Interesting Things I've Learned With a Shovel
Once upon a time, I thought of shovels as simply tools for moving things like dirt, compost, or mulch. While it’s true that they are, I’ve also come to understand that they are invaluable learning tool as well. It’s my first tool for soil analysis; a carefully removed shovel depth of soil reveals its physical structure: type, texture, color, and presence of organisms and organic matter. Then there was poking around in the dirt where I put my first forest garden. That was almost like an archaeological dig.
This particular episode in my ongoing learning adventures started when I planted two quince seedlings in the goats’ browse area. I’d ordered four seedlings, of which two went above the annuals garden. Then I started learning about swales and wondered if I could help those little trees by digging a small trench-like swale between them. What I learned changed everything.
Digging the trench led to an interesting discovery, which led to transplanting the little quince trees again. |
While digging the trench, I observed water seeping through the clay subsoil and filling the trench. Odd, I thought. Even odder was that water sat in the trench for weeks afterward. Unlike our garden swale, which soaks up the water in about two days, the water here was very slow to soak into the ground.
Ridge and old swale above where the quince trees were planted. |
Two ridges below where they were planted. |
We discovered a series of puddles both uphill and downhill from where I planted the quince trees. However, there wasn’t observable overland runoff. Coincidence? Or is something else going on?
If you can spot her, Meowy is squatted down near my 1st trench. |
I dug about this deep and then something interesting started to happen. |
Water started to seep through the clay and fill my little trench. |
It filled quickly enough to make ripples in the water! |
The water fill pretty much stopped when it reached this level. |
I dug another trench a few feet over, and it too started to fill, though not as quickly nor as much. |
The next time it rained, I was curious to see what was happening.
This shot was taken looking down on my trenches. |
The two lower test trenches had filled with water too (top of the photo). |
The trench on the left not only filled, but overflowed. |
Where did the overflow go? Both around and under the old pine stump.
The hole was made by an uprooted pine tree and is in line with the flow of water I’m following. |
I’ve been observing the trenches daily after it rains. My observations are that the two lower trenches drain before the top trench does. And while my garden swale holds water for about two days, the top trench holds water for several weeks.
- There is a lot of water moving underground here, even when it’s not raining.
- Soil conditions are right to retain water here for a longer time than elsewhere.
Looking uphill. That’s the old swale in the foreground. |
Continuing uphill. The green is one of our goat paddocks. My forest garden is uphill from that. |
Over the years, Dan and I have talked about putting in a pond, although we never thought about putting one here. Yet thanks to a shovel, we’ve made some interesting observations about our land and how it responds to rainfall. Will we ever actually dig a pond? I have no idea. When I took my online permaculture design course, Bill Mollison and Geoff Lawton had really interesting things to say about what happens after the land is re-hydrated by swales and ponds. They also discussed how productive aquaculture can be. So, a future pond for us? It’s definitely something to consider.
Source: https://www.5acresandadream.com/2022/03/interesting-things-ive-learned-with.html
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