Moving ground

Day two of my evil plans, aiming to level the garden.

Just started to move soil from the big pile to main area

Already before starting I realized I cannot finish the whole thing in a day, so I needed to prioritize. Good news is that we are still having light frost some mornings which I guess gives me 1 more week to sow seeds outdoors. It means 1 week before sowing the beds must be prepared, fertilized and covered to mature for a week. So I basically decided to concentrate on the main area in the middle of the garden, and postpone leveling the strip behind the blueberry. Also I postpone preparation of the soil in the lowest and the second step in the backyard, because they involve digging out the roots first and need time. I also left the area highest up along the metal fence alone for the time being.

The task for the day was to get rid of the huge pile of soil left after the backyard construction, and to smother the lawn.

Half of the area is covered. It's back breaking work but I enjoyed it.

It was rewarding to see the pile get smaller and smaller, and every once in a while I found a bug in the dirt that I fed to the chickens, using it as an excuse to rest a bit.

The pile was much bigger than I thought, here barely 1/3 has been used

The whole garden's soil is very rough clay except for the very top part which is dead or dying lawn and stuff that the wind brought in. Dig more than 5 cm anywhere and you get very solid clay. I am starting to think maybe I should be doing pottery instead of gardening. The pile was a mix of top soil and clay all in one place.

This is the clay type I have to deal with

I covered half of the main area with a maybe 10 cm layer of mixed soil, and started to realize that I should be separating the worst bits of clay while dumping the soil all over, so I proceeded to make out a rough path and bed plan, basically to know where to dump the better soil and where to put the real nasty clay chunks. The chunks would be useful to be trampled on in the path area.

The bed plan. Focus is on having access everywhere with maximum bed area.

The soil I was covering the area with is still not top quality exactly. So to improve it and maybe bring a bit of life into the soil I have to mix in lots and lots of manure and compost. Luckily I had lots of both and covered a nice thick layer in the bed areas and shuffled it around a bit. With that, the second day was over.

No time, so I left the remaining paths for tomorrow

I raised the level of the whole main area, except for the strawberry tunnel. That bed I have to leave as it is for this year...