Worth's Soil Building Thread.

[pmcgrady]

Originally Posted by Worth1

Oh lord no, what a cesspool.
Lake Bastrop.
Surrounded by park not houses and is a constant level lake.


Worth

I worked in Houston installing elevators in high rise buildings, back in the 80's. Went to Austin quite a bit to get out of Houston... I would go to Lake Travis a lot.. Is Hippie Hollow still a nude beach? Lol! Hamilton Pool was a beautiful place to go also.

[Worth1]

Originally Posted by pmcgrady

I worked in Houston installing elevators in high rise buildings, back in the 80's. Went to Austin quite a bit to get out of Houston... I would go to Lake Travis a lot.. Is Hippie Hollow still a nude beach? Lol! Hamilton Pool was a beautiful place to go also.

Back in the 80's was about the last of it being good as far as I am concerned.
It is over crowded and crawling with speed boats and people lining the shore.
Hippie hollow is now popular for folks with same gender relationships on splash day the first Sundays of May and September.

And yes it is the only legal nude swimming area in the state of Texas.

Worth

[pmcgrady]

Lol! No splash days going on when I was there, just lots of pretty Texas women.
Lake Bastrop sounds nice, think I'll pass on Lake Travis if I'm ever in town.
Sorry I got off topic...

[Worth1]

Originally Posted by pmcgrady

Lol! No splash days going on when I was there, just lots of pretty Texas women.
Lake Bastrop sounds nice, think I'll pass on Lake Travis if I'm ever in town.
Sorry I got off topic...

No worries about being off topic at all.
As for soil building if a person thinks and plans ahead of time the can put up a raised bed of the size they want.
Fence it off to about 4 feet and pack it with leaves wood chips and what ever scraps you have.
You might even toss in some sharp sand now and then.
In no time at all it will decompose into a nice soil to grow things in.
You can do without the raised bed and just fence off an area and do it.
Worth

Next in a bit I will show another pictuer where I did this with a huge pile if leaves and wood chips.

Worth

[Worth1]

This soil is next to my wild pepper plant.
Wood chips from a chipper sand and leaves.
It was all red clay when I first moved here.
The soil is black but the sun is shining on it
Worth
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[creister]

I heard that a tour boat of some kind was going past Hippie Hollow. All the passengers went to the side of the boat to look and gawk. The boat overturned. Building great soil is not as hard as it seems. I think being patient is the hardest part.

[Worth1]

Here is what I do with some of my leaves every year.
I in the pictures you will see a Bay bush Elephant Ears and Bears Breeches.
I simply pile the leaves up around the plants and let nature take it's time.
Not only does this keep some plants from freezing back it also feeds the plants and builds the soil around them.
The Elephant Ears are in 40 gallon troughs with no drainage filled with soil and muck.

I also just chop up the limbs with my lawn mower and let the rot in the ground.

Worth
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[Worth1]

A lot of people would be raking up the bamboo leaves and buying mulch at the big box store.
I can't remember tbe last time I pulled a weed here.
Worth
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[Worth1]

Folks take a long hard look.
By the end of the day tomorrow it will have a fancy 4X8 raised bed at the end with a back drop trellis for Yard Long beans.
Worth

[AlittleSalt]

Sounds good Worth.

[loulac]

I'm quite impressed by the variety of landscape round your place. With a Google view from satellites - if the quality is good enough - we could locate house, garden, trees, may be spot the vintage car ! Just suggesting, of course.

[Worth1]

Originally Posted by loulac

I'm quite impressed by the variety of landscape round your place. With a Google view from satellites - if the quality is good enough - we could locate house, garden, trees, may be spot the vintage car ! Just suggesting, of course.

I put a photo of an an aerial view some time ago it looks like a forest.
I cant remember where at here.

I lost track of the verities of plants I have, it is quite large close to 100 maybe.
My idea of heaven is a botanical garden teaming with wild critters.

Worth

[Worth1]

Me being me I got into a deal at Home Depot the other day.
I was looking for something and saw a lady go by with a cart of Top Soil.
I then went over to the top soil and looked at it in the stack.
It was bank sand with chunks of gravel in it.
Just like you would find on a sand bar on a river or creek.
I then turned around with a handful of it and called out to the lady and she turned around.
I asked her what she though she was buying and what she planned on doing with it.
The lady was a little flabbergasted and I showed her what she had in the bags and explained to her there was no regulation as to what could be called top soil.
It could be the next thing the dozer scraped off the surface.
Then one of the guys working there came over to see what was going on.
He was sort of snotty with me and I whipped out the handful of sandy gravels and asked would you call this top soil.
He said no where did you get that?
It is what is in the bags you guys are calling top soil.
Really he said show me and we looked then he had someone else come over and told him look at this garbage.
They were getting soil locally up the road and then this stuff started showing up he said.
corporate bean counters I told him.
Some office product buyer saw a savings added it up and bought garbage.
These people have no idea what they are getting and dont care.
There goal is to make money.
In my opinion there needs to be a law against this sort of labeling it is a complete and total scam.

Anyway after we figured out what she wanted we got her several bags of stuff she could use.
The lady told me she couldn't thank me enough for helping her.
I told her I couldn't help myself I cant stand to see people get ripped off.

Worth

[wildcat62]

Good thing you were there for her. Not sure I've ever purchased bagged topsoil before but after reading this I'll take a look inside the bag if I do.

[Worth1]

Originally Posted by wildcat62

Good thing you were there for her. Not sure I've ever purchased bagged topsoil before but after reading this I'll take a look inside the bag if I do.

This is a real good example of what it looked like.
Worth