Beds made of humus instead of soil. Compost beds. Converting regular garden beds into compost beds

Previously, we were not interested in farming, the plot was depleted, there were no harvests, so we had no interest in this activity. But one day we learned that it is possible to build beds in which all the heat-loving plants grow by leaps and bounds, and even ripen on the bushes. And they are called warm. We carefully studied how to build such beds and immediately got to work. We dug a trench and filled it with organic matter using the composting principle. The layers of organic matter were thoroughly sprinkled with Radiance-3. The bed was spilled with water and covered.

Within a few days, we made holes, filled them with 10 liters of nutrient soil and planted tomato seedlings.

The plants, indeed, grew very well in the warm bed, and the harvest was excellent.

We had never seen green tomatoes before, but here they were red and in bunches. From that moment on, we decided that we would always make warm beds, because they could not be compared with ordinary ones.

In the spring, our warm beds gave us another surprise. In order to re-lay them, we began emptying the trenches of contents since last year. How surprised we were when huge piles of well-rotted organic matter grew in the middle of the site.

Wow! We've never had so much compost. And what does this mean? Can all plants in all beds be planted in compost? Here we parted ways: prepared compost was laid out in all the holes, in all the furrows, in all the beds.

All trees and shrubs were mulched with it. There was enough for everything, no regrets anywhere. The plants were very happy with this feeding. And we were so happy about the first full harvests.

Now we plant warm beds every year, since they are a real compost factory, feeding not only the plants that grow on them, but also the entire garden.

Very good time to create warm beds, end of summer - beginning of autumn. There is a lot of organic matter at this time. The grass has grown, whole mountains have harvested tops, trees have shed their leaves.

And in the spring, for warm beds, we use hay and food waste accumulated over the winter. So, creating such a factory is not at all difficult and is accessible to everyone.

Feeding a goat is not difficult. In summer there are no problems with food. If there is pasture, then the question of feeding generally disappears. The edge of a forest, an abandoned field, an ownerless flower bed - a goat doesn’t need anything special. Sedge, acacia and any grass are used as food for the goat. In nature, goats browse mountain slopes, which are very poor (in terms of food). When keeping goats in stalls, the issue of nutrition is more complex, but quite solvable. We will tell you in this article how and what to feed goats in winter and summer.

Many gardeners traditionally carry out early spring spraying on still dormant plants. But the second half of autumn is quite suitable for this. In addition, cold autumn weather is more comfortable for gardening. And in many regions, you need to remember that spring can come quickly, and the right moment in the bustle of gardening activities will be missed. So, late autumn, but before the onset of frost is perhaps the most successful period for carrying out eradication treatments in the garden.

I make chokeberry jam with lemon in early September, when the fruits of chokeberry, which many mistakenly consider rowan, ripen. There is an external resemblance to rowan, but chokeberry and rowan are distant relatives, they are not the same thing. The fruits of chokeberry are medicinal raw materials; they contain B vitamins, vitamin C, and many useful microelements. Chokeberry goes well with citrus fruits and apples, in this recipe - with lemon; if desired, you can also add orange to the lemon.

We moved to Kuban. We bought a house with a plot on the edge of the forest. We need to get some livestock. There is a dog and a cat, we brought them with us. We don’t need a cow, we need 3 liters of milk per week. A goat does not fit these parameters either. You can still have rabbits, they are soft and fluffy, they eat only grass and vegetables, but they multiply very quickly - what to do with them then? You won’t be able to handle them, soft and fluffy, and the prospect of an Australian rabbit tragedy is frightening. The bees remain.

The arrival of autumn does not bring as much trouble in the garden as spring, but there are activities that will help relieve the hot spring period and lay the foundations for a future bountiful harvest. And first of all, you need to take care of the soil. In this article I will tell you exactly what autumn work I do in the garden, decorative and orchard. Perhaps something from my must-have list autumn work will come as a surprise to you and will bring great practical benefits.

