Fighting entropy

Gardens are a lot of work. And mine, in particular, is continually attempting to return itself to something like a forest. A weedy forest. Cute wooden structures break down over time, and tree seedlings quickly threaten to take their place.

The compost bin my husband and I built in 2012 is still standing, amazingly. It leans a little bit, and the wooden posts are turning into compost, but the chicken wire cylinder is still upright and full of compost. I add all of our fruit and vegetable scraps to it regularly, as well as leaves from our yard when I start to clean up the garden every spring.

The compost bin in 2012

The compost bin in 2020.

Besides that, though, it's been a little neglected. Sure, if you're a dedicated composter, you'll turn your compost pile regularly with a shovel or pitchfork. But I'm lazy, and not really in a hurry. And, as I said, nature still will break things down over time, whether or not you turn your pile. It just takes a little longer. Since I did so little gardening last year, I didn't have much need for compost. Even when I am gardening, I probably produce more compost than I have use for.

So over time, all that rich, mature compost just sat at the bottom of the pile. I needed more soil to pile up over my potatoes, so I decided to substitute my compost in pinch. It's something in between soil and mulch, so I hoped it would serve the purpose well. When I tried to pull some out from the compost bin, though, I found something like tree roots had made themselves at home there. It was clear my compost was overdue for some attention. So I lifted up the chicken wire and went to town pulling out thick roots of all kinds. After that I took a shovel to the top and tried to break up and stir up the leaves and twigs I had added. It should be much happier now.

It looked like a tree was trying to grow UNDER the compost?

And more roots in the compost pile....

Much better!

Roots aside, I was still able to get two buckets of compost out of my pile, and covered up my potatoes as best as I could.

My compost is somewhere in between soil and mulch.

My little potato hill after adding compost to my potatoes

My next project was the mint bed. I wish I had gotten a before photo, but frequently I just notice things and start working on them and then only think about getting a photo when I'm halfway through. Basically, it didn't look like a mint bed anymore. It was mostly oak seedlings, oxalis, and other weeds. I was amazed to discover there was actually still mint growing in there when I looked closely.

This once was a raised bed full of spearmint...halfway done removing the weeds.

I thought I would just mow the whole thing down, but I was afraid the tree seedlings would find a way to grow back. (Also, there's a large ant pile living in there.) Since there actually was some mint in there, too, I decided to take a more surgical approach. I pulled up the oxalis by hand and used a shovel to dig up every tree seedling. With the mint roots being much more shallow than the oak roots, I thought it might survive the process. (And if not, oh well--I was ready to give up on all of it anyways.) When I finished, I gave the mint a good watering to help it through the trauma.

It's not pretty, but weeds are gone! Don't let that mint fool you--it could fill that entire bed by the end of the summer.

Weeds aren't the only thing flourishing in my garden, though! Can you believe how much my potatoes have grown since my last post? And my potatoes in the grow bag have grown into a small shrub! Even the chives are flowering this week.

Left to right: tomatoes, potatoes, bell peppers, asaparagus

Potato bush

Chives in bloom