Benison Farm

With the help of the Men’s Club from St. Thomas Episcopal Church, Benison Farm is one step closer to completing their new raised mounds that will be used for the fall planting.

Volunteers helped to move brush into the bed area which will be covered. The technique is called hügelkultur, which is constructed from decaying wood debris and other compostable biomass plant materials and is later (or immediately) planted as a raised bed. The next step will be to use mulch on top of the debris, along with good planting soil, then topped with a semi-porous gardening fabric which will allow for moisture retention while providing much needed weed control. This area of Benison Farm was one of the first sections of beds that was installed 5 years ago, and has been an all summer long process to get ready.

“What made huegukulter such an exciting idea is that we have the opportunity to create a long-term, sustainable, self sufficient growing technique that not only eliminate structural bed types that require yearly maintenance but utilize natural materials already existing at the farm,” said Farm Manager Devin Anderson. “These mounds will do wonders for our growing seasons as they are designed to retain more water, allowing for less watering times each week. We’ve worked over the course of three months to prep the zone and gather natural materials needed. Huge win that we reused the old bed boards as the base of our wood/brush stage of mound creation! The St. Thomas Men’s Club played a pivotal part in the structural creation of the mounds. We couldn’t imagine how long the wood and brush stage of the mound structures would have taken without the generous help of these volunteers.”

Stay tuned for further updates!