We are quite windy where I am located, I haven't had the opportunity to test the hypothesis, but I've thought on using those screw-in dog tether stakes to keep lightweight, portable tunnels or other easily airborne mobile structures anchored in their temporary positions.
I love when different languages get mixed 😁 The 'Hügel' means in german mound. It's like when we are saying Naan Bread. It is just Bread Bread. As always thanks for sharing! Wish everyone a beautiful day ☀️
I really like your approach to establishing these mounds, where you allow them to be loosely formed, and completely open to modification as they evolve over time. It will be interesting to follow as you work to deliver a sustaining water flow to these mounds, and manage moisture retention.
In my dry summer context, i’ve realized any rotting wood needs to be bellow the natural level of the ground or nothing ca grow. But for sure concenrating fertility and our efforts in a few spots ( also called tidying up) helps so much
This is another brilliant idea! I'm so envious. I started my Food Forest last year but realized I need to grow my own trees as they're so expensive to buy. I'm starting my 3 air prune boxes! I love your beautiful natural environment not impeccably manicured. I'm hoping to do the same grow as many trees/bushes and plants as possible! Can I get a clone of you! Thank you for the videos you share!
That’s going to take some time to break down. We, used wood in our raised beds and then had difficulty with too much nitrogen and turning the soil. BUT, a good burn and gathering the ashes before a rain kept other raised beds prolific for several years. Getting ready to have another spring burn after 4 years.
Been watching you for around 6 years, one of my first inspirations when finally life convinced me doing special Earth works is most important :) My operation is small and not very dependent on plastic - keeping sustainabiligity and regeneration in mind over $. Zone 6 here lots of small market veggie folks using lots of plastic, electricity and propane to grow. While I do enjoy growing veggies naturally in the ground outside, the true complex value scales of $/time, spectrums, etc have helped nudge me more towards learning more about and experimenting with woody nursery and forest work. Basically moving and stacking whatever organic thing is laying around at different times in the woods off certain areas of paths I've made. It's one of the best joys intuitively collecting certain small amounts of nuts and seeds from the forest, staring them on your own, and learning where and how they are living back in the woods and if you can be of service in anyhelpful way for certain individuals or the landscape/watershed as a whole. Contour based rough hugels in the woods, especially on hills, collect all the goodies - along with being great spots to let new trees naturally come up! I ❤ Edible Acres!
This is just an amazing project. I love the permaculture system, and it is really great to see actual examples of things I had only heard about previously. Thank you so much. Say hi to Zelda❤
This is really great content. ☺It shows how anyone can take just a few natural materials and really set themselves up for some successful garden beds. Like you say, one doesn't need the hoops to get going. I do this often in an area where I know I will want to have a garden bed, sometimes a few seasons before I know I will be able to really work an area. Slowly building it up and then when I am ready, there isn't much to do to finish of and prep for planting.
Love A local saw mill dropped 2 huge bundles of scrap pine slabs for the cost of gas and we used them to make raised beds. I know they won’t last anywhere close to locust but something is better than nothing!
Thank you man. I really appreciate you detailing your thought processes and decision making as you go through the project. Great use the available resources there.
Well we're doing similar work taking advantage of this nice warm weather my hoops hold a shade cloth, trampoline net actually. Works perfect for rooting cuttings!
Great video Sean! I did my backyard garden bed as a 4 foot tall cinder block keyhole design with the first 2 feet filled with big branches recovered from our oaks and chinked with yard debris. This will be my 4th year of tomatoes and sweet peppers (plus filler herbs) without watering. 👍
If it is convenient, would you please show the full development of these beds? I am a complete beginner and would benefit from seeing the whole process. I want to do some type of planting area for winter squash in my back yard. Thanks so much!
There about a million You Tube vids & web pages devoted to hugel beds...of all weird permutations & varieties. Many are misleading. You have to have rotten or wood well on its way to rotting through in the central core to create a water reserve & have the bed perform as intended. Ignore those dumping in big chunks of firewood that have just been sitting around for a few years. Some fresher cut small limbs & branches won't hurt for fill, but not the bulk of the core. These beds take some time to settle & cure. The first year may be disappointing. There aren't a lot of rules...except for rotten wood. Height & width should be determined by your body size & reach. What you intend to grow in the bed is also a factor.
Love your content, and trust your decisions. Having written, I looked into the Greenworks chainsaw with the interest to purchase. I discovered that they do not have replacement parts outside of the chain, bar and tensioner. Meaning, they are not serviceable by the end user.
I use the 40V version of the Greenworks chainsaw. I hope I'm wrong but I doubt any of these cheap chainsaws are built to be serviceable. Electric motors last so long that they are a paradigm shift over internal combustion saws. But, given the low cost, when it breaks, buy a 2nd body and use it until it breaks, then swap parts until both are no longer usable. As a home user, I expect the 40V saw to last a generation at which point even if spare parts were designed in, they would no longer be available.