The fiery beauty Columnaea is becoming more and more popular. This plant has good greenery, but the fire of flowering that engulfs flexible shoots is true goal growing exotics familiar to everyone. Columnia is one of the most difficult plants to grow. Its signals are not always obvious, and disturbances in growth or development do not appear immediately. But if you try to follow the plant and go from the opposite direction - to avoid mistakes, it will be a bright sight abundant flowering quite achievable.

Pickled cucumbers under a plastic cover is the easiest way to prepare cucumbers for the winter. Pickling is one of the oldest ways of preserving vegetables by lactic acid fermentation. This ancient method of preserving seasonal supplies is still used today. The lactic acid formed during the fermentation process preserves vegetables with salt - gives the products a specific smell and taste, and prevents the proliferation of foreign bacteria. The cucumbers turn out sharp and very tasty.

The arrival of autumn does not mean that the bright colorful plants in the garden should disappear along with the last hot days. Choosing carefully perennials for flower beds, you can maintain presence fresh flowers on your site almost until the beginning of winter. If you want to freshen up your flower beds for the beginning of autumn, then these plants will certainly pique your interest. Some of them are already well known to flower growers, while some are among the new products that are gaining popularity.

Rosehip is an unpretentious close relative of the rose. It grows well in wildlife, and its terry representative can often be found as ornamental plant in parks or private gardens. IN lately the plant is becoming increasingly popular among gardeners due to its rich vitamin and mineral composition. In this article I will tell you about the benefits of rose hips, how and when to collect them, dry them, store them and brew tea correctly.

Creamy pumpkin soup with chickpeas is suitable for vegetarian and lenten menus. I also advise supporters of a healthy lifestyle to include this soup in their diet. It has everything you need useful substances- vitamins, microelements and vegetable protein, which is easily absorbed by our body. On a cold autumn day, a bowl of thick cream soup will warm you up, restore your strength, and give you vigor. This soup is “with fire”; ginger root and chili pepper give it a fiery note.

For houseplants, transitional seasons are some of the most critical periods in growing. And if changes in spring are usually for the better, autumn is a period of great risk. Decrease daylight hours and lighting quality, temperature fluctuations, the beginning heating season require special adjustments to the care program. The basis of success autumn care for indoor plants– constant monitoring of their condition and the rate of growth slowdown.

Apple pancakes with cottage cheese turn out juicy and tender, they are prepared in 15 minutes. This dish can be quickly put together for breakfast and served with sour cream - hearty and tasty, or served for dessert at lunch, for dinner with a scoop of vanilla ice cream or whipped cream. Who said that potato pancakes are made only from potatoes? Apple pancakes turn out even tastier, and that’s a completely different story! From personal experience- you don’t need a lot of flour, apples feel great without it.

Autumn is an excellent time for planting and replanting perennial flowers, especially if it is time to divide them - they have grown so much that they have begun to lose their decorative value. Another reason to divide perennials in a flower garden is to get several plants instead of one. And autumn propagation by division has a significant advantage over spring - the planted divisions adapt to their new place of residence even before winter, and in the spring they actively begin to grow and bloom in the first season.

Satsebeli made from tomatoes and peppers - a thick Georgian sauce. This seasoning is from the “dipping” category. Translated from Georgian, “satsebeli” means sauce, meaning “to dip”, hence the version that any sauce in Georgia is called satsebeli. You can eat the sauce with anything; it goes well with both meat and fish. For preparing homemade flatbreads with filling (lavash, pita bread and other delicacies), this is an ideal addition to barbecue; it goes without saying that you can’t think of anything better!

In the spring, you want to start sowing as quickly as possible in order to get the harvest as early as possible. The earth is still cold at this time, and the roots of plants need warmth first of all. You can speed up ripening and increase the yield by arranging a warm bed; it is very easy to do it yourself. Manufacturing technology does not require large financial costs, but the harvest can be obtained three times per season. Let's look at how to make a warm bed with step by step instructions, decorated with photographs. Watch the example of creating beds in the video to understand what the end result should be.

Advantages of a warm bed

To understand whether it is worth arranging warm beds on your site and spending your own time and effort, you need to understand the advantages of this method.

