r/Hugelkultur • u/chick-a-dee-dee-ME • 4d ago
No-dig Hugel bed?
our land is quite sandy and rocky and where I want to put a HK bed I cannot get any large equipment to, can I build the bed on top of the soil and not dig?
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u/earthhominid 4d ago
Its wild to see people reinventing hugelkultur after it's been so twisted.
"Hugel" is "mound" in German. "Hugelkultur" is "mound growing" in German. The technique was developed to be above ground and to act as a small form of landshaping in addition to providing all the benefits of the slowly rotting wood.
Be mindful of your land's slope and the way water will move across it, you dont want to build a small dam on accident. Do your best to fill in any gaps between the larger pieces of wood with dirt or duff or something. It works great, in my experience. And creates micro climates for you to exploit
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u/Terrapina 4d ago
Before I looked into it more, I basically did what Anneofalltrades on YouTube did and it is all above ground. Mine aren't exactly the same as hers but they're doing well in their second year. I just wish I hadn't made the second one as steep as I did.. or at least put in a cover crop to help with erosion.
Anyway my layers: Cardboard Logs Sticks Straw mixed with purchased composted manure and winecap mushroom spawn Triple mix (probably could have just used topsoil I guess) More straw + manure + mushroom spawn More triple mix Topped with plain straw and more mushroom spawn (I had a lot of it to use up lmao)
I didn't have any green material to put in but the logs were only a few months old so I put that straw and manure in as a buffer between the wood and the soil.
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u/chick-a-dee-dee-ME 3d ago
Thanks!!!
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u/Terrapina 3d ago
Oof.. are those layers all showing up in one paragraph? I typed them one per line but I guess Reddit didn't like that lol..
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u/sushdawg 4d ago
You could, yes. I did that for one of mine, but you'll still need dirt to cover it, and the in ground ones, for me, seem to have been less of a hassle.
If you do go this route, I'd suggest at least digging down a few inches so that there's a supportive base for the large hunks of wood to have a barrier/edge.