The power of Manure !!

[RandB]

Attached is a pic of our little backyard garden. All we put in there were 2 each of the following plants: tomato, yellow squash, sweet pepper, cucumber, cantelope, and a little row of green beans. We got a late start, so we got the pre-started plants in the little cups at Walmart. I put a yard chair next to the squash, so you can see the size. That is just 2 squash plants! I have picked dozens of squash so far. The crawling vines are the cukes and melons, they are covered with blossoms. The tomatos are to the left of the squash, they are just starting to set little fruits, and are growing and growing. The peppers are near the front if you can pick them out, they grew huge dark leaves and are already starting to set peppers. We have never sprayed or fertilized any of this - the other day I saw Japanese beetles all over the squash, but they didn't seem to do any harm.
I have NEVER seen such huge healthy plants !! What was the secret? I think it must be the fact that before we made the garden, DH brought up cart loads of horse, sheep and chicken manure. He would dump some there every week since it was kind of a low spot in the yard, he wanted to raise it. He then tilled it all in. Once we planted and they started growing, we mulched all with a heavy layer of old hay. There are hardly any weeds, and you can see the results !! Just had to share, we have never had such a successful garden before.

[Maura]

Beautiful garden! I would have liked to see the squash flowers, I think they are lovely.

If you just mulch it every year, you'll not have to do a thing more. The manure will continue to do its job for years to come. You don't even need to till again, as long as you keep it mulched. You'll just want to take the old plants at the end of the season and compost them elsewhere.

[Willowdale]

Wow! That looks beautiful! Thanks for sharing the technique; I'm definitely going to do the same with the garden I'm preparing for next spring! (Wonder how my colleagues will like being driven to lunch in a manure wagon? Ah, the sweet smell of fertility...)

[Liese]

Bee u te ful!

[WildernesFamily]

RandB... WOWZERS! I hope to have a healthy looking garden like that someday!

[cowgirlone]

Beautiful garden RandB!

[turtlehead]

Da Squash dat ate New Yoik!
Fabulous!!

How do you like the hay as a mulch?
I have used straw a couple of years now and I don't care for it. Doesn't do a good job of weed suppression and it's so thick and ... I don't know, brutal, maybe... that it's hard to get around some plants like carrots.

Grass clippings are my favorite mulch but we don't produce enough so I'm looking for an alternative.

[RandB]

Thanks everyone...

Just today I picked 6 more squash. Tomorrow I'm going to make a "squash run" over to my mother. I told her to be prepared, I'm bringing a BIG bagful! She can share with her neighbors. The cukes are loaded with blooms, also the lopes. If we were to get a veggie for every bloom, we will have to put out a stand. I also discovered a lot of green tomatos developing under all those leaves.
Turtlehead, we like the hay so far. It was old hay from the bottom of the shed, not suitable for feeding to the animals. Once the plants got going well, he put it down very thickly all around them - I'm talking 6 to 12 inches thick. Very few weeds have come through that. It also keeps the moisture in during the dry spells, we don't have to water too much. The only place I have had to weed is along the row of beans where we couldn't put much hay. Another advantage is that those monster cuke and lope vines are spreading on top of the hay, so the veggies should be fairly clean and dry, and won't rot from contact with the soil. From what I have read, much of the hay will eventually rot down over the fall and winter, so he can till it in next spring. Guess we will find out!

[Guinea mama]

I am going to have to try the hay thing in our garden. Our garden looks alot like yours. We moved our garden this year to the old cow pasture and everything that is planted out there is growing great. Best garden we have had in years, got zucchini coming out my ears right now and tons more growing. Can't wait to freeze some for this winter. Thanks for the hay idea.

[Maura]

Don't till it next year. When this year's roots die and decompose, they will help to keep the soil loose. Tilling releases carbon into the air, the carbon that you want kept in the soil.

[teresab]

Now RandB make sure you make good use of everything you have...I cut up my squash into chunks and freeze it on a cookie tray and then when it is good and frozen it transfer it to gallon zip lock bags and throw it in the freezer...I do the same with my green peppers. Green Beans I blanch then put on the cookie tray and freeze then bag.

When you do it like this you can grab handfuls and throw it in your skillet - a couple handfuls of squash,green beans on a castiron skillet with some olive oil, onion,garlic and bacon...ohhhh yummy. And your garden will last you all winter!

[Ravenlost]

Manure is good stuff! And I also mulch with old hay and love it. Great looking garden!

[rmaster14145]

your garden looks great. ours is a small garden too. we put rabbit and chicken poo on it. like you we planted 2 squash plants. since they have had squash on them we have got 36 squash from them. also we planted 2 cayenne pepper plants ...we have already picked 67 peppers from just those 2 plants. the power of the POO is amazing!!

rm

[turtlehead]

Thanks for the hay info.
Do you guys that use hay find it is less likely to mat than grass? I know sometimes grass clippings form a waterproof barrier so that rain can't easily get down into the soil.

I'm thinking hay would be a great mulch with the flexibility and gentleness of grass but the water permeability of straw. Yes???

[moonwolf]

great looking garden patch, and yes, squash will love growing over all that manure.
My potato patch started over an area I kept chickens and also broadcast manure/straw over it when cleaning the coops. Even a few years later when planting the potatoes, they are doing well and growing like crazy. I used manure to start new garden for squash before and it went rampant (the squash) with great pumpkins and squash that year. Composted or worked into the soil, you can't beat manure.
I use grass clippings mulch. I used straw mulch before in some of the squash, but it was too big of an area to deal with buying or bringing in all that straw then. So, I get grass clippings to use now. So far, I'm in a new plot starting squash again with corn to see how that goes. I hope it's even half as nice as what is showing in your garden! good going!