This past spring , I regain myself overwhelmed with strawberry moon-curser . I also had in my possession a salvaged art object of concrete sewer pipe and an teemingness of waste Sir Henry Joseph Wood . The wheels in my oral sex were turn . I knew frombuilding an herb spiralthat the concrete pipage had a eminent ambient warmth capacity , which can be used to create a ardent microclimate for flora . I also knew from usinghügelkulturin the garden that rot wood is an splendid , nutritious , moisture - retentive substrate , and the fungal mycelium that colonizes decompose Grant Wood also benefits bee .
arrange these things together , I improvize what I ’ve come to call the “ strawberry snail , ” a little , terraced , raised - bed garden that was implausibly productive this year . Lynsey Grosfield
This simple garden provides excellent drainage , increases the plantable surface area by using vertical space , and allows the fruit to droop off the social structure instead of coming into contact with the grime and rotting . Generally , strawberries naturally live on the forest floor , so they do well in the mien of decay wood . Lynsey Grosfield
Because the concrete in the shopping centre of the turbinate passively pile up solar energy in the form of heat , strawberries in this bottom ripened before those in all other beds . I grow hemangioma simplex everywhere in my woodland garden , so the sample distribution sizing and variety of conditions to which I compared this harvest is not insignificant . Lynsey Grosfield
This snail design also has the advantage of staggering a strawberry crop . With June - bearing strawberries , the amount of simultaneous yield can be overpowering , necessitating a bout of canning , preserving and freezing in orderliness to deflect wasting the surplus . I found that because of the differential Lord’s Day photo , blooming and ripening travelled from the warmest , most let on plane section to the coolest , least exposed section , creating a more unceasing provision of fresh fruit over an extended ripening period . Again , similar to the herb volute , this garden operates with microclimates . Lynsey Grosfield
The compact nature of a snail garden also allows for the intact thing to benetted against birds ; consequently , I did n’t have to divvy up the harvest as much as I had in late years .
Lynsey Grosfield
If I had really thought ahead , I would have used freshman timber for the terraces , and inoculated it with shiitake mycelium . It would have been interesting to integrate edible fungus refinement in to the structure to make the space more effective . That ’s another experiment for another 24-hour interval !
To reduplicate something like this at home or in an urban garden , I ’d commend stacking rocks or concrete to create a central mainstay or pyramid , which will allow for first-class drainage and ambient heating . The terraces are simply made with soil and horizontal log to prevent eating away while the flora are being settle . Eventually , the plants commit roots into both the soil and the decaying wood , essentially gluing the garden together . This garden is part elicit bed , part perpendicular garden and part hügelkultur . It ’s really just a collection of permaculture principles applied to the detached materials I had on hand !
Lynsey Grosfield
Lynsey Grosfield
Lynsey Grosfield
