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Mom and Dads Hugelkultur Raised Bed

I've been spreading the word on Hugelkultur Raised Beds. My brother had seen mine and I was telling him about Hugelkultur, he was hooked immediately. He then built a few in place of his removed fence and will be building a few more.


We got to talking and I said we should do one for Mom and Dad in an effort to make their gardening a bit easier on them.


So I told Mom, "Mom were gonna build you a Hugelkulture bed", She said, "what" and I said, "Hugelkultur", she then said, "gesundheight"...I said, "no Hugelkultur, its a method of gardening". So I explained the entire process and she seemed to get it.

Over at Moms for Christmas dinner I checked out her little veggie garden. I said, "whats the hell is that", she said, "thats my garden".
I said, "NO, this just wont do"!


After a few measurements I had a game plan, I talked with my brother and we decided on a build.

Later that week I was driving around and came across some wood perfect for the bed. I drove around with this wood in the back of the truck for several weeks.

Then last week my brother calls and tells me he picked up and dropped the wood off at moms with some Hugel Wood.
I thought, "oh boy, were committed now", so we decided on knocking it out this weekend. Friday night I tossed some wood, tools and some other Hugel Bits in the back of the truck and proceeded to smash an 80 pound soaking wet hay bale in there also.

December 31st, the build.

Dad tearing apart the old bed.

Built the first row and leveled the bed.

We dug down about 12" or so to start adding the wood, the goal was to have at least 6" of loose soil on top.

We crammed as much wood in as we could, then poured a few cups of 10-10-10 on top of the logs. I'm not sure if the 10-10-10 will even help, but I guess it can't hurt.

We decided to build the rest of the bed before digging out, that was my call, Jim wanted to dig out first but we had no where to put the dirt.

We added a center support and outside supports, we were concerned with the sides bowing during freezes. We then topped off the logs with hay.

Then we topped the hay with soil and continued.

See Jim! I told you there was no place for the dirt.

When we were discussing this build, we were under the impression we would need a lot more soil, since my original plan was to make my raised beds on the hill into Hugelkultur Beds, I figured I would dig out one of my raised beds and use the soil from that. Apparently we didn't need any additional soil.

After all the soil was added back, I soaked the bed for almost an hour. I'm banking on the level dropping at least 4" by planting time and I can top dress with some composted manure.

Now all that is left, is to cap the top and possibly run irrigation oh and of course it will need to be stained but that will be in the fall of 2017.

February 17th, 2017


Finished capping the top, added some, compost, potting soil and composted manure. Planted some Spinach, Romaine, Black Seeded Simpson, Beets, and Radishes

Looks much better!