Black gold

We’ve been making our own compost, but we’ve also branched out into other techniques like hugelkultur (burying logs under the soil), lasagna gardening (building the soil up with alternating layers of compost, cardboard, straw, and dirt), and this year we’re starting with cover crops. You can also use a method I love called “chop and drop,” a busy person’s dream come true. Come to find out, those woody, spongy materials found in sunflower and okra stalks and the moisture holding material of corn stalks are miracle workers for the soil. Just chop em and drop em. I have had a lot of successes in my life, but — odd as it may sound — few make me quite as happy as watching that uninviting red clay transform into black, earthworm-infested soil, especially when it’s soil that’s built up from last year’s fallen crops

So back to a few Sundays ago. There we were working in the garden, and by we I mean me and my trusty dog and my six-yearold daughter who has become obsessed with the broadfork tool. I’m new to using the tool — a handheld tool that looks like a huge fork and operates like a less invasive tiller. You use your body weight to stand on the metal bar that pushes the tongs deep into the soil. When you turn it over it It aerates the soil and transposes the deeper layers with the shallow topsoil. My daughter, an ironwilled, tornado of a personality, loves to jump on the metal bar and sink the spikes into the soil. The process goes a lot slower when she helps, but it’s always full of laughter.

We were working in the thick red clay, turning it over and getting it ready to add the cover crops when we discovered the gold

“I have had a lot of successes in my life, but — odd as it may sound — few make me quite as happy as watching that uninviting red clay transform into black, earthworm-infested soil, especially when it’s soil that’s built up from last year’s fallen crops.”

of gardening. Upon closer inspection I found a few pieces of wood, some of it charred. Perhaps it was the remnants of a fallen structure or a burn pile, maybe an old barn. Whatever the case, it made the soil healthy and dark, and the layer we had overturned was clearly connected to my grandfather’s tenure on the land. We turned it over and mixed it with the top layers, watching the soil turn a darker shade. Once we had the whole bed turned over, we threw out the vetch, a cover crop that is our own contribution to the soil’s health. Maybe next year it can sustain the needs of a heavy feeder like corn.

I never met my grandfather, but I like to think of my own garden as a long conversation with him and with great-grandchildren I may never know. l

Benita DREW

AGE: 44 OCCUPATION: ABOUT advertising sales, portrait photographer and when I have free time, destruction for my husband’s construction business. There’s something therapeutic about a hard day’s work solo, wielding a hammer and crowbar. HOMETOWN: Pottsville

FAMILY: Husband Jason, children Issac 15, and Issabella 12, Perry and Daisy our beagles, and Jessie our rescue bully.

1What is your favorite book and why? Impossible. I have favorite authors, but I could never pick one book. I started reading Poe at ten, and have always loved his work. Reading a Poe book is like a nursery rhyme from my childhood. I read anything I could get my hands on as a kid, but horror and suspense have always been favorites so I’ve read a lot of Stephen King, as well. I enjoy James Lee Burke books. He writes mysteries set in Louisiana. Being from the South, he can write about the South with accuracy in phrases, culture and mindset, and I think that’s important in a time when we are all losing our roots and dialect a little at a time as the world becomes smaller.

2Dog or cat? Why? Dog-s. When you’ve had a dog that puts itself between you and danger, the answer is clear. Dogs are purpose driven and every breed has specific traits. Rescue a mutt and it’s like a grab bag of traits. You may not know what you are going to get, but it’s going to love you forever. I’ve had three rescue American pit mixes and they are the most loyal, protective, and loving breeds one could own. Our beagles are the first dogs I’ve ever had a hand in training, and that has been a great experience. They can find anything and they’ll let you know if a leaf falls in the yard. I believe there truly is a dog out there for every person, and it’s probably just waiting in a shelter or rescue.