@@SeekingBeautifulDesign My two chainsaws are both 30+ old. I can still buy parts for them; this is important. If a paradigm shift is expected to work, Greenworks failed for my part.
@@cuznclive2236 That's great. I doubt any consumer products of any sort will have that in 30 years unless they can be 3D printed. Which is sort of the counter point...ICE machines for internals require high strength, high tolerance parts and those parts wear out. Electric motors don't require high strength and the only high tolerance thing (the shaft and bearings) last a long time. Bearings are pretty standard, so you can buy those parts. Shafts are pushing immortality. Otherwise, I fix electric motors without buying any parts at all and I haven't even started on the 3D printing world. Another way of looking at it is as a percentage of your useful lifetime...I've used ICE chainsaws and will never go back after using electric. The damage to my lungs/organs and hearing (not incl. to the environment) reduces my functional lifespan, while the electric doesn't to the same degree. The screwing around time to keep ICE's working also reduces my useful lifetime as I could have been doing other things. Granted we don't have electrics good enough to take down 10' diameter trees 200+miles from civilization, but perhaps we shouldn't be doing that.
@@SeekingBeautifulDesign You do you, and I will do me. If I can't purchase parts to maintain my tools, vehicles, etc., I'm not buying it... any of it. Simply, and to my point, buyer beware.
I would be interested in a discussion about why these types of beds work so well given that we are burying freshly decomposing material right into the plant root zone! It seems to work so well but why does this system not tie-up all the available nitrogen thus completely stopping plants from developing???
Very cool video, thanks as always for your helpful content! Do you think removing the pine debris (or any debris under trees in general) negatively impacts the tree in the long run? It seems like a lot of urban trees don't thrive for this very reason.
I would suspect urban trees don't thrive because of immense other pressures like toxicity, compaction, restriction in the root zone, on and on... That said, I think if someone raked up every last fleck of debris under a pine for a few years in a row it would not be helpful to them... FWIW so far I've left all that goodness, don't actually need it for the project.
Great stuff as always. I wanted to ask if you saw any difference in production from using aged wood as opposed to “fresh wood”. Ie the stuff that fell in the windstorm. Is nitrogen lock up from the fresh carbon a problem in newer wood? Or does it not matter much. Thanks! I’ve learned so much from your content!
shaun i have lots of dead ash trees on my property i have cut down and have piles of brush..would you use it for hugel mounds or burn it into charcoal for adding to the soil...whats a better use of time in your opinion? I could do either i suppose. Also do you have any english walnut trees for sale im an hour north of you and would love to replant with some!
Just been doing some of this sort of work myself, crazy that people will dispose of their biomass instead of putting it back into the soil on their own land. I am doing something a little different - I have a steep slope so these kinds of berm serve instead of swales to slow run-off and absorb moisture, though I mostly plant perennials downslope of them, not annuals. It's amazing how much greener everything gets on and around these berms. And people talk about all that carbon stealing there nutrients but I haven't found that to be much of a problem, at least not with perennials. I do envy you though, being able to work every day on the land, I'm only able to do it very part-time unfortunately.
firstly, I love your videos, and take alot of inspiration from your chicken composting videos, my question is on this property, how large is it, how long have you had access to it, and what percentage of it would you say is in production?
Hoops that last for decades is legendary enough if they cost 9$, ridiculous at 2$ 😮😮💪💪💪 about the worry that the logs lying around help with that..? No halfmoon-shaped hugels? :) ✨⚡👾👾👾
Only use wood well on its way to rotting or already rotten. The rottener (sp?) the better. Some acquaintances built a monolithic hugel bed using too fresh wood & even some scrap dimensional lumber in the core. YIKES! They'll be dead & buried before that thing ever performs as intended. Meanwhile, they have to water it constantly while still remaining confused as to why.
... Why wouldn't you just drive some rebar through the locus bed frames if you were worried about wind? Or build some minimal wind-break?? It's kind of bizarre, and now I'm having a hard time taking the vid seriously. Hugelkultur rules though, can be done effectively even in small containers, at scale.
This gets me so excited for spring! All the planning and prep. So close... but yes, things that I can already be doing!
Thats the point... If the ground is workable at all you can prep for spring now :)
We are quite windy where I am located, I haven't had the opportunity to test the hypothesis, but I've thought on using those screw-in dog tether stakes to keep lightweight, portable tunnels or other easily airborne mobile structures anchored in their temporary positions.
I love when different languages get mixed 😁
The 'Hügel' means in german mound.
It's like when we are saying Naan Bread. It is just Bread Bread.
As always thanks for sharing!
