Lasagna Gardening!!!

I finally started my outside garden stuff a couple weeks ago.  I am attempting the "lasagna garden" method which involves no tilling, few weeds, and lots of composting.  Here's a link to a you tube video on lasagna gardening: http://youtu.be/5fGnVRlOqHY

Basically, the idea is to create "raised beds" without having to till your own soil. The raised beds are made from layers of carbon and nitrogen items such as compost, mulch, manure, hay, grass clippings, leaves, etc. Below are pics of how I did lasagna gardening:

Wet newspaper on top of grass

I laid 8-10 sheets of wet newspapers on top of the grass.  You can do lasagna gardening on any ground- even concrete since you don't need the ground soil at all.  I didn't even mow the lawn since my lawn was dormant anyhow due to the winter.  But if you start this in the fall and have lots of grass, you'll want to mow the lawn first so the newspaper lay flat and properly kill the grass and weeds below.  I did this after a rainstorm so the grass was wet.  It made my newspaper stick easier without blowing away.  You'll want to wet the newspaper anyways so it stays put when you lay it down.

I then got some compost from my compost bin and laid the compost on top of the newspaper.  You want to layer like this with various items to create a rich combination of nitrogen and carbon (two essential things plants need to grow well plus light from the sun).

Here's me taking compost from my compost bin (on right).

Here's the fine layer of compost on top of the wet newspaper.  

It started getting dark and cold outside so I stopped with the compost layer for now. My next step will be to add some leaf mulch and llama manure.  Here's a pic of the other half of my lasagna garden that I started a few weeks ago.  It started out as a foot but I let rain fall on it to continually keep it wet so it has shrunk to about half.

Lasagna Garden pile with leaf mulch, some shrub debris, and llama manure.

At night I keep the piles covered with a plastic tarp so it stays moist.  When I think it's gonna rain, I run outside and lift the tarp so the rain can soak my pile.  I did this last night at midnight when I heard thunderstorms were rolling through Madison.  It's important to keep you pile wet so it can slowly compost.  It's nice that I can use the rain rather than hosing it down.  This is why people recommend starting lasagna garden in fall so you can let it sit over winter and just decompose naturally with the snow, rain, etc.  But since I had a late start, I am having to sort of expedite the process a bit.   Here's a pic of my whole lasagna garden patch right now.  The right side covered with tarp is the pile I started a few weeks ago and the pile on the left is what I worked on tonight.  You can spend a whole day and do the whole things but I've been working piecemeal due to time.

Since it's been a bit windy at night, I also make sure to lay stuff on top of the tarp to keep the piles from blowing away.  Since I am starting my lasagna garden now, I don't have the time and access to resources like free leaves and hay from autumn decorations.   So, my next step will include me having to purchase compost and mulch to lay on top of my lasagna garden piles.  At least these items are readily available at my county compost facility for super cheap.  I will place this stuff on top of the remaining leaf mulch and compost I do have.  Finishing off these layers will be the awesome llama manure I got for FREE from a super cool lady in a nearby town and some coffee grounds I got for free from Starbucks.  I am excited about my lasagna garden and can't wait to show you the whole thing when it's finished.

My lasagna garden plot is about 24 x 6 feet right now.
I plan to make a 24 x 14 plot so I'll be adding some more rows to the right there.

Happy gardening.   I'll post next on my llama manure or llama beans!  So excited about those.  Plus the llamas were very cute and curious.