6 Ways to Build Your Homestead Garden

There are a million and one ways to build your Homestead Garden.  Here are just a few for you to give thought to.  Some are hard, some are fun.  You decide which you like best and begin building your new Homestead Garden.

 

The Way Your Grandparents Did.

This, to me, is the hardest method of gardening.  However, it is how I learned to grow things. You need to plow and till and dig and turn all of your dirt and then you can plant. But you will need to weed a lot with this method. I am going more sustainable and hopefully will have less weeding with the methods I am planning to use on my homestead.  This is the hardest of the six ways to build your Homestead Garden.

 

Deep Mulch Method

This kind of garden starts with a deep layer of mulch.   Whether it be leaves, hay, straw just layer it up to about two feet deep.   The Prairie Homestead started with this and had very good success. I am planning to start with this in my main garden. We have a lot of hay lying around with no animals to feed it to right now. It will be a year or two before I get any more cows.  That is why I am going to use it for my garden. I will be adding leaves on top of the hay so maybe, if I am really lucky, there will not be a lot of weeds coming up through it. It will be approximately two feet deep when I am done.  I will let it sit over winter to break down.  This is the easiest of the six ways to build your Homestead Garden.

 

Strip composting, also known as LASAGNA GARDENING

This way of gardening is similar to the deep mulch method, but with different ingredients. Instead of using just hay or leaves or straw you layer them all in one area. For instance, my beds will be done this way; Starting layer; manure – second layer hay – third layer leaves – fourth layer compost – and those will be layered back and forth until each bed is approximately two feet deep.  At that point I will sprinkle with wood ashes, like you would Parmesan cheese on top of lasagna. This is my favorite method of building a Homestead Garden.

 

The Back to Eden method

This is a popular way to garden these days. I don’t personally use this method due to the fire ants we have here in Alabama. They seem to seriously love the piles of wood chips that are used to follow this method. Basically you pile up wood chips where you want your garden and then dig in them to make a hole and plant in the hole pulling the wood chips back up around the plant as it grows. I have tried this one and would love to use it as it works well for the plants, but you cannot touch the plants if you do it here as the fire ants will take over very quickly and bite the “FIRE” out of you.

 

Container gardening

Another method you can use to build your Homestead Garden is container gardening. Any kind of food really except maybe potatoes unless you have a really large container. You can use any containers including shoes, potty chairs, pots, sweet lick tubs (a cattle supplement with molasses in it) and anything else I can get my hands on. This is so much fun for me. For instance, the potty chair will hold marigolds which are very good at helping keep bugs out of your plants, one of many companion plants that do. I’m going to put them in the potty chair and call it my “POTTY OF GOLDS”. I love to have fun with gardening, don’t you?

 

Going Vertical

There are many ways to do this. You can use strings, fencing, wire, wooden trellises, anything that reaches up to the sky. I am going to use fencing in a few of my gardens to run some small vines on such as mini-pumpkins and small winter squash like acorns and patty pans (summer squash but viners). I love to play in the dirt, but sometimes when things are on the ground the bugs get a little too happy and eat them, but since I want to eat them so I must protect them from the scavengers that wish to steal them from me and growing UP is one method that works.  You should try this method anywhere; near your house or in your garden.  Trellises by a window can prevent folks from seeing in or vines growing up a fence can hide something you don’t want everyone to see like an outdoor furnace.

 

Well, that is six, although I am sure there are many, many other ways to garden to your heart’s content. I plan to use two through six in my garden and we will be sharing videos about how to build them starting with the deep mulch garden on my main garden.  Try these six ways to build your Homestead Garden and let me know how it goes.  I would love to hear how your garden grows.  Hope to see you soon.  If you have any questions or comments about any of these methods please leave a comment below or email me at Kelly@HomesteadinCrazy.com.

 

 

 

Love everyone and everything. We are all here for a purpose.

Love you bye,

Kelly Jeanne