Leaf Mountain

We use a lot of leaves for mulching and for incorporating into our clay-based soil to add organic matter.   However, even though we have some large trees west of the house, most of the leaves that fall off them blow away.  Remember our name....Windy Acres!  Therefore, we have to get the leaves elsewhere. 

During the fall, Tom keeps an eye out for leaves that people set out for the trashmen and will pick them up and bring them home when he finds some.  Here is a picture of what we have accumulated so far in our "leaf bank".

I suspect that by spring this pile will be 2 - 3 times as big!

Hunkered Down for the Cold

We've had a mild fall and winter so far.  But, that is going to change in the next 24 hours.  As I write this, we have an Arctic cold front barrelling down on us.  They have been talking about this on TV for a week and I've been concerned about the beautiful lettuce that we have growing in our hoophouse.  

The hoophouse is unheated, but lettuce and other greens survive quite nicely in there during the winter.  However, if the weather gets really cold, they will sustain some freeze damage on the tips of their leaves.  This makes them somewhat unattractive and less marketable.  So, in an attempt to keep this from happening, we have covered the lettuce with a double thickness of row cover.

We have also piled some of the leaves from our "Leaf Mountain" (see Dec 17 post) all along the west side.  We're hoping this may help as well.  Guess we'll see.

Compost Cooperation

I've written a lot of posts about compost over the last few years.  Compost is "black gold" when it comes to fertilizer.  Not only does it add nitrogen and other needed compounds to the soil, but it also nourishes the soil.   It helps to loosen the soil which in turn improves water movement into the soil.  Finally,  it also feeds beneficial microbes in the soil.  Chemical fertilizers can claim none of these benefits.

Recently, we have started cooperating with Oklahoma State University to help recycle some of their kitchen waste.  You can read more about OSU's sustainability efforts and recycling programs here.

http://sustainability.okstate.edu/operations

Twice a week Tom goes to the OSU Student Union and picks up their food waste bins.  He brings them home and dumps them into our compost pile.    There are always a lot of citrus peels as you can see in this picture!

It is important to add dry material, such as leaves or straw to the wet kitchen waste, so he also gathers bags of leaves around town that he adds to the compost pile.  See this blog entry.

http://windyacresnaturalfarm.blogspot.com/search?q=leaf+mountain

Then, about once a week, he turns the compost pile and mixes everything together with the tractor.

It takes some time for the compost materials to decompose.  But, after a while we end up with something that looks like this.

At first glance, it just looks like a pile of dirt.  But, upon closer examination, this is what it looks like.

The Black Gold of fertilizers!