any good sites for keyhole gardens would be appreciated - i'm searching books and the web to try to create my first one. thanks

The compost is made "on-site" so there is no need to remove it from the basket, any nutrients that leach out of the compost are immediately in the growing plants root zones. Indeed the roots will grow into the compost itself.

As the vegetable scraps, etc, added to the basket decompose they add nutrients to the garden. The basket itself would eventually decompose and would need to be rebuilt, again using local branches and sticks.

The keyhole garden takes the best ideas from lasagna/sheet mulch, rain gardens, composting, no-till, and combines them in a neat little package.

Cheers,
Kyle

And the basket idea is great. For those digging in the ground just use the aisle as your basket.

for most of is rectangular raised beds works, the basket thingy for them works as i would be guessing organic material might be somewhat hard to get especially straw or hay etc.,. though they certainly need a lot of material imput to begin the garden.

so for us instead of the basket our path/weed barrier becomes much the same thing as we create a recycling of hay in that are it builds soil habitat which then moves into the garden.

use keyhole if you are limited in space, and use it as extra raised as in the example if you have the materials to create it, but a keyhole agrden can only be at normal raised bed height of around 8" give or take and all the way through to the height in the vid'. i also see that in beds that are small space is at a prime so maybe also not a lot of room to mulch around the plants.

we make our beds large enough to allow for permanent mulch around the plants, so no basket method needed. also the rocks would act as thermal mass to help keep the medium warmer in their winters. keyhole allows for use of largest part of space and still allow arms reach access to the whole garden.

this example is gardeners adapting to local conditions(condition means what is available to work with or climate or drought whatever) as many of us have to do so we can garden for food. and gardeners learn other ideas from other gardeners and use those parts that will give the desired result.

len

The native peoples of the southwest gardened in depressions to prevent the water from running off the beds. It seems to me that would be a good idea in hot, sandy areas. Hoe the surface of your bed to form a border/berm around the perimeter, loosen the deeper soil with a spading fork, mix in some lime and compost (or compost materials), moisten and let sit for a couple of weeks to break down. Don't overwater or you'll wash away the nutrients.

I'm sure that growing in depressions is probably a bit more difficult than a raised bed, but desert/hot areas have their own problems, and holding water so the soil is moistened thoroughly at least 6-7" deep can be a real trick.

Take trowel and see how deep the soil has been moistened after you water. Just getting the surface wet won't do it.

Sue