Digging and Planting a new Garden Bed

This weekend, I was busy digging and planting new garden beds. It may seem a bit late in the year to be digging and planting vegetables, but I’m mainly going after greens and things that produce in less than 60 days this year. With the first frost likely in September, I still have some time. This time I dug two beds. One in the front yard, and one in the back.

I prepared the first area by laying out some extra logs to get a rough idea of the size and shape. This one ended up being roughly 4x12 feet. The grass was problematic in the last bed I dug, so I used the weed trimmer to cut it down to the dirt. I raked the grass into a pile and used it as mulch on some other plants.




I spent what felt like two hours, but according to the dates on the photos was only 35 minutes digging the bed with a borrowed tiller. It doesn’t go as deep as double-digging, but is much faster. I also picked a 90F degree day to dig, so using the tiller was slightly less sweaty than digging by hand.



With a rake, I pulled out the remaining roots from the grass and made a small pile destined for the compost heap.



My soil isn’t the best as you can see from the photos, so I worked in some fertilizer to help the new seedlings get going. It is supposed to also have some helpful fungi and bacteria mixed in in addition to the usual fertilizer stuff. I’m a bit suspicious, but the reviews were quite positive. I guess we’ll see how it turns out. The fertilizer I used is: Dr. Earth Organic 5 for vegetables. The directions on the back say to mix in about a cup per ten square feet, so I used five cups.



I also spread some finished compost on the top of the soil after racking it smooth. After pushing the logs back in place, it is ready to plant! I really like the look of the logs on the edge of this bed. It is nice way to recycle some wood. If these weren’t diseased with brown rot, I’d turn them into mushroom logs and double the harvest from the space. Maybe I can get some to grow on straw mulch instead. Plants and fungi make a great partnership with each helping the other grow.



In the above bed, I planted some: spinach, mustard greens, northern lights chard, rainbow carrots, turnips, and some red amaranth. All have harvest dates at 60 days or less. I had a few leftover amaranth transplants, which found a home in the above bed.



The new bed in the backyard is much smaller. I’m nearly out of space back there. It is just a small 4x4 foot bed. I also outlined it with some left over logs from my neighbors tree. It was planted with collard greens, radishes, and some kale.



I watered both of them thoroughly, and now begin the waiting game. You can see some kale ready to harvest on the right edge of the above photo. Thinking about it making me hungry for another green smoothie. Yum.

Now we wait for the tasty little plants to grow.

How to Grow Mushrooms on Logs Outside

Inspired by our shiitake log and curious how the process started, I spent some time online reading about growing mushrooms. The process typically starts by inoculating logs via sawdust or plugs. Plugs seemed to be the easiest way to do it on a small scale at slightly higher price than sawdust. Pure spores could also be used, but the other two have a higher success rate and a lower price. Mushrooms grown outside on logs are supposedly more flavorful than their indoor counterparts. 



Lots of the tasty varieties grow on logs. I found two sites online that were selling plug spawn: fungi perfecti and field & forest. We selected two types of oyster, one shiitake, and one turkey tail. Each of the above bags holds about 100 plugs which is enough to start two ideal logs. An ideal log is freshly cut and four to eight inches wide and three to four feet in length.



Thinking about drilling 50+ holes in each log was a bit overwhelming. A regular drill would take a long time. Field and Forest had an adapter to turn an angle grinder into a high-speed drill. I bought one with my plug spawn along with an 8.5mm high-speed bit. It made the process MUCH easier. I was able to drill a hole in about a second or maybe slightly less. It was impressively fast, and totally worth the small price of the adapter. Each hole was just over an inch deep which is slightly longer than the plugs.



I drilled the holes about six inches apart alternating each row to get a diamond pattern. Each of the holes would be the starting islands for the mycelium to spread out and colonize the log. Mycelium likes to connect to other mycelium, so the pattern gives the biggest mass and most coverage.



Next, we put the plug spawn into the holes. Plug spawn is essentially just wooden dowels colonized by mycelium. They usually have grooves for the mycelium to live in and survive being implanted into the logs. If they didn’t, the mycelium could be scrapped off when inserted. The mycelium is the white stuff on the dowel below. Wearing gloves is a good idea to avoid harming the mycelium due to antibacterial soap residue on your hands. An alternative to gloves is to rinse thoroughly.



A few gentle taps from a rubber mallet and the plugs are easily inserted.



We dabbed some soft wax over the holes to seal them up against the weather and insects. Mycelium are high in protein and apparently a tasty treat to roaming insects. They also dry out easily. We wanted to give them a chance to get established before having to worry about competition and weather.



A finished log ready to incubate. We were able to finish six logs in about 80 minutes including setup and cleanup. It would have gone faster, but the first two took a while as we figured out how it all worked. The grinder made a big difference in speed. 



Here is our incubation pile. This is a very shady spot in our backyard. The shade will help control moisture loss. The logs have been stacked so none are blocked from the rain by the log above. The six logs on top have been inoculated with plug spawn. In the upper left of the pile, you can see the metal tag we used to mark each log with date and strain. The bottom two logs have not been inoculated and are there just to keep the incubating logs off the ground. We want to give our mycelium a chance to get established before other competing with other varieties in the soil. Contact with the soil will cause the logs to decompose more quickly.

The incubation period is typically 9-12 months depending on how aggressive the strain is and the type of wood used. Each log should last several years hopefully fruiting several times each year. Next summer, we hope to get some mushrooms. Now we wait.

Tools Used:

• angle grinder
• rubber mallet
• gloves