The laborious path to my hammock: a superb broncier in the Sarthe

[Ahmed]

Nico239, you write:

Because suddenly, you leave room for fast weeds who were wearing and dominated by what you cut.

This reflection is right in an environment where it is not planned to intervene: the brambles are not very competitive with respect to water and minerals and play a role favorable to the implantation of ligneous: it is a plant pioneer. In this case, an eradication of brambles would be the gateway to inversion of flora in favor of grasses, much more greedy species
However, vis-à-vis our vegetables that are delicate, brambles are not really compatible and the strategy must be different. Fast weeds need to be controlled and, unless we talk about perennials, this is the job of the hay cover.

[Did67]

Completely agree on the role of brambles: dispersed by birds, they are "soft" woody plants (they fall back in arches), which will however put "barbed wire" on a given area, which frees grazers ( which are the great allies of grasses and clovers). Temporarily, their arches allow them to be the first to take the light above grasses and other herbaceous plants, which regress, and even disappear under a bramble tree. If you manage to slip underneath, it's clean !!! And the land is very structured.

But suddenly they prepare the bed for soft woody (birch, willow, alder, maple ...) which quickly exceed them, sting their light ... A soft forest of softwoods.

At home, very quickly, trees like robinia trees, a little stronger and much more powerful take over.

It becomes clean underneath, but impossible to garden: it misses the light!

[fl78960]

Obviously, now I'm a little jaded when I arrive and I find my little jungle that has prospered despite the heat wave and not watering.

But today, the DreamTeam is assembled.

and hop !

The balance is envied: so few plants or so much for so little care

more details later, there I am slammed

[Moindreffor]

just compare the state in which you find your jungle to the state of your jungle of departure and you relativize maybe a little better and as you say to the care taken

after you will see that a good layer of hay or straw or? who will block your jungle will greatly improve harvests, you start and I think you already have a lot of work and that this field is starting to look like something for the holidays so look like a vegetable garden is the logical next

[Did67]

You have to distinguish:

a) some works are clearing: it is an investment that you make once and for all; we must imagine that it will serve 50 years - so 1 / 50ème of all this job, it is not much ...

Even if you are tired, there, you have to put the package without complaining. Even if we can do it in stages: during 5 or 6 years, at the request of my family, or because new ideas came to me, I enlarged, enlarged, enlarged ... Now, I'm at the end! Rest !!!!!!!!!

b) other work is to be repeated annually: cover biomass, plant / sow, harvest, condition, eat ...

On your first photo after the material, you have an area that is more of an orchard. Most vegetables, which are open plants, will lack light. The more you are in a northern region, the more this argument of "risk of lack of light" will play. The more you are in a southern area, the more excess light, possible burns, drought can encourage you to combine trees and vegetables ...

The second is more "gardener". Or vegetable garden. Locate where the sun hits first in the morning for the tomato area ...

[fl78960]

You have to distinguish:

a) some works are clearing: it is an investment that you make once and for all; we must imagine that it will serve 50 years - so 1 / 50ème of all this job, it is not much ...

Even if you are tired, there, you have to put the package without complaining. Even if we can do it in stages: during 5 or 6 years, at the request of my family, or because new ideas came to me, I enlarged, enlarged, enlarged ... Now, I'm at the end! Rest !!!!!!!!!

b) other work is to be repeated annually: cover biomass, plant / sow, harvest, condition, eat ...

On your first photo after the material, you have an area that is more of an orchard. Most vegetables, which are open plants, will lack light. The more you are in a northern region, the more this argument of "risk of lack of light" will play. The more you are in a southern area, the more excess light, possible burns, drought can encourage you to combine trees and vegetables ...

The second is more "gardener". Or vegetable garden. Locate where the sun hits first in the morning for the tomato area ...

