previous | home page | this month | e-
The Plot Thickens
Richard Bell’s Wild West nature diary, Spring Bank Holiday Monday, 25th May 2009
previous | home page | this month| e-
AS IF WE haven’t got enough with our own vegetable patch, we’ve taken on a small bed at Barbara’s mum’s where a small greenhouse once stood. Over the last 3 years we’ve dug garden compost into the soil and last year we spread a thick mulch of composted bark over the surface.
The clay soil was originally compacted but now it’s heaped up to 18 inches above its original level and it’s developing a crumb structure. It’s only around the edges that it has remained solid and sticky.
Each year we’ve grown a few potatoes, which has helped break up the soil, while runner
beans have added nitrogen, as we leave their roots, with their nitrogen-
This year we’ve added a couple of bags of spent mushroom compost and one bag of composted farmyard manure. Just what the soil needs.