The Demo Site

Oops! Looks like I rounded up in those last two posts about double-digging. Able to squeeze only an hour in this evening, my only double digging consisted of finishing the last two columns of the bed that I started on Day 1. But now I find out the bed is more like 40 sq. ft., not the 50 I’d guesstimated. Good News: My whole being is craving more upper-body activity. If the sun were still out on this Easter Night, I’m pretty sure I’d still be out there with it, digging happily. Instead I’m here typing and double dipping corn-chip crumbs into my own private humus tub.

More importantly, I also cranked up our 10,000 gallon underground cistern system today. For me, this includes digging through a few inches of bark mulch, unlocking the system’s access door, and turning a valve by hand. Thanks to all of this winter’s wonderful snow, the tank is full, so tomorrow morning I hope to sow some peas in that newly dug bed. (Sadly, as I dug, I realized that the soil was surprisingly dry.) In addition to being healthy, delicious, and inexpensive slow-food, the peas will be great soil prep for whatever we put in the bed in mid-May. The water itself will be beneficial to the soil, but since peas are legumes, they will also “fix” nitrogen in our manure-heavy (rabbit and chicken) compost. Not sure if the King of Compost, John Jeavons, would approve of this tact, but sometimes you just gotta go with your gut—plus I happen to have a couple pounds of free (pea) seed!