• A raised warm bed is especially good for damp, cold regions. The soil warms up earlier, and it is possible to get the harvest earlier. In case of overwatering, the plants do not get wet. Even stone fruit trees are planted this way to protect root system from groundwater.
• A properly arranged garden bed will last about five years. Then it can be redeveloped, and the resulting fertile land can be used for sowing other plants.

A warm bed allows you to get early harvest vegetables

• Water consumption is reduced. Organic matter retains water, so watering once or twice a week is sufficient. And if you arrange drip irrigation or at least lay a leaky hose for irrigation, then labor costs are reduced to a minimum.
• When organic matter decomposes, heat is released, which stimulates seed germination. The compost formed as a result of the activity of microorganisms and earthworms is an excellent source of plant nutrition.
• There is no need for a compost heap; all organic matter is dumped directly onto the garden bed.
• You can install a warm bed outside or in a greenhouse - it will bring the same effect. IN open ground It is enough to install arcs and stretch agrofibre to protect plants from frost.
• After rainfall, the crop remains clean, since a layer of mulch covers the soil, and rain splashes do not stain the vegetables.
• Weeds germinate with difficulty and in small quantities and are easily pulled out.
• Doesn't take up much space, is convenient to handle, doesn't create dirt or clutter.

Advice. In the fall, all available small organic matter and leaf litter add to the garden bed and cover with cardboard so that the heat is retained and the beneficial substances are not washed out by rain into the lower layers.

Arrangement rules

When groundwater approaches close, the bed is raised above the soil. In dry regions, on the contrary, they deepen it, making it level with the soil or slightly higher. Raised beds bordered different materials. Most often they use wood or slate, less often metal. Placed in the middle of the lawn, framed by a tiled blind area, such a bed pleases the eye and decorates the area. Or they make it in the form of a meter-long hill without sides. Essentially, a warm bed is a compost heap, folded in the form of a layer cake according to certain rules.

Neat beds look very nice

1. Coarse organic matter is placed on the lowest layer, which takes a long time to decompose: stumps and tree trunks, thick branches. Spill with urea. The larger the waste, the longer the bed will last. Wood retains moisture well.
2. The next layer is laid with smaller organic matter: corn and sunflower stalks, small shrubs. Paper and kitchen waste, leaves, and straw can also be used.
3. To speed up the process of decomposition and warming up, lay semi-rotted manure or compost. Top with turf, grass side down, and then a layer of mature compost.
4. After this, the seeds are sown.

The length of the bed can be any optimal width about a meter. The depth will depend on the composition of the soil and the type of bed chosen. The depth of the bed is 40 - 60 cm. The height of the raised bed is up to 1 m.
The air remaining in the cavities between large organic matter will provide breathing and rapid heating of the bed. You can speed up the process by sprinkling the soil with special bacteria.

Advice. If the soil is initially good, then the need to dig up the bed will disappear on its own. Already in the first year, the soil is well loosened to a depth of 20 cm; the next season it is enough to add compost and plant plants.

The process of making beds

Let's consider the process of making a deep bed with a small wooden side from an unnecessary board.

• We knock down the boards to make a rectangle.
• We mark the size of the bed on the ground and dig a trench approximately 60 cm deep.
• Cut turf and top layer fertile land Fold it to one side - it will come in handy.
• We fold the bottom layer in the other direction.
• The sides of the trench can be additionally insulated with sheet polystyrene foam, and closed plastic bottles can be placed at the bottom.

Insulating the bottom of a warm bed

• We fill the trench with branches and logs. We place finer material higher.
• We pour out several wheelbarrows of semi-finished compost - this will be a starter of beneficial microorganisms for processing and heating organic matter.
• We lay fertile soil and turf with the grass facing down.
• We fill the top with compost, a mixture of sand, peat and sawdust with the addition of microelements.

Filling the bed with compost

• Water well and cover with film. After two weeks, you can plant seeds or seedlings.
• Cover the soil with dark mulch. Light mulch, such as straw or sawdust, is best applied in the summer - it reflects well sunlight and prevents the roots from overheating.

What plants are planted in a warm bed?

