sheet mulching

our soil here is quite sandy and each year JD and i have added compost and soil builder to help the gardens grow.  this year we are starting our garden building in the fall and have decided to sheet mulch our gardens.

sheet mulching is essentially composting in place to help build your gardens soil and add nutrients.
we got the first steps accomplished today.

first you chop down all of your remaining plant life and let it in place.  this is our vegetable garden so we didn't have to accommodate existing plants that will winter over. 

next lay down cardboard or newspaper then cover with mulch.  we are using the leaves we raked from our yard the previous couple of weeks.

 

 

doesn't this look like glamors work?

next we will be covering the leaves with dirt and compost.  we have an existing dirt pile, from when we dug a patio two summers ago, and then will be adding compost from our bin.  both of these will help the worms and insects start to process the leaves and clean cardboard into dirt.

hopefully this spring our garden will be one step closer to great soil and a successful garden.