absolutely right. We really needed to be adding water to this regularly and give it another year or so to really test this out. Need to create another test area for something just like that!
where I have cover crop in the wood chips they have broken down and where there was no cover crop they have not broken down.
Hmm. So are you using clover in the woodchips? We were a little worried about nitrogen deficiency in planting cover crop right into the chips.
Best thing for speeding up the decomposition of wood chips is pee's lol. Sounds gross but they also use it to compost straw bales 👍👍
That doesn't surprise me at all about the difference in pastures. If your soil is compacted it won't matter much what you put on top of it. It usually takes an initial till no matter what on compacted soil, unless you're going hugelkultur or working with an insane amount of biomass and building up. What you might think about trying is tilling them both and then putting wood chips on one side.
You hit the nail on the head with this one Jeff. We've since done an initial, light tilling before trying to plant. Right now we have a test patch of sorghum that is doing really well and you can clearly see the areas where the tiller was able to reach further down. Those wood chips as an initial cover is a solid suggestion as well as it does a great job of holding in moisture.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm That sounds much more promising. I just moved to AZ from the Blue Ridge mountains of NC. I've been off grid for about a decade, practicing permaculture and other regen systems. I'm still learning about the desert. But, soil building is something I've explored in many different areas of the country, I'm many different soils. And, the basics never really change. Though the challenges for addressing the basics are entirely site specific.
So I always first ask myself, how can I optimize for and create the greatest range of aerobic environment, circulate gases and water efficiently, expand the rhyzome, and optimize the balance between moisture retention and drainage. Soil structure is the first step. Then biomass, water, and microbiology.
Have you experimented much with hugelkultur yet? I know finding biomass in the desert is challenging, especially the kind of dense, hardwood biomass typically used in hugelkultur. But permaculture has some answers to that question. And, after seeing the Tucson swales, I'm quite confident is possible to create oasiseses(plural?) in the desert. Besides swales, it seems critical to establish an alliance with certain fast growing shrubs and trees that can be pruned back hard in the early, or cooler seasons, (ideally multiple times) to build up a surplus of biomass thru the year. Acacia seems like a good option. What do you think? That's in addition to the cover cropping mind you, and any natural fertilizers available and repurposed gray waters.
Btw, I really appreciate the time and effort your putting into your channel. It's very helpful to see how others are making this all work in the desert.
@@pottsjk it sounds like you have some great insights that will definitely make soil creation here easier for you. We haven't grown Acacia before, but it should make for a solid biomass accumulator. Mulberry is our primary focus for that right now as we have multiple harvests from a fruiting mulberry tree. Multiple in that we have the fruit and also the fodder, besides the shade it also creates for livestock. Moringa is another alternative we will eventually incorporate, but they will take extra care in the winter. We learned this the hard way losing one when we hit the 20 degree mark a few winters back. We haven't tried our hand at Huglekultur, but we may give that a shot down the road. Something like that would be ideal as long as you have a water source available to irrigate from time to time.
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm Ahh, Moringa, yes, thats a good one. And I can see how mulberry trees would produce lots of biomass here, not to mention extended harvests, of one of the most amazing berries in the world. Mulberry trees are also great border trees, to feed birds, enough to keep them from devouring other berry plants.
I'm not sure how much you know about Hugelkultur. Forgive me if I'm saying too much you already know. It's one of my favorite things in the whole world. But it's an ancient ag tech. It was rebirthed in Bavaria, out of their early forest management projects. It creates extremely robust, long lasting and resilient soil profiles. It takes a bit of work in the frontend. But it's worth it.
Basically, the dense wood at the bottom creates a huge water battery that keeps roots watered, naturally, from the bottom up, thru evaporation. The roots learn to grow down and more evenly over time, towards the moisture stored at the bottom, which is also thermally stable, which has many benefits.
They can be dug in or not, depending. In your case, I would absolutely dig in, but not any deeper than a couple feet. In most cases, 18 inches is sufficient. It may be that deeper is better here. You don't want to go too deep though or you risk creating an anaerobic layer. It's essentially a raised bed filled and packed with wood, piled with incrementally smaller pieces, starting with rounds and ending with chips and compost. The organic climate control and the rich, deep biomatter support a wide range of microbiology, and a full range of fungi including endo and ecto mycorrhyzae, at optimum depths for a wide range of root zones. It's basically mimicking a midsuccession forest floor. I've done microscopy on many beds and it's incredible the life it produces and sustains and how fast or establishes.
Anyway, I better stop there. I would love to collaborate with you, if you're interested. I'm located in the far eastern side of Phoenix major. Mediblegardens@gmail.com
I'm also a big fan of proper use of biochar, among other things.
Thats a diverse pasture.
It's amazing to see what will come up and it changes over time as the pasture starts to build organic matter to grow in.
One tip for "mowing" and watering. DO NOT DO IT IN MORNING OR NOON. Why would you send all that time money and energy to make clouds?
When you mow or water in the morning or afternoon all that water and moisture mixed with scorching sun and temperatures not only all evaporates off but also hurts and kills the plants because how you you feel is someone cut you up and left you out in the scorching sun or poured nice cool water on you and left you in the sun for it to boil and leave you more thirsty? You'd just want to give up and die right?
If you want the grass or pasture to FLOURISH especially in hot hot sun. Wait till everything goes to seed, mow with a bush hog and leave the clippings where the fall as mulch. Do this just before sundown in the late evening, it should be dark by the time you're done. THEN water IMMEDIATELY.
