Cowboy-Up With A Pile of Manure

On his way to a horse show my youngest man-child stopped by one day last week with the back of his truck full of some wonderfully-aged horse manure. Thank you, dear child of mine!

He happens to be a real-life cowboy who trains reining horses.

One of the benefits of horse manure in the garden is that it contains many of the micro-nutrients (boron, copper, chlorine iron, manganese, molybdenum, and zinc) that we hear less about while also adding to the composition of the soil. In addition it helps the soil hold moisture and promotes easier, and healthier root growth.

It is suggested never to use fresh manure because it is considered very "hot" (high in nitrogen) and can burn your plants.

Fortunately this delivery was light and airy as it had been decomposing for several months already.

Most of it went on the new berm I'm building on the north side of the back yard. Some of it went into the compost pile ~~ just for fun~~ and several loaded wheelbarrows of it went straight into established planting beds as a top layer.

These are the things that make a gardener joyful, gleeful, and just plain exuberant!!! At the same time the landscape is singing hallelujahs for the added nutrition.
(A BIG shout-out ~and hugs~to my cowboy!)

More on Soil Prep

There isn't a lot of time between when the spring garden expires and the fall garden calls out to be planted with those first seeds.

When it's time to get busy with a new season of planting like it has been the last few weeks for the fall garden, the concentration becomes soil preparation.

Taking the time and energy to create the foundation to the garden is every ounce as important as choosing seeds/plants for growing. When done correctly the rewards are always greater than the effort put out.

Mr. Meems and I have been in and out of town so much lately it has taken a diligent effort to work around the planting calendar. I'm a little behind on planting a few of those early seeds but it will all work out ... I have confidence in our Florida weather.

My sweet niece shoveled up some bags (from her horse farm) of a fabulous mixture of well-aged horse manure and shavings. With my best helper always willing and handy we broke up the clumps and mixed it in with another mixture of rich mushroom compost puchased at a North Florida nursery.

It was then layered on top of the new soil that had been added a few weeks ago. Then my little 'water bug' happily gave it a good dousing to settle it in. We had a great rain following our project, too. So perfect!

Sometimes I wonder if I don't get just as excited about this part of gardening as I do the actual planting!

There is something so inspiring about amending soil.

What is that? All that beautiful earthy material!

The smell. The feel. The appearance. The prospects. The promise of life it nurtures.