There are LOTS of different ways to start a garden bed–no way is the “wrong” way, you can always continue to improve your soil and implement regenerative practices as you grow after establishment! In this video, we talk about how we turned our grass lawn into a vegetable and flower production bed and give a few different methods/alternatives to how we did it.
We also give our alfalfa fertilizer recipe that we used to help get this soil up and running for the first year, using cheap alfalfa pellets!
If you want to learn more about how to incorporate regenerative efforts into your garden, check out our full class here: https://blossomandbranchfarm.teachable.com/p/regenerative-gardening
14 Comments
This is 100% something I've been wondering about lately. Thank you for this!
I am beyond happy that i found you! This is exactly how I have created all of my flower and vegetable beds for the last several years. People look at you funny when you mention removing grass but they also want instant gratification. I learned something new with the alfalfa fertilizer! Really loving all of your content as I gear up to start my flower farm. Cardboard also doesn't work for us here in central NC. We have Bermuda grass that does not get smothered so pulling it and all of its rhizomes are the only way to remove it. And hurray for mentioning wood chips!! I feel like Ive finally met someone who gets my style of gardening! (Sorry for such a long comment)
Thank you! I will try the alfalfa fertilizer!
I love the look of the walkways! How do you weed in between the wood?
I just want to point out that PFAS’s have, I believe, been found in rainwater, so you’ll probably never get away from them. I think that they are trying to remediate this though, so maybe one day we will be PFAS free again 🙂
Please give your current best mix for making soil blocks. I'm getting ready to start January planting preps.
I'm uncertain about what to use to make soil blocks after watching your video using paper mulch.
Thanks Brianna for all your videos; they're a tremendous help to me! 🌱
Love love LOVE this!! ❤️ I cannot wait to start my new garden! Thank you!
Here in Spain they sell alfalfa pellets as small animal feed – is it the same as alfalfa fertilizer?
thank for sharing, ..give me inspiration to my garden….
Correct about the raised garden beds….that everyone pushes for…and you find all the troubles with after large and ongoing expenses and problems.
With regard to alfa alfa…it's not the bees knees of all nutrition required. It has more than compost but, much less nutrients than commercial fertilizers, on a pound for pound of nutrient analysis and cost basis. Of course the organic way is wasting lots of money for little efficacy, whilst imagining the pixies are dancing with joy..so to speak. If you were to put down enough alfa alfa to fully cover the deficit of growing crops, rather than the organic approach of skimping on nutrients because of expense, you'd find alfa alfa is very expensive. You can get away with doing that on already fertile land but, not so much on typical horrible suburban garden land. Of course at this stage organic proponents will feign outrage over killing soil micro-biota with fertilizers…except they never actually bother to look (let alone research) soil life…other than lip service according to imagination.
So, for the much cheaper option and much less money/effort/time…..forget compost, mulching (no-dig palava), and just get high analysis complete fertilizer with all the micro-nutrients included….and you can dose it like it should be dosed for general crops….rather than fertilizing schedule being about how much money you want to spend on expensive (organic) alternatives each year.
Thank you for this, it helped tremendously! In my county organic fertilisers and good quality compost is hard to come by, so the compost I can make I use it sparingly but alfalfa pellets are something I can easily get, I will definitely try this method out. My sandy poor quality soil definitely needs any help it can get!
This is really great! I just found your channel and already like your style 🙂
Hello and Congrats on this Great video, Have you heard that we do not have to add sugar or molasses any more due to that it is bacteria food only? We have plenty of bacteria in our soil. But little to no fungi which is mostly our main problem in soil health and plant health . Thanks
Alfalfa is a good idea but I do not have access to that and will not buy it. I have a tree cutting buddy who is going to supply me with wood chips soon so that is good. I will begin to transition my traditional garden areas to no till style to go along with my raised bed garden areas.