Some bed preparation for the Winter
Earlier in the year i had neglected somewhat my outdoor beds and gave more attention to the tunnel beds, so much so that i even didn't get round to planting anything in one and it just became overgrown with grass and some weeds. I decided to give more attention now to the outdoor ones too. Rather than leave them open to the elements i decided to cover them over with some of the manure/compost that has been lying under black plastic since early spring. I also cleaned out what was left in my compost bay 2 and added it to the mix. What is in Bay 1 i will leave there till next year. I just filled up the barrow and tossed the mix into 3 of the 6 beds. The reamining beds i will do next weekend with some manure from the farmyard.
On top of this i layered some old newspaper. A handy trick i thought about to prevent the sheets blowing away was to water them to make the paper wet and heavy, then they stayed in place. With that done i then covered over completely with black plastic. The combination should help to protect the soil from the elements and maybe keep the temperature somewhat reasonable. I noticed that the soil temperature is still around 10C. Also the bed levels are a little more raised that earlier in the year now after adding the material so this should help with drainage.
Posted
by John Flynn
