Hügelkultur

I came across hugelkulturing while searching various organic growing sites. I removed a tree a couple years back and was planing on just burning it and just using the ash. Instead I went with the hügelkultur idea minus the mound. I have to say I'm impressed with how it turned out mostly due to how much watering I don't have to do. Every year it's always water every 2 days or they would start to wilt since day after day of 100 plus temps are the norm. Now I'm watering once a week plus this years plants are by far the nicest I've had the pleasure of tending. Has anyone else here taken a stab at this?

Hugelkulture is the shit! I've worked on a couple farms where we did this. My buddy and I built some troughs and are trying to adapt some hugel methods indoors. We lined the bottom of the troughs with red pine, put a bed of nice soil on top, planted, and mulched with the same red pine. We just did this all yesterday lol. I'm excited to see how it turns out. We've done troughs before (they work fucking awesome, we get 2.5 to 3 pounds a 1000watt light) but this is our first time trying to do some modified Hugelkulture ideas. Ill have to make some posts about how it works out!

ok,so i'll ask,will the pine needles rob nutrients or cause soil ph change?

natureboygrower said:

ok,so i'll ask,will the pine needles rob nutrients or cause soil ph change?

Click to expand...

The red pine is not needles! It is bark and some true pulp (but not much). Even if it was pine needles though, mulched at the top it won't effect soil ph or rob nitrogen from the soil. I don't know what needles at the bottom of the bed would do...but the fines and pulp holds water when there is an excess in the soil, and will release the extra water when The soil is in need...in theory lol. We will see.