A container filled with organic matter heats up quickly in the spring. Heat-loving vegetables can be sown in such a bed ahead of schedule, covering with film for the first time. By correctly calculating the planting time and the distance between plants, you can first grow radishes and greens. Place a trellis in the center and plant cucumbers and tomatoes. After harvesting the radishes, plant carrots, onions, and beets. In the fall, plant radishes, salads and herbs again.

Experienced gardeners who have been using warm beds for many years recommend planning plantings in this way:

• in the first year, when the bed is as rich in organic matter as possible, sow pumpkins, tomatoes and cucumbers with zucchini. It is these crops that will give the maximum yield;
• on next year you can plant the same vegetables again as in the first year;
• in the third season, tomatoes, cabbage, peppers, herbs, beets, beans and carrots are planted.

The film can be attached to the bottom row of the trellis with clothespins. Press down the edges loosely with boards. So the garden bed will turn into a greenhouse. Air will be sucked in from the bottom and come out at the top. If you forget to open the bed during the day, the plants will not burn. And if you have free funds, install a roof over the garden bed. It will protect tomatoes from late blight, and cucumbers from peronospora - these fungi germinate in droplets of water on the leaves. Vegetables will remain healthy until frost.

Advice. deep hole and large volume Organics hold moisture well and give off heat. Raised boxes with a small layer of organic matter dry out faster and lose nutritional value.

Once, by finding time and effort, as well as a sufficient amount of high-quality organic matter, and arranging a warm bed with an irrigation system, you will not only free up time for rest, but also get an early harvest delicious vegetables. If vegetables ripen in open ground a month earlier, then such a structure in a greenhouse will more than justify the investment of effort.

Warm bed: video

How to make a warm bed: photo

This year spring is early and since the beginning of April we have been spending a lot of time in the garden - making warm compost beds. In general, such beds are made throughout the year, even in winter, and immediately after the snow melts they are finalized, covered with film and “ripened.” Making warm compost beds with your own hands is not that difficult! Try it too!

Compost heap or compost beds: which is better?

I won’t be mistaken if I say that on almost every garden plot There is a treasured corner where gardeners throw out organic matter - a compost heap. There was also such a place on our site for several years in a row.

Our old compost heap

Our compost heap was located a few meters from the house, so that it would not be so far to run around with a garbage can. Filling the pile was the husband’s “sacred duty”; he did an excellent job with it, but the soil with which it would be desirable to pour organic waste was located far away in the garden, and the husband was reluctant to go with a wheelbarrow to get it every time. It’s not hard to imagine what kind of “aroma” there was around our composter - all the surrounding flies flocked to us! In addition, the compost in our pile usually matured in two years, which is a long time by my standards, and for some reason there wasn’t enough of it. All this didn’t make me particularly happy... We had no doubt that compost was necessary in the garden, but how to optimize the process of obtaining it?

Watching how my husband runs every day to the compost heap with a garbage bucket, periodically mixes the compost with a pitchfork so that it “breathes,” and then every spring he delivers compost with a wheelbarrow to numerous beds located throughout the hectare, I began to wonder: how do they cope? with all this, women who do not have “male power” at hand.

I went to visit my closest neighbor, pensioner Nadezhda Petrovna, who is known in Kovcheg as a real gardener and always receives wonderful harvest, manages to common territory making and planting beds, and she does it wonderfully on her own. Nadezhda Petrovna told me that the whole secret is in the high compost beds! Why carry all the organic matter into one pile, and then from this pile into the beds, when you can immediately take the bucket to the garden bed and cover it with soil from the same bed! But really, why?

After weighing all the pros and cons, I decided to make a compost bed myself, without the help of my husband. It turned out to be quite accessible and did not require much physical effort. Now on our hectare there is no more compost heap, but there are a lot of warm compost beds! Filling them is still the same “sacred duty” of my husband, but now, when he is too lazy to fill up the waste with soil, I am able to do it myself, fortunately the soil is here, in the same bed!

Converting regular garden beds into compost beds

So there you have it ordinary beds, on which you have already grown vegetables. To improve their fertility, we will begin to fertilize the beds with organic waste.

Organic waste includes nitrogenous and carbonaceous materials.

