Some of my gardening chores can get overly complicated, and they need a pre-campaign logistic/strategy/planning session. Sometimes, the ideas fall into place in-situ, but other times, I can't think how to proceed -- the seemingly related tasks won't coalesce into a clear step by step from just standing there looking until I write them down and think about them.
One such project involved the VGB and VGD pallet sided raised beds (VGB.PSRB and VGD.PSRB). The soil level had gone down to about 1/3 and needed to be re-filled before planting. I had started pre-germinating the seeds which meant I couldn't procrastinate on prepping the beds any more.
- I knew I wanted to use the old potting mix from one of the SIP's to top them off.
- The existing soil is nice and friable so that would be the layer immediately under the potting mix....
- I wanted to toss in the swale/path top soil so that would be the next layer UNDER
- and unfinished compost on the very bottom or as bottom as a I could get because there are still some unbroken down branches, etc. in the bottom of these pseudo-hugelkultur beds
...see how I knew what the layers should be TOP-DOWN? Not so easy to figure out exactly how I was going to put them IN.
...also, last time I explored this project, I realized I needed to line the upper slats of the pallet sides with something to hold the soil mixture in. I decided so was going to use bamboo side branches like the last time, so I needed to gather enough from the bamboo I got from my parents' and stored by lashing upright a while back.
Added to the complication was that the used SIP potting mix was corralled in slit open/flattened mulch bag-lined concrete blocks...and I wanted to move these heavy concrete blocks to the patio....
I gave all of this some serious thought the night before, making bullet list of what needed to be done. In actual execution, however, I ran into logistic errors and had to make some modifications. But all was going well and I managed to get the VGD.PSRB refilled:
- one 5-gal bucket of unfinished compost full of wrigglers on the bottom
- scraped up path/swale top soil
- three 5-gal buckets of existing soil mixed with 2 cups of dolomitic lime, 1 cup of tree-Tone, 2 cups of tomato-Tone, and 1 cup of kelp meal
- layering two 5-gal buckets of the used SIP mix on the top.
But when I uncovered the rest of the used SIP potting mix on a slit open/flattened mulch bag to use for VGB.PSRB -- I found out it had been taken over by little black ants -- the ENTIRE surface of the mix was black (rather than the dried peat mix color) and moving
Any tool plunged into the potting mix was immediately swarming with determined ants that rapidly made their way up the handle to my hands and arms (tone managed to get all the way to my neck and bite me), and while just standing next to the pile to assess the situation, my boots were covered in ants.
I stirred it up a bit more until I could see the ants start to carry eggs and pupae out of the light, but had to beat a hasty retreat. I gave up on finishing the VGB.PSRB, and moved all of the tools out of the area in hopes that the ants will finish moving house if the potting mix pile was left uncovered....
...then late afternoon, we had a passing sever thundershower...
I dread to think what I will find when I get out there...
-- with any luck, the ants will be gone, but so might be my nice pile of potting mix, washed into the grass since all of the concrete block surround that were holding up the sides of the mulch bag are gone, successfully moved to the patio area, two at a time with a wheel barrow....
-- IF the garden goddess is looking down on my garden with favor, then that pile of freshly blended SIP mix will be nicely soaked with rainwater now and ready to fill the SIP with. Of course it will be too heavy now to drag it back next to the SIP and I will have to carry by bucketfuls -- I dragged it away so the ants wouldn't decide to move their colony over to the big pile....