24 Apr 2013 | 3:01 AM PDT | Posted by Tricia Fawkes | Category: Fruit And Vegetable Gardening
Three years ago when Kavin was a new-born, we built this strawberry patch. We built a cover for the top as the birds loved it as much as us. The problem was that the soil wasnt deep enough and weeds crept thru from underneath. I have also been a little busy around the house and with the three kids that I honestly didnt maintain it properly. The patch went from neat rows to a giant strawberry mass knotted with weeds and grass. Last fall I let the chickens have at it, they tilled and ate everything green for weeks on end. The this winter we had a few heavy snow days that knocked down the cover with the wet weight and this was what we were left with.
not too pretty.
We decided to empty the entire patch and start over. Rick removed 20 wheelbarrels full of soil mixed with weeds and strawberries.
He threw all of it into one huge pile in the chicken coop. Here is load number one, see the interest.
It took those crazy hens less than a week to perfectly flatten 20 loads in their coop. I then decided to lay a base of plastic down to see if that will keep the weeds out. We poked holes in the plastic with a pitch fork to allow the water to run out....hoping it works.
This is the patch with a plastic base and a whole bunch of bags for me to load in. Well actually we had a week of rain and I put off throwing those bags in, came home one day and Rick had done it for me. I didn't expect him to but it was a nice surprise.
This is the patch re-planted and now too re-build the fence. The work never ends around here. How is your garden coming? email me: farmwithoutabarn@gmail.com
