Ruth Stout’s Garden

Food Plants - Annual, Food Plants - Perennial, Land, Plant Systems, Rehabilitation, Soil Conservation, Structure — by Craig Mackintosh PRI Editor August 9, 2011

I like this lady!

Part I

Part II

Find out more about Ruth and her mulched gardens here.

7 Comments »

• An amazing lady,I am very impressed…

  Comment by Dawn — August 9, 2011 @ 11:16 am

• Fantastic! Simple, effective, unconventional: how gardening should be

  Comment by Peter Greg — August 9, 2011 @ 1:37 pm

• What a grande Lady and that’s how its done. Nature doesn’t need us to do its stuff !!!

  Comment by Hanna — August 9, 2011 @ 3:17 pm

• I just watched this and the 2nd part on You Tube. A wonderful wise woman indeed.

  Comment by Ian — August 9, 2011 @ 8:54 pm

• Is there usually a situation where the high-carbon mulch quickly uses up the available nitrogen in the soil, and how to deal with this organically?

  Comment by Edward — August 10, 2011 @ 4:40 am

• Edward – my understanding is that if the mulch is somewhat rotted already the nitrogen drawdown effect is less of an issue. Otherwise you could place a layer of compost (or rotted manure) before placing new mulch. I use chicken manure pellets under fresh straw. Of course you could run the fresh mulch through the chicken pen before use in the garden – which is a good idea to allow the chickens to eat any weed seeds in the new mulch. Chhers.

  Comment by Peter — August 10, 2011 @ 5:24 pm

• Hey Edward,

  The chooks process all of the fine wood mulch here before I send it out into the orchard and I’ve never noticed nitrogen problems in established areas. 11 chooks process about 4 to 6 wheelbarrow loads of mulch + straw per week. However, this is onto already established areas as a top dressing.

  In a new area, it’d be a good idea to drop a sprinkle of compost on top of the mulch after a couple of weeks as a minor top up. In a new area I also tend to let the weeds grow too.

  Cheers

  Chris

  Comment by Chris McLeod — August 10, 2011 @ 6:50 pm

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