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Building stone hugelkultur raised beds

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 There is plenty of information on hugelkultur (pronounced hoo-gul-culture) on the internet. I am going to give a basic instruction on how I built mine. I would suggest you do some research on the fundamentals of how it works before attempting but its fairly simple and with a basic understanding has rewarded us with bountiful harvest for years. Im going to start with the materials. I use what's available to me locally and make or get most of the ingredients like old wood logs and sticks, leaf mold, compost, worm castings and stones on the property the gardens are located. All the components have acceptable substitutions with a little investigating. Lets start with the bottom most layer. This is our sponge it helps with water retention and its continued breakdown provides nutrients to the garden for years to come.  I like to use wood logs and not just any old logs but old rotted logs are desired in this case. You will have to research which wood is best and some are not suggest...

General questions suggestions and inquires

 If you have a question suggestion or inquire about anything you see on Bridgeterracegardens.blogspot.com Contact me at BridgeTerraceGardens@Gmail.com

How it started

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We live on the Hudson river near bear mountain. The area is steeped in history and abundant with breathtaking views here are a few Hudson river Bear Mountain bridge hiking picture Its actually part of the inspiration for our gardens and why we built them the way we did. In our area rocks are plentiful. There are stone buildings, houses built on gigantic boulders and rock walls wrap our roads, divide our properties and are used for landscaping in abundance. So the rocks availability was ample but sunlight was not at least not in our backyard where traditionally people put there vegetable gardens. We only had sun in the front yard and in our neighborhood flowers and landscaping went in the front vegetables were reserved for the back yard if at all. What to do? This was getting in the way of my gardening explorations. In my mind the only way I could grow vegetables was if I could make it look good or at least fit the established motif. So we began our journey as mot...