I am well aware that my work of clearing is a long-term investment. I'm starting to find the m², although I still have a lot to do:
1 / the painful with areas of bramble less "accessible"
2 / the complicated with the cedar hedge which has been left abandoned for too long: I don't want to cut it down to keep my space "closed" but I have to bring back the light.


the gardening / gardening area will return to service next year, but I will focus on crops that do not claim my presence in D-days (first approach: Pdt, squash, artichokes ...).
the "orchard" area is indeed ... an orchard! and I will focus on reviving fruit trees more compatible with our episodic presence.

[Adrien (ex-nico239)]

Nico239, you write:

Because suddenly, you leave room for fast weeds who were wearing and dominated by what you cut.

This reflection is right in an environment where it is not planned to intervene: the brambles are not very competitive with respect to water and minerals and play a role favorable to the implantation of ligneous: it is a plant pioneer. In this case, an eradication of brambles would be the gateway to inversion of flora in favor of grasses, much more greedy species
However, vis-à-vis our vegetables that are delicate, brambles are not really compatible and the strategy must be different. Fast weeds need to be controlled and, unless we talk about perennials, this is the job of the hay cover.

This is the second year that I grow with weeds.

As much last year it had not worked well: I had let myself overflow.

So much this year it's really great: I put it on the account of the delimited spaces that constitute the coffers that allows me to better manage these reduced surfaces even if they are numerous (and will be even more so next year) rather than a big space in which I let myself be invaded.

They allowed me to have a cool at the bottom of the coffers (ground actually) that I would not have discounted.

Most summer crops are tall, so no worries: the weeds are not too much weight.

If I can I really prefer to have a living cover.

[Adrien (ex-nico239)]

I am well aware that my work of clearing is a long-term investment. I'm starting to find the m², although I still have a lot to do:
1 / the painful with areas of bramble less "accessible"
2 / the complicated with the cedar hedge which has been left abandoned for too long: I don't want to cut it down to keep my space "closed" but I have to bring back the light.


the gardening / gardening area will return to service next year, but I will focus on crops that do not claim my presence in D-days (first approach: Pdt, squash, artichokes ...).
the "orchard" area is indeed ... an orchard! and I will focus on reviving fruit trees more compatible with our episodic presence.

My faith there is a beginning to everything.

Your main weak point as you know it is your absence.

So your related objectives seem to be well suited ...

There is always the unknown rainfall that may as well allow you (or not) to achieve beautiful crops, a priori, more restrictive.

[Stef72]

Do not be discouraged, as others say it's normal that you have some clearing at the beginning.

Your land is a bit like mine. The advantage of a vigorous shoot of these herbs is that your land has remained green and you have moisture. it seems to me important in these times of heat wave.

over time you will find how you want to exploit this land at best, myself I change my mind gradually on my areas and development. Today I still barely at the interview, because I also made clearing more consistent early!
good luck

[fl78960]

Hello,

It's been a long time since the courgettes in my garden (in the Parisian suburbs) are oidium nests ... and I had "abandoned" the land at the beginning of September, telling me that there would only be apples left to harvest , but we spent this weekend with my brother-in-law to continue the slave labor ...

and there surprise! the squash and zucchini feet are in perfect health, and some zucchini specimens wait patiently for us. The green squash foot made 4 or 5 squash, the biggest of which is big as a grapefruit, so I left them, to see ...

the tomato feet never saw the shadow of a guardian, but that did not prevent them from producing a few small tomatoes which embellished our picnic.

Apart from that, the orchard requiring above all to see the light, My brother-in-law attacked a first phase of pruning the hedge while I finished clearing the meadow tip that I could not do the last time, a a good hundred square meters of ground released thujas and brambles.

In this photo we can see the courgettes and squash in the foreground and behind the freshly cleared area which will host part of the 2020 vegetable garden. The hay roll is in the starting blocks :-) we have "stored" it in a corner and it will take place next spring.

This photo (ugly and shaken) is still quite symptomatic of the orchard ... we vaguely distinguish, like ghosts, the trunks of the fruit trees, right in the foreground thujas branches cut on the left a shower of brambles falling from the foliage of the apple tree.

... to be continued ...