I seem to have been bitten by the gardening bug a little late in northern New Engalnd's short growing season. My Hügel is doing nicely, especially the tomatoes and broccoli, but I wish I had planted more, sooner. I've decided I'm going to try to get some sweet potatoes going, but I don't think there's enough warm weather ahead, so I'm going to start them in a large pot indoors, and try to transplant some shoots outside next spring. In the meantime, maybe I'll get a harvest.
About a month since planting, and the Hügel is doing "OK". The tomato plant on top is going like gangbusters, and the broccoli seems to be doing well. The English thyme is also starting to spread. A few plants are hanging in there but not flourishing, such as the peppers and strawberries. These were the ones that bore the brunt of the skunk attacks though (which have stopped now that the fence is there) and were uprooted several times. Overall I'm encouraged. These mounds are generally not expected to be very productive until year 2, and the stuff I planted was chosen arbitrarily. I'll take some cues from what works well this year, and plant more of that stuff next year.
I went by the garden center today and got a bunch of seedlings. Planting was really easy, I basically just pushed aside a bunch of wood chips and dirt with my hand, put the seedling in, and pushed the chips back to cover it.. There's actually nothing planted on the back side right now. I ran out of plants. I'll have to figure out what else to get for back there.
So far there are strawberries, several varieties of chili pepper, red bell pepper, cherry tomatoes, and snap beans. I also planted a sun-loving ground cover plant on the top (I forget the name). I'm hoping it will spread out and help keep the mount from eroding. Finally, it's ringed with petunias and begonias, just for aesthetics.
I gave it a good dousing with the hose afterward, and I'll probably need to keep that up for a while, but allegedly one of the main benefits of the Hügelkultur method is that the wood in the core wicks up and holds moisture, so once the roots penetrate down a bit, you only need to water it in extreme dry spells (which don't really happen here).
I finished the Hügel this afternoon, thanks to my new massive supply of wood chips. All together it's a pile of old birch logs stacked in a shallow pit, then covered by the dirt dug out from the pit, then a few inches of oak leaves, a wheelbarrow full of ages rabbit droppings, two wheelbarrows full of old garden soil and compost, topped with three wheelbarrows of oak/maple chips. This weekend I'm going to plant it with fruit and vegetable seedlings, and plant flowers around the base. As a bonus, I spread some wine cap spawn under the chips, so in the fall I should get some mushrooms from it as well.