HelpfulGardener.com

Due to all the compost and manure and everything else good that goes in my garden it is making the grass thrive around it.

I didn't even notice till my neighbor said something. He has a deck and has a better perspective but apparently all the rain we have had is running through my garden and down the hill right after it. I went to look at it and he is right. Directly below my garden and to side in his yard it is green and thick about mower thick. The thing he really noticed is the guy behind us has a big ol' patch of thick green grass right where my washout is and just up to where his yard starts to go back uphill towards his house. The rest of his yard is mostly yellow except for the washout area. I might have to send him a bill for lawn services.

There you go, proof positive my garden has something right in it.

I can't wait for this year to get moving, I have stuff planted but everything is limbo. We are stuck in a winter like pattern for a few weeks. We had 2 inches of wet snow yesterday and expecting another few inches today. The 2 day's before this it was in the 80's welcome to St Louis.

OK, what can you plant there to intercept and take advantage of all that goodness.
I'm thinking some kind of a fruit tree.

...if it was my garden, that would be where I would plant my NEW PROJECT! -- dwarf bananas during the warm months, to be dug up and wintered indoors during the cold months.

On the other hand, think of all the nitrogen you are losing! Good luck this year! I started planting yesterday, carrots, beets and spinach is in!

I'm not too worried about any losses they will be replaced with added compost and the natural cycle of life.

AS I can't really put anything down stream of my garden that is where one of my Willows are and it pretty much owns that whole part of the yard.

If you are saying it's shady and damp-ish, then I would go with outdoor cultivated mushrooms.

My problem is Where I have shady, it's also dry and away from any source of water. My only shady and moist area abuts that neighbor so I won't grow any edibles along there.

I was thinking elderberries, or blueberries or rasperries, or currants, or gooseberries, or goji berries, or serviceberries or better yet, all the above! Eat what the birds leave; you are still getting more than you were before, and you have made great habitat too...

But ain't it nice to see the biology spreading out, getting the soil back to right, and even restoring where others have done the damage? That isn't nitrogen running away, it is simply biology spreading out and bringing life back to dying soils, and that is nothing but cool! Organic nitrogen doesn't run, it's bacteria! (and yes I know urea is an exception, but for the most part this stands true).

HG