By doing so you're providing it mulch and protection AND SEEDS, natural propogation, washing the nurtients from the clippings down into the soil where it's needed rather than putting it in the air via evaporation to blow away; the water you just put down has 6-8 hours at minimum to soak down into the soil where it's needed. That and you know how there is dew on the plants in the morning? It's condensation from the cooler evening temperatures. Now imagine if one a week or so the dust and dirt was washed off the plants and the surface tension already broken to aid that water to sink down in the ground faster?
Also no till? Not only leave plenty of mulch (straw, grass clippings, leaves, invest in a small wood chipper and run prunings and raked brush etc through it... but all get you some sunflowers, dandelions, look for taproot plants that LOVE lots of sun and will till or irrigate the soil for you. If using woodchips and mulch, do a layer of decent soil and spread seeds including legumes and mushroom spores on it before covering it with sparse or shredded leaf mulch, then woodchip mulch. You just increased the the amount of water the soil can absorb and hold but also how much nutrition and microbiology you can grow.
It should work.
Give it a try.
Great suggestions here Ivan. Thanks!
Woods chips are not equally as beneficial for a grass for 5 years. If you watch the Back to Eden videos of the guys who popularized it, for new ground it takes a long time to build up to the full benefit but also does better with plants and not grasses. He started with already tilled and amended ground, then started new untilled areas and began to build them up. The chips have to break down deeper into the ground. But ya with grass its not quite the same because they have to fight chuncks of chips that they cant grow through on the top.
That's definitely true of what we're finding to be the case.
Not sure where Whitman is, but i just purchased 2 acres in Williams, you think climates are similar enough for my land to do similar? I currently own pigs and cows and rabbits and chickens. Im ok with paying for feed for them for years, but want to plant an acre or so of feed to help offset costs.
Ideas? Possible?
Hey Steven. Well, Williams is up in the mountains of Arizona and in zone 6 (we're zone 9b near Phoenix), so it would definitely be a different process for you up there. You'll get a full 4 seasons including snow in the winter and mild summer temps. That being said, the soil prep and planting would be the same with different seed and your "season" would be the more traditional spring - fall time frame where ours is fall-spring. It's beautiful up there!
Edge of Nowhere Farm it looks like Flagstaff is a source of woodchips, and with the input of my animal manure, hoping the soil will build up after a year or so.
Only issue i can see is water.. Wells are like 1000 feet deep. Too deep for it to be cost effective for me. So i am planning on going with a large rainwater collection ala "DIY Homestead" using a large roof and making a concrete holding tank.
Good plan. Also, Williams and Flagstaff do receive a lot more rain than we do down in the valley, especially during the summer months/monsoon season. So your rain collection would really pay off particularly during the spring-summer growing season. Good luck!
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm do you reckon the heat island effect from all the asphalt/concrete has changed things from when Phoenix was just farms in the 19th century?
@@rhodesianwojak2095 Oh definitely. We can see the difference going into town where we are at least 4-5 degrees cooler separated from the effect of the city. I've clocked 10 degree temperature swings first thing in the morning before daylight heading into downtown.
Need to lime. Wood chips. Sawdust. Etc make the soil acidic
Hey Farmer Brown. You're right on with needing to add acidity. We're to the point now with multiple passes with the broiler chickens that we're really seeing a difference in the pasture quality.
Not sure where you farm but out here in the west you don’t add lime to your soil. Peat moss is good and some humus helps too. But it’s hard to bring our PH down and lime would just complicate issues.
have you thought about meat sheep? that way you just move them ahead of your chickens and you dont have to mow the grass
That is a fantastic question/suggestion and yes we have/are considering that. The biggest challenge we face out here in Wittmann is the limit to how much water we can use, so we have to limit the amount of pasture we irrigate. We're going to try some permaculture techniques on the "back 40" on the new farm where we have a couple of open acres. Hopefully we can get that to take and try something like that out. Again, great suggestion!
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm wish i was there just to help, does your soil crust over even with the pasture on it? mine used to when i was in N.M., i didt have any animals so i am not sure if they would have helped .
@@yoopermann7942 yeah, it still crusts over during the summer months. However, we raise our meat animals over the winter months, so if we can get some rain in the fall it may give us a shot at this.
7:46 dont ever tell yourself you cant do anything buddy
Funny thing is, you're absolutely correct. Now to figure out how to deep fry these bad boys!
Run the chickens over the wood chip side of the pasture. They will likely look the same soon
Ken, thanks for the comment! We've since run our broiler chickens over that side of the pasture and it did see some life before going dormant for the summer. No doubt it should have a noticeable impact on the fertility once the fall comes and we get the pasture up and running again.
Shit in Mississippi if your pasture look like that it would have blackberries thistles briers bitter weed it would look way worse
Yeah, I suppose having no rain for months on end makes for a totally different landscape once there's water involved!
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm but the problem with Mississippi is not the rain it’s that it’s hotter than the damn dessert In that we have 80% humidity all year and it’s 80 in December but hell during the winter one day will be 30 next will 78 so idk I weathers messed up
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm shit hell it ain’t nothing but hot here the kinda hot we’re you can fill your heart beat but it’s still a burifel place
"Desert" but I think he has access to a lot of water.
We're on well water here on the farm.
You should not have taken the wood chips off, leave the chips and put the chickens,
Hey Nick. Thanks for the comment. This year that side of the pasture has come a long way, but we do need to figure out how we can really take advantage of what the water holding capability of woodchips really is. Moving onto the 6 acre property will really give us a chance to try different techniques out and what you're suggesting is something we are considering. We did test out having the chickens on woodchips this fall, but our focus for our broilers is to have them feed on greens to enchance the meat. We also have some layers that we can use to help fertlize the woodchips, so that may really help with what you're suggesting. Thanks again!
Manicure 💅 lawns goes against God laws
We sure agree with that around here!
@@EdgeofNowhereFarm thank you