Back in 2005/6 I was setting up the current system we use to grow our veggies. I wanted veggie patches to suit the size of the chook tractor, that is to say 2000mm x 1200mm or in some cases 3000mm x 1200mm. I needed some material for borders that would allow the chook tractor to sit firmly in place. The borders would also provide a surface to walk on to get access to the beds without compacting any soil. As luck would have it, the place where I was working at the time was tossing out some lengths of 90mm x 90mm Oregon timber which I could use. They delivered the timber to me and over several months I was able to set up all of the veggie patches as I wanted them and the system worked well.
Timber bed surrounds as they were 15 years ago
Roll on ten years and some of the timber was breaking down and looking a bit sad, particularly along the western fence. So I got the idea to not only replace the timber in that area with another material but also extend those four patches from 2000mm long to 3000mm long, thus giving me an extra four square metres of growing area. The question was, what to replace the timber with?
I wanted a material that was cost effective (ie cheap!), had a longer service life than the timber, was readily available and would still work with the chook tractor. After much deliberation I decided on half width (90mm wide) Besser blocks. They’re easily available at the local hardware, cost effective and they were 190mm deep so would need only one course to go deep enough to support the chook tractor (bricks would require two or more courses). Not only that but they have two central cavities which are 150mm long by almost 40mm wide and extend all the way through the block. These cavities can be filled with growing medium and planted out to beneficial species such as insectary, aromatic or medicinal plants.
The process begins!
The original idea was to replace all timber borders with Besser block as time and cash allowed, but there are times when it is best to give it a go and see how things work before committing to going the whole hog (small and slow solutions). In the event I did extend the four western veggie patches by replacing the timber with Besser blocks and I changed the design a bit to give me a walkway between the two central ones. It has been over seven years since that original work was done and so it is time to have a look and see how well they are faring.
Brand spanking new!
The good news is that they are still doing their job adequately and the chook tractor still sits on them just fine. There are a few of the blocks that have, over time, drifted a bit to one side or the other so that the border is not as ramrod straight as it was when I first put it in, but for most part it still looks good. A couple of blocks look a bit worse for wear due to contact with the chook tractor while we are transporting it, or because of an overly aggressive whipper snipper but generally? OK!
A bit worse for wear!
The down side is, those 150mm long by 40mm wide cavities in the Besser blocks. After some work it turned out that they were not really big enough to hold sufficient soil to grow anything useful, and they were difficult to keep hydrated long enough to grow anything anyway. Or so it appeared. When the chooks were doing their thing and cultivating the veggie patches, a mix of soil, plant material, straw and probably other stuff I don’t want to think about, got kicked into some of the cavities. Although the cavities were not big enough or stayed wet enough to grow anything useful, it seems that they were an ideal breeding ground for weeds. The weeds would slowly build up the spill over into the growing area, and with the rain we’ve been getting lately they would spill over quite rapidly and attempt to take over.
Of course, not all of the cavities got filled up with soil and weeds, some remained empty. The empty ones, it seems, are an ideal daytime hideaway and general clubhouse for snails, who then emerge at night and lay waste to whatever I was trying to grow. Well, maybe not that bad, but you get the idea.
While I am still a fan of Besser blocks as a border between the veggie patches, it would make lots more sense to fill in the cavities with cement, mortar or concrete once they are in place.
Another potential problem which I was apprised of by all and sundry was that the pH of the soil in the veggie patches would skyrocket out of control due to the close proximity to the cement in the Besser blocks. An interesting thought, so recently I took a series of soil samples directly next to the blocks and another series of samples in the middle of the veggie patches to see if any skyrocketing was occurring. After testing it seems that there is a difference, albeit fairly small – next to the blocks the pH was 7.5 and in the middle of the beds the pH was 6.5.
So there you go!
Not as straight as it started out!
