Hey there,
How are your gardens doing? What’s gone well this year, and where are you having problems?
Things are looking good for me so far. Like every year, I had some trouble with black bean aphids on my fava beans, but that seems to have resolved itself (even though the affected plants aren’t yielding much).
I’m happy with my onions and potatoes… does anyone know why some of my onion sets are deciding to go to seed?
Wishing you all a great week!
That sounds concerning. I’m having a similar issue with the lawn (in another garden): It’s completely yellow by now. A while back, I deliberately planted thyme in a few spots on the lawn—it seems to handle the drought a bit better. Otherwise, though, I have to say I’m not a lawn fanatic: If it dries up, it dries up. In my experience, the grass recovers in the fall and spring.
Like you, I really only water my vegetable beds. In the beds, I’ve become a big fan of using grass clippings as mulch. It retains moisture, there’s a lot of soil life active underneath, and since grass clippings contain a lot of nitrogen (shout-out to the composting community!), they also fertilize the beds at the same time.
So far, luckily, we still have enough rainwater collected from winter and spring… but summers are definitely getting drier here, too.
I just put the clipped grass beneath the hedges. Normally disappears within weeks, worms and stuff that feed of it are happy and the soil quality will be improved.
Regarding the nitrogen: I heard otherwise, that composting it in-situ will reduce the available nitrogen and you should add some long-lasting nitrogen source to it, like e.g. horn shavings.
There’s some truth to that, but it’s a bit more nuanced: It depends on what you’re composting. With substrates that are very high in carbon and low in nitrogen (such as wood chips or shredded wood, if you have your own chipper), the low nitrogen-to-carbon ratio causes the microorganisms that break down the wood (fungi, bacteria, etc.) to draw the nitrogen needed for cell growth from the soil—and in that case, you’re right: As the mulch decomposes, it initially leaches nitrogen from the soil.
The situation is different when using very nitrogen-rich material like fresh grass clippings: These contain a relatively high amount of nitrogen compared to their carbon content, so the microbes don’t need to draw nitrogen from the soil beneath them… In that case, you have to be careful not to make the mulch layer too thick, as the combination of high metabolic activity and high moisture can create oxygen-deprived conditions (this is why a pile of grass clippings becomes wet, rotten, and mushy and no longer decomposes properly). In my experience, a 10-cm layer of fresh grass clippings as mulch on my soil is no problem and breaks down well.
Thanks for the clarification, I see…
I am actually doing a combination of both: the cut down twigs from e.g. the hedge itself and the grass clippings added on top of it after mowing the lawn.
Keeps it somewhat loose and the air circulating, so no risk of oxygen deprived rotting!