Wish everyone a beautiful day ☀️
So Hugelbed would be better. 😉
Yeah, I've gotten that feedback before. I"m basically saying 'mound mound' :). So good you gotta say it twice? :)
I really like your approach to establishing these mounds, where you allow them to be loosely formed, and completely open to modification as they evolve over time. It will be interesting to follow as you work to deliver a sustaining water flow to these mounds, and manage moisture retention.
You and Akiva inspire me.
So wonderful!
In my dry summer context, i’ve realized any rotting wood needs to be bellow the natural level of the ground or nothing ca grow. But for sure concenrating fertility and our efforts in a few spots ( also called tidying up) helps so much
This is another brilliant idea! I'm so envious. I started my Food Forest last year but realized I need to grow my own trees as they're so expensive to buy. I'm starting my 3 air prune boxes! I love your beautiful natural environment not impeccably manicured. I'm hoping to do the same grow as many trees/bushes and plants as possible! Can I get a clone of you!
Thank you for the videos you share!
That locust sawmill is an amazing resource to have!
It really is!
That’s going to take some time to break down. We, used wood in our raised beds and then had difficulty with too much nitrogen and turning the soil. BUT, a good burn and gathering the ashes before a rain kept other raised beds prolific for several years. Getting ready to have another spring burn after 4 years.
I could try implementing this on my homestead as time goes on. Thanks for ideas.
Been watching you for around 6 years, one of my first inspirations when finally life convinced me doing special Earth works is most important :) My operation is small and not very dependent on plastic - keeping sustainabiligity and regeneration in mind over $. Zone 6 here lots of small market veggie folks using lots of plastic, electricity and propane to grow. While I do enjoy growing veggies naturally in the ground outside, the true complex value scales of $/time, spectrums, etc have helped nudge me more towards learning more about and experimenting with woody nursery and forest work. Basically moving and stacking whatever organic thing is laying around at different times in the woods off certain areas of paths I've made. It's one of the best joys intuitively collecting certain small amounts of nuts and seeds from the forest, staring them on your own, and learning where and how they are living back in the woods and if you can be of service in anyhelpful way for certain individuals or the landscape/watershed as a whole. Contour based rough hugels in the woods, especially on hills, collect all the goodies - along with being great spots to let new trees naturally come up! I ❤ Edible Acres!
This is just an amazing project. I love the permaculture system, and it is really great to see actual examples of things I had only heard about previously. Thank you so much. Say hi to Zelda❤
This is really great content. ☺It shows how anyone can take just a few natural materials and really set themselves up for some successful garden beds. Like you say, one doesn't need the hoops to get going. I do this often in an area where I know I will want to have a garden bed, sometimes a few seasons before I know I will be able to really work an area. Slowly building it up and then when I am ready, there isn't much to do to finish of and prep for planting.
Love A local saw mill dropped 2 huge bundles of scrap pine slabs for the cost of gas and we used them to make raised beds. I know they won’t last anywhere close to locust but something is better than nothing!
That's an amazing situation and those pine boards as they break down will definitely help feed the soil as well. What a great hookup!
If you like this channel, subcribe, thumbs up and leave a comment. This all will help that more people can learn from Sean and team
Thank you man. I really appreciate you detailing your thought processes and decision making as you go through the project. Great use the available resources there.
Well we're doing similar work taking advantage of this nice warm weather my hoops hold a shade cloth, trampoline net actually. Works perfect for rooting cuttings!
Thank you for making these videos...always look forward to your content!
Great video Sean! I did my backyard garden bed as a 4 foot tall cinder block keyhole design with the first 2 feet filled with big branches recovered from our oaks and chinked with yard debris. This will be my 4th year of tomatoes and sweet peppers (plus filler herbs) without watering. 👍
So wonderful!
If it is convenient, would you please show the full development of these beds? I am a complete beginner and would benefit from seeing the whole process. I want to do some type of planting area for winter squash in my back yard. Thanks so much!
There about a million You Tube vids & web pages devoted to hugel beds...of all weird permutations & varieties. Many are misleading. You have to have rotten or wood well on its way to rotting through in the central core to create a water reserve & have the bed perform as intended. Ignore those dumping in big chunks of firewood that have just been sitting around for a few years. Some fresher cut small limbs & branches won't hurt for fill, but not the bulk of the core. These beds take some time to settle & cure. The first year may be disappointing. There aren't a lot of rules...except for rotten wood. Height & width should be determined by your body size & reach. What you intend to grow in the bed is also a factor.
Potatoes n voles .... advice welcome. Disappointed but wising up newbie here.
Love your content, and trust your decisions. Having written, I looked into the Greenworks chainsaw with the interest to purchase. I discovered that they do not have replacement parts outside of the chain, bar and tensioner. Meaning, they are not serviceable by the end user.