Nitrogenous- these are wet (juicy) materials, for example, the remains of vegetables, fruits and other food waste, mowed grass and weeded weeds (although it is better to mulch plantings with them), as well as animal manure, bird droppings, human feces(for some reason, it is this most valuable product of human life that is most difficult for many people to “accept” as fertilizer).

TO carbonaceous materials include everything dry: hay, straw, paper, cardboard, sawdust, branches, various husks, rags from natural materials(although it is better to collect them separately and use them for mulching), eggshell, tea and coffee brewing, etc.

It is believed that in proper compost The optimal ratio of nitrogenous to carbon materials is 1:4. We will strive for this ratio in our compost beds.

It is not recommended to place cooked kitchen waste, animal bones and meat, animal fat and vegetable oil(To be honest, I don’t really bother; I put any food waste in the compost - both boiled and with butter, but we don’t have meat and bones anyway, we are vegetarians). It is also not necessary to put diseased plants (especially those affected by clubroot and late blight), seed heads of weeds, cat and dog feces, unshredded wood, perennial weeds, and wool into the compost.

Do you practice separate waste collection?

If you are still collecting all the garbage in your house, both organic and inorganic, in one trash can, then it’s time to get rid of this bad habit and take a more conscious approach to the waste collection process. You should have at least two buckets in your kitchen! In one you will throw away leftover food, scraps of paper and cardboard (although we, for example, never throw away paper, but collect it separately for kindling), any dust from a vacuum cleaner - in general, everything that can rot and turn into valuable fertilizer. In another bucket we collect all the inorganic waste - candy wrappers, film, plastic, rubber, etc. The next stage of increasing your awareness is the separate collection of inorganic waste depending on the material from which it is made (in the Ark we now practice separate collection of inorganics), but now start at least small - collect organic matter in a separate bucket!

I remember with a smile the time when my husband and I lived in a city apartment. About five kilometers from our house there was an abandoned holiday village, gradually turning into a swamp. No one had lived there for a long time; the land was overgrown with willows. My husband cleared clearings there and grew chestnut seedlings, which he later planted in the local park. We also organized a small vegetable garden there, built a hut and went “to the ground” almost every week. We had such a unique dacha there. So, in order to increase soil fertility, we made compost ourselves right in the apartment! My husband installed a small barrel on the balcony into which we carried everything organic waste. So that there is no on the balcony unpleasant odor, the husband took the tube out of the barrel outside and installed a small fan in the barrel. When the compost was ready, it was taken out in bags to our garden. What I mean is that even in urban conditions it is possible to do composting, if there is a desire.

How many compost beds can you make in a season?

But let's return to our beds. Let's calculate how many beds we can make compost per season. It depends on how much organic waste you generate in the course of your life. For example, it takes two weeks to make one small compost bed on my site (that is, during this time our family of four collects enough organic waste to cover the bed with a layer of 15-20 cm). If we take into account that the beds then have to “ripen” for another 3 weeks, it means that if we start filling the bed with waste right now, then by mid-May we will already have the first ready-made compost bed for planting, for example, corn seeds. In another 2 weeks, by the end of May, another bed will be ready where pumpkin seedlings can be planted.

Thus, this spring I can only make 2 compost beds, which means the rest can be safely planted. The third compost bed can be filled during June after we have harvested early crops from it - radishes, lettuce. Then the bed from under the peas is cleared. Thus, throughout the spring and all summer, you can gradually increase the fertility of 5-7 beds.

A few more beds will fill in the fall. Starting in the fall, we make sure to prepare the beds closest to the house (I’ll tell you exactly how below) so that we can dispose of organic waste on them in winter. It turns out that my family can provide about 10 beds with compost during the gardening season. What about yours?

