DIRT! Glorious Dirt!

Contained within the sturdy walls of this utility trailer is black gold! I am blessed and full of luck to 1) live in a city which composts the vast majority of it's denizens organic waste and 2) have the ability to take as much humus (in varying degrees of decomposition) as I can physically load and haul on this beast.

 In about 40 minutes my good friend Greg and I were able to load up about a cubic yard of still cookin' deep black soil and get it back to the house.

 Here is the South side of our home and where our first raised beds are going to be planned. To the left you can see a tower of bricks which will serve as the retainers for the garden.

Here we will have a rain catchment/filtration system in place of the downspout, in addition to cold frames built against the walls.

And here is (in my opinion) the shot for my before photo. This patch of yard is full of potential and will look so drastically different by the time we're done with it no one will believe it was once yellowed and nitrogen starved grass and weeds.





The first action taken after collecting the black gold was to liberally distribute it to the compost bins. There are a few reasons for this, the first being the city compost is much further than mine and therefore contains mature (and bountiful) microorganisms which aid in the decomposition of organic matter.

Above is the larger bin already churned, oxygenated, and layered with the humus

Why is this important in an already started compost? Well it seems to me that everything in nature thrives off of diversity and it is through this diversity (of everything from colors, to scents, to genes, to species of the same plant) that strength is built. Have you ever wondered why BigAg *has* to use myriad chemicals just to keep bugs, disease, pestilence, rot, and other unsavory happenings from happening? The answer is simple; Monoculture.  Having miles and miles of fields full to the brim with ears of corn or chest deep soy is saying to pests and problems the same thing as neon sign displaying "FREE SURPLUS" at a methadone clinic is to junkies. Through the systematic approach of modern agriculture businesses and corporate farmers have found it necessary to poison, over fertilize  and drop tons of chemicals on food which humans are supposed to ingest. I find this appalling and realize I have ranted my way into a subject for an entirely different time. Diversity! Diversity in everything you do! For example, with the compost, there are microbes from my garden busily working their hardest to convert all that plant matter into thick, rich humus. Adding microbes from another source of composting materiel will increase the diversity of life within the compost bin. What this does is create an environment where the immigrating microbes (being further along in the composting process) will help the native microbes out by strengthening their tolerances, and increasing overall performance.

Here is the technique I used for both bins;

Dig your way to the bottom to ensure you remove the matter being compacted then spread a thin layer of top layer compost over the floor of the bin followed by a layer of humus.

Next you repeat the process of lightly layering more material

And then once more you add more humus, much like microbial lasagna, before dowsing the whole pile and letting it set overnight.











In our society we look upon soil with no respect, as if it were a static, inanimate lump of dirt. We even apply the word dirt(y) to parts of society which are viewed through slanted eyes (pornography, gambling, strip clubs, etc etc) so its no wonder that BigAg works as it does. It treats the soil as a means to an end and not as the foundation for the entire journey. Real diversity and therefor real success starts in the soil and there is no way around that. I'm not going to get into the different soil types, ph levels, or what works for which plants but I am going to say that no matter what the situation, any soil (see dirt) can be improved from wasteland to sustainability to the point of surplus. If you want to succeed in providing quality food for your family, provide quality soil for your worms, microbes, insects, fungus, plants, and everyone else involved in the food growing process.