Need criticism: new garden ideas.

[Try Reason]

The local plant communities don't cope with exotic water regimes and soil requirements. It's environmentally damaging to pristine or relatively unchanged ecosystems to grow food crops here because most species can't adapt. Leave most of it alone and grow your food as productively as is possible I guess.

[LonerMatt]

If you have time to grow a green manure crop thats a great idea , grow a legume to fix N as well , if its not too limey lupins could grow , check your Ph you might have to go with peas or beans , lupins have a strong deep root system so are great for breaking up hard soils , any of the agricultural grains would grow like crazy if planted now and the water was kept up . By far the easiest cheapest way to get large volumes of organic matter on site .
Rob

Thanks mate.

Might wait it out until the end of February. Think it's easier to start in autumn than in summer here.

[Terra]

Thought of something else as green manure "medic clover" and its an excellent weed to have in your garden , N fixing , good in compost , great feed for chooks ect . You could green manure half your availiable space and get some food crops started on the other half .

[sweetpea]

I have heavy clay soil, and I need to keep it covered with at least a shovel depth of layers of mowed weeds, well-composted manure and straw all year long. If the sun gets to it, it will seize up, or if the rain pounds it, it gets super hard. My thick, layered raised beds (no wooden sides) have been a godsend as far as saving water, absorbing fog and dew, keeping weeds down, and even faking out some mice and voles that root around underneath it.

The thing about green manures is they had to use some of the nitrogen/nutrients in that soil, and are uncomposted greens, so until they break down (and it takes extra nitrogen to break them down over possibly 6 months or more in passive raised beds) they will actually use some of the nutrients you think your vegetables are getting until they are broken down, and THEN your veggies get the added value. They are a longer process than we are led to believe. Just tilling them in, turning them into browns, and assuming they are letting off nitrogen/potassium/phosphorus and micronutrients as soon as they are under the soil?? that is never the case, right? Even with compost. The browns can absorb water that has nitrogen dissolved in it (in the form of urea), but they aren't going to let go of it until they rot away.

So they should either be broken down in the off season, or piled in a raised bed so they will eventually break down, or composted elsewhere with other things and moved when finished composting. Greens can heat up a compost pile very nicely, and the browns in the compost can absorb that nitrogen gas as it is released from the cells breaking down in the greens, instead of going strraight up in the air. Even if you are doing nitrogen-fixers, those pin-head sized nodules on their roots can take 6 months to break down under the best of conditions, assuming you mowed them and left the nodules under ground, plus the greens still need to break down. I absolutely rely on green manures, but they are a down-the-road method.

compost teas, thistle teas, stinging nettle teas, manure teas, those will help right away drenched into the soil, and then covered with a good depth of mulch that is maintained all season.

I get whole fields of knee-high vetches, but they aren't enough by themselves to provide everything to a hungry vegetable. I still make layers of greens and browns in my raised beds, but I always provide extra compost and composted manure, compost teas during the growing season.

[LonerMatt]

Ok, so in light of people's help, what I'm going to do is start smaller with a few goals:

In each bed, I'll wet the ground first, and open it up a bit, then put newspaper down, wet it, then put manure (chicken) down, some mushroom compost, dried grass, manure (cows), with mulch (sugar cane or lucerne) on top. Wetting after each stage: trying to encourage things to break down.

Bed 1 will have a few vegetable seeds (lettuce, celery, Kale) and broad bean seeds planted at the back.
Bed 2 will have a few vegetables (Leeks, spring onions) with herbs planted at the back
Bed 3 will have some green manure growing (comfrey or something else)
Bed 4 will have flowers. This is the biggest bed, though!

What do you guys think?

I'll shape the beds so they catch water better, I've positioned them so there's always some shade each day.

I'm concerned with my mix of materials for the beds, but that's not a given - will the mulch prevent the seeds from starting?

Are there any recommendations I've missed?

I'm also thinking of a small worm farm that's sealed so that mice can't get into it: any recommendations of where to get such a device (that's not Bunnings!)

[labradel]

i would be cautious using comfrey as a green manure crop as it propogates by root division and there fore would simply multiply in the bed and out grow the intended veggies. comfry works much better planted in a perennial bed to be cut back and used as mulch or as compost additive. comfry can be very difficult to eradicate once it is planted

[LonerMatt]

Ok - so if I use Comfrey - just cut some of it out and use as a mulch or feed to worms?

But probably don't plant a lot of it?

[S.O.P]

Usually it's used as an edging plant of your perennial beds. Likes it moist, semi-shaded where it's hot. You walk past, rip off a heap of leaves, throw them around, or make a tea, or use them in a compost.

So you can have a heap of it, just where it's permanent and a no-dig area.

[labradel]

sounds good to me no dig is the key

[pippimac]

I wouldn't plant comfrey in a garden: any digging (and there's always a bit in my garden) will spread it around and sooner or later there'll be a thriving, ineradicable comfrey patch and nothing else can squeeze in.
My comfrey mostly grows by the compost and under the fruit trees.
I didn't notice your plan to lay paper under your garden. Unless you have a hardcore running grass, I'd skip it and go straight on the ground. Paper/card can form a really impervious layer in dry climates.
Mulch will stop seeds from sprouting. Broad beans can push through nearly anything, but you'll need to keep the mulch off areas with small seeds. watch out, birds will scratch it straight back if there's no barrier!
In the first season, I'd plant mainly seedlings as the beds will be settling a lot.
Watch out for 'conventional' celery, it needs loadsof water. Cutting celery is much less demanding.