Making compost beds with your own hands

So, we have chosen the first bed and are ready to gradually fill it with waste. To do this, you need to remove a part of the soil from the end of the bed about half a shovel deep and about half a meter long. This soil can be poured into unnecessary (cracked) buckets and stored somewhere in the shade. We take out the garbage into the depression in the garden bed and immediately sprinkle it with a small layer of soil, which we take from the same bed from the place where our hole began (it is convenient to immediately “settle” a separate shovel in the garden bed, so as not to have to run after it with a garbage can every time in hands). Thus, when we fill and cover the first depression with earth, we automatically form the next depression. This way we gradually fill the entire garden bed with organic matter. It is not difficult to guess that to fill the last hole with waste we use soil from buckets that were waiting in the shade.

After compost bed completely filled, it must be very well poured with Baikal solution - EM1 (1 cap of Baikal per 10-liter watering can). A watering can of this solution is used for 1 sq.m of bed.

Then the bed needs to be well mulched. You can use straw or hay, cardboard, newspapers, black non-woven material- spunbond, which need to be firmly fixed in the garden bed. In the spring, to better warm the bed, I additionally cover it with film; in the summer there is no need to use film. While the first bed is “ripening” for 3-4 weeks, we begin making the next compost bed.

When the bed is “ripe”, I sprinkle it with ash (0.5 liters per 1 sq. m), go through it lightly with a flat cutter and. I make sure to mulch everything, usually with freshly cut grass.

If the beds were filled during the summer, and you no longer plan to grow anything in them this season, then be sure to mulch them so that weed seeds do not fall into the soil.

If you still have time before autumn, you can sow the bed with green manure, but then do not cover them, but leave them like that until winter.

Preparing beds for filling them in winter

Therefore, in winter we continue to fill the beds with organic matter. But for this you need to prepare the beds in the fall. It is important to choose the beds closest to the house; in winter there is so much snow that you won’t be able to get far into the garden.

In principle, if you have a ready-made bed with high sides that needs to be filled, you don’t have to do anything, just take all the organic waste into it in winter and sprinkle it with snow. But in the spring there must be a place where you can get soil to fill the resulting compost bed with a layer of at least 10 cm. We have a special mountain of fertility (formed when we dug a pond), and in the spring my husband brings soil from there to such a bed. 2-3 days before filling with soil, it is advisable to walk through the bed with a flat cutter and break up frozen clods of organic matter, if any remain. And then cover it with earth, pour it with warm Baikal-EM1 solution and be sure to cover it with film.

If there is no such reserve of soil, then you can carefully remove the top layer of soil from the garden bed and place it nearby. For example, on a banner. And in the spring, when the soil thaws, return it to the already filled bed, spill it with Baikal-EM1 solution and be sure to cover it with film.

This year, instead of Baikal-EM1, for the first time we used the microbiological fertilizer Siyanie-3 - we sprinkled it on the compost and watered it well. I think the effect will be the same as that of Lake Baikal.

This year we tried to sprinkle the compost bed with microbiological fertilizer Siyanie-3
Then we watered the bed well

Pros and cons of compost beds

I'll start with advantages:

1. Even a retired woman can make a compost bed. There is no need to periodically mix the compost and run around the site with a wheelbarrow (especially if the site is a hectare).

2. The compost bed “ripens” relatively quickly, especially if it is treated with EM preparations. 3-4 weeks after laying the bed, it is ready for use.

3. The compost bed is long-lasting, it can be used for several seasons in a row, planting in the first year plants that like to “eat” (pumpkin, corn, cucumbers, etc.), in the second year root vegetables (carrots, beets, potatoes), and third year legumes (beans, peas).

4. In the first year, the compost bed is also warm, so you can plant vegetables in it, even seeds. For example, in such a bed, corn planted with sprouted seeds in mid-May grows and ripens remarkably.

5. Worms love to live in the compost bed, which helps maintain the structure and fertility of the soil.

Now about cons:

1. In the spring, when the snow melts, covering the compost beds that were filled in the winter, they do not look very aesthetically pleasing. Here you have to endure the “mess” a little, and as soon as the ground thaws, just finish the bed by covering it with earth.

2. The second disadvantage concerns settlements where there are no fences. Dogs love to rummage through an unfinished compost bed, snatching away “goodies.” Magpies also feed there, again, until the bed was covered with earth.

Using compost beds is one method. I have been practicing it on my site for several years now and am very pleased with the result. I advise you too!