Well i dont think any of us are ready to cast in stone what works in one yard or state or climate will work in another.
Well in my case i live in the middle of a deciduous temperate forest. But my state has shale barrens and grass balds, spruce forests and cedar glades as well as wetlands. We each have our pros and cons…
I have no idea what its like to grow things in the desert… i just know that leaves are a thing here where i live… and for some reason trees are abundant and grow well here.
Likely trees and forests covered the flat spots where i grow things for maybe 100s of thousands…maybe millions of years… which is what i call soil… likely leaf litter and dead trees and rocks ground up by roots.
If nobody lived on my farm for probably 10 years… it would be a forest again. Lots of trees and leaves. No sign that anyone ever lived here before… and things would go on like that until the end of time or a fire or something…then it would start all over.
I live in WV. Its Wild and Wonderful here. Some folks say its Almost Heaven.
I think in the video he says he gets rid of his native dirt…
Just saying that there is no exact science to how to grow things. Maybe his yard is fill dirt like alot of residential yards are? I know ive hauled many loads of fill dirt to new developments… alot of folks dont know that.
I know that the experts say to never amend the hole… but some folks can with good results.
I have been putting a ball of pine fines and potting mix with all of my new cane fruit plantings…it seems to help them get established faster.
I think a few folks on here have had good results with pine fines as well.
I know drews potted stuff looks very good and i think he is big on pine fines.
Very creative ideas, you got free labor! They may find some earth worms for dinner.
What is the name of the black and white duck? I have never seen duck in this color. Are they good for eggs or good for the meat? and what is the name of the brown chicken?
i live in the pine tree state and cant find any fines here. think im going lay out a pile of arbor chips next spring and water in lots of urine/ goat /rabbit poop for a summer. id think by the following spring that pile could be used in soil mixes?
My Home Depot carries pine fines but no other place does. I think lowes sells them as soil conditioner. Ball potting mix is very high in pine fines… my local nursery uses it in everything.
Arbor chips make good compost i think but act different than pine bark under the soil.
There are videos on youtube of a guy that sticks all his cuttings in pine fines only…
Im learning as i go with them but so far i like them for rooting stuff.
That’s “baby duck”. Not super creative but that’s what you get when you let your 3yo name it. I couldn’t tell you the breed. He was supposed to be a black swedish but clearly he is not.
I did research for Texas A&M for 30 years in Amarillo. Mainly on sugarbeet, wheat, sorghum, corn, pecans, and apples. Some of that was soil fertility and tillage related. We had long term studies related to tillage as deep as 6ft. Using yield mapping technology we differentiated soils that varied in topsoil depth by as much as 10ft. We found soils that were all topsoil washed in by the higher yields that occurred there. So quite a bit of soil related work.
On the soil we had, with very slow permeability, tillage to 6ft depth increased yield by 10-50% for both dryland and irrigated conditions.
Some things like those roots wrapping up like a ball in a hole can be predicted. Have seen it plenty of times personally. Our soil is hard clay so it is often ammended. Nothing wrong with that. Where people get in trouble is they dig a hole the size of a 5 gallon bucket stick in the pear tree or whatever they are planting and dump in the 5 gallon bucket of manure. Go back in 3 years the hole is completely full of roots but none are growing in the surrounding soil. The clay soil here is treated like a bot not dirt. If you mix the soil the tree spreads out in the native dirt. The manure mixed in firt still causes the tree to grow well.
I just googled. your black and white color duck looks like the black Swedish duck pictures on the internet. What makes it interesting is the following:
“Black Swedish ducks are usually not exhibited. They are used to produce Blue Swedish ducks which are prized for their unusual color. While they are not used for exhibition, Black Swedish make great farm ducks. They like to forage, they will hatch their own eggs if allowed to, and they are plentiful layers”
It sounds like its feathers’ color can change to blue. Is It due to mutations or else?
ive looked at lowes and didnt see any. we dont have a home depot up here. theres a few mills south of me and one is a hardwood veneer mill so they need to debark. im going to see if they sell or give it away. not as good as pine but its bark.
If you have a wood chipper you can buy the pine bark nuggets and shred them and that makes pine fines. The nuggets are good for above ground i think TNHunter uses them… but the fines are best for underground…as far as i can tell.
Crap I just realized the arrow is pointing to the swedish. There are two black swedish(boots & bandit), one fawn runner (banana), and mystery duck (baby duck). The swedish are relatively new. Early last summer we had a fox incident which took out my pekin and a bunch of other chickens. My daughter is always first on scene for such events so I ordered them to lift her spirits. It was a grisly scene.
The soil here is so much better than it was when i came here to this property. Looking back there are places that nothing would grow where i now grow fruit trees. Im really happy with the results but it tooka long time
It really is worth it. Not just on what you can grow, but how well it grows, resistance to bugs and diseases, how much flavor and nutrition is in it, and how you are treating the Earth well for future generations. I am trying to teach my kids about this stuff. I didn’t care that much when I was in my 20s, but I’m in my 60’s now, and it matters. There are ways for us and the planet to be healthier.
