Lauburu garden finished

Two months ago we published a thread explaining our concept about mandala garden with lauburu shape. At that time we were building it, but we’ve done and is ongoing. Here is a photo of mandala-lauburu over:

Comparing shapes

The figure I have in hand is a Lauburu made in iron, I got in the hardware store of the village, the people used to put it at the top of the door. We can see the resemblance to the garden. Following picture is a comparison of  size, remember that is 6 meters in diameter and 45cm for the corridors, thereby providing access to the beds without stepping on them.

Comparing size (I)

In the next photo I’m in the middle, with 1 meter in diameter, to my right is the battery-operated irrigation. All beds have drip irrigation. In these photos are still two terraces (front and left) without preparing the soil and drip tube. Also could be seen the corridors have been emptied, its fertile soil layer has been laid at the raised beds.

Comparing size (II)

And finally here is the lauburu garden completed and producing:

Finished and producing

3 of the beds are padded with straw, but the left one have carrots and don’t need it. This allows us to see the drip tube is placed in the 4 beds. The wall of the beds is made with wooden shuttering and has a protective layer on the outside, to give a more rustic aspect and last more time because the climate is very wet. Inside has not anything because we don’t want contact with any chemical.

It only remains to put filler in the corridors.This filler material is a first layer of rubble and gravel, they serves as drain, will prevent weeds and also serves as thermal mass to heat the beds in winter. In the Fall we plan to make a geodesic dome that covers the garden and serve to hold the winter and produce better for longer.

We have begun experimenting with associations-rotation-life cycles of different plants to be adding, integrating the system. The idea is next year, in sprung, we can start producing soon, a wide variety of vegetables. Each production will be small since we’ll only have household consumption. Over time we hope to diversify and expand production but will be adding new gardens around this lauburu. So, here we see a bed  in which we have tomatoes and peppers, two varieties of each. Now we have tutors for tomatoes, you need to anchor them and prune them slightly to produce more tomatoes. We also want to associate basil as well.

Raised bed with tomatoes and peppers

Here is a picture of a pepper, surrounded by clovers:

Pepper

Here a bush tomato flower:

Tomato flowers

In the second bed we have chard, zucchini (only 3 plants, they are space-consuming) and arugula. In this photo we have a chard:

Chard

And here zucchini, wonderful and productive:

The magnificent zucchini

In another bed we have carrot and the fourth one with leek, lettuce, cauliflower, cabbage. We will include more pictures as the season passes. Stay in touch !