The Mound

On March 22, 2014, I created a mini hugelkultur mound with help from a couple friends. We dug down a few inches, laid down some larger sticks and put a lot of smaller ones on to make a stick pile. Then we took the dirt (the standard Houston gumbo) and worked it onto and into the stick pile. We might have also mixed in some half-done compost. Here is how the mound looked the next day, when we finished it.

Click the photo to see it bigger!

We sowed the following seeds in the mound.

• Lakota Squash on the left front of the mound
• Pink Banana squash on the right front of the mound
• Clemson Spineless okra on both short ends of the mound
• California Blackeye #5 black-eyed peas on the back side of the mound
• Monstrueux de Viroflay spinach on the top ridge of the mound

 On March 24, the mound was finished, with an extra layer of soil on top.

By April 6, many of the seeds we sowed on March 22 or March 23 had emerged, and you can clearly see two rows of black-eyed pea plants, as seen from near the back fence.

By May 10, 2014,  the black-eyed pea plants were covering much of the mound's north side, mixed of course with some goldenrain tree seedlings. At some point I covered much of the mound with leaves serving as mulch.

On the same day, a winter squash plant was speeding up its growth on the south (house facing) side of the mound. This plant would eventually cover a lot of ground, but it only produced a couple of squash.

The far left of this heavily cropped photo shows three winter squash plants growing on the south side of the mound on May 11, 2014.

Om May 17, 2014, I saw for the first time how ants like to be inside squash flowers, in this case, the squash growing on the mound.

On May 24, 2014, sweet basil and spinach was growing on the top of the mound, and bermuda grass has invaded the southern slope, where the squash was growing.

Around that time, I discovered that cowpea aphids were attacking the black-eyed peas growing on the mound, with protection from some ants.

A Four-Speckled Hoverfly (Dioprosopa clavata) was hovering around the aphids, looking for a good place to lay eggs so her larvae would be able to eat the aphids.

She found a good spot, away from the ants, and took advantage.

On May 27, 2014, a little okra plant was growing on the east end of the mound.

By June 10, 2014, the squash plants had sprawled a long way from the mound.

The plants grew a lot, but they didn't produce much fruit.  The lakota squash stayed small and generally didn't look right.

The pink banana squash never attained the size they are known for. In retrospect, I think I might not have let the plants live long enough.

On June 21, 2014, one of the very small okra plants on the mound had a single small fruit.

Nearby, a sweet basil plant was flowering.

Some prostrate pigweed, the first I spotted in the yard, came up in the mound.

On February 1, 2015, I had started working on expanding the mound area into a large keyhole bed. I defined the space with logs and covered much of the ground with leaves. The original mound was mostly bare, with some non-garden plants growing on it.

In this photo from February 2015, you can see the degraded state, from a gardening perspective, of the mound. It was not rising very much above the surrounding area, most of the dirt was bare, and the sticks I had put at the base when I built the mound are visible. A large prickly sowthistle and an oriental false hawksbeard had moved in.

On May 29, 2015, some tomato plants were growing in the extended mound area, but they didn't have any flowers yet.

On the same day, garlic I had planted earlier was growing well just to the south of the original mound.

[More to come here...]