Hope, Zoey and I were out helping Grandpa Pat on the farm for a little while last night. While Dad was knocking the frame off the big shed door (you can ask him for details), I was gathering up a big pile of soybean straw that Duane emptied out of his combine while fixing something earlier in the day. This was a jackpot for me.
I tried a little mulching experiment last fall that I learned from my friends at the Prairie Arboretum in Freeman, SD. I went out to the bean field where the guys were combining and gathered up the soybean straw that is a byproduct of the combining process. So, this nice big pile right in the middle of the farm yard made it much easier this time. Turns out the stuff works pretty well. My biggest problem, being a windy hill dweller, is keeping my mulch in place instead of down in my neighbors’ yards. I even reused some emptied feed sacks from the silo shed, so it was a green project. Good price (free), recycled packaging, and local and renewable materials. Oh so green goodness…
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- recycled bags, soybean straw mulch
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- old stuff from last fall
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- the end game
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- emptied composter
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- the lid, three months later
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- that supposedly compostable cup
I also turned the compost in my homemade composter this morning (I dump it out once int he process to stir it all up and put it back in the barrell). This is the compost containing that supposedly compostable cup from Oscar’s Coffee that I put in there on June 22. Well, still looks mostly like a cup to me. The jury’s still out, I guess.
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