transforming an old fence into simple, stackable box frames gives us a flexible solution to multiple needs in the garden. we can make compost in place, right where the soil wants more life and organic matter. if we time it right we could use the heat of the compost to start seedlings as if in a heated greenhouse (and i didn’t, i scorched mine thoroughly, so sorry babies!) or add a layer of soil to grow early crops (the elusive hotbed we are eager to experiment with.) we could sit a bucket or coils of water to produce hot water from the heat of the microbial fire. this failing (but we will try again!) we have nevertheless produced a fast, hot compost, and can simply move the modular boxes over and turn the compost to have a second or third burst of oxygenated decomposition, right where it is needed. and then, then we can fill these rich boxes with vegetable and flower seedlings, and grow what we want to eat. in autumn we could hinge a glass to them for a coldframe, come winter we might move the boxes to another spot for a new hotbed (wish us luck! we’ll favour goat manure over so much chicken manure this time, that stuff is volcanic!) and the cycle starts again.
thanks to our dear patrons for your support! special thanks to my little sister, her sweetheart and my friend coreen for such great help with building the hotbed composting and the hugelkulture…more details on that in a long piece.
stay tuned to see what stacking functions these stacking boxes generate over the next year, in an upcoming long-form film. i’ll be sure to visit this new south-facing bed on the next farm tour.