I use the 40V version of the Greenworks chainsaw. I hope I'm wrong but I doubt any of these cheap chainsaws are built to be serviceable. Electric motors last so long that they are a paradigm shift over internal combustion saws. But, given the low cost, when it breaks, buy a 2nd body and use it until it breaks, then swap parts until both are no longer usable. As a home user, I expect the 40V saw to last a generation at which point even if spare parts were designed in, they would no longer be available.
@@SeekingBeautifulDesign My two chainsaws are both 30+ old. I can still buy parts for them; this is important. If a paradigm shift is expected to work, Greenworks failed for my part.
@@cuznclive2236 That's great. I doubt any consumer products of any sort will have that in 30 years unless they can be 3D printed. Which is sort of the counter point...ICE machines for internals require high strength, high tolerance parts and those parts wear out. Electric motors don't require high strength and the only high tolerance thing (the shaft and bearings) last a long time. Bearings are pretty standard, so you can buy those parts. Shafts are pushing immortality. Otherwise, I fix electric motors without buying any parts at all and I haven't even started on the 3D printing world.
Another way of looking at it is as a percentage of your useful lifetime...I've used ICE chainsaws and will never go back after using electric. The damage to my lungs/organs and hearing (not incl. to the environment) reduces my functional lifespan, while the electric doesn't to the same degree. The screwing around time to keep ICE's working also reduces my useful lifetime as I could have been doing other things. Granted we don't have electrics good enough to take down 10' diameter trees 200+miles from civilization, but perhaps we shouldn't be doing that.
@@SeekingBeautifulDesign You do you, and I will do me. If I can't purchase parts to maintain my tools, vehicles, etc., I'm not buying it... any of it.
Simply, and to my point, buyer beware.
I would be interested in a discussion about why these types of beds work so well given that we are burying freshly decomposing material right into the plant root zone! It seems to work so well but why does this system not tie-up all the available nitrogen thus completely stopping plants from developing???
And the seldom discussed idea of methane generation through anaerobic decomposition (at least when done as Sean demonstrates)
So cool. I'm doing this now🎉
Yay!
T shirt weather in Feb!
Great content as usual. Therefore 👍 up.
Very cool video, thanks as always for your helpful content! Do you think removing the pine debris (or any debris under trees in general) negatively impacts the tree in the long run? It seems like a lot of urban trees don't thrive for this very reason.
I would suspect urban trees don't thrive because of immense other pressures like toxicity, compaction, restriction in the root zone, on and on... That said, I think if someone raked up every last fleck of debris under a pine for a few years in a row it would not be helpful to them... FWIW so far I've left all that goodness, don't actually need it for the project.
Great stuff as always. I wanted to ask if you saw any difference in production from using aged wood as opposed to “fresh wood”. Ie the stuff that fell in the windstorm. Is nitrogen lock up from the fresh carbon a problem in newer wood? Or does it not matter much. Thanks! I’ve learned so much from your content!
shaun i have lots of dead ash trees on my property i have cut down and have piles of brush..would you use it for hugel mounds or burn it into charcoal for adding to the soil...whats a better use of time in your opinion? I could do either i suppose. Also do you have any english walnut trees for sale im an hour north of you and would love to replant with some!
Just been doing some of this sort of work myself, crazy that people will dispose of their biomass instead of putting it back into the soil on their own land. I am doing something a little different - I have a steep slope so these kinds of berm serve instead of swales to slow run-off and absorb moisture, though I mostly plant perennials downslope of them, not annuals. It's amazing how much greener everything gets on and around these berms. And people talk about all that carbon stealing there nutrients but I haven't found that to be much of a problem, at least not with perennials. I do envy you though, being able to work every day on the land, I'm only able to do it very part-time unfortunately.
firstly, I love your videos, and take alot of inspiration from your chicken composting videos, my question is on this property, how large is it, how long have you had access to it, and what percentage of it would you say is in production?
This is a 6 acre landscape with very active production in about 2 or 3 of the acres and I started planting 2009
The fallen pines - food for thought - limb them and THEY become your edges of next hugel mound
Nice just in time for bed
Rest well :)
Hoops that last for decades is legendary enough if they cost 9$, ridiculous at 2$ 😮😮💪💪💪 about the worry that the logs lying around help with that..?
No halfmoon-shaped hugels? :) ✨⚡👾👾👾
:)
Only use wood well on its way to rotting or already rotten. The rottener (sp?) the better.
Some acquaintances built a monolithic hugel bed using too fresh wood & even some scrap dimensional lumber in the core. YIKES! They'll be dead & buried before that thing ever performs as intended. Meanwhile, they have to water it constantly while still remaining confused as to why.
I have to fence mine in or the chickens, rabbits and deer would destroy it!🤣
Don't forget to add charcoal.
... Why wouldn't you just drive some rebar through the locus bed frames if you were worried about wind? Or build some minimal wind-break?? It's kind of bizarre, and now I'm having a hard time taking the vid seriously. Hugelkultur rules though, can be done effectively even in small containers, at scale.