Hugelkultur Update

Earlier this month, I tried my hand at making a Hugelkultur. Basically, a Hugelkultur is a pile of logs/sticks/mulch/etc, covered in dirt and planted out. Here is the wiki description of the process.

After 'construction', I watered the soil of the Hugelkultur and left the dirt to settle into the gaps in the wood. Turns out that after about a week, the Hugelkultur was about half the original height after settling.

I planted it out with a variety of edibles that were given to me as cuttings from my friends mum. As mentioned in my previous article, I'm not entirely sure what most of the plants are. Some of the ones I recognise are Sweet Potato, Strawberry, Herb Robert, Comfrey and Nasturtium.

 I was also given a few small tree off-cuts from my friends mum and transplanted a Capsicum bush from my parents house that wasn't doing so well there. Again, I've forgotten what the small trees are, I just know that they are all edible. This weekend I'll be mulching around these trees and also mulching the hugelkultur.

The Hulgelkultur and the small trees are planted in the middle of my Fruit Tree Orchid. Its my attempt at a food forest. Over the next few years the fruit trees should grow to about 3-5m to form the canopy layer, whilst the smaller edible trees will form the mid layer. I'm hoping to have a few hugelkulturs spread around the forest floor, planted out with ground covers and then the ground level mulched, so I don't have to mow or weed.